Also started a new workout program, put together with help from Gemini. I'll write a proper post about that soon.

We were fed up with our Nectar memory foam mattress. Well, I was. A few years ago, it developed a dip on my side of the bed - insert weight-related comment here. It was still in warranty, so Nectar sent out an independent company to check it. The guy who came out acknowledged there was a dip, but it wasn't a big enough dip for Nectar to send out a replacement. Thanks Nectar.

I don't know why I continued to put up with it. But, after a couple weeks of sustained bad sleep and waking up achy and sore over Christmas, enough was enough. This time, we've ditched memory foam completely and gone for a medium-firm pocket sprung mattress. My back cannot wait.

I don't like the thought of leaving my thirties behind, to be honest. It's definitely worse than leaving my twenties behind. That said, I don't feel forty at all. I eat better than I ever have, look after my body better than I ever have, and I sleep... well, two out of three ain't bad! Maybe this is the year I start going to bed earlier. Maybe.

There'll be no wild celebration or party to usher in this latest milestone - that's not really me. Just eating good food with my best people. And maybe some DJing, definitely some gaming, a game of football, a walk in the forest, and a gym visit too.

Forty doesn't actually sound too bad at all...

Now if I could just stop getting colds...

This evening, I drove past a house that had Christmas lights already up. I'm no Scrooge, but that's officially too early. Ellie's birthday is at the end of November, so we wait until that's been and gone before we turn our attention to Christmas. Plus, the weather in November has so far been pretty mild and it doesn't feel cold enough to be thinking about Christmas yet.

I remembered pretty much everything I needed to do. The only thing I had forgotten is that you need to leave the adhesive on the inner tube for a minute or two before you apply the repair patch.

It was also nice showing Ellie how to find a inner tube puncture by submerging it in water and looking for the bubbles!

I've also just had a week off, spent down in Devon in a small town called Brixham, near Paignton and Torquay.

We took Ellie to Paignton Zoo, enjoyed beach days, ate good food, and enjoyed the coastal walks. However, I will not miss driving on the steep thin roads.

Isn't it weird how momentum works? You spend time and effort generating good momentum and posting becomes an easy habit. Then, for whatever reason, you miss a few days and if you don't force yourself to post, you lose it all. Back to square one.

It's not like I forgot to post, either. About two weeks ago, I realised I hadn't posted for a while and told myself I had to get back into it. Then a weird thing happened: because I'd lost the momentum, jumping back in felt harder to do. The momentum I had previously felt unachievable, or the effort to get it back was more than I was willing to put in (at the time).

Little and often. That's the key. Let's see if I can build a habit of posting at least once a week.

Will have to write a proper post about it to get all my thoughts down.

"Audentes Fortuna Iuvat".

Introduction

If your Ghost setup can't send transactional emails - such as user invites and password resets - then you probably haven't configured your mail settings correctly.

Step 1: Create Gmail app password

1. Go to https://myaccount.google.com/apppasswords and login (if you cannot create an app password you may need to enable 2FA first)
2. Enter an app name that's easy to remember (e.g. Ghost SMTP)
3. Copy your password and write it down (once you close the popup you won't be able to see it again)

Step 2: Update Ghost mail config

1. Go to your project directory cd /var/www/ghost
2. Open and edit config.production.json
3. Copy and paste the below config, replacing user and pass with your own credentials:

"mail": {
    "transport": "SMTP",
    "options": {
      "host": "smtp.gmail.com",
      "port": 587,
      "auth": {
        "user": "mygmailaccount@gmail.com",
        "pass": "your APP password"
      }
    }
  },

4. Restart Ghost

Conclusion

Hopefully, that should fix your SMTP issues and allow you to send password reset requests, etc. Don't do what I did and accidentally type smtp.google.com instead of smtp.gmail.com and then spend ages trying to figure out why it didn't work.

If you are still having issues, on my search for answers I did find some people had issues with Digital Ocean (DO) locking down port 587. This site is hosted on DO and I didn't have that issue, but if it is for you then that might be a good place to start.

Resources

Here are some threads and posts that I found useful on my quest to solve this issue:

How to deliver Ghost emails from your local dev setup

How to get Ghost sending mail from your development install, without a whole lot of extra fuss.

Spectral Web ServicesCathy Sarisky, Ghost Expert

How to setup basic SMTP for Ghost

Disclaimer I’ve just started to use Ghost as a platform for blogs. Before that, I’ve been…

DEV Communitychakzefir

How to setup basic SMTP for Ghost

How to setup basic SMTP for Ghost Almost everybody has Gmail, right? But a small amount of those knows, that it also includes free SMTP service, which is the same as other Google products: fast&reliable. Everything you need is your email and dedicated app password (for security reasons). 🗝 To gen…

Ghost Forumchakzefir

We were at a family BBQ on Easter Monday and as the week has gone on more of the family have become ill.

Ellie didn't finish her breakfast this morning and after she barely touched her lunch, the school called us to come and get her.

I've experienced waves of feeling rough throughout the day, with a headache and achy muscles to boot. I will now starve myself until I know with 100% certainty that I'm hungry and the worst of the bug is over with.

Here's hoping for a incident-free evening...

My worst habit during time off is going to bed much later than normal. I still get up around the same time each morning, so I feel more and more tired the longer that I let it go on.

Anyway, the time off was enjoyable. We went swimming, played crazy golf, visited the Winchester Science Centre and its awesome planetarium, had BBQs and spent time with family over the Easter weekend.

There is so much chocolate to eat and I'd rather we didn't have it in the house at all because it is derailing my summer body goals.

A tinny-sounding 'Gotta Get Thru This', the 2001 Garage anthem by Daniel Bedingfield, was playing through the shop speakers. "Tune!", I thought to myself as I walked past the carrots and potatoes, chucking a bag of organic spinach into my basket.

It wasn't until I was back in the car that it dawned on me: the music playing in Tesco now includes songs from my own childhood. No doubt picked to make shoppers feel nostalgic and happy.

Did it make me feel more nostalgic? Yes, but that's not the point. I'm now one of the old guys in Tesco and I don't like it.