I've not done New Year Resolutions for last year...didn't seem much point due to the huge amount of un-certainty. I did end up ticking off most of my 2020 resolutions, albeit not to the initial timescales...global pandemics will do that to you!
For me, 2022 will be about adapting to the "new normal". I've lost a commute, and gained a dog, for starters.
Get Track Accreditation and compete in Reading Track League
On Mondays through spring and summer there is a velodrome-based racing league in Reading (at Palmer Park, literally 10 minutes from my house). I've not done track riding before...there are a couple of significant differences between track racing and road racing (which is what I normally do);
- No gears or freehub (proper fixies)
- No brakes
- No right-hand turns
I'm going to go for my track accreditation from March (when coaching starts), and then compete in the Monday evening track league. Compete, for me, means "be competitive", not just attend.
Track accreditation, at it's core, consists of doing coached sessions until a certified coach considers you not a danger to others or yourself. It can take a couple of weeks, it can take months. Once I've gotten past that, I'll need my own track bike in order to race. I've been doing (road bike, with gears and brakes) training sessions down there throughout autumn and winter so far (and I've done this in previous years...it's a great way of getting some leg strength over off-season), and know a number of the regular league riders and organisers from there. It'll be a good way of getting my racing fix in, without the hassle of getting to London. It will also improve my general skills on the bike.
Upgrade the Plex Server
In 2020 I replaced Google Music with Plex on a Pi4. Possibly one of my most successful tech projects, and it's pretty much re-couped its costs already. The media server has now grown well beyond the initial scope, with all my DVD's, online video purchases, music, audiobooks etc are on there. I'm nudging the top of the 2Tb storage I plugged in, and it's worked pretty much flawlessly.
I've now hit an issue with transcoding. It's something that the Pi4 simply cannot do. Most devices I have can do direct streaming, however my old tablet does not play well with Plex (it crashes, the version of android on it is too old). I've risked going with an Amazon Fire HD Tablet...they are simply too cheap to ignore. Downside is that their supported codecs are mainly limited to 30fps. I've captured most of the footage at 60fps, so the Pi attempts to transcode the video...which takes a while (about 4 hours per hour of 1080/60 to 1080/30 transcode). This is totally not the fault of the Plex server, but it is what Plex is supposed to do...it's just designed with a slightly gruntier processor behind it.
So, I'm going to build a new server. The goal is still; small, passively-cooled, and low power requirements. I still want it headless and running Linux as well, as it's simply more efficient and reliable for what I want. I also want more storage. My current plan is to buy an older Intel NUC running (probably) an i5 x86 processor, then install a basic Linux distro (probably Debian, as thats the one I have most/all my experience with). That will then have some HDD's attached (internal or external) for increased library storage. This should be enough for real-time transcode of a stream, as well as opening up some other features such as Sonic Analysis of Music for auto-playlist creation. I can run the servers in parallel, so this once can be got fully up-and-running before decommissioning the old one. I'm half-tempted to put in a NAS, and then a separate processor box...however the setup cost of a NAS box is fairly large (looking at a Synology box with a couple of large Ironwolf HDD's in there, and its >£500).
Sort out the home office
I now spend 7+ hours a day in my home office. It was already pretty well set up, and I've done some ad-hoc upgrades in the last year (a good desk mat, to keep my forearms comfy, and a new office chair which has worked wonders for my back). I've also gotten a new laptop, and a new phone. I already had a good monitor and desk, so I now have all the hardware for a good, ergonomically correct working environment. What does need sorting is the room around it. I'm currently in a small niche formed from a green-screen pinned behind me. I like working in a smaller area, it increases my focus and removes some distractions...but it's a bit messy, and probably won't cope with a labrador in a couple of months time. A re-shuffle of the room, and probably some Ikea stuff is needed.
Complete the dog training
Reaver is now almost 10 months old...at 7 months we hit the "teenage years", where recall goes out of the window, hormones start to come in, and generally he stops automatically obeying us. We were expecting it, and thought we could work through it, but we definitely hit a plateau. I had a fortunate encounter with a dog trainer a couple of weeks ago, and after some guidance and pointers yesterday we've now got some plans and support moving forward. We've got some key goals;
- Good close lead walking - currently this is a bit of a battle, with everything being a distraction
- Recall - was great until 7 months old, now non-existent
- Calmness around other dogs - they have become more and more exciting
- Stop eating poo - I wouldn't mind so much, but it gives him a dicky stomach, forming what is the worst sort of feedback loop
I'm pretty confident that we'll get there. The trainer we've found is a part-time gamekeeper, and works with spaniels and labs a lot at a local shoot. Within 5 minutes he had Reaver walking at heel up and down our road, as well as sit/stay at distance and a good "Leave". Made us look like idiots when he immediately started jumping up on us.
Discover 4 new authors?
This is legit getting harder, though I have maintained it for a few years now. I'm currently in the middle of a marathon Wheel of Time audiobook session (at time of writing I'm halfway through the main sequence, averaging a book every 6 days'ish). Realistically this will continue until March, and I have a backlog of other books from established authors to read once I'm there.
Revise Pension Options
Project 55 is continuing, and the pension fund is about £10k ahead of expectation. I've booked an IFA for early January...normal recommendation is to review your finances 10 years before your planned retirement. Pretty boring, but needs to be done, so it makes the list.
Make a decision on the motorbike
It's now not been used since 2018, is currently under SORN with a rear tyre puncture, and definitely is not accruing value. My "ideal" would be to sell it and get an electric motorbike, however they are cripplingly expensive compared to a petrol machine. I've survived 3 years without needing to transport myself any vast distances...commutes are gone (at least in the short term), and I'm more than capable of self-propelling myself over 20-30 miles without any major hassle.
I should probably sell the bike.
Options are;
- Get it fixed up, re-taxed and force myself to use it
- Get it fixed up and sell it
- Other
Death to Micro-B
This one came about when I was shopping for a new torch (black dog + night-time poo-runs means a good torch is really important). I ended up actively choosing one that had a USB-C port over a Micro-B one, simply as I hate having to have multiple cables sitting around.This led me to think about what I have left on Micro-B;
- 2 GoPro Sessions (never use 'em these days...should probably sell them or give them away)
- Garmin 520+
- Huawei Mediapad tablet - has a spicy pillow forming
- Kindle
- JBL Charge Bluetooth speaker - rarely used, already replaced with a pair of Boompods Zeros
So, goal is by the end of the year to get rid of, or replace these devices, and then NEVER BUY ANYTHING WITH MICRO-B again* so I can pack a bag without taking millions of cables.
*my keyboard and mouse have micro-b, but they get a pass (for now) as they don't move from my desk, and only rarely need charging...anda they are new, so replacing them is just a waste!
I have a handful of proprietary charge cables, and included here is an active avoidance of them in future, unless there is a genuinely compelling reason (the 2 main ones are my bike light, which is very hardcore, and an LED lantern with a magnetic attachment).
Clean out the house
We've been in the house for over 8 years now, and there are some items that are simply never used. I need to go through the garage, over-stairs cupbaord, under-stairs cupboard, utility room and my own room and work out what can simply be gotten rid of. It's a quirk of a modern(ish) house that they don't have a huge amount of storage.
On the list of things that can go are;
- Board games - I have about 40-50 crated up in my office, and the vast majority will probably not get played.
- Camping gear - stacked up in the over-stairs cupboard, not used since we moved here
- Motorbike gear - linked to the "what do I do with the motorbike" dilemma
- Bicycle spares - I have 5 bikes, but realistically only use 2-3 of them. I also have a pile of spares, partially worn items and the like
- Semi-old tech - notably including a 1080 eGPU, some old gaming laptops (MSI and Cyberpower), keyboards, mice, mini-projectors. All are 3+generations old, but still functional
It's all taking up space, which is becoming more and more of a premium. Plan is to go through everything...if it's worth eBay'ing it will be eBay'ed. Then see if anything can be donated, and failing that it goes in the bin. I've discovered the eBay factor is as much about size as anything else...I recently sold my (never used) PS4Pro, and the box was just beyond the cheap zone for Royal Mail, so ended up costing ~£25 to ship... I can see boardgames being not worth selling for that reason, unless I can find a local way of selling them. We did a car-boot just before we moved here, and I wouldn't sell anything with worth at them, as the vast majority of people are only planning on spending £1-2 on items...good for books and nic-nacs, but not for anything else.
Pay Carbon Offsetting
This will be permanant now. 2020 ended up being cheap, as most of my flights were cancelled. 2021 we got a single long-haul in there, so I'll get that re-factored in. We are (as of right now) still with a zero-carbon energy supplier, however they are currently being run under government support, and there is a reasonable chance we'll get shunted off at some point in 2022. If that happens (and lets hope it's not British Gas, who have agreed to never contact me again, after paying ~£300 for poor service and agreeing that they broke their own T&C's to me) I will ensure that we move to another zero-carbon option. It's not much, but it's something.
Comments
Well this has all gone to rat-shit :-(
Get Track Accreditation and compete in Reading Track League
This was going well...I'd sourced a bike from Pankhursts, a local bike shop run by an ex-pro Mechanic...a beautiful custom-made De Rosa, with a load of little quality-of-life tweask (removable brakes, a brake surface on the front rim, some classic Campag cranks etc), and done the first third of accreditation. Generally down the track I was going well, and had finally grabbed the 100-lap KOM of the velodrome in training. This is now on hold until 2023 :-(
Upgrade the Plex Server
I'll have to look at this in the latter half of the year...while it's not strenuous work, getting the hardware in place in the house is, and I'll probably need fine motor control, which is not there right now.
Sort out the home office
Again, this will be put on hold. On the plus side, I have a good working environment for a cripple, and I've been able to tweak the deadk height, chair etc to get my shoulder rested and the weight off my pelvis. Won't be moving any furniture around though :-)
Complete the dog training
This is ongoing, however for the next 2-3 months the focus will be on getting Reaver behaving better with Gill, and not jumping up at me, lest he send my flying.
Discover 4 new authors?
I've finished the Wheel of Time marathon, and I'm now catching up on books that were on pre-order (currently on Neal Stephensons "Termination Shock", which I'm enjoying...he often sends you off on Wikipedia dives, like discussing the Actual Line of Control, which is a long-running border dispute between India and China where both sides have informally agreed to not use guns (mainly), and so they fight with sticks and rocks. Give this a near-future spin and you have gangs of state-sponsored martial artists fighting in mountains while streamers with drones broadcast it world-wide).
Revise Pension Options
Nearly complete. I engaged an IFA to do a review of our pensions to date, and model early reitrement and possibilities or optimisation. We were actually due the playback last week, but that's been delayed.
Make a decision on the motorbike
Nothing done yet...realistically this will have to wait until I'm mobile again.
Death to Micro-B
Not going well.Annoyingly my Garmin died (battery issue). I endeavoured to attempt to replace it (ordering a replacement battery), however the unit was glued together, and despite heat/prying the screen cracked during the disassembly process. There is not currently a Garmin headunit that supports USB-C (the 540 model is rumoured to support it, but it has no official spec or release date), so I ended up getting a 530 which is still on Micro-B
Clean out the house
I had planned to do the effort part of this over Easter (digging through cupboards etc), but again that has to be put on hold. Latter half of this year is going to be busy.
Pay Carbon Offsetting
This will happen in December
I now have a new, relelvant short-term set of goals to see me through the next 3 months;
It must be said that I think you're a legend. For many, including me, an injury like yours would mean months of just trying to survive; not planning to get back to where I was. That you're able to take stock, set limitations and make plans is astounding. It's no small part of why I'm proud to call you a friend and admire you greatly. It's almost boring to say "get yourself fit first, then work out what you can do" because I know that's key to your plans. You're not intending on breaking yourself any further and your patience as always been exemplary.
You're always welcome on Sunday night gaming - it's more about the banter than the game. "not-knowing the games" only lasts for a short time.
Keyboard/Mouse controls dont work too well for me right now, with the borked left shoulder/arm...I have very limited mobility in the left (southpaw mouse) arm, and I have to have the keyboard well over to the left as well for typing, so I don't have to move the shoulder at all...this means that I have miniscule mouse movements. Once I realised I was going to be an in-patient for more than a couple of days I had Gill drop off my laptop and peripherals (the Switch would have been too heavy to hold, which gives you an idea of the stength of the shoulder right now). I have an XBox controller, which is a lot easier to use as I can just settle into a supported position. A nurse said my bed was definitely "blokey"...
I've spent the majority of my time in Forza Horizon 5, which is really good fun....and it's definitely aimed at fun over realism. It's pretending that I'm a really good driver, and it runs remarkably well on my machine (I'm getting 80-100fps at 3440x1440p with Ultra/RTX on and the laptop in "Balanced" mode, and it doesn't even support DLSS). NVidias new resoluton scaling doesn't work great on it, I was seeing a lot of artifacts on sharp edges (of which driving games have many!), but my home monitor supports VRR upto 100fps, so I'm getting a silky smooth experience.
I had my physio assessment last night, and got some exercises (mainly around joint flexibility right now), so at least I feel like I'm doing something to help, rather than just sitting on my arse.
So probably not the 3 months I was planning at the start of the year...no plans survive first contact with the enemy and all that.
A quick recap...on the 26th March I was involved in what the NHS described as a Road Traffic Accident, though was actually a crash in a cycling race. I spent 24 hours in
A&EResus strapped to a spineboard with my neck braced, pumped full of morphine while they determined if I would need immediate surgery. I only found out later that any impact hard enough to break the pelvis (which is what I'd done, in 3 places) is often violent enough to cause significant internal organ damage. Fortunately that was not the case, and the fractures themselves were non-displaced. I'd also broken my collarbone, however the NHS treat you according to your highest risk injury, so I was bundled into an orthopaedic ward for 8 further nights while I was assessed, and the Occupational Therapists got me from "unable to move my legs" to "hobble 10 metres with the aid of a crutch".What I Learnt in Hospital
Alcohol fucks you up.
This was my first stay in an NHS hospital, and I had assumed (mainly from TV shows like Casualty and Holby City I guess) that the majority of ward patients were old people who had fallen over, car crashes and sporting injuries. In my bay over the 9 nights I saw 9 other people. A quick breakdown;
Definitely not the demographic breakdown I was expecting. The easiest patients were probably myself and the roller-blader. One chap (who was undergoing multiple organ-failures as a result of long-term alcohol poisoning) was constantly complaining that the insulin-pump that was keeping him alive was "too noisy". Hospitals are noisy places, but for a good reason. My normal response to using the NHS is guilt, as I feel I am taking up resources better used for more needy people, and gratitude that I can do a sport that does carry a level of risk without worrying about bankrupting myself if the worst thing happens (hello USA!)...to sit there complaining about free treatment that keeps you alive despite your own best efforts...I felt angry (countered by extreme tiredness and opioids).
The ward (the male half anyway, which is all I saw as I waddled from my bed to the toilet)) also had 2 bays (8 beds) full of long-term patients...people who really, really should be in care homes, but were unable to be placed (no space, or quite often a covid-positive test prohibiting their movement).
How is the Recovery Going?
Far better than I have any right to.
He had a look, poked and prodded me a bit and (with Gill as a witness) said "you can do anything with that shoulder, it healing fine". This was slightly revised on a follow-up 4 weeks later to "the bones have not knitted, however the entire thing is held together with scar tissue, and thats fine"...which was news to me. The x-ray looks horrific, but apparently this is not uncommon. The collarbone is about 1cm shorter now, and there is a small loss of range of motion, but nothing that will impact me day-to-day unless I decide on a career of getting thing soff tall shelves behind me.
In terms of cardio volume, I'm roughly where I was just after my Christmas break, albeit with a healthy dose of fatigue in the system. This puts me on course to be back to "normal" in 2-3 months, just in time for autumn. Realistically it will be a rebuild until September, a couple of holidays, and then start the build into 2023.
You got another dog???
Errol is a chocolate labrador (full pedigree, much like Reaver), very small, to the point we could be mistaken for a 9-month puppy, and incredibly affectionate (for context Reaver is 28kg, Errol is 23kg). As a working dog he had never been in a house, and lived in kennels with other dogs. Well lead-trained and crate-trained, but lacking certain skills (we've had to teach him a Sit, and house-training). He's incredibly laid-back, unlike Reaver who is a little FOMO...so between them they have worked out an accord. They are both going for the bollock chop in a couple of weeks (no major issues, but a small amount of dominance behaviour means we've moved Reavers chop-time forward a bit). The house is now a full-on dog home, it's lovely.
anything else?
Gill went public with her news a few days ago. We had the diganosis late 2020. It sucks...however right now the prognosis is good. The drugs are working, and it's been caught very early. The treatments have more day-to-day impact than the disease right now, so it's a case of carry-on-living, and get stuff done.
With that in mind, yesterday I had something done I should have sorted (literally) years ago. In my more rebellious youth (probably 1998/1999 I think) I allowed someone learning to tattoo to try a tribal piece on my arm. You may have seen it...it's awful. Basically a combination of them not really knowing what they were doing, and poor equipment that failed mean that I ended up with some dodgy black lines on my right arm. I had assumed it would need to be lasered off over several exceptionally painful sessions, and ended up just living with it. In the intervening 20-odd years the number of tattoo places in Reading has exploded (it used to just be Ians near Chatam Street), and with it the technical skill and ability of the artists has improved massively. After a bit of encouragement from Gill i spent some time looking through all the various parlours and artists, and really liked some of the stuff a chap call Kev was doing at Eternal Nirvana. I've always liked abstract/geometric and tribal style tattoos. A few emails and phone calls, a consultation or two, and the end result is that yesterday I spent 8 hours have a cover-up design put in place, lined and filled. I have a follow-up session in a couple of weeks for some shading and fill work, and right now my right arm feels like it's incredibly sunburnt...but so happy that I've finally gotten rid of the childs scrawl that has marred the skin for decades. Kev's done an incredible job, and put together an awesome design. Once the arm is done I'm totally getting my lower legs done.
No photos for that yet, they will come once the work is complete and healed...probably end of July.
When people say someone is hard as nails, they usually mean some kind of a martial prowess. Being good with fists and feet and shit.
Not to me.
When I think of hard as nails, I think "in traction to fitness in 3 months" + Mrs with cancer + just getting on with being awesome. I don't know how you do it. It's not sarcasm or banter to say that I admire your spirit. That same spirit that took a leap of faith to move to Reading in the first place, live in a dingy flat and work your way up out of a fucking call center. To deal with all the crap that life's thrown your way is impressive beyond words. It hurts to see you in pain; even though I know you'll push through - because there's nothing that really stops you.
I know you'll be back racing on the bike; although the idea does terrify me. I know it feeds that drive you have, which is vital to your happiness but it's still terrrifying.
Errol looks like a right character, hanging out on the sofa with you. I'm thrilled you're now dogged up to the eyeballs!
As for the tattoo - I'm keen to see the result! I hope it wasn't as painful as getting the one in the centre of your chest. IIRC, that was a right bastard.
Cheers, it is appreciated. I decided a long time ago sitting around being maudlin achieved very little, rather get things done than complain about not getting stuff done.
I'd say parts of the tattoo are on a level with the sternum tattoo...mainly the softer skin on the underside of the arm, in the elbow pit and near the armpit. The time taken also gets wearing...the entire piece is significantly larger than anything previously...probably 2/3rds circumference of the (admittedly skinny) arm from shoulder to ~3 inches below the elbow. Healing wise it's less painful than the neck (and I still remember going to a gig at the Rivemead the same day I had my neck done...now that hurt!), but the area covered means it's a little sore still. I'm really looking forward to seeing the final piece completed myself. I've seen mocked up outlines as part of the design process, but the black-work and shading will really make it.
I'm not sure I'll race with youngsters again...I've definitely got the message that I no longer bounce...however there are still options. There is old-man racing (40+), and BMCR, where someone has already offered me lifts to races. Finally there is the velodrome...it's looking like I won't get accreditation sorted this year (takes 2 months, and running out of summer), so thats for next year now.
So I'm doing pretty badly at keeping to my manifesto this year...definitely gone off piste
Get Track Accreditation and Compete in Track League
Done! Much later than expected, but in August I was able to get my track accreditation...4 weeks of drills and practice on a fixed gear bike got me signed off for racing, and then I was able to squeeze in 2 Monday night race sessions. I wasn't expecting to be at the pointy end, but I wanted to get an understanding of what I needed to focus my winter training on...and in that regard I definitely did. As a roadie, I have a fairly low cadence (probably in the 80-95 rpm normally). Trackies will be sprinting at 130-140rpm+, and it's abundantly clear that my knees don't go that fast! It's a combination of drills and core strength. To compensate I was running a bigger gear than most, to allow top speeds at a lower cadence...but that means slower acceleration, so once I'm at the same speed, I'm 10 metres behind. Lots of work to do over winter, but good to get one ticked off!
Upgrade Plex Server
Nope...realistically this is getting shuffled to next year.
Sort out Home Office
Made some plans, but again it's not a priority, and will involve some furniture shopping. Will probably get shuffled to next year.
Complete the dog training
In Progress still. Obviously we went and got another dog, so the focus in the last 2-3 months has been getting them living together and accepting each other. We are getting there, and there have been instances of them forming a dog ball. They both got a bollock chop a few weeks ago, and we are now seeing some changes due to that, especially with Reaver. He's a bit more focused outside, and recall is starting to come back...he's far less interested in pestering every dog he sees, and as a result he's getting far more off-lead time. Plenty of toy-related recall is going on, and more exercise also means less nervous energy in the house. Looking positive, but a ways still to go.
Discover 4 New Authors
Gettting there...I've read a bit on holiday, but to be honest most evenings have been vanishing, and my reading rate has been fairly slow. This holiday got sort of eaten up (more below). I have added a wedge of audiobooks to the Plex server, and I should be able to tick some of those off soon.
Revise Pension Options
Done, though obviously everything is in turmoil right now. Some tweaking has occured, however if/when the current shitstorm subsides one way or another another review may be needed.
Make a decision on the Motorbike
I'm pretty certain I'll be getting rid of it, but it needs some mechanical TLC first, and motorcycle garages are limited in Reading (MTC on Oxford road has shut, and the Honda garage I bought it from has moved to Abingdon). Maybe this winter, mabe next spring.
Death to Micro-B
Some items are going to survive the year...most notably my Garmin, Kindle and Mouse/Keyboard. The most annoying is the Garmin, as I travel with it, so it means I always need a second cable... Tablets have been replaced (top tip...Amazon Fire tablets and unlock/install Google Play Store...cheap and robust media devices!)
Clean out the House
We had a fairly big clean out...lots of camping gear, old swimming kit and some random stuff we virtually never used. Most went to friends and family on a first come, first served basis. Some went to charity. At some point I'm going to go through my board games and work out which ones can be donated/sold/given away, as it's a big volume, and these days rarely used. This may become a pre-requisite for the home office re-jig.
Pay Carbon Offsetting
Done in December...got a long haul in there this year, so it will be a little more spicy.
Other stuff that has been very much spur of the moment;
The tattoo, which took a fair bit of attention over summer. Once I'm back I'm pretty sure I'll be getting my lower legs done, and pretty sure my left forearm will be done at some point as well.
Errol arrived, and has settled in really well.
I, on a whim, decided to get my scuba diving accreditation done while we were in the Maldives...I was accreditted via BSAC in the 90's, but all paperwork is lost, and a lot has changed in the 25 years since then. Turns out learning to dive in 30'C waters is significantly easier than 2'C quarries in North Wales. I've managed to squeeze in 10 dives (that includes training and accreditation dives), which have been without exception amazing. I'm already planning some future trips.
One more thing before I go. We have all lived to see the end of the Elizabethan Era, the most crazy rollercoaster of 70 years. The future is probably more uncertain now than at any time in our lives...moreso than ever it's important to live for today, and for yourselves. Charlie has a big job to do if he's to provide half the stability that his mum did. I'm not a die-hard royallist, but I do think they are a net gain for the country, which is all you can ask of anyone really, and it will take a while getting used to the changeover. When I was young, I just assumed women ruled the world (we'd had the same soverign and PM forever, and I lived in a matriarchal household. I was genuinely confused when John Major came in, and no doubt the same confusion will overtake me again soon).
Awesome work getting back on top of everything after your injury. Exceptionally impressive!
So managed to tick off an agenda item this week, sorting out the media servers.
I had originally planned to build a more robust Linux server to replace a Raspberry Pi4b that currently runs Plex, attached to a 2Tb SATA HDD via USB. This had been perfect for the original use-case ( replacing Google Music ), and in that regard it's more than made it's money back. I also have 3 other Pi4b's that run a bunch of IP cameras dotted round the house...these were initially done to keep an eye on the dogs in the house and garden (an IR Camera covering the garden at night is super-useful when you have a black dog!). These each have an attached SATA HDD (via USB) of 250-300Gb.
So the issues;
My evenual solution is (for now);
I spent this weekend rebuilding most stuff. The first task was moving ~1.3Tb of video from the current HDD linked to the Plex Pi4b to the WD Elements HDD. I have all the drives formatted under NTFS...Rasbian supports it, and it means I can take the drives and plug them into a laptop without issues. I have left the music and audiobook files on the current Plex server for now (explain that later)
The 3 other Pi4bs (running the cameras), were all completely rebuilt. Another thing that the Raspberry Pi Foundation have released in the last couple of years is a choice of boot device. It used to be that the OS had to be on a micro-SD card. This is a fairly big risk, as they are not the most reliable storage devices, especially if they get hot (I get this problem a lot with GoPro's, which get very hot!). I flashed the EEPROM to have boot sequence of USB, then Micro-SD. You still do the initial install on the Micro-SD Card, however now you can copy that install to the attached USB Drive. The big benefit here is that as I install software I don't have to re-point any storage or save locations, I can use the default locations...as now I have a 250-300Gb footprint, rather than a 32Gb card that I don't overly trust.
They have been installed with the 64-Bit Raspian OS, and then I have installed MotionEye as an Application (rather than an OS). It took a little more time, but the installation process is well documented for Pi's. The performance uplift of the 64-Bit OS is significant...previously 4 cameras would have a Pi running at 75-80% capacity...now it's down at 40-50%. 2 of the Pi's handle the camera processing, and the 3rd acts as a web gateway to the others. This 3rd Pi is now under-utilised (the web frontend is not hard work), so here I've gone from 3 fully-used Pi's to having 2 at ~50% utilisation, and one that is effectively un-used....and now it's on a full Rasbian OS, I can use it. All are fully headless, accessible via SSH and VNC.
The nVidia Shield was very easy to set up...however it cannot be done headlessly. This would have been a real issue (especially this morning, when everything was moved into the final home in the living room by the broadband router), however I've been able to bodge together a HDMI-to-Webcam cable, using one of the super-cheap capture cards I bought a few years ago. This allowed me to plug in an unlocked Fire Tablet into the Shield, and run a basic OTG Webcam program to navigate the menus. The Shield itself comes with Plex Media Server already installed (and I have a perpetual license, so just added it to my account). It was a little temperamntal getting exterior network access, and it turns out when I moved it the Server became "unclaimed", so I had to re-claim it...this is where the bodged display came into it's own!). The Shield is plugged into the 18Tb USB drive...and that space is network accessible (with Androids version of SMB, I can simply map the storage to a Windows network drive). Now this is all up and running, the screen is un-plugged, and it all sits silently behind the broadband router (and plugged into the built-in 4-port switch.
All 4 Pi's (the 3 re-installed ones, and the original Plex Pi) are now all powered by the Anker Power Port, so thats gone from 4 plugs to 1. They all connect into an 8-port switch. This means I have capacity for 2 more Pi's down there now (power and network)! (they are currently rare as hens teeth, so probably won't be happening). Thats all bundled into a single Ikea Kallax square, and is nice and quiet.
Very happy with it all. Got a lot more storage now (18Tb should see me good for a while), and also have some play-space on the 3 Pi's to investigate some more uses of always-on machines. The media server now has significant transcoder grunt without having to learn archaic Linux stuff, and without any noisy fans. It's all a lot tidier.
My music and audiobooks are still on a 32-bit Rasbian install. The way Plex works is that it generates and stores metadata for the media files separately to the files itself. This makes it super-powerful, and the web/app frontends use this to provide a really great interface...however that metadata is stored on the OS filespace. In this case it means it's on the 128Gb micro-SD card in the plex Pi4b, and I'll lose it by doing a rebuild. There is a big difference between manually validating metadata for ~300 films and ~20 TV series to ~5-6,000 music files. I have spent a long time correcting errors made by the agents when determining the metadata on the music metadata, and I need to work out if it's possible to copy that to a new installation. Short term there is no downside, as I can run multiple servers with no additional cost, and the front-ends can handle it easily.
In terms of data, there is no redundancy. I have a long term goal of removnig risk of losing media and data behind paywalls. THis started with Google Musics demise, with the (still awful) replacement of YouTube Music putting certain features behind a subscription paywall. The same will certainly happen to Google Photos in the near (2-3 year) future, and I'd like to get a home instrastructure in place to protect image storage, and I think this needs a level of data security. An 18Tb USB drive is all very well, but it's the very definition of "all eggs in one basket".
So in a couple of years I'll probably invest in a proper NAS system, running a level of RAID to protect me from data loss. Rasperry Pi's support network boot now, and the Shield supports NAS connectivity too. I don't need the level of redundancy that Google/AWS/Azure run to, but I'm already running with ultiple isolated data storage locations, so should plan to join them all up.
If you have a compatible Raspberry Pi and a PoE swtich, then the Raspberry Pi PoE+ HAT https://thepihut.com/products/raspberry-pi-poe-plus-hat might be of interest
I did look at PoE when I was originally building them, and also for the security cameras (you can get PoE models, but they are significantly more expensive than the ones I'm using...it would make more sense for a professional/commercial operation, but not for a half-arsed home enthusiast)
PoE would have required a much more expensive switch (about £100 for an 8-port PoE injecting one), and increases the thermal load on the Pi's as well. You can see the 4 Pi's are in big heat-sink cases, and are passively cooled. Not only would the cases no longer fit with a HAT on, those PoE boards have mini fans on which are noisy (in a high-pitched buzzing way)! The end result is running all the power via a £25 USB 6-port brick was significantly cheaper and easier!
I loved reading this; completely nerding out at it all. Especially the neat use of a Kallax! And the labelling printer too. That's just dirty nerd stuff.
So 2022 is nearly done. Not exactly the year I had planned. I've spent a total of 4 months covered by various Fit notes...3 ambulance trips (one an internal transfer, 2 "proper" blue flashy light ones), 6 discreet bones fractures and probably enough raditation exposure to last a decade! (3 x CT Scans, 8 x X-Ray sessions, each with multiple angles taken).
Oh, and we doubled the dog count!
Get Track Accreditation and compete in Reading Track League
Done, albeit not when I had originally planned. I did the Accreditation in August, and completed in 2 Track League events (one local, one "regional"). Really enjoyed it, and definitely hoping to give it another shot next year. Very comically, that one Regional night of racing made me the top regional performer in my club.
Upgrade the Plex Server
Done, though again not how I originally planned. I still need to decide on if I need to migrate/upgrade the audio part of the server (Music and Audiobooks), with the challenge being the massive pile of metadata.
Sort out the Home Office
Failed. We had a minor house clear-out, but didn't really touch the sides of the office. We are looking at a more major house renovation next year (2 years of dog has done an interesting amount of "wear and tear"), and this may get folded into that.
Complete the Dog Training
Errr......so the goal-posts moved on this one. Errol and Reaver have very different training needs. Reaver is (almost) too intelligent and hyper-aware, and a real scavenger. If he's not doing something, he's looking for something to eat. Errol, on the other hand, is super-relaxed...but dumb as a sack of spanners. Compared to where we were at the beginning of the year Reaver is in a much better place...he's no longer fixated on other dogs, and we are comfortable with him being off the lead in parks etc. The training will be a continous work-in-progress for both of them.
Discover 4 New Authors
Done...a mixed bag. Some stuff that was absolute junk, some unexpected stuff I enjoyed, and some really enjoyable reads. Notable authors;
Revise Pension Options
Done, though it's reasonable to say that 2022 has not been good for any investments (including Defined Contribution pensions). I'd estimate my pension balance is ~£20k down on a "normal" year.
Make a decision on the motorbike
Failed. I had actually got a couple of local garages lined up to collect/service it, but then I decided to get hit by a car. This will have to wait until next year. I'm now thinking it's most lightly I'll sell it...I haven't used it for 3 years, and short of major life changes won't be using it in the future. If I do need a form of transport, something much smaller will suffice.
Death to Micro-B
Failed. Kindle, Garmin, keyboard, mouse all remain on Micro-B. None are bad enough that they need replacing (the Kindle is oldest, but it demonstrating remarkable resilience. The Garmin and Keyboard/Mouse are both pretty new). An annoying need to keep some old cables lying around.
Clean out the house
Partial Success. We cleaned out the understairs cupboard and overstiars cupboard...flogged a load of stuff on eBay, gave a load of stuff away. Plenty more to do...we'll have been in the house a decade next year, and plenty of stuff is showing its age. The carpets and sofa in particular have suffered from dog. We had the heating system fully flushed/serviced a couple of months ago, and one radiator needs replacing. We did a serious repair on the lawn...fully scouring it, aerating it, adding a metric ton (literally) to it and fully re-seeding it...all the day before we went on holiday to give it a couple of weeks without dogs to bed in. We'll probably do something similar before the next holiday...just trying to get plenty of grass roots into binding the soil to protect it from the 50kg of fighting beasts that trash it!
Next Year...
I need to work out what the goals for 2023 are. They will have to be fairly fluid as (right now) I'm not fully in the clear after Octobers wipe-out. The bones in the shoulder have set well, however there is a lot of soft tissue damage and internal scarring. I had a cortisone injection last Thursady to assist with swelling reduction, and plenty of physio (private and NHS) lined up. There is a minor possibility of follow-up surgery to clear out the internal scar tissue, as right now it's blocking the joint. I'll find out more about that in February.
I gained Tinnitus after the crash...a constant ringing in both ears. This has persisted, and is really affecting my ability to sleep. I have sleeping tablets for now, however that's not a long-term solution (the GP was already relectant to prescribe them, to the point where he called me after I had picked up the prescription to see if I would want to hand them back). If it's still there 3 months after the crash (so end of January) then I'll be referred back to ENT/Audiology for further assessment. It's not linked to any obvious physical injury (plenty of head CT scans to check that), so may just be a thing I have now. Hopefully once I can ramp up the exercise routine this will affect me a bit less, as I get back to my more normal levels of fatigue.
Financially, the biggie in 2023 is the re-mortgaging. Right now mortgages are not looking great, with a rates being about 3x what we currently have. The deadline is the middle of the year, so we'll need to work through best options for that starting early next year. Our situation is...complex, and we have a lot of options which we'll need to work out.
Alongside all that, there are a couple of legal cases against the driver to factor in. Sounds like the police are going to press charges (apparently my injuries were significant enough to not allow the driver to only have an improvement course), and there is a personal injury case ongoing via British Cyclings lawyers.
On the slightly more positive side of things, I have a level of health to re-build, and that starts immediately. I have some short terms goals (a trip to Gran Canaria in January, another to Spain in February, and Majorca in April). I want to be healthy by my own standards for summer, and get back to what I enjoy. My replacement bike should be arriving in January sometime (stupid global supply chain issues, combined with my insistence of riding top-end kit!), and after 2 months locked inside definitely looking forward to some fresh air.
Musically, I want to extend my listening habits. I've spent most of 2022 listing to a single playlist...it's 460 tracks/24 hours, but when you listen to it cycling that starts to repeat pretty quickly. I'm very old-skool and refuse to rent music via streaming. I've done some pre-work on this, so think this one is mainly a habit-breaker in terms of how I select music, and probably backed up with some curation of my music library.
I have a bit of Tinnitus something that sometimes helps me sleep with it is a bit of background noise at night. I often have a tablet or something playing at low volume. There are a bunch of videos like this one with cricket noises and the like on a long long loop although often I'll play things like podcasts or something ambient talking noise set low to just be in the background.
Obviously that's fine for me as I'm not going to be disturbing someone else with that but another option you can get little sleep buds (they are like ear buds but even smaller and more limited in function) that you can wear while sleeping they only play a few select tracks things like white noise or sounds of the ocean or rainfall indistinct people speaking etc
I have these ones https://www.amazfit.com/en/zenbuds they're not hideously expensive. Bose do some which are relatively expensive and there seem to be a few others on the market.
Hopefully that helps
Cheers
I've been trying various masking sounds...white noise does nothing, but rain/thunder simulators help a little. I've found some tinnitus-specific sound patterns that do stop it, but they are very high-pitched and contain random bleeping noises...not something I can play out loud. I have tried a head sleep-band with speakers, but they don't have a great dynamic range and cannot recreate the high end noises. I'll have a look at those buds you've linked.
As I've gained it via a head trauma, there is some hope it fades (hence the delay before referral to ENT. I could go private, but I'd have to wait until April as I've managed to max out my private healthcare outpatient budget 🤣).
I did try to see if I could work out the pitch of the noise...act very fiddly, and a smartphone app is not the best scientific tool. My best guess is the 4-5000hz range. Probably closer to the 4000hz end of things
https://youtu.be/Dgq-ka1FkZk
https://youtu.be/cx1VQISKvhc
(Playing both those videos on my phone now _really_ confused Reaver)
I cannot hear the 6000hz test video, so either my hearing has lost that range, or my phone speaker doesn't get there.
Apparently once you have the pitch there are various tricks you do to desensitise your brain to that specific band of noise. The entire area is a little bit homebrew...what works for one person does not work for another. There is a "newish" product out there that (as far as I can work out) illicits a Pavlovian response by playing the tone while gently electrocuting your tongue.
21st Century Science for you, right there!
Bloody hell, what a year. Sorry to hear about your ongoing physical issues; tinnitus and internal scar tissue are both horrid. I'm glad the police are going to press charges; as hard as the court case is going to be, it's going to feel at least like some justice is served.
Love how you describe Reaver and Errol.
I can't quite explain how much I admire your grit. We used to laugh about how stubborn you could be but I've always felt it was really determination!
I'm inspired to set goals for next year, as things have settled down enough here that setting goals doesn't feel hopeless!