If I’m lucky, I manage to get to about one comics convention a year. Typically that’s
FanExpo here in Boston, but this year it was Terrificon down in CT at the Mohegan Sun
Casino.
The main draw for this was absolutely the creator guest list, which was – I won’t
mince words – for me, staggeringly good. As a kid, I got into these books in the
late 80’s, early 90’s, at the height of the “mutant” craze. Some of the names most ubiquitous
during that time – Chris Claremont, Alan Davis, Walt and Louise Simonson, Arthur Adams –
were all in attendance this weekend, among many other heavy-hitting artists and writers.
As a result? I had to go.
I pulled together a small stack of books I wanted signed, and made my way down to CT. The
day was long, the lines were longer, but thanks to the folks at the CBCS booth I was
able to wrangle witnessed signatures and get them submitted for grading. It’s not
something I do often, but this time around I went the “treat yo-self” route. YOLO, and
all that.
There was no shortage of people. My anxiety didn't let me forget it 😅
Arthur Adams - a personal GOAT, an absolute legend.
Four of the Arthur Adams books I had signed
Speaking of legends! Mr Chris Claremont, the creator of who most (myself included) would consider the canonical Uncanny X-Men.
No signature limits for Claremont so ... shoot your shot, attendee guy.
Walt and "Weezy" Simonson (!!!)
Ryan Ottley, one of my favorites current artists, holding Hulk #1
Tom King and Mitch Gerads - two of DC's best modern-day creators
Rick Leonardi at work
Several of the books I'd gotten signed, getting ready to be shipped off to CBCS for grading, and slabbing
And finally, my very dear old friend Tim, who drove up from his side of CT and that I don't get to see nearly as much as I would like
Last week we learned that our CEO of 16 years, Stefania Mallett, would be
stepping down as CEO of ezCater. After next month she’ll be embarking on the
next chapter of her life, retirement(-ish?). I mention this because this week
we had the company’s summer party, AKA “Summer Sweetness”. So it’s fitting that
we all got together to celebrate the last year+, and her time as the leader
of a company which I consider the best in my 20+ years-long career. The past
4 years have been some of the hardest, and some of the most rewarding of my
work life. An inordinate amount of credit should be paid to Stefania, as the
company she’s built is built on core principles that align well with my own. No
place is perfect, and each individual’s journey is their own, but I’m grateful
for my time here. To that, I say congrats to her, and I am forever grateful
for all she’s done. Kudos!
This week we hosted an epic Summer Sweetness, @ezCater's annual event that brings employees from all over the country to our Boston office for a week of connection, collaboration & celebration 😎
We pride ourselves on our incredible culture & people—this week reminds us why💚 pic.twitter.com/T2JKEXkofW
Aaaaaanywho – “ezCater Summer Sweetness ‘23”! There’s not much that I may say with
words that I can’t better express with photos. The people I work with make it
the place it is. So here are some photos with my co-workers from the several days
this week where we all got together.
(If anyone from my team ever reads this? Thank you for everything you do. Day
in. Day out. You are all remarkable people!)
07.18.2023: After lunch group photo in Post Office Square.
07.19.2023: Our captain, tour-guide, and knower-of-all-things "Boston Harbor" -- Scott.
07.19.2023: My co-workers, friends, and fellow Harbor-sailers enjoying a leisurely ride.
07.19.2023: It was a good trip! 👍
07.19.2023: Members, past and present, of a team I'd previously lead, but forever comrades.
07.19.2023: Myself and Derek. All smiles.
07.19.2023: Myself and Marco. Also all smiles, and potentially clearly quite tipsy!
After 9871 days the inevitable happened and Covid-19 got Sara and I. If we’re completely honest, there’s almost no way people are going to escape this thing. The opportunity to extinguish it, in the time of social media, misinformation, and buffoonery, had come and gone in a zeptosecond. So, that leaves folks like us to be ultra-vigilant with precautions, get the vaccine as soon as we could, get boosted whenever allowed and/or recommended, and be sensible when it comes to packed indoor spaces with people we don’t know2.
And that last point is where Covid had its opportunity to nip us - “Gotcha bitch!”
We’d seen Boyz II Men in concert several times in the past (Yes, that’s right. Those Boyz II Men.) So when we saw that they were playing at Foxwoods the night after Thanksgiving, we said “Sure! Why not? Let’s go!” and made our way to Connecticut. It was a fun night. We got some take-out from one of the casino restaurants, ate it in our hotel room, walked around a bit, had a drink at a bar while we waited for our meal. And then went to the show, which was pretty great. 112 and Dru Hill opened up for the main act. I know maybe 3 songs between the two of them so 🤷, whatever. Fine. Boyz II Men are great live, though so - go see them if you’re a fan. After the show, we made our way back to the room and called it a night. It was late. We’re old. We’re terrible at “the gambling”.
I realize it’s a fool’s game to try and figure out “who” and “where” and “how”, but humor me. We had been wearing masks the entire time we were inside. That leaves me with 2 possibilities:
The 15 minutes at the bar where we both had a single drink. Masks off.
The concert where a few thousand people were screaming at the top of their lungs for 2+ hours. Masks still on – mostly!
Again, a fool’s game. It doesn’t really matter. We’d made it through the weekend feeling fine until Sara started feeling off later on Sunday, early Monday. On Monday afternoon, while I was on a conference call, she knocked on my office door, opened it and exclaimed that the home test she just took was positive. Covid: “gotcha bitch!”. I still tested negative at that time. Thus began the home quarantine scramble - masks around the clock, doors closed, me sleeping on the office pull-out couch, G spending all his time at home in his room, door closed. We’d been together 24/7 for days so it was inevitable that I would be the next domino, and I was. I started feeling crappy Tuesday night, when I ultimately tested positive.
Mind you, through all this, G has tested negative every day and has not once exhibited any symptoms. Covid is weird. Sure, we’ve done everything in our power to keep him safe from it, but still. Bizarre. Kids are exceptionally resilient.
Lastly, what was it like for me? In a phrase, “exceptionally uncomfortable”. Flu-like? Bad cold? There’s no way around it, the experience was shitty. Fever for 3 days and nights – Tuesday night through Thursday night and into Friday, when I must have sweat out the last of the worst of it. I did not get a decent night’s sleep until Friday night. Chest congestion was bad, sinus pressure, terrible cough, chills, muscle aches. Sense of smell and taste were completely gone through the worst parts but that could be chalked up to the congestion in my head instead of the covid side effects. I can (sort of) taste things again, albeit somewhat muted.
Looking back on this experience (and most of the reason I am writing this, because I would like to refer to my own thoughts if [and when] this happens again) I am left with two thoughts. First, we are exceptionally fortunate and lucky to have scientists who can create the vaccines and therapies that help keep the worst at bay. That’s all we can hope for at this point – just dull the worst of it! And the shots did the job. With my own, and my family’s, medical history I can’t imagine what sort of catastrophe would await me in the absence of a vaccine. Second, while I do not want to get this again, I hope the near-term future affords me the opportunity to enjoy the next month or two without fear of catching it. Antibodies, and all that.
I’d like to be able to say “Wellp, glad that’s over! Done with Covid”. But, dear reader, that too is a fool’s game.
1: “987 days” because we consider Mar 13, 2020 as the day Covid shut everything down for us. It was the Friday we received an email from our son’s daycare stating that they would be shutting down “for the next 2 weeks”. Haha - “the next 2 weeks”! Oh man, that is rich! Anyway, 987 days between Mar 13, 2020 and Nov 25, 2022.
2: Like raw-dogging rides on the MBTA. #Sorrynotsorry but I am never riding the T without a mask again. No thank you.
As we close the chapter on the summer of ‘22 I’m left dealing with the feelings
that hit me every year at this time. “Summer’s over. School’s here. Stoke up the
anxiety machine.”
As a grown man who hasn’t been in school for more than half his life, yes. I
realize this makes no sense. Very well. Tell that to my brain.
In any case, I can look back on this summer and consider it a success. G had a
great time at his day camp. We’d made it to the Cape more than a few times to
enjoy some sun and water. I may have read a few books, and comics, that I very
much enjoyed. I saw a few movies that I also enjoyed - Nope, and Top Gun: Maverick
at the top of that list.
And we’ve managed to still ditch Covid. 🤜🪵
Looking back - I am grateful and happy.
It isn't a summer on the Cape without a few trips to a mini-golf course (or two).
The giant blue deck chair in Mashpee Commons is easy photo-op bait - so we took it.
Sara and I took a trip, just the two of us, one morning to Woods Hole to get some breakfast and take a stroll. It was lovely, as is Woods Hole.
A year or so ago I bought a Synology NAS and started to consolidate some of the disparate cloud storage services
into one single physical box that I knew I could (theoretically) control myself. It worked out well. I liked it!
I could install some packages, I could run Plex, I could back up docs, photos, mp3’s, movies, etc.
Then I started branching out a little bit and messing around with using docker to host some services that didn’t
already have Synology-related package installers. With docker-compose, this was all pretty straightforward and
didn’t give me too much headache.
Over time this has grown into a full-on “homelab” situation where I’ve migrated most services onto a small Dell server
that sits in the corner of my office plugged into a UPS. Ultimately this has turned into the sweet spot and I am
thrilled with the workflow. It looks a little something like this:
Does this service I pay for (Dropbox) have a decent alternative? Is there a docker image? Give it a shot.
Does this service which I DON’T pay for but serve as data points for a machine-learning algorithm (Google Anything) have a decent alternative? Is there a docker image? Give it a shot.
Does something look cool on /r/selfhosted that I want to try? Is there a docker image (almost 100% of the time: “Yes”)? Give it a shot.
Pretty easy.
So what has been good for me?
Dashy - A dashboard that serves as my homepage. Links to all of my self-hosted services, in their logical groups, go here.
Nginx Proxy Manager - An nginx configuration front-end. Makes setting up services and LestEncrypt certs a cynch.
Linkding - Bookmarking app a la “Pinboard” and “Del.icio.us”
Whoogle - “A self-hosted, ad-free, privacy-respecting metasearch engine “, AKA “Google front-end”. No google ads. No tracking.
Umami - A privacy-focused website analytics package. No more Google Analytics for me.
AdGuard & Pi-Hole - Both! DNS servers for local, in-house, ad blocking.
This is the tip of the iceberg. There are more, but these are good starts.
If you’re in the “tech” business you can imagine this is a potentially dangerous hole to drop down into. I
recognize this, but there’s not a chance in hell I end up like the people in /r/homelab.
Knock on wood.
Hello, I'm Joel. Hi! 👋
An engineering manager in Boston.
Lapsed "tweeter" at @jayroh.
Here I write about my family, my (bull)dogs, code and technology, and working on a little passion project named
shubox.
