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Alison Hawke

Alison Hawke

New Mac build

I got a shiny new Mac laptop for work use this week, and was thinking about the stuff you put on a machine to make it useful. This is my current set of necessary-for-work software: Homebrew (to get everything else) ChromeFirefoxGit (to get code in progress) Node.js (to get

Now, 11 November, 2017

Thinking aboutRecruiting, training, and how to propagate a good company culture across locations so you get siblings instead of clones. I would like to see offices that incorporate the best of the local area and the home office culture. Stimuli and inputChewed through "The Rook" by Daniel O&

Taos Wool Festival, 2017

I went to New Mexico, for the Taos Wool Festival with Laura, we took a weaving class with Liz Gipson. It was my first time in New Mexico and the scenery was stunning. Mountains, just hanging out like it's perfectly normal to wake up and see the sun

Norfolk Rusks

Back in the distant past in Britain, there was the Yorkshire Television company, who had a show called Farmhouse Kitchen. I went to university with two volumes of recipes from that show in books that were copyrighted in 1975. This is an adaptation of one of those recipes to be

Eclipse 2017

Using a tree as a pinhole camera, these were taken a bit before the eclipse and fifteen minutes before totality. Traffic stopped, everyone was out and looking at the sky. Even though the sun was down to a tiny sliver, it was still almost full daylight. Then the light dimmed

Now, 12 August, 2017

Thinking aboutPublic speaking, I have stuff to say! Co-presented a talk at the company internal conference, 'Free cookies and usability for all,' and baked nine dozen cookies for it. I never want to smell cinnamon and brown sugar again. Solo speaker on a lightening talk, 'Agile for

Sourdough Scones

I've been tweaking a recipe for sourdough scones, and it feels sufficiently different from the original to put it here. I found this recipe on Sourdough Surprises, who credits Sourdough Diva (no longer online) Ingredients: * 2 cups of sourdough starter (about 460g) * 1 1/2 cups of bread

Now, 2 July, 2017

Thinking aboutStill noodling on distraction and focus, also considering the system one and system two thinking that Arthur Doler laid out in a useful and informative Lunch and Learn at work. Picked up a copy of Cal Newport's book "Deep Work," it seems to tie in

QA skills besides testing

Figure out who you areThe Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) test is useful. Are you an introvert or an extrovert? How do you handle stress? Are you a pattern-noticing person? Are you a visual, tactile, textual, or auditory person? Try a DiSC test. Figure out how you learnQA is a career

Now, 22 April 2017

Thinking aboutDistraction. I turned off all the notifications on my phone except texts, it feels like I have less pressure to poke at my phone at all times. Also thinking a lot about how you lead a team across multiple cities, especially ones you can't just drive to.

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