Routine Happiness

Routine Happiness

Byrichard

Today I’m going to write about happiness, and specifically about routine happiness. During the pandemic I noticed that people with children all looked happy. There is a simple reason for that. Children don’t understand what a pandemic is, so to give them a feeling of normality you distract yourself from the pandemic with children. The result is that all the parents I saw were in their own little happy world. I noticed that parents were laughing, happy, going to parties and more, ignoring the pandemic, despite having the most to lose.


I didn’t have children or a spouse, so I had to find happiness from another source. For months and months I was desperate for zero COVID to be reached but eventually the inhumane head of Switzerland decided to ignore common sense, and that the vaccine was enough. This act doomed me to solitude, because it meant that COVID zero would never be reached.


I value my health, so I still mask to this day, when I am indoors. It makes me both absurd and consistent. It makes me absurd because I’m surrounded by people who are happy to live in COVID denial. They are happy to ignore the inconvenient truth that COVID can result in Long COVID and long COVID can last a lifetime.


I really suffered when I saw that COVID was a new disease that people wanted to make endemic so I had to change where I got my happiness from. That’s when I learned to derive happiness from moving forward, of having a daily routine. My routine is that I write a blog post every single day. By doing this I spend an hour or two being mindful, thinking of topics, and taking the time to elaborate on them, as if I was having a conversation with someone.


The second part of that routine is the daily walk. It is almost always an hour and a half, whilst listening to podcasts or audio books. The third part is to spend an hour or two each day studying IT related topics. Recently I have been practising with the provisioning of Linux systems on raspberry pies. In theory once you’ve set up a system you know how to do it.


As I have learned, through playing with Nextcloud you provision the machine, you get it up and running, but then you find that it can only be accessed via one wifi hotspot, not the other. You find that the device overheats as you try to sync 19,000 pictures from a mobile phone. You also find that you need to adjust the folder permissions so that the phone app can create folders to organise the photographs you’re sending from your phone to your Nextcloud instance. Finally you find that it’s better to use your old mobile phone for these experiments because you can leave it plugged in for hours, or days as it syncs.


You also find the need to learn about cooling, how to plug a fan into a pie, and more. You also realise how noisy that fan is so eventually you turn off that Pi instance.


The point of routine, and working on projects, is that it helps you forget that you’re lonely and isolated, so you don’t feel lonely and isolated. This is an emotion that people with family lives never experienced for real. People who are not alone think they feel lonely, but they haven’t been alone during a pandemic, for months in a row. They will never understand.


Due to the pandemic requiring me to redefine my sources of happiness I derive happiness from reaching my daily goals, not seeing people. People put my personal goals on hold.


Back in 2006-2007 I was working on my dissertation for a few minutes a day, every single day, seven days a week, for months. If I didn’t spend five minutes every day on it, I couldn’t sleep. I needed to move forward with that goal. What amused me in this scenario is that I really enjoyed the process. Other people called it “The D Word” because they had not invested as much time, over as long, as I had, so they were panicked. I was happy.


The point is that I’m happy to see people, once I have reached my personal goals, either for that part of the day, or for the entire day. If I don’t work towards my projects because I’m with people, then I feel unhappy, until I have reached my daily goals.


Once I have reached my goals I am happy to be distracted by other things, but only once I have reached my goals, not before.


And Finally


If I see people spontaneously I am happy, but if my presence is required I am miserable. People love to say that we can always say no, but we can’t. We can’t say no. “I don’t want to” might be a valid reason for a child, but not for an adult. Mental health is a valid reason but I don’t want to play that card, despite it being the real reason for me not wanting to do something today. I will burn over an hour of petrol to see people who a few days ago said “don’t come over unannounced. That message is the reason I don’t want to do a chore today. I don’t like being told I’m unwelcome, and then told to go a few days later.


There is nothing to gain, by saying no, because I have a favour to do nearby anyway, so it’s absurd to say no, but after today I will take a break from driving to that location. Last month I drove over six hundred and eighty kilometres, not for work, not for pleasure but for a favour.


Last time I went up I left the electric car, because I had no intention of going back up. I want my life to stop being absurd. The last five to six years have been absurd. I want my routine to stabilise once again, so that I reach my goal of feeling employable again, but I want to work remotely because I am not a friend of COVID.

Swimming Pools Per Capita Map

Swimming Pools Per Capita Map

Byrichard

Today I learned that Switzerland has a map that shows which communes have the most swimming pools per capita. Nyon has 50 swimming pools. That’s 2,3 per thousand people. Blonay St Legier has 336. Collonge- Bellerive has 491, as you’d expect. 


Switzerland has, on average, one swimming pool per 155 people. They cover an area of around 2,500,000 square meters. 


The Water Impact


Switzerland has 56,000 private pools that contain 3.5 billion litres of water according to their estimate. That’s an enormous amount of water. This doesn’t include the indoor private pools. As droughts become more common the concept of having a private pool becomes more and more absurd. It becomes absurd because private pools require a huge amount of water, and are seldom used. 


It would be interesting to see a chart of “litres of water used per swim” where evaporation, splashing and other factors are taken into account. Swimming pools lose a lot of water, especially on hot water. 


Remember that we have been in an age of stopping the water when we’re brushing our teeth and washing our hands. We’re in an age of showers rather than baths. Within this context it makes sense to look at pools and consider their water impact on the environment. 


Having said this there is one saving aspect. The water that runs off from pools shouldn’t be dirty or dangerous for the environment. It’s that so much of it is lost and wasted in evaporation. That’s when the requirement to cover pools when they’re not in use would make sense. It would save a lot in water. 


Saving Petrol


In theory, with more private pools, and if they are shared with friends, either in the neighbourhood or elsewhere, then pools could be more efficient. If pools are set up with a cover for when they are not in use then they heat up faster, thanks to the sun, but evaporation is also greatly reduced, thus making the pool more ecological. 


They also spoke in the video report about setting up outdoor pools every summer, for some people, and that these outdoor pools were filled in summer, and emptied for winter. At least with permanent pools they are filled once, and then topped up. 


I didn’t hear any discussion about collecting rain water to keep pools filled with water and I didn’t mention a comparison with green lawns and more. Does a pool use more water than a watered garden? 


Trees Instead of Pools


Although not discussed in the report they should have explored the benefit of having trees, rather than pools. If we’re walking on a warm day we notice the thermocline as soon as we get near woods. We notice that the temperature goes from being like an oven, to cool and refreshing. Not only do trees keep air cool and provide shade, but they are able to gather their own water from deep underground. You get to feel cool, while dressed. 


Lakes, Rivers and Public Pools


Nyon has the Piscine du Rocher, Piscine de Cossy and Colovray, three public pools that people can use, three all year round, in theory, and two for winter. The lakes, during heat waves are warm enough for swimming, as are some rivers and more. In theory there is no need for them to have so many swimming pools. 


And Finally


Some communes, like Cheserex, built communal swimming pools, that people could use year round. In winter you can sit outdoors and get cooked by the sun, before going for a swim. In winter you can go for a swim, and then go home, without using the car, if you live in neighbouring villages. 


The report often spoke of the desire for private pools stemming from lockdowns. I would see it as being due to heatwaves that are constant for two or three months a year now. During a heatwave the desire to cool down is strong. 


Communal pools, and trees would help people cool down, without the environmental impact of private swimming pools. 

Northern Exposure and Blowing Bubbles
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Northern Exposure and Blowing Bubbles

Byrichard

Northern Exposure is a series about a doctor who finds himself sent to Alaska to be a doctor for a few years. He thinks that it is the middle of nowhere and he has to adapt from enjoying life as a New Yorker to life as a frontier town doctor.  


Early colza in the Canton of Vaud
Early colza in the Canton of Vaud


Although the series is thirty plus years old it still remains relevant today with its exploration of global warming, pollution and more. The characters have existential conversations and in a few episodes we meet the man living in a geodesic dome. He lives in the dome to avoid pollution. He is allergic to aluminium, methane gas and more. 


It’s an interesting episode to watch within the context of the pandemic. People, including me, continue to wear masks when we are indoors. People think that we are strange for doing this. The pandemic isn’t over. We hear all the time about how Long COVID lies dormant, whether people are symptomatic for weeks, months of years after primary infection. It makes sense to wear masks, given that a mask takes a second to wear and take off, but long COVID can be for life. 


Cars coming from Geneva on Easter Friday
Cars coming from Geneva on Easter Friday


The idea of being allergic to the modern world, to various forms of pollution is an interesting one. We read about forever minerals and plastics in drinking water, more and more often, and about air pollution. We have CO2 monitors to keep an eye on pollution. We have maps of pollution around cities, motorways and more. The topic is still relevant today. 


This television isn’t on Netflix or Amazon Prime. It is on Filmin, a film network for experimental films. The content is niche, more diverse and more interesting. as long as you understand Spanish. It has films like Nano of the North, which I find interesting. I know this because when I typed North for Northern Exposure it suggested Nanook of the North, a documentary film I read about regularly when I was studying documentary. 


Modern television series should have people wearing masks to socialise. “Lunatics” like me, who still wear masks, should be normalised in modern television series, to show that being cautious should not be worthy of stigmatisation and prejudice. Northern Explored pollutants in the air. Modern series should explore the reasons for still masking despite the gas lighting of politicians, stating that the pandemic is over, despite the death rate telling a different story. 

Playing With Migros SubitoGo

Playing With Migros SubitoGo

Byrichard

Yesterday I tried playing with Migros SubitoGo and the experience was good. You scan the QR code for the shop as you enter and then you scan the products that you want to buy. I kept them in my hands until I got to the checkout counters.


Passabene


With Passabene you shop, you scan your products, and then you go to the cash machine, scan the shopping list to the device, and it charges you. It’s quite conventional and sometimes it asks for a double check from a cashier.


Subito Go


With the Subito Go app you can scan what you’re buying, put it in your bag and then choose to pay, and you can pay for what you bought, from anywhere in the store, if you are so inclined, via Twint and more.


A Strange Feeling


It feels strange to pick things up, scan them, pick up more things, scan them, and then to pay directly from your phone, without using any shop device. In future I can walk into a shop, scan what I want to buy, put it in my bag, pay for it and walk out without stopping, at the checkout, without a cashier seeing me motion that I am paying.


A System of Trust


This works for one simple reason. Societal trust. If and when a society behaves morally then people can be trusted to walk into a shop, pick things up, and pay for them, before leaving. I read about this type of shopping in Switzerland but I had not played with it in Switzerland yet. Now that I have, I like it.


Phone Batteries


The SubitoGo app is within the Migros app. It uses the phone’s camera to scan products. It works well but it’s better to use it with a well charged battery. It used about 8 percent for 27 minutes on my phone.


The Moral Side


People do not like self-checkout and other such tech because they feel that it removes jobs from shops. I don’t think that it does, because shelves still need to be stacked. Instead of being stuck in one place shop workers are constantly walking around and filling shelves.


I often see that the people standing by self-checkout machines are having conversations with friends. They interrupt the conversation, if someone needs assistance, but the rest of the time they chat, like bar staff in bars, on a quiet day.


Some jobs are fun. I think that sitting at a cash register, on a quiet day, without customers is boring. On such days I am sure that they prefer self-checkout, where they are there in case of a problem.

The Immature Coming of Age of Social Media
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The Immature Coming of Age of Social Media

Byrichard

Around a decade and a half ago I grew tired of seeing blog headlines that said “The top ten blah blah”, “Three signs that …” and more. It grew tiring to see all those headlines, to a point where it generated the term clickbait. The idea of a headline being written to attract people to a click where there was no content behind it.


Today I worry that the juvenile behaviour and attitude of social media, and to some degree mainstream media, is making it hard to have meaningful adult conversations. A lot of social media is about sensationalism, and tabloid superficiality, rather than meaningful, pleasant conversation and idea sharing.


I realise that terms like woke are apparently based on African American culture in the US to describe white people that are in tune with the reality of the situation, but I hate the term. When I worked in Human Rights I came across the term “The decade of the People of African Descent and I much prefer this term. It isn’t about race, chrominance or anything else. It’s about where a family might have originated. I have no problem with “of European descent” or other terms, because it brings the conversation towards migration and mobility.


Woke is a word that already has a meaning, that we use every single morning. To use it to insult others makes it a useless term, rather than a useful term. I used social media to find pleasant conversations, for friendship, and for more, as time advanced friendhips.


This is the time of year when people complain about the changing of the clocks, and I have the view that those who live far enough from the equator will love the move of clocks forwards and backwards, because it signifies the arrival of spring or the arrival of winter. It also signals an extra hour in bed when the weather is colder and more unpleasant, and waking an hour earlier, when the sun rises an hour earlier. I love the change of clocks.


Others don’t, and wnt to argue about how we shouldn’t change the clocks according to the season. People discussed their hatred of the clocks changing on Mastodon and my reflex is to keep the app closed, and to steer clear.


I loved social media when it was a pleasant, adult conversation about projects, aspirations, friendship and more. Now that it is childish bickering I prefer to take a step back. Why do we invest years of our lives on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and other social networks, only to see them bought by immoral people, and ruined. The death of Twitter has degraded my desire to invest time and effort into any social network.


If the pandemic was over for real, rather than for commercial reassons I would give up on social media completely. I would use telegram or signal, with a group of people and chat. Paradoxically, not having a car, having a broken arm and then three years of pandemic, encouraged me to dump whatsapp, facebook, instagram and now Twitter. I ran out of things to give up on.


Now I’d like the pandemic to be over. I’d like for there to be zero new cases for two weeks in a row, for the entire country, or even continent, so that I can rebuild a real life, and forget about “social” media, at last.


And Finally


And Finally I really don’t get why Auttomatic bought ActivityPub. For me the product is not ready to be seen as a product. I think that sale was premature.

The Absurd

The Absurd

Byrichard

Over the last few weeks I have been thinking about the absurdity of life during this pandemic. People are pretending the pandemic is over and falling sick with a disease that keeps them sick for months.


Entire professions are now unstable so finding work is harder.


Millions of others are unable to work.


Living with COVID is absurd. I wish the world would stop being absurd. I am tired of the absurdity of people being okay with living in a pandemic.


I would spend more time writing this blog post but part of the absurdity that I am writing about is that I do not have the space to work towards my personal goals, so my days are absurd. I am in limbo and I can’t change it until I regain my normal life, a life that is not as absurd.

The Illusion That The Pandemic Is Over
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The Illusion That The Pandemic Is Over

Byrichard

Switzerland is living under the illusion that the pandemic is over. If you look at the data on the RTS website and other sources of information such as Cotrack – Grafana then the pandemic is over. The number of new cases has gone done so if you look at the metrics then it is over.


There is a good chance that this is an illusion, demonstrated in three ways. The first of these is the number and saturation of hospitals now, with many of them overloaded and in a situation of crisis. The second indicator that things are not fine is the increased mortality for years, at this point. The third indicator is that people with COVID compromised immune systems might have stopped testing positive for COVID but there is a lag between when someone stops testing positive for COVID and when their immune system has fully recovered from the disease, able to combat other illnesses that would otherwise have little or no effect.


They charge for COVID tests. They no longer test sewage for traces of the disease. They tell people that the pandemic is over, and then they provide data that gives this illusion.


Two things bother me about this situation. The first is that I don’t trust that the pandemic is over. If we had frequent tests, and everyone was testing positive then I would trust that the pandemic is over. The second is that by not having data that proves that the pandemic is over I will keep wearing a mask when I am indoors and keeping my distance outside of people in my family, or that I am staying with.


Graphic from RTS insinuating that the pandemic is over.


Information for the Canton De Vaud, 44 tests, 4 positive, 9 percent positivity.


At the start of the pandemic there was a thing that said “the pandemic will be over when we have zero transmission for two weeks”. We are not at that stage yet. We are also at a nine percent positivity rate. That’s four percentage points higher than the five percent required for a situation to be considered under control. In reality I don’t need to be confused. When I see 0 new cases for two weeks, and the test percentage is down to 0 then I can consider removing the mask.

On Engagement and Leaving Social Media Platforms
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On Engagement and Leaving Social Media Platforms

Byrichard

I used to like Facebook and Instagram because they were extensions of my social life. I left both of them when I saw that only two or three people reacted to my posts. Although social media platforms had started as being solitary, they had become social with time, and then lonely again, as time went on.


I left Facebook because it made me feel lonelier to use it than stay way. The same is true of Instagram. When I felt that I was looking at ads and influencer accounts, without getting anything for myself I dumped both, and this occurred during, and because of the pandemic. When solitude is permanent, social media plays an important social role.


With Twitter it’s different. My engagement and social network are growing and if I kept tweeting my network would grow and I’d get something out of it. The drawback is that I have an intense dislike for the attitude of the person in charge, and the people he allows to influence himself. I want moral and ethical people to take a twitter break, not because I want Twitter to fail, but because I want Musk to get a clear message that social media platforms are what they are, because of their users, and that without respecting human rights platforms empty of users.


I don’t expect people to take a twitter break so I don’t think that what I want will have any effect. The second reason for the twitter break is to take some time and some space to work on other things, to blog more. I am tired of spending hours a week on social platforms. only for them to be sold off, and for others to profit from our attention, and our engagement.


Twitter should never have been sold to an individual, especially not such an individual. Social networks always collapse when they change hands. I always leave them when they change owners, because the website goes from being a place for innovative early adopters, to being a place for advertisers and disengagement.

On Not Listening to Podcasts

Byrichard

There are times when I listen to two or three hours of podcasts a day and I learn from them. I usually listen when I am cooking and when I am walking. For several weeks now I have hardly listened to any podcasts. This is for three reasons.


The first of these is that I spend two to four hours studying a day, so when I go for my walk I think I have listened to the point of saturation and now I’m ready for a change of ideas. Recently whilst walking I spent days reading Gulag by Anne Applebaum and I learned a lot about the Gulag, about its history, it’s pervasiveness in society and more. I also learned about some of the cruelties that people did not try to stop. Cruelties such as the mass rape of women on prisoner ships.


The second reason is more pleasant. I have been cycling more, and rollerblading. I never listen to anything when I am cycling for two reasons. The first is that the wind is too loud, so anything you listen to would be hard to understand anyway. The second is that I also rollerblade and with rollerblading it’s entirely based around my need to be fully focused. I haven’t done this sport for years and my subconscious is being lazy. My conscious is stuck doing all the work so I want to keep my focus free.


The third and final reason is that I am socially exhausted. I went from weeks at a time with five minutes of conversation, or less. to several hours of not being alone. The transition has encouraged me to enjoy walking without podcasts, to cycle and to just daydream rather than ingest information.


Due to society’s desire to live with COVID, rather than Zero COVID introverts, people between contracts, single people and others have been forced to adapt to solitude. The adaptation was painful. I fear that I have now transitioned to the opposite side. I am happier when I spend 10 minutes to half an hour with people, rather than hours at a time. I know that I will transition back to absolute solitude soon enough, and that if I lose my habits of solitude I will really suffer with loneliness.


Recently my happiest days are where I am left alone to study, do my daily sports, cook and eat when I want and live my routine. I hate weekends and holidays during this pandemic. The reasons that I used to love them, are now gone, until COVID zero.


Society was selfish and stupid to go for living with COVID, rather than COVID zero.

Playing With Harmonicas

Byrichard

During a walk a few weeks ago I came across L’Harmonica pour les nuls, Harmonica for Dummies, so I picked up the book and within a day or two I had ordered a harmonica to learn the instrument. The harmonica is a small versatile instrument. that can be used to play a range of music.


The greatest advantage with harmonicas is that it fits within a pocket. It takes very little space and can theoretically be taken anywhere. Despite what I thought about harmonicas the book is quite big. It’s over 300 pages.


I play a few minutes a day and I found some online lessons in the form of videos and more. I have spent a lot of time while cooking just playing with the harmonica, rather than playing the harmonica. I got used to the feel. I got used to the sound. I eventually learned to play individual notes. It takes time to learn.


I had a good studying routine before this summer but it has been destroyed by the summer months. When winter comes back I will be back to my healthy routine and I will progress with all of my projects, instead of stalling like I have. I went from studying three to four hours a day, between programming and harmonica to one or two hours, sometimes even less.


I don’t like the pandemic. I don’t like not being able to socialise with single people. I don’t like that the risk of COVID is always hanging over us. I want the pandemic to be over, so that I can socialise doing the things I enjoy, rather than doing things with people that remind me of what I don’t have.


I hate pandemic summers, and weekends. I long for the pandemic to end and to go back to doing group activities.


Too many people live in denial. Too many people behave as if the pandemic was over. It isn’t. The statistics show this very clearly. For over a year I didn’t worry about catching COVID because I was self-isolating and wearing a mask around people. This week I started worrying again. If I was going to get COVID it is during summer


I prefer self-isolation and solitude to being with couples who don’t understand what living through a pandemic as a single person is like.


I am fatigued by the pandemic but playing the Harmonica, rollerblading, cycling, studying and more help me regain my mental health. People drain it.