June, 2022
2022-06-01
Well that was an interesting week off from daily writing. I can't even tell you what I did because I don't have this blog to jog my memory.
My weight has been OK. Had a few meals there that were a bit carb heavy but overall my consumption has been disciplined. I am still inspired to cook low-carb food and am finding new recipes every week. I'm also more confident is just making something up as I go along using ingredients I have on hand.
My walking on the other hand has been absolutely atrocious... I was feeling cold/flu symptoms early last week and the weather here in south eastern Australia has been cold, windy and sporadically rainy. A perfect combination to really push a mood of procrastination. My alarm goes off at 5:18 each morning and I get out of bed to turn it off, but the insidious self-talk tells me to jump back into the super-warm and cozy bed. My hope is that by having this daily writing again will give me the strength to do it tomorrow morning, regardless of the weather.
Work has been quite fun lately, I've been looking into Microsoft Teams and the wonderous ways we can utilize it to improve our business processes. So many notifications coming from different places.
I've worked on a couple of personal projects as well, including my "divination" script and also a new one about extracting vintage Windows images and assets.
This website design definitely needs an overhaul and the static site generator is another project I need to improve; I'm tired of the VanillaCSS look and want to go with something that's even more minimal that allows me to be creative with the design for specific projects/articles.
2022-06-02
I did the walk! It was bloody cold, but I did it!
Having fun patching together stuff in Microsoft Teams. Feeling positive about the future of RLA's systems and learning lots of new and cool stuff about the Microsoft 365 platform.
2022-06-03
Woke up coughing, leaking nose and sore throat. Argh it feels like a long time since I've been 100%.
I went and got a PCR, worked from home today.
Very thankful for the automations and notifications I set up on teams, it has helped me keep on top of things a lot easier.
Test came back negative, thank the creator!
This evening I'm feeling a little bit better, but I have been pumping the cold and flu tablets, so that is probably a contributing factor.
2022-06-04
Feeling much better today.
Spent the day plodding around, not doing anything much of much in particular.
I did do some more work on one of my side projects; Building a disability directory for the Illawarra. One feature I would like to build into it is a monitoring service that will alert when webpages change on the NDIS or NDIS commission websites.
Finally changed the oil in my car after having a few goes trying to remove the sump plug. Fresh oil makes car so happy!
Toddler spet at the in-laws tonight and an old mate randomly popped in for the night.
2022-06-05
Had a few drinks last night so I was a bit too hungover to walk this morning.
Wollongong Council have a special event running today for cleaning out chemicals, paints, oils, etc. So I took some old paint and the oil I changed yesterday. When I got there, I found out that I could have just gone to the dump on any day and recyled those things any day, d'oh.
Went into the office to get something ready for tomorrow morning. Went out with the family to a playground and toddler had a really fun time.
Continued working on the directory side project today.
2022-06-06
Bloody hell keeping up with this thing is difficult.
2022-06-07
I'm in this awful morning routine where my alarm goes off, I get out of bed, walk over to the phone, turn it off and then get straight back into bed. My theory is that the blanket I'm using is just way too comfortable. I'm going to try a different blanket tonight.
Made some fantastic progress with Power Automate today. I've finally harnessed the power for it to send out HTTP requests to endpoints I control. This changes a lot.
Went over to the in-laws for dinner as my wife's uncle is down from Queensland. The pork we had was TASTY!
2022-06-08
There was a moment this morning as I turned my alarm off where I become suddenly really self-conscious. I paused, took a deep breath and did the opposite of what my brain was saying. Feeling accomplished because I went for a walk. It's very cold and slightly windy outside but well worth it.
Work was a bit mind-numbing today as it we were focusing on compliance. The latter-part was exciting as I am rolling out a feature that will provide people much quicker feedback, leading to people getting paid correctly and invoices being generated quicker.
Made a really yummy fritatta tonight! Feeling motivated to go for 2 days of morning walks in a row.
2022-06-09
Forgot to write an entry today
2022-06-10
Bed was too comfy this morning. I did not walk.
Work today was interesting, we had our first staff members being inducted entirely through the new intake process and it went extremely smoothly. Some feedback we got was that they were overwhelmed with information but that's better than being left with no resources or support.
Went to the FriendlyJordies show tonight with Dad, it was postponed about 40 minutes because of technical difficulties with the venue, but when it got started it was a really fun show. It was basically a comedic uni lecture about the Roman empire. There was a shitcunt heckler that was thrown out by another patron, he fell over and the crowd erupted in laughter.
I repeated to myself before bed "I will go for a walk in the morning, I will go for a walk in the morning, I will go for a walk in the morning"
2022-06-11
The mantra last night worked, I woke up and went for a walk. Maybe that's the latest brainhack to make me get up and go; I need to put the will into myself before bed.
Went on the Picnic Steam Train ride this morning. Toddler really enjoyed himself. I started to get a headache which I believed was the soot causing me some issues. On the drive home my head was really starting to pound. When we got home I put toddler to bed, had some ibuprofen and had a nap myself.
When I awoke, my manager informed us that she had contracted COVID. Given that I'd been quite sniffly since waking from the nap, I thought I should do a RAT myself. Bam, finally got COVID-19. Thankfully it's not too bad so far.
2022-06-12
Sleep was generally good last night. My symptoms aren't that bad considering how bad other people have it; Mainly a headache, runny nose and some muscle aches.
2022-06-13
COVID-19 🤒
2022-06-14
COVID-19 🤢
2022-06-15
COVID-19 😷
2022-06-16
COVID-19 🤒
2022-06-17
COVID-19 🤢
2022-06-18
COVID-19 😷
2022-06-19
COVID-19 🤒
2022-06-20
OK that's enough of feeling sorry for myself. I got up and went for my walk this morning. It felt really good. My lungs are good and my muscles are surprisingly strong.
Back to work today. I'm finding it difficult to get back into a flow state.
Went out to Aldi, felt slightly socially anxious, it's been too long since I've been around people.
There's a lot of projects to do, and only a limited amount of time. Tonight I'm working on this website as I've been neglecting it for a while.
2022-06-21
I didn't walk this morning and I'm disappointed in myself. I will go tomorrow.
Took toddler to swimming this morning, he was aalmost the only one in the class but another little boy turned up with his mum right as the lesson started. Bummer.
First day at the office in a while. It was so good to be surrounded by people that aren't my immediate family. I love them more than anything in the world, but you know what I mean.
Made some good progress with projects. Had a play around with Microsoft Planner and can think of some processes where it would work well in our organisation.
Also spent an hour trying to figure out a method of inserting an image into a PDF. I can categorically say fuck the PDF format and fuck the fact that there is no freeware to accomplish this task. What I ended up doing was splitting the document, adding the images manually using Inkscape and then merging them together again. What a fucking hassle. There's definitely a gap in the market for a simple, freeware PDF editor. There's plenty of offerings but they're all "online". Why the fuck would I want to upload my document to your random server if it may contain sensitive information. Bloody hell.
Tonight I made a mince fritatta. It was a bit oily but overall quite tasty.
Also did some more work on a new design for this website. I'm going to roll out the changes for the new financial year.
This was a fun little fret. I've done enough of them now that I will need to create a dedicated page for them.
Toddler is not going to sleep tonight so I stayed up to continue work on my project to extract Windows assets
2022-06-22
I don't remember what I did today.
2022-06-23
I don't remember what I did today.
2022-06-24
Huskisson Beer & BBQ Festival
2022-06-25
Huskisson Beer & BBQ Festival
2022-06-26
Huskisson Beer & BBQ Festival
2022-06-27
I've had this strange ankle pain the last couple of days. I was hoping that it would go away on it's own, but it doesn't appear to be subsiding. Hmm. Looks like I have another reason to go to the doctor. Suffice to say, I didn't walk this morning.
Back into the casenotes process this morning. The new auto-reply is working wonders and it has helped standardise the values people have been using. Never underestimate the psychological power that comes with presenting someone the colour yellow instead of the colour green.
I got some coffee-flavoured BBQ sauce at the festival over the weekend and a couple of colleagues tried it out. They all enjoyed it albeit also found it odd to some degree.
Been playing with Snapforms and am quite impressed with it's ease of use. We've hit limitations with Microsoft Forms. The fact that Snapforms supports file uploads and eSignatures makes it well worth the subscription fee.
My parents are going away for holiday tomorrow so we are babysitting their dog. It's going to be an interesting adjustment but toddler has been having a great time with him so far.
Threw together a meal tonight and it went OK considering it had no forethought.
I'm also continuing work on the Windows Icon/assets projects. I'm hoping to get it ready for July, as with the new design of this site.
2022-06-28
Foot still hurts, no walk. Booked in a doctor for this Friday.
Parent's pup has come to stay. Things have been relatively smooth with the cat.
EOFY is coming up which means changes to NDIS price guide and to SCHADS award, it's a hectic time of the year.
2022-06-29
Foot is hurting more now, looking forward to the doctor appointment in a couple of days.
Made updates to our system to accommodate changes in the SCHADS award, thanks past me for making it easy to extend.
We went out to 2 Smoking Barrels tonight for a date night while the in-laws held onto toddler. The food was so delicious and I didn't feel cool enough to be eating there.
2022-06-30
Foot is hurting even more, fuck sake.
Worked on Snapforms today, really enjoying the intuitive nature of their interface, however it would be nice to have "power-user friendly" features, e.g:
- Draft out a form using JSON or similar and importing it instead of having to drag and drop everything.
- Escape key closing out of the field edit modal
- Always show "Advanced Options" when editing a field
- Select multiple fields and duplicate at once
- Duplicate an entire field group
Unfortunately I broke something in the backend when creating a fairly complex form, so hopefully that gets fixed up soon.
Got back into better eating today. I feel I've gained a few kilos since having COVID. Can't check currently because our scales are broken!
While I didn't get around to finishing the Windows icons/assets project, I did decide to put in an hour or so tonight to get the new design out the door. This feels more like me as it doesn't use any template or reseting stylesheets.