Why I have not been posting so much

When I started contributing more to this blog again, around 2019; after a burn-down-and-start-over approach to previous blogging attempts; I had a lot more time on my hands, and I did not practice personal journalling.

Some of the less well put-together blog posts, should have been personal diary entries, that I did not share with the world, without a lot more editorial thought and process. As a result, I don't enjoy reading all the articles.

I now diary and journal prolifically, both using open tools such as trillium, and platform tooling, such as apple notes.

Health

Over the past two years, I've had some health issues, due to a gargantuan kidney stone, that required invasive surgery. This is the first serious illness I've ever had, and the only operation(s) I have ever had. I am now recovered from my surprise relatively short-term ailment.

I Am restarting my weight loss journey and have lost weight from the heaviest I have ever been at over 26 stone, or 160kg, to now 22 stone or 140kg, since May 2024; I hope to get down to at-least 100kg 15-stone.

I've achieved this by using portion control, intermittent fasting, and surprise, surprise… [semi-]Regular exercise.

Work

At work I have a new title, and another raise. Staff Software Engineer, to me is the same as Technical Lead Software Engineer; but I also got paid more, which I am somewhat happy with.

Work-wise, I am very happy. There are folks I work with who cancel out most negatives, most of the time. I Am gutted that some people I adored have left the company. I remain childish that others remain.
C'est La Vie; it happens everywhere, anyway, for many different reasons.

I still struggle with saying things, that absolutely do not benefit me to announce, to people who are unreceptive to the free-flow of specific ideas I share; so I guess that might be the next thing I work on.
It kills a lot of the joy, of “bring yourself to work” to then be told, oh no, not you. We want the PR version of bring yourself to work. Others may transgress, but not you! I persist regardless, knowing I have a home life, and friends who have not expressed such concerns, and remain amazed at my restraint.

I have a strong peer pool that is enviable. Likely more than I've had in a while.

I feel, like some of my "internet connections", are going better, which is cool, because I tend to get on better with folks in-person.

Technology

• I'm working with lots of python code at the moment.
• We use AWS, at work, and I think I'm influencial and helpful there.
• I know more Lucid, Draw.io, and Mermaid JS than I would have been happy about 2 years ago.
• Folks continue to call me “High-functioning”, with regards to technology. I am assured no words are being omitted from that.
• After years of complaining about MySQL; I'm using it, begrudgingly. The Oracle team are likely doing amazing things. But the legacy specs feel rose-tinted. So I am now re-introducing Postgresql.
• Poetry, Justfiles and monorepos are now things I feel I have debugged enough to say I know “quite well”.
• My logging and observability, and bent for not being creepy to users are shared, and our team is improving with good practices, including flourishes here and there.
• I could go on forever, but I'll stop myself.

Closing

Anyway, that is it for now. Love to all the people that provide power to the positively electric communications we have. Best wishes to those who do not.