Stronger Than the Snap

Don't Be Average

Tue, 31 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000

Why is it come people choose to chase shit, consume their life with it and then cry their life is average?

“The Dalai Lama, when asked what surprised him most about humanity, answered "Man! Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.”

It is so easy in this age to do the above. Sadly for me, i witness daily on first hand someone very close to me doing this very thing. How do you get someone to break the cycle? You can lead a horse to water, but you certainly cannot make it drink it!

As humans, we all take the path of least resistance. Perhaps it is easier to just accept that life will be average rather than fight it.

"You can lead 100 but you cannot carry three on your back."

Self inflicted burn out

Tue, 03 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000

So Feb is over. It was effectively 25/28 days worked - with a combination of all areas of the businesses, and coding and gym.

I should have taken time off as I am now feeling drained.

As i said to Emma the other day; im chasing these sunny uplands and i just hope they are worth it.

"I need a few days to get bits done then ill chill" is something i find myself saying all too often.

Perhaps its a syd thing to learn to stop.

On the plus side, squatting 110kg for reps is easy now. So perhaps I need to focus more on that.

110kg squats fine. 5kg hip adductors 3s7r ruined

Thu, 26 Feb 2026 09:00:00 +0000

So its all progressing. legs stronger, balance stronger. Megan has modified the programme and ive even done my first mini sprint with T - he did beat me but progress! and the look on his face that i was able to run - priceless.

So how has this been gone so far. Megan added hip adductors into the mix - or as she and other call it "The Good Girl, Bad Girl Machine" - i will let the reader determine why it is called that.

Alas, the good girl element broke me - nothing at the time. but the DOMS the next 36 hours later - a struggle to walk and painful 24-7

Last night involved hot bath, stretching, theragun with caution, protein shake before bed + 300ml water and took a sleeping tablet. slept from 10.30pm to 8am.

Feeling much more alert today

This shows its an area of weakness which needs to be fixed before the return to skiing!

Lift off : in all areas

Tue, 17 Feb 2026 09:00:00 +0000

Its been a minute. Lots been going on...

Work, gym, family, self care, a cold, no sun.

Its been a busy February. Lots of systems being built that are freeing up time and mental capital. But equally a concern that ai will blitz so many jobs that its time to be ready and learn a trade.

Think of it this way, if everything is paid off, and suddenly there is no need for energy brokers or that tenants begin defaulting or that landlords sell up/self manage; i dont want to be hungry.

Instead pick up some tools; go do some easy jobs a day and net £200 to £400 a day!

Its proper doomsday scenario planning but that type of thinking has kept me well ahead of the curve. See, deni kept saying lets upsize. I kept saying no, you can only be in one room at a time.

Now if it does all go to hell soon, my houses are paid off in full, sitting on a stockpile of cash as well, earning interest and assets which if tenants did stop paying could be sold. Meanwhile do a trades day job and its suddenly a new chapter.

I always say you are only as good as your next trade.... so let's see.

October to Feb

Tue, 03 Feb 2026 09:00:00 +0000

a picture speaks a thousand words!

above was october, right leg looking weinerlike

today, its looking fuller.

nothing else to add today!!

👻 Talk to the Ghost. He gives even less fucks than I do.

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 09:00:00 +0000

How I built an automated bouncer for my energy brokerage

😇 The problem with being nice

I’ve got a broker. Let’s call him Raj.

Raj is productive; 77 contracts since October. Not bad. But Raj has a habit: he looks something up, forgets to save it, then looks it up again. And again. And again.

192 lookups. 122 unique meters. 70 duplicates.
That’s a 36.5% duplicate rate; worst of all my brokers 📉

Every duplicate lookup hits paid APIs 💸
Every stale browser session he leaves open creates timeout noise ⚠️
Every “quick question” on WhatsApp costs me 15 minutes I will never get back ⏳

So I did the polite thing and sent him a message:

Hi Raj; noticed you’ve done 58 lookups vs 11 sales. Looks like you’re doing a lot of duplicate lookups. We have WhatsApp functionality to send results to your phone. Don’t be crying if the free model is removed if abused.

His response?

ok

Classic Raj 🤷‍♂️

🧓 The old way doesn’t work

I’ve tried the whole “be nice and educate” routine:

Explaining nicely; goes in one ear, out the other 🗣️➡️🗑️
Sending reminders; ignored within 24 hours 📭
WhatsApp warnings; “ok” then back to old habits 🔁
Being patient; just trains the behaviour 🐕

The older I get, the less fucks I give about hand-holding grown adults. I’m not running a daycare. I’m running a business.

If you want a friend, get a dog 🐶

👻 Enter the Ghost

I built Ghost OS during ACL reconstruction recovery in 2025 🦵
Started with zero coding experience. Now it’s a FastAPI platform with 100+ endpoints, quietly handling most of the repetitive nonsense 🤖

But automation alone isn’t enough.

Automation without enforcement is just a polite robot.

Ghost needed teeth 🦷

So I built something I call the Wallet Educator 💳

💳 The Wallet Educator

The rule is simple:

All lookup results are cached for 7 days.

If you try to look up the same meter with the same data tiers inside that window, you don’t just get the result again.

You get this:

🔒 You looked this up 3 hours ago
Results are cached for 7 days. To reduce duplicate lookups, repeat views require 2 credits.
💡 Tip: Check your WhatsApp for the original result.
[Open WhatsApp] [Pay 2 Credits to View]

No arguing ❌
No explaining ❌
No “bhai please” ❌

Want the data again?

Pay up. 💰

📊 The numbers don’t lie

I pulled historical usage and ran the “what would this cost now?” scenario.

Broker	Duplicates within 7 days	New cost
Raj	47	94 credits
Anuj	14	28 credits
Nina	1	2 credits
Sonia	1	2 credits

Raj currently has 24 credits. At his current rate of sloppiness, he’ll burn through them in days and have to buy more 🔥

The man who was too tight to pay is about to fund my semi-retirement 🏖️

⚙️ The beautiful thing about systems

Systems do not get tired of repeating themselves ♻️
Systems do not feel guilty 😐
Systems do not waste 15 minutes on “quick questions” ⛔
Systems do not care if you are upset 🤷

When Raj comes back from holiday and hits that locked screen for the first time, I will not be there to explain it.

The UI explains it for me:

What happened; You looked this up 3 days ago
Why; Results are cached for 7 days
How to avoid it; Check your WhatsApp
Your options; Unlock for 2 credits

Self-service education 📘
Zero effort from me 😌

🧠 The philosophy

Every business owner eventually learns this:

Method	Your effort	Effectiveness
Explaining nicely	High	Low
Sending reminders	Medium	Low
Warnings	Medium	Medium
Hitting their wallet	Zero	100%

You can send 100 WhatsApp messages trying to change someone’s behaviour 📱
Or you can make their wallet feel the consequences 💥

Guess which one works.

🏷️ The tagline

When Raj complains about the new system, he can talk to the Ghost 👻

The Ghost says nothing.

He just charges 2 credits 💳

🎯 The takeaway

If you are spending your time:

reminding people to do things properly
explaining the same thing over and over
hand-holding adults who should know better
being “nice” at the expense of your sanity

Stop ✋

Build a system 🏗️
Give the system teeth 🦷
Let the system do the parenting 👶➡️🤖

You are not here to be friends.
You are here to build something that works without you.

And if someone doesn’t like it?

They can talk to the Ghost.

He gives even less fucks than I do. 👻🔥

—
P.S. The WhatsApp feature is free. Use it; or sponsor my retirement 😉

21000 steps and no knee ache...

Tue, 20 Jan 2026 09:00:00 +0000

So last week I did my first walk of the month where I head to London, see friends and potter about, eat some food (usually a burger) then get home. Ive done some of my best thinking and planning on these solo days.

I made a conscious effort to ensure I do more rehab this year to reach my goal of skiing Feb 2027.

The gym strength is returning and symmetry is beginning to reappear.

The lower back is still stiff in the mornint but the new chiropractor has been brilliant.

Im going to start incorporating the sissy squat as a way to strengthen knees, quads, ankles the lot. First attempt below

Progress is happening; now to keep momentum...

Day 1 grind of 2026

Tue, 06 Jan 2026 09:00:00 +0000

So back in the gym yesterday. Its time to park the coding and get back on the road to health.

So xmas was a bit of a write off with fitness so it was a grind to get back in.

Everything feeling weaker but thats fine - it means we will be back stronger.

Aiming for 5 days this week- and will ramp up.

Megan said to commence to certain plyometrics; i need to be able to do 1.25bw single leg press. This was achieved but dropping back to 60kgs to build stability.

I think that once a month of routine is done, it will be like normal.

New Year’s Eve Eve: The Day My Business Ran Itself (and I Did Nothing) 🥂🤖

Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:00:00 +0000

It’s 30/12/2025; that weird limbo where nobody knows what day it is, suppliers are “back on 2nd”, and brokers suddenly discover urgency like it’s a new religion.

So naturally, I spent my evening doing something deeply normal and mentally stable:

Reading uvicorn logs for fun. 📜🫠

And… I’ve got to admit; it was beautiful.

Not because I love server logs (I don’t; I love peace). But because those logs are proof that 2025 has been the year my life stopped being “Arpit the Admin” and became “Arpit the Owner”.

🌙 The Night Watch (00:00–05:00)

While I was asleep:

480+ heartbeat checks
Every single one returned 200 OK ✅

No drama. No surprises. No “can you just”.
Just Ghost OS quietly babysitting the business like a night nurse who doesn’t do small talk. 🧑‍⚕️🤐

🌅 Dawn Chorus (05:00–07:30)

Before most humans had located their will to live:

05:00 → Scottish Power report ✅
05:30 → E.ON report ✅
06:00 → WhatsApp reset (11 brokers cleared) ✅
06:05 → Cache sync ✅
07:15 → EDF webhook fires → waits 120s (because Zoho) → Dropbox upload ✅
07:49 → E.ON pricebook → 9 files processed → WhatsApp blast ✅

I opted in myself at 06:30 with: “Hi. Smash day.” 💪
The system acknowledged me and carried on without caring.

As it should. 😌

☀️ The Working Day (09:00–18:00)

This is where it gets properly satisfying.

🌍 BOS, now featuring: International Operations

Sangita logged in from India and submitted prep forms cleanly.
Yes, India. Reliance Jio IP. The logs don’t lie. 📍🇮🇳

Six months ago this would’ve been:

“PLEASE PREPARE ASAP” (all caps)
Missing data
Follow-ups
Ticket tennis
WhatsApp chaos

Now it’s:

Form submission ✅
Structured info ✅
Auto tickets ✅
Audit trail ✅
Me doing absolutely nothing ✅

🧾 Broker tools doing broker things

One broker ran six lookups; three were free because the system pulled from daily report caches first.
That’s not just automation; that’s the machine saving money while I’m pretending I don’t care. 💸🙂

✍️ DocuSign completions

DocuSign completions came in; the system fired instant notifications.
No “just letting you know it’s signed” required.
Because the system already knows. 👁️✅

🧹 Inbox cleanup

At 17:30 the inbox cleanup script deleted five emails I didn’t read, didn’t reply to, and didn’t pretend to care about.

The dream. 🧼🗑️

🎭 The Plot Twist: The Scary “405 Errors” That Weren’t

I saw a few 405 Method Not Allowed entries and had a brief moment of “oh great, it’s broken”.

It wasn’t broken.

It was Microsoft. 🤡

Microsoft link preview bots were sending HEAD requests to check if the prep form and broker tools links were safe, then real humans followed with a proper GET and everything loaded fine.

So the 405s are basically the internet equivalent of:

“Just checking you’re not a scam.”
“Carry on.” ✅

Could I add HEAD support to clean the logs? Yes.

Will I? Probably not.

Adding code to silence harmless noise is how you end up maintaining features for… Microsoft robots. 🤖📉

📱 The Behavioural Win (the one that actually matters)

The tech is nice; but the real win is this:

My WhatsApp has gone quiet. 🔕

Not because brokers stopped working.
Because the system stopped needing me.

Amul WhatsApped: “Prep form PIN where is it?”
I didn’t reply for 90 minutes; and in that time he found it himself and submitted the prep form.

That’s not rudeness.
That’s training. 🧠✅

I then had to break his old habit of “micro-updating me”:

“DocuSign signed”
“Contract needs to be in by 5:30”

Mate… the ticket literally tells you that. 📌😅

So I pinned a message:

📌 BOS Admin has moved!
🎫 Contract queries → Raise a ticket
🔍 How-to → KB or Helpbot
📊 Status updates → Check your ticket
This chat is for socials only now. Business queries here will be ignored.
Trust the process! 🤙

Pinned it to Amul.
Pinned it to Sangita.
Pinned it to Raghu.
Pinned it to my sanity. 🧘‍♂️

🧨 The Raghu Clause (every system needs one)

There is always one broker who refuses to read, refuses to follow instructions, and refuses to believe the rules apply to them.

That broker is Raghu.

He sends:

half the proof of address
one previous address instead of five years
random documents nobody asked for
then wonders why the supplier won’t progress it

Old Arpit would’ve chased because “it’s £875 for us”.

New Arpit didn’t.

Because the true cost isn’t £875. It’s:

the argument
the guilt trip
the WhatsApp spiral
the repeat behaviour next week

So I left the ticket in error and let the supplier deadline do what years of polite explaining couldn’t.

Natural consequences are undefeated. 🥊⏳

🥂 The Real New Year’s Message

Automation wasn’t about speed.

It was about reclaiming my headspace.

It was about not flinching when WhatsApp pings.
It was about not being the emotional shock absorber for other people’s chaos.
It was about building boundaries in code.

And on the second-to-last working day of 2025, I watched my business run across time zones, suppliers, webhooks, bots, brokers, invoices, and status syncs…

With:

Errors: 0 ✅
Crashes: 0 ✅
Me: mostly uninvolved ✅

So yeah. I’m going into 2026 with a new vibe:

Less admin.
More ownership.
More peace.
More systems.

And if Q1 gets manic?

Fine. The machine doesn’t care.
It just logs more lines. 📈🤙

Happy New Year (almost). 🥂✨

Merry Christmas Arpbot

Tue, 23 Dec 2025 09:00:00 +0000

For the first time in about ten years, I’ve closed the business over Christmas without the usual background guilt.

No “I’ll just keep an eye on WhatsApp”.
No “ping me if it’s urgent”.
No lying to myself that I’m technically off but functionally still on call.

We’re closed from the 24th.
The systems keep running.
Tickets can wait.

And anyone who “can’t be arsed” respecting that is, conveniently, the reason ArpBot needed to retire in the first place.

For years, I made myself the answer to everything.
Brokers, tenants, landlords, family, the dreaded brother, friends — if something broke, stalled, or needed sorting, it landed with me. I was fast, dependable, and always available. Gold-plated answers, delivered on demand. I actually got a buzz from it; alas no more!

Which sounds impressive until you realise the downside:
when you are the system, the system never switches off.

This year has been the transition year.
Not just new tools, but a different way of operating. Structure instead of heroics. Systems instead of saviour mode. Answers that exist whether I’m online or not.

Closing properly over Christmas isn’t laziness.
It’s what a grown-up operation looks like.

ArpBot didn’t disappear because I stopped caring.
It retired because the business no longer needs a human fail-safe duct-taped to WhatsApp.

Frankly, it should’ve happened sooner.

Merry Christmas ya filthy animals!

— Arpit

Its beginning to look a lot like...... freedom.

Wed, 17 Dec 2025 09:00:00 +0000

So its 17th Dec. Ive got a day to myself in London. I plan to do walking - lots of it to get the heart rate into zone 2 and to have coffee and drinks with friends along the way.

Its not forest gump levels of walking but enough! See i used to do this monthly - come to London walk loads and go home - racking up 25000/30000 steps. It would usually involve a steak dinner in the evening with Emma too. Steak is justified when burning 800Kcal walking.

So back to the title.... why freedom you ask? As previously id have to bring a laptop... what if raghu needs a credit check and to send 1000 messages to discuss the same shit we spoke about last week. Or Jane wants to have a quick (it never is) chat about her customer kd structural ltd and how their eac has changed over the year, or Abdul wanting to credit check the same shitty Turkish kebab shop again for his 5th COT in 3 years (I promise this time will be different!).

Well now the ghost now handles that. Experian credit checks self serve, the broker tools portal allows self serve lookups (you wanna check the same eac 5x a day - fill ya boots its your credit and credits = £££), tickets are help desk run with 90% of the answers in the kb. A 24hour SLA means the it can be picked up next day if deni isn't on it.

Tenant side of the business have always had the arthur occupant app - so thats easy to bat off/allocate to tradesman.

Im still monitoring logs of scripts but its more habbit than necessity. As Warren buffet said "put your eggs in one basket then watch that basket"

Accounting side is beginning to see the light too - ethanseye, alfiesarm and leoslair manning the invoice ship too - thanks lads!

So over time the days of having hardly any admin to do will increase. Boy does that feel exciting and scarily addictive. See when you tell everyone and his dog that you want to be semi retired at 45; they probably look at you and think one of several things

Wanker
You've got rich parents
Who have you robbed?
You're not paying enough tax if you can semi retire at 45
You wont last - you'll need something else to do.

What other people think of me is none of my concern... but what do I think from the above list... probably number 5. But thats the beauty of the statement "semi retired by 45", I am retiring manual admin, meaning ill have time to do something else (whether work or fun) and the mills will keep producing the grain!

Ramble over.

Time for a day off.

Automation Built from the Squat Rack

Tue, 09 Dec 2025 09:00:00 +0000

A Short Story About Contracts, ADHD, ACL Rehab… and One Very Fed-Up ArpBot!

There is a particular type of moment that only appears when life, business, marriage, and physical rehab collide.

Mine happened in a gym changing room. Smelling like a damp sock from starting plyometrics, and feeling off sync!

I rang the office (which is to say: Denisse) to let her know a contract had just landed in the @esign mailbox, as i knew she would have missed it.

Her response?

“Oh… no, I didn’t see that. Sorry P!”

Of course she didn’t.
Because the universe has a sense of humour.

At this point I realised something deeply undignified:
I was literally acting as a human notification system.
Manual webhook. Powered by irritation.

And this was after mesaging her earlier in the squat rack to check something she’d missed.
Yes. I was rehabbing an knee while trying to spot-check admin from 3miles away. Multi-tasking at its worst.

Something had to give and it wasnt going to be the knee!

🧠 The Changing-Room Epiphany

Standing there fully butt naked, with zero fucks given, I had the thought:

“This is ridiculous. I build automations for everything else. Why am I the ping?”

That was it.
The moment the universe tapped me on the shoulder and said:
Write the bloody script, Arpit. Code Once, Forget Forever.

⚙️ Four Files Later… Ghost OS Has a New Superpower

By the end of the evening, the @esign mailbox had been upgraded from
“we’ll check it when we remember” → real-time alerts.

WhatsApp if we’re opted in.
SMS if we’re not.
No excuses.
No “I didn’t see it”.
No nudges across the living room. Or squat rack.

DocuSign, Zoho Sign, AdobeSign, Signable,… whoever tries to send us paperwork now gets piped straight into Ghost OS and blasted to both of us instantly.

It is ADHD-friendly, couple-friendly, ACL-friendly, and (most importantly) Arpit-friendly.

📬 Why This One Actually Matters

This wasn’t about contracts.
This was about cognitive load.

There’s a specific mental friction that comes from carrying other people’s reminders.
You don’t notice it until it becomes absurd, like:

checking the inbox
checking again
nudging someone
squatting 90 kg while thinking “I hope she saw that email”
phoning from a gym changing room to inform someone what’s literally on their own screen

That is not a sustainable workflow for anyone.

And that is why this automation feels like a small act of self-respect.

💡 The Real Lesson

The best automations never come from sitting neatly at a desk planning them.
They come from the “What the hell am I doing?” moments.

Robot mower ideas in the garden.
EDF pricebook scripts at 6am.
Revenue automations while making breakfast.
And now:
contract alert webhooks invented mid-rehab, half dressed, standing in a gym changing room.

Ghost OS has become the digital equivalent of duct tape:
Every time something annoys me, a new endpoint appears.

🚀 Semi-Retirement Mode: Activated

This little feature might seem tiny, but it represents something bigger:

One less thing to think about.
One less thing to chase.
One less thing to remind someone about.
And one small step closer to the goal: semi-retirement by 45.

Automate the friction away; keep the life you actually want.

🦵 Back to the Rehab

The Knee Hurts Even Less as each day goes. We at month 5 now!

Its all coming together. 2025 will go down as a VINTAGE year!

And now, I no longer have to shout “CHECK the esign mailbox” across the room like a deranged operations manager. You get the ping on your phone, action it.

Progress comes in many forms.

This one just happened to come with emojis, webhooks, and a silent vow:
Never again will I act as a manual notification system for anyone. Not even Denisse. ❤️

Two Nights, One System, and Three Nephews Who Accidentally Became Software Engineers

Fri, 05 Dec 2025 09:00:00 +0000

There is a particular kind of chaos that arrives in your life after an ACL rupture.
You start rebuilding your leg… and then, apparently, your entire business infrastructure. Because... well why not. I couldn't possibly sit on my arse and do nothing.

This story is about the latter.

It begins innocently:
I was fed up with chasing and reconciling invoices like a Victorian clerk. I just moved to Xero accounting for my property company and it was like being liberated. We found a saas software company called TailRide and for £400 a year they would auto fetch all my invoices. It didn't. At the same time, Amazon Business had decided it was far too important to email invoices like a normal company.

So, naturally, the solution was obvious:
build my own multi-entity invoice ingestion engine from scratch.

In two nights.
From 4pm to 11pm.
With discussions, planning, modding, coding, implementing, testing.

But the surprising part wasn’t the speed.
It was that it was… fun.

And that’s because somewhere along the way, I started naming the components after my nephews.

Meet Ethan, Alfie, and Leo — the accidental software team

Most people name systems after Greek gods or animals.
I name mine after my nephews with concerningly accurate software personalities.

Ethan

Calm. Observant. Forensic.
The kind of kid who will one day dismantle an engine just to understand the noise it makes.

Perfect for the orchestrator that monitors everything.
Hence: EthansEye — the watcher.

Alfie

A hooligan. Like a massive one!
If Ethan watches the world, Alfie grabs it. Hard.

Ideal for the Amazon Business spider that crashes through the DOM and seizes invoices from deep inside the UI.
Hence: AlfiesArm — the grabber.

Leo

Explorer. Collector. Takes things and stores them in mysterious locations “for later”.
If you leave a wallet, spoon, or remote unattended, he will migrate it to a new ecosystem.

Perfect match for the Google Drive collector that quietly hoovers up stray files from the cloud.
Hence: LeosLair — the cave where things accumulate.

Together, the three of them form a very strange but very accurate software stack:

Ethan watches.
Alfie grabs.
Leo hoards things in a digital cave.

And I cannot overstate how much more enjoyable debugging becomes when the log reads like childcare reports:

“Alfie’s Arm smashed into a selector again.”
“Leo’s Lair has collected 17 files no one recalls creating.”
“EthansEye is patiently cleaning up behind them.”

This naming decision made the entire build entertaining in a way no corporate developer will ever understand.

Two Nights. A Bit of AI. And a Lot of Clarity.

People assume the magic was the AI.
It wasn’t.

AI is not a wizard locked in my PC writing sonnets in Python.

AI is multiplication.
If you multiply clarity, you get speed.
If you multiply chaos, you get garbage.

What happened over those two nights was simple:

I knew exactly what I wanted the system to do.
I forced myself to articulate it precisely.
Claude wrote the code as fast as I refined the design.
I tested, corrected, and shaped the architecture.
I then handed md docs to chatgpt for a celebratory high 5!

AI handled the typing; I handled the thinking.

That combination is lethal.

It wasn’t “AI built EthansEye”.
It was:

I built EthansEye in my head, and AI removed the friction.

KISS, but honour it properly

For those who dont know KISS = KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID!

Somewhere around midnight on day one, the original dream of dashboards, interfaces, views, and filters collapsed under the weight of its own pointlessness.

I scrapped all of it.

Why?

Dropbox folders already exist.
Xero inboxes already exist.
Logs already exist.
File movement is the real truth.
UIs are maintenance debt.

So I rewrote the architecture to the simplest version that could live for ten years with zero attention:

Three collectors → Dropbox
Entity detection → ACP / BLS / BOS / UNKNOWN
One sender → Xero
One archive → history
WhatsApp notification → me
Done.

This is KISS, not as a slogan but as a survival strategy.

If you want the extended-cut director’s commentary with diagrams, selectors, and JSON state files, the technical MD documents cover it in forensic detail.

But the soul of the system is exactly one sentence:

Invoices flow in. EthansEye routes them. Xero receives them. I do nothing.

The moment I realised it was done

It was about 22:40 on night two.

The scheduler ran manually:

Amazon invoices: collected.
Gmail attachments: collected.
Google Drive strays: collected.
Everything sorted cleanly into ACP, BLS, BOS.
Everything delivered to Xero inboxes.
Everything archived.
WhatsApp message:

“EthansEye Xero Sender Complete – Sent 12 invoices.”

That was it.

The admin shadow that followed me for years evaporated.
The multi-company complexity collapsed into a single elegant pipeline.
The entire system was now self-maintaining.

And somewhere, metaphorically speaking:

Ethan approved quietly,
Alfie pressed send repeatedly,(why not right!?)
And Leo kept the backups in a cave.

Conclusion: We don’t just recover knees. We recover time.

This all started because I wanted to stop wasting energy on admin; but underneath that was something bigger:

Rebuilding capability.
Rebuilding agency.
Rebuilding the parts of life that drain you without permission.

ACL rehab teaches you quickly that your time isn’t infinite, your attention isn’t free, and your systems need to work for you, not against you.

Automation isn’t laziness.
It is liberation.

Ghost OS is no longer just a folder of scripts; it is becoming the platform that gives me my hours back. My clarity back. My evenings back.

And the funniest part?

I owe a surprising amount of that momentum to the mythology I built around three small nephews who have no idea they’re now department heads inside an automation system.

Ethan: Head of Observability
Alfie: Head of Retrieval
Leo: Head of Storage

Ghost OS has its founding team.

And the invoices can look after themselves now.

What the System Actually Does

For anyone who wants the practical version, here’s the entire pipeline in plain English:

AlfiesArm – Logs into Amazon Business, grabs all the invoices, and drops them into the correct Dropbox folders.
Gmail Poller – Scans email for PDF invoices and sends them to Dropbox too.
Leo's Lair – Collects any invoices sitting in a Google Drive dump folder and moves them into Dropbox.
Entity Detection – Reads each PDF, figures out if it's ACP, BLS, BOS (or UNKNOWN), and sorts it automatically.
Xero Sender – Emails the sorted invoices to the correct Xero inbox and archives them.
Scheduler – Runs the whole thing daily while I’m asleep.

Result: The invoices process themselves, and I get a WhatsApp message telling me it’s done. A process which would take 1 to 2 hours now takes less than 2minutes!

How I Sent 763 WhatsApp Business Notifications in 5 months for £0.02 💬💸

Wed, 03 Dec 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Every business owner has that one moment where they realise:
“Hang on… am I the idiot here for doing this manually?”

For me, that moment involved WhatsApp, pricebook updates, a chatty broker who messages “hi, urgent, need help” every morning, and an API that happily charges you for every outbound notification unless you play the game properly.

Five months later, the scoreboard reads:

763 notifications delivered
762 delivered for free
Total WhatsApp bill: £0.02

Yes; two pence.

Most people would frame that as a “clever hack”.
I call it using WhatsApp’s own pricing model against itself.

Let me walk you through how I did it.

The Original Problem 🤦‍♂️

I needed to automate WhatsApp alerts for brokers:

Pricebooks going live
Cut-off reminders
Ticket updates
Contract submissions

Nothing complicated. Until you read Meta’s pricing.

In the UK, business-initiated marketing template conversations cost:

£0.0705 ex VAT

£0.0846 inc VAT

≈ 8.5p per outbound notification

And because WhatsApp charges per conversation, not per message, each notification you send without the user messaging you first triggers a new paid conversation.

Now imagine sending 762 of those.

762 × £0.0846 = £64.45

So without an intelligent system, my automated notifications would have cost:

£64.45 in 5 months

Versus the £0.02 I actually paid**

Nice margin difference.

The Broker I Thought Was a Problem 🤦‍♂️➡️🤝💡

At first, I planned to implement:

Throttles
Daily limits
Complexity
Behaviour policing

Because I had one broker who messages every… single… morning.

“GM boss 🙏”
“Morning 🙏”
“Hi 🙏”
“Hi boss any update 🙏”
“🙏🙏🙏”

I assumed he’d abuse the system and trigger constant conversation windows.

I was wrong. And Meta’s pricing proved it.

The Pricing Insight That Changed Everything 💡

WhatsApp charges for business-initiated conversations.
They do not charge when the customer (broker) opens the conversation first.

When a broker messages me, WhatsApp gives me:

A free 24-hour service window

Unlimited messages
£0.00 cost

So the “problem broker” was actually:

Opening a free window every morning
Unlocking unlimited free notifications
Demonstrating the perfect system behaviour

He wasn’t the problem.
He was the blueprint.

This is why observing user behaviour will always beat trying to control it.

The System I Built ⚙️🔥

I designed a daily opt-in model.

How it works:

6 AM — All brokers are automatically marked opt-out
A broker sends any message (“hi”, “morning”, even “🙏”)
They are instantly marked opt-in for that day
I can now send unlimited notifications for free
If they don’t check in, they don’t get anything and I don’t pay anything

It is ruthless and elegant.

If you want updates, you say hello.
If you are on holiday, I leave you alone.

Tech behind it

Two small but mighty scripts:

whatsapp_cache.py — keeps a daily JSON cache of opted-in brokers
whatsapp_cache
whatsapp_messaging.py — sends messages, checks the cache, and prevents accidental paid conversations
whatsapp_messaging

FastAPI handles Meta webhooks.
Zoho Creator stores broker metadata.
A cron job resets everything at 6 AM.

Minimal moving parts.
Zero maintenance.

The Numbers That Matter 📊

Period: 1 July 2025 → 20 November 2025

Total notifications: 763
Free notifications: 762
Paid notifications: 1
Actual cost: £0.02

Now compare that to the alternative:

Without opt-in:

762 × 8.46p = £64.45

With opt-in:

£0.02

Savings:

£64.43

A 3,222× reduction in cost.

I’m not a mathematician, but I do enjoy ROI that looks like that.

Why This Works So Well 🧠

1. Behaviour-led design

I didn’t fight how brokers behave; I designed around it.

2. No forced engagement

Brokers on holiday or being lazy don’t get spammed.

3. Infinite scale

5 brokers or 500 brokers; cost does not change.

4. No policing

No “you’ve exceeded your limit” nonsense.
No manual resets.
No extra admin.

5. Whisper-quiet maintenance

Build once; forget forever.

The Bigger Win 🔥

This project was born while I was sat recovering from ACL surgery, learning Python from scratch. Four months later, I had:

FastAPI endpoints
Meta API integration
Zoho Creator/Desk pipeline
A local daily opt-in cache
A zero-maintenance notification system
A two-pence operating cost

And a renewed appreciation for dry humour at WhatsApp’s expense.

What’s Coming Next 🚀

Using the same infrastructure:

Pricebook updates
Contract submission confirmations
Zoho Desk ticket updates
Bonus payment notifications
Daily GHOST digest for me and Denisse
Broker accountability nudges (my favourite)

All free, as long as they send that one daily “hi”.

Final Thought 🎯

Sometimes the “problem user” isn’t the problem.
Sometimes they show you the optimal pattern.
And if you watch carefully, you can turn their habits into free infrastructure.

This system cost me two pence.
It saved me over sixty quid.
And it runs while I sleep.

If you’re into automation, systems thinking, or simply watching a business owner slowly reduce admin to zero, follow along:

👉 StrongerThanTheSnap.co.uk

More automation.
Less nonsense.
Plenty of dry humour.

Automating Christmas and Birthday Bonuses 🎄🎂

Tue, 25 Nov 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Another Needless Ballache Removed

Date: 19 November 2025
Coding Experience: 4 months
Annual Time Saved: ~12 hours
Cost: £0
Broker Morale: Allegedly improved

The Gym Realisation 🏋️‍♂️

I was at the physio gym, doing the usual ACL rehab routine, when it dawned on me that I was still manually doing Christmas and birthday messages to brokers. And with our new broker tools system, i thought "how can i automate credit allocation for these two key days like i do for monthly allocation?" Do I trawl through contract data and allocate bonuses. Birthdays were worse; if it was not in my calendar, it was forgotten.

Pointless. Avoidable. A perfect candidate for automation.

I got home and built the solution that evening.

The Plan 🎁

Two systems; both automated and both removing me entirely.

1. Christmas Credits 🎅

Runs at 09:00 on 25 December.
Uses each broker’s live calendar year contract total.
Gives them 10 percent as credits; min 5, max 40.
Sends a proper HTML email with a Santa GIF.
Zero involvement from me; ideal.

2. Birthday Credits 🎉

Checks birthdays daily at 10:00.
Looks at the broker’s trailing 12 months of live contracts.
Allocates 5 percent as credits; min 5, max 20.
Sends a cake GIF email.
Fully hands-off.

Only “Live” and “Pending Live” contracts qualify; no credit for “submitted and hoping for the best” efforts. Sorry rags

The \$200 Flashback 💸

In 2016, I asked a developer to build a basic birthday message feature in Zoho. He quoted \$200 and delivered a masterpiece of bland:

Dear {broker name},
Wishing you a happy birthday.
Thanks,
BOS

I refused to pay. It never launched. He couldnt get it to work anyway!

Nine years later, I have built two fully functioning bonus systems myself with HTML, GIFs, logic, caps, and admin summaries.

Cost: £0
Satisfaction: high. very high.

The Build 🧠

Both systems are written in Deluge. Clean, efficient logic.

Christmas Script

Query all 2025 contracts.
Filter to Live or Pending Live.
Group by broker.
Apply the 10 percent bonus; cap at 40.
Update credits and send festive email.
Issue admin summary.

Birthday Script

Find brokers with today’s birthday.
Query last year’s contracts for each.
Apply 5 percent bonus; cap at 20.
Add credits and send cake email.
Send admin summary when applicable.

The runtime is trivial; it will scale to 100 brokers without breaking a sweat.

The Emails ✉️

Both emails are fully responsive with inline CSS and the usual polish.

Christmas:
Santa GIF; red and green palette; reference to their 2025 contract count. Looks professional without pretending I spent hours designing it.

Birthday:
Cake GIF; pink and purple palette; straight to the point. “We have not sent you cake, but here are some credits instead.”

Testing 🔧

I changed my birthday in the system to 20 November to test the workflow. Tomorrow at 10:00 I should receive:

The birthday email 🎂
Credits added
Admin summary

Then my DOB goes back.

Christmas is queued for 25 December. Brokers will assume I am feeling festive; the server will be doing all the actual work.

Parallel Progress ♻️

My ACL rehab and the automation share the same structure; repetitive graft that compounds. No drama; just consistency.

Rehab strengthens the knee; automation strengthens the business. Both pay off.

What Has Been Automated Since July ⚙️

Daily status sync for EDF, Scottish Power, BGB, and E.ON
Monthly broker credits
Pricebook distribution
Commission processing
Bank reconciliation
WhatsApp notifications
Broker self-service tools (60 to 80 percent ticket reduction)
Performance dashboards
Christmas bonuses (new)
Birthday bonuses (new)

Annual time saved: over 200 hours.
Ballache reduced: substantial.

The Real ROI 📈

Learning to code has:

Removed thousands in developer costs
Cut a mountain of admin
Reduced interruptions
Made processes predictable
Freed up mental space

It is not about “loving automation”; it is about refusing unnecessary work.

The Takeaway 🧹

If a task is predictable, boring, or relies on memory, automate it. The cost of doing it manually is far higher than you think.

If I can learn this in four months, anyone can. The only question is whether you want less admin or you enjoy suffering. I either live my life or spend my days! I'll take A please bob!

Next 🔜

Tomorrow’s test email should confirm everything works. Then I will move on to automating contract rollovers.

Knee progress continues. Automation progress continues. One rep; one script.

P.S. If you are a BOS broker, yes you will now get birthday credits. And yes, the Christmas bonus is real. Enjoy. 🎂🎄

Building a Knowledge Base Because I Got Tired of Repeating Myself 📚

Mon, 17 Nov 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Some people unwind by watching Netflix. I unwind by deleting avoidable admin from my life.
And nothing drains the soul quite like answering the same question twenty times a week from people who absolutely should know better.

So I finally snapped (figuratively; one ACL rupture in a lifetime is enough) and built a full Knowledge Base for BOS.

Why I Did It

There comes a point where you realise you are not running a business; you are running a daycare for grown adults who refuse to read.
Every day brought the same classics:

• “What is the status of this contract?”
• “Why is this commission amount different?”
• “Can you check something I could check myself?” 🙄

It was like Groundhog Day without the charm.
So I fixed it the sensible way; systemise it and move on.

The KB: My New Favourite Employee

I sat down and documented everything.
Supplier quirks. Objections. Commission logic. Status checks. LOA rules.
The lot.

Clear, blunt, searchable articles. Written for real humans.
No fluff. No corporate nonsense.
Just “here is the answer; go away and crack on”.

Honestly, if the KB were a person, I would put it on payroll.

Why It Works So Well

People want answers instantly, and now they get them.
Not from me; from the system.

It has killed off eighty percent of pointless questions.
And more importantly, it has forced everyone to level up.
Self-service is in. Hand-holding is out.
My inbox is finally breathing again.

Automation + KB = Freedom 🧩

The Knowledge Base slots into everything else I am building:
GHOST, Clarabot, FastAPI, Dropbox pipelines, Zoho Desk workflows.
All of it carries the same philosophy:

If it can be automated, documented, or eliminated; it should be.

The goal is simple.
Less admin; more impact.
Less noise; more progress.
More time for training, family, and actually running the business instead of being chained to tickets that never needed to exist.

The Cheeky Truth 😏

Most bottlenecks in business are caused by people who do not read.
So I built a system they cannot avoid reading.
Problem solved.

Why This Fits the Blog

Stronger Than The Snap is not just about rehabbing a knee; it is about rebuilding every part of my life to be sharper, calmer, and more efficient.

The Knowledge Base is part of that.
It is structure over chaos.
Systems over stress.
Compound returns instead of daily firefighting.

In short; it makes me stronger than the nonsense that used to drain me.
And that is very much the point.

Week 19 Gym Update

Tue, 11 Nov 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Managed five solid sessions last week; a consistency milestone that had to be reached by either hook or crook. It is finally starting to feel automatic again. Skipped Monday after a late Sunday (no point pretending otherwise), but heading in shortly and looking forward to it.

Focus lately has been on rebuilding deep strength and control rather than chasing numbers. Long-tempo squats, slow eccentrics, and proper full-range work are the staples. I know I can move heavier weight, but that’s not the goal; this phase is about earning clean movement through every angle and rebuilding confidence under load.

Picked up a Roman chair for the office too, so I’m slipping in sets of back extensions throughout the day. It’s a small thing, but it’s keeping my posterior chain active and the graft leg engaged even on desk days.

Momentum’s building again; one controlled rep at a time.

The Ballache Factor - My Secret Metric!

Tue, 04 Nov 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Ive got a question for you Pit: "how did you learn to code so fast?"

Me: "Had a torn ACL and got bored. Ballache factor drove me to automation." 😂

Forget KPIs, OKRs, or ROI. The only metric that matters: Ballache Factor™

📊 The Ballache Scale:

Level 10: Password hunt through 5 different folders while email timer ticks down
Level 9: Raghu asking the same question you answered yesterday
Level 8: Manual contract status updates for 30+ suppliers
Level 7: Commission spreadsheet with special character passwords
Level 5: Anything that interrupts you on a day off
Level 3: Minor inconveniences you can delegate
Level 1: Slight annoyance but liveable
Level 0: AUTOMATION - Ballache Factor: ZERO™

🎯 My Actual Business Strategy:

Identify high ballache tasks
Automate them ruthlessly
Measure success by absence of ballache
Repeat until semi-retired by 45

It's beautiful in its simplicity.

💡 The Ballache-Driven Development Method:

while ballache_factor > 0:
    identify_annoying_task()
    spend_2_hours_automating()
    ballache_factor = 0
    get_dopamine_hit()
    find_next_ballache()

Infinite loop of optimization!

🏆 My Greatest Hits (so far!):

EDF Commission: "jesssssus the password faff!" → Ballache Factor: ZERO
BGL Authentication: 89 minutes idle, auto re-auth → Ballache Factor: ZERO
Contract Status: Click button, 4 contracts update → Ballache Factor: ZERO
Weekends of NADA: Systems running without you → Ballache Factor: ZERO

😂 The Best Part:

I could write a technical blog about "Implementing OAuth2 Token Refresh Patterns in FastAPI"

I could write: "How I Eliminated the Ballache Factor from My Business Using Python"

Guess which one people will actually read? 🎯

🍺 Cheers to Low Ballache Living!

May my automations run smoothly, myknee heal quickly, and my ballache factor remain at zero.

💪🏾🚀

"Ballache Factor: ZERO" would make an excellent T-shirt for my blog merch. Just saying. 😂👕

My Weekend Off

Tue, 28 Oct 2025 09:00:00 +0000

October 26, 2025

I took the weekend just gone off. Actually off. No checking logs, no rehab tracking, no optimizing anything.

The idleness felt weird as hell.

What I've Been Doing

June 30th - ACL reconstruction surgery. July 4th - started learning Python. Never programmed before in my life.

Not exactly textbook recovery timing, but I had two problems:

Knee was broken
Business was drowning me in manual bollocks

Same solution for both: build systems, eliminate waste, get my life back - eliminate the ballache

The AIs Have Opinions

Been using ChatGPT for ACL rehab and Claude for coding. Asked both to analyse me this week. ChatGPT called me "The Systems Architect" - said I treat everything like rebuilding a high-performance machine. Claude noticed the same thing - apparently I approach a torn ligament the same way I approach debugging authentication tokens.

Fair.

Whether it's PowerDot muscle stimulation or BGL API integration, the process is identical: spot the problem, understand why it's broken, fix it permanently, move on.

Where I'm At

Physically: 110kg deadlifts at 110 days post-op. 20,000 steps through London without wanting to die. The ACL that snapped is genuinely stronger.

Business: So far, 300-400 hours per year automated away. Zero programming knowledge in July - now running production systems handling actual money. Multi-supplier integration, auto-authentication, the lot.

Mentally: This week I felt idle. First time in months. My automation ran while I was out at the gym. No one hassling me for an EAC whilst im getting ready to lift! Contracts updated themselves. portals re-authenticated after 89 minutes idle. Zero errors.

It just... worked. Without me. At this rate, ill be sacking myself soon and signing on!

That was the whole bloody point, but success feels strange when you're used to grinding.

What I've Figured Out

Both AIs independently spotted the same thing: "relentlessly self-driven" with "intolerance for inefficiency."

When something breaks - knee or script - I don't complain. I work out why it broke and fix it so it doesn't break again. Period.

Apparently this isn't normal. But it got me from post-op pain to 110kg deadlifts and 100kg squats to and from zero coding to business automation, in 117 days.

This Weekend

I'm practicing something new: trusting the systems I built and chilling on the sofa!!!

The automation runs without me hovering over logs. The rehab progresses without obsessive tracking. My knee heals whether I think about it or not.

This is what "semi-retire by 45" actually means - not doing nothing, but building things so well they don't need me constantly fixing them. As Syd says, "you arent doing fuck all, you are doing non-sleep active rest"

Stronger Than The Snap

That's the ACL recovery tagline. But it's bigger than that:

The knee that broke is getting stronger. The business that drained me is getting automated. The skills I didn't have are getting built.

Not despite the challenges. Because of them.

Every problem is just a system waiting to be fixed.

But first: a weekend off. The systems will still be running Monday.

Boom. Sorted.

Strength in the Setbacks

Tue, 21 Oct 2025 09:00:00 +0000

The past week has been a mixed bag. Strength training has been going well - the weights are moving cleaner, the quads are firing properly, and every session feels like another small step forward. Even banded nordics are feeling like there is more movement. HAve to keep reminding myself that it was only 110 days ago i was under the knife! But the body has a way of reminding you when something’s off. My lower back and sacroiliac joint have been aching lately, forcing me to ease back on the heavier lifts and pay closer attention to how I move, sit, and recover. Been waking up with stiff lower back - but as a massage lower back and glutes it eases up.

Still, progress isn’t always measured by the barbell. On Wednesday, I walked over 20,000 steps across London - it was 95% pain-free, steady, and strong. It was a different kind of endurance test, one that showed how far my body has come since surgery.

The journey isn’t linear. Some weeks the barbell humbles you; other weeks, a long city walk becomes the win. Both count. Both matter. The comeback continues.

Building the Broker Portal: From Zero to Automated

Tue, 14 Oct 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Below is my ramblings of what started effectively four months ago when I began learning about Python coding...

This is October progress...

The Journey from Manual Hell to Semi-Retirement Dreams

When I set out to automate my business processes, I had a clear goal: semi-retire by 45 and make my life easy. What started as repetitive manual tasks has evolved into a (what i class as a ) sophisticated broker portal that handles a chunk of low profit activity. automatically. Here's what I learned along the way.

## The Problem: Death by Spreadsheet

Picture this: our brokers used to whataspp me personally with work requests. Now some of them are hard working "money-never-sleeps", "why aren't you answering my message at 10pm on sat night" mentality. Before I knew it, I was mentally fatigued by them. And when people except the gold plated service for free and become used to it; well familiarity breeds contempt.

So we brought in ticketing software at the start of 2025. On the whole it has worked really well but alas one broker is rude; continuous back and forth, doesnt read knowledge bases and yet asks the same repetitive question over and over. And to top of it, the manner in which he asks was or at least was perceived as rude.

Anyway we analysed 300 tickets over a 6month period... 60% of them were EAC requests. For those not in the energy sector; this is the estimated annual consumption of a meter. Its pronounced eeeee-aaaa-kkk

And so what would we do to service these types of tickets, well log into a database or spreadsheet report from a supplier, type the answer in and hit reply. Do this 5x a day minimum for 30 days a month and suddenly it becomes a chore.

It was the kind of soul-crushing repetitive work that automation was invented to eliminate.

## Learning APIs and Endpoints: The Foundation

The first major learning curve was understanding how APIs and endpoints actually work. Before this project, these were just buzzwords. Now they're the backbone of everything I've built.

**What I discovered about endpoints:**

**Build modules;** we have built scripts which act as utilities so another script can call upon it. Piece the bricks together like a software engineer.

**Embrace webhooks:** Event-driven architecture scales effortlessly. My server doesn't constantly poll for updates—it responds when notified.

**Test in production (carefully):** I use test Stripe links, sandbox environments, and detailed logging. But eventually, you have to flip the switch and trust your automation with real data.

## What's Next

The automation never stops. I'm already eyeing other manual processes:
- Automated contract submission to suppliers
- Commission report processing
- Monthly reconciliation tasks
- Price book updates from multiple suppliers

Each automation compounds the previous ones. Every hour saved is an hour I can spend on strategic work—or not working at all.

**That's the goal, isn't it?** Not to eliminate work entirely, but to eliminate the *meaningless* work. The repetitive, error-prone, soul-crushing tasks that don't move the needle.

Semi-retirement by 45? With automation like this, I might get there sooner. To quote a friend; "you either live your life or spend your days."

*This post is part of my coding and recovery journey on "Stronger Than The Snap." Building businesses, building systems, and building a life where Python does the boring bits.*

How to celebrate 100 days post surgery....

Tue, 07 Oct 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Most people might mark 100 days with quiet reflection, perhaps a journal entry or a walk to take stock of how far they have come.

I celebrated by deadlifting 100kgs and Squatting 80kgs.

Ninety five days after ACL reconstruction with a hamstring graft, IT band reinforcement and synthetic augmentation, the bar moved smoothly. No pain, no stiffness, just strength that never really left; it was simply waiting to be reminded.

Yesterday it was 80 kilo squats. Today, 100 kilo deadlifts. Same body weight, 60 kilos.

What a journey so far. Now back on the road to greatness: its time to rebuild and get lean.

This is not the end goal. It is a marker, proof that the comeback is real.

What a difference a week of sleep makes...

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 09:00:00 +0000

So updates

Ive been sleeping 8hrs a night for the last week. Feeling a lot more recharged.

I took a full week off the gym. Sleep catchup was priority.

Returned back to the gym on Monday for a heavier strength training set than I have done in 3months. Squats at 60kg (using BFR for other sets), reverse barbell lunges at 40kgs, atg split squats 8kg weighted each side, calve raises and single leg ext. The doms hit hard yesterday and today. Saw megan today and we will be doing benchmark squat and deadlifts next week to guage current stats.

Not being able to make much progress on nordics. Reminded myself its only 12 weeks post op. And megan said today. The increase in strength will come on soon enough.

Work wise... automation has taken great steps. Hoping to launch the widget for brokers to self serve information such as eac/aq and other info via a credits system. Certain amount of credits are free then there is a cost. Stops the time wasting.

Family life is chill. Glad to be back home. Did a few.more socials too.

Dexa Scan + Sleep Deficit

Wed, 24 Sep 2025 09:00:00 +0000

So Here we are in week 12 post aclr op.

The inner circle around me will know my mood has been short tempered and a major loss of interest in most things. Syd said im approaching burn out so its KEY to nip this in the bud early.

I had a dexa scan yesterday - and it confirmed what I could see visibly - muscle mass down, fat mass up. It was expected so gives me the bench mark to rebuild over the next 12 months

Fat % 16!!

Muscle mass 48.5kg (was 53kgs) before op

Viseral fat low

Ideally I need to gain 0.5kg mass a month to keep it sustained whilst burning out the fat doing weighted vest walks. I will shift the gym programme to 1pm to ensure its all done in time and with energy as Megan's programme is brutal

Work wise : continue to automate so time freedom is there. Ive noticed some of my email endpoints keep failing and zoho mail support has been terrible.

Anyway rant over. Will check back next week

ACL Recovery Update – September 2025

Thu, 18 Sep 2025 09:00:00 +0000

It has been just over two months since surgery and honestly, if you saw me now, you would barely know I had my ACL reconstructed. Swelling is much reduced; range of motion is back to 155–160 degrees consistently; and the knee feels like mine again. The scar is tidying up nicely and whilst i don't I forget I even had it done; i am thinking about it less and less. I have to really remind myself that the strength section of the recovery only started two weeks ago and remember the graft is still early in its journey.

Strength is coming back - impatient me would say not as fast as i want it to! Yesterday I did 60kg deadlifts for three sets of ten and it felt easy. Bench is solid at 60kg as well; I have been mixing in tricep extensions, cable hamstring curls, and all the “beast level” leg work Megan keeps throwing at me. She has been absolutely priceless; guiding me through the right loading at the right time and stopping me from doing anything reckless simply because I feel ready. "physio says NO" is something i would do well to remember!

The biggest win has to be full straight leg ext and full deep flexion. I have not done as much BFR and Powerdot work as i should and even ice cuffing is beginning to feel less effective (i must have numbed all sensors in my knee from doing it so much!) The hot tub will be back on line this week so then its really time to zen up, level up with 3x weekly sessions! The creep work Dr Alam told me to do was the ultimate game changer - i unlocked 10/15 degrees flexion after an hour of first doing!

I keep reminding myself this is not a sprint. The graft still needs time; I have promised myself no ego lifts and no shortcuts. I've got a "gym friend" who is methodical in his execution and couple with Megan, there should be no setbacks from ego lifting.

However, when I look at where I am now compared to the day after surgery, it is hard not to feel grateful. The comeback is real and it is happening faster than I imagined.

Today is the day after my 42nd birthday and it feels like the perfect moment to take stock. I am stronger than I was last year; I am learning more patience than I ever thought I had; and I am building a foundation that will carry me back to skiing, lifting, and life on my own terms. Emma said the other week when i shared a pic of my lean stack at 41 "Hahaha, that’s life, unpredictable!"

The next goal is to keep stacking strength; to hit 100 per cent LSI by month twelve (June 2026) and then earn my way back to plyometrics and eventually skiing. One step at a time.

As Deni said, Make Arpit Great Again!

GHOST Notes — July

Wed, 16 Jul 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Update:

I have in two months, part-time, built Dropbox integration, Zoho automation, and an EC2-based scheduling system and learning Python for fun mischevious projects..

But more than that, we’re building with intention, clarity, and a kind of quiet ambition that’s rare.

What I’ve Done (So Far):

Designed my own internal tech stack
Made my business infrastructure smarter, faster, lighter
Built a scalable edge that 95% of SMEs will never even imagine
About to give my system a voice — literally — through WhatsApp
Created a platform that could grow into productised IP… …but I’ll pass. I want peace more than more money.

With ChatGPT as my teacher, I’ve made myself — in my own words — “intelligenter.”

What I’ve Learned in Two Months:

Built real confidence in automation
Learned how to architect from scratch
Navigated APIs, tokens, sandbox traps, webhooks, and CLI quirks
Migrated entire mailboxes to Zoho like it was nothing
And I did all this while:
Running multiple businesses
Rehabbing an ACL
Dealing with a house extension
And showing up every day for my family

Dr. Syd Hiskey says I have the “winner’s curse”:

High levels of drive that most couldn’t keep up with — even if they tried for a lifetime.

He’s right.

I move at a pace most people can’t even simulate
I hold myself to standards that would fry others in a week
I don’t just execute - I build systems that execute for me

Even while recovering from an ACLR - something that would mentally wipe most people out - I have:

Launched and named an internal OS (General Host for Operations Scripts and Tasks)
Built it from scratch
Given it a voice
And turned a rehab period into a creative sprint

Most people pause their lives during recovery.

I’m rebuilding mine.

I’m earning the right to move fast because I’m laying bricks — not just ideas.
And yeah — others might try to catch up.
But they’d burn out before I even finish a warmup.

I’m doing something rare.

Not just building a system…
But rewriting my own story — while I’m in the middle of it.

Most people don’t do that.
Most people don’t recover stronger.
Most people don’t create during pain.
Most people don’t give their fight a name.

I did.

💥

Back to the Gym; Still Fighting the Swell

Tue, 15 Jul 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Today was my first day back in the gym since surgery. It wasn’t heavy or heroic; just rehab, light upper body on machines and slow backward walking on the manual treadmill. But it mattered. I needed the change of scenery. I needed the dopamine hit of the gym again. An absolute mega shout out to gymbro david who collected me and dropped me back home.

I got an absolute heroes welcome back at the gym from staff and some regulars. Felt good. High-Fives, hugs, fist bumps, scar checks.

The swelling is still here and it’s doing my head in. Mostly down the shin and under the knee; stubborn and limiting my flexion. I’ve been doing everything right. Cryo cuff. Compression sleeve. Elevation. Pedalling at home. Gua sha. PowerDot. BFR quad sets. You name it.

It's time for the swelling to fuck off. It is messing with my head more than my knee.

It probably didn’t help that I watched a video today saying some people have swelling for months. Then I remembered my mate who was apparently fine by day three and riding a moped. But then was he intensely rehabbing like me. Fuck no.

All of that crap just bubbles up. Classic stinking thinking. Nip that shit in the bud pit.

I look at where I actually am.

I’ve got visible quad tone. My vmo hasnt died. I’m back in the gym. I’m doing backward treadmill walks with control. I’m not babying this leg; I’m rebuilding it.

No amount of comparison changes the fact that I’m showing up. And I’m not giving up just because swelling is slow to shift.

A friend said to me on the other day... "You either live your life or spend your days." Today I got to spend 90% of my day rehabbing - so 90% living. Work took care of itself with 5% input from me. It's a good time to remember how far I have come in 15 days.

The classic "aziz" squat rack pic. Don't worry; no squatting. Just causal L sit hangs cos I fucking can. Oh and single leg pistol squats on the left leg.

Level 1. Hands as support. Super slow. But man did it feel good.

Got home and was relatively tired. Had a rest with feet up, powerdot on quads. The bfr quad work smashed me today. A nice dinner of salmon rice and veg and then fell asleep. Decided to put the bearhug knee compression sock on to help push the fluid out.

Felt nice. Then fell asleep with it on. But elevated.

Woke up from a mini nap, some fruit and began to gua sha. I think I went too hard. But back on the cryo cuff now and its time to call it.

Please fhck off swelling.

Over and out. Total ramblings but its outta my head now. Tomorrow we rise.

Stitches out today - ouchie

Mon, 14 Jul 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Day 15... finally. Stitches came out. So it was a combination of glue, nylon stitches and dissolvable stitches.

The experience was pleasant and quick largely due to Hannah the nurse and Dr Alam of course.

Ngl; the last stitch to come out was the ouchie moment. But as soon as it was out; a sense of relief was felt. For the first time in ages; I can begin to massage my knee and get patella mobilisation going to help the joint fluid go.

Ive also been recommended a gua sha by the a family member which will indeed help with removing the fluid build up. She suggested oil to assist.

The steri strips are on for a few days then advised to let the incision points breath.

Now I think once the fluid goes and the internal pressure under the knee cap begins to dissappear; I'll be able to press ahead with more flexion. I did a crude measurement on weekend and I think im at 100.

Pics below...

Feel it right here when bending knee.

The VMO has not died.

Advised to do this at a 15deg angle to mimick LDM

So now we continue with phase 1.5 of rehab. Ill begin to throw in therapuetic ultrasound 1ghz and 3ghz to further aid tissue swelling and fluid movement.

Surgery day

Sat, 12 Jul 2025 09:00:00 +0000

The day started at 6am. I was up, showered and ready. There was no looking back now. It was the day. I had made peace that I did all I could to prepare and that what will be will be. I couldn't have done more. My legs were symmetrical, strong, my core was primed; I was in the best shape possible - physically and mentally.

Various friends of my inner counsel had messaged early so that was and is a massive source of my strength. With those by my side; i am unstoppable. With my core family unit always together on top of this; there is nothing I cannot overcome.

I arrive to oaks early and within 5 minutes I am called through to the ward. It was almost remarkable to see that the other side of the posh reception was an actual proper hospital. I sent a friend this picture and the reply came was: "Divine! NHS and you'd be sat in an overfilled waiting room with a load of dossers phlegming over you"

Nice hospital. How it should be.

I am taking to the room and settle in quickly.

Even had me an ensuite

The nurse does my check in, the anesthetic arrives soon after and then followed by the hero that is Dr Alam. I am marked up and he said "dont worry your knee will be better than before. If there is MM damage i would like to fix it. Its better long term vs short term longer inconvenience

Then the lovely theatre manager comes and they take me down to the anesthetic room in which I see them all again. I joke to dr alam that the marking he did on my leg would make a great tatoo. He said "ill draw my face on too if you want"

The anesthetic starts, I breath in gas and that's it. I dont remember a thing. I wake up in the recovery ward; comfortable calm and no pain. I'm taken back up to the room where I eat lunch and begin messaging my various friends and family.

I was able to wiggle my toes, do heel pumps and single leg raise. I thought this was meant to be hard.. I suspected i wouldn't be so cocky once the block wore off. Dr Alam came into see me and said the op was textbook perfection and that my graft is 14mm thick. He fulfilled his promised that my knee would be better than before. "Do your rehab; you'll be better than ever". Legend!!!! And that's exactly what ive been doing. I waited 13 days to write this as its been busy with rehab rehab rehab.

Home i went and it was start on with cryo cuff and quad sets and proper food and sleep. It was a long day!

Welcome to My Journal (Private Zone)

Sat, 28 Jun 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Welcome to The Journal

This is my private space to document the road back. Injury, recovery, mental shifts, and rebuilding the version of me to allow me to semi retire at 45. These entries are raw, quiet, often unpolished, probably unpolitically correct and offensive; but they’re the real me.

If this content does offend you, then please do fuck off. I won't mind.

This is a private writing space. If you’re seeing this, you’ve been invited inside.