Mike McArthur

Tue, 16 Sep 2025 18:51:12 +1200

A few of the thousands of lambs I drove past on my sampling run today. Amazing how many have been born in the last week!

Tue, 16 Sep 2025 18:45:10 +1200

I live about as far from the USA as you can get, but my news feeds are full of crazy political stuff that is going on in America, along with how America is “unreservedly” backing the evil nastiness of Israel. Have world leaders gone totally mad???

I’m So Sick by Flyleaf

Mon, 15 Sep 2025 17:37:52 +1200

www.youtube.com/watch

I like the way this song captures the feeling of being fed up with my own culture and the commercialisation of everything at the expense of being human. I also like it because it reminds me of both of my daughters for different reasons.

Mon, 15 Sep 2025 13:33:34 +1200

Lammerlaw Range from Glenayr Station, Athenaeum Road, Otago.

Thu, 04 Sep 2025 17:48:59 +1200

My view from the ‘office’ today:

Sun, 24 Aug 2025 22:54:23 +1200

Back on micro.blog after a very long hiatus. Drawn back here by the huge advance in social media enshiffication recently driven by artificial “intelligence”. Part of me feels like giving up on the web and just walking away. But then I think of how much better it could be if more of us put truly human creativity out there on the open web.

Sat, 23 Aug 2025 00:04:26 +1200

Late evening callout to switch pumps at a water treatment plant. There appears to be an electrical fault causing the motor to go over current. Here’s a pic of our lovely clean pump shed:

Internet detox

Tue, 26 Jan 2021 17:15:09 +1200

We have been away camping for a few days. Three days without an internet connection has been great!

Why Micro.blog?

Thu, 21 Jan 2021 22:09:38 +1200

I’ve used a variety of website, blogging, and social media tools and platforms since around 2008 when I first dived into having an online presence. So deciding what to use this year has been a deliberate choice.

I have one current social media accound – Facebook, which is not publically visible and I use strictly for keeping in intermittent contact with a few friends and family who hang out there. My preference for social interactions is real life interactions, or by email. I’m quite protective of my personal email address.

I do quite like the idea of Twitter, and used it quite a bit from around 2010 to 2014 but abandoned it as the ratio of interesting stuff to garbage and vitriol declined. But the short format and interactivity is good, it is the saturation with advertising, gaming of the algorithm by sellers and deterioration in civility that ruin it.

At the other end of the scale are various blogging platforms or even keeping a static site. I really like this longer form type of site but realistically don’t currently have enough motivation to write thoughtful long posts so would probably have spent time and money setting up a site just how I want it only to let it sit without updates for months.

Micro.blog is a good middle ground. I already had a free account, it is reasonably priced for a managed blog, and conceptually I think of it more as a place for shorter updates and thoughts so feel less pressure to write interesting, informative posts.

The Retro Future

Thu, 21 Jan 2021 21:18:00 +1200

I just finished reading The Retro Future by John Michael Greer. I’d rate it about 7/10. The author argues that the Western concept of unending ‘progress’ is an illusion and that due to diminishing resources our society may be heading towards a serious decline. If a decline or even collapse of industrial civilization is inevitable then we should look for old technologies and tools that would enable society to continue but using less energy and other natural resources. Finished 21 January 2021, 256 pages. (Kindle edition). 📚

Thu, 21 Jan 2021 10:15:45 +1200

I’m looking forward to 2021: In 4 weeks I begin training as an electrical enginer, leaving behind five years of stress and bullying from my current manager. Financially it will be a struggle, but worth it for a change in career and new perspective.

Wed, 20 Jan 2021 20:51:29 +1200

I just added @microdotblog to my domain name with @iwantmyname. Go check it out: mikemcarthur.nz

Fri, 09 Aug 2019 14:15:49 +1200

Today I joined the ranks of folks who have injured themselves riding (or in my case falling off – ) a Lime scooter. My own fault, took a corner too fast and slid out of control. Now I have a skinned knee and wrist.

Wed, 31 Jul 2019 10:39:13 +1200

I just noticed that I am wearing my watch which has a flat battery. I put it on my desk last night knowing that the battery is flat and I wouldn’t want to wear it today, so am puzzled as to how I managed to put it on and wear it for three hours this morning without even noticing. Some habits just happen without thinking!

Thu, 25 Jul 2019 22:05:42 +1200

Really happy to have completed the first day of my Chaplaincy training. This is just the very start of the course but has me excited to learn more and get into the internship component.

Wed, 24 Jul 2019 22:07:37 +1200

After some fiddling with DNS settings and such I now have my new domain (mikemcarthur.kiwi) pointing to my micro.blog site and for good measure changed my theme to ‘Arabica’, which I really like.

Fri, 14 Jun 2019 15:41:42 +1200

Taking small steps towards getting back into regular blogging. I haven’t written anything on the web since March – in many ways a needed break but I do miss getting thoughts into writing and somehow it makes a difference to know someone might read them.

Wed, 27 Mar 2019 20:53:26 +1200

After a year-long hiatus, I’m back on micro.blog and it’s good to see the community is thriving.

Mon, 22 Jan 2018 11:31:12 +1200

Reading about global warming while sweltering in Wanaka, quite appropriate.

Sat, 20 Jan 2018 10:52:20 +1200

I’m curious as to what chemicals are in Lynx body spray to make it so pungent (and in my opinion, awful).

Thu, 18 Jan 2018 20:22:10 +1200

Flamin’ Windows and it’s autoupdates, takes forever to start up and even to shutdown.

Thu, 18 Jan 2018 06:34:49 +1200

It has been so hot in Dunedin lately that I’ve stopped wearing my (analogue) watch but then really miss the convenience of having the time on my wrist. Pulling out my phone to check the time is a hassle.

Thu, 18 Jan 2018 06:27:36 +1200

Interesting to see how dramatically my use of Facebook tapered off in the last 3 years. From multiple posts per day to perhaps 2 per month now!

Wed, 17 Jan 2018 09:59:15 +1200

In the process of slowly backfilling my blog with my Facebook content. Facebook really object to deleting old posts, an annoying popup asking “are you sure” and assuming you’ve been hacked with every item I delete.

Mon, 15 Jan 2018 17:48:42 +1200

I only figured out what the ‘conversation’ option does when you tap on a post in the micro.blog timeline a couple of days ago and it has transformed my experience – magic!!