June 2021

June was mainly about enjoying the summer weather in Edinburgh. Harriet and I started the month with a swim out at Gullane Beach. We’re lucky to have such a nice coastline near Edinburgh. It’s nice to be more social after a year of lockdowns: wandering in the city center, fish and chips in the park, and even some beer and (rare for me!) football at the pub.

I have been pleased that PubRun folks have started meeting up again. Although the group is not officially “open” (due to Covid restrictions) small groups are meeting up for runs, cycles and beers. It feels fairly safe meeting up outdoors, and I’m glad of the warm weather that has made it possible!

I managed an two day cycling trip to Peebles and back, which I wrote about in my journal. Check out the full post for more photos, a video, and route map on Komoot.

This month I powered through a lot of reading in preparation for the II “Reading the Greats” salon on Machiavelli’s The Prince:

The Medici by Mary Hollingsworth was an interesting tour of the history of one of the foremost families of the Renaissance. In the long-run it seems Machiavelli’s advice on focusing on preserving your dynasty and state was needed. Things seemed to fall apart from the family once they secured their hereditary Dukedom. Complacancy provides Fortuna ample opportunity to take away your inheritance.

The Artist, the Philosopher and the Warrior by Paul Strathern wove together the stories of Machiavelli, Cesare Borgia and Leonardo Da Vinci. Although slightly tenuous with the overlaps between the three in some places it was an interesting background to Machiavelli’s writing. I’ve picked up Strathern’s “The Florentines” and will probably also try a book of the Borgia family.

Other books I read were Bill Gates’s How to Avoid Climate Disaster and a look at the relationship between Britain and Europe This Sovereign Isle by Robert Tombs.

For work I continued working on a PHP/JS/React project for one client and did some investigations into No-Code/Low-Code tools and workflow for another. I’ll be taking on more work in August, so please do get in touch if you are interested in me helping you out.

In July I’m looking forward to a Scottish holiday with Harriet (the third or fourth time we’ve tried to organise a break!), more reading, running and personal projects.