How to build a village, Rosie Spinks:

You don’t need friends, you need people. Kurt Vonnegut wrote that most marriages fail because they don’t have enough people in them:

“You should know that when a husband or wife fight, it may seem to be about money or sex or power. But what they’re really yelling to each other about is loneliness. What they’re really saying is, ‘you’re not enough people.’”

He goes onto say that in order to recreate the “like-minded, extended families of fifty people or more” we should “join all sorts of organizations, no matter how ridiculous, simply to get more people in his or her life.”

Laying wide awake, trying to sleep in a Perth hotel, so I thought crunching some annual stats might help me sleep.

2024 has been a wild year of travel. Here’s my 2024 travel stats as of when I get home on December 2:

For 53% of 2024 I have slept in a bed I do not call home. 172 nights away from home, 94 flights, 85 marriage ceremonies, 275 hours in the air, 47 visits to Hobart Airport, 37 rental cars, 27 hours lost to flight delays, 15 airports, seven countries, six airlines, six Australian states, three trains, two boats, one moped.

Qantas Platinum, Virgin Gold, Hotels.com Gold, and Accor Gold, Mitre 10 Silver. No I’m not joking about Mitre 10.

Ask me anything except about the moped.

Pretty cool to see my work at Balandra Beach in Mexico on Conde Nast's Traveler today.

One day I ought to figure out how to be a professional profitable photographer instead of being an Unsplash dude.

Let's talk about the disconnect between mainstream media, social media chatter, and reality in Perth's coffee scene.

When Starbucks opened their first WA store recently, both mainstream and social media were full of people insisting Perth would reject it in favour of local cafes.

Well, I just visited this morning... The reality? Over 100 people inside and a 40+ car drive-through queue. Before 9am on a Saturday.

Just a reminder that media opinions and online discussions don't always reflect what's actually happening on the ground. That Starbucks is absolutely thriving.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

I asked ChatGPT “Based on what you know about me draw a picture of what you think my current life looks like”

Seeing the Rode Wireless Micro release today (another spectacular release from Rode) reminded me how Australian companies and people are driving the infrastructure level of the creator economy.

Rode Microphones, Blackmagic Design (cameras, accessories, switchers and DaVinci), Procreate, Envato, Canva, Linktree, and Fastmail are the big ones I can think about plus Pocketcasts, Whooshkaa, and Omny Studio in the podcast world. Also, Emojipedia!

Barack Obama:

We live in a time of such confusion and rancor, with a culture that puts a premium on things that don’t last: money, fame, status, likes. We chase the approval of strangers on our phones. We build all manner of walls and fences around ourselves, and then we wonder why we feel so alone. We don’t trust each other as much because we don’t take the time to know each other. And in that space between us, politicians and algorithms teach us to caricature each other and troll each other and fear each other.

Straight outta JT

How to know if it’s a legit cowboy hat, a guide

Lucy Schiller in the Columbia Journalism Review’s The Final Flight of the Airline Magazine:

The idea of the airline magazine reaching everyone possible. An in-flight magazine is “for you, it’s for your mother, and it’s for your daughter,” she said. “Everyone has to be able to read it. It crosses generations with its appeal. Most people are aware the audience is broad.” So: the opposite type of product, really, from the personalized digital content tooled and retooled by increasingly specific customer data. “It can’t be niche,” Carpenter continued. “It can’t make people feel separated from it. It’s not going to be political or religious. It’s going to be inspiring, positive. Airline magazines don’t write bad reviews. We don’t interview someone to make them feel dumb. It’s all about putting positivity out into the world.”

Thomas Hooven on Love:

“By the time I met my wife, I was a changed man and a real doctor. And our love developed differently from any I had experienced before. Less like a crystal vase, more like a basketball, our relationship is made for bouncing — for the good and sometimes rough play that modern professional lives generate. We do have fights (oh, yes, we do), but they do not threaten our foundation. They deepen it.”

Robert Pirsig the author of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance in this interview in 1974:

If a plant only gets sunlight, it’s very harmful. It needs darkness too. In the darkness, it converts oxygen into carbon dioxide. We are like that too. We need periods of doing, and periods of non-doing.

A mashup of Y.M.C.A. by the Village People and a track from Hans Zimmer's Interstellar soundtrack shouldn't be so beautiful

Ezra Klein in Happy 20th Anniversary, Gmail. I’m Sorry I’m Leaving You:

I have thousands of photos of my children but few that I’ve set aside to revisit. I have records of virtually every text I’ve sent since I was in college but no idea how to find the ones that meant something. I spent years blasting my thoughts to millions of people on X and Facebook even as I fell behind on correspondence with dear friends. I have stored everything and saved nothing.

Disneyland for Luna’s 6th birthday. What an amazing sensory overload. A work of art!

I don’t want to join an Illuminati that wants me as a member

Lightroom's Generative AI-powered remove feature is wildly good

The pilots of QF15 invited Luna to the flight deck for her 6th birthday

Cabel Sasser's XOXO talk is required watching for all inhabitants of earth.

Put the 19 minutes aside and watch this.

Seth Godin in Amplifying the fringes:

It’s no wonder people feel ill at ease. Instead of the ship adding ballast to ensure a smooth journey, the crew is working hard to make the journey as rocky as possible.

Aurora Australis over the Huon River in Franklin, Tasmania.

Aurora you glad you stayed up?

In case anyone was interested, it costs $1600 to fly Qantas then Jetstar from Hobart to the Gold Coast today if Virgin wasn’t able to rebook you on other flights today and yours was getting in to Sydney too late and you’d miss your connection. Just a lazy $1600 and there goes this week’s profit margin.

My high school internet username results in a Googlewhack today. I've never been so proud.

Britt Shoo sketched me at work at a wedding in Maleny today, how cool is it!

All the guests recieved portraits like this.

Jenny Saville:

When I paint, I don’t search for beauty, but for the power of life’s force: when you fall in love with someone, it's life’s force. When you see amazing food or you listen to music that goes right inside your body, that’s life’s force. That moment is not an intellectual space, it's something beyond – you can't articulate it. It’s about the moments that help you breathe deeper.

A short love letter to QuickTime. RIP QuickTime Pro.

My favourite thing about taking a car to the dealer for a warranty issue and they make you feel like you're a woman in the fifties reporting sexual abuse. Looking at you like you're imagining the problem, suggesting "maybe it's your fault?"

tap, tap is this thing on?

I’m grateful for the opportunity to share my wedding celebrant story, my passions, my heart, and to also talk videographers and audio from an audio tech point of view on the Wed Co podcast today.

Qantas’s ears were burning

Wild how we use the same bowl for popcorn and vomit

I would personally donate money to keep the Raygun fire burning

Along with a social media age limit I'd like to see the app icons and splash screens changed to shocking images of people depressed, public servants dancing, or phone notification screenshots overflowing with replies featuring the opinions of strangers.

Look, I might not be your favourite person, but at least I've never tried to sell you a MLM, or a course that promises you that you can make lots of money without any effort.

A drive through Outback Queensland yesterday