David Hughes

A relatively quiet week but ended with a great weekend away in London.

Formula One Degree of Separation

We enjoyed watch the Brawn documentary on Disney+ and I really enjoyed realising my one degree of separation from the main protagonists.

Episode one opens with footage of Ross Brawn whilst at Beatrix Lola using a rolling road inside a wind tunnel at Cranfield Institute of Technology as I did my work experience at Cranfield and helped install the very rolling road they feature.

I have driven one of Jenson Buttons’s cars. OK, it was a Renault Coupe he had as a company car whilst driving for Promatecme in Formula 3 but it was his and he had obviously ‘driven’ that poor car.

At least and least interesting I saw Keanu Reeves at Goodwood Festival of Speed when he was there a few years back with his own motorcycle company. We just happened to be passing his paddock space as he was getting onto his bike.

Unofficial Anniversary London Weekend

Every November, on the weekend closest to the 16th, my wife and I celebrate the first anniversary or f our first unofficial date which happened when I invited myself on her day trip to London.

The rest is history as they say, as 33 years later we’re still very happily together.

We essentially spent Saturday eating and drinking our way from Borough Market, to Covent Garden, to Fortnum’s wine bar and back to our hotel via China Town.

Whilst in The Rake in Borough Market we had an unplanned planning meeting and now have a loose plan which could guide our next 33 years together.

Much of this week was consumed by whatever lurgy I picked up in Bristol only returning to work on Thursday.

None More Black

One highlight of the week was the arrival of my MacBook Pro. All I’ve done so far is to set it up, but I can report it’s a thing of beauty and does an amazing job of not showing fingerprints. Phew…

As many have said it’s more of a very dark grey than a pure black, but much of that depends upon the lighting; in brighter lighting it’s a dark grey, Space Greyer if you will, and in lower light it looks closer to black, there’s a pleasing amount of variation.

West Wittering Weekend

I spent the weekend visiting family in West Sussex. On Saturday we took what is becoming our traditional walk around West Wittering, a beautiful beach on the south coast. The weather was perfect –  bright, crisp and little wind.

After the walk we headed home and watched Harlequins vs Leicester Tigers in the Premiership, followed by a gorgeous beef casserole and a couple of bottles of good Rioja for dinner – a perfect Autumn day.

I Am Speed

When I returned home I imported some RAW images into Lightroom on both my new MacBook Pro and my trusty old iMac as a test – the difference in performance was extraordinary.

Now I just need a Studio Display to pop up on the refurb store.

Another short weeknote after a short week ending with the dreaded lurgy.

Scary Fast?

I picked my MacBook Air up at the end of last week, and must admit I didn’t like it.

The 13″ MacBook Air feels just right, the 15” feels too big and larger than 15”, the proportions just felt off to me.

I had a 14” MacBook Pro when I was still self employed and much preferred the design and feel, not to mention the beautiful screen

Fortunately Apple had their Scary Fast event at which they announced new M3 powered MacBook Pros, so for a few hundred pounds more than the Air cost me I will now get a Pro.

I just need to see whether ‘Space Black’ is a fingerprint magnet or not…

Bristol Once Again

I drove down to Bristol Tuesday evening and had my longest trip to date at almost four hours, there just seemed to be traffic everywhere.

After that drive I didn’t fancy heading out into the rain so ordered room service and crashed out.

Wednesday was a doubly good day as it marked both the kick off of a major project and the first time I’ve had my team together in reality not a glowing rectangle.

I’m a big fan of remote work when deep work is required, but when collaborating creatively you cannot beat being in the same room together. It’s almost as if we’ve evolved over thousands of years to be the social creatures we are.

Sadly I woke up feeling terrible, lurgy not hang over, drove home and collapsed into bed which is pretty much where I spent the rest of the week.

As I mentioned in my last weeknote we visited Bath for a few days as part of a mini tour of the West Country.

A few highlights from our trip.

Bath

It was nice to revisit Bath, although it feels more touristy with each visit as it slowly morphs into a Georgian theme park.

On Saturday evening we found a fabulous Spanish restaurant Pinxto Bath and had one of the best Spanish meals I’ve ever had including Spain.

My favourite part of Bath is Queen Street, I’ve joked that I could live there quite happily, which has two great pubs in the The Raven and The Salamander (the better of the two), a fabulous place for brunch and lunch in Wild Cafe and quiet possibly the finest bookshop this side of Foyles in Mrs B’s Emporium of Reading Delights.

All of which were frequented and enjoyed.

On our last morning in Bath we watched the Abbey gradually emerge into view as the fog cleared and then headed over to Bristol.

Bristol

It was nice to be in Bristol and to be able to explore it more and do some ‘touristy’ things.

We had lunch at Cargo Cantina on Wapping Wharf which was excellent and then wandered down to the SS Great Britain.

I think the last time I visited SS Great Britain was probably the early 80s when it was still pretty much a hulk being rescued. It’s now fully restored and a really great experience – highly recommended.

The next morning we walked up to Clifton via Constitution Hill which I assume is thus named as its test of one’s constitution.

We had breakfast and excellent coffee in Foliage Cafe and then walked over to Clifton Suspension Bridge which still slightly boggles my mind it’s so high over the gorge.

My Dad lived in Clifton for a period in his youth and used to drink in the Coronation Tap, one of only two places I had a drink with him, I was keen to revisit it but alas it was closed until the evening.

Cirencester

We drove home via Cirencester which has popped up on one of those 10 Best Places to Live type lists, so we thought we’d check it out as a possible move location.

I immediately felt young and poor, there seemed to be a startlingly high number of gents outfitters specialising in bespoke tweed and red corduroy trousers, and it was notable that every bank still had a high street branch there.

This tells me their customers are old and high net worth.

We won’t be moving to Cirencester.

A quiet week, and a quick weeknote.

I finally took the plunge and ordered a new Mac, as my trusty 27″ iMac is now classified as ‘Vintage’ by Apple and isn’t supported by MacOS Sonoma. With no big iMac even rumoured before 2025 I’ve gone with a 15″ MacBook Air and Studio Display.

The MacBook Air will now be my only Mac, so I needed to increase the storage and RAM, pushing the price up to £1999.

£1999!

Now you see why I’ve put this purchase off for so long. I’m hoping a Studio Display will pop up on the refurbished store before the MacBook Air arrives to save me a few quid.

We’re on holiday for a few days now, I’m typing this sitting in a guest house in Bath over looking the Cathedral.

We arrived yesterday afternoon and headed into town over Pulteney Bridge, the river was the highest I’ve seen it with the water from Storm Babet rushing down over the weir.

I find it fascinating that my Dad used to stand on the weir fishing as a child, he wouldn’t have been yesterday.

Bristol

The beginning of the week saw me back in Bristol for a couple of days of workshops with Nomensa, a creative agency I’m working with.

Monday night we had dinner at The Coconut Tree an excellent Sri Lankan restaurant – superb food and lovely service.

Tuesday night I was flying solo and headed over to Wapping Wharf, a very cool collection of restaurants and bars all inside shipping containers.

I’ve always loved Bristol. My Dad was evacuated from London to the West Country and grew up in and around Bristol. He moved back to Bristol after a short period back in London and met my Mum when they were both working at Bristol University. As a child we used to visit my Dad’s mum, spending weekends in Bristol, Bath and Keynsham.

Bristol was weaved through the early part of my life, and it’s been lovely reconnecting with it over the last couple of  years.

London

Thursday I was in London for Interact, Nomensa’s annual UX conference. It was a really good day of talks and great being at a conference I wasn’t running. I wish I’d thought to count the number of times AI was mentioned, as a drinking game it would have been carnage.

90s rave detroit techno wednesday morning

Spotify has a cool new feature called daylist and I’m really enjoying it. Your daylist is an automatically generated playlist that changes through the day with morning, afternoon, evening and night versions based on what you tend to listen to at that time on the day in question.

So far my daylists have been pretty good with a nice mix of old and new tracks. My only concern is that if I then listen to the daylist it will confirm to the bot that is what I listen to and gradually reduce the new and prioritise the listened to, which I’ve always felt is the risk of AI generated playlists and timelines – confirmation bias induced ever decreasing circles.

The daylist names are entertaining in their own right:

• analogue minimal techno monday afternoon
• krautrock motorik thursday early morning
• groovy eclectic friday afternoon
• frutiger aero breakbeat Saturday night
• bells instrumental afternoon

Mind you confirmation bias induced ever decreasing circles isn’t a bad name for a playlist either…