Slow progress in work, running again and lots of gigs

Slow progress

I've been feeling frustrated in work again this week at the glacial speed of everything.

As mentioned last week, I've been reassigned to new a thing for 50% of my time. But of course it's impossible to completely switch off involvement, so I'm sort of juggling 3 things now.

I think part of the problem in the department is that everyone is across multiple things, so everything moves very slowly. There is also a lot of siloed working.

I think I've seen a presentation by Kate Tarling before, about organising teams around a service, rather than departmental boundaries. It feels like we are a very long way from that, and I feel a bit powerless to influence it at the moment.

Good news though, we have a UCD (user-centered design) lead starting with us. They are a principal user researcher and part of their role will be helping the 2 or 3 UCD teams in the department to work more efficiently, and having a stronger voice in prioritisation conversations and decisions.

Running again

I've starting running again, in preparation for doing Cardiff Half Marathon in October. I'm running in memory of my nephew Emrys and my brother's family and to raise money for Sands. Please donate if you can.

I'm not really a runner, although I did enjoy doing couch to 5K a couple of years ago. So I've restarted that to try and get my fitness back up. I've run about 4K every day this week, and it's been a huge boost to my mental health. It's really helped me to decompress after work.

I've dragged the dog along for a few runs too. She pulls me along for the first half, then I half to pull her along for the second half. 😅

Lots of gigs

Last Saturday, I had a great day running around different venues in Swansea to catch 6 bands!

We saw Mari Mathias, Los Blancos, Adwaith and Gruff Rhys at Gŵyl Tawe. Then Positive Reaction and Asidhara at a breast cancer fundraising gig at The Bunkhouse.

The genres ranged from traditional Welsh folk music to hardcore punk. And we finished the day off dancing to R&B until the wee hours. It was quite a day.

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