So my daughter surprised me with a "laptop bag" she decorated for me - which was an opportunity to build Pong for the hundredth time - but, for the first time, to her spec - and with her watching along. I've built so many variations at this point. One of my most favorite variants that I built 20 years ago is one I called ' Pango'. You can tell Pango is old, because it's from an era where lens flares meant good design. Pango let you move in all directions, and required you to first break a hole in the wall protecting your opponent's end-zone. And while Pong is not necessarily complicated to build, it's always a fun exercise to see how much faster & better you can build it. For example - building the collision detection to avoid cases where the ball gets trapped within the paddle, and bounces back and forth rapidly. Or including momentum transference that can alter the ball's angle. My daughter version includes a yellow obstacle that moves back...

Some time ago, I decided to go through all my old files (some of them being as much as 25 years old ) to find all the things I'd posted online since the late 90s. Hundreds of journal entries (before it was known as blogging), updates about things I was coding, and then a lot of day-in-the-life type posts from my college days. I took a bunch of them and re-uploaded them within this blog - preserving their original publish date. Walking through them is not only seeing the progression of the internet, but my progression from student to professional. It's interesting to put myself back in the mindset of being a college student - and re-reading post after post after post where I was running on fumes, sleeping in the school library, barely scraping by. With graduation on the horizon, I relived the stress and anxiety of starting my first professional job hunt - and then ultimately the transition to adulthood. I remember the final day of my senior year in high school. The final bell ra...

This past weekend I read a fascinating article by Cognitive Scientist and Marketing researcher Hang-Yee Chan. In this article Dr. Chan, backed by brain-scans, supports the case that storytelling is one of the most effective ways to land your message. More specifically, crafting a linear narrative triggers the consumer to a process   called mentalizing , "which is the ability to decipher the thoughts, feelings, and intentions of others. It's what makes human beings social, allowing them to interact and coordinate based on subtle cues. Mentalizing is also key to story comprehension." I come from a long line of great story-tellers (it's one of the things that pushed me to pivot from writing code to Product Management) but it also had me thinking about a lot of the advice I give around crafting a solid resume. First - I think it's worth reiterating: my own views on resumes have evolved over the years. I don't think resumes carry the same weight in the job-applica...

Dall-E drew me this picture... 10 points to whoever comes closest to the prompt I gave it. I've finally caught up on a month's worth of messages / resume reviews / advice.  If you haven't received a response, please msg me again - and apologies for missing it.

AI-Generated: "Chalk & Pastel Album Cover of 90s Kids Jumping in a Pile of Pennies" If I want your thoughts, I offer a penny for them. However, when I provide input, I am giving my 2 cents. The moral: People value their own input more than that of others. I'm not sure if others have made this observation before - but this is the kind of youthful cynical observation that my 14 year old self would have thought profound.

If you're lost in the maize,🌽 feeling fried and roasted, 🍗 get yourself unghosted : 👻 with resume reviews 📃 and mock interviews 👩‍💼 on our live stream, hosted 🎥 by me, and who you guessin? 💭 the one and only Taylor Desseyn  Join the event

  Just 1 week until our #Spooky #Friday13 episode of #Unghosted where Taylor Desseyn and I will be doing #resumereviews and #mockinterviews LIVE ! And with this being October, there's a higher than normal chance we'll even be in costume. (I haven't consulted with Taylor on this...) Hope you'll join us! 👻🎃🦹‍♂️

I'm behind on messaging a lot of people. If you're waiting on a response from me, I'm sorry - I'll try to get back to you soon. While I could, in all honesty, just say "I'm busy" and leave it at that, the reality is...  well, I'm busy. Thankfully I'm fortunate to say I'm not being disrupted by any large & life changing events. I'm just reaching one of those points I think we all reach at various points... when everything all happens at once, and we're just barely staying above water. Maybe these moments are worth recognizing - when you're able to be the good husband/wife/partner, the good dad/mom/guardian, the good son/daughter/child, the good friend, the good neighbor, the good coach, and you're even good at tending to your own needs... but all of that takes time, takes intention, takes energy. It's the feeling you get perhaps just before you feel overwhelmed... and, (if you do it right) maybe you will avoid...

Tom Hanks talking about the ad that uses AI&Deep Fake technology to use his likeness in order to promote some dental plan reminds me of 15 years ago when the One Laptop per Child organization used John Lennon's likeness to promote their mission. I wrote about it back then - pointing out the problems of someone's likeness being used without their consent (in Lennon's case, Yoko Ono gave her approval) not thinking there'd come a time when living people would have to contend with the same issue. While I don't think anyone's likeness should be used without the explicit consent of the person (even their estate requiring explicitly approval) maybe (hopefully) the silver lining good news here is celebrity endorsements will become so diluted with fakery that they'll no longer be meaningful.