Daily Coping 30 Jun 2020

I’ve started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here.

Today’s Tip is to create a list of favorite memories you feel grateful for.

I have so many, but here are a few that I came up with off the top of my head:

  • Getting married
  • The births of my children
  • The death of my father
  • Starting SQLServerCentral over a phone call
  • Selling SQLServerCentral to Redgate
  • Completing a marathon
  • My first sabbatical
  • Playing baseball as an adult and hitting 3 HRs in a game
  • First day snowboarding with my brother
  • Flying overseas by myself at 20
  • Visiting Dunedin with my family
  • Going to a Yankees game in NYC
  • Finishing the first Harry Potter book with my oldest
  • White water rafting with family
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A Virtual Trip Down Under

I had a great holiday last week, getting away from my home for the first time in months. It’s been an extra strange time for me as I usually have a number of personal and business trips I’ve taken by this time, but with the pandemic, I’ve been at home, like most of you. However, we managed to find a campground open, and we packed up the family, dogs, and horses for a week in the South Dakota hills.

I’m back, and while I won’t be getting on an airplane, I am going to travel virtually to Australia this week for quite an action packed Redgate Streamed APAC Edition. I’m slightly disappointed that I won’t be able to shake hands with Troy Hunt, but neither will Damian Brady, Greg Low, or Hamish Watson. I was on stage last summer with those three, and I immensely enjoyed the experience.

This year we’re holding the event virtually in the Australia time zone, so I’ll be working late afternoon and evening my time for the event on Thursday, July 2. Time zones certainly get strange when I do things in Australia, and it’s the one place I’ve traveled where I feel really out of place when contacting this side of the world. The last time I was there, I watched my daughter’s evening volleyball game as I was eating breakfast.

I get to deliver a talk, and then I’ll settle in to watch everyone else and enjoy the other talks. All of these are expert software developers and data professionals, and I learn quite a bit from them on a regular basis. If you want to spend time later this week, register for the event and join me, wherever you are in the world. The one good thing with these virtual events is that we can attend them if they fit our schedule.

I’m excited to talk DevOps, software development, and, of course, security with the incredible Troy Hunt. This is an exciting week back for me, but also a busy one as I prep for a look at the software challenges down under.

Steve Jones

Note: Podcasts paused this week as I have construction taking place at the house and nowhere to record.

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Measuring Well Being

I need to write something more on this, but it struck me that this is something I wish previous employers had done, anonymously, and reported results back to others. I also with I had some data on how I look at things over time.

Here is my Thymometrics dashboard.

2020-06-15 07_39_08-Thymometrics _ Contribute

Today I got the reminder to fill this out and decided to reset the sliders. The left is my rating of this in my job and the right is how I feel. I often glance at these and adjust them, but periodically I reset them.

I look at this as a chance to take five minutes and take stock of where I am in my current employment.

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Daily Coping 29 Jun 2020

I’ve started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here.

Today’s tip is to appreciate the joy of nature and the beauty in the world around you.

An easy one for me, with land and animals all around. I appreciate nature constantly by taking the time to notice how the world flows around me and how much I love where I live.

I also get regular reminders on the hard side of nature with dead animals that my cat will catch and bring in.

Nature is amazing and wonderful, and can help you enjoy life. Take a minute sometime, inhale a deep breath and just look around.

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