Weeknotes 21:12

August 27, 2021

Week of August 22 - 28

  • I really enjoyed my work this week. I had started a new project at the end of last week. We are building a microsite for a client. I had built a similar site for this venture back in July. That site is focused specifically on students and small business owners to join this program. I finished up the HTML on Monday and started the CSS work for layout, colors, and typography. After so many years of doing this, I still really enjoy getting to see a site come to life as I built my stylesheets. I finished up on Thursday and passed it to my teammate Ryan who will be adding some animations to the site. Normally, this is a task that I really enjoy but due to some restrictions in third-party software and resourcing allocation, I built the site with a solid foundation for my teammate to now progressively enhance.
  • My youngest daughter celebrated her 15th birthday on Tuesday. We had a fun time celebrating and encouraging her. She enjoyed a trip to our local art museum for a special dance exhibit with her older sister and my wife. It was a treat for her to spend her birthday with our oldest most years would be back on campus for classes.
  • Last week I started working on a WordPress guide for the GenesisHR project that will be launching soon. This was the first site that I utilized Gutenberg. I learned how to create the guide within the WordPress admin, something I have been wanting to do for a long time. I am very happy with the result and hope that it will serve as a helpful reference to the client as they take over the site very soon. I continued working on the guide this week and finished it on Friday.
  • We had a crazy moment on Wednesday. I got a call from my wife just before our company “all hands” meeting. Our van would not shift into any other gear and was stuck in reverse. Our big concern was that I was planning to use our van to help move my daughter back into her college apartment on Saturday. We have another vehicle we could use but would have had to leave some things behind which would mean another trip up to Nashville in the coming weeks. We were really glad to hear that the problem was that a connection between the shifter and transmission had broken. Our mechanic was originally going to replace the cable but found a replacement part for the rubber connector which cut the cost of the repair by more than half. We got the van back on Thursday and will be packing it up this evening (Friday) for our trip to Nashville on Saturday. My daughter will be starting her senior year. It seems like it has flown by so quickly.

  • One of my goals for the summer was to get my oldest daughter out driving so that she would be prepared to pass the road test for getting her license. It has been a monkey on my back for over four years as different things have had my attention and I had not given the time to help her get ready. I was determined to get her ready this summer. I enjoyed our times out together driving around where we live. It gave me time alone with her and we had a shared experience. I was ecstatic a couple of weeks ago when she passed her road test. Some paperwork went through and she was able to get her physical license this past week. So proud of her and so glad we finally accomplished that rite of passage.
  • I didn’t get to it this week, but I had started working my way through Kevin Powell’s course, CSS Demystified, a couple of weeks ago. The course is not currently open but it is one that I would recommend to anyone in the future. Kevin is trying to teach the foundations of CSS to help developers become more confident in writing CSS. I think a lot of complaints about CSS could be overcome with a better foundational understanding of how it works. Part of my motivation in taking the course is to be able to helper younger developers in the future. I love CSS. But there is always more to learn and this is a great course on the foundations.
  • I felt a bit melancholy mid-week. The news of a former co-worker losing her battle with cancer, the events unfolding in Afghanistan, and the death of a Nashville pastor and his daughter in a car accident all contributed to a great awareness of the brokenness of this world. The last one shook me up a bit because the pastor was taking his daughter back to school in New Mexico for her senior year. Tomorrow, I am making a similar trip so it hit really close to home.
It was nice to have a piggie break mid-week. Piggies make everything more fun.

Reading (Books)

  • Play – My local library purchased this one at my request. It was recommended by Dave Rupert and I thought it would be a good compliment to the book, Rest, that I read about a year ago. I have read about half of the book so far and am enjoying it.
  • The Lost Discipline of Conversation – A book about the spiritual discipline of conference practiced by the Puritans. I am reading this one through Hoopla. I had seen it referenced in a recent article. I am still trying to figure out how this looks different from the ways I have interacted in small groups before. It is a rich book with a lot of good ideas but still trying to grasp what this discipline would look like in regular practice.
  • WordPress Themes in Depth

Online Reading

Bookmarks

I have not spent much time reading articles online this week. But there are several that I bookmarked and look forward to getting to in the near future.

Watched

  • How to Make Stress Your Friend (TED Talk) – The LGND team watched this video together on Friday for professional development. We watched in on Zoom and then had some discussion around personal strategies for coping with stress. It was a great time connecting with the team as we thought through this together. I shared about how prayer, my faith in a sovereign God, walks, and talking to my wife are all strategies that have helped me to make stress my friend.
  • Jocko Willink’s message if he were President during Afghanistan Crisis – Jocko is one of the authors of the book, Extreme Ownership, which the LGND team read this summer in preparation for an hour seminar. None of what Jocko said was a surprise to me as it really exemplified the principles taught through the book.
  • Alias (Prime) – My wife and I finished watching the last season of Alias. We felt like the series jumped the shark on numerous occasions after the second season. But we enjoyed it overall.
  • Making the Cut Season Two (Prime) – I enjoy watching these competitions and rooting for the competitors. My favorite did not win.
  • What If? (Disney+)

Playing

  • FIFA20 (Rangers) – I started my second season with Rangers over the weekend. I did not finish as well as I would have liked in the first season but did well enough to get into the Europa League. I had fun doing several transfers to improve my team. And I am off to a good start through 11 games just moving into first place in a tight race.
  • I stopped playing MLB The Show 20 with the Padres. I was not enjoying it as much and decided to play FIFA instead. FIFA games don’t take as long and I needed the break from baseball.

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