This week was a change of pace in several ways. My plan was packed (no change there!), Robinson and our main clients were out, and coding work had shaped up as the priority. Compared to my past intervals of heavy solitary work, this one had much more time in reading and writing human text relative to code. The TMSR-OS project came front and center as MP timed out on waiting for Trinque and offered Robinson the management role. On my end this meant expediting publication of my own work in the space as well as my other technical items. I set about finishing my ongoing article series and digging into the rest with vigor, and also boosted my forum reading and discussion time. It’s unclear if I’ve as yet absorbed the lessons of Kafka’s mouse, though I had fun attempting the translation.
I found Robinson even more tied up than anticipated, and I was surprised by his request for a third wallet article in addition to the time estimates already owed. In my mind, time was already tight, the tasks were as clear as they could be at that stage, and I just needed to get in the focused time on the coding. What ultimately unblocked me was setting the requested writing aside and just proceeding as if to code; this ended up stimulating the lines of thought necessary to clarify the spec and I was then able to write it. I think it ended up for the best to have taken the time, especially given the thought-provoking comment thread with MP that followed.
I managed to attend everything in my plan at least to a substantial degree, and some past debts I just couldn’t stand anymore such as my blog theme. I made heavier use of detailed schedules to get through each day, including ending them in time to ease myself into an earlier sleep cycle — with a big exception of today, what can I say. In several instances I found myself at least somewhat deliberately choosing to disregard the planned time blocks and push ahead with the task I was engaged in.
The work and discussion time ended up at 74.6 hours; still, morale stayed high, I got in at least some of my evening walks, ate simple but hearty meals, and managed some meatspace social time. Unfortunately I didn’t manage my proposed wallet milestone; I’ve been updating Robinson about the work but haven’t heard much back as yet. And this review is late; I’d scheduled it to be started earlier, but I still struggle to find the necessary pressure internally without an external deadline looming.
“Work and discussion time” is poorly worded, as if communication isn’t part of work; more like “work time including discussions and background reading”.
Comment by Jacob Welsh — December 2, 2019 @ 6:41 am
“just proceeding as if to code” – what do you mean here?
Re lack of internal motivation – this does read more like a report than a review and I doubt you have much motivation for reporting, yes. How about you actually make those reviews for yourself first of all?
Comment by Diana Coman — December 2, 2019 @ 7:54 am
Comment by Jacob Welsh — December 2, 2019 @ 9:14 pm