Bulktember 2022

Prior to my 7 AM admission for surgery today I was advised of the requirement for a negative RAT result upon arrival. Acute awareness of this checkpoint has led to forty-eight hours of pre-admission anxiety about every throat tickle, moment of fatigue and headache (reduction of caffeine intake explains that last one).

I did not put a lot of effort into planning my visit to Strasbourg. There was an Alltrails map that promised a thorough tour of this World Heritage district and I took it at its word.

While taking a holiday was supposed to be an escape from much of life's routines, I was not expecting to abstain from eating almonds for over a week. Finally this weekend I have resumed my almond and apple morning teas in the presences of some grand waterfalls in Springbrook and Lamington National Parks.

Nineteen years ago I created my first seasonal playlist (the tracklist lost to time as I recorded it to cassette from my computer back when I drove an original-condition VK Commodore). Some time during the next fifty playlists I realised that these snapshots of musical preference, if curated expertly, could act as a time travel mechanism and transport me to the autumn of 2004 (in my VK Commodore) or the spring of 2016 when the simulation really started to fall apart at the seams.