At the end of every week I reflect on the previous seven days and look forwards.
These are thoughts on work, work adjacent stuff, a little bit of life which I am willing to share (in case maybe it helps someone else out there), any culture notes, running/fitness, home improvements, and looking forwards. Read some or all, it’s your choice.
My God, it’s cold for this time of year though, innit.
Work and work adjacent
Quite a lonely week in a few ways, suddenly going from being part of a team, the same team for two years to… sat at my MacBook on my own. I’ve got a couple of Slacks where I am chatting to people, I’ve had a few half hour chats/catch ups with people — but the consistent thread of the same mission… It’s a bit of an all-too-sudden decompression, while hanging around to tie up some small bits of HMPPS stuff. It’s been a while since I’ve done the packing everything away, like the caretaker going round the house at the end of the day, going from room to room, closing windows, pulling the curtains to, turning off the lights and shutting each door. But on the other side a bit of peace of my mind it’s done. Eventually.
After the last three, maybe four years of getting up about 6, cracking through the chores, being sat at my desk to Get On With Things, the impending every day stand up, getting through the day, the little extra most days, the bit over the weekend, and… not really having a break to just reflect, disconnect properly. It’s been a while. There’s a lot still bottled up from Covid times, working on Covid stuff and all the fun of that, rolling straight off that into the HMPPS work...
Example: In some of my half hour chats people have asked “Are you not in the shed today?” And it takes a second for me to work out how to say I haven’t had the shed for about three years now when my wife and I separated, the shed’s at the house she lives at. And I’m that was three years ago. It was a long long time ago and yet it wasn’t. And of course it’s not a thing I’ve talked openly about because why would I, why do I need to talk about all that openly? That’s a very personal thing. It’s nice people liked the shed. So did I. That 2 metre square shed was a thing of marvel. But this week it hit me for the last few years I rolled from one thing to the next thing to the next thing. And being asked "Are you not in the shed?" has a simple response of "no" with a lot underneath it.
Anyway, I was tying up some small hanging over bits from the HMPPS work. That’ll continue into next week, just little dribs and drabs. You’ve not lived until you’ve transferred over 150 Miro boards to another account. It’s just so so one at a time, so so manual, one by fucking one. It’s good in a mindless way, get the rhythm going and spin an album while you do it. It's absolute crap in a way as someone who likes to think about how things end. (Cue obligatory shout out for Ends.) Made me miss a graphical user interface that allows me to just group things and then send them somewhere, with several clicks, a few moves of the wrist and done. Also, I am sure some of those Miro boards would have been better suited to some other tool, any other tool. (Notable exception: The massive product map, with every screen on. The unspoken, mostly unseen initial and regular graft designers do to keep a team orientated. Thanks if you're reading, Paul O'Neill.)
On my Monday morning walk I spied a guy sat on one of the benches, earphones in, clearly on a business call. Reminder here: How much I do my calls sat at my desk at home or the office. I take this as cue to put the small dining table into the back yard for a bit over the week, one on some head down stuff, two to take some calls. I liked the fresh air. I did not like the chill. It’s June, yeah?
Spent some time on LinkedIn. Sufficiently bored curious to play with using ChatGPT to write me a LinkedIn summary and updated that. Ship it and all that. Had a couple of people feedback the previous summary somewhat underplayed what I have done and can do. Feel the current one might be a little too “positive PR”. I don't want to be seen as one of those people who has disappeared up their own arse or/and exudes toxic positivity. Who knows. Maybe you do. Let me know. As I had some time I sorted through a lot of physical work items and posted a couple of times about laptop shells and stickers and pens. Better than bragging on LI how your business is growing while keeping quirt you've laid people off. Shade, eh.
Had a fun old time at the monthly service design morning. Marianne shared an interview with Don Norman as a primer for an hour together. Good idea. Looking forward to next month's.
Presenting without any political bias (because there’s the election etc etc): Ed Davey was in the news about speeding and there’s a good little bit about form design and content design amongst it all. Can you see it too? “The only mitigation for failing to provide my licence details was just being super-busy and failing to read the form fully, having already accepted liability and made arrangements for the payment.
I learned what a 451 error is: Unavailable For Legal Reasons. Might be useful to you too.
Yet more fall out from the new Sonos app. I wish I didn’t have four of them in my house. It’s all so… disjointed now. Laggy. Having to kill the app and restart it. Having a side app in beta would have been so so much better.
King Charles III banknotes enter circulation: “The first new banknotes were printed last year, with the long lead-in time allowing automated machines that accept cash to be updated to recognise the new designs.” I want to know more about that updating process. Or processes because it'll be different in a few ways because reasons.
Really enjoyed having a slow read through Making services more accessible through an accessibility audit day over at old client of mine Royal Borough of Greenwich. Lovely stuff.
Latest example of when yer tech issues spaff your service and have grim consequences: Half a million left without Child Benefit payment. And more: Cyber-attack on London hospitals declared critical incident. It's just IT though, yeah?
General life notes
The 10th to 16th June is Diabetes Week. I’ll be reflecting a little on my journey from being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, being told my symptoms showed I was living it for quite a few years and what I’ve done since then.
That culture
Much excitement in Saltaire as they’re filming something based on an Alan Bennett screenplay. Ralph Fiennes is in it, occasionally being seen on a nearby street. Spent some time with the crew, who were giving advice to my son. On Friday PM the shoot was on our street until late in the evening. The boy and his mates were looking out of the window watching, and later on two of them went out for an hour, watching what was going on. In the rare breaks from doing anything the crew talked to them about what they were doing. Something in this for quite a few workplaces.
Running and fitness
🏃🏻♂️ 1 run, totalling 6.4 km. A bit super shit 👎🏼👎🏼
🚶🏻♂️ Tracked 21 km of walking 👍🏼👍🏼
🧗♂️ No climbs 👍🏼
🏋️♂️ No weights or aerobics sessions but, again, plenty of life aerobics. Got the barbells all sorted in the out house though, ready and waiting.
⚖️ Weight down a little at 87.5kg, despite eating what must have been a loaf of bread over the weekend 🙄
Race/organised runs plan. I track most activities on Strava.
Home improvements
Got the keys to the new house on 27 October 2023. Four months of renovation. Moved in start of March. Lots of things left to do.
Over the last week:
- Finished the doors. (Had a couple to realign.)
- Did yet another go at the back yard paving slabs. Some are looking a lot less black, some are looking a bit less black, some are stubbornly hanging onto the filth.
- Hung some more shelving units in the kitchen. The kitchen is getting closer to being acceptably done.
- Scoped out how to deal with the hearth in the kitchen.
- Bought and assembled a table for the back yard. It's a small thing, but means I can do things like work out back. Watch it rain all of next week now.
Interesting links (some of them, which didn't get used earlier)
- Mexico elects Claudia Sheinbaum as its first female president in landslide victory
- Camp Digital video archive (some great stuff here)
- Eight in 10 primary teachers in England spending own money to help pupils
- Australia drops case against X over stabbing videos
- IKEA is opening a new store on Roblox
- How an organization forgets...
- My tips for an ADHD friendly Trello workflow: Really like the “to be processed” column.
- Still getting the chuckles from the posts of William Conrad on Instagram and the basement crew lurking in the comments
Looking forwards
Work / work adjacent
- Better find some work longer term than a few days here and there.
- Start one of those blog posts I keep hinting at. (Removed the “try”.)
- More open calendar chats.
- Looking if there’s any good events after the summer to go to. Working that around things like avoid the first week of the new school year. But also holding out on booking until I know if I’ve got a quiet month of work or quiet months of work ahead.
- Product for the People in Leeds on Thursday.
- Watch some more Camp Digital videos.
Life
- Tentative idea of a longer summer break with the kids. (Also need a plan to build up my resilience as they’ll inevitably stark bickering by the end of day one.)
- Keep reading through those 400-odd browser tabs in my phone.
- Final stretch of accounts / taxes. (Booked for Tuesday.)
Health and fitness goals
- Run at least 35km. And go for runs after work. Start of the weekday runs can’t be relied on.
- Weight down to 87kg. 🙏🏼
- One weights/aerobic session.
Home improvement
- Fix the sideboards on by the oven THIS WEEK.
- Keep finishing cleaning the backyard’s paving.
- Touch up the walls in bedroom 2 if there's time.
- Hang some more pictures if there's time.
The full home improvement log (needs the tasks sizing and prioritising)
Diary management
Say hi if you’re going to be at any of these/are at one of these.
- Thursday 13 June 2024
- Product for the People, Leeds
- Friday 14 June 2024
- Monday 17 June 2024 to Wednesday 19 June 2024
- Paris
- Friday 21 June 2024 to Sunday 23 June 2024
- Dublin
- Monday 24 June 2024
- CSS, The Brude, Leeds
- Tuesday 2 July 2024
- Service Design Mornings (If you’re interested email Marianne: marianne@dxw.com)
- Sunday 14 July
- Ilkley half marathon
- Wednesday 17 July to Sunday 21 July
- Bilbao
- Tuesday 6 August 2024
- Service Design Mornings (If you’re interested email Marianne: marianne@dxw.com)
- Saturday 24 August 2024
- Field Day, Victoria Park, London
- Tuesday 3 September 2024
- Service Design Mornings (If you’re interested email Marianne: marianne@dxw.com)
- Sunday 15th September 2024
- Pudsey 10k
- Monday 28 October 2024
- Fran Lebowitz, Barbican, London