My third weeknotes! I’m actually sticking to doing these, which is a good start. Let’s see where we are in a few months. Hopefully, more structured. I’m also typing this Sunday evening instead of Tuesday or Wednesday, which is also good.

It’s been a busy week work-wise. I’ve run a number of different workshops, finalized some user journeys, and have written a heap of user stories—150+. This is, of course, not just this week’s effort but that of the prior week too. Why so many user stories, I hear you say to yourself? We have a number of processes we are working on, and the first one is very large. I decided we should probably tackle the big one first. Straight into the deep end. It’s sort of ballooned as we’ve gone through the user needs and pain points in depth. Which is fine, and means we’re getting to the nitty-gritty aspects that are so crucial in product development. Within just this first process, there are six smaller processes! It is incredibly complex. 🔎

It’s been a great way to really get a shared understanding between us and the client. More importantly, it’s highlighted many opportunities for improvement in their existing processes. Hopefully, in the future, I can share some of this work in more detail. I’m respecting client confidentiality at the moment, so you get vague details only for now! 🤫

We will start looking at the other processes from next week onwards, which I am very excited about. We did a lot of really great, in-depth work on the first process—long may it continue!

Outside of work has been relatively quiet. I did manage to get back to the gym this week. I’ve also made more of a conscious effort to get more fresh air throughout the day. Probably the wrong time of year, with the freezing temperatures and gusty winds, but getting a bit of fresh air during the day really helps provide a welcome break from screens. 🚶

Being back in the gym was good, too; one hour of weight training followed by bags and pads. A good stress reliever. Not that my body is thanking me for it now, though.

I have been continuing to pursue my personal development in programming and speaking Welsh. I am committed to furthering my development through certifications. I am fairly close to finishing my first full-stack developer course. I’m aiming to keep stacking them up throughout the year! 💻

A fairly mild week.

Watching 📺

We finished Ant-Man Quantumania; now we’re on to Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. We got a little into that before the baby decided she’d had enough. She was dancing to all the songs before that. Too much dialogue, I expect. It’s also not Peppa Pig, Paddington Bear or Finding Nemo! A new one to the rotation! I haven’t seen it in a long time and forgot how brutal the start of that film is. Classic Pixar—pulling at the heartstrings in the first ten minutes of the film. Not that our daughter understood this though, she just very excited to see Marlin and Nemo (the clownfish) get screen time. 🐠

Listening 📻

Nothing of interest, other than lots of ReactJS code and Welsh words and sentences.

Reading 📖

Same as last week. I should probably think about changing this.

I met my goal of shorter weeknotes and typing it them up Sunday evening, so that’s a bonus.  

No picture of a fancy car this week, just a Pokédex I’ve been building in ReactJS as part of my full-stack developer course!