Reflections on 2024
2024 has come to a close. What do I want to remember about it?
I turned thirty this year. My twenty year old self would be proud of me, I think.
I focused a lot on work, grinding my way to a second promotion in two years (Senior MLE). I’ve been thinking a lot about how my role and career has evolved over the last few years and how to balance individual contributions with leadership/mentorship/planning as I become more senior.
Zelus was acquired this year. It’s been an awkward transition, but I appreciate the company being more financially stable overall.
I’m still doing a bit of freelance consulting work and figuring out how that fits into my overall working life without becoming too much - thus far doing a much better job balancing that than my first go-round in 2020ish.
I travelled a little less than last year: Toulouse, Bordeaux, Carcassonne, Philadelphia, Banff, Jasper, Calgary, Seattle, London, Newcastle, Manchester, and Scotland. The Scotland road trip was a particular highlight and I can’t wait do something like that again.
I attended three conferences: PositConf in Seattle, Shiny in Production in Newcastle, and Statsbomb in Manchester. I tried really hard to not give any talks this year but somehow still got roped into giving a talk at Shiny in Production.
I got tested and treated for sleep apnea. It’s made a fairly sizeable improvement in my day to day outlook, I can’t believe I was nerfing my brain for so long. I’m still not very good at sleeping with the mask but I think that’s improving over time.
I’m continuing to work through ADHD medications and trying to find the one that helps me the best. I think that the sleep apnea has had a substantial confounding impact so I’m interested to see if previous medications work better now.
I attended pickup sports consistently this year and found myself enjoying the activity and the camaraderie. A weekly pub night definitely helps with getting out there, and I found myself enjoying ultimate frisbee and volleyball a lot more than I’d expected!
I started swimming for exercise this winter and hope to continue it through next year, I’m enjoying it so far.
I’m languishing a bit on physical self-care otherwise, weight is up to the highest it’s been. I need to take better care of myself and to eat better.
I appreciated Bluesky bringing back a lot of the global connectedness feeling! My global friend groups feels so much stronger now that we’re all on one platform again. I still worry a little about loneliness - I’m not yet feeling like I’ve made a lot of friends through pickup sports in a way that’s filled the gap in local connectedness that leaving rowing hurt.
I’m blogging again, a lot inspired by Bluesky being back to share those thoughts with. My other side projects remain in a maintenance phase, and DynastyProcess calculator app creeps ever closer to a sunset date.