Retirement activities - let me think.

 Well I gave up 'work' around 10 months ago - bit of a grey area on exact time. 

Felt a bit strage for a while but am now getting to grips with it. Difficulty is not having a routine to follow, so have invented a starter activity for most days - dog walking my son's dog! 

That at leats gets the day unerway. But I'm going to have to find some additonal activities, outside of all the travelling I've done. I do like travelling though. Especially now I have my free bus pass! 

I've been researching retirement books looking for inspiration. I could return to do some software programming of some sort but I can't raise enough energy to start. Probably means I need a change. Books say you have to keep your mind active. Books also say get a hobby. Unfortunately all my hobby ideas ended up sounding like work I'd done in the past, e.g. astronomy, programming and the like. Maybe I just don't have the imagination?

There is one thing worth putting on the list and that is, walking. I do like a good walk but not sure I'd fit into the ramblers association, me being a bit antisocial and all that! 

The activity list has started though, here we go;

1    Walking - lets see how that pans out, outside of dog walking that is.

2    Travelling - well I do like travelling outside of walking!

Will add to list as and when.....think 5 activities feels about right.

To brighten up this post here is a pic from our recent trip to Egypt - Abu Simbel, simply phenomenal.

Attempt at catching up

 Rest of 2022 activities

• Trip to Mardid and FOSSA to finalise the build of 10 SAIN units. 
• Attended Highways conference in Birmingham with Richard to try and scope out what others were doing on bridge structural health monitoring. Not a lot as it tuns out.
• Lots of trips to the static in Wales!
• Trips to London to investigate collaboration with a drone provider on bridge monitoring Aeongreen. No money though so it was back to DIY again.
• Attendance at the Glasgow Pocketcube workshop. Always a great bash put on by Alba Orbital. Some investigation into collaboration with Scotish remote monitoring outfit Krucial. Didn't come to anything.
• The issue with SAIN was, and still is to some extent, it needs an injection of money to the tune of £100k to take it to a production level. We (I) have already put that amount in through the consulting business. Didn't really want to go for VC money, probably a mistake, but hey, ho, such is life.

Then 2023

• Trip to London to discus SAIN with Jacobs engineering, David Bradley. Again no go, no money.
• Trip to Budapest
• Lots of trips to the static in Wales
• Bought new motorhome - Bessy!
• Trip to Costa Rica - volcanoe's the lot!
• Big trip to Scotland in Bessy to visit the Rasaay distillery and sign our barrel.
• Advisory business closed down completely!
• Trip to Tenerife - holiday - first time back in a long while!

Then 2024

• Fantastic trip to India - holiday.
• Trip to Berlin - holiday
• Lots of trips to the static in Wales
• Tenerife - again - holiday with Richard to celebrate final ending of Advisory business.
• Big trip to Costa Rica and Panama - holiday
• Lots of Bessy trips, Wales, Durham...big 1 month trip round France to visit friends!
• Brilliant trip to Egypt - holiday

Phew.....as you can see the work aspects have started to take a back seat to the holidays. Long may it continue. I will summarise the SAIN position at some point just to state where things ended up.

Dropped the ball

 Well the last couple of years have seen a few changes that have resulted in me dropping the ball on Fortran revival activity. Mostly good stuff, lots and lots of travel - need to summarise all that at some point. Retirement has kicked in fully! 

However starting to get a little restless, need to come up with some new projects now that I have all this time on my hands - also needs to be summarised at some point.

Frogs of the Osa Peninsular

 

What fabulous place - primary rain forest, birds galore and plenty of frogs to record.

See https://www.researchgate.net/project/Costa-Rican-Observation-and-Analysis-of-Calls-CROAC

For the recordings!

More frogs at Greentique Wildlife Refuge, Manuel Antonio

Sat outside or hotel room, pre-breakfast, near the site entrance. Was visited by humming birds and others!

Night walk at the Greentique refuge - fantastic!

Call can be found here - https://www.researchgate.net/project/Costa-Rican-Observation-and-Analysis-of-Calls-CROAC

The frogs are calling at Macaw Lodge

But which ones.....

Check out the recordings at,

https://www.researchgate.net/project/Costa-Rican-Observation-and-Analysis-of-Calls-CROAC

Frogs is us!

Trip to Costa Rica to record a few frog calls for our CROAC product development. 

Installed at Macaw Lodge awaiting dusk and the frogs.