Home › Updated Jan 05, 2022

Now

Inspired by this.

< 2024-08-10 >

After almost 6 months, I am officially on the job market! I spent the time:

I'm not proud of that last one but it's how I felt. It felt quite indulgent to just do what I want (within the constraints of a family), despite plenty of people around me expressing support. The thought that kept coming into my head, though, was that I'll never be this young again. In that time I've taken 65 bike rides, totaling over 645 miles and 138,000 feet of elevation gain (not including short local rides to the store, school, activities, etc). I trained for and rode in 2 races, spent a bunch more time with family and friends, and was able to focus on a few hard things when they came up. So, yeah, this was what I needed and, if you're in a position to do the same, I highly recommend it.

< 2024-05-02 >

I'm starting the 3rd month of my sabbatical (that's the term that seems to allay the fears of folks that don't understand taking time off) and, so far, it's exceeded expectations. I've been hanging out a lot with my family, working on home projects (purging stuff, organizing what's left, rewiring things that don't need to be rewired), riding bikes, fixing bikes, catching up with folks, and writing words and code. I'm working on a software project right now that I hope will lead to something (post coming soon) and taking meetings with companies that seem like a good fit. Time has been flying but I'm planning on keeping this going through the summer, seeing what this project goes, and then decide on a plan in the fall.

< 2024-02-01 >

Well, I got the email today. My 6 years at Auth0/Okta ends today. I can't say that I'm shocked, to be honest, but it's certainly not how I expected to end my tenure there. I wish I had been able to say a proper goodbye but I posted on LinkedIn and got such an amazing outpouring of kind words and support. It was like attending your own funeral in a way, totally validating! I have a massive list of posts I want to write, projects I want to work on, trails I want to ride, and people I want to connect with over the next few months so I'm in no rush to get hired. I am, however, always happy to meet new folks in the identity, security, data, and developer experience spaces!

< 2023-12-05 >

I signed up for the Sea Otter Fuego XL mountain bike endurance race, ~65 miles of trails in Monterey, CA. I'm both excited and terrified! My last major event was the 1-day Seattle-to-Portland ride in 2012. I still trot that out as an accomplishment I'm proud of but it's time to add another cycling badge to my sash.

< 2023-01-23 >

I switched teams at Auth0/Okta and am now a solutions architect working with a friend and long-time collaborator. I'm really looking forward to the new role and team!

< 2022-1-5 >

I formally published my library of cocktails along with a guide on custom content type collections in Eleventy. Over the last 2 years I've grown much more familiar with, and fond of, Eleventy and all it has to offer. I'm starting to dial in my personal knowledge base and publishing systems while making more time to take notes and process information. Part of me feels like this could be a big rabbit hole but the practice has, so far, felt like a good use of time and a way to make connections that I otherwise would not have made.

Publishing a big list of cocktails right now is funny timing as I stopped drinking for 1 year 6 months starting 2021-12-20. This is partly an experiment and partly because it just feels like the right thing to do after 2 years of COVID YOLO.

< 2022-1-4 >

I just updated the About Me page with a few things I'm thinking about lately. I've been writing a lot more everywhere and trying to work in public a bit more. Part of that is more frequent updates here.

< 2021-12-12 >

I can say, without hesitation, that this now is better than the last now.

We're all vaccinated and the kids are back in school and doing great. Just that is such a massive weight off of our collective shoulders that it hardly feels necessary to talk about anything else!

I'm the same team at Auth0 (acquired by Okta this year) and have been enjoying working for our team as the technical lead. Lately, I've been spending my time leveling the team up on planning, diagramming our architecture, and documenting all the things.

On the side, I've been thinking about and working on getting our digital archive in order, including digitizing paper documents, collecting personal and family data in one place, and getting our money tracking in order. A huge help with all of this and writing more in general, has been taking notes in Obsidian.

I've also been working on my physical health by making some diet changes and focusing on getting exercise more often, in any form. I use an Oura ring to remind me to take breaks, keep my activity level up, and shame me for not focusing on my sleep. With all of this thinking and planning comes with, of course, the actual behavior change itself, which is the main challenge. I keep coming back to my thoughts in 2019 about experiments instead of trying (and failing) to just will myself to change.

< 2020-5-17 >

Oh man ... now. Now is weird and hard.

Professionally, things are good. I'm on a new team at Auth0 working on the core platform which has been great. Tons of learning and building and designing and product thinking. It's been tough to mov away from open source and our community but also refreshing as well. I've been doing support professionally in some form for 2 decades at this point, it's time for a break.

Besides the occasional support request, my time working with WordPress has concluded. This blog is now on Eleventy, I don't do any freelance work, and my work at Auth0 is primarily focused on Node and React. It's been a relief to leave all my WordPress ideas in the past (though I'm working on one final post about WordPress testing that I'll get out soon).

Personally ... well, we have kids and there is a pandemic. If you're in the same boat, then you know exactly what my life looks like. If you're not and would like to imagine what it's like to suddenly take on teaching a first grader, I just published a post about it.

I've been writing a lot, both in a journal and on a blog. I take a lot of phone photos lately and have been adding old journal entries as a timeline both for myself and our kids. I'm almost at 1,000 entries in my Day One journal at this point. I've been playing around with Roam Research and trying to just get words out of me. It's been very theraputic.

I miss the gym and breweries and breaks from the kids and eating out with my wife and friends and family and the library and so so many things. We're doing our part with once-weekly grocery trips, wearing masks, and staying isolated. We've had some really great bonding time together, though, and are able to stay employed doing jobs we love and are challenged by. It's hard but it could be worse.

< 2018-7-19 >

After reducing all of the professional clutter – trading it in for a “real job” I’m quite fond of – I started concentrating on the material and digital clutter around me. I’ve gotten rid of around half of the stuff I used to keep in my office and I’ll do another half more before the year is out. If this form of obsession appeals to you, I’d recommend Marie Kondo’s first book.

I’m walking less, cycling more, and spending even more time with my family. We now live on Bainbridge Island now, a 35m ferry ride from downtown Seattle. It’s green, it’s quiet, and it’s exactly what we all needed. I miss easy access to Seattle family and friends, city bike rides, and great breweries but not traffic, noise, bridges, or owning a house.

I joined a fantastic company called Auth0 in January of 2018 and feel this ten times over. Being given the time to actually craft good software is refreshing in a way I needed. A lot.

I’m working less with WordPress and more with vanilla PHP and Node. I’m also picking up Ruby, writing tons of documentation, and solving problems. I miss SCSS and UI/UX but not SEO, analytics, or PhotoShop.

< 2017-6-30 >

Right now my focus is paring down. I sold my WP product business … not taking on any new client projects … archived most of the things I had on my list to work on.

I’m reading more, walking more, and spending more time with my family.

I’m also focusing on a single client right now which gives me the headspace to produce better work.