Now
A glimpse of what’s ping-ponging around
in my head and life these days.
Where I am
A few months ago I said, “The rest of the year is going to be chaos.” Since then my partner and I got married, packed up our lives, visited home, and moved to a new city.
Today I would say most of the chaos is over. We’ve moved from a rolling boil to a steady simmer. Daily life is relatively stable, but there are some unanswered questions and incompleted tasks tumbling around beneath the surface.
Daily focus
These days, I’m looking for work in product design, either in-house or in a consulting role. My daily activities are a mix of either directly or indirectly related to finding a job.
The “directly related” are exactly what one would expect from a designer (refining my portfolio, reviewing job ads, etc) and not worth rehashing here.
Indirectly related, I’m using this time to return to writing, including my book about onboarding and other shorter pieces on design. I’ve also been using this time to refresh my coding skills and practice on some small ideas.
Hobbies and side projects
This website
I think this project will be listed on this page for a long time. The main motivation behind each effort I put into it changes by the week as I—and others—need different things from this space. And so, the efforts will be neverending, at least not for the foreseeable future.
I plan to share more of the journey one day, when it feels more complete (but never will be, I expect, not truly).
Sport
I’m currently training for a 14km swim in Lago d’Orta, Italy, hosted by Oceanman in June 2025. Am I terrified? Yup. Am I excited? Yup!
I’m currently swimming with the triathlon club at McGill University. With challenging workouts and a welcoming group, I’m enjoying myself and the race anxiety is delayed for the time being. I also simply feel more like myself when I have a swimming routine, so race or no race, I’m happy to be in the pool.
Art
In the chaos of the last months, drawing has fallen away for me. Hoping to find my way back to it now that we’ve settled in one location with no trips (or moves!) on the radar.
What I can recommend, should anyone else need to find their way back to a creative activity, is drawing with kids. Whenever I fall away from drawing or painting, I’ve found drawing with my nieces reminds me how simple and enjoyable it can be.