Category: Uncategorized

If there’s one lesson I’ve internalized this year that’s benefited everything I’ve touched, it’s that getting clear about what you’re doing before you begin a project is paramount.

Instead of your (unclear) vision coming into (an obscured) view as you build it, it’s worth taking the time to figure out what you’re building before going to the toolshed.

This might sound like common sense, but the discipline required to transfer an idea from the ether to a blank sheet of paper staring back at you is not trivial. And once you’ve committed the idea to paper, you’re on the hook (even if it’s just to yourself) for creating what you said you were building.

Not only does this force you to deal with the inclination to leave several options on the table at the outset, your commitment to the ever-clarifying vision of what you committed to building in the first place becomes the resolve needed to weather the inevitable storms to come.

I’ve been head down for a few years with work and it wasn’t until recently that I took a look at the technologies that have matured and that have been adopted by the DevOps community.

Much has changed.

Things that used to take hours can now be completed in minutes, and these same tasks can be fully automated. This was already happening, but the tools to facilitate this are robust and well-supported.

Based on the communities around these projects, it’s easy to get up and running after reviewing a few tutorials. But since I’m building something important (and I won’t have time to firefight once things are up and running), I decided to buy a few books and take the plunge.

I’m glad I did.

Something that hasn’t changed much in the time that I’ve been doing system administration and server management work is the nature of the posts that are typically published about new technologies.

They’re typically written by:

1. someone who hacked together an inadvisable workaround;
2. someone writing an article for money, often at the expense of important security considerations; or
3. someone with a unique setup (making the post useless for most people)

One huge advantage of reading documentation and official books is that the author of the book is often the creator of the technology.

This is helpful not only because the author benefits from being as clear as possible (a poorly written book is unlikely to get good reviews and be recommended), but they’re incentivized to think through how people will interact with said technologies.

I saw a billboard the other day that read, “Non-invasive brain surgery means dad can still give her away.”

In terms of being remarkable (the literal definition of the word, meaning worthy of notice), they nailed it. In terms of making the people who read the billboard feel good about what they’re doing, I’m left with mixed feelings (see: horror and bemusement).

Western culture fears mortality and suggests softer euphemisms to reference the dead and dying. People don’t die here, they “pass away” or perhaps “go on to be with the Lord” depending on your family’s world view and orientation to the Mason–Dixon line.

In many other cultures, both human and (non-human) animal death is cast in a completely different light. Death is not universally feared, it is in fact regularly celebrated and embraced. But that’s not the case here, and I can’t help but feel like the billboard missed the mark.

I could be wrong, but since I don’t have comments enabled on my posts… 🙂

Every time I accept a friend request on Facebook from someone that I don’t know (particularly people with whom I don’t share friends), it introduces a slew of new strangers into my suggested friends list.

It’s fascinating to see how dramatically different the suggestions are when I add, say, a life coach from the Pam Slim tribe vs. someone’s Aunt who saw my episode of House Hunters International.

This is a really visible reminder of how the people (and influences) we allow in our life matter.

Adding a random stranger sends a signal to Facebook about the kinds of strangers they should send your way. What signals are you sending the Universe about what people to send into your life?

I had some important deadlines coming up recently and needed to iterate on a few big ideas rapidly.

Writing in notebooks felt restricting and waiting two whole days for a whiteboard to be delivered by Amazon was obviously out of the question, so I started writing on the walls of my room in pencil like a crazy person.

It was great.

The progress made on a few of the ideas and projects was enough to obviate my graffiti experiment, so I decided that it was time to paint over the madness. I’m well acquainted with my own brand of crazy, no need to be reminded of it every time I look at my wall.

So this afternoon, I went down to the office in my building to obtain some paint. In the office, I was told that someone named Tony (who was referenced in a tone that suggested bureaucracy and territorial gate-keeping) would need to be petitioned for my 16 ounce request.

As soon as “work order” was mentioned, I pretty much knew how the story would end without evasive action being taken so I started harassing the maintenance workers who were walking into and around the office.

The first referenced the dreaded tyrant (Tony) so he was of no use to me.

The next guy (the newest hire, so far as I can tell) was pushing a cart towards the elevator, so I put on my best non-threatening face and approached him with my container.

Hi. I need some paint.

Without missing a beat, he confirmed that I needed paint for the wall and dutifully headed towards the heavily guarded compound in which the elusive paint was being held captive.

He muttered something about the paint being in an adjacent building, so I decided to wait for him in the lobby. It’s real out here in these streets.

A few moments later, he returned with what I needed.

That’s the end of the story.

I’m not saying that you need to be crazy (nor am I not not saying that), but I am saying that sometimes you don’t need to wait on Tony.

I had the privilege of organizing a reading of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail this month.

It’s an important letter, and one whose words carry just as much weight today as they did in 1963.

Many thanks to everyone involved, all on short notice:

1. Winnie Kao
2. Mike “Ambassador” Bruny
3. Doc Waller
4. Darius Gant
5. Garfield Hylton
6. Jermaine Maree
7. Shaun King
8. Pamela Slim
9. DeRay McKesson
10. Dr. Ivor Horn
11. Charlie Gilkey
12. Neal Ludevig
13. Charles Davis
14. Soledad O’Brien
15. Greg Hartle
16. Kimberly Nadia Scott
17. Lisa Nicole Bell
18. Paul Drayton
19. Codie Elaine
20. André Blackman
21. John Montgomery II
22. Daniel Jarvis
23. James Lopez
24. Donna Queza
25. Marc Aarons
26. Stella Santana
27. Alex Chavez
28. Spencer Pitman
29. Ankit Shah
30. Cliff Worley
31. Keylor Leigh
32. Stephanie Hasham
33. Willie Jackson (my dad!)
34. Don Pottinger
35. Rachel Rodgers
36. Dr. Angelica Perez-Litwin
37. Akilah Hughes
38. Diana Alvear
39. Danielle Jenene Powell
40. Emmanuel Azih

This project is dedicated to my father (whose name I share, and whose voice you hear at 37:24), who was born into segregation 71 years ago and taught me everything I know about how to be a man.

[More here].

Amusing stories from one day of Uber rides in the South:

1. My first driver asked me if I was on my way to church. (I wasn’t.)
2. My second driver apologized for the smell, sharing that her previous rider was smoking weed before she asked him to put it out.

No hidden cameras were discovered before exiting the vehicles.

I was chatting with an advisor this month about shipping projects. He shared how leading up to project launches he kicks around ideas aggressively, but once a project is initiated, he refuses to permit distractions and thus always ships on time.

I lit up when hearing this and shared that this was a skill I wanted to cultivate.

…but I was immediately reminded that this was not a skill to develop, but rather a decision. A commitment.

Oh yeah.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IytPXZDpq98

John Legend and Common kicked off the new year on a high note with a performance of their Selma theme song “Glory” during “Good Morning America’s” Winter Concert Series. Donning black suits, the well-dressed gentlemen delivered the gospel-soul number live from the “GMA” Times Square studio. With Legend on keys, Common preached to the people with his wise words.

“Glory” was nominated for Best Original Song at Sunday’s Golden Globe Awards, while the civil rights drama is a frontrunner for the Oscars.

(via)

I posted this on Facebook the other day:

There is such an incredible opportunity for leadership and reform in virtually all aspects of Western society right now.

If you fancy yourself a culture-shaper and influencer or maybe, I don’t know, just a decent human being…we might never see another time like this in our lives.

The problems we face are huge and complex and won’t be solved by the powers that be. They’ll be solved by people like you.

Now is (y)our time.