When we moved to Ottawa one of the things I had on my mind was to get another motorcycle, and I did. I bought a 2012 Kawasaki Ninja EX250R. It’s an entry level sports bike, enough for the highway but not enough excessive power. Over the last few years it had moments where I got […]

When I was a younger developer I didn’t see the value in writing tests for the projects I worked on. I was focused on being as productive as possible during the day to turn out new features and fix bugs. Tests doubled or more the amount of code that needed to be written, it added […]

This month has started with the large project of replacing the flooring in the upstairs of the house. The old oak strips were squeaky, splintered, worn down and nailed with damaging spiral framing nails (from a previous owner trying to fix squeaks). Having those floors has resulted in a few splinters and lots of sock […]

For the past week I have been binge-watching and reading a ton about welding machines, techniques and project ideas. Continuing on from my last blog post about what kind of projects to build in the garage I think I’m landing firmly on dipping my toe into some metal work. Welding is something that I have […]

Since buying a house all my normal routines have gone to shit. A new environment with different cues and a backlog of projects that demand my time, there has been little time to devote to the self determined projects that I would want to accomplish. However one of the great things about the new house […]

The utopian future portrayed in Star Trek takes place is a post scarcity society where money has lost it’s importance and people more or less have the access to food, energy and housing they need to live as well as the freedom to acheive their personal life ambitions without worrying about where the next paycheque […]

Making the most of things when stuck at home for the last couple of weeks, and plans for the next while. I’ve been chipping away at various small projects. I’m looking for things that I can get done with the things I have at hand and not going to the store. One of the recent […]

In the midst of the current global crisis for COVID-19, I was reminded just how often we have found ourselves in Bug-in situations over the last decade. We have been personally impacted by 4 significant events in the last 12 years. In 2018 a tornado ripped through a power distribution station in Ottawa knocked out […]

There’s a limit to the things a single developer can accomplish as part of a project. I get a great deal from checking things off my todo list. You can write great code and propose great ideas, but there’s a limit to what a single person can accomplish without a team. A team can accomplish […]

The projects continue to pile up in a never ending list of things that need to be worked on. The scope of things to do has gotten to the point where I need to do some proper planning on dependencies and costs for the bigger things that I cannot do on my own. Last weekend […]