These times, 2020.

There's something about the morning, just sitting outside with your coffee. Soon there will be Slack, and email, and video calls.

But for now. Breathe.

So yeah, how are you holding up?

This toilet paper thing, well it's a thing isn't it? Most everything else is ok. We're home all the time just like you. Coffee here is good. We work on our laptops, we read, we stream our TV.

We stand at the end of our driveway and chat to neighbors at the end of theirs – 6ft distance yo. It's nice to live around good souls. We gave some eggs and received a bottle of wine in return. I'd say we got the better end of the bargain there.

We'll all get through this and look back on it. Stay away from people, wash hands all the time, and adjust your Twitter feed so eyeballs are not consumed by negativity.

Now, where's that cake?

Weather here in the desert is getting nice. It's that time of year when you remember why you like living here. Well, until the summer hits and you question everything about yourself.

A moment to step outside and breathe in that after thunderstorm air. Phoenix is on day three of storm watch 2019 and there has been rain. Our garage flooded and we have a bucket in the kitchen catching drops. So that's cool.

I'm sitting here waiting for my grilled cheese sarnie (because I'm seven years old) and start watching the other customers. This cafe has an iPad terminal that you sign with your finger. In the two minutes I've been here I've seen lots of different finger signing techniques.

There's must get it correct slow signing lady. There's who gives a shit squiggle guy. And then this most recent one just put a X in the box. Me? I'm squiggle guy. Life's too short man.

It seems like it's been a long desert summer. After months of 100° days, today was the first morning we could open the windows in the house.

So that's what breeze feels like.

Phoenix, yesterday.

This is not my first desert summer rodeo. Why I thought it was a good idea to walk out to the car in bare feet is gonna be left to science to figure out.

So, those Ring doorbells, offer a few more features than perhaps you realized.

What has raised eyebrows, however, is the company’s push for partnerships with law enforcement agencies across the country, a fact that some feel has allowed police to create informal surveillance networks in hundreds of neighborhoods.

Yeah but you don't have to give the Police the footage though right?

However, he noted, there is a workaround if a resident happens to reject a police request. If the community member doesn’t want to supply a Ring video that seems vital to a local law enforcement investigation, police can contact Amazon, which will then essentially “subpoena” the video.

Ah, oh well.

And Apple are but the latest tech giant caught uploading your conversations to the mothership.

I suspect most people don't know, or don't care, that this is all going on? Perhaps this is just the world we live in these days? If you told me 20 years ago that homes would have video cameras and cylinders recording everything said and done I would have thought you nuts.

Yet here we are. 2019.

As a side note I'm a bit pissed off that Apple are doing this. They'd always positioned themselves as holding a higher standard. While you knew the creepy tracking tradeoffs using anything Facebook/Instagram/Google based, Apple were supposed to be better. But I guess not, and everything is terrible.

It's been about a month, how are you getting on in your new house you didn't ask. I'll tell you. We love it. But roses it has not been.

Couple days after we moved in we had raw sewage coming up out of all the shower drains. As you do. Blockage from the house to the City line.

About a week later a nice little flood in the laundry room and part of the living room. Pipe in the wall feeding the washing machine disintegrated. We had a restoration company come in to dry out the floors/walls/framing. A week of jet engines and not hearing ourselves think. I'd envisioned living in the house slightly longer before putting in our first house insurance claim.

Then last week during the storm of century we got, well, all the rain I think. The puddle in the kitchen with ceiling dripping a lovely good morning surprise. Leaky roof is leaky.

Hoping for a quiet and incident free rest of the year.