October 13, 2018 10:12 AM
Writing code is fun
Guys, (I know, no one reads this, who am I even addressing here?) I read and modified some code today. And it was fun. I love writing code. I think computers are awesome. But sometimes in the grind of work and trying to do everything in the best way possible, I forget that.
So last night I was trying to add some tests to my Teochew web app, and it was getting kind of tedious, so I wanted to take a break. I also needed some way to know that I still need to finish these tests. For this whole project, I've just had a single text file that I add notes to, but lately I've been wanting something more sophisticated. I wanted a real bug tracker. I had tried the bitbucket issue tracker, but I thought it was annoying to have to actually log into bitbucket in my browser. I decided to look for command line issue trackers, and I came across bitbucket-issue-manager.
I initially thought it just looked really spiffy, so I installed it. Then I realized I needed nodejs, and then I realized my version of Ubuntu is no longer supported, so I had to upgrade that. That was a long process of installing things, and reconfiguring things, but fast forward and I have the issue manager tool installed! Of course I go to run it and I realize there's a typo in the command name (already previously noted in an issue on the github repo). So I go mucking around renaming the command in my system. And I finally get it all to work, but I realize there are things I'd like modified in this tool.
But it's nodejs! I've literally never touched nodejs code before. Well, before today. Anyway, I decide to clone the repo and modify it. Turns out, nodejs is pretty easy to read. I modified the code to make the issues display the way I want, and it was really satisfying and it reminded me of how awesome the concept of "typing words on a computer and having things magically happen" is.
I actually wanted to modify the typo in the command name, but I didn't even see the typo in the code in the repo, so perhaps that's already been done and the package on npm hasn't been updated? That's a lot of other stuff that I don't understand. Well if I modify something in a useful way, maybe I'll see how the whole pull request thing works.
September 16, 2018 11:11 AM
Mid Year Resolutions: Part 3
These are more "fun" resolutions than ones that will really gain me any valuable skill in life. But hey, if I spend time doing these things over browsing Facebook or Reddit, it's probably a good thing.
Get better at DDR
Yesterday I made a $65 purchase which allows me to play as much DDR as I want for three whole months. It sounds a little ridiculous, but one of my pipe dreams in life is to own my own DDR machine, as well as other arcade games. I've been playing DDR since middle school, and I can pass pretty much anything on the hardest level except those stupid fast songs. What I'm not very good at is playing Double, so I've been hitting up the arcade to try and get better at that.
2021 Update: I can pass what?! I must have been thinking about a really old DDR game. Maybe I was just thinking about the songs on the DDR cab that Victory Pointe had. I did say "pass" and nothing about how well I did. I distinctly remember getting C's on everything when I first started going there. But with current DDR? There are a lot of songs I cannot pass.
I'm also playing more Pump it Up. I first tried this game out when I was in Cambodia last year, and I don't know why I haven't been playing it more often. The local Dave 'n Buster's has a machine, and it's about $1 for three songs (or $0.50 on Wednesdays!). Plus random people like to try the game out and then quit after their first song, so I try to mooch off of them :P
Beat Stardew Valley
I'm really slow at video games. If a game normally takes someone a week to finish, it probably takes me 6 months. I started playing Stardew Valley some time last year, and I've found it a lot of fun. But I only just finished the Community Center which is one of the main goals of the game. This is a farming game like Harvest Moon, and I know you can't really "beat" the game, but I'm trying to actually play through all of the features that exist. My polished farm still only covers less than a quarter of the area available. Once I'm done with playing the main game, I want to check out the mods people have made and see if I can make one of my own.
August 15, 2018 10:03 PM
Mid Year Resolutions: Part 2
Here are some more goals I'm giving myself.
Learn more about programming and computers
At work I've been feeling like I just know less and less. I'll read a piece of code or look at an application and just have this blank, confused stare. I really want to get back into actually coding, but I think I need to start small. I decided to borrow Learning Perl from one of my friends and just read through it. I know, I use Perl at work all the time, and this whole website was even created in Perl. But I like to read about the basics just to get a better understanding and see if there are things that I never really learned over the years.
2021 Update: I did finish that book. It was a very good programming book, and I definitely recommend it if you want to learn Perl. Shortly after that I read Intermediate Perl, which I do not recommend.
Read more
Speaking of reading, I'm also going to try reading more books and less social media. I've made meal time and just before bed time my reading times. As far as what books to read, I basically just like to look in the computer books and the personal finance books in the library, but I'm also going to try and expand my horizons more.
Exercise regularly
Four summers ago I managed to run 3 miles every day for about 40 days. It was the first time in my life that I really ran since that one semester of track in high school, and I lost about 30 pounds in the process. I don't think I'll ever want to be that crazy again, but I do think I'll try to run once or twice a week, along with some other kind of exercise. This week I've already gone running twice, and surprisingly it wasn't that bad. Maybe I'm not as out of shape as I thought I was.
August 13, 2018 7:40 PM
Mid Year Resolutions: Part 1
Part 1 because I get super ambitious when I set goals for myself, knowing that I won't reach all of them, but with the hopes that at least one of the goals actually sticks.
I've always been a really frugal person. Growing up, I just figured that if something cost money I couldn't have it. It wasn't until college that I realized I had some money, and I could just buy things. Now during college my goal was just to find an internship so I could secure a stable job where I sat in a cubicle and typed words on the computer for 8 hours a day. And I did that. But shortly into my job I felt bored and unhappy. Was this really what my life was going to be like for the next 40 years? It was at this point that I stumbled across Mr. Money Mustache and learned about the wonders of early retirement. Since then, that has been my long-term life goal. I could just take my natural frugality and put that into overdrive.
That was about 3 years ago. Yeah, I've been saving money and investing it, but I've still been spending way more than I need to. I needed to make more concrete goals.
Spending $30 on food a week
This is the first of what I'm calling my "Mid-Year Resolutions". (I know, the year is more than halfway over.) Why $30? I don't know, it just seemed like a reasonable number that didn't require me to drastically change my diet. I just finished reading On A Dollar A Day in which a couple tries to first eat only $1 worth of food every day, and then tries to eat food based on the average amount people get on food stamps. Things like this inspire me and remind me that I'm spending a lot more on food than I need to.
So far it seems to be going well. I've meal prepped and cooked everything for the week during the weekend, and I spent just over $29 at the grocery store without actually thinking about how much everything cost before putting it on my list. I've also told people about my goal so that should also help me stay on track. I plan on posting an update on Friday night to see if the amount of food I cooked actually lasts me as long as I expected.
August 12, 2018 10:23 PM
I wanted to start a blog
Summer is a busy time of the year for me. Somehow the whole summer gets planned out before May even starts and it already seems like we don't have enough time to do everything that we want to do. Summer is when too much life gets in the way of my New Year's resolution, and I neglect to update my site for a few months. Well, things are getting back to normal, so it's time for me to be a productive person again.
I needed a place to keep myself organized and keep track of my goals. I guess I could have used an actual journal, but then I'd have to buy a journal, and one of my goals is to save money. I don't intend on this blog ever being useful to anyone other than myself. We'll see how long I can keep up with this.
Oh, yeah I'll get back to learning more Chinese and updating the site eventually.
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