To do lists have their place, but I feel I need somewhere to just brain dump
What’s been cooking today? I hear you ask. Well a bit of a variety of things for a change. Some days are all about training a donkey just one trick, while others are a multi-dimensional labyrinth of overlapping puzzles. The days spent focussing on just one issue often start with a coffee and a thought along the lines of: I’ll just spend 5 minutes on something interesting before starting the important stuff I should be doing. I don’t know why I mentioned coffee. The start to all days feature coffee. Today I was in diligent, responsible mode from the off. I dealt with an issue that one my client’s suppliers was having with a database connection by setting up a URL that could run tests on demand. I found the guarantee for the broken microwave and booked an appointment for someone to come and take a look at it. Not strictly day job stuff, but - you know - modern times.
The rest of the day can be summarised as admin really. Updates to admin systems in order to process actual admin tasks. Not much fun, and all the while the sirens of more interesting code sang. But I resisted them. I have too. Nearly out of ships.
Spending time on interesting things rather than grinding through a list shouldn’t be totally discouraged though. Each new code puzzle solved is a new tool for the box, and messing around with pet projects or trying out something different can be - and often is - the catalyst for big leaps. Big leaps can then require rewriting a million lines of code, but if you end up with 10% less code then it’s worth it. No-one needs more code. We need better code. And coffee.