Weeknotes 23:33

October 16, 2023

Week of October 1–7

Rest

As I mentioned in my last post, I asked my leadership to take off the week after recovery from a medical scare at the end of the previous week. I am so grateful for the unlimited PTO policy that LGND put into place almost two years ago. It gave me the freedom to take this time off when I needed it and not feel like I was burning through a small allotted amount that I might need more of later.

I completely stepped back from things knowing my teammates had me covered. I set up several medical appointments and took other action steps to help get to a healthier place. I relaxed and enjoyed reading, journaling, taking daily walks, watching shows on Netflix, and playing MLB The Show 23 on the PS4.

I was more deliberate in taking time to write in my journal. This is a great place for me to process and reflect on my life and identify some needs that I want to address in order to become a healthier person. It was nice to have the space to reflect, plan, and begin to execute some next steps.

Time with my son

One nice thing about taking time off was that it coincided with my son’s Fall break from Murray State. We hung out on Wednesday afternoon. He wanted to go downtown to check out the maker space at the public library. After that, we visited Stove Works. Most of the art on display was not my cup of tea but I enjoyed getting to talk about it with my son, who is studying graphic design and has taken several art courses in his first two years there.

We concluded the afternoon by visiting the Sculpture Fields at Montague Park, on the South End of Chattanooga. I enjoy walking around and looking at the different works. My son asked me what I considered sculpture. I can’t remember all that I said to him but we had an interesting discussion.

I enjoyed the different textures of the works. I would like to more about what the artist’s intentions were behind each piece, an artist’s statement if you will. My son asked me if it is important to know the artist’s intention.

We didn’t dive too deep into the subject. I think it would help me to appreciate the art more to understand where the artist was coming from and what influenced them to create the work. It would give me a deeper respect for the work if I really don’t get it or if it does not “speak to me.”

I was reminded once again how much I just enjoy hanging out with my son. I am glad that we were able to do several activities around art because that is such an essential part of his life and it helps me to understand and connect with him a bit better. I also was glad to have the space to talk about my medical scare with him and answer questions that he had.

I wish I had a better camera and the weather had been sunnier. Most of the pictures I took were taken dark or they do a really poor job of representing the work we saw.

Classic rock, Mario Kart, and why we can’t agree on Tailwind

I read this article late in the week which is one of the best articles I have read in a while on the subject of web development. Josh Collinsworth provides a really good perspective on why Tailwind is so divisive in the Web developer community. He is open and honest with where he stands but was still able to give some balanced commentary.

It really comes down to tastes and to what it is that is important to you. He makes a distinction between two different types of developers–builders and crafters. The focus of both of these is what part of the job they consider most important. It comes down to what each of them values about the process of bringing the product to life.

Builders value getting the work done as quickly and efficiently as possible. They are making something and they are eager to bring it to completion. And Tailwind is a tool that helps them to do that.

Crafters, on the other hand, see the frontend as the product itself, not just something to get through to reach their goal. Speed is not the issue and they enjoy the challenges of using CSS and can find a tool like Tailwind getting in their way. Plus, many crafters have a deeper knowledge of CSS so they don’t really have a need for the tool (Tailwind).

Josh’s conclusion is that both sides are right. The reality is that there is not a “right” answer. It really comes down to what you value–what is most important to you as you build a project.

This is a very simplistic overview of what I got out of the article. Josh has a lot of other really good thoughts and I think he did a great job of building his argument. It would be well worth your time to read his thoughts. I think a lot of this same logic could be applied to other debates/divides within the Web developer community.

By the way, I am a crafter. I like to be challenged by CSS and enjoy that part of the work on a project the most.

Articles I read

The Athletic

Books that I am reading

What I watched

What I played

  • MLB The Show 23 (Rays) – I had a great week as I went 5-1. Four of my wins came in 1 run-ball games. I ended up playing a game on Wednesday after watching about 4 innings of the Rays’ playoff game against Texas. It felt good to win that game 4-1 after seeing the Rays get beat up by the Rangers.
  • FIFA23 (Manchester City) – I played a trio of games on Saturday and won only one of them. But I only lost one of them with the third game being a draw.

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