2017 Recap

I don't like to predict or set expectations for following years, so instead this is just a small recapitulation of the key aspects of my 2017.

I switched job again (sigh). There's a saying, "things don't change unless you make them change". Sometimes change is hard, so as the company wasn't going to change to my expectations/desires I was the one that changed. And it is a pity as technically I cannot be happier to work there and what we already had but... At least I'm betting strong on the current one and so far I'm really happy (fingers crossed!). Also was a good exercise to do some CV cleanup and simplification, plus the small transparency exercise of adding the reasons of leaving each past position.

I'm in love with Python: After two years using it almost daily, it has some not-so-beautiful things but is so simple, powerful and yet nice to write into. Plus the huge ecosystem, the nice community around it... I'm doing all new experiments and pet projects using Python 3 and even started to give talks and participate at meetups again!

My grandfather died. After months with weekly visits to see him, the inevitable happened. But hey, I really wish to reach 95 as he did (working a garden until being around 90 years old!). This also affected my decision of changing jobs, I needed peace to settle my mind and for the first time in my life I gave my resignation letter with the idea of going home and then doing more interviews.

Talk less, do more. My twitter activity keeps at low levels, but I've done more pet projects than past years and managed to at least write one blog post per month, also tending to be of more appeal or at least have more techy content. I still have lots of ideas but at least some of them materialize now.

Letting go of things. I had hundreds of books, dozens of boardgames and book RPGs and lots of other "tangible decorative things", ranging from a LEGO Death Star to old videogame consoles. Now I keep a few dozen books, very few boardgames and excepting my miniatures (painting is really relaxing when I can spend some time) most decorative things are gone. I even reduced my hobbies both in number and in scope. I feel much better, like I have time again both to do geeky things and to spend time outdoors, with the family and the pets, etcetera.

Read more. Here is a partial ok only. Had a few periods along the year that I couldn't focus on reading as much as I'd wanted, or just needed distractions to ease my mind (videogames, movies, ...). I am hearing a lot of podcasts, watching some talks every month, and doing some online video courses (AWS, now a Google Cloud Platform ongoing one), but one of the points to improve for next year is reading a lot more.

Positive stance: Less complaining, more trying to be part of the solution instead of the problem, or else shutting up and moving on. The attitude of removing toxicity from my surroundings keeps improving things (even if I create a kind of echo chamber). Life is too short to spend my energies with bullshit.