A miserable end to an otherwise good week as I came down with a horrible cold. Temperature all over the place. Hard to get warm, hard to get cool. On Thursday I slept for 16 hours and started feeling a bit human again.

I wrote a few weeks ago about leaving my maths assessment until the last minute. I’ve always had a deep shame of my procrastination tendencies - not least since it’s impossible for people to understand why I can’t just get on and do stuff sometimes. Saying it’s just the way my mind works doesn’t seem to be much of an explanation. In my head, I’ve muddled through life dealing with it. But in reality, I’ve thrived despite it. In a fair world, it would catch up to me. Not this time.

The results came in this week. I did really well in the assessment, easily clearing the bar for a first - no marks lost for the maths, six marks down for the sloppy presentation. The odd thing is that I didn’t expect this. Before the results came in, I had prepared myself for failure. I’d even done the maths (!) to work out what I’d have to get on the subsequent assessments to catch up and get a decent mark overall. If you’d asked me to wager money, I’d have said I’d be lucky to get 50% on the exam. I can’t explain it and I’m aware this is moaning about a gift that, by all rights, I should be happy to receive.

On reflection, this has happened so often in my life. I’d get awful marks in class but ace all the exams. Teachers wouldn’t see me as a high flyer and couldn’t explain how I always did better in exams than the kids that coded smart. At school, at my degree, even at work. During a TESOL course 20 years ago I was convinced I’d failed the grammar exam and remember commiserating with another student - they failed, I got full marks but ended up looking like an arsehole… Not the only time that this situation played out. I remain a mystery to myself.

A few new ‘things’ this week - things I think will change my life but never really do. A standing desk - bought to do maths at and prompted by my self-convinced shameful failure. And a dehumidifier to help with the winter laundry drying. I tried the dehumidifier yesterday - I am amazed by the amount of water it pulled from nowhere. I was ready for it to be a new-age scam.

There’s a new project kicking off at work that I can maybe take some ownership of. Though again I need to find a way to balance my self-effacing tendencies with my ambition and ability. In a way the maths result has brought this internal conflict into a bit more focus.

Finally finished the Mission: Interminable films with the youngest. Gosh, that last film is a drag. We cleansed our palates by watching one of the 60s TV episodes - it involved a clever ruse with a pair of monks unloading wheels of cheese from trucks, a fake submarine and an SS officer hiding a hoard of nazi gold. Much better.

What shall we watch next? A friend recommended the Fast and Furious films, which I’ve never seen. They’re a bit… earnest, they warned. We might need a break from silly films that take themselves too seriously. Recommendations?

I think I’ve settled on an e-bike conversion kit for my Brompton over getting a new e-bike. I’ll be able to say au reVOIr to the hire bikes soon. See what I did there?

Grab-bag

  • Simon Willison on locating the source of a mysterious beep with Claude. “I think the most interesting part of this project is that I demonstrated it’s possible to give Claude Code ears.” I remember sharing an office with Simon - this project could only be his.
  • I hadn’t seen Libby Miller’s Catwigs before and I like it a lot! Serious whimsy is my favourite approach for this kind of stuff - well, for any kind of stuff. I like the idea of having a conversation with your project.
  • I also enjoyed Prototyping and Power, a talk of Libby’s about physical prototyping at BBC R&D. Lots of good thinking about products, R&D, users and design. Couldn’t decide which good quote to pull from it so you’ll have to read it all.
  • David Sparks on why an audience of one is enough when building AI-assisted software just for yourself.
  • The Real Kevin Bacon, from The Pudding. I don’t quite buy some of the stats used here, but the dedication to the visualisation of a trivial thing is excellent. It’s so much harder to tell a story with dataviz than this project makes it look.