The Command Line

Exploring digital citizenry as a creator and a consumer.

Polishing the Mirror

I was chatting with my good friend, Chris, recently. He had asked for my advice and help. He wanted to brush up on and add to his programming skills. I recommended a language to consider, a couple of books that have helped me gain a working fluency with it, and a newsletter on the same. We scheduled a time for a video chat where he had many excellent questions from his reading so far. Our chat brought up some unexpected memories that yielded a fresh insight and reminded me of an old one. There are things about being a manager I hadn't realized I missed. Helping my friend approach a professional transition reminded me of some helpful thoughts from my last move from management back to contributor.

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2017-08-20 The Command Line Podcast

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Searching for Myself

Detail of an orrery made by Benjamin Martin in London in 1767, used by John Winthrop to teach astronomy at Harvard, on display at the Putnam Gallery in the Harvard Science Center, used under CC-BY-SA, by Wikipedia user Sage Ross

I sat across a table today from an account manager at a staffing firm. I didn't expect to be there. I had taken a phone screen the week prior, my first in-depth technical assessment, that I thought I had completely fumbled. Looking back at my notes from right after the call, I wrote in big block letters, FAIL.

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Keep on Walking

I woke up late this morning, at least late for a weekend. Despite sleeping in, my mind and limbs felt heavy. I skipped my usual habit of making myself breakfast from scratch, instead throwing something frozen in the microwave. Out the window, the neighborhood was gray, wet from overnight rain. I felt unmotivated to keep at another, more recent habit, of taking brisk walks on as many days as I can. I will be traveling this coming week, I knew I should get out of the house to walk when I have the time and space so I feel less bad if I have to skip a day later on.

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