An orange brown Rana temporaria peaking out of the watercress in our pond

Today is my first day of retirement. I’ve spent 45 years working for the same company as a software engineer, joining a few weeks after leaving university in 1981. It has been a very enjoyable journey with such a variety of technical challenges that I never thought about looking for another job…

But all good things must come to an end, and I was finding it more and more difficult to keep up with the workload, so it became time to hand over to younger and more skilled colleagues.

For the last few years, my workload and training needs have been so intense that I haven’t had the mental bandwidth for any of my hobbies. I recently checked blipfoto and realised my last post was of a Lego build in 2022 - and that I had still not finished the kit!

I retired with no specific plans, just a pile of half-finished projects that I want to resurrect - some MicroPython development, coding a little application in Psion OPL, learning to use my Sony α6700, a whole stack of Lego kits, and learning about the Peloponnesian War.

I have had the α6700 for a couple of years now but have only scratched the surface of its abilities. I finally have time to read the manual properly.