Boy math. A true story. Boy want smart home. Smart home cost money. Boy cannot afford smart home. Boy discover smart thermostat save money. Suddenly boy not spending, boy investing. Boy making grown up decisions. Boy saving money. Smart boy!

Cursing at myself for recognising the need to have a label maker YEARS AGO for the very organisational emergency I am experiencing. Yet not having the foresight to put it somewhere I'd remember where it is, nor label that place properly with it. WHAT A FOOL!

Drinking tea from my Christmas mug, the washing up can wait.

The very specific tears of only being able to order stories for an epic in Jira in backlog view, instead of in the epic itself.

Turned my new PC on for the first time in front of my sister. She comments on the RGB lights. 'Oooh it has party mode! Oh look! And your keyboard has party mode too.' Well... My grown up purchase very much feels less grown up now.

A single swan is holding up a 10-carriage train and absolutely refusing to move. It won, a 20 minute delay. And yet this afternoon here I am saying I can't change this or that. I'm just one person.

You know you can sometimes look at an image and hear a sound? I now think it's possible to look at a Jira ticket title and ID and hear something. Is there a word for this?

101 Reasons why I couldn't be a content designer number 76. I ask questions like 'what's the proper, but not proper noun for that? ' 'Do you mean what's it called? ' Yes i do.

Spent the afternoon guest facilitating a liberating structures eco-cycle for another team. It helped me practice my skills in a space that I'm not too comfortable in, and I get to hear what my peers think of the practices they use. Lots I can take back and think about in my own work. Win win.

If you see one thing at the cinema this week. Treat yourself and go see Secret Agent.

Nouvelle Vague is a fun film.

Here I am pitching a dummy hang up call button in video call software. Never again will someone say 'is there anything else you want to talk about' where you confidently say 'no' only to be immediately struck by a new thought when you hang up.

We've seen why it's critical to run things safely. Often this can be traced back to decisions made over time. This framing is helpful for teams. Adds weight to raise outside of retros. Short post on tackling tech debt. Make it visible + modernise incrementally. rummanamin.co.uk/tackling-tec...

If your venn diagram niche is public benches service design accessibility then I have a short blog post for you What's with all of the missing park benches? – Rich Blake share.google/CkdeSUmPbX7T...

That feeling when NS&I send you an email on premium bonds draw day, only for you to log in and find it's just a duplicate 'secure' message copy of an email they sent you 4 days ago.

Thinking about making an illustrated picture book called 'look mum, that looks like grandad' and it's just a series of different people, animals and objects wearing a flat cap.

What can you learn about team dynamics from watching a film about football? Quite a lot actually. See my weeknote. richblake.github.io/blog/weeknot...

I'm slowly trying to get into week-noting and writing more about creating great teams as well as living with arthritis. Feel free to follow along. Oh, and there's a backlog of ideas linked from the homepage. richblake.github.io/blog/weeknot...

At least the worst user journey about going to the library in the sodding rain only to realise you forgot to bring the book you wanted to return is that you can just renew it and get another book.

Trying to decide how to log a cook book in story graph. 100% when you've done the flick through of the pictures and decided what you like the look of? 100% when you've read all of the prose at the start of the book? 100% when you've cooked every recipe? surely not!

My service to Hertford North (on the tannoy) says Cambridge North on all of the in train signs. I am feeling quite tired. so let's see if I end up in the right county or not.

Need to spot a Brit in Helldivers 2? Simple! Watch for people getting into the right hand side of the fast recon vehicle expecting to put the pedal to metal and get the hell out of danger. Then a sad pause, followed by a 'loop of shame' where we run around to the left side. Drive on Diver!

Welcome to Jira Camp. We're going to stand in a circle, and update each other on how we got on. When you're done. just trust fall into the arms of the next person so they know it's their turn to talk.

I WAS RIGHT FFS!

In today's episode of Rich is an idiot. I've been playing a lot of Clair Obscur. It has a lot of French swearing in it, which I don't know the words for 😇 Anyway I've figured out that they're not exclaiming about a Canadian dish of chips, cheese and gravy when bad things happen.

The pricks in my pub come with a follow up tetanus shot.

Who's taking part in 'bring your parents to work day' tomorrow. And will it help them understand what you do? How many of them are going to have a sleepless night thinking you're going to physically put them inside a computer?

Was feeling the high of hearing my new PC is on the way. Then hit by the car crash low of seeing the words 'our delivery partner is DPD'.

Slack is such a menace for focus.

Playing a co-op campaign of BG3 and my companion made a bad roll which angered Scratch during the meet. And now I need to spend the next sixty hours campaign being cross at them. Poor Scratch.

Ah! Sunshines out. Time to start my annual campaign annoying my science friends by saying 'Ahh time to cool down with a refreshing, cooling cup of tea'

Hello Germany 👋 Please can you think about the name of the compound noun that you'd use to describe the feeling of editing a 500 page document using Microsoft word on a slow laptop. If you can't help, I may need to learn how to communicate in emoji. 🐌😭😱🚨😅

There's been a great disturbance in the force. Jira has moved the drop down to transition the state of a story. The plans for the death star can't go into 'sent' if you can't find the drop down to change the status from 'open planetary shield' after you've fought Krennic on the Comms tower.

We need to come up with a word to describe the temperature of water that comes out of your pipes after we've all set out boilers into summer mode because of one 'almost' heat wave two weeks ago.

My local council has switched from one 'remember what bin day it is' tool to another, but they've got rid of the old tool without putting in place the new tool until an unspecified date... My neighbour is on holiday. So I guess we're in the end times now.

Slip of the day.. Don't worry. I'll do the Spreadshit bit for you, so you don't have to. Spreadsheets Rich. 🙈

Scientists should study the nausea created by asking your northern friend (bonus pain: I'm also a northerner) how much they'd reckon the flat you're living in would cost

If a colleague tells you they've just redone their website and are going to start writing some more blog posts, I will be happy for them... but also start planning for them to leave 🤣

Had a power cut this morning about 7 am. Just got home and reset the cooker clock. And now my flat will be operating on the Next Power Cut time zone until further notice. It's now 00.01 NPC

Split Fiction is hands down the most fun video game I've played in a really long time. It's funny, silly and really well designed.

You know when you are old when you have to introduce the idea that there's an actor called Adam Sandler and he had a movie called waterboy to someone during a tea break at work.

I'm not into contact sports but that was wild. Bluesky artists 1 - Adobe 0. Well played.

Since ancient times it's been said that eclipses aren't truly over until you've checked the chart of Google searches to see the spike in search terms like 'Why are my eyes sore' 🌙

Just wrote the sentence 'Jira is infinite' and I had to go take a break and have a word with myself in the mirror.

This is a call to all friends of a fellow Kevin to follow my petition to have the Kiloelectronvolt (KeV) removed as the keyboard default abbreviation when you type 'Kev'. keV is more than just kinetic energy. He tells dad jokes too.

2 presentations today within 45 min to the same people The first, improvised. It felt natural and fine. Second prepared, but scripted. It caused a full on panic attack 2 hrs later. Knew from rehearsing it might happen Brains are weird It's OK to find presentations tough Important to do anyway

In today's 😱 how did I get so old the 'left shark dance' gif, which I use daily is now ten years old.

👀 Mid level and Senior Developers in Bristol, London and Manchester Last week GOV.UK Pay completed £38.80m in payments safely, securely and accessibly. 💸 We are recruiting permanent roles until 24th February 2025. Apply now www.civilservicejobs.service.gov.uk/csr/jobs.cgi....

Yeah, sure. Autonomy, mastery and purpose are all good measures of motivation theory, but has anyone studied the motivation fuel that is slack tada emojis on your messages.🎉

If anything can make you go 😱 when you're making a large payment with a bank is your Nvidia driver install turning off your monitor the second you click 'confirn payment' 🤣