May 15, 2026
I owe my blog an update. I'm still working for the same software company.
Good news is that I was promoted into the IT Infrastructure team.
Lots of new people in the last year, and unfortunately lost a few coworkers leaving my team stretched thin.
My boss is a good guy and I admire him, but I don't feel like I'm meeting his expectations.
My now ex girlfriend I was living with at the time of my last post moved out and is now with someone else and pregnant. I started dating someone else, but it feels more like we have a dynamic than a traditional relationship.
One of the best things to happen to me last year was when I was hit by someone driving through a red light on the way to work. A nice woman who only spoke with the office that arrived showed dashcam footage that was in my favor.
Setting up AI access for clients has been the majority of my work recently.
Everything is AI or becoming AI assisted.
From a technical standpoint I think AI research is really cool and will push our race towards a better future.
On the other hand it's getting more and more frustrating to see people vibe code projects they don't understand the backend to.
The noticeable impact I've seen this have has mostly been towards they way open source projects are supported because it's rough. You work hard to make a piece of software people use and one day login to find a ton of AI generated git requests that you then have to review. The tools can be useful sure and help in a pinch, but it seems to just be making more work for the people who actually understand what they're looking at.
Cloud security over the next few years is gonna be one interesting game.
Maybe I need to just throw myself into my work because it seems like the only thing I really have going for me.
I definitely need to lock in and make sure I get my work done. I feel like I'm letting my team down when I'm having a rough day at work.
December 12, 2024
Tonight is The Game Awards, I'm weak for the trailers, but otherwise these skits the hosts do are so cheesy.
My girlfriend and I went to the company holiday party and it was… fine. The food was better than I expected this year. We've grown a lot as a company. So many new people at the company. I did my best to not look like I was mentally working a ticket I've been stuck on in my head the whole time. Work is going okay. I’m hoping I can land a promotion soon, because I’ve been putting in alot of effort and I’d like that effort to turn into more than “good job man.”
Hanging in there. It’s not constant panic, but it’s also not “we’re rolling in it.” The middle zone. The “we can breathe but don’t do anything too stupid or you'll be homeless” zone.
Candice our dog is getting older, turns out she's at least 10 and we thought she was 8 lol. She’s still doing her usual thing where she acts like she pays rent, but I can see the age creeping up on her. I want to get her to the vet for a checkup soon. I keep doing that thing where your brain starts pulling up worst-case scenarios like it’s a playlist you didn’t ask for. Trying to stay hopeful anyway.
I’ve been thinking more about where I want my career to go next. I’m genuinely grateful for my current IT helpdesk job, because it’s taught me a ton and it’s kept me stable. But I keep staring at cloud stuff like it’s the a skill tree. I just got my AZ-104 this year and so glad I did. Got my AZ-900 before that last year, not sure if I mentioned that before.
Overwatch pulled me back in again, and the devs are also doing an Avatar (The Last Airbender one) crossover. Hazard is the new tank and he’s basically an Irish puppy man. His primary burst is 10 spikes: 7.5 each up close (so 75ish dmg), bit of a falloff down to 22.5 at range so seems the best way to play him is jumping on the squishys and wreak havock heh. His leap slash is 70 dmg so not like a rein strike but still enough to kill someone already low.
Marvel Rivals just came out and has been so much fun I haven't been able to try him out much yet. In Rivals my girlfriend has been playing Scarlet Witch and we've been really enjoying it! Would recommend the game at least while it still feels casual. I have a feeling I'll go back to overwatch after.
Anyway. Things are okay. Not perfect. Not falling apart. I’m working hard, trying at my job, trying to everyone in my life happy, trying to make sure Candice is alright, and still finding time to work on projects. Its kind of funny how many near release projects I have a habit of abandoning. Maybe its that if I do release something I want it to be something so important to me that I can continue to build and develop it forever. Contributing something of value to the wortld sounds nice.
December 18, 2022
I started a new job as a service desk engineer this year. It’s been a lot, but I’ve been working hard and I’m honestly really appreciative of having this IT helpdesk job. I’m learning a ton and even on the rough days it feels like I’m building something real.
My girlfriend moved in a few months ago. A new one from the last time lol. I mean we've been together a couple years now and she's really good to me. We’ve been struggling a bit (mostly money/stress) but I’m doing the best I can. I got a Christmas tree for her and seeing it up in the apartment made things feel a little more normal I will admit. Still hurts to spend $200 on a plastic tree when I'm trying to pay off debts. Candice keeps trying to mess with the bottom branches like she’s got beef with the ornaments.
I’ve still been doing projects and commissions on the side.
Some of them have been really cool! Maybe I should show some here some day.
Been getting back into Overwatch after being away for awhile. OW2 is… a whole thing, but it’s been fun to relearn it and grind a bit. Also feels like everybody is talking about Elden Ring right now. VR is still a big part of my life. I’ve had a couple doubts about how much time I spend in VR, but not really. It’s still my space.
July 31, 2020
Welcome back, it's been a year since my last post and since entry 0002 things have changed a lot.
I've been working a pretty decent IT job since last Fall, now live alone in a pretty decent one bedroom apartment, and have a new car. It's a 2017 Nissan Versa, and so far it's pretty reliable. My friend joked with me about it being a Nissan Compromise, but really I'm lucky to have a car at all.
My girlfriend and I broke up. I wanted her to stay, but she moved away. we fought a lot and it was a messy breakup. I don't regret dating her, but I do wish I could redo our whole relationship.
I've gotten a lot better at Unity. I started working on a game again. I need to learn more C# over the rest of this year.
My stream hasn't been doing well. My lack of commitment makes it difficult for me to grow or improve at anything at all.
There's a lot I could talk about, but I'll stop here for now.
More entries to follow.
July 31, 2019
Recent times have been a big oof and I haven't felt up to writing entries. I've been unable to find work and was barely able to cover my rent for August. With $24 in my bank account I have no idea where I'm going to get the $300 I need for September's rent let alone money to eat.
I hadn't mentioned it previously, but earlier this year I was in a car accident. I'm severely indebted and was unable to qualify for enough credit to get a new car so I've been slowly, but surely depleting my savings while I look for somewhere to work within walking distance.
Nothing I do seems to improve my situation, and I feel as if I'm in a constant state of lying to my loved ones to keep them from worrying. Is there even anything I can do? I ruined my relationships with my old roommates by not covering the entirety of my rent at my last apartment for months, and I'm worried it's going to happen again. As soon as I can I'll pay everyone back, but every day it becomes a deeper and deeper hole. The deeper it gets the less light there seems to be to keep me hopeful.
Not everything is terrible. I'm not bored. I work on projects. I make things and I've gotten pretty decent at ripping assets from games.
I'm at a cross roads. I need money, but I'm not willing to do anything evil to get it, but if I don't start making something I'm going to starve. I want to go on being creative. Will I be able to figure out a way to do that? There are trips I want to go on like to twitchcon, my friend's wedding, and my cousin's graduation. Will I be able to manage any of that?
March 29, 2019
This is a series of articles where I express my inner thoughts to keep myself from going mad. Having paid for the hosting of this website for years and by hosting it on posthaven it should be available for a long time. Very possibly longer than I will be alive.
The beginning of stories always ends up being poorly written or cringy. I don't think I'll be able to avoid it.
Today is not a particularly special day, I don't recall anything important ever happening in my life on March 29th, and that's perfect. Any day that shares itself with another event always ends up being overshadowed in one way or another. This is no exception.
My father always wanted to write about his life. He would go on and on about how he didn't know where to start. One time he recorded himself talking for awhile. I wish I knew where that recording was. He was legit the smartest idiot to ever exist. He had more degrees than anyone I've ever met. He went to brooklyn law and passed in the bar in New York. Lived over 25 years longer than doctors told him he would. He was really good at losing money though and never seemed to be able to get ahead. People have told me that they seem him in me. Knowing they mean it as a compliment I would always thank them with a smile. There's a hard truth that keeps that from being true however. I'm not as smart as he was. No matter what anyone says I'll never be. He worked hard. Me? Not so much.
I feel like nothing I ever do will be worthwhile. I feel like everytime I pour my soul into something I'm met with mediocre results, but even when everything feels pointless and I just want to end it all I snap out of it at the last moment and try again.
At least I inherited his stubbornness.
I use Siri and my Alexa every day and the microsoft Zo chat bot is always fun to mess with, but there's still so many things I wish I could do with them. Customized commands are seriously lacking in the current day commercial line up. I want to be able to manage servers, my personal internet of things, get alerts when something happens, and be able to mess with people. I want utility beyond asking to set an alarm or pause a song.
Requirements
Flask>=0.8 twilio>=3.3.6 wikipedia>=1.4.0 pyowm>=2.6.1 wolframalpha>=3.0 git>=3.0
Creating your own bots is easier than ever so let's fill our lust for having things our own way by doing just that!
The best thing about doing this is how many dang options there are. A bot can be written in a number of languages using a ton of different services. You can have it running completely serverless through AWS, or as cost efficient as possible using mostly free services.
First off you'll need a Twilio account. This currently includes a free trial that'll work just find for getting everything working, but Twilio automatically adds a "Sent from your Twilio trial account" message to everything sent from them and there's no way around this that I've aware of besides paying. I'd love to be wrong so if anyone finds one I'd be happy to know! Overall Twilio fees are reasonable. Sending texts should cost you less than a cent each, and even with regular use its unlikely you'll send being doing more than a dozen messages a day. Even 12c a day is less than a dollar a week in costs.