Debugging Myself

I’ve spent years building things—code, systems, teams, habits—and somewhere along the way, I realized the hardest system to understand is the one between my ears. This is my attempt to document the settings, defaults, and edge cases that make me… me.

Core Architecture

Curiosity as a Default

I can’t leave a question alone. Whether it’s why a build got faster on Linux, why a conversation felt off, or why engines only rev loudly the moment I’m on a call, I follow the “why” until I either learn something—or break it and learn more. Curiosity is the root process that spawns the rest.

Clarity Over Cleverness

Clever is fun; clear actually ships. I choose names, plans, and approaches that are boring and obvious, so the energy goes into doing, not decoding.

Momentum Matters

I work in deliberate bursts: short, focused sprints; clean handoffs; honest pauses. Shipping small, often, and with intention beats heroic last‑minute rescues.

How I Work

Write to think. When problems get fuzzy, I open a blank doc and reduce them to constraints, tradeoffs, and one next step.
Scope like a realist. I aim for outcomes that fit into a week, not fantasies that need a quarter.
Feedback early. I’d rather be wrong fast and visible than right too late and alone.
Protect the edges. I’ve been burned out more times than I’ll admit; good work needs recovery. Rest is a requirement, not a reward.

Real‑World Bugs

Living and working this way isn’t frictionless:

I sometimes chase perfect when clear and shipped is enough.
I can overanalyze minor issues and delay decisions that need momentum.
I’m quick to move the goalposts after a win instead of pausing to acknowledge it.

These aren’t defects to delete so much as patterns to monitor. Awareness reduces the blast radius.

Personality Patterns

Analytical with empathy. I like clean logic, but I care deeply—people > ideas.
Quietly competitive. I won’t announce I’m racing you; I’ll just run a little faster and take the win any time of day.
Calm surface, active mind. I read the room before I speak, and I mean what I say—even when it’s brutally honest.
Playful seriousness. I can’t stay solemn for long; I find a way to laugh—often at myself.

Off‑Screen Life (The Things That Keep Me Balanced)

Movement: weightlifting and long walks—either pacing in front of a favorite show or a deep‑talk loop with a friend that starts as “just fifteen minutes” and ends somewhere new.
Coffee as a craft: two words: Spanish latte. It’s my default fuel before the day picks up speed.
Photography & nature: light, lines, and the challenge of framing what others miss. I’d rather capture a quiet scene than myself. Places tend to stay with me more than faces.
Cooking as decompression: simple food, real ingredients, shared with people I like. (Who doesn’t appreciate a good steak and potatoes?)
Making & fixing: from tiny home projects to reorganizing a workspace until it feels inevitable.

Top 10 Favorites of 2025 (So Far)

These are the things I loved in 2025, not necessarily released during 2025.

Games

(you can tell i'm really into indies)

Balatro — a poker-themed roguelike deck-builder where smart handcrafting and synergies matter more than luck.
Dispatch — an episodic, choice-driven adventure about a former hero managing a chaotic roster of “reformed” supers from behind a dispatcher’s desk.
The Drifter — a pulp point-and-click thriller with razor-sharp pacing and stylish pixel art, following a drifter pulled back from death and into a conspiracy.
Split Fiction — co-op only, split-screen adventure from Hazelight that bounces between sci-fi and fantasy worlds as two writers fight to reclaim their stolen stories.
Sword of the Sea — serene, hoversword “surfing” across dunes and water from the studio behind ABZÛ and The Pathless.
Mouthwashing — first-person narrative horror aboard a stranded freighter, told through a fractured timeline and escalating dread.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 — a Belle Époque–inspired RPG that mixes turn-based strategy with real-time inputs and painterly presentation.
DELTARUNE — Undertale’s parallel tale; bullet-dodging battles, big heart, and chapters that land like mixtapes.
Jet Set Radio Future — cel-shaded, inline-skating classic: graffiti, rails, and Tokyo-to’s rhythm in full flow.
Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds — a fast arcade racer with “Travel Rings” that warp you between dimensions mid-race and deep vehicle customization.

Shows

Severance — workers at Lumon split work and personal memories; eerie, precise, and uncomfortably human.
High Potential — a sharp, breezy procedural: a single mom with a brilliant mind teams up with a by‑the‑book detective.
Lazarus — Shinichirō Watanabe’s globe‑trotting anime about a miracle drug gone lethal and the team racing to stop it.
Solo Leveling — from “weakest hunter” to system‑blessed powerhouse; sleek A‑1 Pictures action that escalates cleanly.
Invincible — Prime Video’s brutal, character‑first superhero animation that never forgets family fallout.
Rick and Morty — multiverse misadventures where the absurd and existential shake hands.
Gen V — The Boys spinoff set at Godolkin University, where aspiring supes test power, ethics, and ambition.
Squid Game — debt, deadly children’s games, and moral erosion—K‑drama turned global shorthand for survival.
Family Guy — the Griffin family’s long‑running animated chaos; comfort‑watch timing and unapologetic punchlines.
The Wonderfully Weird World of Gumball — Gumball’s return as a continuation series: elastic comedy with real warmth.

New (or Old) Hobbies I Picked Up in 2025

Home‑lab (self‑hosting): moving services off the cloud and into a humming corner—learning more from one broken docker-compose than any tutorial.
Reading: back to physical books after years away; paper’s scent is something I can’t resist.
CS surfing: yes, it counts—flow, rhythm, and the quiet satisfaction of a clean ramp run; it helps after a long workday.

Working Notes I Keep Handy

Spend attention where it actually moves the needle.
Say yes with conviction or no with kindness—no hedging.
Make things legible for future‑me; present clarity beats future archaeology.
Leave things a little better than I found them: codebases, rooms, meetings, conversations.

Next Experiments

Depth over novelty: stay with a few hard problems until they get interesting.
Deliberate rest: schedule recovery like work—walks, sleep, and unstructured time that isn’t “earned.”
Compounding over heroics: pick projects, relationships, and habits that accrue value.

Closing

If this year has a theme, it’s maintenance: attention, health, and the small routines that make bigger work possible. I’m not after a perfect version of me—just a cleaner commit history and fewer noisy regressions. The bugs won’t vanish, but the diffs tell a story I want to keep writing. Thanks for reading. I’m still building.

Debugging Myself: Understanding How I Think and Build