A month of holidays, annual performance reviews, STEMettes, wax anniversary, minimal sides, a new TECH session and back to the cinema.
Work
- Reflected on the first 5 months back in the role, realising quite a few rewarding achievements along the way
- Organised and participated in two STEMettes Outbox takeover days, engaging and encouraging young girls/non-binary into Tech
- Facilitated 4 speedback sessions to encourage more faster-feedback on personal improvements (blog post draft currently in peer review)
- All the EOY reviews with my 12 direct reports, facilitated by a new Powerpoint template covering day job, objectives, “being ASOS” (values and behaviours) and feedback
- One trip to Birmingham, one to London
- Gave Lightning Talk on making a podcast in an hour with Pinecast
- Made some Lightning Talk stickers on Stickermule
- Reviewed Manager Readme on GitHub following internal interest
- Identify and engaged with internal social champions to grow our Tech brand awareness
- Realised only 1 engineer across 3 teams I support is a fellow parent.
Life
- Wrapped up 2 week family holiday in East Devon
- Long weekend back at Rhodian Sun in Rhodes, short but sweet
- Outdoor middle-aged rave at Classic Ibiza in Hatfield (a delayed anniversary night out)
- Made a scented candle with Red Fox Candles for our 16th (wax) anniversary
- Grabbed some tickets to George Ezra’s Finsbury Park performance next July
- Celebrated Princess’ 9th in style with a Glastonbury-inspired garden party
- Stopped leg stretch therapy following a long break and no noticeable pain
- 5 local 30minute runs, building up to a couple 6km efforts around Cracks Hill
- Set a daily habit for 3×20 reps of 10kg dumbbells
Sides
- Continued weekly #FinesseFriday for House Finesse despite decline in downloads
- Added transactions sheet to Crypto Folio and included Revolut portfolio of Ethereum
- Review monthly outgoings in my custom Google Sheet for entertainment and hobbies
- On The Side coffee roulette with Ed Clews
- Started booking in guests for Make Life Work Season 6 – TBA on 6 Sep
- Queried the Apple Podcast SQLite database for recently listened episodes
Tech
- Replaced the dead Epson printer with a WiFi-enabled HP including Smart Ink – it’s liberating being able to print straight from our phones
- Discovered fixtur.es as another source for football calendars including EFL
- Found an RSS feed of Untappd user activities under My Account for syndicating my beer consumption On The Side
- Setup Coinbase Wallet, now accepting Bitcoin 🪙
- Setup music corner with the mixer in my office for more vinyl & bass enjoyment
- Started selling unused clothes on Vinted, 3 shirts snapped up in 24 hours
- Placed some Anker wireless chargers around the house following Mrs J’s upgrade to iPhone 11
Entertainment
- The Office US on Prime
- Daniel Terhorst-North on Supermanagers podcast
- Lad Hood on BBC
- Mary Kills People on All4
- Hunt for the Wilderpeople on Prime
- A Quite Place Part II on Prime
- Black Widow at Cineworld
- Free Guy at Showcase
- The Arachnid by Kishore Tipirneni
- The Lost Colony by AG Riddle
- The Humans by Matt Haig
- Broadcast by Liam Brown
- Glitterbox Jams Vol 4 on vinyl
- Inner City – Good Life 7” on vinyl