June 2024 Review
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A collection of accomplishments, notes, and observations about June 2024 (and some early July things too).
Work
Stress about the future private equity acquisition of my current employer looms. There is a high probability of being laid off in early 2025.
My mindset has reverted to treating the employment more like a contract. I am a professional and give them a professional effort. I do my best to have a positive impact on the team. I have however pulled back on long-term corporate growth/responsibility plans, which is sad. I wanted this switch to full-time employment to be more long-lasting.
Outside of work, I need to find focus and figure out what’s next.
The June work itself has been varied. Individual contributions towards a large product refactor. Specifically, I have been working to recompose some of our LiveView modules so that they are more organized and also posting notes about ideas for authorization using on_mount hooks other members have taken the lead on. During my chore time, I’ve been investigating production exceptions and working with the leadership to see how to edit the schemas/database table to avoid invalid states.
Side Projects
Like last month, a few short coding sessions on Flick, but not as much as I would have liked.
I keep rethinking the schema design I want. In my last coding session, I even pulled back the ballot to include only a single question to simplify the UI layer.
I am feeling a little time pressure to get something working so I can use this for the Elixir Book Club’s next vote.
Tech Education / Books
Reading A Philosophy of Software Design, 2nd Edition with the Elixir Book Club. About halfway through. It’s a great book and focused. It does not waste your time with excessive pages and gives you much to think about per each small chapter.
Still working through the Obsidian Field Guide.
Started reading MYST: The Book of Ti’ana (fiction) during my vacation on the beach.
Read another chapter of Radical Candor, which I started in April but kind of forgot about.
Did not do much Postgres reading this month. I want to get back into that one.
Video Games / TV
Lots of Stardew Valley. I’m in Winter, Year 2, on my new 1.6 farm.
I play an occasional game of MLB: The Show, but I’m not doing the week-by-week grind like last year.
Bought and played some of the new Riven remaster.
Finished Dark Matter. I liked it a lot.
Started Better Call Saul. I’m in the middle of season 3.
Baseball
Watching and listening a bunch. They are the best team in baseball!
Walks and Exercise
Some walks but not much. I want to get into a swim schedule in the coming weeks.
Other Notes
I posted last month about some mind fog, lack of focus/drive, and that has continued but is a little better. Need to get into a rhythm towards some new projects. I need purpose.
I did enjoy a week down the shore in June with my sister. Mostly just beach time, but it was great, and we had great weather.
What’s Next?
After some vacation and holiday time, I have some full 5-day work weeks ahead. Need to find a productive rhythm both in and outside those hours.
Later in August I will be headed down to ElixirConf, which will be fun. If you see me, please do say hello.