Jake Sulpice

A Brief Review of 2024

Jake Sulpice — Mon, 11 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

As you can see, I’ve only posted two Andrei Tarkovsky film reviews to this blog in all of 2024. That’s not to say I haven’t had things to write about; I’ve just been much busier than expected and this site has not exactly been a top priority.

The car listing company in Los Angeles I worked at for two years abruptly let me go from my sales job in February. After about two months of job hunting, I landed a role at an aerospace fastener distributor about 35 minutes from my house, which I continue to work for today. While I don’t make quite the same pay as with my previous employer, this company offers a much more direct path for growth within the industry, and overall feels like they honestly care about their workers’ success. I’m genuinely thankful I received an offer here, and with consistently hard work, I may (hopefully) see a promotion within six months. At that stage, I’ll be making considerably more than at my previous job, and while money isn’t everything, it’s admittedly been a financial struggle as the sole source of income for my young family.

Speaking of family, my son, Kai, is the smartest little boy I’ve ever seen. He’s 2-years-old (plus 3 months) and just yesterday he spontaneously counted to 15, unprompted and without error. Kai’s shown a keep interest in vehicles, the bigger the better, and loves his new bug adventure kit for catching insects in the backyard to examine with our magnifying glass. He’s got a hilarious sense of humor, his intelligence is nearly eclipsing my own, and every moment I get to spend with him is an absolute joy. I couldn’t love him more if I tried.

Kai at the local pizza spot

In other news, I’ve dramatically fallen off with writing long-form film reviews here, as well as taking the time to watch movies to begin with. Within the past two or three months, I’ve seen less than 10 movies, whereas earlier in the year and the year before it I was averaging a solid five or six per week. The time is just not there these days, and that’s okay. As much as I’d love to watch something I haven’t seen before bed, my sleep pattern was wildly inconsistent for a long time, with work that still needs to be done in that regard. It just makes no sense to sacrifice one third of my nightly rest for a movie anymore.

There’s a lot more that has happened this year in my life, and I’d write an entire book dedicated to my beautiful little boy if I had the time, but I’ll keep this post brief. Life isn’t half bad right now.

Watching Update

Jake Sulpice — Fri, 15 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

If you’ve checked this blog recently, you may have noticed the new watching menu link.

If you were curious enough to click on it, you’ll find that I’ve been rating movies and writing about them here.

As much as I love using Letterboxd, I wanted somewhere where I could write long-form reviews that I put extra effort into. That’s where this page comes in.

Not all of my film reviews from Letterboxd are here, and I don’t plan on adding every single one, only the reviews I think are decent enough to put out there officially. I’m still using Letterboxd for everything, but if I write something I arbitrarily deem as Good™, it’ll also go here. One of the highlights of the popular film review platform is the social aspect; my website lacks that by design.

Some reviews have a lovely little star to the left of the movie title. The outlined star just indicates which reviews are longer, requiring a considerable bit more effort. Those without it will hover around three or four paragraphs, while the starred posts will have as many paragraphs as I see fit.

Hopefully, I’ll write more of these starred reviews with time. At that point, I’ll most likely remove some of the star indicators to highlight only the best of the best.

I take (almost all) screenshots myself from the source material, download subtitles to pick out specific quotes, and optimize the images manually for each post; it’s mildly tedious but also forces me to engage with the film a bit more post-viewing, helping me remember certain scenes and the timeline of events.

Anyway, I’ve put some reasonable effort into these lately, so it’d be cool if you read a few if you see any movies you’re into. Either way, it’s fun, so I’ll keep doing it when I have the energy.

On Fatherhood

Jake Sulpice — Thu, 06 Oct 2022 00:00:00 +0000

How it Started

As is tradition, I spent this past New Year’s Eve with Selene and her family. After walking in, we made our way to her room so that I could put my backpack and belongings down before heading downstairs again to watch the countdown show from Times Square. Next to her bed, some balloons were floating, but that seemed normal given the holiday.

“Do you notice anything?” Selene asked me. I looked around the room before noticing one of the balloons was that of a baby, and that’s when it suddenly hit me. I turned back to her and heard those extraordinary words, “I’m pregnant!”

It’s hard to describe the emotions that rushed over me. Once the shock had at least partially worn off, the uncertainty set in. I’ve known for some time now that I want to spend the rest of my life with this woman and raise a family; the concern was rooted in my financial insecurity. At the time, I was working as an administrative assistant and technology specialist at a local small business without medical benefits. With less than one year left on my parent’s health insurance, I knew I had to act fast to support my new family.

Immediately following that short period of anxiety, I became overwhelmed with excitement. Yes, I knew this would easily be the greatest challenge of my life, but it will undoubtedly be the most rewarding thing I’ll ever have the pleasure of experiencing.

Crunch Time

As though it were an act of God, my mother told me that her colleague’s daughter worked at a nearby driving technology company that was urgently hiring new employees. I sent in my resumé and quickly heard back regarding an interview. During the video call, the interviewers asked if they could share my resumé with their relatively young sister company, a similar business with an open position in sales, to which I agreed. Long story short, I secured the job and began working in February, earning much higher pay than I’m used to, in addition to an array of medical and financial benefits. I finally felt that feeling of security I’d spent years searching for.

After working in sales for three months, I was introduced to the new role of Account Manager and started focusing on fixing dealership inventory feeds and ensuring that clients remained billable. Not long after that, I was switched to a more data-oriented reporting role, and I have been doing this for a few months now.

I’m now in a position to provide for my new family and could not be more thrilled.

A Brand New World

On August 4th, 2022, after nearly five days of Selene having painful contractions and a severe lack of sleep, Kai Peter Sulpice-Vigil entered the world and took his first breath.

I can safely say I have never in my life felt a wave of emotion as tremendous as the moment he was born. Sobbing tears of joy next to Selene, I knew my life had just changed in ways I still have yet to fully grasp. This was it; life had a new purpose now, and I was ready to face it head-on. But as someone who deals with generalized anxiety, my nerves took a beating instantly. I was nervous when holding him out of fear that he’d slip out of my arms, and in all honesty, I was not quite prepared for this level of responsibility, though I knew I had to be.

Fast forwarding a bit, it’s now been two whole months since Kai was born, and our little man is as healthy as can be by the grace of God. However, my personal demons had only grown stronger with time due to stress and uncertainty of the future, and I admittedly haven’t been as present as I strive to be. A tiny human depends on me to survive, and the raw fear of letting my family down had taken a toll on my well-being when I should have been pushing through it to be the best father I could be. Things have not been perfect by any stretch of the word, but I can safely say that I’ve now put those internal struggles to rest and can show up for my family with every fiber of my being. Frankly, I’m finally writing this because things are getting better.

What’s Next?

Today, the future is bright. I finally feel a sense of clarity in my head and can put all my efforts into ensuring this beautiful boy has the best life possible. It won’t be easy by any means, but it’s a wildly necessary part of my life, and I strive to do my very best, not just for me and Selene, but for Kai.

I love my family to death and will do everything I can to support them in every way possible.

Minimizing My Hobbies

Jake Sulpice — Tue, 10 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been using Ableton Live on and off for over ten years now. It all began in early high school when I was inspired to make music after reading an interview with Skream, one of the early pioneers of old-school dubstep in the UK.

I quickly installed FL Studio on my barebones Windows desktop and proceeded to tinker with buttons and knobs until I was left with something I thought sounded interesting. I never really watched tutorials, and I surely didn’t read any books on music theory. My musical capabilities were essentially nonexistent.

Once I left for college, I was gifted a shiny new MacBook Pro, which I still use to this day roughly 7 years later. I had heard of Ableton Live by that point and was in love with the minimal user interface. I hadn’t exactly forged a creative workflow in FL Studio considering my low skill level, so making the switch was nearly seamless.

Since then, I’ve been using Live to produce what I can only describe as weird, pseudo-experimental trap-influenced beats that were incredibly rough around the edges and lacked proper mixing and mastering. What mattered, however, was that I was having fun doing it.

The current dilemma

Looking back on my now dormant Soundcloud and listening to the tracks I had produced in the past, it’s evident that I at least marginally progressed in skill. All things considered, I wasn’t half bad for someone who knew not an ounce of music theory or so much as sat through more than a handful of tutorials in their entirety. But something has changed since then.

My most recent upload to Soundcloud that I genuinely enjoyed creating was over an entire year ago. That’s not to say I haven’t fired up Ableton countless times since then, in fact, that’s where my dilemma lies.

Every single time I open Ableton Live with the intent of producing a beat for the fun of it I get frustrated, uninspired, and creatively void. Time and time again, I reluctantly quit after attempting to make music for anywhere from ten minutes to an hour and a half. I search for new sounds and virtual instruments to give me something to play with in hopes that it sparks some joy, and it does for a moment or two, but eventually I hit the same block that I left off at.

An expensive camera with thousands of dollars in lenses and gear doesn’t automatically make you a phenomenal photographer. The same can be said regarding music production: a great producer can create something worthwhile without needing to download thousands upon thousands of samples and presets or every VST they can get their hands on.

Where I’m at now, I just don’t truly enjoy making music anymore. Because I’ve fallen victim to downloading anything and everything that I believe will finally make my beats sound good or boost my creativity, I have roughly 800 gigabytes of samples, presets, instruments, and effects plugins stored on my single terabyte external SSD. Do I need hundreds of thousands of drum samples and pre-constructed melodies to create a two-minute beat that only a handful of people will listen to? I don’t have a problem with nobody seeing what I produce, but it feels like that would at least give me a sense of validation if I actually enjoyed the process of making them.

Out with the old

This brings me to the point I made regarding photography. I legitimately love shooting photos, and it doesn’t phase me in the slightest that I’m using a relatively entry-level Nikon DSLR. It’s perfect for me as a casual hobbyist. I’m as amateur as they come, but if I spent thousands on a top-of-the-line DSLR with loads of fancy lenses, all of that high-end gear would be wasted on me. I’m only scraping the surface of the knowledge surrounding quality camerawork and know even less about processing images, so a $5000 camera is simply not worth even dreaming about just yet.

What I’m trying to get at with this is that I think I’m spreading my interests too thin (as seen below in some hastily drawn diagrams I’ve made). I pick up new hobbies like it’s an Olympic sport, and a vast majority of these turn out to be phases lasting no longer than a week (no thanks to my attention span). It’s a miracle that I’ve clung onto music production for as long as I have, but it might be time to cut my losses.

Spreading myself too thin

I actively avoid attempting to estimate the time I’ve wasted forcing myself to make music while enjoying it for a slim fraction of time spent on it. Maybe my massive Nexus 3 installation and wildly space-consuming Kontakt libraries that I never use are better off leaving my hard drive entirely. External storage isn’t exactly that costly these days, but there isn’t a single reason for me holding on to hundreds of gigabytes of sounds I’ll never use.

Actively progressing in fewer hobbies

My final thought on this is that this time spent on a hobby I hardly like doing anymore should be used for one I actively love. Photography forces me to get out of my comfort zone and travel to new places. Learning how to take better photos challenges me and encourages me to get out and do something. It’s important for me to keep busy for a variety of reasons, but my camera fills that request with ease.

I’m going to be much happier with a hard drive full of memories and adventures than I am with forgotten drum kits and sound libraries.

Rediscovering Stability

Jake Sulpice — Mon, 22 Mar 2021 00:00:00 +0000

One thing I’ve always struggled with is keeping my life structured. I have always been told I work best when following a routine, but getting comfortable with a set schedule has never been easy for me. That being said, I feel as though I can safely say I’m finally on the right track.

A Brief Backstory

About one month ago I decided to quit my grocery store job without a clue about where I’d be working next. After many months of hardly receiving one, maybe two shifts each week, I made an executive decision for myself and thought it’d be best to search for something new. With a schedule that varied week to week and the uncertainty of whether I’d be getting a paycheck at all, I figured it would be in my best interest to focus my entire energy into looking for greater opportunities elsewhere.

While I knew this was most likely the best move for me at the time, it frightened me not knowing if and when I’d be able to secure my next position. Certainly I was unhappy at the grocery store, but leaving at a time when jobs are hard to come by was not ideal by any means. The little structure I had, if you’d go as far as even calling it that, was now gone.

At this point I knew I had to find something different; setting my sights on a role that better utilized my skillset was ambitious during a pandemic, and being too picky in my search during a time when I had to find employment quickly would leave me empty handed.

The Search Begins

After updating my resumé once more, I got to it. Applying to the countless available positions that matched my search on various job boards became vastly overwhelming. There’s nothing that crushes your spirits more than sending in an application and revisiting days later to see 1000+ applicants for a role you dearly desired.

With my hope of finding a job depleting at a pace I’d never experienced, I opened up Craigslist. Expecting the usual Work from home, DEFINITELY NOT A SCAM listings, I was unsurprised to find my expectations were still accurate. However, there was a diamond in the rough; a legitimate, local office job in a sea of telemarketing spam and multilevel marketing schemes.

Full time work, great pay, a stones throw from home; it seemed too good to be true, but I was close to getting desperate. Knowing that there would surely be a flood of applicants for the position, I took a chance and responded to the listing. Admittedly, I had never sent a cover letter before, but there I was hyping myself up about how I ticked all the boxes they were looking for.

Send. Off the email went. After another two or three hours of tediously crafting a Trello board to track my applications, I closed my laptop, grabbed my Manduka mat, and began a short yoga session in my garage to take my mind off of the fruitless job search.

No more than ten minutes into my mindful stretching, a number I didn’t recognize appeared on my phone. Nearly breathless from my now poor physical ability, I answered knowing full well that it was most likely a scam call from a fake insurance company I don’t even use; yet part of me had a glimmer of hope that it was a potential job prospect on the other end. Needless to say, I’m glad I answered the phone.

The next day I met the President of the local business to discuss the position I had applied for. Even though I was grasping for air for the first half of our 30+ minute phone conversation, she was pleased with my experience and wanted to meet me in person.

The initial meeting could not have gone any smoother. A short few days later I returned to meet with her again, this time with her business parter as well. Without going into much detail, I’ll just say that our conversation ended with I like the cut of your jib.

Due to the nature of the business, I was required to get my COVID vaccination before starting work, and by the same time the following week I had began my first day on the job.

Why Does This Matter?

What I’m trying to get at is that I need structure in my life. I need a rigid schedule to succeed or I will undoubtedly lose my balance. Whether it be school, work, hobbies, or anything else I have on my plate, I need to be busy in order to stay in check.

With my college studies being entirely online, often without a set time for lectures or labs, it becomes difficult to stay focused and plan out my days or weeks. Having a job with a fixed 9-5 schedule not only consumes a good chunk of my time, but it allows me to plan my other activities around it, forcing me to be efficient with my scheduling.

Not only do I now get to plan effectively, I also genuinely enjoy my new job. I no longer dread going into work. I look forward to tackling the challenges I’ll face each day and proving my worth, which in turn keeps me happy once I return home to attack my next tasks for the evening.

Structure is important. At least, for me it is. As I continue progressing at work I’ve noticed many other improvements in my daily life, whether it be consistently waking up at six in the morning or something as simple as choosing to read a book before bed. I’ve found new value with my time and as a result have become more productive.

Productivity isn’t everything, however. The fact that I have less time to do activities I enjoy at home forces me to put in more effort into my hobbies, genuinely pushing me to put my best foot forward and work towards my goals. In the past, it felt as though I wouldn’t progress in the things I love because I just had too much time. There was no sense of urgency, I had all the time in the world and that was counterintuitive to my progression.

Conclusion

Finally getting a rigid, consistent, structured schedule has been widely beneficial for my overall wellbeing. I love doing things I used to enjoy again. I act with the desire for personal and professional growth. I feel well for the first time in ages.

It’s wildly important not to overwork yourself, whether it be at home or on the job, but finding that balance leads to a greater sense of peace and fulfillment within my own life. I dearly missed having a strong routine. I don’t feel scattered anymore. I feel like I’m on the right track again.

Deploying a Lobsters Clone: What I Learned

Jake Sulpice — Sat, 09 May 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Introduction

At the very end of March, I decided I’d try my hand at deploying a real website. I’ve created my fair share of static blogs before, but have never attempted a fully fledged web app with complex code and a database. This project proved to be an immense challenge and consumed an extreme amount of my time each day. In the end, those sleepless nights taught me some invaluable lessons I may have not learned otherwise. This is the gist of where it started, the direction I took with it, what happened along the way, and what the future holds.

How It All Began

When I saw that Lobste.rs allowed users to launch sister sites using the same code, I immediately decided I wanted to give it a shot. Lobsters is an elegant discussion board and link aggregator that perfectly aligns with my minimalist ideals, and I began thinking of ideas for a site of my own.

I knew next to nothing about deploying websites aside from Wordpress blogs and those made with static-site generators like the one you’re viewing now. Although the challenges it posed were not insignificant, I embraced it as an opportunity for enjoyable learning.

My initial brainstorming process for the site’s purpose led me to the idea of creating a hip-hop discussion platform with a strong emphasis on providing high-quality content and thoughtfully written pieces. Maintaining a uniform standard of quality across all content proved difficult, and achieving consistent quality in posts and comments yielded mixed results.

Now that the idea was in place, I gave it a shot. I failed and gave it another. This cycle of failing and trying again from square one continued, losing hope, but my amazing partner encouraged me time after time to take a break for the day and give it a fresh attempt tomorrow. After roughly two weeks of trial and error, it somehow worked and was accessible at the cheap .xyz domain I had registered nearly a month prior while considering website names.

I was ecstatic. I’m not sure what exactly did the trick, but it was finally up and running. My next step was to adjust the codebase to better meet my needs, which involved opening up registration, configuring the email server, and constructing an automatic dark mode for those who have enabled it on their devices.

Whenever I encountered a challenge or needed a fix, I sought help in IRC channels and on programming websites. The response was overwhelming — kind strangers generously offered support and guidance to a novice like me. I’d try the solutions suggested to me, and if they didn’t work the first time, I would head to Google, armed with a rough idea of where the problem lies, hoping to find a more precise answer. I wanted to learn how to find answers independently, instead of just getting them from a chatroom.

The successful completion of each improvement would fill me with overwhelming joy. Somewhere within the process, it clicked, and I found a new passion that I hadn’t known existed. I felt like I was doing it. I was deploying a website and creating a new community for a music genre I love. I truly thought that was the case, but while not completely wrong, I was thoroughly mistaken.

Where I Went Wrong

My enthusiasm for the site quickly turned into an unhealthy obsession. Before certain aspects of the website were even operational, my attention shifted from learning about site creation to user growth. I lost sight of what mattered.

The problem originated from the very beginning. My focus during this project was on the result, not on learning as I went. To be fair, I just wanted to create an online community for people who shared my enthusiasm for this topic. I admittedly wasn’t doing this all to become a web developer.

The fact was, I wasn’t making any genuine progress in my learning. Sure, regarding reaching out for help, I was doing a decent job; but my questions were essentially asking for others to fix my problems for me. Instead of asking why my solution was flawed, I asked for someone else to hand me a solution of their own.

I’m grateful for the fantastic help I received from many online users who addressed my coding issues. One individual, in particular, was incredibly helpful, offering a Skype screen share to guide me through a complex problem that I’m still working on.

But one developer stood out from the rest. He had helped me with issues as I initially deployed the website, but only recently did I realize his approach veered from the others. That person was Peter Bhat Harkins, or pushcx, current administrator of Lobsters.

What differed in Peter’s guidance was the fact that his suggestions were not as direct and straightforward. While asking my somewhat specific yet remarkably broad questions, he would respond with a more open-ended explanation instead of precisely outlining which lines of code I had to change and in what manner.

At first, I didn’t even recognize this difference in direction. It was only a couple of days ago that I realized what he was doing; he was guiding me toward solving the problems on my own. Rather than copying snippets of code that were given to me, he gave me a veiled hint about where the trouble was and let me figure it out myself.

He who learns but does not think is lost. He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.

Confucius

In retrospect, this was extraordinary advice. Cultivating the ability in students to learn independently, no matter the subject, is a valuable skill for any teacher or mentor, and its importance transcends the specific content being learned. The only problem here was that I didn’t know anything about Ruby on Rails, so I couldn’t exactly locate the specifics of the issue.

I take full responsibility for that. As mentioned before, my focus was on reaching the finish line swiftly rather than starting from scratch and learning step by step. I skipped studying even the basics of Ruby and jumped straight into deploying my version of Lobsters. To be honest, even my Git skills were lacking, and I didn’t discover the power of grep until halfway through this entire undertaking. I dove right into production, neglecting any testing or creating test versions of the website.

Even a basic grasp of the core principles behind Lobsters would equip me with some useful knowledge about applying my own solutions. I regretfully took shortcuts, which wasn’t the wisest idea.

Peter recognized this from the start. While asking one of my unclear questions, he directed me towards two excellent resources for getting into real web development; Roadmaps.sh and Learn Enough.

He also gave me some of the best encouragement I’ve ever received when I’d repeatedly express my gratitude and acknowledge my lack of programming expertise, saying things like, “I’m not exactly that knowledgeable about programming.”

pushcx: You’ve done better than some programmers who’ve picked it up. Great persistence and curiosity. Consider a career.

jslp: That’s means so much to hear, thank you! I actually began as a CS major years ago but fell off the path and hopped around majors, but after this I genuinely think I’m going to give it another go!

pushcx: I mean… you’re doing it. Whether or not somebody gave you a piece of paper, you obviously can do some. At this point it’s just figuring out what you want to learn about and digging in. Finishing railstutorial.org would probably be good, help you learn to maintain [redacted site name]. https://roadmap.sh/ has some good pointers for what to learn next - before you get intimidated, remember you don’t have to learn everything to accomplish stuff.

pushcx: and if you want to talk to some programmers, I sent you a lobsters invite :)

jslp: I’ll definitely check those both out, thank you for the suggestions! I’m hoping to keep this sister-site maintained for as long as I can so I better start at least learning some basics.

Now What?

That brings me to the point I’m at now. I initially wanted to make a special place for sharing music and harboring discussion related to hip-hop, but at some point, I realized I genuinely loved making it all work.

Thanks to Peter’s suggestion, I purchased the complete Learn Enough subscription bundle covering everything from the very start. I know enough about text editors and the command line (apparently besides using grep), but I’m starting at the top to ensure I miss nothing I don’t know.

Last night before heading to sleep, I began chapter one of the command line tutorial and already appreciate its teaching methods. If I’m stuck during the Learn Enough tutorial, I can also turn to the private Slack server where subscribers can ask questions and get advice from other learners and instructors.

As for the website, I’m not sure what I’ll end up doing with it in the foreseeable future. Seeing as there’s only a handful of users that are active, some of which only visit every few days, I may decide to shut it down in a few weeks unless it sees some more growth somehow. I don’t want to take it down after investing so much time into it for the past month, but eliminating the costs associated with server hosting, domain renewal, and site backups will offset this Learn Enough subscription.

That being said, figuring that out isn’t too high on my list of priorities right now. If hip-hop listeners find use from the website and actively contribute enough to make discussion worthwhile, I’ll happily continue paying for it while implementing what I learn on the site as I progress in the course. Otherwise, I may keep it up anyway as a practice environment, move to cheaper hosting, or delete it entirely; again, I haven’t totally decided on this and am not in a rush to do so.

Conclusion

It’s been incredibly fun to maintain my website over the past few weeks, and this project has been an invaluable learning experience, helping me understand my career path and how to tackle any problems I encounter.

One short month ago, I knew absolutely nothing about…

Web apps and their creation
The components required for production deployment
Web frameworks like Rails or Django
SQL databases
Basically, the entirety of launching the website

Today I can safely say I know the basics about…

What web applications are and what they do
HTTP servers (Nginx)
Application servers (Passenger)
The purpose of web frameworks
Basic Ruby on Rails
Some key aspects of MySQL configuration
The importance of a local development environment
Editing CSS style sheets using variables
SSL/TSL certificates
Setting up a remote mail server — and preventing emails from directly going to spam
Backing up websites and databases
Grep

From a broader perspective, I also gained knowledge about…

Which career path I’m passionate about
How to seek help with programming-related errors
Where to find resources to help achieve my goals
How tremendously gracious the developer community is at helping a struggling new guy
That learning is a constant process that lasts a lifetime

Special Thanks

If you made it this far, thanks for reading. I wasn’t sure how much I was going to write about this, but this was a really important project of mine that consumed around 12 hours every day for a month and taught me some amazing lessons that will stay with me for my whole life.

Most importantly, thank you to my wonderful girlfriend, Selene, who supported me day in and day out every step of the way. You encouraged me beyond words and helped me believe in myself when I doubted if I could get the site working to begin with. You listened to me talk about it every single day nonstop, and I know that must have been annoying after the third day, if that. If you weren’t by my side to listen to me vent that night about whether this was worth anything, I wouldn’t have come to these positive conclusions at all and would have seen this whole thing as a complete failure on my part. I love you so much.

Huge thanks to my family for seeing how much this meant to me and encouraging me throughout. I know I’ve been spending a lot of time working on this for a while now, but you and I both recognize it’s rare of me to focus on something with this intensity for longer than a week or two.

I’d like to give a big shout-out to Peter (pushcx) for the constructive guidance and incredible encouragement throughout this entire endeavor. Your help was crucial, as it allowed me to learn essential lessons I might have otherwise missed, potentially continuing the careless expansion of my poorly managed sister-site without ever gaining that knowledge (or perhaps learning it independently much later).

I also want to extend my thanks to creature on the Freenode IRC server for offering to take time out of his schedule to teach me via Skype about how to solve a specific problem I was running into. For multiple days in a row, you offered suggestions and advice to me in the Rails channel during your busy workday, and I appreciate everything you’ve assisted me with.

Even though you all probably aren’t reading this, big thank you to everyone who visited the website and gave encouragement and feedback. I wouldn’t have continued with the project if the response wasn’t overwhelmingly positive from those who gave comment, and wouldn’t know what I know now. The same goes for the handful of Rails developers who searched the site for bugs and errors I might have missed. I appreciate you all more than I can express in writing.

Recap: Catalina

Jake Sulpice — Fri, 23 Aug 2019 00:00:00 +0000

This is my blog, so I’m going to post something sappy if I want to.

Yesterday, I celebrated my 23rd birthday with a trip to Avalon, Catalina, thanks to my beautiful girlfriend. I wanted to take a trip to the island to create long-lasting memories, and we achieved that goal. It was her first time to Catalina, and on a boat, so I was excited to show her a completely new place she has never experienced before.

We departed from San Pedro at 8 in the morning for Avalon, and the excitement was unmatched. I don’t usually do much on my birthdays, so this was a welcomed treat. The boat ride was smooth and serene, and thankfully neither of us got seasick on the way to the island. Once we arrived, we got some delicious food at a pancake house. She ordered an egg white omelet while I went with the classic eggs benedict and some grilled Portuguese sausage on the side. Although crowded and a bit loud, the restaurant was pleasant and delivered some terrific food.

Once we finished our hearty breakfast, off we went to acquire our hiking permits to wander around the city as we pleased. We chose a trail and began our trek to the trailhead. To nobody’s surprise, the walk there took about an hour, as we opted not to rent a golf cart and instead travel on foot. It turns out we were a bit unprepared and didn’t stock up on water or sunscreen before the journey, leading to me constantly in search of a water fountain or vending machine.

Although the hike to the hike took a bit longer than anticipated, we had a wonderful time shooting photos on the way, even stopping at the nature center midway to see close-ups of insects and various rocks and gems found around the island.

Once arriving at the beginning of the actual trail, we hiked back down instead and got some much-needed food and water. We had a DIY photoshoot with my tripod on the way back, taking some wildly cute couples photos together, something we’ve meant to do for some time now. The walk was a bit quicker as it was now on a downward slope but still took some time. We managed to see roughly fifteen ground squirrels on the route, so that was nice, though one of them was being aggressively attacked by a woodpecker as it attempted to run from one burrow to the next.

Upon reaching civilization once more, we got some fantastic lunch at a bistro above the conservancy center. At this point, we realized it might be a bit drawn out to stay for another four or five hours before departing back to the mainland, so we changed our itinerary to leave a bit earlier than planned. Even with this altered schedule, we managed to fit in a relaxing kayak voyage around the bay and some sublime ice cream and gelato before heading off to leave.

Honestly, this was easily the best birthday I’ve had in my 23 years on this planet. Usually, my birthday celebrations are a tad bit boring and uneventful aside from gifts from my parents and an excellent dinner at night; but this time was a refreshing experience. I got to spend the day with the woman I love, and for that, I will never forget it. To top everything off, we enjoyed some poke bowls back at home, and I was able to blow out the candles on a decadent chocolate cake full of berries that I love.

I don’t often have plans for my birthday, but this time was different. I felt joyous and free the entire trip and couldn’t have been a happier man if I tried. I wasn’t even planning on writing about this here, but it was such a great day that I had to. I want this ingrained in my memory for years to come.

You get one day a year to celebrate your birth; it’d be a shame to waste it sitting on your friend’s couch talking about nonsense for hours like I usually did in the past. As cliche as it is, experience life to the fullest, travel as much as you can, and do what you love, especially on a day when you can do whatever you please. I couldn’t be more thankful for the loving relationships I have in my life.

Five out of five stars.