Howdy. It’s March already. Let’s catch up. In January, Austin had a freeze but thankfully uneventful. Brings up a lot of “my dumb hyper-capitalist ultra-Libertarian government has created a failed state” trauma though. In February, my family and I have been battling sickness on and off. Switching over to care for a sick kid at home is such a sidewinder to my intended productivity. Shazam! Transformed from computer man into a butler who futily tries to hypnotize kids (who don’t take naps) into taking naps. We are rolling with the punches that come from attending public school and Spring Break starts next week.

Temperatures are already hitting 89ºF (31.6ºC). It’s still technically Winter, but feels like late Spring. I’m trying to enjoy it and take walks but feel a background sense of dread for the upcoming Summer. There’s an old saying in Texas that goes something “warm winter, cool summer” (sometimes expressed as “extreme winter, extreme summer”). I haven’t crunched the numbers to verify that, but looking at the data trends it seems to only go up and the new February 2024 ocean surface temperature chart makes more alarmed.

But enough existential climate dread, let’s take a look back across these past two-and-a-half months.

A different but successful Christmas

We celebrated Christmas at home this year. Typically, we visit family in other states for the holiday. But hauling Christmas across the continent is too much and after last year’s debacle where I missed Christmas day entirely, we made the decision to not travel until after Christmas. I missed seeing my extended family but I’ve never been more relaxed around the holidays.

The day after Christmas we flew up to Omaha, Nebraska to visit my dad and saw my brother and step-brother’s family. We had a great time. Kids played hard. We went to the zoo. We nearly froze to death going ice skating. We went to an interactive museum. And we played lots and lots of dice games and crokinole.

We left Nebraska with a double dose of bad family news but fingers crossed there’s better news ahead.

Digital gardening

I spent heaps of time tinkering on my site. Getting it juuuuust right.

  • I tightened up spacing and typography a bit across all the pages.
  • Moved my bookshelf to the main navigation after Trent suggested it.
  • Prototyped a page for “Limited Runs”, self-contained story arcs and seasons.
  • I blogged a metric ton.

That last one makes me happy. I had two blogging-related goals in my Year-in-Review post:

  1. Publish half of my 39 drafts
  2. Publish on other sties

I’m happy to report that I succeeded at both. I posted 31 posts on this blog and 2 posts over on Boost, the new Frontend Masters blog. Somehow, I still have 30 drafts left. Weird how that happens. It feels good to get those posts out, much cognitive load shedding occurred.

Office reorganizing

A new year, a new season of life, and a dose of inspiration from Adam Savage’s reworking of his workshop, I felt compelled to drastically reorganize my office.

I moved my bookshelf to the back wall, bringing my Gundam compulsion front-and center. I 180º’d my desk to a different wall and put the windows at my back. That creates some video call whiteout sun challenges, but the sun is not in my face anymore. My office now feels fresh and zesty and like a much better use of the space.

Stats

🧠 Learning

  • Becoming a domestic goddess - Started a daily habit of cleaning and organizing more. I’m not great at it but trying to get better.
  • Algorithms - Lots of reading, Leetcodes, and went thru Primeagen’s “The Last Algorithms Course You’ll Need” on Frontend Masters. I don’t like algorithms.

💪 Fitness

  • Got a new bike for Christmas, but haven’t done a good job at riding it.
  • Been walking more. That’s nice.

📖 Reading

My book consumption feels like I’ve slowed down, but I’m closer to the Book-a-Week club than I want to be.

Finished

Started

📝 Blogging

Frontend Masters Boost Blog (2 posts)

This Blog (31 posts)

📺 Media

Movies

  • Howl’s Moving Castle (Max) - Never actually saw this Studio Ghibli classic. I was surprised to learn that Howl was not the old lady.
  • Dune II - A perfectly executed sequel to an epic-feeling epic.

Anime

Finished

  • Den-noh Coil S1-S2 (Netflix) - An anime set in the future where all the kids have an AR visor.

In Progress

  • Zeta Gundam (Crunchyroll) - Kamille!
  • Delicious in Dungeon S1 (Netflix) - Dungeon crawling meets Japanese cooking show
  • Gundam Build Divers S1 (Crunchyroll) - More gunpla fan service and I’m here for it.

Podcasts

I love this medium and cleared out my podcast queue… then posted about it and now I have ten more series to get thru. I love how that works.

Finished

Started

  • The Adventure Zone Versus Dracula
  • Finding Drago
  • Santiago Boys

🎙 Recording

ShopTalk

🤖 Gunpla

Three plastic model photos side-by-side. A yellow thick robot called 'THE-O', a beautiful nimble white robot called the Calibarn, and an athletic but mass-produced seafoam green mech called the Jegan

Cleared out my gunpla backlog and celebrated by buying three more models.

  • HG Gundam Calibarn
  • HG PMX-003 ‘THE-O’
  • MG RGM-89 Jegan

I also started on the RG MSN-04 Sazabi, but not quiiiite finished yet.

⌨️ Open source

  • WobblyBox - A web component for wobbly boxes.

👾 Video games

  • Gundam UC Engage
  • Duolingo 🔥 100-day streak… then quit.
  • Call of Duty: Warzone
  • Rage quit and uninstalled Overwatch 2