pages/blog/2021-in-review.md (view raw)
1---
2template:
3slug: 2021-in-review
4title: 2021 in review
5subtitle: The post-year ramble is here, slightly late this time
6date: 2022-01-10
7---
8
9The last year was quite eventful to say the least, and I'd been putting
10off on writing this retrospective simply because of the sheer number of
11things that happened/I did, of varying levels of importance -- both to
12you as a reader, and me as... well, the one who experienced them.
13
14I'll try to highlight the major ones here -- they're also the ones I'm
15okay to discuss publicly, so there's that. As for the rest: they'll
16serve as conversation fuel for 2022.
17
18## I graduated... barely
19
20After 4 long years, mostly "learning" about things that haven't been
21used since like, my mom was born (I'm looking at you Intel 8086), I am
22now a Bachelor of Technology in Computer Science and Engineering. I say
23barely because I actually did pretty terribly. I'm still mildly
24surprised that given my GPA, the degree certificate classifies it as a
25"First Class". I think they just felt sorry for us lot.
26
27Was it a waste of time? A lot of the coursework, sadly, was. But my time
28in college -- however little -- was actually quite fun. One thing's for
29sure: I can't rewind time to see what would've happened had I _not_ done
30the degree; but now I've done it, and here we are. Wherever that is.
31Maybe it helped, maybe it didn't. Oh well.
32
33## my time at DeepSource
34
35This time last year (January 2021), I joined
36[DeepSource](https://deepsource.io) as a Security Engineer (SRE on
37paper). Suffice to say, I had an excellent time there, working with some
38equally excellent people. I got to touch a whole bunch of systems:
39ranging from observability pipelines, mesh networks in Kubernetes,
40cloud-native security, and some more Kubernetes.
41
42Oh, and here are a few pictures from our trip to the Maldives.[^1]
43
44
45
46
47[^1]: If you're in Bangalore and are looking for work, definitely
48 consider [applying to DeepSource](https://careers.deepsource.io)!
49
50In December 2021, I decided to leave DeepSource in favor of other
51opportunities. I must say, I will deeply miss my equity when DeepSource
52eventually becomes a unicorn -- and I'm confident they will! As for the
53other opportunities, I will write about that in a future post. This is a
54_retrospective_ after all.[^2]
55
56[^2]: There are hints... in various places...
57
58## projects and hacks
59
60Probably my biggest and most fun project this year was
61[forlater.email](https://forlater.email). Both the site, and its
62[technical breakdown](/blog/building-forlater) frontpaged on Hacker News
63and was pretty well received. In hindsight, I should've included some
64kind of payment model, but at the same time, being flexible enough to
65accomodate those that can't afford to pay. And the code is shit. I'll
66probably rewrite it. Eventually.[^3]
67
68[^3]: Sure, lol.
69
70My attempt at running [Kubernetes at home](/blog/k8s-at-home), while
71being super fun, failed miserably. I learnt a ton from it however, and I
72have no regrets. Setting up a Wireguard mesh manually, bootstrapping a
73cluster using `kubeadm`, multi-arch considerations, etc. I do sorely
74miss the declarative-ness of it all, I must say.
75
76Besides these, I don't think I spent any serious amount of time on
77anything else. Other than, of course, work projects.
78
79## this site
80
81As is tradition, let's talk about this site and the blog. There have
82been some minor visual changes but I think it's largely stayed the same.
83I've found the aesthetic I like -- at least for now.
84
85I've re-added the [reading](/reading) page to publicly track books that
86I've read. More on that in a bit.
87
88As for blog posts this year, let's see:
89
90```console
91$ grep 'date: 2021' pages/blog/*.md | wc -l
92 13
93```
94
95Only 13! That's about 1 a month, and the lowest count per year so far.
96I'll attribute this to me dedicating more time to work, i.e. I've become
97a wagie cagie. Make of that what you will. That said, I think the
98quality of posts has considerably increased. I think.
99
100## other stuff
101
102I couldn't think of an appropriate heading for this section so "other
103stuff" it is: a catch-all category for general life-ey things.
104
105I read a grand-total of 9 books last year -- not particularly good. I'd
106like to at least double that this year. Some of my favourite reads were:
107_Dune_, _The Hero of Ages_, _The Enemy_ and _Permanent Record_. Big
108thanks to [Vishesh](https://awalvie.me) for _Dune_ and
109[Vishnu](https://twitter.com/thebluefowl) for _Permanent Record_!
110
111Language learning took an unfortunate hit, with basically zero progress
112in Russian. I did study it for a month or two in early 2021, but I won't
113count it for I've likely forgotten it all. I hope to restart where I
114left off, this year -- hopefully with the help of my new [productivity
115hacks](/blog/bujo) (which has been working wonders, by the way!).
116
117I had roughly about 6 - 7 months of time to hit the gym, i.e. when the
118gym wasn't closed off, and I managed to get some swole on. As of this
119writing, it's the "third wave" of COVID-19 and the gym's closed. Again.
120
121In other somewhat big news: I switched to an iPhone 13 mini. This
122probably warrants its own big post -- one full of copes and hopes. I
123will have to mull over it a bit to fully articulate my thoughts. I have
124a few other post ideas as well -- many that I planned on writing last
125year but never got around to. I often consider writing commentary on
126`$TECH_OUTRAGE_DU_JOUR` but everything that I want to say has usually
127already been said. I'm sure there'll be plenty of stuff I can be the
128_first_ to comment on in 2022.
129
130And speaking of 2022...
131
132## 2022 might be big
133
134This might be a big year for me, with some potentially huge life
135updates. New job, new adventures, the works. I'm looking forward to it.
1362021 was super eventful; 2022 just might top it.
137
138Here's a list of things I'm looking forward to this year:
139
140- Formula 1: New regulations! Williams back on top? Who knows?!
141- New albums: Oceans Ate Alaska, I See Stars (one can hope!), Invent
142 Animate.
143- Travel.
144- Reading _The Wheel of Time_ series.
145
146I'm going to close off this rambly post with a big thanks to everyone who's
147supporting forlater.email -- it made my whole last year. Maybe this year
148too. And you just might see another micro-SaaS from me!
149
150I'll see you soon.