Welcome to another edition of the newsletter, folks! This week I am trying something different; categorized content! 🎉 I don't have enough content to post a single-threaded article, so I'll be doing surface-level dives on a few significant areas that took up space in my brain this past week.

In Personal News - Househunters

So now that Bridget and I are married, we thought we would settle down and relax for a bit. Well, it turns out that we don't like just sitting around and doing nothing, so we've started poking our heads around different Real Estate open houses.

Both of us are avid users of Zillow - even if we disagree with their previous mass-house-buying strategies - and are constantly checking the few different areas for new homes on the market.

Hey! So it's been a while since you've heard from me. I've been busy with a thing or two, like getting married! So yes, I took some time off away from writing because there was so much wedding planning to accomplish. That, mixed with work and other responsibilities, meant that things like writing small novelty newsletter issues fell by the wayside.

But that's a small price to ensure you have a fantastic day when you marry your best friend. 🥰 🤷🏼‍♂️ There isn't going to be much, if any, tech in this issue, but it'll be a good one!

The Venue

This issue is a little different than my previous issues. There's no technical portion, it's all purely about the fun of sports. It's been a rough few weeks at work, and so I wanted to focus on something a little more fun & light-hearted. I hope you enjoy it!

On Thursday, May 12^th, the NFL released the game schedules for each team. This was the first look for fans to see what competition lay ahead for their teams in the upcoming season, and it provided each team's social media groups a chance to have a little fun.

Each year when the schedule is released, some teams like to dive right in, display it, and commentate how they think their team will do. Other teams though, want to go the extra mile to entertain their fans by making funny, over-the-top videos that showcase their teams, players, cities, and upcoming schedules.

Wow, this weekly newsletter makes it feel like the last issue was really two months ago! - 62 days to be exact 😅 You may be asking, "What gives?! You start a newsletter for three weeks and then suddenly stop writing?! Boo, give us content."

I'm back, busier than ever, but I've got some content for you. So let's see if we can get some consistency back.

I'm sorry, folks. It turns out that trying to build a software company while working a typical day job is incredibly difficult and sucks all the free time out of your life, which includes the time that you devoted to crafting meaningful newsletters every week. But for now, let's talk about things going on in the world, mainly Ukraine and inflation.

The wheels are turning, and the train has left the station; issue number three is coming your way! I'm almost inclined to say that this newsletter is going places. Thank you to everyone who read the last issue, as it's your support that keeps me wanting to make these.

Without further ado, what will we be discussing today? Escaping your comfort zone & death. 💀

One Day We'll All Be Ghosts

You ever had a song stuck in your head for days on end that you can't seem to get over no matter how much you listen to it? I was watching a few promos for the CBS show Ghosts, and I found the background music incredibly addicting to listen to on repeat. The song was Ghosts by The Head and the Heart.

We made it past the pilot! This second edition has more structure, better content, and changes to the presentation of the weekly tip to be more readable over email.

Is This What a Senior Feels Like?

I'm finally settling into my new role @Heroku. Its the first role where I was hired directly as a senior-level engineer instead of being promoted up to one. This situation put quite a bit of pressure on me, and I wasn't sure of the expectations compared to my previous position, where I had proven myself as a senior vs. being assumed to be one. Unfortunately, this led to some extra anxiety and stress that built up over time which put me into a situation that almost led to burnout before even finishing my onboarding.

I realized that much of my stress was self-inflicted. My manager and more senior engineers were telling me that I was doing fine for being new to the team, but I was still beating myself up. I realized that while my technical abilities were still adapting to my new team and their existing systems, I had to change my expectations and be realistic with what my early contributions were going to be. I have written about battling Imposter Syndrome before, and this new situation brought many of those feelings back. It's impossible to be a rock star on day ten of a job, but it's very easy to be a good team player on day one. Being a senior engineer is about the mindset just as much as the technical abilities. When I started, my immediate goals were trying to contribute as fast as possible, but I shifted them towards those based on community, relationship building, and learning the new systems & protocols around the team.

In the beginning, the Universe this Newsletter was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.

- Someone, probably

They say the process of becoming the best version of yourself is to take a step, so here we are! After blogging for some time with decently successful results, I figured the next step would be to spam send you some helpful tips, interesting posts & articles, and other things that help me get through each week.

Growing Together

This newsletter aims to provide transparency into my life as a software engineer and to share some of the tips & tricks I've picked up over the years. Hopefully, you can learn some technical details concerning engineering and some personal lessons I've picked up along the way. With this, I hope you can see similarities in your own life and engineering work as we grow together.