Daybreak in Zurich It was autumn and the middle of October. I was looking at signages in German and relied on icons and arrows to get me to the right places. The second part of the flight was delayed. Some random (and likely bored) guy was broadcasting angry smileys and weird pictures via Airdrop. It was midday there, few people knew I was awake since 2 am because I had grad school classes in Manila.
(Note: This is the free writing category. I used to do this a decade ago and decided to pick it back up. Basically, anything goes here. Some creative dump of words that are predominantly figments of my imagination. This piece I am writing is about allowing vulnerability and losing the person inexplicably.) There is flotsam and jetsam of your memories etched in my head. You don’t touch me, but you haunt me.
I am currently on a two-week break for my health. After I hosted the 2021 Pista ng Mapa (Philippine Festival of Maps) last Saturday and finished grad school finals week with a grade of 99%, I crashed and found myself running on empty. Actually, I was no longer running by Sunday evening. I was just emptied out. Forced to rest in bed and let go of my usual Herculean work load, I finally had time to reflect in my solitude and unpack the events from the last 12 months of my life.
As I am typing this article, I am still genuinely amazed. To be quite honest, I still can’t believe I am writing technical tutorials in the internet on topics that I am incredibly passionate about here on my website and in other places. For almost half a decade, I was on the fringe or the neighboring fences of data science work. I was drawn to data, I had a bit of a knack for numbers, and I adored the “data deadlifters” in my country and overseas.
I turn 36 today! I’ve been more fit with my Fitness Tiktok and academic load in this decade than I was when I was engaged and in my twenties. It’s not the numerical value of your age that would determine what you are meant to do in life. It’s how you make use of your time. Here are 18 things I have learned that doubled my growth in the last 10 years that can apply not just in personal life but also in business:
Grief and Healing Earlier this week, I attended a Zoom novena Mass of a data science mentor’s father who passed away due to covid-19. My mentor and I did not exactly part in the most amicable of terms last year due to a misunderstanding but we got restored earlier this week. I am taking this tiny development in my personal relationships as a spark of good although it transpired in the most weird and saddest of circumstances.
Lately, I have been noticing a fluctuation in my productivity levels. Instead of fighting it, I began to try to understand it and work on it with a pinch of self-compassion and self-care. This month has been particularly challenging because I am in a career transition and I needed to meet both existing commitments and prepare for a new chapter at the same time. The simultaneous demands did require me to consolidate my entire life management system into a combination of a few technology tools: Cloud Storage for PARA system folder, Notion personal knowledge management system, and Monday boards for project tracking.
Introduction Ghost and Wordpress have taken the lion’s share of blogging platforms, but static site generators like Jekyll and Hugo are not completely lost to technical content makers. It has its own distinct charm. Hugo, in particular, is called the fastest framework for building websites in the world. This tutorial will teach you how to set up a local development machine environment for a Hugo-powered basic website and then deploy it to Netlify.
Dev Christmas Got Early for DataMom I applied for a Github for Education Developer Tools backpack four months ago when I went back to grad school. I wanted to check out some new developer tool offers out there and I found some pretty neat ones that I can use for my current and future projects as a data nerd. Last night, I learned that I was able to unlock the treasure chest and I was able to activate SEVEN cool free premium tools that I intend to use more frequently in the coming days.
Curious Toddler Goes Back to School After postponing our eldest son’s supposed formal entry to school, my husband and I finally hopped on a call with the school administrator here in our village for their “new normal” enrichment programs for kids. For a good year, I was in denial and felt like we can postpone the schooling until normal days come back again. It does not look like normal days are coming back anytime soon.