Enjoy life, be good to other people!

The last few weeks are a little blurry — I had a bit more on my plate than usual.

Everything else

• Some time ago I wrote about a friend who’s been fighting cancer. I’m happy to report that he’s with us and was discharged from the hospital as a healthy person! I can’t even describe the emotions or the full story behind it, but the main thing is that M. is recovering and doing fine. That’s the best info of the year. Let’s all celebrate the small things and daily life with people next to us 💙
• One day we went to the forest to look for mushrooms. We found just 7 — not much — but spending time among the trees was a great experience. It helped calm the thoughts and gave us quality time together as a family.

Work

• I was assigned to a new team (on top of the previous one) as we needed to speed up one project, and I joined as part of the reinforcements.
• It was quite a disruption to my already established routine with projects and tasks, and involved more meetings and more time in parts of the application I hadn’t discovered before.
• This type of change and additional pressure helped me appreciate the previous/normal state more :)
• Boring is not always bad!

Sport

• This year I took part in a running Grand Prix in my county.
• It consisted of 4 races located in my neighbourhood.
• I did one 5k race and three 10k runs.
• My best 10k time was ~48:20.
• Next year I’d like to repeat the cycle, but this time I want to focus on 5k races and improve my PB (shouldn’t be that hard).
• Races like this help me keep motivation for training going. It’s always fun, and getting the medal (and hot meal) after the finish feels nice!

On another note, my older son started attending football trainings for a local club.

• It’s a bittersweet journey: sometimes he’s very happy because he scored a goal or did well during training; sometimes it’s quite the opposite when he’s not picked for the first team or not playing in his favourite position. I think it’s good for all of us as a lesson about how life generally is, but… it’s not easy 🙃
• A cool part is that I have time to do my own training while my son is running after the ball.

Woodworking

• There hasn’t been much on this front since my unemployment period ended, but I’m in the middle of building some furniture — starting with a few cabinets — and the end goal is to create something bigger and finish the wardrobe.

Startups

• Our music startup didn’t get the funding we applied for, but…
• We decided to continue anyway, added new members to our team, and we’re aiming to help music teachers get more students and make sure their lesson management and logistics are covered and smooth.
• New code delivered in React — quite a journey for me. I miss the conventions I’m accustomed to from working with Rails, but on the other hand, I love that TypeScript gives me hints thanks to strong typing.

Music

• I just realized that ASOT gives people a way to attend the radio show and be there with Armin and Ruben during the show.
• Back in the day, when I listened to ASOT regularly, it was around episode ~300 (now we’re at ~1250).
• You had to download an MP3 and a .cue file, cut the big file into smaller pieces, add ID3v2 tags (I couldn’t just listen to a 2h long file called ASOT320 — I needed to know the exact names of songs). It was a mess, but we had this ritual of listening to it live on Thursday (?) and then replaying it over the next few days.
• I like going back in time with my photos, so here you can see the room I lived in with two other colleagues and my battlestation from 2007. Great times!!

When it doesn’t feel worth it, take one small step anyway. The inner payoff shows up later. This post won’t turn the world upside down, but it helps me see what was and what will be a bit more clearly. Thanks for being here and see you soon!

I feel like a hacker. I’m writing this edition of Bullets using NeoVim. After a few weeks in my coding job, I started to feel some nostalgia and need to start tweaking my development setup. What could be less dramatic than switching my main editor/IDE? I think my peak Vim-use was around 12-13 years ago, so it’s fun to navigate via hjkl again.

Let’s go through some bullets!

• So for starters, I’m going to recommend NeoVim as an interesting project. I initially wanted to use something ready-to-go like LazyVim, but it was too good and had too many features – I simply couldn’t understand what was happening on my screen. So I decided to start from scratch and build my config slowly, making sure I understand most of the configuration I use. My config is available on my Github: https://github.com/lubieniebieski/config.nvim.
• Tour de France 2025 has already started a few days ago. Things are looking good – Tadej Pogacar is wearing a yellow jersey, stages are exciting, many great cyclists fight for something - be it one of the jerseys, an individual good result in one of the stages, helping out their teammates, etc. I think you have to do more than just watch the transmission of the race. Because let’s not fool ourselves, it’s 3 weeks of 170+ men in lycra riding their bikes for a few hours each day. I must admit that I enjoy it more and more with each year, because I watched some races, witnessed some historic moments already, but I also try to follow the TdF from behind the scenes, like watching short vlogs from Victor Campenaerts and bringing back memories from 2024 by watching the “Tour de France: Unchained” on Netflix.
• My woodworking hobby brought a mud kitchen for my kids, you can see it below – there will be some additions like some old pots and cutlery, but besides that, our little (but HEAVY!:D) family project is live, and boys are already playing with it! <happy dad!>

  

• Today I told my younger son that one day we’re going to attend Goodwood Festival of Speed, as he’s into cars, he immediately liked the idea. Maybe I’ve read and watched too much coverage from this year’s Le Mans (where Robert Kubica and his team won!), but it really sounds like a good idea for a trip for us:)

No more bullets today. I’ll try to post more frequently, keeping them shorter and easier to read :) Have a great day folks! 💙

PS: Writing this post in NeoVim took me longer than it would have in Obsidian or VS Code – I missed all my snippets and smart shortcuts. It might seem counterproductive, but I truly believe the best way to learn is when it hurts a little. When you start missing something, that’s your cue to build or improve it. Pure kaizen: not just jumping to a tool that solves your problem (and 567851 others you don’t have), but growing your setup as you go. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Things changed

I’ve got a job - I joined a new company!

After years of wearing the manager hat, I’m back to being an engineer, just like in the early days of my IT journey. It’s been a few weeks so far. I joined an agency and got assigned to a project that’s… well, let’s just say it’s large, has a few years on its clock, and includes a lot of people working on it simultaneously. Think serious enterprise vibes.

I’m now living the backend life with Ruby on Rails and trying my luck with Vue on the frontend. It’s honestly fun to live in IDE full-time again. 😄

Also, I somehow became a team leader. Didn’t really plan for that, but I certainly don’t mind, I enjoy supporting people.

After almost a year and a half of sabbatical (or early retirement), I’m back in the game and officially selling my time for money again!

Battlestation refactor

Since I received a MacBook as my daily work machine, it was time for a desk refresh. My setup was perfectly tailored for the stationary Mac Studio, but it wasn’t ready for a two-devices setup.

As the laptop is a work device, I had to make sure that everything works well there, but I’d also like to use Mac Studio for daily life. The first few days were rough. Context switching was hard, I couldn’t find a satisfying rhythm, and I missed the small everyday conveniences.

Fast forward through lots of cable rage, research, and experimentation – I now have all peripherals plugged into the monitor. HDMI + USB go to the Mac Studio, and USB-C goes to the MacBook. Changing the monitor input is all it takes to switch between machines, and surprisingly, everything just… works! The only manual thing left is switching my MX Master mouse to the right device. Few seconds and I’m switched. Acceptable.

Still, my dream setup is still a single-device setup where both personal and work life run side-by-side. I’d love to be just a CMD+TAB away from replying to my wife, or turning a HomeKit lamp on. But hey, this is good enough, for now.

Underware and multiboard

I upgraded my desk with motors, so I can now press a button and it moves up and down depending on my needs, super convinent. I had to switch, as my old setup was not capable of lifting 32" monitor anymore.

Most of my effort here went into cable management and organizing all the stuff under the desk. I’ve worked with two projects which are super cool and I can recommend it to anyone¹:

• Underware
• Multiboard

I printed over 2 kg of filament just to bring order to the cable spaghetti. I probably spent more time under the desk than on top of it. 😅 I’ll post some photos soon… once I clean up the chaos that organizing has caused. Here’s a sneak peak of the last few prints.

Life after “Unretirement”

I noticed a few things after getting in the new mode:

• I stopped using LinkedIn. Got the job – mission accomplished. Now it’s just another social media.
• There’s not enough time in a day. Shocking, I know.
• I can’t finish a workday unless my git status is clean, and everything in my brain is offloaded somewhere. This is not healthy:/
• My fitness dropped. I struggled on a 7 km run, which used to be quite easy a few weeks back. But somehow I also manged to beat my 3km PB. 🤷🏻‍♂️
• I get nervous more often.
• Woodworking and furniture building are just a hobby now.
• I’m basically off social media. I miss Mastodon sometimes (fortunately, I can still follow some people via RSS)… but ⬇️
• I can’t check RSS feeds during work (e.g. while waiting for builds), and the unread count is piling up.
• My monthly cash balance is net-positive. Finally! 😅
• It’s going to be hard to build relationships as strong as the ones I had in my previous workplace. I’m not in my 20s anymore, we just see each other during standups and on Slack.
• I still have great friends I can chat with, and I’m grateful for every little interaction.
• Keeping a separate work-life balance is hard, but in my case I’d like to have it much more integrated. I like to have one browser (with profiles), one terminal, one email client, one calendar… All these apps have a way to separate work and personal life, but right now I have different devices with the same apps and it’s just not the same. I had a way of working and living that worked for me, and now I’m forced to approach it differently.

Summary

So yeah, I’m officially back from my “early retirement.” Summer is in full swing, horse flies are terrorizing my runs again, I fire up the grill every few days, and my sons are out of school, so no more washing lunchboxes or refilling water bottles for a while. We’re healthy, life’s good!

We talked. About everything and nothing. Politics (the Polish elections were a big topic), raising kids, education, siblings, family, the usual day-to-day stuff you only realize matters once you slow down long enough to really notice it.

What made it special was the space — space to speak and to be heard. I had time to share my view on things, and Mum had time to respond. We bounced thoughts back and forth about raising children — me now being fully involed in this, and her reflecting on those wild parenting years from the other side.

I grew up thinking friends were the people you choose, and family — well, they’re kind of assigned. I’ve always had a wide circle of friends and never really understood the idea of limiting your life mostly to relatives. Don’t get me wrong, I have a good family. They come with different views, different ideas about the world, and that’s fine. We might not see each other every weekend, or even every month — and that’s okay.

Back then, when I was a kid, we’d see relatives every other day. Life felt smaller and more connected. And during our ride, I told my Mum that I didn’t mind how things have changed — that having looser family bonds isn’t automatically a problem.

She nodded and agreed, but then she gave me a few glimpses of her youth. About what it was like fifty years ago when families were big and tangled up together in everyday life. Sharing rooms, sharing chores, picking berries, chasing butterflies. Their lives were connected. They learned together, helped each other out. You made your brother’s bed, and he brought home sweets in return.

Now? Everyone’s scattered. The arguments are louder, and people less willing to find common ground. She wonders when it all changed.

She told me some stories about their life I’ve never heard before. Nothing fancy, just regular days stuff. But it helped me to appreciate my Mom even more and realize (again), that the quality of life improved dramatically. In their times, her parents had one day during a week where they went out, visited one person in the village who had the TV and they watched it. Hard to imagine in our always connected world with Youtube, where we need to limit the time in front of the screen:)

Through all our talk, one pattern kept showing up like a chorus: When you have the chance — widen your horizons.

Learn new things. Meet new people. Ask why. Ask how. Get curious. Try new food. Try new experiences. Travel. Observe. Reflect. Repeat.

Sometime during our time together, I felt a wave of nostalgia roll in. A quiet one. The kind you feel not for what is gone, but for what you’re lucky to still have.

A meaningful conversation. With a beautiful human. My mother.

💙

A good thing about my writing is that I have a direct contact with my reader(s):D And one of them just emptied their RSS queue and asked for a new edition of Bullets. So here it is!

• Spring is in full swing! I love the green colors during my runs; I feel much better in such an environment!

• Speaking of the outside world, I continue to run in preparation for an upcoming 10k race in May. It will be my attempt to go under 50 minutes as much as possible (even one minute less would be cool!).

• There’s not a lot of cycling these days (I’ve probably watched more on TV), but from time to time I manage to take my sons for a short ride around the neighborhood. Today I realized that having some sort of intercom would be cool during such trips. Even though we ride close to each other, when we go to busier streets, I would really like to avoid screaming and the current way of communicating. I’m thinking about buying some sort of intercom, like for motorcyclists. No research yet, but something like BiKom 20 from Sena looks promising. Maybe you have some thoughts about it?

• On the professional front, I find recruitment hard. After more than 10 years of recruiting other people, I am now being recruited myself. I must say, I prefer the first perspective :) Definitely this topic deserves an article on its own. For now, the TL;DR is: it’s a tough game!

• On the other semi-professional side of my life, I’ve delivered another commission to my son for his birthday - custom build wardrobe. I’m very pleased with the results, I’ve learned a bit about working with black paint and designing custom handles. Little boy is happy, finally we have enough place to store his toys:-)

  

• We did a trip to Wrocław. The main point was to visit the water knowledge centre Hydropolis, which I can recommend. Lots of interactive exhibits, very interesting stories about water, and nice exhibitions — definitely worth visiting!

  

• We also had an unfortunate event with the car — one lady didn’t stop before our car, and the bumper + trunk lid were damaged. Current status is that we’re riding an SUV as a replacement vehicle while the parts for the Mazda are being ordered and replaced. After driving a few days with a different car I can see that infotainment and camera quality are far superior in newer cars than in mine, but to be honest, I still don’t fancy SUVs and like the high revs of my 6! :)

• Another car topic: yesterday we visited a motor show in Poznan. It was very cool to take my boys and spend quality time with them. They are into cars, so they were very pleased with the event — seeing Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Aston Martins, McLarens, drift shows, etc.! What I realized after the show is that I might have a sweet spot for RAMs. And this color…

  

  

Enjoy Spring, folks!

Last edition of “Bullets” came out in October ‘24, so it’s been a few months… Let’s fix it ASAP!

Tadej Pogačar won the Strade Bianche again! Even though he fell at one point and had a brutal accident, he still managed to finish first. What a sportsman! Unfortunately, our Kasia Niewiadoma also crashed, but her accident was more severe, and she had to abandon the race. So, it’s a bittersweet day, but it’s always a joy to watch the riders race on the beautiful roads of Tuscany. I’d love to go there again – hopefully soon!

We started playing Rummikub as a family. It’s a board game that requires a bit of luck and a good eye for spotting patterns—quite addictive too! I highly recommend it if you and your team know the colors and numbers from 1 to 13. You’ll be good to go and will have a great time!

Spring is around the corner, and I can’t wait! Running is so much more enjoyable when the sun is out, and I don’t have to wear multiple layers of clothing. I also think that in a few days, I’ll disconnect my bike from the Wahoo trainer and start covering some outdoor kilometers again. My Zwift subscription has already expired, so… ;)

After countless hours of research, I finally pulled the trigger and copied Marco’s move—I’m now a happy owner of a new 32" OLED ROG monitor. Quick review: it’s too good for my coding needs, but for everything else, it’s simply awesome! Prices have dropped significantly in recent weeks, so if you’re in the market for a new display, you may want to consider the PG32UCDM.

I’ve recently made some attempts to get back to (paid) work¹. The job market is pretty wild—hundreds of CVs are being sent for every open position. There are a lot of people looking for jobs, but also a flood of bot-generated CVs that look legit but are often useless. Anyway, the job market is quite competitive. It’s a great time for companies to hire top talent, but it’s challenging for individuals looking to advance their careers. More on this topic in Gergeley’s article

Not so long ago, there was a lot of snow in the area, and I decided to pick up the drone, record some footage, and put it together in a form of movie, here’s what I got https://youtu.be/PB_bQK0ze2A. I was also testing CapCut for this particular edit, but I still prefer Davinci Resolve as my go-to-editor².

I’m on Book #15 from Jack Reacher series. If you like action, Bond or Bourne movies, you’ll love these books. I definitely enjoy them, and I’m looking forward to the next one!

A good friend of mine has been fighting cancer for some time now. He is strong. The trajectory seems to be positive, and I hope he’ll be back to his normal life soon. 🙏 When we talk on the phone and I hear him in good spirits, speaking positively—it immediately makes me forget about my own problems (what problems?!). Stay strong, my friend! 💙

So, what exactly makes someone “my kind of person”? Let me break it down:

1. A sense of humor and the ability to laugh at themselves

“My kind of person” has a lighthearted approach to life. They handle things with a positive attitude, aren’t afraid to joke about their own weaknesses, and definitely won’t get offended by a little dark humor. Being around them just feels easy.

2. Respect for time

If they say they’ll be somewhere, they’ll be there. If they commit to something, they’ll follow through. No excuses, no last-minute “ekhm you know…”. Trustworthy and reliable – we love to see it. When you say you’ll be there at 8, you’re there at 8.

3. Willingness to help

This is the kind of person you can open up to, someone who listens attentively and genuinely cares. Whether it’s something practical or emotional support, they are there for us. They ask, “How are you doing?”, and actually mean it.

4. Bias toward action

Less talk, more doing. Instead of endlessly analyzing every possibility, they jump in and get their hands dirty—even when things get tough. Maybe even especially in such cases! (blood, sweat and tears, anyone?)

5. Empathy and standing up for others

A good heart matters. “My kind of person” understands people’s struggles, treats others with respect, and won’t hesitate to stand up for someone who needs it.

6. They know the difference between 2000 Colombian pesos and 2 slightly less valuable 1000 pesos

If you know, you know.

Nodding your head while reading this? You’re my kind of person! 💙

What triggered me to write this post was one person in my network, who was a regular poster and a very active member. One day, I saw a post from them that said something like: “The most satisfying thing about starting a new job is logging out of LinkedIn and feeling grateful that you don’t have to check it for a while.” They also disabled comments.

I mean… that person sold advice, highlighted successes, commented everywhere, and when they got what they wanted - they simply left? Why on earth are we doing such things to ourselves? Why do we post things like this when we feel it’s wrong and doesn’t contribute to anything good? Why do we use “fake it till you make it” in business? I’m being naive, I know, but I want to trust people and be positively surprised when someone tells me, “I’ve never done it, but I’ll do my best,” rather than being disappointed by the results of shiny marketing and “of course I can do it, I’m so good at this” and then experiencing failure.

As I don’t want to leave this post in a disappointing tone, I’ll also share a positive example from my colleague Paweł, who recently wrote the following:

While writing these Notes, I noticed something disturbing - I’m scared of being authentic. Which is ironic, given that I chose authenticity as a core value for Explorer’s Studio. My first instinct is still to show my work and myself from an angle that I think would be most “beneficial.” That’s when I realized how much unlearning I need to do. In the last 10+ years, I functioned in roles that are somehow poisoned by the notion that it’s okay to color reality. Some level of bullshitting became so normalized that I accepted it without question. After so many years, I’m now wired that way. It’s like a reflex - make things look better, smoother, more advanced than they are.

Full article here: https://yarmocovich.substack.com/p/unlearning-to-be-authentic.

It reminded me that you don’t have to fake things and fool others, there’s a better way - staying authentic!

That’s also why I like my blog: I can write whatever I want, I don’t have to do anything just to please anyone! I don’t want to ever say that I’m pleased to stop BSing anyone! I’d rather stay silent 🙊

And honestly, it made me happy as well! I hold my friend, and their contributions, in such high regard – so such recognition shouldn’t come as surprise:)

On the very same day, I had a small yet meaningful moment of my own. I finally submitted a Pull Request to the Hugo Theme Terminal repository, a theme lovingly crafted by Radek aka panr, someone whose work I’ve been using since the very start of my blog! A few minutes later, my PR was merged, and it came with a short but wonderful comment:

It genuinely made my day – a kind gesture that didn’t take much effort but meant a lot. It’s a good reminder that simple acts of acknowledgment can have a big impact.

It got me thinking – beyond all the noise of likes, followers, and algorithms, there’s still a valuable side to social media and the internet. These tools can let us be kind to each other, see and appreciate each other’s contributions, and, sometimes, make someone feel “seen” 👀. I’m not saying we all need this, but for a person like me – it’s definitely a nice thing!

As we step into a new year, an idea keeps buzzing in my head… What if big social media platforms just stopped working? Imagine a world filled with meaningful conversations, vibrant communities, and personal blogs—where we don’t spend time discovering the most-watched TikTok video of 2024¹.

Mastodon feels like a glimpse of that future. With its independent servers and a lack of corporate interests chasing profits from your data, it’s refreshing. I hope more people will explore it in 2025! But hmm… maybe I’d have to get active on those big platforms just to tell them to shut down first? 🤡

My name is Adam, and last year I did something both terrifying and exciting – I quit my job at Netguru. For the past 12 years, I had been immersed in the software industry-writing code, creating fixing bugs, learning more than I ever thought possible, meeting some truly awesome people, and eventually stepping into leadership and management roles. And you know what? It was an absolute blast for the most part! I found myself leaving the company in the end of 2023, and I decided to take a year off to recharge, reflect, and explore some of the things I’d always wanted to do but never had the time for.

Before I dive in, let me just say this: I feel incredibly privileged to be in the position I’m in. I worked hard in many areas of my life to make this possible, but I’m also keenly aware that having a strong foundation: family, health, and financial stability – was a huge factor. A few bad decisions or twists of fate, and I might not have had this opportunity at all.

Fresh start

When I left my job, I didn’t have a clear roadmap for what to do next. I just knew I needed some time. No hustle, no crazy goals. Just time. But as the weeks went on, I started thinking about things I’d always wanted to accomplish but had never managed to squeeze into my busy schedule. Here’s what I came up with for my “life-on-pause” to-do list:

• ✅ Run a half-marathon (because why not torture myself in the name of fitness and longer life?) Bullets#17
• ✅ Start a LEGO-based side hustle with my wife (it’s out there already - Zabawnia)
• ✅ Sell a piece of furniture I made with my own two hands Bullets#14
• ✅ Finish a long-overdue renovation on a few rooms in our house, and build a garden shed/storage space for all those tools and gardening supplies you need when you decide to have a garden Bullets#9
• ✅ Actually keep in touch with friends instead of just thinking, “Oh, I should text them sometime!” One of such contact led to another wonderful adventure with Ola - we’re on a mission to connect teachers with students on their musical journey applausi.io

But this wasn’t just about ticking boxes or chasing achievements. I also made a personal non-negotiables list:

• Avoid stress, as much as humanly possible.
• No rushing! Seriously, no more rushing from one thing to the next like life is some kind of never-ending sprint.

I’ll divide my learnings into few areas and describe how it went and what would I change (if anything).

1. Time is a great enabler, but doesn’t guarantee the results

When I started this break, I had this dreamy idea that I’d finally have all the time in the world. No deadlines, no meetings, just endless hours to do everything! Spoiler alert: It didn’t quite work out that way. Even with a calendar that was blissfully clear, life found a way to fill my days-errands, minor distractions, and my kids’ endless stream of “brilliant” ideas. Suddenly, the day was over, and I hadn’t accomplished Anything Meaningful™.

Looking back, I realize that a lot of the productive things I achieved in the past happened because I had two things: clear priorities and some pressure to push me forward. Without those constraints, it’s surprisingly easy for time to just… drift away. Don’t get me wrong, having more time is fantastic! But it’s not the magical key to getting everything done.

If I could do it over, I’d add some structure-with certain days for exploring and others for working toward specific goals. Time management isn’t just about squeezing tasks into busy schedules; it’s just as important when your calendar is wide open.

2. Aren’t you pushing yourself a bit too hard?

Here’s a hard truth I had to face during this year off: I’m a bit of a workaholic. Even with almost no external pressure, no deadlines, no demanding boss, and no looming targets – I somehow found a way to overload myself.

I’d get sucked into a project, find that “flow state,” and keep going way past what was reasonable. The wild part? No one was asking me to do it. I just kept pushing myself and, unsurprisingly, ended up feeling miserable more often than I care to admit.

But here’s what really hit me: for most of my career, the person pushing me to work late, tackle extra tasks, or spend weekends glued to my laptop wasn’t always the company. Or my manager. Or someone else standing over my shoulder with a deadline. Most of the time, it was me. Sure, there were tough deadlines and moments when the company really cranked up the pressure (and yes, I absolutely suffered through those), but looking back, a lot of the extra hours and stress came from my own high expectations.

This year taught me the importance of knowing when to hit pause. Just because no one is setting limits doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be any.

3. So many options, so little time

You’d think having unlimited options would feel freeing, right? Well, I learned it can actually be paralyzing. With so much time and so many possibilities ahead of me, I thought I’d dive headfirst into everything I’ve ever wanted to do. But instead, I found myself spinning in circles, unsure where to start.

The truth is, having endless options is amazing for exploring, trying new things, or just wandering. But without a sense of direction, it’s easy to get overwhelmed or, worse, spread yourself too thin.

The biggest realization I had in all this? You simply can’t do everything. What worked for me was narrowing my exploration to just a few directions at a time – things I was genuinely excited about. Try something, see if it sparks joy, and if it doesn’t? That’s fine. Drop it and move on to the next thing. Half the journey is figuring out what isn’t for you so you can focus on what is.

4. Apart from time, you need space

Taking a year off gave me the kind of time and space I’d never had before. Enough to dive into things that just wouldn’t have been possible otherwise. Two big ones defined this year for me: woodworking and starting my own business.

Woodworking wasn’t about grand creativity or intricate design. It was about enjoying the simple, meditative tasks like cutting wood, adding oil, and watching something functional come together. Zabawnia, on the other hand, was something entirely new, a true adventure. Getting it from an idea to a fully operational business took us months, and it’s the kind of project I never could’ve finished if I’d only had a few hours here and there each week. Having the freedom to commit to it fully without distractions made all the difference.

This experience taught me that some goals don’t just need “dedication” or “time management” – they need space. Without carving out that mental and physical room, those ideas wouldn’t have gone from dreams to reality.

5. If you’re a builder, then build

This past year, I realized something important about myself: I’m a builder at heart. Nothing lights me up quite like creating something with my own two hands, whether it’s a piece of furniture, a LEGO set, or a fragment of (working!) code.

In my previous roles, when I led a team, I was still “building” in a way. We created systems, delivered projects, and accomplished big goals. But so much of that work felt intangible. And as much as I loved leading and problem-solving, I realized I missed the tangible side of creating. There’s something magical about starting with raw materials and ending up with something real.

I’ve decided that I want to keep this part of my life alive. If you’re a builder, then build. Create things that bring you joy, and don’t underestimate how deeply satisfying it is to see and feel the results of your work.

Summary

I found balance in life. I started to appreciate the things I once took for granted. I learned that many clichés are true after all. Nothing monumental happened, and that’s okay. Or maybe it does matter – it was refreshing to simply live without the daily grind weighing me down. I made progress. I enjoyed the journey, I’m proud of the outcomes, and I love the place I’ve ended up. I didn’t have to wait until retirement to experience what it might feel like, and I’ve realized that if I want a happy retirement someday, I need to stay healthy, maintain balance, and nurture my passions along the way. Both the mind and the body need to stay in a good shape.

I wish everyone could have the chance to take a longer, uninterrupted break while healthy, to revisit their perspective on what really matters, what’s worth chasing, and which things might not be as important as they seem.

I immediately liked the speed and snappiness of Obsidian - it works really fast and it’s responsive. It’s a pleasure to write and jump from one note to the other. After the installation, the setup looked pretty basic, so I took a deep breath and spent a few hours investigating interesting plugins and other people’s setups. I will mention a few changes that made the biggest impact and made Obsidian feel like home.

TL;DR

Just in case you don’t want to read the whole thing, here are some screenshots of my setup:

Font

I love monospaced fonts, but I don’t have a clear winner in terms of fonts. There are many great monotype fonts like Fira Code, Cascadia Code, or Monaspace. I played with all of them in Obsidian, and after a few days of experimenting, I stuck to JetBrains Mono. It’s brilliant!

Theme

I’m a big Dracula fan and use it all around the place; however, it didn’t click with me in Obsidian. Thankfully, I found an inspiration from CyanVoxel in one of his videos!

Daily templates

Daily notes are first-class citizens in Obsidian, and it was something that I used in Logseq the most, so making them work for me was the first goal. Here are the setups/links that inspired me the most:

• https://jdheyburn.co.uk/blog/how-i-use-obsidian-to-journal/
• https://dannb.org/blog/2022/obsidian-daily-note-template/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHuzZIjb6l8

Initially, I went with Calendar and Templater and worked a few days with them. I didn’t like the navigation between daily notes, though, so after finding Journals for Obsidian, I looked no further. All I had to do was to add calendar-nav to my template and I was good to go!

The most important bit for me was a way to look back at what happened in the past, a feature from DayOne that I enjoyed immensely. I didn’t know a lot about fetching the data and using DataView, but thanks to other people sharing their stuff, I was able to quickly build something adjusted for my needs.

If you want to take a look, here is the daily template. For now, it has everything I need. In the upcoming weeks, I might put some effort into writing weekly/monthly/yearly notes. Right now, I’m focusing on building the daily habit and journaling a bit every day.

The best part of the day is going through old notes!

Importing from Logseq

Importing data was quite easy. I just moved the folder. 🤷‍♂️ There are some clever importers, but I did that manually except for journals. I had my data stored in a year-based hierarchy, but I wanted to adjust that slightly, so I built a bash script to sort files accordingly. And that was it. My notes were very simple, linking stuff, some tags here and there, so I didn’t have to bother that much.

Importing from DayOne

A few thousand journal entries from DayOne were a bigger challenge. I tried a few solutions/importers available on GitHub, ended up modifying this one: LucyDYu/dayone-to-obsidian the most, and extending it with some bash goodness to make things work.

The biggest headache was the output format and the front matter. I decided to make it compatible with the Journals plugin to save some time. I saved the first sentence of the journal entry as the DailySummary:: section, and thanks to that, I have a nice-looking “On that day” part of my daily journal.

My importer is a messy thing not worth pushing to GitHub, but if by any chance you see the possibility that it might benefit your own migration process, just ping me.

Don’t do everything at once

That’s that, expect for the fact that I also went Johnny.Decimal in the same time. I was struggling between discovering Obsidian and migrating the old tools to a yet not discovered environment. Sometimes I like to mess my routine, usually after a slower and poor period I get my anticipated productivity hit. I felt it pretty quickly this time.

Still todo

• find a way how to work with tasks
• sort files automatically based on properties (like move notes tagged #book to a certain location and add even more properties to that note)
• integrate Obsidian data structure with contents of my blog - I want to write/edit notes here and sync it with my blog’s repository so I can build and publish stuff there, but have just one source of truth.
• add sync with read-it-later service¹

If you have any questions, or suggestions on how to improve my setup, feel free to reach out! What I did was a quick and dirty migration, and I’m sure there are many things that could be done better.

It was fun, it always is! Solid 3/10 for the migration process :D I’m happy to join the Obsidian community!

The darker side

🌚 Last Sunday, we adjusted our clocks in Poland by an hour to gain more sleep (well, there are potentially other reasons we do that, but let’s not get into that here). Initially, it seemed like a good idea; the children were ready for school on time the following Monday. They didn’t complain, and everything went smoothly. However, when I went for a run after my second coffee that day, I discovered that it was already dark outside. In short, I’m not a big fan of changing our clocks twice a year, and I hope our country will eventually stop doing this.

The brighter side(s)

🏃🏻‍♂️ I completed my first half-marathon with a sub-2-hour result! I’m incredibly happy, even though I was surprised by the lack of energy in my legs in the last few kilometers. This event marked one of my biggest goals for this year, and I’m thrilled to have achieved it.

📝 I’m experimenting with Obsidian! My notes-taking system has been struggling lately, so I’m hoping that switching to Obsidian will help me improve. One positive outcome is that I drafted this post in Obsidian, and you’re reading it right now on my blog. It’s a nice side effect! Now, I just need to figure out how to use Obsidian effectively, establish a daily, weekly, or monthly notes routine, and so on. I believe it should be relatively straightforward. If you read this and use Obsidian yourself, please share your favorite resources with me. Perhaps you’ve developed a workflow that you’re happy with, or maybe you know someone who’s worth following. Any information that could enhance my journey with Obsidian would be greatly appreciated🙏

🪑 I’m also making progress in furniture making. One of my most enjoyable commissions was the office desk made from plywood. Instead of simply cutting a tabletop out of a large plywood sheet, I decided to cut around 40 thin pieces, glue them together, and create something unique.

🤔 I’m not active on social media, and I’m not entirely sure about my feelings towards it. I feel like I’m in a good place with my life right now. However, I need to return to work, and my digital footprint in my area of expertise is quite limited at the moment. I’m not sure how this will impact my job search and potential recruitment process. I’ll have to wait and see how it unfolds.

🍏 On a brighter note, Apple recently released new Mac Minis, and I must admit, I’m captivated by their compact yet powerful design!

🧐 In the software realm, I recently discovered that Omnivore is joining ElevenLabs. I’m not sure whether this is a positive or negative development, especially considering I’ve found a comfortable rhythm with my DCCF (Digital Content Consumption Flow) using NetNewsWire and Omnivore. We’ll see how this change affects my workflow.

📖 In the meantime, I encourage you to read my friend Michał’s insightful article You May Need a Gap Year - Five Reflections. After reading this, I realized that my current unemployment situation might have a more sophisticated name, definitely 😅

I miss you all, wonderful people! <3 I hope you’re all doing fantastic!

PS: I’m also glad that the Hugo theme I’m using is back in the development stage! Fingers crossed for https://github.com/panr/hugo-theme-terminal and Radek the author! Such updates are pushing me to tweak and play with blog a bit more, and I’m excited about it!

The journey began in December 2023 when I purchased two pieces of raw oak wood, intending to create some nice shelves for a friend.

After a few weeks of planning, asking for advice, and buying tools, I realized that I wasn’t quite ready to build a shelf. I lacked the tools, experience, and courage. Plus, solid wood is heavy, making it challenging for a floating shelf.

Months later, I decided to take on a bigger project: a coffee table for my wife’s birthday. This would be a significant upgrade from my previous gift, a cutting board, which was my first woodworking attempt that ignited my passion for the craft. I asked Beata for the dimensions she wanted and set out to design the table. Instead of opting for a simple solution, I dove into learning about joining wooden pieces at a 45-degree angle and how to create a wider table than the wood’s original width.

Most important part of this chapter was that I knew what I want to do and I approxaimately knew what I need to do to achieve it.

The exciting moment came when I cut the wood to size. I attempted to use a track saw, but the heavy wood made it too dangerous, so I switched to a plunge saw, which was much safer and easier to control. After cutting the pieces, I planed them to ensure they were straight, parallel, and uniform in thickness. The glue-up was a fun challenge. I used plenty of clamps and was thrilled with the result, though a bit frustrated about the places where I applied too much glue. 😅

The tricky part involved creating the 45-degree angles. By the time I reached this stage, the tabletop was around 4cm thick, and my saw was at its limits. The cuts were long, requiring careful precision. After making a few test cuts on scrap wood, I was ready to cut the tabletop. It turned out well, although I slightly miscalculated the angle, ending up with about 44.5 or 45.5 degrees. I decided to keep it as is (better done than perfect, right?) and moved on to the next step.

With all the pieces cut, I did a dry fit to see how it looked. Unfortunately, one of the larger pieces slipped off the table, and I broke a corner. I was furious with myself, needing to take a break for a few days to regroup after such a costly mistake.

When I returned, I decided to fix it once the table was assembled. Then… another accident occurred. While moving pieces, one fell and cut my hand. I was worried since the last time I cut myself, the wound took weeks to heal. I went to the hospital, but with the doctor unavailable, the nurse and I opted for a simple bandage. Fortunately, it healed nicely, and I was back to woodworking soon after.

There were several scratches and dents to fix. I used black wood filler and lots of sandpaper to make the table presentable. A lot of sanding was necessary to create a smooth tabletop.

I added dowels to join the pieces and recut the longer pieces to fix the broken corner. Honestly, refactoring in IT feels easier than in woodworking! 😅

Finally, I applied an oil finish, and the table was complete! For the legs, I opted for some pre-made ones from the store.

It’s incredibly heavy, but it looks fantastic! My wife is happy, and I feel a strong sense of pride in this project. I’ve learned so much during this process and am looking forward to tackling my next woodworking challenge.

I hope I will not cut myself again. 🤞🏻

If you have any questions about the project, feel free to ask me!

• honey
• cinnamon
• pepper
• nutmeg
• ginger
• cloves
• flour

and then you mix it all together and bake it 🤷🏻‍♂️.

Oh, and if you happen to be in Toruń, you should definitely visit The Living Museum of Gingerbreads. It’s a great place to learn about the history of gingerbread and see how it’s made. Enjoy!

🇵🇱🚴🏻‍♀️ Kasia Niewiadoma, a Polish professional cyclist, has just won the Tour de France Femmes 2024! 🚴‍♀️🇵🇱 After an unlucky start during the Olympics, she took the yellow jersey and won in the General Classification (GC) after 8 stages! I’m very proud of her achievement and her win brought good emotions to our entire family. 🥹 It’s been a good cycling season, with Tadej won both Giro and Tour, and now Kasia winning her first TdF!

👌 In general, I’m doing great! I’ve had a lot on my plate, with my sons at home all the time because vacation started, my woodworking projects getting serious, beautiful weather, and having some amazing people around me whom I try to meet, text, or call as often as possible. In short, life is good! It would probably be good if I posted more on social media so it’s easier to interact with others. I will (someday!) 🙈 For now, I’m glad to visit your RSS readers!

🪵 I’ve comissioned a few constructions for my friend (thanks for trusting me!). It has been (and still is) a tough project, but it turned out almost like the visualisation I made:) Even the slide works as expected!

🏃🏻‍♂️ I have run 500+ km this year! I’m super stoked about this, although I had to interrupt my running streak due to some nasty flies in my area… I mean – look at this:

Quick recap of the last few weeks

🏅 The Olympic games are over. It was a blast to watch so many sports, especially with my little ones! I loved the fact that for 3 weeks, I was able to turn on the TV and watch random sports that I sometimes knew nothing about. I would like my children to have a lot of passion and respect for sports and all the athletes in all the sports, coming from all different nationalities. Even though I’m mostly a football fan, I like to watch and cheer for other athletes. I don’t want my kids to only watch one football team and keep saying that they are the best and other teams suck – that’s not what sports is/should be about.

📚 I’m going through the last piece from the Wheel of Time series, it’s the 14th one! Finally, the “Last Battle” takes place, and the entire story concludes! I started reading the series in 2023, and it took me about 9 months to finish! I’m not sure I would recommend it to anyone, but for me, it was a blast! Especially the last three books, written by Brandon Sanderson who continued to write the story after the “original” author -– Robert Jordan –- passed away.

✈️ We went to an aviation event, where we could see a lot of planes, helicopters, and other flying machines. I was skeptical about it at first, as there were tons of people, and we had to walk 5km to get to the place… but it was worth it! My kids loved it, especially the F-16s and the Hercules C-130. What a day! I regret not having a better camera and lens with me, but I managed to take a few shots with my phone, and what’s more important -– I was able to enjoy the moment with my family!

It’s the better part of the year now in my part of the world. I hope you’re doing well and able to enjoy the summer! 🌞

It’s June already! Last year I did monthly summaries, but this year I have bullets, so I’ll try to keep it short and sweet!

Still running

🏃🏻‍♂️ I’m still on the run! I’ve already covered a distance of over 300km this year and I’m nearing the 400km mark! Here’s an interesting fact - this is more than the total distance I ran in the past five years combined. 💪🏻 Additionally, I successfully completed a training session where I ran a half-marathon distance, so I’ve achieved my goal ✅. I’m feeling content and satisfied!

Cycling

🩷 May is the month of the Giro, and this year Tadej Pogacar made his debut and finished first! I had a great time watching over 150 cyclists race almost every day for nearly three weeks. Now, my sons understand the significance of the pink jersey, and they’re really getting into all the cycling slang and themes. It’s so much fun when we ride together, and they pretend to be “chasing the attackers” or “closing the gap” while tackling a 3% hill. These are such enjoyable moments!

Around the house

🗜️ Tidying up the garage and garden shed can feel like a never-ending task.

However, I recently came up with a brilliant solution. I realized that I could use the leftover scraps of wood from my projects to construct shelves and storage units. This not only allows me to get rid of the excess scraps, but also helps me become more organized. It’s truly a win-win situation! I can’t believe I didn’t think of it sooner. The outcome is that I now have more space to store my tools and materials, and I can easily see what I have at a glance. Admittedly, it may not look the most aesthetically pleasing, but until I become a YouTube sensation, showcasing my DIY projects, it’s more than sufficient for my needs.

Day One meets Logseq

📝 I have been using Day One for almost a decade, and over the years, I have accumulated a substantial collection of memories on the platform. Additionally, I utilize Logseq as a personal knowledge management system to keep all my important notes easily accessible. These notes are conveniently stored on my disk in markdown format.

To ensure that all my memories are consolidated in one place, I wrote a script that allows me to import my Day One export file into Logseq. I import the entries as daily notes, and they are displayed in the daily view. If there is any specific information or reference that is not available in Day One, I add it in Logseq. This way, I can have all my memories centralized while also enhancing them with additional information and links.

This system works exceptionally well for connecting information about people and projects. It enables me to visualize the connections between them and understand the context in which they were created. Currently, I do not import any photos into Logseq since they are not as crucial within the Logseq framework. However, each link from Logseq to Day One includes a reference to the corresponding photo.

The only drawback is that I need to manually run the export from Day One because there is no API available for that functionality. Hopefully, Day One will implement an API in the future. One Day, right? :)

Reading

⏱️ I’m currently reading the 9th book in the “Wheel of Time” series, and I feel compelled to finish the remaining books in the coming months. The storyline is as intricate as the length of the series suggests, but I still find it highly enjoyable. However, I must admit that I’m starting to grow weary of the overly detailed descriptions of the women’s attire and jewelry. There seems to be something off in that aspect.

I no longer have a drone

💥 I crashed it, had it replaced, and then sold it. After experiencing a third collision caused by an obstacle on the side of the drone while flying left or right, I made the decision that I would only buy a drone equipped with omnidirectional obstacle detection, or I would not fly at all. At present, I am without a drone, but if there is a promotion for the DJI Mini 4 Pro, I will likely pull the trigger.

Trip to Błędne Skały

We had a wonderful time visiting Błędne Skały¹ with our dear friends. The children played together, the weather was pleasant, and we savored delicious food, desserts, and sweets. It was a delightful experience spent together!

Last weeks on social media

I wasn’t very active last weeks on Mastodon, that’s what worries me a bit, but I managed to see that some other people also had a break recently, so I’m not alone. I hope to get back to it soon! But to be honest, for me it works best as a platform for discovering new personal blogs and interacting with people who share their thoughts and experiences. Either I’m too old for this or I’m just not a social media person. 🤷🏻‍♂️ Maybe that’s why I keep writing some posts here from time to time!

Anyway, have a great time!

The weather is great, the trees are green, and the flowers are blooming. The days are long, and when it rains, it’s not cold. I love May!

Things are going well for me!

May is my favourite month of the year!

🏃🏻‍♂️ I’m really proud to have surpassed 200km running this year. It’s more than I’ve ever run in a year! And we still have a few months to go! My small dream is to run a half-marathon in one go. We’ll see if I can make it happen.

🪑 2 #woodworking projects have been monetized! It’s my first time in more than 10 years of getting paid for something other than IT programming/consulting! Ain’t much but it’s honest work :D

🎂 My younger son is really into cars. Every week, I have to buy him a new issue of the “Motor” magazine. Look at the cake he had on his birthday! Everything was edible! The cake was delicious!

🏦 I experimented with home budgeting a bit. Instead of taking the simple approach, I chose to explore the options available on the market. My goal was to find a self-hosted, open-source solution that would help me manage my budget and allow me to import from different sources.

• I ended up with Actual and a bunch of importers/parsers. The flow is:

  1. Download CSV, save it in a Downloads folder (bank statements, Allegro history)
  2. Hazel watches the folder and moves the file to a specific folder
  3. Run a script that parses the CSV from banks and creates it own version of data in JSON/CSV formats
  4. Run a script that imports the data to Actual
  5. Check if everything is ok, categorize the transactions, and check if the balance is correct
  6. Profit!

• One special mention for a Rails project Maybe: The OS for your personal finances – it’s still early, but I’m watching it closely.

🚗 I test drove the Tesla Model Y and while I wasn’t completely blown away, the experience exceeded my expectations. I’m not a Tesla fan yet and not quite ready for an electric car, but I must admit that the prices of Teslas and the value they offer are highly competitive compared to other car manufacturers. However, it’s worth mentioning that there was a BMW dealership near the Tesla Demo Drive and we couldn’t resist exploring some options there too. I still don’t have a strong preference for SUVs; I still prefer Tourings… Speaking of which, the last time I mentioned the 3 series, I was genuinely impressed!

📝 I see a lot of posts with #WeblogPoMo2024 – even though I’m not “attending” with my content, it’s fun to read all the stories, my RSS backlog is getting bigger and bigger!

Have a great month Folks!

Game was first

I began my journey with the Fallout universe nearly 25 years ago when full versions of both games were included with the CD-Action magazine I used to buy. Back then, as a teenager who didn’t speak English very well, nothing (except maybe FIFA 98) captivated me as much as Fallout. It was a game that not only fascinated me but also left a profound impression. That experience likely sparked my love for turn-based games (which continues to this day), the post-apocalyptic atmosphere, and dark humor.

War, war never changes.

The story is somewhat similar

The character I created in Fallout strikingly resembles Lucy in the series. She has a good attitude towards people, a desire to help, lives by her principles, but also displays some naivety and lack of experience. However, as the story progresses, she gains more depth, isn’t afraid to wield a gun, and does what needs to be done—in the Wasteland, sometimes you have to be brutally pragmatic. I had a lot of fun watching her character development and the way she interacts with the world around her, because it reminded me of my own experiences in the game.

I didn’t expect that the TV series would add a lot of new elements to the Fallout universe, but it definitely helped me to understand the world better and see it from a different perspective.

Recommendation

I am enchanted and delighted by this series rating it 9/10 and eagerly awaiting the next season!

Static site generators have gained popularity due to their simplicity, speed, and security benefits. However, one limitation of static sites is the lack of dynamic content. Typically, static sites are built with HTML and some assets, but that’s it. In this post, we will explore the concept of dynamic content in static sites and how to implement it using Hugo, a popular static site generator that I use for my blog.

You have three options to add “dynamic” content to a static site:

1. Client-side JavaScript: Fetch data from an API and render it on the client-side.
2. Cron job: Rebuild the site periodically to fetch new data.
3. Webhooks: Trigger a rebuild when new data is available.

Journey to a Dynamic /linklog Section

I learned about this topic when I wanted to create a /linklog section on my blog. The idea was to have a dynamic section that would automatically update when I add new links to my collection. I wanted to avoid manual updates and automate as much as possible.

To my surprise, even when I got Hugo to fetch the content from an API, the content became static the moment the site was built. Not what I wanted. I needed a way to keep the content dynamic and up-to-date.

The journey itself was quite hilarious, with many trial and error attempts. But in the end, I managed to create a dynamic /linklog section using Hugo. Let’s dive into the details of how I achieved this.

Implementing Dynamic Content

Firstly, you need to have a source of dynamic content. In my case, I created an API that fetches links from my read-it-later app and Mastodon. The API returns the links in JSON format, which Hugo can parse and render on the site. If you know a little bit of programming, you should be able to set up a simple API using your favorite language and framework, there are also many services that can help you with that. In my case, it was a simple Ruby Sinatra app serving /links endpoint.

Once you have the API set up, you need to fetch and parse the dynamic content using Hugo’s templating system. Hugo provides a powerful templating language that allows you to manipulate data and generate HTML pages. You can use the getJSON function to fetch data from an API and then loop through the results to render them on the site. There are a few examples in the Hugo documentation that can help you get started.

I created a shortcode in Hugo that fetches the links from the API and displays them. Here is an example of the shortcode:

{{ $apiUrl := .Get "url" }}
{{ $links := getJSON $apiUrl }}

{{ $data := $links }}
{{ range $links }}
  <div>
    <a href="{{ .url }}" title="{{ .description }}">{{ .title }}</a>
    {{ range .tags }}
      <code>
        #{{- . -}}
      </code>
    {{ end }}
  </div>
{{ end }}
  

It fetches links from the URL passed in the shortcode and renders them as a list of links with tags. You can customize the shortcode to suit your needs and style it using CSS.

In order to use the shortcode, you need to add it to your content file. Here is an example of how I added it to my /linklog page:

---
title: My linklog
---

These links are cool!
{{<links url="https://example.com">}}

And that would be it. If you build your site now, you should see the links fetched from the API and rendered on the page. But the site is still static, and you need to rebuild it every time you add new links. Let’s automate that.

Automated Deployment Trigger

I’m a big fan of automation. I automate many things to save time and reduce errors. The setup I have for my blog is that whenever I push a new commit to the repository, Netlify automatically builds and deploys the site to the server. There is also a build hook that I can manually trigger to rebuild the site.

Since I have the hook available, I decided to use it to trigger a rebuild whenever I add new links to the API. I connected all the pieces using N8N, but Zapier, IFTTT, or any other automation tool should work as well. Here’s a preview of the workflow:

As you can see, whenever I save a link using my read-it-later app, a webhook is triggered. This webhook then triggers the API refresh and the Netlify build hook. The site is rebuilt, and the new links are automatically added to the /linklog section. Automation FTW!

Benefits and Lessons Learned

With all the pieces in place, I can now focus on curating links and not worry about manually updating the site. The /linklog section is dynamic and up-to-date, providing a better user experience for visitors. The time-saving aspect is also significant since I don’t have to spend time updating the site manually. The truth is, I used to forget to update the site, and as a result, the /linklog section was always outdated. But now, it’s always fresh!

I can also customize the shortcode or create a similar one to use for “monthly summaries” or “weekly notes” sections. The possibilities are there!

I also didn’t publish this post until I figured out the site update automation. Now, I feel more confident about sharing this approach with you because I know it works and is reliable.

The additional API I created can be used for other purposes as well.

It turns out that one’s static site might not be so static after all!

Today was Easter Sunday

In Poland, we celebrate Easter.🐣 In many homes, including mine, families gather for a lavish breakfast. There is usually an abundance of food that lasts for hours, and it wouldn’t be surprising if you skipped lunch. However, on this day, usually, no one skips any meals because there are always more delicious dishes and cakes to enjoy. Otherwise, you risk being bombarded with questions from your grandma, mother, or aunt.

I didn’t want to feel sluggish after breakfast, so I went for a quick run with my 2 sons - they were riding their bikes and I tried to keep up the pace.

After 2 kilometers on the forest path, I met a colleague that I went to school with (👋 Szymon! we grew up together for about 10 years). We had a great chat, including discussing the motivation for running after taking a break or encountering unexpected obstacles. We concluded that:

there’s no point in overthinking getting back on track, you shouldn’t think, just do it.

So simple, and that was also the reason why I put on my running shoes today.

here I’m skipping the part when it turned out that during our conversation with Szymon, my son got a flat tire and we had to go back home on foot, skipping the run and lifting 10kg on my back instead… 🤦‍♂️

Evening reflections

Later in the evening during an RSS session, I found out that the newest combination of Omnivore and NetNewsWire gave me peace of mind, and instead of thinking, I’m actually benefiting from the system I created and the stuff I read has an impact on my brain.

Simplifying things helped me start doing more complex things within my brain.

One of the items in my backlog was Paweł’s¹ Top picks — March 2024 | pawelgrzybek.com, where I found a link to an old Seth’ article: Talker’s block.

My favorite part:

“Just write poorly. Continue to write poorly, in public, until you can write better.”

I knew I had to try. Do not overcomplicate things, just do it. It kind of works! It connected well with the conversation I had earlier today.

It’s good to have friends not just feeds

And lastly, Michał shared a wonderful tip regarding the time change we do every year (today was the day). He learned² that the British found a great way to remember how to do the time change correctly every year:

“Spring forward, fall back.”

I know your watches, phones, and computers have already made the switch, but if you think of all the analog clocks, microwaves, ovens, etc., you might find this sentence useful next time!

So, how do I feel at the end of March?

I feel great! I moved forward a lot with my projects and I know which direction I want to go. I find the small bits in life that make me happy and I try to use them to my advantage. I know that I can do a lot of good things to other people when I’m on the right track. 🙌

But this time change is killing me… and I feel like going to bed now!

March, thank you! 💙

🏔️ Back in December, I visited the Karkonosze mountains and had a great time, as you might remember from Bullets #9. This week, my family and I went there again, accompanied by another family. The weather was completely different this time; it wasn’t as magical as it was in December, but we still managed to go hiking and spent two nights in a mountain lodge.

📸 Why do all the families I see on Instagram or social media appear so happy? Parents never seem to complain about anything, etc. If I were to share a few snapshots of the conversations or situations we experienced on the trip, it would definitely present a much different picture than what we are accustomed to. Instead, I will simply say that children are much more adept at descending than ascending, and sweet motivators like chocolate or candies work wonders 🙈.

🪑 I’m making progress with my wood projects! One bathroom cabinet is finished, and it would have been ready to hang on the wall if I hadn’t mistakenly measured the distance between the walls as 0.5cm wider than it actually is. So, I need to make a small adjustment and it should be ready in a few days! In the meantime, another cabinet is completed, and there are no issues with its dimensions. I’m excited to ship it next week!

⌨️ The other two sites I’m working on are progressing nicely. The domains are ready, and one of them even has a logo! I want to give a big shout out to Andy Carolan for his work. I’m very happy with the result! Zabawnia will be a place where we will be renting toys, games, and LEGO sets for children (and not only for them!). Perhaps a small sneak peek first:

👨🏻‍💻 I don’t regret writing the e-commerce part from scratch. I’ve learned a lot and had a lot of fun doing it! I know there are multiple no-code/low-code solutions out there, but after browsing them for a while, I realized that it would take me a lot of time to become proficient with them. Plus, I might hit a dead end without knowing how to move forward. Ruby on Rails is a really cool technology that has matured a lot over the years. I’m satisfied with it as part of the technology stack for my new projects!

🤖 My free Copilot license for Open Source has expired, so I immediately purchased it again. It’s a huge time-saver for me and a great companion that helps me throughout the day when I’m dealing with code!

❓ I am currently considering how to manage deposits in our business. In the majority of cases, I will be returning the deposit to the customer. I am looking for a solution that minimizes the fees charged by payment providers. Ideally, I prefer not to have the funds transferred to me initially, but I still want to have a means of retrieving my money if necessary. I am aware that this is not a unique problem and believe there must be a suitable solution out there. If you happen to know of one, please inform let me know!

📽️ I made it to Boilingfrogs for the 3rd time in the last few years! In addition to attending informative sessions about DDD, clean code, and architecture, the highlight of the event was definitely the time I spent with Radek. We shared a ride, a room, some beers, and burgers! Thanks, M8! 🙇🏻‍♂️

🚴‍♂️ This season, Tadej Pogačar won Strade Bianche and finished 3rd in Milan-Sanremo. In addition, this week he achieved 4 other stage victories and won the GC in Volta Catalunya! It’s really enjoyable to watch him race. As is often the case in this professional group, there are certain things that make you laugh, even when the stakes are high.:

“Nobody wanted to pull, so we came from behind, me and Domen, and we’d like to pull but nobody held our wheel,” he said. “So we had a little bit of a gap – 100 metres, 200 metres – so we stopped for a pee and hid in the bushes so the peloton didn’t know where we were so it was just a little bit of fun.” via First a joke, then Tadej Pogacar blows the Volta a Catalunya apart | Cyclingnews

👋 That’s it this time! “Nothing really happend”, but writing about it was a fun thing to do!

Context

Reeder was my companion for RSS feeds; its integration with my Apple devices provided a seamless user experience. Everything went well until I started writing more on my blog. I wanted to have API access and connect it with my site, especially the linklog. I was reading quite a lot of links and wanted to tag them, add highlights, and share them with all of you here. Unfortunately, Reeder is “just an app” and doesn’t have any API access. My RSS feeds contain various content like brain-melting articles, interesting blog posts, news from some of the sites around my interests, and some “alerts” with deals.

Adventure with Readwise Reader

I was looking for a solution and found Readwise Reader. It wasn’t perfect; I even extended the trial and exchanged a few emails with support. The experience was much heavier than with Reeder (which I would describe as more casual). There were a ton of options, settings, and customization. Here are a few things I liked the most about it (it’s a great service after all!):

• Highlights – I could highlight the text and save it for later. It was a great way to remember the most important parts of the article. There’s also a Logseq integration, so I had all of the important parts in my notes.
• Tags – I could tag the articles and then filter them by tags. It was a great way to organize the content. It’s also a great way to customize the views 👇
• Views – I could customize the views and create a few different ones. I was able to create multiple views with the same feed, and based on the tags or properties (like read/unread), I could filter the content. I had my “Quick!” view and some other views for different purposes and for different states of mind.
• API – I could connect it with my site and use the API to fetch the content. It was a great way to connect the content with my site and share it with you.
• RSS reader and read-it-later in one – It wasn’t obvious at the beginning, but I had one place for all the content, both for quick reading and for saving for later. It was very convenient. I realized it when my new RSS reader only had a “starred” state, and I wasn’t able to save articles not coming directly from the RSS feed I followed.The reason I resigned from Reader was that I was paying around $9 each month and not using it as much as I wanted. I mainly used it for reading, not for saving content or making highlights. As a result, there was hardly anything going through the API to my site. I was essentially paying for unused features, and I hate paying for something I don’t use.
• ChatGPT integration – I could use the ChatGPT integration to summarize the articles. It was a great way to get the gist of the article and decide whether to read it or not. It was just one click away!

New Approach

Now, I’ve adopted a new approach to RSS reading. I have two apps:

1. NetNewsWire – This free, open-source app now serves as my RSS feed workhorse. I can browse through the content and then decide whether or not to save it for later. Although it may not be as polished¹ as Reeder or Readwise Reader, it gets the job done (fast!) and I am satisfied with it.

   

2. Omnivore – I use this app to save content from NetNewsWire and the web at large. It’s also available on all my devices, and I utilize it to read articles and make highlights. Similar to Reader, it integrates with Logseq, enabling me to save the highlights and incorporate them into my notes.

   

The fact that both apps are open-source is a major plus. I believe that supporting these projects is a better way to invest my money rather than paying for underutilized features. Additionally, I appreciate the idea of having two separate apps for reading and saving content. It adds a layer of complexity, but it works well for me. My brain is happy with this solution – it doesn’t trigger the more powerful cores when in “browsing” mode, but it’s ready to fire up when I’m in “consuming” mode.

In conclusion, I am content with this solution and believe it is the best approach for now.

Trip to Tenerife

• I was luck enough to spend some holiday time in Tenerife, Spain with my family. It was a great time, and I’m happy to report that we all had a wonderful time!

• In my case, it seems that sand, water, minimal clothing, and lots of ice cream are the key ingredients for a happy family time. With these elements, there is minimal friction and a smooth passage of time without many problems.

• I love this island (beaches, hiking trails, the overall beauty!). It was my second time here, and this time we were able to bring along some friends and their families. Spending time together made our experience much more enjoyable and diverse! Not to mention, we already have some friends permanently living there (lucky them!).

• Sadly, my action camera got wet and stopped functioning. Fortunately, this occurred on our final day, and all the data remained unaffected. To resolve the issue, I am currently testing a DJI Care Refresh solution that I purchased alongside the camera. Under this agreement, I will pay 17EUR for a replacement device. I will be sending the damaged camera back to Hungary, and DJI will send me a new unit without any additional inspections or procedures. Fingers crossed for the process to work as good as advertised!

• Now it’s time to go throught the photos and videos and start editing them.

Backpack and some tech

• After using my Deuter backpack for 12 years, it has unfortunately been damaged¹. It appears that a pencil from my iPad became disconnected, creating a hole and causing the pencil’s tip to go missing. I have already spent 4 EUR to purchase a replacement pencil tip. Now, I am unsure if I should attempt to repair the backpack myself by stitching it or if I should simply buy a new one from the market 🙃 Do you have any recommendations?
• I’ve seen a lot of Kia EV9 reviews recently. I like the car, but it’s suspicious that all of the reviews are almost 100% positive. What am I missing? Besides the fact that I’m not ready for an electric and expensive car right now. Look at that color! 💙

There is a new X100 in town

• I totally missed the premiere of the FUJIFILM X100VI. I own the previous model, and I’m a little jealous of the image stabilization in the new one! But other than that, I’m happy that Fuji is going to be able to keep up with demand, and there will be many more X100 owners soon!
• I’ve bought mine in 2020, needed a simple camera with a lot of customization options that is going to allow me to take picture of my family life plus some photography during cycling trips. Still happy with the choice!

Traveling is great, but

• I missed the feeling of being at home and having a variety of activities to do aside from hiking and going to the beach. I enjoy having busy days when I am engaged in something significant or at least something that keeps me occupied.
• When we returned home, I couldn’t help but smile as spring is just around the corner. The vibrant scenery will soon burst forth with lush greenery, birds will serenade us with their joyful songs, and the temperature will rise. The next six months are going to be the best!
• Speaking of projects, I will structure my days as if I were going to work so I can push forward with more important projects and try to finally generate some income… This week I’m working with ⌨️, the next should also include some 🪵!

Other

• Playing Jagged Alliance 3 – love it, but I hate how turn-based games steal so many hours of my life!
• I feel a bit envious of those who have already ridden over 100km this year (great job, Jakub!). Unfortunately, my body isn’t quite ready to handle more than 3 hours on the bike yet. Hopefully, I’ll be able to join the club in a few weeks. For now, I need to focus on training and covering more and more kms.
• Speaking of cycling, this week I’m going to watch the first event of the season – Strade Bianche 2024. I’m also thinking about going cycling in the same area, so watching the race could be a potential motivation to turn my plans into reality.
• I can see that Marco is interested in Gridfinity system with his 3d printer. I must say this is a #1 project if I ever get a 3d printer! Waiting for some updates from you Marco!
• For a music recommendation, I can share something which I’ve been listening to recently, it’s a repeating radio program, but every time it makes me smile! BBC Radio 1 - Radio 1’s Dance Anthems

Inspiration

For a long time, I was a fan of wheniskeynote.com, a site that counts down to Apple’s next big event. If something as anticipated as a keynote merits its own website, why not something as practical as trash collection reminders?

In my household, despite having shared calendar reminders, the occasional schedule tweak or human error has led to angry words coming out from my mouth. As a resident of a single home, the chore of hauling bins to the front the night before pickup is mandatory – unless you’re a fan of exceptionally early starts when you hear the big truck coming.

Domain name

The turew.pl domain was already mine, but I didn’t start any projects around it. Adding smieci¹ was the intuitive choice for a subdomain that says exactly what it does in a quirky, local fashion.

The Tech Stack

Speaking tech, I took a straightforward approach:

• Data sourced directly from our trash collection company to ensure accuracy.
• A simple Ruby (Sinatra) app powers the site, serving up a single, lean endpoint.
• Deployed seamlessly through fly.io, making the app accessible and reliable. Also free for small projects like this one.
• Code is shared on Github for transparency (maybe someone would like to build a similar page themselves?).
• CSS is minimal, just enough to ensure usability on both mobile and desktop devices.

What’s Next

Future enhancements? Perhaps an .ics link for easy calendar event importing, maybe it could be a PWA with notifications… However, right now I’m happy with the simplicity of the site and the fact that it’s already helping my neighbors (or at least myself). I know similar services exist, but you have to download an app for that, they aren’t pretty or they don’t work in my area.

Joy

This venture was a reminder that coding can not only be cool but also practical. It’s a joy to provide a solution that eases the small hassles of daily life for myself and people around me. Coding isn’t just about building complex systems or chasing the latest trends. Sometimes, it’s about honing in on an issue, no matter how small, and deploying fun-sized tech to solve it. I hope my newest project is exactly that!

As we kick off the new year, I’m pleasantly surprised by the positive energy and progress in my life. Does this mean 2024 starts exceptionally well, or was 2023 just setting the bar low? Let’s dive into the highlights!

Back in Action

• Outpaced my entire 2023 running distance in January alone, hitting around 50km, all indoors¹.
• Pedaled through a few bike rides, aiming for a 200km total by month’s end.
• I am extremely grateful for good health! Feels good!

Books

• I’m sure I’ve chosen the wrong series (The Wheel of Time). I’m currently on the 4th book!
• My app says that the audiobook series is 323 hours long, which means I still have around 250h to go 🙃
• I find great satisfaction in immersing myself in longer forms of content, as opposed to solely focusing on shorter ones. While I still appreciate shorter content, I no longer overlook the value of longer works as I did in 2023.

I’m watching

• Experiencing Ted Lasso anew alongside my wife – shared moments are twice as nice. 💙
• Finished Season 1 of Slow Horses and gearing up for the next. Superb acting, intriguing plot, and spot-on humor!
• True Detective Season 4 is a return to form – dark, gripping, and reminiscent of favorites like The Killing.

I’m listening

• When Bobiko recommends some old-school dance/house/party (MANIECZKI!) music, I immerse myself in it and listen for several days. It’s a wonderful sensation to revisit the 00s for a little while!

Woodworking Woes and Wins

• I had my first major disappointment in my woodworking journey. I had invested several hours into a project, only to realize that I wouldn’t be able to complete it due to a lack of space, tools, and skills.
• Initially, I felt like giving up and getting rid of all the tools I had purchased.
• Fortunately, it was too cold to go to the garage, so I had some time to calm down and let the disappointment fade away.
• I already have some designs for my next projects and I can’t wait to begin working on them!

Coding

• I’ve spent a considerable amount of time creating a website for our small business (my wife and me) that we are about to launch.
• The concept is similar to e-commerce, and I have been weighing the options of using existing solutions or starting from scratch.
• For those who know me, the answer is already clear - I am opting to build it from scratch.
• Although I am both excited and terrified, I am confident that it is the right decision. I will gain valuable knowledge and have the freedom to design it exactly as I envision.
• I find myself chuckling as I work on implementing the shopping cart feature; it may seem mundane, but I am thoroughly enjoying the process! 😂

Other

• I’ve started using Timery to track my time spent on different activities. I’ll share the results in the next bullets. It looks promising so far!
• Sophie wrote a post about the way she shares her recommended links on her blog. It’s a great idea increasing the value of the shared content (we as people love recommendations from other people we know²)! It could be a great way to start blogging for those who are struggling to find topics to write about³. Human curation FTW!

All in all, I’m happy with the current state of things. I’ve been feeling more positive in recent weeks. It could be due to increased activity or simply because the kids are back in school and I have more time for myself.

Take some good vibes from this post and have a great week!

This post is inspired by Bobiko’s post 🇵🇱 Twórz uniwersalne notatki – I decided to finally write a bit about my adventure with Logseq.

I’ve tried many apps

My toolkit was once a mishmash of popular apps—Apple Notes, Confluence, Evernote, Craft, Drafts, Google Docs, Bear, Ulysses, Obsidian², and more. Despite the breadth of my experience with each, the search for the ideal platform continued. That was until Bartek introduced me to Logseq, praising its Markdown capabilities and suitability for our shared job responsibilities. His recommendation came at a time when I was already a devoted Craft user, drawn to its user-friendly UI/UX and seamless formatting experience. While Craft facilitated cross-linking between documents brilliantly, its closed system posed limitations for exporting content and integrating easily with outside world, nudging me towards alternatives. I then saw Michał grepping through his plain Markdown notes on his computer and thought that I need something simple. I also wanted to be able to grep through my notes, and I couldn’t do that with Craft. It was around March 2022 when I started using Logseq, I know this thanks to my own post:)

Mor than just a notepad

Logseq stood out with its versatility—it wasn’t just about Markdown. The appeal of themes, templates, and plugins captured my attention, but the journaling view truly set it apart. Each day automatically begins with a fresh entry, ready to capture spontaneous thoughts. As the day unravels, links and tags organically connect these entries to relevant pages. Sometimes, a simple woodworking tip or a memorable point from a conversation can effortlessly become part of a vast network of interconnected knowledge. The ability to recall details just by navigating to a person’s or topic’s page is, for my workflow, invaluable.

However, Logseq isn’t without its hiccups. While it’s a robust system on Mac, its performance on mobile devices, particularly through iCloud synchronization, is not as good. It’s ok for reading but falls short for writing, leading me to keep Apple Notes and Drafts close at hand for certain tasks.

Journaling in Logseq

Journaling presents a different set of requirements. Logseq, akin to a versatile hammer, handles a lot of tasks well, but for delving into personal introspections, Day One remains unmatched. For me, Day One has more intimacy, and Logseq is just a tool. Still, experimenting with Logseq’s templating capabilities has been rewarding. My 1-1-1³ template—covering #wins, #thoughts, #stress, and #gratitude -— has brought structure and reflection, aggregating tagged thoughts into a single, accessible domain. It’s another feature I’ve tried to replicate in Day One but without the same efficiency.

Looking forward

I foresee sticking with Logseq for the long haul. Its plain Markdown foundation ensures flexibility and future-proofing, ready to transition content to apps like Obsidian or any newcomers that might arise. And if the need for customized exporting ever arises, I’m confident in my ability to develop a solution or rely on the community for support.

Pros

On a positive note, Logseq has a lot going for it:

• built on plain Markdown
• easy to start with yet highly customizable for power users
• versatile
• fast
• extensible with plugins
• works great as a personal knowledge base (PKM)
• support for tasks
• templates
• free and open-source

Cons

On the other hand, there are some drawbacks:

• mobile experience is not as good as on desktop
• I can’t use it for journaling, as it lacks the intimacy of Day One
• it’s not as polished as Craft
• it might be too complex for some users

In sum, Logseq has become an integral part of my life—a digital hub for my personal and professional worlds. Whether I’m journaling or managing a whirlwind of miscellaneous information, its strengths have, thus far, overshadowed its weaknesses, making it a mainstay in my day-to-day.

Summary of my Logseq adventure

I’m thrilled to share first post of 2024 and at the same time – the 10th edition of Bullets with you! I’m glad this format “clicked” for me. While I considered being more active on Mastodon, it turns out that writing on my own website offers me more joy 🤷🏻‍♂️.

2024: Year of the Blog

• Inspired by Paweł’s post discovery, I stumbled upon the prediction that 2024 will be the Year of the Blog, and I wholeheartedly agree 2024 is the Year of the Blog.
• Recent shifts in the digital landscape show more individuals favoring personal websites and embracing RSS. My perspective might be somewhat bubble-bound, but it’s encouraging.
• Mastodon, despite my affection for it, presents a challenge to keep up with content flow—surprising even for someone with my free schedule.
• Reading longer (and more thoughtful) blog posts has become my primary mode of social interaction. The best combination for me is a blog post with a Mastodon thread for discussion 🙌.

The Generalist’s Dilemma

• I never considered myself an expert, but I’ve managed to learn a lot of things in my life and I’m pretty good at a few of them.

EDIT: My friend – Michał pointed out to me that I can attach a “specialist” badge to many things I’m doing and that I definitely consider myself an expert. After a while, I found this quote that resonates with me: “A jack of all trades is a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one.”. And it’s true for me, I might just have a different definition of “expert” than others, and that’s fine!

• Right now I’m torn between a few different topics:
  • Programming, ever the engineer
  • Parenting, with its unexpected lessons
  • Reconnecting with friends and family
  • Crafting a business concept
  • Woodworking and DIY projects, from novice to practiced amateur
  • Cycling for unmatched joy
  • Photography, a persistent love
• The challenge isn’t just finding time — it’s excelling in these diverse fields, as I strive to do things well.
• I’m keen to share these thoughts; perhaps they’ll resonate with you and help me strategize a fulfilling balance.
• My latest bet is to spend more time on the things that bring me the most joy.

How to become an optimist

• I don’t have an answer to this question, but I’m trying to find one.
• For yeeeeeears I was an optimist, but in last few years I’ve become more and more pessi… realistic.
• It hit me when I was taking a shower on the 1st of January, and I’ve heard a song “Always look on the bright side of life” by Monty Python.
• So, I’ve decided to try to become an optimist again — suggestions are most welcome! 🙃

Other

• “Wheel of Time” series continues to captivate me into the third book.
• I’m learning Fusion 360 and I’m planning to build a few things using it. I love the rendering capabilities of this software (finally something that puts stress on my Mac!), and the way it works!
• Cycling has made a grand comeback in my life, with over 100km clocked this week!
• DIY pondering led me to choose mitre joints and dowels for a shelving project—just awaiting warmer weather for a garage workshop return.
• My feed is brimming with 2023 summaries, they inspire me a lot (and of course lead to opening more and more threads in my already fullfiled brain:D)
• Thanks to Bobiko, I have a music recommendation for you: Paul Kalkbrenner in Istanbul 2023!
• I’m bulding Aston Martin DB5 from Lego and it’s so much fun! My 7-year old son built it some time ago and it was even featured in Bullets #6, but it was only a borrowed model. Now I have my own and it’s going to be a great addition to a shelf in my office!

Warm wishes for 2024—may it be a year of discovery and contentment for us all! Do you have any themes for the year ahead? Let me know!

Rediscovering Blogging

This year marked my return to blogging after a hiatus. Drawn to its simplicity and adaptability, I embraced the Hugo platform, choosing a theme that brought a personalized elegance to my virtual space.

Impressed by Inspiration

Among the myriad of inspiring content creators, Robb stands out. His page, a beacon of creativity and dedication, has earned my unofficial “Web Award of the Year.” His work is a testament to what passionate webcraft can achieve!

Kudos to all people maintaining their personal sites and blogs, you’re AWESOME! 🙌 The Web is Fantastic, you know?

Finding My Writing Groove

Challenging myself to write more, I’m proud to have published a personal best of 40 posts (including this one!). I wrote 0 posts in 2022 and 0 in 2021, so it’s a huge improvement!

Adding “Bullets” was a game-changer, allowing me to share my thoughts in a more casual format.

The Return of RSS

RSS feeds have made a triumphant return to my daily life, enriching my reading routine with curated content that keeps me connected and informed. For those yet to rediscover its charm, I urge you to give it a go. And if you have a blog, Please, Expose your RSS!

Great Blogging Platform That Works

The trio of Hugo, GitHub, and Netlify has become the cornerstone of my blogging. Together, they provide a reliable and cost-effective solution that keeps my focus on creating content rather than managing a website. All the code is available on GitHub.

One small addition to this trio is a standalone app written in Ruby that helps me to add some dynamic content to my blog. It’s a simple app that fetches the data from various services (like what did I add to my reading lists, what are Mastodon links to my entries, etc.) and allows me to add them to my blog.

Conclusion

Looking back on 2023, I’m filled with gratitude for the renewed passion, lessons, and connections blogging has brought into my life. It’s with eagerness that I look forward to continuing this journey into 2024. To my readers, thank you for being a part of this voyage—may our adventures in the blogosphere continue to flourish! 🙏

The Double-Edged Sword of Focus

• Sometimes I wonder if my relentless focus is a strength or a stubborn quirk. Once I’ve zeroed in on a task, I’m locked in –— nothing else exists until I’ve seen it through to the end.
• This intense concentration can be a double-edged sword. On one side, it’s a source of frustration; it grinds against my ability to switch tasks smoothly. I find myself wrestling with the urge to pause and catch my breath.
• Flip the coin, and it’s my superpower. The very same drive ensures I see projects to completion, often with results I’m proud of. It’s the reason I’ve been quiet on Mastodon and here these past weeks.
• While I’m still navigating unemployment, my days have been fully consumed by the Advent of Code, delving into woodworking, and immersing myself in Christmas preparations. It’s not silence, but a vibrant dedication humming away from public view.

Advent of Code

• Eleven days of coding yielded 21 stars, posted for all on GitHub.
• I enjoyed it a lot and plan to finish the rest of the puzzles in the next few weeks¹.
• It was both enlightening and obsessive, leading me to temper my involvement for the sake of harmony at home.
• ⚠️ Realizing that others, like Robb, Lewis, and Zoe, also stepped back at the same time was an eye-opener. Zoe’s post Advent of Code is not healthy for me echoed my sentiments exactly, something I didn’t realise until I read it.
  • I feel grateful for this post and I’m glad not only that I’m not alone in this, but also that I’m not the only one who decided to step back. 🙏

Woodworking

• Furniture for my bedroom is 92% done!
• I’m so happy with the results, and the things I’ve learned along the way.

  

• It’s MDF, so don’t expect fancy stuff in here, I’m not that good yet :D
• It was fun project, because I’ve never done anything like this before and went through all the steps from designing, ordering materials, buying hinges, screws, cutting, drilling and assembling.
• There will be a mirror on the left side of the TV plus some LED lights soon.
• I’ve also made a few cutting boards for my family and I’m also pretty happy with the results! Aren’t they pretty?

  

Mountains

• A trip to Śnieżka (1602 m) and a stay at the mountain shelter Samotnia were nearly perfect—only a fireplace was missed. The company, weather, and vistas painted the ideal pre-Christmas escape. The photographs here barely do justice to the experience.

Other

• Kudos to Bobiko for launching a new version of Bobiko.Blog!
• The GTA VI teaser has me eagerly awaiting its release!
• I’m still reading “The wheel of time” and I’m surprised by the number of threads that are still open!
• This story about time made me smile Did the SS Warrimoo Exist in Two Centuries at Once? | Snopes.com²
• And although unemployment brings its challenges, it has opened a season of creativity and anticipation.

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year! 🎄

PS: Should I write 2023 summary post? 🤔 I expect nothing less than 💙🚴‍♂️🪵🫡🙌💸📉 :D

Productive Blogging in November

• November tallied seven posts – a leap from October’s zero and September’s one.

• Writing more signals a positive shift for me.

• My posts combining tech insights with personal musings embody my ideal blog style.

• Kudos to @Marco for resuming his What caught my attention… series!

• This month, I’ve enjoyed following Polish bloggers Paweł Grzybek and Michał Żelazny for their compelling content.

• RSSes FTW!!! Remember folks, expose your RSS!

BTW, do you have any preference regarding the contents of the RSS feed? I’m thinking about adding the full content of the post to the feed (currently I just use the summary/description), but I’m not sure if it’s a good idea. What do you think?

Recent Blog Enhancements

• Fresh updates, including the blog’s footer!
• Discover every post with the new Archives page.
• “Now” page fans¹, find a direct link in the footer /now
• I’ve fixed /linklog page, which was broken due to the fact that I’ve changed the way I’m using tags (migration from Pocket to Readwise Reader), plus IFTTT decreased the number of free applets, so I had to change the way I’m using it²
  • BTW, you should definitely check how Jose done it on his blog – automated, clean, and insightful!
• If you’re a Google crawler, you can find the right stuff in sitemap.xml you should be able to spend your budget better now! No need to thank me!

I feel free

• Post-Bullets #7, I’ve embraced the freedom of unemployment.
• Diving into various ventures keeps each day diverse and fulfilling.
• While it has its challenges like disrupted routines, focusing on hobbies and side projects doesn’t feel like a waste of time!
• I’m doing a lot of things, each day is different, I learn new things (outside of IT, mostly).

Home automation

• Shelly devices integrated with Homebridge running on my Synology proved to be an excellent choice.
• I was reluctant to buy cover/roller/shutter controller, but when I bought and tested one, I didn’t hesitate to buy more for all the windows in the house!
• A cautionary tale – my first ever electric shock from 230V AC taught me a painful but valuable lesson. I’ve turned off the fuse, but it was not the right one. I’m more careful now³!

Music and reading

• Inspired by kottke.org blog, for the last few days, the only thing I’m listening to is one of the Ministry of Sound compilations, e.g The Annual 2021 - Mixed by Pete Tong (DJ Mix) or the one mentioned by kottke. Perfecto!
• During polishing, sanding and other #woodworking activities I’m listening to the audiobook

Check out this video from the dealership showcasing the very car that won me over:

Next to this blue-coloured beast, there was a red one, a little bit older, but the one which is one of the most recognizable 🐎 Ferrari models, the F40. It was a nice contrast to the blue Divo, and I couldn’t resist taking a shot of it as well.

Core setup

Computer 🆕

I use a 2023 Mac Studio.

M2 Max with 12-CORE CPU + 38-CORE GPU, 1TB SSD + 64GB RAM. More than enough for anything that I throw at it. Lightroom, DaVinci Resolve, Docker, VS Code, even browsing the web – everything is fast and smooth. I’m really happy with this machine.

I’m satisfied the most with the number of ports available. I can connect all my devices without any issues. Not a single dongle is required. I still have my Anker Hub connected to the computer, but it’s mostly because of the cable management.

2023 is the first year when I bought a stationary Mac, after almost 15 years of using laptops. I’m happy with the decision, but I have to admit that I miss the portability of the laptop. If I had to travel a lot, I would probably stick to the laptop.

Display

In 2017 I bought LG 27UD88-W display. It’s 27";, 4K and it has a USB-C connection which works great as a laptop companion (one cable for power&display). Currently connected via HDMI.

The desktop is occupied by a beautiful GT3 Touring most of the time, or a different creation coming either from my own camera.

Keyboard and mouse 🆕

I used trackpad for years, but when I switched to MX Master 3 for Mac – I never looked back. Great scrolling and customisation possibilities, I can have a different mouse-key bindings for each application.

Big change for me was switching to a mechanical keyboard. I started with Keychron K14 some time ago and after some time changed it to Kechron Q1 Pro. I struggled a lot after switching from the Apple flat keyboard, it hurt for quite some time. Didn’t give up, bought a funny things called arm rest from Fellowes and it helped a lot.

It has a blue esc key, has a knob, all the F-keys are available and it’s a pleasure to type on it!

Additional devices

I have a couple of additional devices on my desk as well.

Speakers

Long time ago, it was 2002 or 2003 — I dreamed of having a 5.1 speaker system. I bought Creative Inspire 6.1 6700 back then. They are with me for almost 20 years already, even though I use them as 2.1 system right now.

I use the sub and two satellites from the 6700 set. Why? Mostly because of the size (satellites are very small) and they have a wired remote which is glued to the bottom of my desk and I use it to control the volume of the speakers.

It’s not ideal but for work — this setup is pretty much OK.

Headphones

I choose beyerdynamic DT 990 PRO. You can wear them all day long, they produce good reproduction of the voice and are aesthetically pleasing. I didn’t like the original black/gray combination and went for the all-black edition. Until they arrived, I didn’t notice that they come with a different impedance (250 vs 80 Ohm). Not sure how much I lost because of that, but I have to admit that the are great!

Additionally, I own a pair of Apple AirPods Pro 2nd gen. These are noise-cancelling headphones which help me to survive train/plane travels as well as help to cut off the environment when I need it.

Microphone

My mic of choice is Audio-Technica ATR2100x-USB. I spend quite a lot of time on calls and look like a serious podcaster

It’s a dynamic microphone and I think it much better suits my needs and it’s a good choice for people who deal with a lot of noise around.

The microphone is mounted on a Rode PSA1 arm and is one of the things that allows me to keep the desk tidy.

Microphone is capable of running via USB-C, but I picked up Audient EVO 4 interface. One of the reasons was that the provided USB-C cable was too short. XLR cable is much more robust (and longer) and works fine with the setup. I like the fact that I finally have a hardware mute button available for me and I like the visualisation provided by white LED on the device.

External camera

As I mentioned, I do a lot of Meet/Zoom/Slack calls every day, so it’s important for me to have a decent Audio/Video setup. In addition to the Blue microphone described earlier, I use a Logitech C922 webcam which offers nice quality and allows me to get a better angle than using a camera available on my MacBook.

Clock

I would like it to be a piece of art, but — this clock is some no-name LCD device bought for 50PLN on Allegro. It shows the temperature and the time obviously, but it also fits nicely to the black desk.

Loupedeck interface 🆕

I’m not a professional photographer, but I like to spend some time in Lightroom and edit my photos. In order to improve my game and speed up the process, I’ve bought a Loupedeck Live device. It’s a customisable interface which can be used with a variety of applications. I use it with Lightroom mostly and it’s a pleasure to use it. It’s a bit pricey, but it’s worth it.

Apart from using it in Lightroom, I use it as a macro keyboard. I have a couple of shortcuts configured for it and it’s very handy – switching things on/off, opening applications, managing windows, etc.

The Desk

The desk is a custom-built one. Two pieces of Swiss Krono Worktop — the front one 70x180cm and the side one (on the left) 60x110cm. It’s very deep and there’s plenty of space. The worktop sits on two IKEA Alex drawers which suit the black&white theme of the desk and offer additional storage for the commonly used items like cables, accessories, etc.

When I want to change my position from sitting to standing, I use a standing desk converter FlexiSpot EdgeRiser. Entire platform looks a bit ugly, like a transformer but it does a good job in delivering the ability of working in a siting or standing position. Everything is steady event in the top position. It’s not electric, but it turned out not to be that much of an issue. The only challenge I had with this setup was the cable organisation. It’s pretty clean now, after buying some cable organisers, double-sided tapes and other stuff.

Shelves

Behind the computer, I have a few shelves. I use them to host some of my LEGO cars — currently it’s a Porsche 911 RSR, a Porsche 911 Turbo/Targa, and an Aston Martin DB5.

Unfortunately, the plants don’t survive in my office for too long, so after many casualties, I decided to go for a cactus 🌵. It’s a nice addition to the shelves and it’s easy to take care of.

Lightning

I’ve added a few lighting sources around the room. The most important one is the Yongnuo YN-300 Air LED lamp. It allows my face to shine (lol) during the calls. There’s a variety of combinations of how can this lamp be used, starting from flexibility of movement and ending up with the light temperature. Additionaly, I have some Philips Hue lights around the room to add some colour to the background.

That’s it! If you have any questions — reach out to me on Mastodon @lubieniebieski@social.lol!

It started with Hemispheric Views’ entertaining “Duel of the Defaults!” podcast episode and was further popularized by Robb Knight’s excellent initiative to collect app defaults on his website https://defaults.rknight.me/. It’s the software world’s version of sharing desk setups, and I can’t get enough of it!

It’s nothing big, but you might discover some new apps or workflows that you haven’t heard of before. I know I did when I was reading through other people’s app defaults.

My app defaults

• 📨 Mail Client: Mail.app
• 📮 Mail Server: Fastmail
• 📝 Notes: PKM: Obsidian
• ✅ To-Do: Reminders.app
• 📷 iPhone Photo Shooting: Camera.app
• 🟦 Photo Management: Lightroom Classic + Photos.app
• 📆 Calendar: Calendar.app
• 📁 Cloud File Storage: iCloud Drive
• 📖 RSS: NetNewsWire
• 🙍🏻‍♂️ Contacts: Contacts.app
• 🌐 Browser: Arc
• 💬 Chat: iMessage
• 🔖 Bookmarks: I don’t!
• 📑 Read It Later: Obsidian Clipper
• 📜 Word Processing: Markdown
• 📈 Spreadsheets: Google Sheets
• 📊 Presentations: Keynote
• 🛒 Shopping Lists: Reminders.app
• 🍴 Meal Planning: I don’t!
• 💰 Budgeting and Personal Finance: 🇵🇱MyFund + Google Sheets
• 📰 News: I rather don’t!, if something is important I’ll hear about it
• 🎵 Music: Apple Music
• 🎤 Podcasts: Overcast
• 🔐 Password Management: 1Password

If that’s not enough, you can check out my /uses page for more details about the software I use.

Building a successful blog goes beyond creating engaging content. An integral part of promoting articles on social media involves including captivating previews. But what about instances where you don’t add a cover image to a post? Let’s chat about my journey to addressing this, using The Open Graph protocol, and how you can implement it on your Hugo-based site.

<meta property="og:image" content="linktoimage.png" />

Previously, when I didn’t add a cover image to my posts, I used a default symbol - a blue heart png. It was a sufficient placeholder but lacked uniqueness.

After spotting a post from Łukasz, where images were dynamically generated based on post titles, I had my ‘I want this!’ moment!

The goal

So, what was I aiming for? A unique, automated, blog-fitting preview image for each of my posts, even when no cover image is present. Here’s an example of what I wanted:

The process

After a quick online search, I found a Hugo forum thread discussing the same issue. That thread led me to an example given in Hugo’s documentation, which I could modify slightly for my needs.

The first step was to create a background that the text filter modifies. I used https://og-playground.vercel.app/, saved a png, and placed it in the assets folder along with the FireCode font I use on my blog.

All that remained was to implement the Hugo code to apply a text filter to that image whenever one was required:

{{ $featured := resources.Get "/opengraph/background-og.png" }}
{{ $size := 150 }}
{{ $title := $.LinkTitle | truncate 55 "..." | string }}

{{ $text := $title }}
{{ $y := 550 }}
{{ if gt (len $text) 30 }}
    {{ $y = 350 }}
{{ end }}
{{ $textOptions := dict 
    "color" "#FFF"
    "size" $size
    "lineSpacing" 35
    "x" 350 "y" $y
    "font" (resources.Get "opengraph/FiraCode-Bold.ttf")
}}

{{ $featured = $featured | images.Filter (images.Text $text $textOptions) }}

and the HTML part:

<meta property="og:image" content="{{ $featured.Permalink }}">

And voila! Automated, unique preview images for each blog post! Full code can be found here.

Wrapping it up

I hope you found this guide useful. Adding Open Graph previews to your Hugo posts not only enhances the visual aspect of your posts on social media but also offers an incentive for potential readers to click and read.

COVID

• 😷 I got hit by COVID recently – fever, caugh, headache, the whole package.
• I isolated myself from my family for a few days, barely remembering things and only leaving my room to eat.
• After three weeks I’m still not 100% back to normal, but I’m getting there.
• Though I didn’t accomplish much during my sickness, I’m grateful for my recovery and my family’s well-being.
• ⚠️ COVID is not over!!

Unemployment

• Huh, that will be another blog post for sure.
• 😱 After 12 years in Netguru, I decided that this is time for a change and quit.
• 🤩 I feel like I’ve done my job, all the major things I wanted to do, I did, my team is great, and I feel like they can lead the company to the next level. Apart from that, I wanted to do more with my own hands, and I didn’t have enough time for that. It’s going to change now!:)
• 🥹1/3 of my life was spent there, and I’m very grateful for that time! 💚

007

• 🎥 It’s the 7th edition of “Bullets”, and coincidentally, I’ve also published a post about Bond (007) movies
• I’m thinking about rewatching last 5 Bond movies with Daniel Craig, but before I do that, I decided to do the same with the Mission Impossible series – I don’t remember them very well, but I feel like I need to see some action movies now!
• 🫵 Do you have some action movies recommendations? Let me know!

Plans for the future

• 🛠️ Currently, I’m doing quite a lot of things around the house, rennovating kids room, planning some furniture, building a garden shed/garage, fixing all the old todo items.
• COVID slowed me down, but I’m recovering and getting back on track.
• 🪵 I have 3 woodworking projects in progress, and I’m planning to finish them before the end of the year. Table saw sled is almost finished, open wooden wall is in the making (I have all the materials, need to cut some grooves and assemble it), shelves and drawers for the bedroom are in the planning phase.
• 😬 I’m enjoying woodworking but non-standard cuts on the saw table can be intimidating. Even though I’m thinking about woodworking as a hobby and fun activity, I often think about how dangerous it is.

• ⌨️ So yeah, long-term plans are definitely about being in the IT industry, it should be easier to keep my fingers intact.
• I’m also planning to start a small business related to LEGO, it will be a micro business, but it should be a fun excercise and a good way to learn new things in life!
• I’m preparing for Advent of Code 2023, I’m planning to do it in Go, and I’m very excited about it! I’ve prepared repo already, it will be fun!

I no longer have a laptop

• 👨🏻‍💻 I decided to work on a desktop computer only, bought a Mac Studio and finally I have enough slots to put all the cables I need.
• 👾 This thing is a monster, it does everything instantly and doesn’t make any noise.
• The truth is, due to the fact of mobility, or rather the lack of it, I’m not using the computer as much, as I used to, but again – I’m not worried about it. I know that when the time comes, I’ll crush all the tasks I need to do! 💪

Open Graph previews

• 🔎 I’ve added a smart og:image tag to the blog, so now when you share a link to the blog post, it will have a nice image attached to it, even if I don’t add any cover image to the post. Thanks Łukasz for the inspiration!

Recently, I’ve been spending more time in front of the screen and came across the movie, The Sound Of 007. Its familiar sounds and music transported me into the world of 007 that I know well. The melodies brought some chills and painted vivid images in my mind. The stories, the behind-the-scenes tales of all the auditory impressions in 007 movies, fascinated me. I also liked hearing the artists talk about their work on the songs. It made me really like the movie because I could see 007 series from a different angle!

It occurred to me then - the bond I have with Bond¹ movies goes beyond the action and plot. I’m in love with the accompanying tracks, the unique “Bond-songs”. Despite their differences, they harmoniously blend with the narrative every time.

By the way, every aspect of 007 - from the filmmaking process, editing, and music, to the marketing efforts, featured watches, casting decisions, easter eggs, and nods to previous films - serves as a stellar example of a well-maintained brand. The complexity of logistics behind its consistent execution is incredibly impressive!

My favorite Bond songs

Of course, all Bond songs are not crafted equally. We all have our own “TOP BOND SONGS list”. Here’s mine:

1. Another way to die

   That’s not the best Bond song², but it accompanies the movie “Quantum of Solace”, the one with Olga Kurylenko. I might be biased because of her 🤷🏻‍♂️.

2. You only live twice

   The opening sequence is a masterpiece and I love it! Ideal for a car ride somewhere in the mountains.

3. We have all the time in the world

   The charm of Louis Armstrong’s voice is undeniable. The song is a perfect fit for the movie “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”. The phrase “We have all the time in the world” is a great reminder to slow down and enjoy the moment. And it’s also a great song for a car ride somewhere in the mountains.

4. No time to die

   This song is all about the voice of Billie Eilish. Together with the rest of music for “No time to die” (composed by Hans Zimmer³), it’s a great fit for the movie.

5. Nobody does it better

   Calm, romantic, and a bit melancholic. It’s a song that wakes a lot of emotions in me.

The harmonious fusion of music and movie in Bond Series is sheer brilliance, making each viewing - or rather, listening - experience unique!

Baldurs Gate 3

• As you may have noticed, I haven’t been very active on Mastodon or this blog recently. The reason is simple – I’ve become completely addicted to “Baldur’s Gate 3” instead of spending my evenings in a productive way.
• I’m playing as a paladin and trying to be a good guy, or rather a male human in this case.
• The last time I felt so immersed in a game was when I was playing Fallout 2 more than 20 years ago¹.
• I tried playing it on Mac some time ago, but I wasn’t happy with the performance and the limitations of the screen, so I returned it. I patiently waited for the premiere of the PS5 version and bought it again. I still find it difficult to manage inventory, spells, and dozens of actions using a controller, but fortunately, as a turn-based game, it’s not a big issue.
• It’s a wonderful game, but if you want to get enough sleep, I wouldn’t recommend buying it.

Woodworking

• I’ve completed a few projects! Once I reach 5 projects, I will create a dedicated page for them on this blog:)
• The most recent project I finished is a cutting board that I gifted to my wife. It was my first time using a router and jig!
• My wife is happy, and that makes me happy!
• It might not be impressive to someone else, but I know that I put genuine effort and heart into it, and this invisible part is the most valuable aspect of the gift.
• My great streak and optimism faded a bit when I attempted to build a pencil holder from multiple pieces of wood. I failed to cut out the perfect circle and couldn’t figure out how to work with small elements.
• Even though I didn’t manage to finish the project, I learned quite a lot, and that’s the positive aspect of it.
• Another positive aspect is that I asked a friend to help me out with some 3D printed templates for the next attempt. I already have them, and I can’t wait to use them in my next project!

New keyboard on board

• I have to admit that buying a new keyboard was a good excuse for writing this particular post. I’m a proud owner of a Keychron Q1 Pro with Keychron K Pro Brown switches. If there were a burglary, I would grab this keyboard and fight off the burglar with it. It is heavy and could be used as a weapon.
• The main reasons for the change were that I wanted a full set of function keys and a different layout compared to my previous keyboard (it turns out I’m a fan of the ISO-UK layout²). I’m still getting used to the Enter key being narrower, so I often hit \ instead of Enter, but other than that, the overall experience is superb!
• Hopefully, I won’t need to buy another keyboard for the next few years!

Links I saved for sharing with you

• Two articles from Mark Manson that I’ve read recently and I think they are worth sharing. I think a lot about increasing positivity in my life and these two articles are a good starting point.
  • How to Stop Caring About What People Think
  • 3 Steps to Stop Negative Thinking
• In the 1994 Caribbean Cup qualifying group stage match between Barbados and Grenada, the 90 minutes of normal time ended with an intentional own goal by Barbados and then with Grenada trying to score either a goal or an own goal and Barbados defending both nets. Say what?! How did this happen?
  • The Weirdest and Most Chaotic Soccer Match Ever
• After seeing the renders, I want to have one in my backyard! Looks outstanding!
  • Backyard Office & Studio Sheds - Download Small House Plans - Den
• This got my attention by accident, but looks very cool if you want to scan your documents and organize them in a nice way thanks to OCR capabilities of the software, all for free!
  • Paperless-ngx

Other

• The days are shorter, and the few minutes when the sun is shining during the day are precious. These days, I keep my camera next to me because there’s only a narrow window of opportunity to capture a nice, warm photo! I particularly enjoy taking photographs of our day-to-day life, such as preparing dinner or playing with kids. Give it a try!
• I still love reading other peoples’ blogs! Apart from stories and thing people share, I put a lot of attention in how their pages work. Michael automated a lot and I’m impressed! Especially by the /blogroll and /now pages. A lot to learn from!

Criteria

• blue color
• gravel bike
• carbon
• hidden cables
• SRAM groupset
• 1x gearing
• electronic shifting
• price below 4k EUR

Candidate(s)

Actually - there weren’t many bikes that met my criteria.

Here’s the only one I really considered: Rose Backroad!

Additional motivation

I’m a big fan of what Weronika is doing. Just browse through her Instagram! Last year, she bought a Rose Backroad, and this is how I learned about this bike. I’ve been following her adventures for a while, asked for a few tips, and decided to join the Rose family.

Thank you Werka! I hope I will get 1/10 of your adventures!

Initial issues

First of all, I didn’t want to buy this bike because in the meantime, SRAM released a new version (D2) of the Force groupset. Most of the changes were about the fact that the new one has a rainbow-like sticker on the crankset. It was enough to hold me back for a while. Fortunately, after thinking loudly about my “issues”, I’ve decided to buy the bike anyway.

I’ve ordered a wrong size, due to an incorrect measurement of my inside leg. I’ve ordered a bike with a frame size of 53cm, but I should have ordered a 55cm one. Another thing that pushed me to do so was the fact that the 53cm size was available in 5 weeks, the other one much later.

Long story short, I went to a bike fitter, tried the smaller one, didn’t work. Then I ordered a bigger one, and it was much better. I’ve returned the smaller one, and I’ve got a refund. The process was easy and smooth, and I’m happy with the way Rose handled it. I was super afraid that they are going to be super picky about the condition (even though I’ve only ridden it for a few km), but they didn’t even ask me about it.

What I’ve changed

• I had carbon wheels (Evanlite New Gravel) from my previous bike, so I’ve swapped them along with the tires (Pirelli Cinturato Gravel M 40mm)
• Saddle -> Specialized Power Comp
• Some of the screws were silver, so I’ve replaced them with black ones 🙈
• I’ve lost my cadence sensor, so I’ve bought a power meter mount on the crankset 🤷🏻‍♂️
• Pedals -> Shimano SPD PD-M540

First impressions

I can’t give a full review just after a few activities and a few hundred kilometers, but I can share my first impressions.

• the bike is super light
• it’s relatively easy to maintain a high speed¹
• I can ride any road I want, any terrain I encounter is not a problem
• it looks slick
• electronic shifting is fun
• additional mounting points are useful (but I haven’t used all of them yet!²)
• the stem is custom and it’s not 100% perfect for me – if you would like to change it at some point, it might be a problem to find something that plays well with the frame

Pictures

Here are some pictures of the environment that the Backroad is used in

In the woods

Among sunflowers

Somewhere

Summary

I’m super happy with the bike! 💙 Currently, I’m the weakest element of the system and I’m working on it. I’m looking forward to the next adventures with the Backroad! Exploring Squadrats definitely helps with that!

If you have any questions about the bike, feel free to ask me on Mastodon ✋!

Previously, I thought this feeling was exclusive to coding. I was mistaken. It applies to everything. Whether it’s creating a new function, writing a blog posts, cutting a piece of wood, or painting a wall, each incremental step brought a sense of satisfaction and small victory.

Upon seeing the results of my work, I wasn’t necessarily happy – the code could have been better, the wooden item may be a bit ugly (though, I’m secretly proud of it). It turns out, I’m not fixated on the outcome as long as I put my best effort into the process¹.

So, here’s a piece of advice to my future self: give your best in every step of the process and find joy in it. The results will follow.

It worked, but I wasn’t happy with it. I thought that making it available through Homebrew would be a better idea. And when doing this, I also wanted to experiment a little with Go and give Github Copilot a chance (as my coding skills are a bit rusty).

I’m happy to say that I was able to achieve all my goals. All the code is available in the markdown-tools repo, it’s written in Go, there are some tests (thanks, Copilot!) and it’s available through Homebrew. I still have a lot to do before I’ll mark it as a 1.0 release, but it’s a good start. I had a ton of fun writing it; I struggled the most with writing the right regexes:)

Outcome

To summarize the whole gig:

• Repo with the code: markdown-tools
• Updated scripts repository where I store some random stuff I use: lubieniebieski/scripts
• Homebrew tap: lubieniebieski/homebrew-tools
• The process is automated with Github Actions, so I don’t have to do anything manually (well… almost, but the Homebrew formula part is done nicely).

The best part for me is that I can currently focus on improving the tools themselves, fixing some edge cases, and so on, while the release process is automated. I no longer have to worry about it! 💪

Resources

Some useful sites and article I found that helped me to get through the process:

• regex101: build, test, and debug regex
• Create CLI in Go and Publish it to Homebrew | by Mehran | ITNEXT
• How To Build Go Executables for Multiple Platforms on Ubuntu 16.04 | DigitalOcean
• spf13/cobra: A Commander for modern Go CLI interactions
• Homebrew tap with bottles uploaded to GitHub Releases — Homebrew
• Homebrew docs
• Homebrew tap docs

Bory Tucholskie trip

• I took some time off and started my holiday with a trip to Bory Tucholskie¹. We had a great time together with my family and friends! Lots of good food (it was so good that it was hard to stick to the diet), beautiful sceneries, and rapidly changing weather – we experienced a few hours of sunbathing, only to run from a blizzard in a matter of minutes.

  

• We took a very nice walking trip to the actual park. It was peaceful, quiet, and the air was so refreshing!

• Next time, I’m taking a bike with me!

Tour de France 2023 is over

• Oh boy, I was really sorry to see Tadej Pogacar losing the battle with Jonas Vingegaard. But at the same time, I had immense respect for Jonas who won the time trial by more than a minute and resembled a machine during his 30-minute long ride. The next day, we heard “I’m gone. I’m dead.” from Tadej, and that was the moment when the race ended. I’m certain these words will be a significant part in Season 2 of “Unchained” on Netflix next year!
• 😭 This interview with Matej Mohoric after winning the race is pure gold. So humble… and the moment when he thinks about Gino Mader, who passed away a few weeks ago… A special moment, worth watching to experience the emotions with Matej.

Around the house and life

• 🧴 Stage 1 of the terrace renovation is complete! I applied the last can of oil right after we got back from the Bory trip. The only issue is that it didn’t dry entirely before it started to rain. I hope it won’t ruin my effort and everything will be okay! I’ll add some photos in the next bullets edition.
• 📚 I finally organized my movie/TV series library and ended up with Trakt as the main source of information. It was a lengthy process, though, as I had to migrate things from Filmweb², Letterboxd and Serializd. In order to do that, I had to play with a few Python scripts: jensb89/trakt—letterboxd-import, jensb89/Netflix-to-Trakt-Import, anthonyfoulfoin/trakt-tv-duplicates-removal and some tools like a duplicate removal tool. I hope you won’t need them! Right now, I’m up to date with movies and TV series. I just need to get back to spending time in front of the TV, but I’ll probably wait with that until the days become shorter!
• 🤙 dbrand prepared a new drop – Something. I like it!
• 😲 What an animation masterpiece – great find, Jason Kottke! An Incredible Stop-Motion Animation of a Samurai Fight.
• 🚲 My journey with a new bike looks promising! I returned the smaller one (and received a refund 😙). In the meantime, the new one arrived, and the first ride was already much more comfortable. A few more tweaks are needed here and there (such as brake modulation, Karoo/front light mount), but overall, the bike is ready and just waiting for the rider to start pedaling!
• 🇵🇱 Last cycling bit – Tour de Pologne 2023 starts in my area in a few days, there’s a good chance I’ll be there with my boys watching the peleton passing by!
• ❌ I mean… WTF:D I wouldn’t bother, but a lot of short material (including the one from TdF) is still posted there, I wish the Eurosport crew is going to migrate to Mastodon soon!
• 🏋️‍♂️ I thought it was another service from our beloved @adam, but I don’t think that’s the case! workout.lol is a cool site giving you a lot of ideas about possible exercises. I’m not an expert in the area, but it appears solid and adjusts the results based on the equipment you have, so you don’t end up with ten different exercise ideas that you can’t perform because you don’t own a kettlebell. I might have something similar in Fitbod, but workout.lol is a free service!

Pro Cycling

• 🇫🇷 The Tour de France 2023 is underway with nine stages completed. My favorite cyclist is currently 17 seconds behind in the GC¹. I watch every stage and even my children know the teams, riders, peloton, and breakaways. Proud father moment!
• 🤨 I can’t help but feel a bit² jealous when I see others like Jakub making the most of their time on the bike Co zwróciło moją uwagę w czerwcu 2023 - Bobiko ▪ Blog. Their inspiring posts serve as motivation for me, and I hope to share similar experiences in the future.
• ⛔️ Unfortunately, I’m spending more time not riding than actually on the bike at the moment.

No cycling

• 🆕 I planned to do a #newbikeday post recently, I was very close to do that, but the reality is that I’m still waiting for my new bike.
• 🙅🏻‍♂️ New one arrived, with Rowermistrz’s help I was able to change wheels from Shimano to SRAM system, I’ve mounted the pedals, the seat, added the bottle cages, added the bike computer mount. I was ready to ride, put 20km ride and I was experiencing some pain. After a few days, I went for a bike fitting session and even though we tried, we weren’t able to find a good position for me on this bike. So… I’ve ordered a bigger model and in the meantime, I have to revert all the changes I’ve made to the bike. Not a big deal, but still, I’m not riding, and the previous bike is in pieces in my garage.

Terrace

• 🛠️ This is the biggest refactoring of recent weeks – equipped with new tools, I’m ripping off the old layer of oil and damaged wood! I estimated it for a few sessions after work, but of course it’s taking longer.
• 💪 I’ve made some early progress even though my children says I look like Bear Grylls during the process!
• ❤️‍🩹 But my tool broke down, I pushed too hard 😂
• 🩹 Unfortunately, I’ve made a mistake and I accidentally injured myself with the angle grinder. I’m fine, it’s just a finger but I had to pause and take some antibiotics 🤷🏻‍♂️

Other

• 📚 I finished reading Sooner Safer Happier and found it insightful for improving in the coming weeks. The quote “Be the best at being better” resonated with me.
• 😎 We had a great time at company retreat, it was so nice to see people with legs³ and have a proper amount of laughs and fun!
• 🍿 I watched Extraction (2020) - IMDb and Extraction II (2023) - IMDb – I’m a simple man and I enjoyed them!
• I’m also experiencing with Trakt, as I’ve never used it before, and even though I initially went for Letterboxd, I’m not sure if I’ll stick with it. I don’t need a social network for movies, I just want to track what I’ve watched and what I want to watch. Plus, Letterboxd doesn’t allow to track TV Shows, and I have to use a separate app for that. I’ll see how it goes. Thanks to Marco for sparking my interest in exploring different platforms.
• 😶‍🌫️ For ChatGPT stuff, I went for TypingMind — A better UI for ChatGPT, which is exactly what it promises to be – A better UI for ChatGPT. This time, the trigger for me was the invoice for ChatGPT Plus compared with the spending through API. After 3 secs calculation, I decided to go for an API-only approach and found TypingMind. Works great!
• 📸 I’m quite happy with the drone photos I’ve made recently!
• 💬 I found an article about blog comments and using Activity Pub for that Toot toot! Mastodon-powered Blog Comments ⋅ Cassidy James Blaede – it looks like something I have on my site right now, but without all of the Webmentions stuff. I’ll have to look into it.

Below are a few more shots from the flight.

And yes, I still haven’t forgotten about delivering the package!

This week’s been a blast! I’ve been posting like there’s no tomorrow - this ‘bullets’ thing has really ignited my blogging spark.

Email client

• 📬 A few weeks back, Mimestream, a Gmail-specific email client, was released as version 1.0. I was a beta user before and I gotta say, I really liked it (it’s almost like Gmail, but with native MacOS UI).
• 🏃‍♂️ But then, I switched from Gmail to Fastmail for my personal emails, leaving Mimestream behind.
• 💰 The final nail in the coffin? Mimestream started to be a paid app. I decided to leave. But guess what? Three weeks later, I missed it, bad. So here I am, using the app again, and I’m actually cool with the fee. Hats off to the team – they even hooked me up with a 50% off discount code when I missed the early-bird pricing. Nice one, guys!

Bike world

• 🚲 My older son and I have started taking longer 20km+ bike rides together. It’s a great way to spend time with him, and I enjoy the bike rides too! Now, my next goal is to teach my younger one how to handle a bike, from starting to braking. I hope he’ll be riding on his own by summer!
• 🚨 I’ve bought Scout Bike Alarm & Finder – It’s a small tool you can attach to your bike to get alerted if someone tries to steal it. It also works as a “GPS tracker”, similar to AirTag. Since I used the AirTag in my saddlebag already, I decided to switch to this native solution. It’s discreet and can be mounted under the water cage. It’s good to have, even if I hope I won’t need it.
• 💧 I’ve been looking for new water cages and water bottles. I decided on the Cannibal XC from Elite and the Podium® 710ml from CamelBak. So far, they’re great! I’ll share more about them in the coming weeks/months.
• 👨🏻‍🔧 With more family members taking up biking, I’m spending more time on bike maintenance. It seems like everyone loves to ride, and I’m the only one who takes care of the maintenance.
• 🍿 I started watching Tour De France: Unchained on Netflix and I like it a lot. It shows the behind-the-scenes of the Tour de France from the 2022 edition and bring up the perspective of what cycling is about. Truth is, I didn’t understand much of this sport even 2 years ago. I started watching some cycling events in 2022, including the Tour de France, and I remember vividly the stages and the emotions I had when watching it. This tv show helps me to revive those memories and it also explains a lot of context around the sport for people who are not that familiar with it.
• 🚵‍♂️ I came across a fascinating article from Adam Kolarski about his bikepacking trip in Morocco. It has great stories (in 🇵🇱) and beautiful photos. Check it out here: ADAM KOLARSKI: Maroko. Bikepackingowy dziennik podróży - Część 1/2. - ETNH GRAVEL MAGAZINE

Trauma is Trauma

• 🤕 Bad things happen to all of us, more and more people deals with mental health issues, that’s not an easy topic and it’s not easy to talk about it. I watched the video Trauma is Trauma: A Mental Health Talk with Kevin Smith | PEOPLE. It left a big impression on me and changed the way I perceived trauma (“it’s nothing”)… If you want to learn why there’s no “trauma olympics” and that any trauma is just trauma, go and listen to this video.

Ending on a positive note

• 🖼️ The Andy Carolan Avatar Club on Mastodon 🤘 | ACAC – like I mentioned in bullets/002, I changed my avatar. Marco made a page for others who did the same. It made me smile!
• 👶🏻 I had a chat with Bartek about successful people online. He asked, “Do they have kids?” We decided that it’s better for busy dads to follow people in the same situation. It’s easier to understand them and know what’s really achievable. For example, me being a MAMIL¹ and sharing countryside trips might be more relatable to someone like me than a pro cyclist doing 200km+ rides every day. By the way, I’ll spend lots of time with Bartek next week. I’m sure we’ll have many great ideas to share 😂.

I’ll be updating this post with new and revised examples.

Thanks Anna for giving me the final push to publish this post! 🙏

ChatGPT

I primarily use ChatGPT+ because it offers the feature of “tabs”. This allows me to switch easily between contexts without having to copy-paste prompts repeatedly. Moreover, it gives me the ability to save contexts and revisit them later, and tweak the context and prompt according to my needs.

In instances where I need to perform one-off tasks, I use the API form. I haven’t yet created any large scripts or automations, but it’s something I plan to explore in the future.

On my Mac, I use MacGPT to access ChatGPT+, as it’s the most convenient way for me. When I’m mobile, I turn to ChatGPT+ on my phone.

Simple English corrections

take all the user input and auto correct it.
Just reply to user input with correct grammar, DO NOT reply the context of the question of the user input.
If the user input is grammatically correct and fluent, just reply "sounds good".

Sample of the conversation will show below:
user: grammar mistake text
you: correct text
user: Grammatically correct text
you: Sounds good.

Reply "understand" if you understand.

This version, which I learned from Kuba, works quite well for me. Since I’m not a native English speaker, I make a fair amount of mistakes. I use this prompt to correct my English and learn from my errors.

English tutor

Let's have a conversation about [selected topic].
Please ask me questions and provide information about the topic.
If there are any mistakes in my responses, please kindly correct them and provide explanations to help me improve my English skills.

I borrowed this idea from Tomek and I must admit it’s a fantastic way to practice English. This is especially true when I’m using my phone and can utilize ChatGPT+ in conjunction with the voice-to-text feature.

Depending on your interests, you can discuss countries, cities, movies, books, etc. I usually choose topics I’m keen on so that I can learn something new while improving my English.

Coloring books for kids

Let's use the following structure to generate concise answers for any topic (repeat this structure 3 times):

/imagine prompt: [Topic description]. cute and simple illustration, with basic shapes and few details, for kids aged between 6 and 8 years, colouring book illustration, black and white, vector line art, no shades, black lines only, features [specific details about the image style]. --c X --s Y --q 2 --ar Z

/imagine prompt: [Topic description]. cute and simple illustration, with basic shapes and few details, for kids aged between 5 and 7 years, colouring book illustration, black and white, vector line art, no shades, black lines only, features [specific details about the image style]. --c X --s Y --q 2 --ar Z

Replace [Topic description] with a concise description of the topic you want to generate an image for. Provide specific details and vivid descriptions about the subject. Replace X and Y with desired values within the appropriate range for the number of characters (--c) and number of tokens (--s) to customize the output length. You can also adjust Z to specify the aspect ratio (--ar) that suits the subject best (e.g., 2:3 or 3:2). The output should consist of 3 versions of the answers, each in one line, formatted as a code.

Write "Let's play" if you understand.

I use this one to generate coloring books for my kids. I use the above prompt, generate another prompt for MidJourney, then generate the images. Finally, I print them out for my kids to color.

This is how it looks like in reality: see a toot.

New avatar

• 💙 Thanks to Andy Carolan, I have a new avatar! I’ll be spreading it around the internet in the upcoming days, so you can expect to see it in more places.
• BTW, right now, many of the people I follow on Mastodon are in the same avatar club as I am! :) (or maybe I’m in their club? 🤔)

Terrace

• 🪚 I need to renovate the wooden terrace in front of my house, and after doing that for weeks the last time, I wanted to hire some folks to help me with that. It turns out, it’s not cheap 😅
• 💡 My brilliant idea is to buy a lot of stuff and do it myself. I’m sure it’s not a good idea, but I’ll try to do it anyway. The first item on the list is a grinder ¹.
• 🍿 I even watched a “professional” video on how to do it (in Polish, but you will get the vibe), and based on that – I’m sure I can do it myself! 😂

Water

• 🦾 In order to save some time with watering the garden (we have some sprinklers but they are controlled manually), I decided to automate the process a bit.
• 🛒 In my case, it means putting some money into the ground, buying a few electric valves, a controller, and some cables.
• ⛲️ But… water is quite expensive, and the current well I have is not that deep, so I figured that we can spend invest even more money and dig a new well! First, I need to find some people who can tell me whether there is a chance to find water in the place I want to dig it. Keep your fingers crossed!
• ⛱️ Now I just need some holiday to pull it off.

The rest

• 📖 I started reading Sooner Safer Happier – it has been on my list for a long time, and the trigger for me was the fact that this was mentioned at least a few times during the last DevOps Enterprise Summit in Amsterdam, which I attended in May.
• 🎮 SpaceTraders game looks super interesting – you can play it via an API. I haven’t started yet because I’m afraid to spend too much time on it 😅
• 👹 Same thing with Diablo 4… The last time I played Diablo was around 2012 or 2013, so more than 10 years ago. Reviews are pretty positive… It grows on me, but I’m waiting for the price to drop. On the other hand, when it happens, there should be a new Assassin’s Creed already or the new Cyberpunk 2077 DLC… Should I save my thoughts for the winter maybe?

I felt good and vulnerable recently

A few days ago I had a AAR² with my closest team at work. We try to do it every quarter or so, this time we wanted to check how do we feel about recent change (big one) in the way we work and cooperate. Everyone prepared in advanced, nothing fancy, just what we are happy about and what could be better. We’ve done dozens like this over the years, as I have a privilege to work with my team for quite a long time.

Then something remarkable happened. Someone voiced a thought, more open and vulnerable than our usual fare. This set off a domino effect. The “Openness Gauge” kept turning up a notch with every shared experience. It wasn’t that we hadn’t been honest before, but we pushed our comfort zone a little further, about 2-3 clicks³ further.

I walked out of that room feeling rejuvenated, filled with newfound trust and a stronger bond with my team.

In the meantime

Simultaneously, I’m part of various other teams and groups, each with its own dynamic and purpose. But a common thread that I’ve come to realize is missing in some of them, is the ability to be open and vulnerable.

Yes, I’ve read about psychological safety. Yes, I’ve seen it work its magic. But, until recently, I didn’t quite “feel it”. I thought, we just need to get our heads down, crack on, and move on.

Now, don’t get me wrong, different groups call for different levels of openness and vulnerability. But I’d say, every group could benefit from nudging the openness gauge up a bit.

Nice is shady

Fast forward to today’s workshop. I couldn’t shake off the feeling that it was missing the honest dialogue that I experienced a few days ago. Even though we had a productive session, it lacked the magic. We didn’t touch on certain issues that concerned us as a group.

Sure, everyone has different needs, and some people were taken aback by my need for more conflict. But I know, I’m not the only one who felt that way.

I’m starting to think that maybe, just maybe, my role in my various teams might be to advocate for this openness and vulnerability, to help nudge that gauge a little further. Worth a try? I think so.

I don’t think that being nice is shady, but I do think that being nice instead of being open and vulnerable is shady.

• 😮 Yes, the content is going to be presented in bullets. This shouldn’t be a problem though! I was thinking about the structure for some time already, started to write some monthly summaries before, tried to move that into weekly and… it didn’t work.
• 💬 Why don’t I try something that doesn’t require me to stick to a weekly cadence and allows me to write about whatever I want?
• 🤦🏻‍♂️ I wanted to use an emoji next to the title, but apparently there’s no such emoji available. :shrug: ?
• 👇 Let’s have some bullets below, shall we?
• ⦾ I realized that reading through other people’s summaries and lists, often in a concise format, gives me a lot of inspiration and ideas on how I might iterate some of my own processes.
• If that format works for me, maybe my own bullets will work for someone else?
• 💙 I found out that for the US market, the new ID Buzz is going to come in this beautiful blue color which is not available in the Polish configurator (yet?). Totally fell in love with it!
• 🪚 I’ve done some cool things recently, including a little bit of wooden DIY around the house. Nothing eye-pleasing (a little bit of fence for waste containers :D), but it was fun to do it myself and reuse material that was lying around.
• 🛒 I did buy an app called Bobby (it tracks spending on subscriptions), thanks to one and only Marco and his weekly summary series. It didn’t make me smile though. Nevertheless, I feel better now, knowing how much I’m spending and on what.
• 🚲 Bobiko amazed me with his casual 370km ride from Sopot to Gniezno. I was happy last week to see 100km+ covered during the entire week. Need to improve my cycling game!
• 🤔 I’m thinking a lot about sharing and consuming content, ideas and thoughts in my work environment. Things aren’t that easy, I’d like to have a comfort of RSS-like activity, but the pace is a little bit faster. I’d be happy to hear about your solutions – what works for you? Brown bag sessions? Internal newsletters? Slack channels? I’m curious!
• In Ivory 1.0.1 you can change the icon now. And now there’s a blue 🐘 sitting in my dock!

It was supposed to be a comedy, a moment when I could turn my brain off for a bit and enjoy some easy TV. However, it turned out to be so much more. What surprised me the most was the amount of tears I shed while watching this show.

Recommendation

I started watching Ted Lasso just a few weeks ago. I had a tough time at work and needed something to cheer me up. I’ve heard good things about the show, so I decided to give it a try. I was hooked after the first episode.

I’ve asked around my close friends and colleagues, and everyone seems to love it. Especially those in managerial roles, as they can relate to what’s going on in the locker room and on the pitch, even though they don’t deal with footballers on a daily basis.

I started recommending it to other people, and the best part of it is the message I got on holiday, around 7:30 am, from a friend who said:

“I started watching the series you recommended me because I had some time after 22. I stopped after 6 episodes” :D

I get a lot of satisfaction when my recommendation lands well! :)

What I liked

Let’s just stick with 10 items, in no particular order:

• Ted’s optimism
• “Oi!” and all the British slang
• It’s about football after all!
• The music
• Every single tear in my eyes while watching it
• Amsterdam episode (I was in Amsterdam when I watched it)
• Pep
• Dani Rojas’ “Football is life!”
• Real-life issues and situations
• Polish actress

Final thoughts

Just watch it! It’s a great show! 💙

Back in 2010, I spent a lot of time on social media, mostly on Facebook. Looking back, I see that it was fun, but also had some dark moments (and humor as well). I used Facebook to keep in touch with my closest friends, workmates, and even some family members.

After Facebook, I started using Instagram. I liked seeing nice photos from other people. But, after a while, I noticed the photos were getting better and better. I felt that my photos were not good enough to share. So, I stopped posting and became less active.

At the same time, I had a Twitter account. I used it to follow some people, but I didn’t really like it because there was too much happening!

I also used LinkedIn, but mostly for work-related things. I often found it hard to find what was important there. I also questioned whether I had enough good things to share or smart enough comments to make on other people’s posts.

Something changed after that. Maybe I was becoming more mature, or maybe I wanted to spend my time more wisely at work. Either way, I started to spend less time on social media.

My Ideal Social Media

Here’s what would make social media better for me:

• I believe that social media should be a part of our daily lives.
• I want to chat more with my close friends, family, and workmates.
• Even if I don’t know someone in person, I want to be able to relate to them and imagine spending time with them.
• I want to see what they are doing, what they are reading, listening to, watching, and thinking about.
• I want to share my thoughts with them and vice versa.
• I want to do this in a way that is not annoying and doesn’t take too much effort.
• I think it would be nice to keep the conversation going, whether online or offline, because these two worlds are connected.

Yes, that would work really well!

My Current Social Media Usage

I still have a Facebook account, but I don’t post anything. Facebook groups are useful for finding information though! Mastodon is good. I only interact with a few users, but it’s not bad. In fact, I’m more active there than before and I have quite a lot of fun!

LinkedIn is still helpful for my work, and Instagram is a nice break from my daily routine (which is not always as fun as the photos on the feed :)).

And finally, there’s this blog. It’s my space. I don’t know who reads it, as I don’t track any stats. But it’s a happy place for me. I enjoy sharing what I know and what I find interesting! The blog gives me a sense of freedom; I’m not limited by platform rules or character counts. But Still, I would love some interactions; it doesn’t have to be 1000 likes or comments, one would do!

• I’m back in the saddle, both gravel and MTB bike were ridden a few times this month! A little bit over 100km in total, but it’s a start!
• I watched some cycling in TV, kept my fingers crossed for Pogacar, he managed to win Ronde van Vlaanderen, Amstel Gold Race and La Flèche Wallonne. It was a pity he had to pull out of Liège-Bastogne-Liège due to a crash and broken wrist. It’s really cool to watch the final kilometers of the race in TV with children, they are really excited about it:)
• Changed the tires in the car, and a few days later one of the tires got puctured, we didn’t react on time and it got damaged, had to buy another one 🙃
• Juve has one of the worst seasons in the last 10 years, sometimes it’s really hard to watch them play. Still… Fino alla fine!
• We spent one day with alpacas on the farm nearby, it was a great experience for the whole family!
• During one of the weekends, when I was with the boys alone, we had an idea of using ChatGPT and Midjourney to create a story. It was a lot of fun, and I can recommend it to everyone who has kids and wants to spend some time with them in a creative way!
• By the way, at work we’ve done a workshop for our People team and presented them how to leverage the power of generative AI in their daily work. 3 main insights from the workshop:
  • I enjoy such events with people!
  • We’re in exremely interesting times and it feels great to be a part of it!
  • Legal and compliance stuff around this topic will be (and already is) a mess.
• I’ve bought a drone, even though I resisted for years. It’s cool to fly it, it gives me a lot of fun! I have to add few things to my todolist right now:
  • learn how to fly it properly
  • make sure I know how to store the raw footage in a clever way
  • become a video editing master
  • learn what’s LUT and color grading
  • learn how to use DaVinci Resolve (or maybe something else?)
  • empty my photos backlog from last year to make some space for the new stuff
• There was at least one pretty sunset, totally #nofilterneeded
• We planned to do a family holiday between April/May this year, we even managed to go to Budapest (here’s a “cyk” from that trip), unfortunately some viruses or other stuff broke our plans and got back home. Before I felt asleep, I had a reflection that… here is everyone and everything I need, especially during warmer months, we can enjoy our place even more:)

Posts

• March Was Tough

April, thank you! 💙

Budapest is a beautiful city, I hope to visit it again soon!

On the positive or simply neutral side, there were some good things as well:

• I went to Berlin for Disruption Forum – it was great to meet people in person again! New faces, new experiences, and good old kebabs!
• I started to use logseq as my main note-taking tool. I’m still not sure if it’s the right tool for me, but I’m giving it a try. A few weeks in, I’m using it everyday, mostly as a daily journal/note taking tool. Definitely need to write more about it as some of the features are really cool and probably it will end up with a complete transition from Craft app.
• I’ve spent way too much time on playing with links last month when I was creating my /linklog. It pushed me to explore better ways of saving links, tagging them and highlighting the most important context. TLDR: I’ve been using Readwise for my linklog and I’ll probably purchase it when my trial ends."
  • by the way, linklog isn’t updated, because the API I created for it is not compatible with Reader/Readwise yet. Online life is complicated.
• I went more into generative AI, mostly ChatGPT and Midjourney. I try to use it every day and make familiar with what such interfaces and tools can do. Right now I’m not exploring every new tool that comes out, as there are a lot of scams and empty promises there, however there’s a lot of potential in this area and few decent ones as well.
  • my first Midjourney creation is the header image for this post. Pretty, isn’t it?
• Marco (@esamecar) inspired (and still inspires) me with his weekly journal. I enjoy the format A LOT and probably I’ll start something similar (as soon as I get my normal rhythm back)
• I went to the cinema and watched John Wick 4! It turns out that I’m really a simple man and don’t need a complex movie to enjoy it. Good action, good sound and I’m good to go!
• After few years of using Unifi ecosystem, mongodb instance on my console got corrupted and I did a clean install recently.

Posts

• The URLs #1: Are we going back to the earlier days of the web?
• Uploading Files to Fly.io Using scp
• How to create a linklog in a few easy steps
• February Summary

March, thank you! 💙

Theme: Are we going back to the earlier days of the web?

Since the beginning of the year, I’m discovering the Internet once again and I’m enjoying the journey. RSS, Mastodon, open APIs, new people and their work… I don’t actually see ads and algorithms. I like it this way.

Sharing is enabling

Internet is about exploration!

The internet should be about exploring and novelty. When I was younger, I remember the thrill at finding a new author at the library or a book store. For a short time, the internet was like that as well. I am on Mastodon not because I want to “build my brand” or “expand my audience” but because there are so many people in the world that are smart, funny, and creative, and I want to see what they have done

I doubled down on RSS

I’ve never stopped using RSS feeds and I’m glad people didn’t drop them. Why is it worth to use RSS? What might you learn when you go past their social media feeds? Bonus points: beautiful examples of some peoples’ homepages - check them out!

However, I wanted to see what folks were up to. I like personal websites, but I don’t exactly have a ritual where I visit all of them on a periodic basis. Visiting each person’s personal site let me check in and see all the cool things people are doing in addition to writing blog posts.

I don’t want to log in to your website / I simply won’t read! Solved!

Monetize, sell, get data, monetize more, sell more, repeat… Life is hard, some people are going to live out of their Internet presence, but some other should remain content with folks simply reading their content (👋🏻, love you all Readers!💙)…

There is a new trend among websites where they want my email address before I’m allowed to read their free content. While I sympathize with the struggles of the media business, I am just going to point out something obvious: not reading is easier than reading — and way easier than logging in.

The mighty rest

How Good Documentation Can Improve Productivity

Shopify’s take on writing documentation. They describe the importance of documentation from the productivity and culture perspectives. One thing that we often forget is how much impact can a markdown file make:

Engineers whose primary language is not English may find it difficult to assimilate spoken information. In general, widely accessible tools and documents create a more inclusive environment because everyone has a say and can feel part of something.

It also helps with onboarding, not just with the speed, but also with the new joiner’s confidence.

Onboarding or to a new team is faster. Not everybody is comfortable asking for help or guidance, especially if they’re a new employee or have joined a new team.

Reliability: It’s Not Great

I’ve started using Fly.io for hosting my API. I didn’t need anything extraordinary, I was rather looking for a free and simple solution. Instead of Heroku, I went with Fly.io this time. When Heroku dropped their free offering, more people switched to Fly.

This post openly shares the problems that the Fly.io team is facing. It’s a good read for anyone who interested in the reliability aspects of SaaS.

And: we were growing about 15% per month. But post-Heroku, we got a huge influx of apps in just a few hot spots — and at 30% per month.

BTW, I’m super happy with the service so far!

Culture viruses

Currently, a lot of organizations have tough time. Some problems start to be more visible than ever. This post describes a few cultural viruses: Toxic Positivity, Lack of accountability, Burnout, Resourcing and suggests how to prevent them from spreading.

Fun

Fashion doesn’t know age or gender! ❤️

😎

Crazy Moment a Horse Gets Out of Fields and onto Course at Strade Bianche Ahead of Demi Vollering

Cycling is back! But I’ve never seen a horse on the course before

Outro

That’s it for this week. I hope you enjoyed the URLs! 💙

• Fly.io for hosting
• Sinatra (Ruby) for the API

I’ll cut it short: at some point I needed to send a file from my computer to the server hosting my application. It wasn’t that straightforward, so I decided to write a post about it and help others who might be in the same situation.

Here’s what you need to exchange files between your computer and the server: Disclaimer: I’m using MacOS, so the commands might be different on other systems. Assumptions: you have a Fly.io account and you have a project deployed. You also have a fly or flytcl command available in the terminal

1. flyctl wireguard create – this will create a Wireguard configuration file for you. If you don’t have Wireguard installed, you can download it from here. Use the generated configuration file to connect to the Wireguard server.
2. fly ssh issue – this will generate a new SSH key for you. You can use it to connect to your server. Save it somewhere, e.g. tmp/flycert, you’ll need it later.
3. Get address of your app: flyctl ips private – this will give you the address of your app. You can use it to connect to your server.
4. scp -i tmp/flycert LOCAL_SOURCE root@\[ADDRESS\]:REMOTE_DESTINATION – this will copy the file from your computer to the server. You can use it to upload files to your server. Escaping the address is important – \[ and \]

That’s it! You can use the same command to download files from your server. Just change the order of the arguments.

So you think that’s it? Just an inspiration and a few lines of code and here we are?

Haha.

No, not with me!

The story isn’t that simple

1. Let’s take a look at my links
2. Reeder. More than 100 unread items in the read-it-later list.
3. Let’s tag things.
4. Oh, I have a wrong tag on my item from 2019. It’s a typo there. Not a big deal, I will rename it.
5. You can’t rename the tag in Reeder!
6. Moreover, there’s no way of working with multiple items at once.
7. Let’s search for an alternative!
8. Reader from Readwise
9. NetNewsWire
10. Feedbin
11. ReadKit
12. [it’s already been more than a week since (3.)]
13. How about we report the bug to Reeder developer?
14. Bugs reported, no response so far.
15. Hmm, I had this Pocket account for a while. Maybe I should use it?
16. For sure there are better alternatives to Pocket.
17. I had also this Instapaper account…
18. Someone mentioned Raindrop on Reddit (or somewhere else).
19. Talked to a friend about it. I don’t think he still doesn’t know what I’m talking about with this /links thing. Hello Bartek!
20. But he says that Pocket is good, because it’s a backend that might power up Reeder.
21. Something clicked.
22. Let’s build an integration in Zapier that saves saved items from Pocket to Raindrop and let’s build an API on top of Raindrop that will be exposed by my own API and then processed and served as JSON, so it can again be consumed by the blog website you are reading right now.
23. … exactly, I didn’t mention creating my own API! (because I had this idea of exposing “myself” in form of consumable API… I know many… One? Consumer. Well, irrelevant for now, let’s go!)
24. So this Zapier works but I realized… why the heck can’t I just use Pocket everywhere, they have good integrations with the system, browser, mobile etc. and see point (20.) – it might power up Reeder (which I really like!). So I decided to use Pocket.
25. Implementing OAuth, getting token, I’m in!
26. Let’s write the API in Go, seems easy, I always wanted to have a real project in Go.
27. [3 mins later]. Oh, I need to learn Go first. Let’s use Ruby & Sinatra and finish this task this year.
28. Of course, I have to have a Dev Container for development, not that I use just Ruby and 2 gems and I already have them in my system.
29. I’m in, I fetched links from Pocket and I have JSON api returning them in a slightly different form.
30. Why don’t we add also boosted links from Mastodon as originally planned?
31. Mastodon API, here we go.
32. New classes added, Copilot is helping me with the code, I’m making progress and I have a working API.
33. Pocket + Mastodon work together as one endpoint, my job is done with API for now.
34. Where do I host this thing. Is Heroku still free? I don’t think so.
35. fly.io seems to be a good idea in theory…
36. … and in practice, too! flyctl deploy and I’m done with API.
37. Let’s get back to the blog and add the links.
38. Hmmm, but how do I comment on the links? I don’t want to have a separate page for each link. Maybe I should have something like DaringFireball’s links?
39. Totally, I will do that.
40. New page type in Hugo, new shortcode, new template, new CSS, new content, new content type, …
41. Ok, system is in place. Do I actually have a link to comment on?
42. Yeah, there is one, let’s do it.
43. One post later, I have a working proof of concept in place.
44. Deploying blog to production.
45. Automation kicks in, posts a link on Mastodon.
46. BUT THE TEMPLATE DOESN’T INDICATE THAT THIS IS AN EXTERNAL LINK IN THE POTS’S TITLE, I need to resolve that before thousands complaints from people are going to reach my inbox.
47. Damn, what about the links in RSS feed? How to make a different link in the feed, not linking to my page, but to the one that I want to share?
48. Let’s leave that for now, when people get to the blog, they will see the link to the external page. Problem solved.
49. But how to indicate the external page?
50. Should I use ↗️ or 🔗 or 🌐 or 🌍 or 🌎 or 🌏?
51. I don’t know, let’s use ↗️, looks cool in blue.
52. Now I can add commentary on the links I find in the Internet, how cool is that?
53. Reflections kicks in – why don’t I use Mastodon for that… nah, let’s not waste time for overthinking!
54. New /linklog page created, new shortcode, new template, … you know the drill.
55. But this time it’s also about fetching JSON from my API page, you remember? And I haven’t done anything like that before.
56. Ok, I’m implementing and playing with Go (that’s what I wanted, right?), code looks like 💩 but it works.
57. Unsorted list? Sorted list? Paragraphs? Let’s do paragraphs.
58. I think this blog needs CSS changes in the template…
59. … no I didn’t go this route, I know it would end up with a lot of changes and I don’t have time for that (hehe).
60. It looks good without modification, actually. Let’s just group links by month.
61. Group fetched JSON by month…
62. Group fetched JSON…
63. Documentation, documentation, random blogposts, Discourse…
64. GOT IT!
65. I love the end result. I’m happy with it.
66. Commit!
67. Deploy?
68. NO! Write a post about it first!
69. I created a linklog. But the story isn’t that simple…

Howgh!

You probably shouldn’t be worried about an audience at all. Write. Paint. Draw. Create. Put it out into the world and let it go. Maybe it will change the world. Maybe it might change the mind of a single person. Perhaps after all your effort it won’t be noticed at all.

All of that isn’t as important as creating.

Since the beginning of the year, I feel like I’m discovering the Internet once again and I’m enjoying the journey. RSS, Mastodon, open APIs, discovering new people and their work… all of this is very rewarding.

The internet should be about exploring and novelty. When I was younger, I remember the thrill at finding a new author at the library or a book store. For a short time, the internet was like that as well. I am on Mastodon not because I want to “build my brand” or “expand my audience” but because there are so many people in the world that are smart, funny, and creative, and I want to see what they have done

Heh, the more I write here, the more I want to learn CSS 🙈.

1. We had a little holiday in Kraków with the family. Hard to call it a regeneration but still, it was nice to spend some time together. We had a nice whether, including -10°C during the day. Highlights: Wieliczka, Wawel, Muzeum Iluzji, Pałac Krzysztofory, Wesoła Cafe, AleKlocki.
2. During the Kraków visit, I had a chance to experience the BMW 3 series for the first time in the 370+HP version and explore the city with my guide D. - thanks a lot for the opportunity! It was great! The most important insight for me was that I don’t really need a full M version of the car, the one I tested is more than enough!
3. I spent a lot of time digging through BMW configurator, it seems that cars still make an impression on me.
4. February was not impressive in terms of bike trips, just 3 of them. I hope that my issues with the tires are gone and I won’t have to spend most of the ride pumping them up.
5. February marks my 4th month in a row when I closed all the activity rings on my Apple Watch!
6. At work things were good but INTENSIVE, the highlight was a workshop we had in a bigger group in Poznań! First of all we closed some important topic, but there was also a lot of fun and a lot of learning! I also started in a new role – exciting things ahead of us!
7. I had my first experience as a host with Disruption Talks format, it was fun!
8. FlexiSpot surprised me when I reached out to them and they agreed to send me a new desk top for free (I had a small issue with the previous one).
9. Something triggered me to improve my backup game. I decided to leverage the power of my Synology and backup all the photos from all the phones at home to Synology (even though I use the big iCloud package). Just in case. Apart from that, I did some changes to running Docker containers on NAS and I’m using it more and more for things other than just a file storage.
10. I’m glad that my home is running almost entirely on Apple devices, just a few things left for migration. Not that I don’t like other brands, but it’s easier to have everything in one ecosystem.
11. Health is good!
12. I felt urge to learn CSS from scratch, hopefully I will find some time for it.
13. I wrote 5 posts on my blog! That’s more than in 3 last years combined!

Few random links

• https://store.steampowered.com/app/1794680/Vampire_Survivors/
• https://github.com/louislam/uptime-kuma
• https://logseq.com/
• https://dokku.com/
• https://www.youtube.com/@flavourtrip
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4aPeeI64CA
• https://letterboxd.com/

Posts

• Cyk007: One night in Kraków, Kraków, 2023
• Uses Page Is Up
• Exploring WWW
• Playing with Webmentions
• January was NICE

February, thank you! 💙

Why? Because when I explore peoples’ pages, I can learn a lot about them and how do they work. More importantly, I can learn about tools that I didn’t know about before. And that’s what I want to do with my page.

My uses page is just a click away in the main menu or you can just go straight to the /uses page.

Feel free to reach out to me if you find something interesting — I’m always open to discovering new ideas and tools!

In general

• RSS – oh boy, I’ve never left the RSS boat, even after Google Reader was shutdown years ago. Right now I use it to browse a very diverse (also random) set of feeds to broaden my perspectives and follow the topics I’m interested about – without the comments/likes hustle.

  The last part is crucial for me – RSS are about the content, not everything around it. That’s actually how I like to browse web.

• Newsletters – when I was a very active developer back in a day, I felt that being on the edge with news about programming languages, new libraries, etc. was a must. After a while, I realized that receiving TOP-10 links from a given topic once a week is enough. I still believe that’s the case and that’s why I like reading newsletters:) One caveat – RSS feed is still better when executed nicely.
• Mastodon – new player in the block, I covered it my another post. Currently, it serves as my tiny social network and inspiration for browsing other people’s blogs.
• Random pages on the internet – I’m combining Mastodon toots with subscribing to people’s feeds. Most of the time, people are not that active on blogs, write 10 pages a year or something like that. But that’s exactly what I like – exploring this random stuff, finding great content (and collecting another ideas to explore). I still don’t want to leave “the bubble” but at the same time feel comfortable with content “on the edge”.

  This approach exposes me to a quite varied set of topics which I probably wouldn’t find otherwise.

• Facebook Groups – there’s really good content in FB groups! I avoid things that are “general”, like city-based groups, etc., I focus on specialized groups of people who talk and exchange ideas about a narrow topic, e.g. woodworking, car detailing or cycling. I don’t like the interaction process, but you can get a lot by the extended context of comments in some discussions.
• Messenger/Signal/WhatsApp/iMessage – depending on the group of people I’m interacting with, instant messaging app changes and I can’t really tell which one is my platform of choice. The biggest problem I have is that the most people are on the platforms I’d like to utilize the least 🙃

All these activities have enabled me to stay connected and up-to-date with the ever-growing world of the web. I enjoy the freedom of browsing, exploring and learning from the world wide web, and I am constantly experimenting and adapting to the best ways to do so. Even without realizing that I do experiment:)

Work

• Slack – most of my work happens there. Mentions, tasks, daily job. I don’t want to say it’s my main working tool - actually it is and my work happens through Slack. I do fun and serious stuff there, but there’s always too much going on.
• E-mail – not used that much anymore, forwarding from time to time, intros, contacting with people outside of the company
• LinkedIn – networking is important part of my role and LinkedIn gives me the best visibility and chance to understand what’s going on “professionally”

After writing this, I came to a conclusion that this is just a general outline of how do I interact with the Web, without concrete details. That’s totally OK – if you would like me to expand some of the channels a bit, let me know!

I’m using webmention.io to receive and send webmentions. I’m also using bridgy to combine that with reactions/replies from Mastodon.

The first time I’ve heard about webmentions, was when I stumbled upon Robb Knight’s article. Robb’s website is beautiful and encouraged me to read more about webmentions and actually implement them on my website.

What are webmentions?

• Webmentions are a form of web communication that allow one website to notify another about mentions or links to its content.
• They are a modern alternative to traditional trackback and pingback systems and provide a way for one website to notify another that it has linked to its content.
• Webmentions are a key part of the IndieWeb movement, which aims to give individuals more control over their online identity and data.
• In practice, webmentions work by sending a request from the linking website to the target website with information about the link, such as the URL of the linking page and the URL of the linked page.
• The receiving website can then use this information to display a notification or summary of the mention on its site.
• Webmentions offer a more open and decentralized way of communicating between websites and can help to foster a more connected and engaged web.

Future plans for webmentions on lubieniebieski.pl

Of course, the first paragraph was a bit of a joke, with 2 reactions on Mastodon, there’s not a lot of incentive to spend a lot of time on webmentions here. However, I believe that eventually, I’d would be great to connect the content here with other places on the web, to spark discussions, to get more feedback, to cross-link content when it makes sense.

For now, there’s not even a div for webmentions on the site, but the “backend” is already working.

How to implement webmentions?

Have a look at following sites, I think they are a great starting point and were enough for me to get webmentions working here:

• All in one with a beautiful example
• Showing webmentions on site (JS plugin)
• Starting with webmentions in Hugo
• webmention.io
• bridgy

Tools

I realized that I like people and things that are NICE and welcoming. Places where we say “hello” to each other, where we are polite and where we are not afraid to ask for help or simply we can share what we think without being judged.

Arc browser - a browser for the modern web

After a few years of browsing Internet and jumping on the Chrome boat right from the beginning, I didn’t expect that there’s going to be a browser that’s going to make me switch. But Arc browser did it. It’s fast, it’s simple, it’s beautiful and it’s NICE.

I love the sidebar and a “magic” feel of interacting with favorites and tabs. But most of all, I like how the entire thing is designed. It’s not just a browser, it’s a whole experience.

The way new releases are presented and also the way the team is communicating with the community is just amazing. Look at an example here: Arc team is presenting a release without major updates, but with a lot of small improvements. It’s just 💙.

Even though I’m usually the picky person, liking when everything is aligned, polished, pixel-perfect and beautiful — I enjoy the “chaos” of what the Arc team is sharing.

Their screens are messy, there are a lot of thinks on the desktop, record quality is not 8K, some footage is done via iPhone directly.

But it’s all NICE.

omg.lol- a social network (?)

After a recommendation in YesWas Podcast, I was curious what this omg.lol thing is. I thought it was a Mastodon server, but it’s more than that. For a small yearly fee, you get a subdomain YOURNAME.omg.lol + a lot of extras including:

• web profile / simple homepage
• URL shortener
• custom DNS management
• weblog
• statuslog
• /now page (link to the “movement”)
• mastodon server
• email forwarding
• and many more

And what’s interesting, every feature is accessible via API. When you interact with the page you see a lot of things like:

• We hope you’re having a great day.
• Need more help? Contact us at any time.

Colors are friendly, everything is extremely polished - links work, many feature are available, there’s a status page, news, crazy domains. And when I got to the Mastodon instance, I was warmly greeted by @adam who runs the entire gig. NICE!

BTW: there’s a possibility to use all the cool features under your own domain, so if you feel like there’s something cooler than omg.lol domain, you can do it!

Mastodon

I’ve started my journey on mastodon early this year, you can see my activity by following lubieniebieski@social.lol.

If you don’t know what Mastodon is, you can take a look here:

• Poradnik for my Polish friends by @lukem@masto.ai
• For everyone else speaking English http://guidetomastodon.com by @Noelle@elekk.xyz

So far, I like it and try to post something from time to time. I’m using Ivory on my iPhone and I’m still looking for a decent client for the desktop. The web version of the client is OK, but I’m missing the ability to resume the timeline when I finished last time, not to jump right away to the newest posts.

Hugo static site engine

I’ve already shared my hello-world post regarding Hugo, but I forgot to mention that this entire thing is written in Go (Hu - Go… !:D) which I recently explored as my language of choice for hacking after work.

It’s fast, it’s NICE:) And you read this post — which I consider the biggest achievement of my migration from Wordpress to Hugo.

There are two main thoughts in my head which I’d like to share.

I wouldn’t believe myself that this is even possible

Yes, me! I did it and I’m celebrating it here!

Usually when I tried keeping track of my activities, I’d eventually failed due to some random coincidences like a bunch of clouds, pain in the a… ahm, important body part, or just sheer lack of motivation. Every time I failed, I felt awful and frustrated ‘cause I’d put in effort for like, a single day and then have to start all over again. Plus, with all the things I have to get done or simply would like to do like work, playing with the kids, talking to family, and getting the proper amount of exercise- it often seemed impossible.

But here I am, having achieved my goal of consecutive 100 days!

I heard other people did it, yet me? Yes, me indeed! I’m here celebrating it!

It was surprisingly easy

I went for a walk one day, closed the ring, felt good. I did the same the next day. No one complained, no one was angry, no one was disappointed. Job was done.

It was dark outside (thank you Polish winter!), but thanks to multiple flashlights waiting for me in the drawer I was able to walk and conquer the darkness.

It was raining outside, but I had this jacket which was waterproof and I was able to walk and conquer the rain.

It was cold outside, but fancy beanie, gloves and winter jacket made the difference and helped me to conquer the cold.

It was busy at work, but I found a walking pad laying under my desk. It turned to be quite useful and helped me to stay active while working on my computer. Lack of time was no longer the issue.

It was not difficult at all. All I had to do was to apply the right tools and techniques and I was able to conquer the obstacles that I faced.

Results

• 100 days of activity rings closed
• one weird exercise during company’s Christmas party (I realized at 23:40 that I still need to close the rings for the day and ended up running up and down the stairs in the building for 15 minutes)
• weight KPIs not met 😬, but I guess it’s more about the fact that there were many occasions to eat a lot of great food and it would be a sin not to eat a lot of it
• I wasn’t ill, nor felt bad in any way
• I don’t feel tired, coffee is more of a habit than a necessity
• I sleep well
• it was the first time since a few years that I didn’t feel depressed during the end of the year season
• I feel good!

What’s next?

Next steps? Who knows? Keeping up a routine is something I plan to continue, and I can’t wait to get back out on my bike and enjoy the sunshine!

Good job Adam! 💪

• migrate away from my hosting provider and reduce costs
• have a static site that I can host anywhere (Github Pages included)
• have a site that is easy to maintain and update
• have a way to write posts in Markdown
• have a feeling of doing something new and exciting
• have a site that is fast and lightweight
• being able to write posts in my favorite editor (currently VS Code, as my Vim muscle memory faded away a bit)
• do something “hackish” and fun

Here we are! I’m happy with the result! There are a few things that I’d like to introduce, like light/dark theme switcher or a better way of handling images, but I’ll get to that later.

I’m giving this blog/site another go. I don’t expect to post multiple times a day, but a few entries a year would be a nice improvement comparing to the last few years…

Currently, I’m exploring a few things:

• Mastodon lubieniebieski@social.lol as a Twitter alternative and re-entry to interactions in the webz if you’re out there — let me know!
• 2FA improvements with YubiKey
• Loving RSS more than ever (thanks Reeder!)
• Changing my e-mail setup a bit — I decided to buy a domain and run it on Fastmail
• My plan is to write about these topics a bit more in upcoming weeks.

Cheers!

Core setup

Laptop 🆕

I use a 2019 MacBook Pro 16"; in Space Gray.

2,6 GHz 6-Core Intel Core i7 + 16GB RAM. Sufficient for day-to-day work. But it blows air like a jet engine. Definitely too loud! And it’s definitely bigger than my previous 13";. I wanted more power (which it delivers), but I really don’t like the noise it makes.

MacBook is wrapped in a dbrand skin, a special Robot Camo edition which was shipped to me a few days before we went into COVID lockdown last year. I like the structure and the fact that it differentiates my laptop from other devices in the office — not particularly beneficial when you stopped getting to the office, but still.. 🙂

MacBook sits on a silver Rain Design mStand. It’s not matched to the colour of the hardware but I don’t mind it (there was some kind of promotion on this particular colour after all).

Display

In 2017 I bought LG 27UD88-W display. It’s 27";, 4K and it has a USB-C connection which works great with my MacBook (one cable for power&display).

The only issue I had initially, was the USB-C cable itself. The one delivered with the display was to short for my cable management needs and I had to look for a replacement. The one provided with the MacBook doesn’t transfer data (it transmits power only), the other ones are short or have some other issues. After some time, I found the right cable on Amazon, unfortunately, it’s not available anymore.

The desktop is occupied by a beautiful GT3 — you can read more about it here.

Keyboard, trackpad and mouse 🆕

I use Apple’s Magic Keyboard and Magic Trackpad 2. I like the fact that I can charge them over a cable and I don’t have to worry about buying another pair of AA batteries.

Recently, a MX Master 3 for Mac joined them and I have to admit — this little creature is lovely and I like it more and more with every day. Great scrolling and customisation possibilities, I can have a different mouse-key bindings for each application.

Additional devices

I have a couple of additional devices on my desk as well.

Speakers

Long time ago, it was 2002 or 2003 — I dreamed of having a 5.1 speaker system. I bought Creative Inspire 6.1 6700 back then. They are with me for almost 20 years already, even though I use them as 2.1 system right now.

Ten years later I bought a pair of 2.0 Creative GigaWorks T20 Series II, but after few years and changing the desk I decided to put them back to the box and have some fun with the sub and two satellites from the 6700 set. Why? Mostly because of the size (satellites are very small) and they have a wired remote which is glued to the bottom of my desk and I use it to control the volume of the speakers.

It’s not ideal but for work — this setup is pretty much OK.

Headphones 🆕

As I changed my audio inputs, I wanted to change the output as well. I choose beyerdynamic DT 990 PRO. You can wear them all day long, they produce good reproduction of the voice and are aesthetically pleasing. I didn’t like the original black/gray combination and went for the all-black edition. Until they arrived, I didn’t notice that they come with a different impedance (250 vs 80 Ohm). Not sure how much I lost because of that, but I have to admit that the are great!

Additionally, I own Jabra Elite 85H. These are noise-cancelling headphones which help me to survive train/plane travels as well as help to cut off the environment when I need it. I like the fact that they offer 3 modes of working (ANC/Off/Hear-trough), have physical buttons, the battery lasts for 35h+ and they pause the music when I put them off.

Microphone 🆕

I said goodbye to my Blue Snowball and welcomed Audio-Technica ATR2100x-USB. I spend a lot of time on calls with Bartek and he noticed the difference immediately. Because of that, I consider this particular item as a good purchase! Now I look like a serious podcaster and I can definitely go into business. Next step: have something to say!

It’s a dynamic microphone and I think it much better suits my needs and it’s a good choice for people who deal with a lot of noise around.

The microphone is mounted on a Rode PSA1 arm and is one of the things that allows me to keep the desk tidy.

Microphone is capable of running via USB-C, but I picked up Audient EVO 4 interface. One of the reasons was that the provided USB-C cable was too short. XLR cable is much more robust (and longer) and works fine with the setup. I like the fact that I finally have a hardware mute button available for me and I like the visualisation provided by white LED on the device.

External camera

As I mentioned, I do a lot of Meet/Zoom/Slack calls every day, so it’s important for me to have a decent Audio/Video setup. In addition to the Blue microphone described earlier, I use a Logitech C922 webcam which offers nice quality and allows me to get a better angle than using a camera available on my MacBook.

Clock

I would like it to be a piece of art, but — this clock is some no-name LCD device bought for 50PLN on Allegro. It shows the temperature and the time obviously, but it also fits nicely to the black desk.

Numpad

At some point, I wanted to have more ability to control some actions on my mac without clicking or going trough some complicated shortcuts. I found something called Elgato Stream Deck, but it was too expensive for my experiment. For less than 100 PLN, I found LogiLink Wireless Keypad which turned out to be a good match for my purposes. Thanks to Keyboard Maestro and Karabiner Elements, I was able to set up macros for arranging my windows, starting some applications, running funny voices on the call, or change some scenes in OBS (I don’t use it, but I will!).

The Desk 🆕

The desk is a custom-built one. Two pieces of Swiss Krono Worktop — the front one 70x180cm and the side one (on the left) 60x110cm. It’s very deep and there’s plenty of space. The worktop sits on two IKEA Alex drawers which suit the black&white theme of the desk and offer additional storage for the commonly used items like cables, accessories, etc.

This year, I had some issues with my back and decided that I want to migrate to a standing desk. I didn’t find a good platform for it, and one of my colleagues (thx Wiktor!) suggested a sit-stand kit which could be placed right on the existing desk. After some research I decided to give it a try.

Entire platform looks a bit ugly, like a transformer but it does a good job in delivering the ability of working in a siting or standing position. My choice is FlexiSpot EdgeRiser. Everything is steady event in the top position. It’s not electric, but it turned out not to be that much of an issue. The only challenge I had with this setup was the cable organisation. It’s pretty clean now, after buying some cable organisers, double-sided tapes and other stuff.

Lightning

I’ve added a few lighting sources around the room. The most important one is the Yongnuo YN-300 Air LED lamp. It allows my face to shine (lol) during the calls. There’s a variety of combinations of how can this lamp be used, starting from flexibility of movement and ending up with the light temperature. Currently it is mounted on the monitor-arm (which I no longer use to hold my monitor) combined with DIY connection.

More photos

That’s it! If you have any questions — reach out to me on Mastodon @lubieniebieski@social.lol!

The flagship model is painted in a beautiful Shark Blue colour and I couldn’t resist to create my own specification (just in case I have 1M PLN to spare 🙈). Renders from the configurator went directly to my desktops and they are replacing the previous gen Porsche!

I really like this one, especially all the blue accents (Shark Blue seatbelts, blue rim and lights decors). I could definitely ride one! There should be a GT3 Touring version coming soon (no spoiler, manual only) and I’m really looking forward to see one!

Jak to miało być? Plany vs rzeczywistość

Miałem w planach zrobić sobie takie bardzo dobre jakościowo książki ze zdjęciami podsumowujące każdy kolejny rok, jednak jakoś nigdy nie było we mnie wystarczająco dużo weny, żeby ten projekt zrealizować. Na początek — przeraża mnie selekcja zdjęć — ładnych zdjęć, które są dla mnie istotne jest w każdym roku ZA DUŻO. W ostatnich miesiącach lepiej sobie radzę z ratingiem ★★★★☆ podczas pracy z biblioteką, ale nie jest to coś co praktykowałem od zawsze. Czyli póki co — pod górkę. Żeby było ładnie, chciałbym żeby wszystko było spójne i w jednym stylu, a to zawsze kojarzyło mi się z olbrzymim wysiłkiem włożonym w projekt layoutu, w jakimś Photoshop czy innym cudzie. Again, pod górkę. Ci, którzy mnie znają wiedzą, że też lubię robić trochę lepiej niż “dobrze”, więc naczytałem się postów o obróbce, kalibracji, papierze, gramaturze i szeregu innych parametrów, które mają wpływ na docelowy wydruk. Jak się pewnie domyślacie, efekt jest taki, że nie zrobiłem żadnej fotoksiążki.

Do dziś!

Moja pierwsze przygoda z fotoksiążką

Dostałem ostatnio w zakupach kod rabatowy na fotoksiążke w cewe.pl, wywołałem i… tak to wygląda:

Jest całkiem fajnie. Przede wszystkim uśmiech na twarzy wywołują wszystkie zdjęcia które się znalazły w wydruku, wspominam z chłopakami KIEDY TO BYŁO i co w tym czasie robiliśmy — dobrze spędzony czas.

Proces powstawania

W bólach:) Ale nie takich jak sobie wyobrażałem! Jest aplikacja, ma gotowe layouty, ma możliwość edycji wbudowaną, zarządza się intuicyjnie i nie było żadnych problemów (było tam wszystko co mi przyszło do głowy, w stylu templatów na różną ilość zdjęć na stronę, style kolorystyczne, podpisy, etc.).

1. Wybrałem foty, po kilka z każdego miesiąca ostatniego roku
2. Wyeksportowałem do jednego folderu
3. Rozpocząłem pracę z kreatorem, wrzucając cały folder ze zdjęciami, wybrałem ile stron ma się znaleźć w finalnym produkcie
4. Program podzielił mi sprytnie na strony zgodnie z porządkiem chronologicznym
5. Pozostało mi wprowadzenie poprawek (wymiana zdjęć, inne kadrowanie, inne rozmieszczenie)
6. Klik, klik, wysłałem, zapłaciłem (kuponem! a bez rabatu jakieś 150zł przy 40 stronach) i gotowe

Czego się nauczyłem?

• Bądź bezwzględny w selekcji zdjęć!
• Rating zdjęć — rzecz obowiązkowa. 3 gwiazdki to dobre zdjęcie, 4 to coś co śmiało trafia do takich rocznych fotoksiążek, a 5 to totalne koksy, które powinno się wydrukować i poprzylepiać na ścianach
• Wyłącz wszystkie autopoprawiacze zdjęć (nie wyłączyłem tego globalnie i nie jestem zadowolony miejscami, bo sam zrobiłem obróbkę wcześniej)
• Sprawdź sobie kilka produktów, w różnych serwisach, różnice są, czasem jest to jakość, czasem jest to cena, czasem UX aplikacji, czy inne aspekty
• NIE BĘDZIE IDEALNIE ZA PIERWSZYM RAZEM!
• Chociaż raz przeleć przez projekt po zakończeniu ale przed wysłaniem. Dobrym pomysłem jest niepowielanie tego samego zdjęcia kilka razy (tak, tak właśnie zrobiłem).
• Daj sobie czas na pracę z materiałem, takich rzeczy nie powinno się robić w pośpiechu, emocje ze zdjęć są warte chwili refleksji nad tym jak je najlepiej przekazać na wydruku
• Kombinuj z różnymi rzeczami w rocznym albumie: dodaj coś co się działo w okolicy, wspólne przygody w kuchni, najbliższych, rzeczy wesołe i rzeczy ważne — you can do better niż “tylko dzieci” 😉

Kilka lat już nie wywoływałem fotek, ten krótki projekt uświadomił mi jak przyjemny jest efekt końcowy i że warto czasem poświęcić kawałek wieczoru, żeby móc “pomacać” wspomnienia!

Różnica prędkości między s2, a s6 jest kolosalna – korzystanie z wszystkich funkcji sprawia autentycznie radość i satysfakcję. Mam wrażenie, że to samo uczucie towarzyszyło mi przy pierwszym zegarku, więc chyba Apple specjalnie dodaje jakieś instrukcje w swoich aktualizacjach, żeby uczucie spowolnienia i niechęci wywołać.

BTW, sorry za odcisk palucha, przynajmniej widać, że to nie jest super sterylny sprzęt – on ma być używany i będzie tak wyglądał!

Core setup

Laptop

I use a 2016 MacBook Pro 13″ in Space Gray.

I’ve liked it in the beginning, but recently I run into issues with the keyboard (this is real and I actually know more people who have some issues with their MacBook keyboards than the people who don’t have any issues) and the overall performance of the OS and I’m looking forward to a replacement in upcoming months (probably a 16" MacBook Pro).

It’s the basic configuration with TouchBar and 16GB of RAM. I usually work with Chrome, some docs, terminal and other small apps but the amount of RAM is never enough!

MacBook sits on a silver Rain Design mStand. It’s not matched to the color of the hardware but I don’t mind it (there was some kind of promotion on this particular color after all).

Display

In 2017 I bought LG 27UD88-W display. It’s 27", 4K and it has a USB-C connection which works great with my MacBook (one cable for power&display).

The only issue I had initially, was the USB-C cable itself. The one delivered with the display was to short for my cable management needs and I had to look for a replacement. The one provided with the MacBook doesn’t transfer data (it transmits power only), the other ones are short or have some other issues. After some time, I found the right cable on Amazon, unfortunately, it’s not available anymore.

The display is mounted on a Maclean MC-628. It’s cheap but for a couple of years I had 0 issues with it and I’m able to move the display in all directions. Sometimes I bring it closer to my face, sometimes I put it back. There’s no such thing as one-hand, assisted arrangement, but it’s good enough to not worry about it.

Keyboard and trackpad

I use Apple’s  Magic Keyboard and Magic Trackpad 2. I don’t use any mouse for years and don’t miss it at all. I like the fact that I can charge them over a cable and I don’t have to worry about buying another pair of AA batteries.

Additional devices

I have a couple of additional devices on my desk as well.

Speakers

Long time ago, it was 2002 or 2003 — I dreamed of having a 5.1 speaker system. I bought Creative Inspire 6.1 6700 back then. They are with me for almost 20 years already, even though I use them as 2.1 system right now.

Ten years later I bought a pair of 2.0 Creative GigaWorks T20 Series II, but after few years and changing the desk I decided to put them back to the box and have some fun with the sub and two satellites from the 6700 set. Why? Mostly because of the size (satellites are very small) and they have a wired remote which is glued to the bottom of my desk and I use it to control the volume of the speakers.

It’s not ideal but for work — this setup is pretty much OK.

Headphones

Newest addition to my setup: Jabra Elite 85H. These are noise-cancelling headphones which helped me to survive train and plane travel last year. I like the fact that they offer 3 modes of working (ANC/Off/Hear-trough), have physical buttons, the battery lasts for 35h+ and they pause the music when I put them off.

Clock

The clock is some no-name LCD device bought for 50PLN on Allegro. It shows the temperature and the time obviously, but it also fits nicely to the black desk.

Microphone

I love this one — it’s a beautiful Blue Snowball in a… blue color. I bought it mostly because of the color, but for the number of remote calls I do every day — I think it’s worth the investment. The microphone is mounted on a Rode PSA1 arm and is one of the things that allows me to keep the desk tidy.

External camera

As I mentioned, I do a lot of Meet/Zoom/Slack calls every day, so it’s important for me to have a decent Audio/Video setup. In addition to the Blue microphone described earlier, I use a Logitech C920 webcam which offers nice quality and allows me to get a better angle than using a camera available on my MacBook.

Phone

iPhone 6s — it works! I don’t rely heavily on the phone so I don’t need to upgrade it every year. However, I’m going to switch it as soon as iPhones will get the USB-C type connector. I love the photo quality of the iPhone 11, but the Lighting port was a dealbreaker last year.

I use a stand for the phone which also holds the Apple Watch charger and allows me to charge the devices when I work at the desk and helps me to keep the cables organized.

The Desk

The desk is a custom-built one. Two pieces of Swiss Krono Worktop — the front one 70x180cm and the side one (on the left) 60x110cm. It’s very deep and there’s plenty of space. The worktop sits on two IKEA Alex drawers which suit the black&white theme of the desk and offer additional storage for the commonly used items like cables, accessories, etc.

That’s it! If you have any questions — reach out to me on Mastodon @lubieniebieski@social.lol!

I’m experimenting with my site right now, stay tuned for the updates!

Improving daily work is even more important than doing daily work.

The above is another quote from The Phoenix Project book I’ve mentioned in my last post.

When I heard about “kaizen” for the first time, I didn’t expect that I would experience its power so much in my professional career.

When Netguru was a small company, we made dozens of small improvements every day. It helped us to improve quality, embrace the growth, and be ready for all the challenges in front of us in the constantly changing environment.

I see no other option for hyper-growing companies than embracing Continuous Improvement principles as a part of their core values.

I feel that the one area which we haven’t improved in a kaizen way is… the kaizen way of doing things in the company.

We’re not small anymore, and finding the time for improvement is not granted. We have to make room for that.

We’re on our way to address this: we’ve introduced investment time for our team. We’re thinking about adding “kaizen blitz” to our flow, so people can more often focus on a given area, gather like-minded people, and introduce various improvements.

I’ve always assumed that DevOps are the people who work between servers and developers.

That was until I read a novel titled The Phoenix Project, recommended to me by Bartosz Pranczke.

Suddenly, all the pieces started to fit, and the software development environment looks different to me. I realised that DevOps is not a function, but a culture.

… and that everyone on the team is responsible for a project’s success.

Implementing DevOps around a project is HARD.

So imagine that my current goal is to help the entire organization do that.

I’ve spent a lot of time recently working closer to the projects, analyzing our development processes and talking with people.

For starters, I would like to define and track KPIs that will help us decide whether we’re headed in the right direction.

Once we know the baseline, we can start improving.

The metrics pick will likely not be ideal, but we need them to build self-assurance, improve, and celebrate progress.

Believe it or not, but most of the people don’t want to make other people’s lives worse and they don’t plan to ruin your day! At least, I think so:)

After spending many years with different people, I’ve realised that what we feel about some decision or a situation isn’t the same what other people feel about it. And that’s the source of all the issues and misunderstandings.

I want to encourage you (& me!) to do three things:

• Don’t take decisions personally
• If you have doubts – simply ask the person behind it about their point of view.
• Assume positive intent!

If you want to talk to the person who you think might have done something bad/stupid and you disagree with this, don’t hesitate to express your concerns. The key thing here is to use some form of Nonviolent Communication, by using your sincere feelings and explaining your point of view.

I try to follow this guidance and I never assume that someone (especially one of my co-workers) would like to do something bad. My algorithm is simple:

1. Accept the fact that someone has a different point of view
2. Try to understand it
3. Ask this person about things that concern you
4. < someone is going to profit from this discussion >
5. Move on

Assume positive intent, have a meaningful discussion and benefit from understanding a different point of view. It’s much better than getting angry and letting stress to come into your body.

We all like to complain from time to time, that’s in our nature, especially in my Polish nation. This post is not about judging who we are, but it’s about the way we should reduce this step from our conversation with others.

Take a deep breath

Imagine this situation: you talk to your boss (or even your colleague), there’s something you don’t particularly like about it, maybe the task isn’t perfect or there’s no enough information. Your peer states their point of view and as the response – you roll your eyes 🙄, exhales deeply and say that you don’t like it. The conversation goes forward, days go by and you’re done with the task.

Can you see what’s unnecessary here? Exactly, the grumpy part.

Replace or eliminate?

The rule is simple:

• if you don’t have an opinion, just eliminate complaining and get your hands on the task’s execution
• if you have a better idea or some questions, engage in the conversation, saying all you have to say, without any grudge on your side.

Why is it important?

No one wants to spend a lot of time on persuading someone else. From my own perspective, when I see that my conversation partner goes the grumpy way, I feel like the other person is mad at me like I’ve done something wrong and like I would like to do something bad to them. And that’s not the case 99% time.

I try to pause the conversation when I see something like this, say how I feel about it and ask if we can replace this behaviour by spending time on generating ideas or arguments why it might not be the best idea ever. And do this in a pleasant way, without aggrieving anyone.

If I don’t know how should I react in a given situation – I usually use this simple rule: Treat people the way you want to be treated. It works! And this year I want to make it more special, so I add treat them better on top of that. How do I want to achieve that?

Be nice, break the ice

If someone new joins my group, I need to make sure that the person doesn’t get ignored and gets recognition from other members of the group. I’m going to make the first step. It’s easier for me to start, then it is for a new person. They might not know the group well and be worried about making a good introduction. Or there might be a thousand other reasons which makes them uncomfortable. I want people to enjoy their time and not to stress a lot – taking of that stress does do the job!

Example I like here is the very short and simple. If I see someone waiting for a recruitment appointment, sitting somewhere in the lobby, I tend to ask what position do they apply for, who’s going to be in the meeting, give them a hint (or two). When after few weeks I can talk to this person as my new team mate and they remember the face I’m really happy and satisfied that I’ve made a good job. There’s a relation already and everything goes smoother with that in place!

What if something goes wrong?

I see stuff failing all the times. People are not happy about that. My job is to make things smooth. I want to be more helpful for other people and I want to do that by a few key guidelines:

1. Ask about the problem (don’t assume anything), and remember than asking once is not enough. The real problem lays deeper. You can help by asking questions and thus forcing the person to take a step back. You need to help them to get things in order.
2. Don’t make things worse by being ignorant. If someone asks for help, give them the answer and try to narrow down the solution. Saying nothing is worse than saying “I don’t know” or pointing to other person who might now the subject.
3. Stay in the loop. Don’t quit the discussion after first round. You’re done when the dust settles.
4. Make sure there’s the incident owner. It there is no one – congratulations, your job is to use your experience and make the problem go away.
5. Ask if your help is enough. We might thing that we’re helpful, but the reality might be different. Do one more step, and ask if “there is anything else you can do”.

Why do all of that?

I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. ― Maya Angelou

Here we go, 10 rules/guidelines for Adam Nowak, let’s start with the first one:

Slow down. Enjoy, don’t rush

Not much to add here. I’ve realised that in 2017, I’ve read more books than blogposts. And I kinda liked it. Instead of skimming through the content or navigating by headlines – I took the time to enjoy the topic in a broad context.

This is connected to multiple contexts as well. My job requires wearing a lot of hats every day and switching the context all the time. I accept it, but I rather focus on doing one thing at the time than trying to handle multiple things at once. I feel that’s better in the long run and keeping focus helps a lot in achieving great results. As I want great results as much as I want to enjoy my work – slowing down and focusing seem like a good tips for me.

There’s a great quote by David McCullough Jr which fits perfectly here:

Climb a mountain not to plant your flag, but to embrace the challenge, enjoy the air, and behold the view. Climb mountains not so the world can see you, but so you can see the world.

👋 🚀 👍

Another year, another “Hello world” entry! 😂

It’s all about the content, so there’s no need for fancy styling right now - please forgive me! 🙏