Jump to content
NEurope

Will

Members
  • Content count

    3,363
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    17

Everything posted by Will

  1. Making 'big' decisions

    I feel like I’ve made a fair few big decisions in my time, and I have a very easy way of evaluating them. The way I do it is to imagine myself in the future, say 5 or 10 years down the line, and evaluate what I’d think of the good/bad of each option and try to see where the balance lies - it usually comes down to will you regret not trying the “change” part of the decision you’re making vs. will life actually progress if you stay as you are. For me, this has served me well in every big change I’ve thought about. In your situation I’d weigh it up as if I move and the whole thing fucks up what do you do? Probably move back and within a few months be back to where you were before you left, but with the experience of trying it. If you don’t move, what will you think in 10 years time? For me, at least, I’d probably be incrementally better off than I was before but always wondering what might have been - this might be different for you, but it will give you a pretty good indicator of what you want to do. We really only have so many years to do things like this, if you have the chance, it’s really something special to do. I moved away ten years ago now and I’ve not once regretted it - experiencing new places/people/things as something more than a holiday is honestly life changing. If I were you I would 100% do it.
  2. Job woes/wins

    Bad managers ruin everything. Pretty much everywhere I’ve worked have had Scrum as the base methodology used. I’ve definitely seen it used badly but the last really product related role I had it really worked amazingly well. I think if you actually have the right people on the management/product side Scrum can be one of the best things to keep everyone locked together and working towards the same goals. My current role is about as far away from product as I’ve ever been and I’ve semi-implemented some Scrum stuff into how my team works and it’s worked well even outside of development imo. Disclaimer - I am a manager type and you are free to discard everything I said.
  3. House buying is the worst

    Wow, that’s quite a difference! We wouldn’t be able to have any sort of life but that sort of difference would push us up into the next bracket of property if we maxed out.
  4. House buying is the worst

    Yeah it’s what I always hear, and mostly agree with it. I guess it’s just kicking the pain further down the road and potentially in a bigger manner. We’ve been looking at some online mortgage calculators and seems we can afford the type of place we’d like to live in pretty easily. Did you all find much change when you started speaking to proper advisors? I don’t want to get excited because a website tells me I can live in a great place only to find that the reality is we have to move into a shared studio in the basement.
  5. Job woes/wins

    What framework were you using before? I feel like the whole point of scrum is to cut down things like that so not great if it’s adding more time you’re not being productive.
  6. Job woes/wins

    If you’re having a set meeting with the whole team for backlog refinement then it almost certainly will become a total waste of time, just as you fear. It really shouldn’t be something you need to do if you have a decent product owner imo.
  7. House buying is the worst

    The hassle of all of this really does sound like a nightmare. We’re currently looking into places and I’m really steering towards just buying a new build to avoid all of this chain nonsense. Seems like there are some really good options in the exact place we want to be so it might actually work out.
  8. Job woes/wins

    After a lot of back and forth (mostly from my side) I finally accepted the offer. Still really not sure about being in the UK given everything we see on the news, but the job seems so much better than what I’m currently doing I knew I’d regret it if I didn’t at least give it a try. Will be starting remotely from Singapore while we figure out our move back. Will use it as a bit of a trial run and if things don’t work out at least we haven’t moved back for nothing. Excited but very nervous is probably how I’d describe things right now.
  9. What Have You Bought?

    Bought some more toys:
  10. Formula 1: 2021 Season

    Supper happy to see Ricciardo take the win, would love it if they can continue their upward trend next year and mount a serious title challenge. I think with the sprint races they still have some work to do on the format, but I do like there being something important each day of the weekend. At the moment it’s some weird thing that is not quite qualifying and not quite the race. Hopefully they can work out how to make it it’s own nice thing and I reckon it will be a welcome addition to the weekend.
  11. What Have You Bought?

    I’ve bought a few toys recently:
  12. Spider-Man 2 (20th October 2023)

    I was just last night saying to a friend I hope this gets announced soon as it’s one of my most wanted games. Really looking forward to it, just wish it wasn’t so far away.
  13. Nintendo x Lego collab

    Oh man that’s fantastic! I know what (one of) my Christmas present is!
  14. Job woes/wins

    It took a bit longer than I expected but I got the job! They offered me everything I asked for with a crazy good bonus scheme. Trying to figure out if we really want to be based in the UK now. Not at all sure what we will do but definitely leaning towards coming home.
  15. Olympic Games Tokyo 2020

    Need to try and catch up as I’ve seen nothing so far due to a bit of a weird week. Unfortunately, after amazing coverage of the Olympics, they’re only showing stuff that has Singaporeans competing for the Paralympics. Is the UK coverage BBC or someone else?
  16. Job woes/wins

    That sounds like such a weird IT policy to me. I assume you’re allowed to do whatever you want with it given that you’re sharing in the cost of it? Can you stick with your current machine and they’ll pay you more?
  17. Photography.

    This all makes sense, and gives me confidence the Sony route is a good one to go down. The Fujis look nice but those models are 2 to 3 times as expensive as what I’m looking at and I think a bit beyond what I’d like to spend. This looks like a great setup, but again that camera and lens would be going way over budget for me. The A6600 seems to me to be the next step up in equipment, not really entry level as I’m going for. Definitely tempted to go body only but… This probably makes sense. Buy the camera with the included kit lens and just use it and see what I need/want to buy next. The Twitch/streaming thing is definitely a try it out in my setup and see what works, I’ve tried a ton of webcams and other solutions since working from home and none have quite got it right for me. The family picture thing is definitely more in-the-moment action shots than formal portraits, have never really liked pictures like that. For sure. To me, as a total newbie, it looks great and has a lot of features I’d want to play with as I learn more. The mic thing is definitely a good point, I’ve basically been thinking I’d see how the camera on its own goes and then maybe buy one of the Rode wireless systems or a more permanent mic for my desk dependent on what the needs are. Thanks for all the comments and advice, I kind of feel comfortable picking one of these up now and seeing what happens with it. Just need to find one in stock.
  18. Job woes/wins

    Should hear back on Monday on whether I’ll be offered a position back in the UK. It’s something far more aligned with what I want to be doing that what I am now, and with a lot of scope to build a team and strategy as I see fit. Not totally sure if coming back is what I want to be doing but they have said they are embracing flexibility and if I want to work remotely for a few months a year it shouldn’t be a problem. Really not sure what I’ll do if they offer it to me.
  19. Photography.

    Yeah the Twitch/Vlogging side of things is definitely a smaller priority right now. I guess it’s mainly that this seems like a good entry-level interchangeable lens camera that has some nice features to ease into having something more than a smartphone. I don’t think I’m too interested in spending more than this costs, it’s more is this worth it as an upgrade from the smartphone really. Still not sure what to do, I hover between definitely don’t do it and buy it with a load of extra lenses immediately.
  20. Photography.

    I've not owned a camera for quite a while as, generally, I find my phone OK for most of what I do. I've recently been thinking of picking up the Sony ZV-E10 but I'm not sure if it's just a waste of money. Generally, I want it for better family pictures and would probably use it as a webcam too. I might at some point use it for twitch streaming but given I've never really gotten into that too much it's definitely a lower priority. Any thoughts on whether it's worth it?
  21. Virtual Reality

    Can’t really tell too much from the trailer but I love the Star Wars VR stuff so will definitely pick this up.
  22. Olympic Games Tokyo 2020

    Yeah it’s was awesome second week, really enjoyed the whole thing. Yeah it definitely sucks, but I guess that’s all part of the sport and sometimes it doesn’t go your way. I really enjoyed the final couple of days from the velodrome and the athletics stadium. Some of the events I couldn’t take my eyes off, I’ve always been a big fan of the middle distance running and they did not disappoint. Particularly enjoyed the mens 1,500m but the last couple of days I think almost every event was worth watching. One thing that really got to me was the music for the podium ceremonies. Seeing how happy some of the athletes were with that music playing there were more than a few times I felt myself welling up a bit. Having worked so hard for so many years, missing the Olympics last year and then not being sure they would happen this year either, it must be such a huge outpouring of emotion for anyone that gets to that point. The marathon ones during the closing ceremony were especially nice this time, being basically the only ones with any sort of crowd. Also nice that the men’s marathon silver and bronze were both refugees finding new homes in Europe and then being able to go on and compete in the Olympics, just a great story to finish off with I thought. My wife was very angry with the closing ceremony, she didn’t like the Tokyo Sunday afternoon in the park section and thought they were stupid for arranging it like that. Going as far as to say it put Japan in a bad light to the rest of the world. Personally I thought it was great, not up there with London but given the circumstances I thought they put on a damn good show. I particularly liked the AR light show making the Olympic Rings. Looking forward to the Paralympics, another one I’ll try and catch the majority of. I also hadn’t realized until the end of this that we’re barely six months away from the Winter Olympics too!
  23. House buying is the worst

    Sounds very reasonable! I’m (very casually) looking in the Midlands and at 260k you really don’t get too much even up there. So 5% seems possible but not ideal I guess? Will have to look into this a lot more, thanks for the info. In reality it will probably take us quite a while to find something so we can probably get closer to the 10% deposit by the time we find something to buy. Might be some family help too so that will play a part. Definitely enjoying looking at what’s available though, at the top end of our budget there are some really nice places.
  24. House buying is the worst

    What sort of deposit are you guys being asked to put down at the moment? We’re starting to seriously consider moving back to the UK and if we did I’d probably look to buy rather than rent. Unfortunately my savings got wiped out last year but we’ve managed to build them back up fairly well over the last 12 months. If we were to move back tomorrow then at the price range we’re looking at a 5% deposit would be pretty easy, but maybe with a more realistic time frame we might be able to push closer to 10% - are decent deals available with that kind of deposit?
  25. Olympic Games Tokyo 2020

    I always enjoy the Olympics and this one is no exception. It’s nice to finally be in the same timezone(ish) as the event and I’ve been able to have it on while I work and catch pretty much everything I’m interested in. For a country that doesn’t really do sport the coverage here has been fantastic. They pretty much give a full schedule of every sport and I’d say 95% of them are being shown live. There is something stupid like 30 channels showing this stuff here. If you’re using a VPN I’d really recommend watching Singapore’s coverage if there are specific things you want to see. On a personal level this is also a really weird one for me. The Olympics was my ‘target’ when I moved to Japan to have done five years there and the time I’d be thinking about my next adventure. I ended up only doing two years and life took me on it’s own adventure. Moving away 2020 was always a target for a long holiday and then with COVID I’d hoped that this year they would finally sort of be an end point for this whole thing. I guess things never really work out quite how you plan them.
×