Preface
This piece records and reflects on my life from May 1, 2023 to May 20, 2023.
As I type this first line, I realize it has been delayed for three weeks. Many interesting things happened during this period, but it seems my desire to share has been gradually fading. I only jotted down some fragmented thoughts in Logseq, and despite several attempts to organize them, I couldn’t find the right approach. So I didn’t force it. The stagnation lasted until last week when I was slowly recovering, but then I became busy with an upcoming project launch. It was postponed to this weekend, and before I knew it, here we are.
Strangely enough, after surviving three years of the pandemic as one of the rare uninfected people around me, I caught it in this wave. My fever reached 39.5°C over the weekend, and I initially thought it was just a minor cold. It wasn’t until Monday, when I was almost recovered, that I thought to take an antigen test. Sure enough, it showed two lines. Overall, it was a mild case - I had a fever for a day, a sore throat that felt like swallowing knives for another day, and then gradually recovered. I suppose you could say I speed-ran COVID.
So this weekend marks a moment when everything seems to be improving. Most of the project requirements have been completed, giving me a brief respite. My COVID recovery serves as a wake-up call for my health. Pinch, post-neutering, has had its stitches removed and regained its lively nature. I’ve also started to resume my normal input and output frequency.
During the May Day holiday, I went to Chengdu to attend an event and met some friends. After a hurried trip, I went to Xi’an for a leisure tour and met a long-lost college roommate, finally fulfilling a years-old promise, though we were nearly stranded at the airport due to the return-to-work rush. There were many other interesting events as well.
Old Friends and Past Emotions
I have a roommate who, despite only being classmates for our freshman year (he later transferred majors), has stayed in touch with me to this day. As the number of people I can call friends dwindles, this connection becomes particularly precious. During college, we made a promise to meet in his hometown of Xining. Years have passed, I’ve moved through several cities, and he has settled in Xi’an for work. After years apart, I took the opportunity of the May Day holiday to visit Xi’an. It wasn’t really a tourist trip, just drinking and chatting, just like old times.
In my memory, he was unrestrained and cynical. Due to our frequent chats or phone calls, our long-awaited reunion still felt familiar. Beyond the mundane routine of work, he still persists in running, playing guitar, and reading. He still disdains and dissatisfies with worldly matters, yet lives along his own trajectory, with a newfound gentleness.
As it was my first visit to Xi’an, despite it being the May Day holiday, I still braved the crowds to briefly visit tourist attractions like the Big Wild Goose Pagoda. Back when I was still passionate about photography, I would always carry my camera and take many shots wherever I went. After the trip, I would edit and share the photos. But after several years of the pandemic, this enthusiasm has gradually faded. On trips in the past two years, even if I brought my camera on a whim, I often couldn’t capture much. It seems that neither natural nor cultural landscapes can truly captivate me anymore. What remains are more often the casual group photos taken on the spur of the moment.
Rediscovered Desire to Share
My hard drive also contains numerous unorganized photo and video materials. Most of them have been rendered untimely by the passage of time, relegated to being fragments of memory scattered in some folder. I remember before my birthday in 2021, due to many events that had occurred, I shot some videos, intending to share and record those experiences as a video birthday summary. In the end, I never got around to organizing those materials, and later, I didn’t even leave much in writing.
It wasn’t until 2022 that I started recording again. In the blink of an eye, a year has passed. Perhaps because it’s a similar time of year, I’ve been having trouble sleeping lately, inevitably revisiting some traces of the past, or suddenly feeling wistful when a friend remarks, “It’s been a whole year already.” Recently, when I want to put pen to paper, I often worry about continuing to write about those somewhat depressing emotions. Although genuine, they feel powerless and leave me feeling exhausted.
Upon careful reflection, I’ve made some changes this year, bringing me closer, more or less, to the person I want to become. As I wished, I’ve gained some freedom, both in work and daily life, bringing me closer to life itself. Although I still procrastinate at times, I’ve recorded many of my thoughts and insights, thinking more about self-reflection. I’ve learned some things I wanted to learn and explored and practiced more of my own ideas. I’ve also experienced some interesting things in the company of friends, not confining myself to my own world as I did last year.
Everything seems to be slowly improving, and for things that can’t be changed, I’ve resolved to move forward. This is how I console myself.
Fortunately, recent progress in both work and life has been quite good, with some positive signals. I’ve also gradually noticed the return of my desire to share and create. After a brief review, I realized there are many things I want to do and need to do. Many were set aside for various reasons, and now I’m starting to pick them up one by one.
Interesting Things and Objects
GitHub Copilot Chat
Recently, I’ve become highly dependent on AI-assisted programming, mostly using ChatGPT and the GitHub Copilot plugin. I’ve just been approved for the Copilot Chat internal beta, so I plan to switch and try it out.
It seems there might be some issues with the ChatGPT Plus billing. After it expires, I’ll need to find another solution. I might try renewing it using US gift cards, which is quite a hassle.
VS Code
Also, because I’ve been using VS Code (still holding out despite being looked down upon by the Jetbrains faction in the team), I discovered this EVA theme through a tweet by DIYGod. It gives a strange coding power boost, making it feel like there are fewer bugs. Indeed, aesthetics are the primary productivity factor.
For program launchers, I’ve been mixing the use of Alfred and Raycast. I use Alfred because I’m used to it and bought the Mega Supporter License, but I’m also envious of Raycast’s plugin ecosystem.
Recently, I discovered that Raycast can configure many plugin functions to be called through global shortcuts. As I often need to open different VS Code projects, I configured the “Open with VS Code” and “Recent Projects” functions to Option + . and Option + , respectively, and I’ve become highly dependent on them.
Input
Although most interesting inputs are automatically synchronized in the “Yu’s Life” Telegram channel, I’ll still select a few to list here. It feels more like a newsletter now.
Articles
- Application-Specific Blockchains: The Past, Present, and Future
- Building an AI-powered ChatBot using Vercel, OpenAI, and Postgres - Neon
- Everything we care about Account Abstraction(AA) — ERC4337
- Enhance Your Internet Privacy in 2023 - GeekPlux
- The Principle of Immersive Web Translation
- #15 Dune SQL Query Engine Introduction - Mastering Chain Analytics
- My Note-Taking Method | Randy’s Blog
- Distributed Deployment of cloudflared for Closer Origin Access and Further Speed Improvement
Videos
Here are some interesting videos I’ve watched:
- We Made an AI Paimon That Can Talk, Free for Everyone to Play With!
- Next.js 13 Crash Course | App Directory, React Server Components & More
- Communities Have Always Been Hard to Monetize
- Can You Tell the Difference Between 50 Yuan and 2000 Yuan Editing?
- Why Did I Spend 500,000 Yuan to Go Back to School at 30?
- Am I Still Using Linux After Two Years?
- What’s the Theme of Melancholy for This Generation of Young People? “Those Sad Young Men” by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- How I Take Notes
- GPT-4 - How does it work, and how do I build apps with it? - CS50 Tech Talk
Podcasts
Here are some interesting podcasts I’ve listened to:
Anime
- Demon Slayer: Swordsmith Village Arc, it started to get exciting from the third episode, currently following
- My Love Story with Yamada-kun at Lv999, it’s indeed a tearjerker, currently following
- The Tatami Galaxy, I had heard of it for a long time but watched it intermittently. In terms of presentation and style, it gives a sense of déjà vu reminiscent of the Monogatari series. An unsuccessful protagonist, a cyclical setting, an interpretation of unknown possibilities - even now it remains novel. I often think that I’m also trapped in a 4.5-tatami room, not knowing when I’ll have the courage to break free.
- Uncle from Another World, I forgot which month’s anime it was, it felt like it had been on hiatus for a long time. After nearly half a year, I finally finished it these days. It’s an entertaining daily life anime with an interesting setting, but the plot doesn’t have many novel parts. I mostly watched it while doing other things.
- Chainsaw Man, marking it as watched. It’s a classic revisit, with high-quality animation.
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