Tag Archives: weekendcoffeeshare

Another Reflection

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If we were having a coffee I’d be telling you that as I looked at recent posts, that reflections have been somewhat of a common theme. So here is another.

My blog, and how it has evolved across its life. It very much started as a part of my retirement project or as I referred to it ‘What’s Next’. That was more than 10 years ago. Across that period I’ve had periods where I posted regularly and then had gaps. Over the last couple of years those gaps have been longer and my desire to post has waned somewhat.

Once again, I wondered if I would continue it. This time, when I got my web hosting bill. I nearly fell off my chair!  The charge had gone through without me getting notice that it was about to renew. It was my fault, as I hadn’t notified the hosting service that the email attached to the account was no longer valid.

I wondered if it was worth the money to continue. Perhaps my blog had served its purpose. I wasn’t sure. In the end, after a chat with the hosting service, I found a suitable hosting plan that better matched how I view my blog. I’m now on a new plan and have committed to a 5-year service.

But as I discussed why I had my blog with my favourite person, I started to think about how I will use it in the future. So many of the posts in the past were about travel, but we are doing less of that now that we delight in spending time with our grandchildren. Our travel is domestic and shorter, but as my favourite person said, there is much to write about these trips.

I also blogged about my journey through my PhD which was very much a ‘What’s Next, project. I completed it around three years ago. It’s a bound book on my bookshelf. I still use what I learnt in the few consulting projects I have but I’m not sure if that is a topic for this blog .

Then there are the general reflections on wine, music, and the world. I realised, as I thought about it, that I have a number of posts on songs that look at the songs in a more reflective tone, e.g.  I just want ot enjoy their music – A reflection on Bob Dylan. Perhaps that a direction for future posts?

So with my hosting service renewed, I have whet my blogging appetite with a new motivation to keep on posting!

A reflection – Barry McGuire’s Eve of Destruction

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Eve of Destruction (song) - Wikipedia

I was driving home recently when Barry McGuire’s Eve of Destruction came up on my playlist. I hadn’t heard it for quite a while, but as I listened, I was struck by how familiar it sounded. Not because the world it described was the same as the one we live in today (the song was released in 1965), but because the anxiety behind it was. 

Eve of Destruction became one of the anthems of the 60s. 

It’s a song about war, nuclear weapons, racial tension, political violence and a generation wondering where the world was heading. I recall talking to my grandpa, a First World War veteran, about the end of the world. I can only imagine what he thought of the rantings of this grade 6 child, having experienced what must have felt like the end of the world while serving.

Listening to Eve of Destruction in 2026, I found myself thinking that although the circumstances have changed enormously, the feeling that the world is somehow on the brink of disaster hasn’t changed very much at all. In fact, as my favourite person said when I discussed it with her, we are always ‘dancing on a pin ’, and that really we are only a step away from some form of disaster, whether it’s man-made or natural.

Maralinga | National Museum of Australia

In 1965, the Cold War was at its height. The United States and the Soviet Union had enough nuclear weapons to destroy each other and all of us many times over. The Vietnam War was escalating; we had the draft, thankfully I was too young, but my favourite person’s brothers weren’t!  On the other side of the world, the civil rights struggle was exposing deep divisions within American society. The assassination of President Kennedy was still fresh in people’s minds, and all of this was being presented in our living rooms via television. 

Even as a pre-teenager, it felt quite literally as if we were on the eve of destruction, but we survived. The world didn’t end, and in fact we went through a period of peace and greater harmony.

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What streaming service to listen too

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If you were a regular coffee buddy of mine you’d already know that my life runs on music. You’d also know that I am in the first year of a PhD program that follows on from completing Honours last year. My study has been fueled on coffee and a lot of music. I estimated that I listened to more than 20,000 songs during my Honours!

So as we catch up on coffee I’d ask you what are you listening to and how are you listening to it? I’d get into the specifics and quickly I’d get to my current dilemma – Apple Music or Spotify supported by a Pandora. You of course were expecting the topic of conversation over coffee to be on the US elections and its impact on us in Australia!

Before you had a chance to change the topic I’d continue with my topic telling you pandora-thumbprint-862x647that I like all three. I’d quickly explain that I see Pandora as a great companion to my mainstays of Spotify and Apple Music. Pandora is easy as the music is selected for me and with the best part of a thousand Thumbprints Pandora makes listening easy.

However if I want to listen to something specific Pandora’s greatest asset, that it does it all for you becomes a problem, so its off to either Spotify or Apple Music.

I’d explain to you the history of how a couple of years ago I moved from iTunes to Spotify. As I transitioned away from CDs I’d found iTunes an easy way to carry all my own music with me.  This was because I had downloaded my hundreds of CDs to my iTunes Library via iTunes Match. That way my CDs were available everywhere on my iPod, particularly with the work travel timetable I was on at the time. About the same time as my iPod froze for the last time I also  decided that buying CDs from the almost nonexistent CD Stores in Adelaide was no longer satisfying as they didn’t have the range and with that I moved to Spotify.spotify

It was initially a bit  of a hassle finding what I liked but I got used to it and at the same  time Spotify got better. As a Premium user, that is I pay for it, I was able to download music so I could listen offline solving a dilemma of listening while traveling which I was still doing. Continue reading →

Diary of a Slow Traveler – Conference trip to California

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This morning was our last coffee with our daughter before we depart for a quick trip to the USA.

I was successful in having the paper I wrote based on my Honours Thesis accepted into two conferences in California. I was so surprised as it never occurred to me that a paper based based on Honours Research would be accepted into a leading management conference. it made the time spent reformatting it whilst we were in Siracuse very worthwhile.

My desk - Siracuse, Sicily

My desk – Siracuse, Sicily

 

 

 

 

My research area was Small Family Wine Businesses, For some reason this was of interest to the organisers of 2 conferences and not just me, my long suffering supervisor and 2 very generous examiners! It gives me some hope that my PhD which I expect will extend this research may also be of interest to others.

In recent weeks the pressure has been on to get take my paper and convert its content into 2 short presentations. No easy feat I have to say and confirms one of my favourite quotes

I didn’t have time to write you a short letter, so I wrote you a long one instead     
– Mark Twain

My original thesis was about 20,000 words and the conference submission reduced this to 8000 and now my 2 presentations Continue reading →

It’s Negroni not coffee this week

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2016-06-10 18.19.02

Negroni – Second Valley style

Well this week we won’t be sharing a coffee rather it will be a Negroni! After all,it is Negroni week .

Negronis have become our drink of choice. A wonderful aperitif that doesn’t seem to be climate dependent. Whether at home, at the beach (Second Valley) in a local bar or somewhere on our travels they have been a highlight. In Australia they are carefully measured, unless you having one of my homemade versions, whereas in many of the bars we sampled them in Italy it was a “glug” of Gin, Campari and Vermouth making them all the more special.

After a Negroni or two the conversation often becomes obtuse. For example – unusual words in songs.

“moot” in Rick Springfield’s Jessy’s Girl – surely a little sophisticated for a song like this?

“gavotte” in Carly Simon’s Your so Vain – Carly Simon in Variety discusses why she used the word which means a French dance. Continue reading →