Hi, I'm James

Me and a friend have a bond over our shared appreciation of how much better this song is than it has any right to be. It's nothing sophisticated, and was definitely aimed at 2008 teenage girls, but it's also just so well done that I had to add it to my list of cheesy pieces I transcribe.

During COVID, I developed a system for myself which radically transformed my life. Before, I'd been a chronic procrastinator, desperately trying various approaches to get myself into the habit of being productive. While this tool has served me very well, I want a version of it which I can carry on my phone.

Finished April 2024

For a little while now, I've been trying to slowly build up shimi into a toolkit of neat little features that musicians or programmers alike can use for easily experimenting with MIDI music. The latest item in the collection is a Chord Progression Editor, which believe it or not has proven to be the most complex addition yet.

Finished October 2023

FF7 was one of the first console games I ever owned. My cousin heard that me and my brothers were getting a PS1 for Christmas, and immediately asked his dad to get it for us. While I was truly terrible at playing the game as a kid, I developed such strong memories of it. So, when I wanted a piece to practice my ear training, the novel, often folksy pieces that Nobuo Uematsu composed for the game jumped to mind.

Finished August 2023

While going back home to the UK, I got introduced to Richard Osman's House of Games and kind of fell in love with it. I do enjoy a quiz, but so many of them rely simply on testing your general knowledge, where you either know the answer or you don't.

Finished February 2023

I've found that playing piano by yourself, and playing in front of other people are 2 totally different experiences. I can practice a piece to the point where I know it better than some of my oldest friends, and yet when I get up to play in front of others, none of that matters! My mind goes totally blank.

Finished December 2023

Depending on who you ask, this is either a horribly trashy early 2000s pop song, or an absolute masterpiece by Toronto's most distinguished musical group since Rush. Wanting to keep working on my ear training, I decided to transcribe this song about 3 guys who'll go down on you, but only if you suck them off first.

Finished September 2023

I built a library a little while ago to compliment my main shimi library. This library was made up of a number of web components to provide easy UI capabilities to apps using shimi. As time went on though, simply getting the project to build started to become an act in blind faith, and so, I did what all good developers threaten to do, and did a full rewrite.

Finished April 2023

I went into this book mainly just because it had been recommended by others, but didn't really expect it to change my perception of developing much. As I started reading through it though, I was really surprised.

Finished February 2023

I joined Toastmasters back in 2019 to help with my confidence speaking in public, and since joining I've found it a great creative outlet for myself. This year I decided to try joining in the annual speech contest, giving a talk about a solo bicycle trip I did in 2016 from Vancouver to New York.

Finished December 2023

As much as I enjoy living in Toronto, I've had enough of the crazy rent prices that make saving a meaningful amount of money a truly glacial process. On top of that, as someone who's naturally a bit of a minimalist, I wanted to test myself a little and see if I'm able to actually live minimally enough that I'm able to do so with no fixed abode.

Finished August 2023

My goal when I decided to start relearning piano was to become the most rounded musician that I could be, meaning I don't care about playing the most technically advanced pieces, but could play with some level of technical proficiency, could improvise, could sight read somewhat well, and most importantly, could hear music well. To this end, I built myself my own little ear trainer.

Finished March 2023

For a while now, I've liked the idea of having my own little corner of the internet which I can tinker around with every once in a while and show the things that I'm proud of in a way that's more flexible than any of the social media platforms would allow. In the process of getting this all set up, I figured that I might as well further develop a skill in the process.

I think the thing I love about Dave's channel is that he focuses on pretty much everything except the code itself. What started out primarily as a way for him to advocate for practicing continuous delivery grew in scope to now focus on giving advice on pretty much an good practices that developers can adopt to become more efficient. I also love that while Dave shows passion for the ideas he presents, he still does his best to be fair and even-handed in his advice.

Luckily, I'm at a company right now where I feel valued, and overall is a fairly healthy place to work. That hasn't always been the case though. I think every developer has at some time or another worked somewhere that just drained the life out of them. Jayme is great at discussing the soft-skills of the job, with plenty of stories from his own career. I just find it very beneficial and re-assuring to listen to what he has to say.

Just like many people, I first got interested in software development because I wanted to make my own games. While I haven't tried my hand at game making in a long time now, I still enjoy learning about the process. Sebastian always seems to be drawn to trying out the weird and experimental ideas. Regardless of what the end result plays like, they're always fascinating and beautiful to watch.

When I first started looking away from the .NET world that I'd lived in for several years, and towards getting more involved with Javascript, Tania's guides were such a godsend. Beyond that, I really like the description of her website as her digital garden, which is the approach I want to take with my website too.