ROBE

About a month ago, we were having Thanksgiving dinner in shorts in the greater Vancouver area. Since then, we sorta skipped autumn all together and jumped straight into freezing temperatures and snow. There was perhaps a brief week or so of what I would normally consider “autumn” temperatures.

Last week it snowed but not enough for it stick thankfully. The temperatures are now hovering around freezing or slightly below at night. Some of the higher elevations got enough snow that it did stick around.

Since it got so cold so quickly, I am refusing to turn on the heat so soon. In the past, I’ve bundled up with hoodies or a North Face jacket but this year I am trying something new. My parents got me a really nice robe last year and I’m now wearing it nearly every day. It’s fluffy and soft, so it’s very pleasant to wear. It’s long enough to cover my legs, so more of my body heat gets retained. It’s got that classic tartan pattern to it, so I wouldn’t look out of place as an old man picking up a newspaper off a front porch (if I wasn’t so poor that I could afford an actual house). I quite enjoy lounging around in my robe while it’s so cold outside. I think I just need a pair of slipper to go with it and I’ll be all set.

TWITTER

The following e-mail was apparently sent out to all Twitter employees today. There are rumours that as many as 50% of the company will be laid off.

I’ve been part of several layoffs and waiting to see if you have a job is obviously terrible. The longer you have to wait, the more it becomes like torture. Though I’ve been reading that many employees already know they don’t have a job since they’ve lost all access to their accounts. It seems like it’s not a great time to be associated with Twitter in any way.

CAR MAINTENANCE

Since buying my car in August of 2020, I’ve only done oil changes in terms of maintenance work. This week, I brought my car in for a more thorough inspection.

My mechanic didn’t find much at all. He changed the oil, replaced the cabin air filter, and rotated my tires. His only recommendation was that in about six months I will need new front brake pads and possibly a new battery. For now, I’m good to go.

It’s true when they say Toyota vehicles are reliable.

I HELPED MAKE THIS

For almost the entire summer and well into the fall, I was developing a large-scale feature for the game I work on. Our game has featured an in-game store since it launched, allowing players to buy cosmetic items for themselves. Other games feature similar in-game stores but they also allow players to buy items for their friends as gifts. For the last several months, I assisted in developing a gifting feature for our store.

Specifically, I wrote all the back-end logic in our game so that we could communicate to the servers that handle our economy system that a player wanted to gift their friend an item or items. I’ve been a game developer for a long time and the schedule that initially was presented to me on when they wanted all of this to be done was aggressive to say the least. The desired date for this feature to be launched was today actually and I’m pleased to say, we did release this feature today. The required effort to get this done was, however, monumental, not just from me but from several teams over the last few months. There were lots of meetings, last second discoveries, many questions, and a plethora of moving parts and dependencies.

I’ve been told and I’m not sure if this is true but we are the first major title at the company to have a gifting feature in their store and that many other teams are looking to see how all this works out for us in the coming weeks and months. Being a pioneer for anything has both pros and cons but it is kinda cool to be the first ones to do something.

I’m not sure how much more money this will make for us but if it is an appreciable amount, I hope they remember that when they decide what my bonus will be next year. If you’re interested in reading more about this gifting feature, click here.

RAIN DRIVE

The warm and dry October in Vancouver seems like a distant memory now as torrential rains have filled most of this week. A deluge of rain has laid waste to any remaining wildfires and forced people to dress seasonally appropriate now.

I had to drive in this monsoon-like rain on Tuesday evening and I admit I initially was not mentally prepared. I exited the parkade and the rain was coming down in sheets. I briefly forgot how to turn on my wipers. Then the windows began to fog up slightly and I had to think for a second how to engage the front and rear defrosters. It all came back to me but it’d been probably a good five months since I had to turn some of that stuff on.

When I got to my destination, I had to park outdoors and the rain washed away a good amount of dirt that had accumulated on my car due to the lack of rain. I should probably still bring it in for a good wash soon.

DAYS OFF

Today was day one of several days off I have and I didn’t play anything today other than go and get a massage at a local spa. The massage was great and left me feeling quite relaxed. When I returned home, I knew I had to clean my apartment but doing chores right after a massage is a terrible way not understanding how massages work. Instead, I drank lots of water and lied down on my couch while watching TV. Whatever relaxing state I was in, I just tried to let that go for as long as possible. I wound up falling asleep on my couch, letting my relaxed body get some rest. I cleaned my apartment a few hours later.

REAL OCTOBER

On Friday, it rained for the first time in probably a month and a half, the first rain of October for sure. With the rain came a drop in temperature. It’s currently two to three degrees colder now in my apartment compared to last week. It now feels like a regular Vancouver October. My windows at home aren’t as wide open anymore and I’m lounging in a hoodie now instead of just a t-shirt.

It’s suppose to rain all next week and the highs will barely break double digits. I think people will need to put away the summer clothing for real now. We had a good run though. This year, people were able to comfortably wear shorts for almost five continuous months. That’s amazing for a city that normally has four distinct seasons.

I bet it snows next month!