Weeknotes  

Monday 18 Oct - Sunday 24 Oct 2021

Hello, me again!

I took a break in an attempt to improve my physical and mental health. In this new ‘season’ of weeknotes details some reflections about balancing life, work and health.

Keep an eye on the bubbling pans

Certainly I felt better for taking a break from the computer outside office hours, that said, I did miss noodling on the computer and being creative with code.

It’s one of those problems related to when your hobby or personal life overlaps with your work. The line between the two can be blurred and taint one or both of them.

It’s a problem as old as time for us humans. The cobbler never has time (more likely motivation) to fix their own shoes.

I imagine my personal life, health and work life as simmering pans on the hob.

Everything is generally fine so long as I attend to the pans equally. Adjusting the heat a little here, stirring a little over there. If you focus on one pan too much the others will start to boil.

I doubt I will ever balance work and life perfectly but that’s OK so long as I keep learning and recognising when one or all of those pans have started to bubble over.

Removing barriers to writing

As well as looking after my health, getting a post published on this site was something I was struggling to find motivation for.

The reason was not because I didn’t want to write but was actually due to the process of creating a new weeknote or article.

Being a bit of a nerd and somebody who ordinarily enjoys tinkering with code, this site is built using some open source software (11ty) and was pretty much entirely handed coded.

This meant it required me to create and edit some new files and bits of code every time I intended to publish something.

Like the cobbler, it was not always something I felt motivated to do when the previous 8 hours in my day job involved similar tasks.

Luckily for me, something came up in my day job that I have been able to use to make writing these weeknotes a little easier.

I was tasked with making publishing on a website easier, so the solution I developed at work has been adapted for this site and so removing a barrier to my writing.

Thanks for reading, see you next week for a full and proper weeknotes.

• Paul.