Week in review & a little rant
How are we half way through October already? Our heating clicked on automatically for the first time yesterday. The temperature has dropped so quickly.
Let's get the rant over with first. Over the past three days I started blog posts on a topic only to bin it the next day. I really struggled, and I think it's because I've been in quite a bad mood when it comes to the internet. There is a leading news story happening right now that has swept Kbin off its feet completely. Although it is a very complicated situation you wouldn't think so if you visited a social media platform. No, apparently it's actually very black and white. I have read some ridiculous takes, downright disgusting comments and have just generally been very disappointed in people the past week. For the first time in maybe ever I found myself wanting to stay away from the web completely. I'm feeling a little better now, and I have decided to cut Kbin out of my routine and focus on cool independent sites instead.
Off the 'net, work has been going really well. Before I started I was very afraid that I was not going to be good enough. Constant feeling of imposter syndrome, you know how it is. I am pleased to say I can point to numerous meetings and stories (a story basically being what we call a ticket, a piece of work) and say that I added value there. I've been able to make a few suggestions and tackle problems I've never come across before, so overall I'd say I kept up my end of the bargain. They did too, which is also nice. I went to a meeting yesterday that talked about what the company does for sustainability, what their targets are etc. and they take it really seriously. For them it's not a small PR team to look good on the outside, they actually make changes. They're already carbon neutral and aim to be net zero by 2040. I like that.
At home I finally figured out how to use our coffee machine. It was a wedding gift (so acquired over a year ago) and we really struggled to get a decent cup out of it. The coffee came out too watery, and if it wasn't too watery it just didn't taste right, so it ended up being ignored and gathered dust in the corner of the kitchen. Earlier in the week my wife brought it up and rightly said it was wrong that we're just ignoring the coffee machine when it was a wedding gift so I dusted it off and tried again. The first thing I did was ditch pre-ground for beans and grinded them myself which has been a big help in getting better flavour. I also managed to find a good balance, see I came from an instant-coffee household where one spoon was all you needed, plus I personally drank tea anyway so getting the coffee:water ratio was a little hard. It came with a little spoon, and I have found that four spoons of coffee to roughly 500ml of water makes a decent cup. 500ml might sound like a lot but some of the water sits in the bottom of the tank rather than ending up in the pot so you have to account for that too.
Oh, and the news that the Microsoft-Activision deal has been approved pissed me off too. How many studios can one company own before regulators start thinknig "Hey, maybe this is bad for the consumer?" An infinite number? Oh. Great. All the more reason to support indie developers.
~ Honey