Week of June 11th, 2025

Work

I am getting more deeply into figuring out exactly how code agents can (and cannot) help augment my developer workflow - tentative thoughts here, and most of my reading to this end is from simon willison’s blog. More opinions welcome.

I am taking active calls with people to figure out my next consulting gig - it is so much fun going into calls with people knowing I can handle a lot more than I did the last time I did this. I love growing in work and life. It’s almost the same feeling as travelling for a week and coming back to the gym realising you can lift 25kg instead of 20kg now.

I’ve wanted to talk at a conference for a long time¹. For a while I lost interest in it, then I thought the work I was doing didn’t merit a conference talk. The process of updating this blog, even when I have felt like I have nothing to say, makes me feel like I could see this dream accomplished next year. Manifesting.

Life

I have been driving a lot, and as a result I have been listening to a lot more music, which I am grateful for - but I find that I now need to have a ready list of albums to put on, and I don’t know how to keep such a wishlist. Suggestions welcome.

Driving is really fun, and I feel like I have changed as a person - I’m not sure if it is a good thing. Last night I had a horrible migraine and a friend dropped me home. Today I didn’t want to leave the house because I wanted the comfort of my car if I had to. But it is also a good thing - a friend was very sick and I drove to get to them very fast and surprisingly well.

I have also found pleasure in calling my friends when I am stuck in traffic. Maybe I will finally check off all the tasks in my ‘People to respond to’ project.

My driving skills give me confidence I did not know I lacked, but my car gives me comfort. Oh how I hate my parents for afflicting this change upon me.

Health

I had a really bad migraine last night. With it, came the usual aches and pains of my right arm but the scariest thing was when I didn’t have the finger strength to pop a pill out of its packaging. This has happened to me, sure, but the last time was some 4 years ago, and under much worse circumstances. But I was taken care of, and put to bed by a dear friend.

In the past with my illness all the caregiving has fallen onto whomever my primary partner has been. This seems to be a reasonable thing to be expected by society but I’m not so happy with it - because people in life come and go, but some caregiving needs don’t change. I don’t talk about how the illness affects me much either outside of this little section in my weekly updates, but I am toying with the idea of creating a little “Take care of Tanvi” doc and sharing with my closest friends (maybe even put up here behind a password) so that I may truly draw on the little village I have built.

Simple things - sometimes I’m in pain and I forget which one of twelve different alleviative measures will help with this particular kind. Or maybe a list of easy, helpful snacks that I can be encouraged to make when I am home alone. So much of caretaking for people with chronic illness is making space to listen to the person ill and gently encourage them to do the things that hurt worse but will be better in the long run.

Learning

I have been mostly neglecting my mandarin, but I did read the second instalment of a short story on the life of a cat. I also found this hilarious Weibo-curator substack (thanks Nirbheek!)

Driving has moved to the “life” slot now. Since most of my waking hours have now become about chasing curiosity I will probably retire this section.

Media Diet

Reading

Thanks to my migraine, I had the time to finish reading Pride and Prejudice. I didn’t imagine how much I would love it! Probably because the concept of a man working on himself and becoming better is quite novel to me at the moment, but also because the writing - even if stiff and rooted in the era it was released in - is quite marvellous. We are fully with the protagonist in her initial assessment of the pride that Mr Darcy possesses, and are fully in agreement of the upbraiding she gives him. Later, when she is contemplating the letter he gives her that changes everything, she takes us on a journey through her philosophy and her brain so complete that we cannot remember why we disliked him before. I am going to go back and read so many passages from there. I have read many classics, and none have stayed with me as long as this one probably will - but then again, there is a time for all things and I probably needed to be exactly here in life to understand the feelings of one Ms Elizabeth Bennet.

Listening

1. Enjoying the new Lil Sims album, but not as much as Grey Area
2. Addison was very meh, not listening again
3. Rediscovered Tambdi Chaambdi - this is going to go in the middle of my PinkPanthress playlist and be happy about it