Basically, I'm falling apart

I went for a run last Wednesday (29th). Then later that day we went to the gym and had a pretty good back day. Even hit a deadlift PR for two sets of three. Fast-forward to late Thursday, and I notice that my ankle kinda hurt when doing my nightly stretches before bed. I thought that was weird, but random pains just kinda “show up” these days. By Friday it was swollen and kind of red. Not bruised, just red. Could this have been from running? I hadn’t ran in a couple of months due to the cold and “meh” weather overall. But how on earth does one sprain an ankle two days after the activity?

A few days before that, I woke up, and repositioned myself in bed. I immediately felt a pain near my shoulder blade that was not there seconds before. It’s like when you sleep wrong and get a neck pain that just nags at you for days on end, but right above my scapula.

Basically, I’m falling apart.

I still haven’t found a job

I took a break late last year on the job search because we had a few trips that were scheduled and already paid for. Then the holiday season hit and things just kind of stalled. I’ve since started back. I refreshed the designs for a few older projects and created a portfolio site to share with prospective employers. I plan on adding more case studies in the future. I also feel like it needs a personalized redesign, but the goal was to get something up that I could share now. Websites can always be tweaked later.

The job search is brutal. If you don’t know someone at the company you’re applying to, your resume is likely not even being looked at. If the job posting is even real to begin with. I applied to a (supposedly) remote role at a company a friend works at and when I asked for a referral, he couldn’t even find the post. I looked, and it had been taken down. He eventually found the hiring manager and learned that it was taken down because he got over 1000 applications the day of posting. He also said he liked my resume, but the role wasn’t actually remote.

It’s tough out there. -Kevin C.

Keeping my phone out of reach

I’ve been experimenting with keeping my phone upstairs, or in another room pretty much the entire day. This is an idea from Cal Newport that I sort of started doing a long time ago, but when you need your phone for logging into work SSO, or anything else security-related, I found that I kept going upstairs to grab it, thus starting the whole process of checking apps, scrolling, checking other apps and scrolling etc etc. It’s so easy to get sucked in.

I’ve just been a lot better about it lately. Also? The socials are all mostly awful these days so I don’t want to look at those or stumble upon some news that’s just going to piss me off. When I want news, I’ll go looking for it.

My Apple Watch pings me for some notifications (I don’t allow many), and if it’s really important I’ll go look. But most of the time it’s something I can take care of on my laptop. I do wish you could get non-iMessage messages on Messages for MacOS, though. That’s a lot of “messages”, I’m sorry.

Screen time on my phone is down ~50% consistently the last four weeks, and I’m working to make that even better. I’ve been way more productive all around, whether it be searching for jobs, updating my portfolio, learning, or reading.

Naz Hamid just wrote a really great post that’s related to all of this, and you should definitely give it your attention. I see those design updates, Naz. Looks good!

Also, semi-related, Raycast added a new focus feature that’s pretty cool. Dave Rupert wrote a post about it , so I won’t go into details here. It’s worth checking out if you use Raycast.

I started shaving my head

It was time.

Media Consumption

🎧 Heavy Rotation

2025 is off to a slow start for me, music-wise. Some things I missed last year have been in heavy rotation. That’s usually how it goes, but this time I’m kinda kicking myself in the butt, because I saw the Magdalena Bay album posted multiple times, it has super sick album art, and I still never gave it a listen (as far as I know.) “Image” would have been on repeat like it is now, and the album is definitely a new favorite.

Magdalena Bay - Imaginal Disk

It’s just, sooooo good.

Matt Berry - Heard Noises

I love Matt Berry. His album titles are hilarious to me, though.

The Cyclist - Sapa Inca Delirium

Never heard of this guy, and this album is top tier. But I mostly just listen to the song Inhale/Exhale

Cate Brooks - Prismatics

Another hidden gem from last year. Somewhere between ambient synth and techno.

Noroth - Sacrificial Solace

Gym tunes.

Earth Boys

Multiple albums, because Earth Boys. But give BK Swing a listen.

Decius - Decius II

Still on the fence about this one. It’s definitely good, just maybe not entirely my thing.

📚 Reading

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

After completing Norwegian Wood, and loving it, I wanted more. But, apparently Norwegian Wood isn’t like other Murakami books, with the closest being The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, from what I read online. So I grabbed that, and it’s been very good so far.

Supercommunicators

I tried reading this, but it was kind of boring. It’s just not something I’m into at the moment. I’ll pick it up again later, I’m sure.

Every Layout

I finished Every Layout by Andy Bell and Heydon Pickering , which I found incredibly useful. It’s made me think a bit differently about implementing layouts, and I actually just re-structured the CSS on my portfolio site to use CUBE CSS and some ideas from Every Layout. I also used Utopia for setting up a nice type scale as well as fluid spacing. I’m going to either redesign this site soon using the same methods, or just rewrite the current design using CUBE, Utopia and Every Layout. Either way, it will be more simplified with a goal of having zero breakpoints.

📺 Movies & Shows

Nosferatu

I loved it. It was so dark and wonderfully shot. I honestly never knew how many similarities there were between Nosferatu and Bram Stoker’s Dracula, with the former being inspired by the latter. The movie for Bram Stoker’s is one of my all-time favorites. I really need to read the book.

I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before someone remakes it again. However, nobody will be as good as Gary Oldman for the role of the Dracula.

The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim

Not sure what took me so long to jump on this, but it was fantastic. I love the style of animation. I don’t know how to put it into words, but it had a kind of vintage feel to it. Maybe because of the highly detailed backgrounds, like old Disney films. But also the fluidity of the animation made it feel almost like it was a remastered cartoon from the late 70s or early 80s. Probably some Peter Jackson magic.

Ranma 1/2

I enjoyed this a lot. I don’t remember Ranma 1/2 being so funny. Cute and entertaining, yes. But the comedy seems a lot better in this refreshed version.

Archer

We canceled YouTubeTV because they did a helluva price hike, and we only used it to watch reruns and football. Was not worth it. So I started watching new shows or seasons of shows I hadn’t seen before. Completed Archer, finally. I miss Jessica Walters.

Sakamoto Days

This show is great. It’s got a bit of a John Wick vibe, but if he retired with a family and owned a convenience store. The action sequences are really well done, and the writing is good. I’ve noticed a lot of western-style humor in anime recently.

JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure

I tried to start watching JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure because people praise it so much. I just can’t. I made it about 10-15 episodes in, and I just don’t think it’s for me.

Bleach

We’ve been plowing our way through Bleach, but as with most shonen anime, it’s a lot of filler with loads of dialog and arcs that just drag on, and on. We’re almost done with the Zanpakuto arc.

Castlevania: Nocturne

Not sure why we stopped watching this a while back. Recently picked it back up, and really liking it. The fight scenes are well animated, and there’s a pretty good story, too. A new season was released, so I wanted to dig in again.

All of the Castlevania shows on Netflix so far have been really good.

NFL

Football isn’t something I talk about a lot, but over the last couple of years, I’ve gotten more and more into it. Being a Panthers fan is hard, y’all, but I think Bryce “Bryce Cold, the Carolina Reaper” Young may take us pretty far next year. It was amazing to see how he changed mid-season. I don’t know what happened. I don’t care what happened. But, holy hell, did he step it up.

I’m not entirely thrilled about the Super Bowl matchup being a repeat of last year, but it definitely says a lot about the two teams that made it. I had been predicting a Lions vs. Chiefs Super Bowl all season, but it didn’t pan out.