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Season Seven Finale - Live with Nick Taylor

Season 7, Episode 9 | March 31, 2023

Join Bekah, Dan, and Special Guest Nick Taylor for a live-streamed episode of the Season Seven Finale!

Show Notes:

Join Bekah, Dan, and Special Guest Nick Taylor for a live-streamed episode of the Season Seven Finale!

Watch the video replay here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Wj-zlORvm8

Watch our 2023 Spring Lightning Talks here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2CsTN-WEZ0

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Transcript:

Bekah:

Hey, and welcome to Season seven. Why are you laughing me? Hello and welcome to Season seven, episode nine of the Virtual Coffee Podcast. I am Bekah, and this is a podcast that features members of the virtual coffee community. Virtual Coffee is an intimate group of developers at all stages of their coding journey. And we're here on this podcast sharing their stories and what they've learned, and today we are here sharing our own stories. Here with me today is my co-host Dan.

Dan:

Hey, what up Beck? How's it

Bekah:

going? Yo, it is going good. We just wrapped up our lightning talks. They were

Dan:

amazing. Amazing. My gosh. Yeah. So many good talks.

Bekah:

We had 11 or 12, which was really

Nick:

fun.

Dan:

Yeah, I know. I can't count, but like there was so many and, uh, yeah, I did, I did a talk and, um, somebody made me not touch my talk until last night at like nine o'clock.

Bekah:

Oh, someone made you do that?

Dan:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was not my fault at all. Uh, so I did the thing where, you know, you know how you commit to something wait way ahead of time to make yourself do it.

Bekah:

Yeah. And then like someone reminds you constantly. Right, right, right. And then you have somebody that you, and then you still don't do it. Like, kind of like

Dan:

that, that reminds you a bunch of times to work on. and you ignore them over and over again. Uhhuh. Yeah. Yeah. And then at the end of the day, like the night before, it's late and you have to do your slides and all that stuff. And it's not your fault at all. Right?

Bekah:

wrong. very wrong. Anyway, I I was up late too. I don't know what that feels like, Dan. I don't, that's not me. I'm not

Nick:

that person.

Dan:

Yeah. Well, I, I, I've just kind of always been that person. Although last, this, this was like an extreme example and I'm not really sure why, you know, it just happened, uh, where I was like, every day I was like, I should work on my lightning talk. I should work on my laptop. One of the problems was I couldn't cite on a topic. I was waffling between two topics for a really long time. And, uh, you know, so I finally decided on a topic on I think Wednesday. When did I send you the ti? I sent you a title just to like, I sent you a title, I think. Uh, On Wednesday or Thursday just to like commit myself I still honestly had thought there was a point last night at like 7:00 PM I think where I was like, I should tell Beck I'm doing the other one.

Bekah:

I will say, I will say that. It was very good, so. Well thank you. Yeah, it was fun. It turned out to be insightful and something that I haven't really heard anybody else talk about. So I did very much appreciate Good

Nick:

your

Dan:

av. That's good. Cause my other one was like a css, you know, thing, you know what I mean? And it would've been fun and stuff, but like, it was like more of like a tech talk, you know? And this was the first one, uh, that I've ever really done. I've really done. That wasn't just about like some technology, you know? So I dunno. It was fun. I liked it. I liked a lot. Interesting. You wanna catch up later, you know, check us out. Virtual coffee? No. youtube.com/virtual coffee io. Is that right?

Bekah:

Me too. Yeah. And YouTube changed things a little bit. So sometimes there's some issues if you do slash virtual coffee io, cuz now they have handles. So it might be slash at virtual coffee io. But either way you should be able to find your way there

Dan:

either way. Or go to virtual coffee.io and

Nick:

there's links to YouTube.

Bekah:

Yes, there's that. I am gonna introduce our very special guest today. Who? Who?

Nick:

A special

Bekah:

guest we do who was our very first guest ever on the virtual coffee podcast. I'm gonna pause there so you all can go check out who was our very first guest who was, was Taylor. And he taught us about structured yolo, which is influenced my entire life. And here he is today.

Nick:

Hey, what's up friends? Hey.

Bekah:

Hey. Hi. He's, how's going? Fancy haircut

Nick:

and everything. Pretty good. Yeah. Yeah. I, uh, yeah, I got a haircut and lost five pounds just cutting my hair. So, uh, that was good. So, uh, con, continuing with my weight loss journey. Just get a haircut and you're halfway there, so, uh,

Bekah:

well, okay. We're gonna get, let's, let's formally get started because we start every episode of the podcast, like we start every virtual coffee with our name, where we're from, what we do, and our random check-in question. And we're gonna pull from Kirk's question from Thursday. Oh. Which is, what job did you want to have as a, oh, yeah.

Nick:

So, okay. My name's Bekah. You gonna

Bekah:

go? I, I am starting a job on April 10th as lead developer. No developer experience lead at a place. That's a startup. Oh. Place that you can find out more

Nick:

about later. you've never heard of tb D uh, Dan, it's, it's a pretty, pretty popular company. A lot of people are

Dan:

TB io. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, man.

Bekah:

All right. And I answered this question yesterday, so I wondered be a vet and then my mom was like, do you know that you have to put a thermometer up Dogs butts to take their temperature? And I was like, I don't wanna do that. How about I be a forensic, forensic pathologist instead?

Dan:

I feel like dogs, dogs Butts is like the best case scenario in that situation too,

Bekah:

we were like very, very big, um, X-Files fans, so, okay. I just wanted to be a Scully, really. That's all I.

Nick:

And okay. That, that, that's, that's valid. Uh, yeah. I'd probably take a, yeah, I'd probably take a Scully over, uh, hold on a sec. Let me stick this thermometer in your dog's butt. You know, just in terms of, uh, you know, at least, you know, when you're doing small talk at a party, I don't mean to, I don't mean to brag, but I, I stick a thermometer up Dog's butts daily, you know, um, can I buy you a drink, I dunno if that's violating any of our code of conduct. I'll find, I'll find out after we're

Bekah:

not yet there, so we're good. Alright, Dan,

Nick:

you're

:

turn.

Dan:

Uh oh. Wow. Yeah. Okay. Hi, I'm Dan. I, um, live in Cleveland. I am a web site developer. I don't know. That seems so weird.

Nick:

I'm never know your title web

Dan:

developer. I don't know. I don't have a title is the problem,

Nick:

you know. You get to make up your own title. Businessman Dan, t b Dan TB

Dan:

That that's right. And, uh, yes, going along with the T B D theme. I, I mean, I, I never had a job that I wanted to do as a kid. I don't, I mean, like, I'm sure there's jobs that like, sounded as exciting or whatever, but there was never, like, I never latched on anything. The only thing, I was talking about this on Thursday, the only thing that I can really remember related to that was that I knew for sure that I did not want to be a lawyer cuz my dad's lawyer.

Nick:

All I

Bekah:

wanted to be from the time I was 11 until the time I was 21. That's what I wanted to be a lawyer.

Dan:

Yeah. Yeah. Well that's different than a forensic second. Well, now you're changing

Bekah:

your story. Okay. Because what? Well, but it was like the first job that you wanted. But from the time I was 11 until 21, that's all I wanted to be. And then I didn't do great on my LSATs. Okay. I didn't hit that 1 61

Nick:

tldr. No dog thermometer butts, no dog thermometer, butts. That's the continuing theme, basically. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.

Dan:

Although I, you know, hearing the stories my dad tells, uh, honestly, like if he had to choose between sitting through another like board meeting with the people, you know, they get to deal with or. Doing the dog, but thing, I think he probably will choose the dog butt thing. honestly, in retrospect. Um, but yeah, I mean, he is like, he does like property law stuff, you know, and it's, it always seemed very, very, very, very boring to me. And so, although he's, he's a, you know, successful, you know, self-driven career as well as that stuff, so no shots, uh, against lawyers. It's just like never seemed good to me. And so I don't really have an answer. That was my non-answer. And, uh,

Nick:

yeah, that's it. Okay. I, I don't have a really good answer either, but, and, and I'm gonna give a long story, sorry. But, uh, so I, I didn't really know what I wanted to do. And like, I don't know if you grew up with people that are, like, they knew what they wanted to do from like, day one. Like, I remember in high school, like grade seven, somebody's like, yeah, I'm gonna be a doctor. And they became a, I think they did become a doctor, but like, I'm like, No idea. You know, like I had Doritos like an hour ago. That's was exciting. Um, But, uh, I, I don't know, like, as, like, I had, this is like less of a job these days for like kids, but like, I used to have a paper route and I was okay. But like, I remember as a kid, like my dream job was to be a gas pump station attendant, partially because I do like the smell of gas. You know, there's, there's people that either like the smell of gas or they don't. I am on team, smells good. And I don't know. There was, I agree. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I don't know why, but it just seemed like a cool job and it's what I wanted to do. And in retrospect, I, I, well, one, I didn't end up doing that. Uh, so probably smelling those fumes all day is probably a good thing. I didn't do that, but, um, in high school, the, I don't know if they still do this, but they used to give out, like surveys you would fill out, like what's your career gonna be by some criteria you fill out. And my, my career was supposed to be a cheese maker, so I was like, I'm like, I'm cool with that. I like cheese. But, uh, I honestly, I never really had anything like big dreams of things aside from I love basketball. I, I've, I've told this many times to people in virtual coffee, but, uh, for folks who can't see us, cuz it's a podcast, I'm five seven, but I used to be obsessed with basketball and I used to literally be able to grab a regulation rim. Like I couldn't dunk it cuz I couldn't palm a ball, but I could literally jump high enough to grab the rim that is and. Crazy impressive. Yeah, it is. It, it, it, it was impressive. At the time I was 135 pounds. Now I'm like, I'm a little bulkier, so like, I'm like 1 95 right now, but, But the thing was, I was so obsessed with basketball, like, you know, like a lot of people, I was, it was in the nineties, so loved Michael Jordan, the bowls and stuff, and I was constantly jumping like all the time, like I'm not exaggerating. Like I bought these books from the back of a body building magazine on how to improve your vertical. This is like I'm, I don't know if they still sell stuff in the back of books like that, like buy this pamphlet or whatever.

Bekah:

Like listen, we just bought some kind of bands to improve our vertical in this house. Okay. So like we would be those people

Nick:

Yeah. But the thing is it worked. It's just you have to consistently do it. And I was literally in my parents' living room using a dining room chair doing one legged jumps and then like eventually I was able to touch our ceiling. It was like a split level house, but basically, Pretty high. I used to have these things called moon boots, uh, and they're basically running shoes where your platform is in the front and your heel is never touching the ground. Uh, I did all those things and like in, in, this is such a long answer, sorry. But like in between all that, I broke my ankle playing basketball. So I was like in a cast, uh, before grade nine, all the way up to my knee for like the whole summer. Oh. So part, part of getting back to, into things like it took me a year to be able to run again. So like physio, all that stuff, and that's one of the moon boots and the jumping. And anyways, uh, that didn't pan out because one, I'm five seven and I'm also realized I am clearly not good enough to play in the N V A, which is pretty much probably most people, but. Yeah, that was, that was kind of it. That's my long-winded story. Maybe I should have been a cheese maker. Who knows.

Bekah:

I think you're doing a pretty great job at what you are doing, so I don't think you should be a cheese maker. Um, but the last time we had you on, you had a totally different job. You wanna tell people about what you're doing now?

Nick:

Yeah, yeah. So, yeah. So the first, like you were saying, the first episode of this podcast, I was working at dev dot two. Uh, so I've been working in opensource professionally since January, 2020. I was contributing to opensource prior to that, and I, I still do contribute to opensource outside of work hours, but, um, now I'm at Netlify, uh, I'm on the ecosystem pillar, which is just a fancy name for like the big team. And then I'm on a, a smaller team within there called the Frameworks team. So, uh, basically my job is to make sure. Whatever framework you're deploying to Netlify. It works. Uh, it's not just my team. Like, there's obviously people that run the platform and stuff, but like, I'm kind of, my team is at the center of like, the actual build of the framework and making sure it works properly with like serverless and edge. So that's, that's kind of what I've been up to. I've been there. It's actually gonna be my one year anniversary on Tuesday, so, Hey. Nice. It's, it's pretty wild. Like, I feel like I've been there forever, but I mean that in a good way. You know, like how it, it's kind of like if you're just hanging out with people for like a weekend or something and you feel like, or like a great vacation and you're like, it's like five days, but you feel like you've been there two weeks, you know, kind of. So it's, it's felt like that, and I have really great. Managers and skip level. They're, they're super supportive and everybody's really cool. So it's, you know, last time I was on the podcast I said Dev two was my dream job, and it was at the time. And like, so right now this is my dream job. So like, not that I plan on leaving any type suit, but like, hopefully I can keep saying my dream job is my next job all the time. So, uh, yeah. I love

Dan:

that. I love that. We love Nefi Edwards coffee. We would, we've been nullify. I, I, I wouldn't, I don't wanna say customers because they nullify has a, an amazing open source like, I don't know, plan or whatever you wanna call it. Um, yeah, so if you're, you're open source repositories, they'll host your sites for free and give you, like the pro plan, give you what Nefi, uh, uh, is the pro plan. If you're a business and you have private repositories, um, if you're an open source organization, they'll give you the pro plan for free. And, um, we've been on Nefi since, I don't know, whenever the, whenever like we. redid the web like

Bekah:

it was the first year for Octoberfest Octoberfest. Yeah. So that's probably April

Nick:

20, October of 2020. Um, and yeah, we've been,

Dan:

we've on that since then. And I, I've been, I I've always been a huge fan, so I, when we, when I heard you were going there, I was, I was very, very excited. It was, it was

Nick:

awesome. Okay. I just, sorry, I'm just laughing cuz Triple B's in the chat, uh, bald bearded builder or Michael O Jolly and I said, Hey, triple B, but I wrote triple B and so now I triple, triple, triple. Yeah. Or maybe we could call him triple trouble. I don't know. but yeah, no, it's, it's great. Yeah, no like, uh, Netlify is a big fan of open source, so like that's why they offer those plans like that. It's uh, uh, you know, it's, they don't just give 'em out to anybody. But definitely there's lots of, lots of great. Open source projects that, uh, we like to support.

Dan:

So, yeah. And we didn't like, it wasn't, I, I think they give it out to mostly anybody if you're actually an open source organization. You know, they, like, we didn't, I mean, I applied and I got, it was like a form, you know, and got a response. Yeah. The same day or the next day or something like that. You know, it wasn't like, it was very easy and it was, it was totally cool. So. Awesome. Speaking of frameworks, Onfi, are you gonna be. Getting some WordPress going on there pretty soon.

Nick:

Hp Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, you can actually, I, I know, I know you're, you're, you're joking, kind of being slash serious, but you can actually, my, my coworker Matt Cain, who, uh, currently isn't on the frameworks team, but he was, but uh, you can actually run, he has an example of running PHP and Wam on the edge. Uh, I can find that tweet. So like, if you wanna deploy your, uh, your Word press site within Wam, within an edge function, Dan, there you go.

Dan:

So, yeah, that, I think that fits right into the, like, squarely into the, you know, you were so interested in seeing if you could, you didn't stop to think if you should

Nick:

Oh, yeah, yeah. No, it was definitely, definitely a, a proof of concept, a fun thing. It was more. I, I remember when he put it out. I, I, I think I responded with, now even JavaScript devs can get their Lamborghini cuz like everybody always has those jokes about Oh yeah. Well they're not necessarily jokes like the, the creator of Lave has a Lamborghini, I believe. Uh, cuz like p h P and Laravel are, are pretty successful even though people try to trash talk it all the time. So it's, uh, no

Dan:

pH php tells Awesome. I I honestly actually work in PHP all the time. But, uh, you know, I, I was just trying to think of a, a jokey framework and WordPress is the first thing that I thought of, so, you know. All right. Um,

Nick:

that's awesome. What, Yeah.

Bekah:

Michael also said, next step, they put all that in flash and we, there was like actually flash stuff covered in our lightning talks earlier today, so, okay. It's that me, it's not gone forever.

Nick:

Yeah. I'll, I'll get, I'll get working on that cold fusion and, uh, while I'm at it, Michael, I'll also work on getting Java apples in waza working on the edge if you want. So, uh,

Dan:

Man, Java apples. I just got like a shiver, like a cold shiver of,

Nick:

yeah, it was, I, I still remember it. Uh, just like you'd have your website and then there would be this gray square with this little Java logo coffee with the, with the hot part of the coffee kind of waving and it'd just be like loading apple or something. And it, and they took forever cuz like, broadband internet only really came about like mid to late nineties. So like, I don't know, I, I almost kind of wonder if like, uh, it would, uh, if it would've caught on better, um, if, if broadband had been more prevalent at the time, cuz like it was slow, you know, just cuz of that. But, uh, yeah,

Dan:

I mean, you know, not to get too far into it. I, I think the, the real, the big reason like Java stuff got shut down and also flash was security, you know, problems. Yeah. Rampant security problems. Um, but the, Nope, I had something else to say, but I, I lost it so we can, we can move on.

Bekah:

Sorry. I was just like, I'm being super distracted by Michael in the chat who says, I still didn't know why I just didn't remain a V B A developer by now. I'd be integrating chat g p T into Excel and Word like a boss Michael. The time has not run out. You can still do all of

Nick:

those.

Dan:

Yeah, also chat, G P T. Uh, nice. Talk about chat G p T from Matt today in lighting talks. So yeah, check out virtual coffee, um,

Nick:

something, something lighting

Bekah:

talks. We had lighting talks that will be up very soon. They were livestreamed, they'll be

Nick:

I to shout

Dan:

out something and I dunno what like to shut out

Nick:

Triple B also, Jen hasn't

Bekah:

been a podcast host for very long. He doesn't know what he

Nick:

is doing. Yeah, it's only been seven seasons. I hear. I hear season eight is when you catch your stride. So yeah. Thanks. I'm hoping, I'm hoping

Dan:

for that. We'll see.

Bekah:

Uh, yeah. Okay. So, alright, we, I just wanted to, so we can keep talking, but also Dominic does a really good job of putting together our Friday Twitter chat. So if you don't follow us already on Twitter, we're at v Virtual Coffee, can't Say it, virtual Coffee io. And every Friday morning at 9:00 AM Eastern, we drop our Twitter chat. And Dominic, that's run by Dominic Duffin, who was on the podcast this season. So we can go ahead and dive into some of those questions. Unless Nick, there's something that you want to bring up and to talk about as our special.

Nick:

Um, I can't at the moment. I'll, I'll try and think of something else. Uh, I, I got slightly distracted cuz I have to just reply to an email for something, but, uh, I'll definitely, I'll definitely try and think of something cuz I, I know I'm super happy to be on the podcast. It's just like there's something that had come up that I completely forgot about, so I just had to email them. But, uh, let me just send that.

Bekah:

Michael, you are on Twitter, so in the chat I'm responding to the chat. Michael, if you're not on Twitter, I dm you on Twitter. Um, we do not do our chat on ma does he reply? No. yes, he does reply we don't do Mastodon chats because we're, we're not. We're not down with Mastodon yet, right?

Nick:

I, I mean, I, I've been on don't for a while, but I don't even know where to start with Mastodon. Nick.

Bekah:

Nick is down with Mastodon. You can DM him on Mastodon. Free

Nick:

to let free, feel free to toot me. Toot me Toot away. Toot.

Bekah:

Why is it called that? Okay, that's not going to any place that

Nick:

caused you, okay, so, so I can explain all this if it's not clear, but like, also I'm the, the MAs on instance. So like, unlike Twitter, Twitter, it's like there's just twitter.com mast on, you have several instance, not several, like as many instances as people wanna create. And then, so like, I'm on a instance, I joined in 2017. and it's called Tut Cafe. So like, if you wanna reach me on ma on my address is Nikki Nikki t Online Tut Cafe. Um, the reason I'm pretty sure why it's called Toot is because the logo is a ma on like the, which is I think, pretty similar to a mammoth, like a wooly mammoth. I'm not sure what the diff difference is, but like, it's so like elephant trunk and I guess elephant trunks make a tooting noise. Either that or mastodons farted a lot back in the ice age. I have no idea but they, they just went with that. So

Dan:

yeah, there's almost no doubt that that's it, you know? All right. I feel like, uh, Google says MAs duns were shorter and stockier than mammoths with shorter and straighter tus.

Nick:

So, okay. Okay. There you go.

Bekah:

Gotcha. Okay. And what everybody really wants to know is that they are using DNA of mastodons, right. With elephants to breed them into existence.

Dan:

I thought you talk about the meatball.

Nick:

Oh, meatballs. Did you say Mastodon? Meatballs. Meatball. I think I'm gonna have to do a hard pass on prehistoric meat. Somebody made a meatball from, that's before. Uh, one A meatball. No, no. This,

Dan:

yes. No, this is like truly, uh, truly. I don't know. What, what do you call it? Like, just awful stuff. But somebody made, um, do I have to share my whole screen? Oh yeah. Window. Alright, here we go. Ready? Here it is. All right. Window share. Did that work? Yeah. Somebody get outta here ad somebody. Made a massive meatball with mo moly, mammoth dna. And, uh, I've seen this Atlanta a bunch of times. I've refused to open the articles but still it stuck into my brain. I don't, I I haven't actually read the article. So, um,

Nick:

meatballs,

Dan:

I'll, I'll put this, I'll put this in the, uh, and

Nick:

may maybe that could, could drive adoption of people using Mastodon, like create an, create an account and get like a, get like a free bag of meatballs. Kind of like, you know, like, I don't know if, if, if your families eat the IKEA meatballs, they're, they're pretty solid. Those, those 50. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And it's, it, it's just they come with an Allen key too. Almost bet. Almost. Right? Right. Yeah. Sorry,

Dan:

I got, I saw, um, Very good prank. You know, sometimes pranks are like mean spirited, and sometimes pranks are really, really good. And I saw a prank and I think they actually got in real trouble for it. But, uh, somebody, you know how, um, Ikea has those arrows to sh to like point you through the way they like put in fake arrows and made like a maze that never ends in Ikea, which, uh, was very entertaining to me. So if you follow the arrows, you just kind of keep going in circles, you know? Uh, anyway, that's my, my case story.

Bekah:

So I feel like the, the biggest issue here is that we let Michael derail any conversation that we had, which I, I should have known better because I have worked for him for an entire year. This is what happens when you. Michael comment on anything,

Nick:

I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm embracing the Triple B derailment of the conversation. The, the

Bekah:

Triple B derailment. We have had some marathon meetings, um, which were we're, we're very, very great. Um, but that also brings us to a topic about perseverance, which, uh, we post about in our Twitter chat. Have you ever felt like giving up but ended up not, what motivated you to keep going and what did you learn from that experience? Are there challenges that you have ahead, that you're afraid you won't be able to complete? And how can we help? That was our, that was our back pocket topic on Tuesday.

Nick:

Yeah. I missed, I missed Tuesday as there Thursday, but, uh, no, it's a, it's a great question. It's, it's like, I, I don't know. I mean, like, in terms of like giving up, it's like I, like I've mentioned this to you before, Bekah, I, uh, yeah. Triple B's derailing it's a manager developed a lot of perseverance. I, me, sorry, sorry, sorry. Folks who are listening to this, you can't see the chat, but, uh, triple B is making us laugh. Um, no, I, I think, you know, maybe, maybe the first time where you, you think you can't do something, it's, it's pretty daunting. And then, you know, like, you know, maybe you got support or you did it on your own, but you get past that hump of like, okay, I did it. You know? And. the more that happens, uh, I think it's, it's easier to say, like when you're, you're like, uh, I don't know if I can keep doing this. And then, you know, I'll, I'll think back, like, uh, even if it's not the same thing, I'm like, no, I got past this. You know, and like, so, and like, I, I don't know. It's something that's over the years also, like, just, just having, like, you know, definitely had some rough stuff happen to me in, in my, my personal life that I don't, I don't really particularly wanna talk on stream about, but like, there's just so many things that I don't care about because of that, like, that are just so, like, it, it's, it's something I don't worry about. You know what I mean? And so like, when it comes to tasks and stuff, I think it, it's really, I think to persevere too is, is you have to avoid getting overwhelmed and the way. To avoid getting overwhelmed. At least what I've learned, and I'm, I'm probably not the first to say it, but it's like you, you gotta break down the problem, whatever it is. So like, you know, cuz if you look at, I don't know, like say for example, we, you know, Dan wanted to, uh, redo the entire virtual coffee site again. For some reason you would never wanna do that,

Bekah:

right? Yeah. That's not anything you've never ever mentioned recently at

Nick:

all. Oh, I didn't, I didn't even know that. Sorry. So that's, uh, foreshadowing unintentionally by me. Sorry, But, but like, you know, at first glancing you might be like, oh man, that is gonna take forever. But if, if, you know, and if you break it down, you know, it's like, okay, well I'm gonna do this part and this part and, and you just slowly I'm not gonna look at the chat. I just saw partially what don't, don't listen to

Bekah:

anything Michael says. Okay.

Nick:

But, you know, I, I think breaking it down is, is so good. And it, and it sounds so obvious maybe, but like, as you chip away at something, you know, whether it's a tough problem or just you're working on a feature or whatever, it's like every time you finish that task or that piece of it, you know, it's like looking at the thing as one piece. You're like, oh my goodness, it's so much. But like, as you slowly see like, oh, I've got 20 tasks done already, and then it's all of a sudden it's like you, you can see the momentum and the progress. And I think, I think that's super helpful. Um, the other thing for me is like, it it, it's not a, a cocky thing. It's more even when I don't know stuff, I'm just, I just know I can learn things now and. I know if there's something like I'm, I'm not certain about whatever. I know, I'll figure it out. I'm, you know, and, and, and just knowing that also helps me figure out things. And I'm, I'm trying to still stay serious for a sec, but I can't cuz Becca's smiling, cuz I know she's looking at the chat.

Bekah:

it's Michael. He's derailing everything. I'm sorry.

Nick:

Apparently I'm a flat earth. Well, you're not a flat earth. It depends. Well, you just, you just don't go to the just, just don't go to the end, you know? Cuz that's where you'll fall off. Right, Michael? So, uh, it's true. Anyways, that was my ramblings. I, I don't know if that was coherent at all for anybody, but, uh, Oh, oh

Dan:

damn.

Bekah:

Oh man, I didn't see that. That's part thing of putting comments up. Oh, here we go. All. So what are you doing? Add the banners like you're supposed to. Was a earth. No, don't take away that banner. We don't want that one Good one

Nick:

around accepting. We live, live on a round.

Bekah:

We just started using Streamy Yard. We're just getting used to this.

Nick:

Friends.

Dan:

Yeah. Yeah. It's, it is a new tool. I learned a couple things today during the, during the Lightning talks. Um, it's good,

Bekah:

good to learn while you're live. Right.

Nick:

So I, I forgot

Dan:

to share this with Bekah, but I, I figured out. So when you are hosting a thing on Dreamyard, in an event, if you invite guests, they can like start sharing their, and it doesn't show up, you know? And then you as the host can like, activate it, you know? Yeah. But I shared my story. No, I'm saying, I'm saying, this is what I'm saying. If, if, if you're the host, if you're a hosts or like a member host, like, you know, Sobek and I are both like account. Owners or whatever. Uh, when you start sharing it, it goes up no matter what is all already happening. Um, both Beck and I discovered that I, I did that, which I did not

Bekah:

know. I shared my, I didn't my slides Yeah. During, sorry, Brian Meeker. Yeah. During his obsidian talk and it went up there and like, luckily I feel like I pretty quickly recognize that like, this is not good and I took it down and I was able to switch it. Yeah. But I did not anticipate that when I shared my, I thought I was gonna go backstage and dreamyard. It did not go, go backstage. It went, would've

Nick:

straight up would've. Okay. Yeah. I would've assumed it would've. We're calling you out first too. Yeah, yeah,

Dan:

yeah. There might be some setting, you know, that I haven't found yet. Uh, no. I did the exact same thing to Gantt, uh, this morning at the beginning. Um, so apologies to Gantt too. It was a couple, a second of my slide while he was still talking. So, and he didn't have any slides, so it was even more, you know, like. Disruptive Cause it was just like Gantt and then it was my slide and Gantt, and then it was Gantt again. So, yeah. Whatcha are you gonna do

Nick:

Good. John cracked me up. GT's awesome.

Bekah:

G Gantt is amazing. His talk is always so good. And his was, um, the title of his talk. Give me a second and grab it. Um, it was, nope, I did not grab it. I clicked the wrong thing. Where did that we're doing right here at Virtual Coffee. Do you know? Okay. Do you have it up, Dan?

Dan:

What? No.

Nick:

Oh,

:

here

Bekah:

we conquering your stage one laugh at a time. And Gant is incredibly funny and has been very impactful in my speaking career. So everything he says is like, it's gold. I just like, Eat it up. Well, you can't really eat up gold. I, it's like pepper.

Nick:

Well, it's malleable. So like, drink it. You could maybe, yeah, there's gold swagger. Uh, is that, I can't remember. Is that real gold? In gold swagger? I feel like it is. You think it is? I think it is. No, it's for sure. Okay. Yeah. Um, yeah. Um, what was I gonna say? Uh, yeah, no, just, just a shout out to the Lightning Talks. I mean, I tweeted out before, but they were all really great. But the other thing that, uh, I really like, uh, about virtual Coffee with the Lightning Talks, and then we also have lunch and learns for folks who aren't aware that might just be catching this podcast for the first time. It's, there's, there's a lot of people in the community who were reluctant to give talks initially, either outta shyness or maybe a bit of lack of confidence and the Lunch and Learns. They've been so great for so many people that I've seen because like, I'm. I'm extroverted and like I'm the kind of person that will just talk to a random person like anywhere. But I know not everybody's like that. And it was just the, the lunch and Learns have been great for that because it's like a welcoming space where people can just, you know, be in a safe space to. One, give the talk, but also, you know, get, you know, great feedback from people and it's, it's a, it's a great space for people to just keep improving on, on their public speaking. And the Lightning Talks are great for that as well too. And, uh, I'm, I'm smiling again cuz I see Bekah smiling and now I'm gonna look at the chat and see what Triple B is written.

Bekah:

Yep, yep. That's, that's about it. Well, and you know, that is like one of the great things that's happened over the past couple years at Virtual Coffee. And one of the things I've been thinking about a lot very recently too, it's like our, our mission is to be a welcoming tech community that allows room for growth and mentorship at all levels to create meaningful opportunities for learning, leadership and contribution for everyone. And we say that all the time, and I can rattle it off like I just did, but, but like I, we spend a lot of time thinking through those things. and Lightning Ducks is a big part of that because it allows people who have never been speakers to participate. It allows people to learn in a way that they feel comfortable because they know they can go to a speaker at Virtual Coffee who they never talk to before, but they're connected in that space to ask those questions. And so I really love the Lightning talks and I'd love to see them happen more than once or twice a year. Um, yeah. But like it's, it's all part of that, like that growing and sharing and stuff that we do. Yeah. And that's one of my favorite

:

things

Nick:

to. Yeah. And, uh, uh, there's been a lot of organic growth in the community in the sense that like, like, like for for folks who are already in virtual coffee, like the norm might just seem to be, you go in the slack and there's the automated, join today's virtual coffee and the Zoom starts. But that, that's not how it began. Like, uh, I, I, a long time ago, uh, I won't say in a galaxy far away or whatever, but I will, um, you can do it. I, I can't remember. Exactly how I started talking to Bekah. But like, uh, when I worked at Dev two, uh, we had acquired Code Newbie. And Code Newbie had this Twitter, uh, check-in. And I remember Bekah, I don't even remember what she wrote in there, but, uh, I was trying to be helpful and I was like, oh, try this or something. And, but then after that, I'm not sure how, but like you showed up on my timeline, or maybe I gave you a follow, I don't remember, but I saw you tweet out. This is like April, 2020. Uh, hey, does anybody wanna meet for virtual coffee? And I was just like, I, I just, you know, uh, it was, it felt a little weird, but I, I Dmd, I dmd you, I was like, uh, hey. Um, Is it okay if I come to virtual coffee? And you know, and it was literally the, the first Zooms were like, you were literally saying, here's the link in like a Twitter dm. Yep. And then all dm, that's how it started. Yeah. And then I don't think we even had Slack yet at that

Bekah:

point. No. No. And I had to be talked into Slack. There was somebody that, like early on was like, I started a Slack and I was like, I don't know about that. Like, that seems like a lot of stuff. I don't know. And we're not, we're not doing a lot of stuff and then, A couple months later, I am pretty sure, as Brian Healy was like, Hey, slack would be really good to keep up these conversations. And I was like, I can't handle that. Yeah. And he was like, well, then I'll start it if you, if that's cool. And I was like, all right, you wanna do it? You go for it. And that's like kind of been the whole thing of virtual coffee, right? Like, we always wanna support people with what they wanna do. Like, Hey, you got an idea, we're here to support you. Go for it. You know? Yeah. And so it's not about like waiting for the things that we are doing, it's about like, you do the things that you wanna do and we're here to give you the support that you need.

Nick:

Yeah. And there's been like, just so many things that people have just done on their own initiative. Like there's a bunch of things I don't participate in just one cuz I'm super busy Yeah. These days. But there's a lot of great things out there. There's like the, the tech study group. There's accountability, bu accountability buddies. I, that's very difficult to say. Um, it is, you know, there's the

Bekah:

front end Friday battles. Wait, what is it Dan? You know what

Dan:

Uh, front end Friday. Lemme look it up. Front end Friday. Something, something. A whole bunch of

Nick:

Fs. Friday. Friday front end Friday

Dan:

folks fighting CSS Battle.

Nick:

That's ok. Okay. But yeah, there, there's, there's that. Um, uh, what else is there? There's just like, I went

Bekah:

to my first feelings Friday today. And that's run by Ethan and which was inspired by the founders of Flatiron Group. And okay. It was like a really nice space to talk about what was going on in our week, how we felt, and to be able to identify like do we want feedback? Do we want to just vent? Um, and like to establish like what we want out of that conversation. And so that was like a really great way. We had a member who had been here for a while and then like went through a lot of personal stuff and dropped out off for a while, and then he was back and that was one of the first events that he had coming back in. Like to just be there and to listen. And it was really, really great to be able to extend that opportunity because Ethan thought this would be a really great space for people to be able to share what they're going through.

Nick:

That's great. And the, there, there's other, other things. And even, even though they're repeated all the time, uh, I think people appreciate them. Like I know you always do the Wednesday check-in, how's everybody doing, uh, Bekah. Um, and then there's like, you know, uh, Friday, like, what was your wins and so on. Or like, how, how are things going too there, stuff like that. Um, you know, the other thing, you mentioned it before, but like, I think it was after, was it Octoberfest 2020 or was it 2021 when we started really doing a lot of open source, uh, at virtual coffee. It was 2020, right Dan? Yeah. This is the first one. Okay. Yeah. You know? Yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Cuz I was at Dev two and. Yeah, I remember, uh, cuz I, I was running octoberfest, well not running it, but me and Christina Gordon, who I used to work with, we were kind of the face of the dev two kind of stuff there for Octoberfest. And then we, I remember starting to do some stuff, uh, with virtual coffee and then Kirk started up some stuff and then there was like, you know, like, you know, if you're a maintainer, you know, like this is some things you can do and stuff. And then, and then, I can't remember, maybe you can speak to this that, cause I can't remember when the site came about, but at some point I think you put up the site and then, and then we, it was open source. So then people from the community, well also people outside the community I guess. But you know, that was a great way to start getting people in a open source, I think as,

Dan:

Yeah, it was that first, it was that first, uh, Hector Fest, you know, I made the first version of the, of, so, you know, Karen made this site, uh, the first version of site. It was like a single pager, you know, nice little single page thing. And then to basically create some issues for Hector Fest, we created the, like, similar to the current version of the site. It was built on 11 at, at first, but that's right when we got onto Nefi, like I was talking about before, um, and all that stuff. And, and it looks very similar to how it looks now. Um, okay. You know, we've just added things to it since then. And at some point, yeah, in the last year, uh, switched over to remix instead of, um, 11. But yeah, it was, yeah, it was, it was, it was to do that, to encourage our members to kind of get into a open door. So we figured out a, a way to. The the members page, you know, is, is all, uh, people add their own profile, like files to the repository. Yeah. To, um, get their member, you know, profile onto the site. And, um, that was like the big, you know, the, the big push for our Hector fist thing, you know, you can get one pool request for free right here. I mean, you have to do something, you know, you still have to Yeah, do a poll request and all that stuff. Um, but. It was cool. And I, and I feel like it was pretty successful. Yeah. Um,

Nick:

yeah, I, I, I thought that was a super fun way to get people kind of kickstarted into open source, cuz it's something you can see, like it's literally your picture on the virtual coffee site, uh, or whatever you use for your avatar for GitHub. So yeah, I thought it was super fun. Um, dealing with distractions. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry, I'm looking Yeah. I'm looking at the chat again. Yeah, you should, uh, you should definitely have, uh, triple B do a lightning talk on, uh, distractions.

Bekah:

All right. Yeah. Michael, do you hear that? Like you're, you're going to have to do a lightning talk next time because that's what you wrote. So there you go. That's your punishment.

Nick:

Yeah. What is he being punish slash

Bekah:

reward for being distracting in the chat? Oh, he's intentionally trying to distract us.

Nick:

Uh, that's all good. It's all good. Got it. Uh, uh, MI Michael's good people. I know we're, we're, we're, we're kind of tr trolling a little bit at the moment, but

Bekah:

Yes, yes, 100%. Like Michael is one of my, my favorite people, and he was a very fantastic, um, game leader for me in last year. So I, I do appreciate Michael and also his inner troll. You've not been on the wait list, you've not even signed up for the wait list. Okay, man. Okay.

Nick:

I've got 10 invites if you, if you need one. Um, I've been, I've been a little busy, so they've been kind of stockpiling, but, uh, yeah, I'm actually gonna be hanging out with Michael in, I can't remember if it's l I think it's early June. He's gonna be on the, on my, uh, live stream. Um, cuz he, he's got a new role at, I believe the company's called Tigres Data. So, uh, so we're gonna be talking about that. I know nothing about it, so it'll be classic, uh, you know, yolo. Let's just look at something.

Dan:

You know, I love the, the YOLO stuff, so that, that

Nick:

YOLO life.

Bekah:

Yeah. You didn't have me on your podcast again, I was just on your podcast recently, but I can talk about my new role at Yeah, yeah, let's do it up, up Sauced.

Nick:

Just say it Gosh. Oh, okay. Oh, so it's no longer T B D. All right.

Bekah:

Okay. I mean, well, just like right now, I'll just say it right now.

Nick:

Yeah, James is saying he pushed a prod today. Yeah. Breaking news all around. Yeah. Pushing to prod Becca's spilling the beans. So, no, but that's, uh, no. Congrats, uh, on, on open sauce. Yeah, that's huge. I, I love open sauce. Well, Brian Douglas, who created it is super awesome and there's a lot of great people over there like Brandon Roberts, uh, Ted, I can't remember his last name at the moment, but it's Vortex. That's his, uh, that's his handle on GitHub and stuff. But, uh, but yeah, it's a great project. I've contributed a bit there and. It's one of, well, one, it's a great community and I just love what they're doing over there. They are productizing it now, so like it's, it is open source, but it's, they're actually working on a product now. But, uh, it's such a, a great welcoming community and it's like, it's a place I consistently tell people to go to if they're starting to get into open source. It's, uh, Brian's a big fan of like, you know, good first issues, so, uh, it's a great.

Bekah:

Okay, listen, I'm gonna have to deal with this chat because they're getting outta hand. All right? Like I am not excluding any of any of you. James, you can have an invite into our Slack. You've come to virtual coffee before Michael. You need to join the wait list, or you need to find an active volunteer who is willing to allow you to come into virtual coffee, cuz that's how we do

Nick:

it. Here I, I'll, I'll hook you up, Michael. Even though you told me I'm a flat Earth Yeah.

Bekah:

Well, how dare you, Michael. And look how nice Nick is to invite you, even though you accused him of such

Nick:

things. Well, if the Earth's flat, so if I just kind of push the invite, it should just slide across to, uh, I forget where Michael lives. Is it not Louisiana? Uh, Alabama. Alabama. That's it.

Bekah:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Michael could never give a lightning talk. That's true. And then Chad, he says, I, I Bekah knows that I could never give a lightning talk. What's the time limit? we're a little over today. Um, we went a half an hour past what we anticipated was going to happen. Um, there, there was, yep,

Nick:

go ahead.

Dan:

Mean if it was only a half an hour and there it's 11 people outside, only a half an hour. That's two and a half minutes per person. That's not that bad. You know, promptness. Dan also, uh, I, Bekah told me today, she always just plans on me going over

Nick:

is, but always goes over.

Bekah:

He has never once not gone

Nick:

over. That's fair. I

Dan:

guess, but also, How dare you is all I wanted

Nick:

to

Bekah:

say. I go last so it doesn't matter if I go over or not. So I have the fewest

Dan:

times. Becca's. Yeah, I

Nick:

noticed he didn't volunteer to go all coming out, all the dirty laundry's coming out right now. I tried

Bekah:

to gear my talk to be the last talk cuz I was also the mz and it's weird if the mc also gives a talk. Okay. So I tried to. Curate it to be that last piece of thing. I like that. Thanks. Thanks James. Quack. Yes. You noticed that I am flexing the VC mug. Oh, yeah. In our store

Nick:

right now. I gotta, I gotta grab one of those. Uh,

Bekah:

I gotta send you one. Like I said, I was going to the

Dan:

enamel one here.

Nick:

Okay. Okay. Look at you all fancy. Yeah.

Dan:

Well, I'm not gonna drink outta it. Got a poly work one. It doesn't have anything in it because, um, if you put anything hot in it, it burns you.

Nick:

Okay, so don't buy it. You drink coffee

Dan:

for a mug? Yeah. Uh, I mean, I didn't, I don't know. I test, I didn't know that until I tested it out. So, I mean, it's still in the store if you want get it, but just like be warned if you get the enamel one. Yeah.

Nick:

If, if you're looking to burn your hands, even the handle

Dan:

gets hot.

Bekah:

like you can't find out more about our merch@virtualcoffee.io slash store. Is that what it is? Are

Dan:

you're asking me? I, I, I'm pretty sure

Nick:

that's right. Yeah. I, I can't tell if Becca's gonna sneeze or if she's just making funny eyes squinting for some reason. I'm not sure what's going. I,

Bekah:

I'm making, so that's how I concentrate. Breaking news. One.

Nick:

Eye

Dan:

breaking news. Don't go to slash store So No, that's a 4 0 4. I mean, any of our things you can always just go to the normal site. Virtual coffee and find links to everything else. Uh, the link to our store is store virtual coffee io.

Nick:

Okay. I just had in the

Dan:

wrong, I probably should add a redirect for, you know.

Nick:

Yeah, you probably should. That probably, you probably should do that thing. It, it, it is, uh, it's one of those age old questions. When do you do sub-domain versus just like a path? Well, it's

Dan:

like Shopify and all that stuff, so, you know, yeah. It's a little, uh, more complicated to try to have it on a subdomain or, I mean, not have it on a subdomain, but regardless, store dot virtual coffee.io.

Nick:

What a great store. I'm gonna make squinting. I'm, I'm doing terrible ice pointing now. Yes. That's what

Bekah:

I do. I do the squinting eye. It's always the right eye. You gotta get the right eye. And that's what why was in the case that you're thinking? Because I'm thinking, okay,

Dan:

yesterday I was trying to open a glue thing and it was like this little craft kit for Ben, my, my seven year year old. And there's like this like tube of, you know, it was just a little white glue, but it was, and we have like tons of glue, but like the craft kit came with glue, you know, and. It looked like it was open, but it wasn't. No glue was coming out. I started squeezing it and looked at it and then shot myself right in the eye with glue Oh, it came out, it came out, uh, very suddenly and with, it

Nick:

wasn't crazy. The

Dan:

velocity? No, no, it was just like white glue. It was just like Elmer's, you know, what is essentially Elmer's glue? Uh,

Nick:

okay. So ultimately you can practically eat that stuff. You, you know, put that on pasta with a bit of salt, you know? For sure, for sure. But it

Dan:

was not, uh, my favorite thing in the world. I mean, and of course it was like it was in my eyes, so I couldn't actually do anything else, but it was also on my shirt and also all over, over the floor and, uh, on the kitchen table as well. So it was, it was a large mess. And, uh, for once it was all my fault, I couldn't blame it on the kids even a little bit, uh, that time. So, you

Nick:

know, you, you could have put the glue in front of the kid, like, oh, Ben, what did you do?

Dan:

Oh, yeah. Why'd you shoot me in the eye with the glue? Yeah. Yeah. Well, I, I wasn't thinking very clearly because I had glue in my eye. So it's a good call though, Nick. You're you're right, you're absolutely

Nick:

right. Would, uh, glad it wasn't crazy glue though, cuz Oh yeah. That would've been disastrous. Yeah, that would've been very bad. Crazy glue is good though for, well, it's probably not medically sound to say this, but I've crazy glued my head before from like, like, cuz when I played rugby, like I've split my head open so many times and like, you know, I, I'd usually get stitches and stuff, but the, the thing with stitches is if you don't get them handled like quickly, like the, you're gonna end up with a massive scar because like, it doesn't, like it literally starts healing incorrectly. And nowadays, like if you go to the doctor, depending on the size of. You know, the, the amount of stitches you need. A lot of times if it's kind of tiny, they'll, they'll actually use medical grade, crazy glue now. But, uh, I feel like I might have pioneered that in the late nineties by just saying, I, uh, I need to stitch myself up. So I, I mean,

Bekah:

I, I will provide you with stitches anytime you want. Just let, lemme know. Oh my gosh. All I've wanted to do in my life is to stitch somebody up. I'm pretty sure I'd be very

Dan:

good. It's fourth time. It's fourth time today. You've been offering medical advice by God?

Nick:

No.

Bekah:

Okay. Did I, but I have told on the podcast before, once I almost gave stitches to somebody, did I get, did I tell that story before? Uh,

Nick:

let's hear it. I don't think so. Yeah.

Bekah:

When I was a freshman in college, I was friends with a lot of the hockey team and somebody came home and had a pretty big gash on their head and I was like, I could handle that for you. I've had a lot of stitches in my life. And so as we were gathering the materials and he was totally down with it, he was like, yeah, you can gimme stitches. That's totally like, yeah, you've had stitches, you know what you're doing. Sure you can give stitches. And so somebody was going to go get some, a sewing kit and some sterilization materials and, and then the um, uh, ra the resident hall director came and was like, you may not give him stitches. You must leave right now. So I was like very, very close to being able to give someone else stitches. So it is okay. It is my, um, lifelong journey to be able to provide medical care to somebody since I have a master's in English and I have been in tech for a couple of years. So,

Nick:

so that, that's, that's practically you, that's that's practically a surgeon. So yeah. Practically,

Bekah:

I mean, like. I can follow a YouTube video and do the thing just like a little

Nick:

stick.

Dan:

You had me until YouTube video

Nick:

Yeah. No, I actually alcohol. You just pour

Bekah:

it on there, right? Pour it on there.

Nick:

Yeah. I mean,

Dan:

one time, I don't know if you've ever seen the like bar video game where it's like bowling. It's like a, there's a golf one too, but it, there's a bowling game where it's like a ball that you like push, you know, and it, it's, it's like a, one of those standup video games. And we used to play this at the bar that we used to go to. And I, you know, I mean, I like to win games and so I get like, kind of aggressive and, um, slammed my hand against the edge, cut my hand open. Whoa. At the bar? Not, not like horrible, you know, but like, it was definitely like bleeding. And I, and then I just like turned over, turned around to the bartender who I. Pretty well cuz we were there all the time. And, uh, I said, Jeanie my hand bleeding cuz of your game. And she was holding a bottle of gin and she looked at me and she's like, oh no. And then she just poured the bottle of gin on my hand.

Bekah:

Very good. She did the right

Dan:

thing was, you know what I, no infection, no scar. I'm like, I'm perfectly healed

Nick:

now. So, okay. Well, I, I, I gotta, I gotta say to continue on Becca's story, I actually had somebody stitch me up who wasn't a nurse. Yes. So anyway,

Bekah:

turned out amazing, right?

Nick:

Yeah. Well, I have a scar, I, I can't remember now, but it's like under one of my eyes, like, it, it is from rugby, but like, I went to, I went to tackle somebody and like the way, the way you're supposed to tackle somebody, like a, a textbook tackle is you, you, you grab your arms and you wrap it around their legs and like, the side of your head is kind of like on their butt cheek and you kind of, you kind of just dump 'em. Uh, that didn't happen. And so like, I basically got two cleats into my face. Oh. And so like, I had like, It was like this gash here. I can't remember which side. I can never tell. But, um, if you get closer to the camera, I'm be able to tell you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can't tell. I think it's this side. Uh, no, this side. That's my nose Anyways, but, uh, and it was, it was my first year playing in university and it was, uh, rookie night, that night. Um, and my roommate, or no, it wasn't my roommate, it was like one of the senior guys. He's, I told him like, I'm at the hospital, uh, I'm gonna be late. And he is like, just, just tell them to give you the stitches and stuff. And the, I asked the nurse there and she's like, you, this never happened. And she just gave me like the, uh, the needle, the stitches, and like the stair strips. And then I went back to my, my room. And, uh, took a couple shots of tequila and then rubbed ice on my face and then he just sewed it up and, uh, yeah, I'm still here. So. And nice. It was hopefully sterile. I mean, uh, what did,

Dan:

what kind of, did you use just thread from like a So kit?

Nick:

No, no. Like they, they literally gave a, a stitching kit from like, like what they would use in the hospital. It's just nice. They, they're not supposed to give those out, you know. But the nurse, the nurse clearly, cuz it was a small town. The university I was in, the nurse knew I was on the rugby team and she knew I was going to a rookie party or like just a party. So she's just like, she's just like, it's the end of my shift. Take this, I don't care. But this never happened kind of thing. Oh man. So shout out to that nurse. I'm sorry I don't remember your name, but shout out

Dan:

nurses are the best.

Nick:

I can't stop reading triple pieces. I know,

Bekah:

same. Okay, Michael, we're done being distracted by you. It's been an hour since we've been here and that is where our podcast ends. So we wanna thank Nick for being here during this podcast episode. Listen, Nick, this season we've been doing a one word description of what your career journey has looked like, and I've given you absolutely no preparation to think about what that one word is, but I'm gonna ask you about it now, as I like, try and push through this congestion that I have going right now. sorry for everybody that heard me. Sniffling, what is your one word of your developer?

Nick:

Yeah. It's like, it, it's, you know, when we had the first podcast episode, I, I said structured yolo, it's something I kind of made up on the fly, but favorite, but I, I really do mean it. And it's like when people hear the term yolo, they think like maybe Red Bull based jumping stuff like that. That's not what I mean in in that context. It's really like the first, you know, whenever opportunities appear for you, uh, basically strongly consider taking them because one, not everybody gets those opportunities. And you know, the other thing is like, even if it's something you're like, I don't know if I can do everything that's in this thing or whatever, in my experience, like just getting outta your comfort zone as well, that and. Just taking opportunities that present themselves, you know, assuming there's no major red flags, you know, uh, it's, it's changed my career trajectory, like immensely. And it's like, I, I, you know, I love getting outta my comfort zone now, and it's, you know, it's always the same thing initially. It's like, ah, my brain hurts. I don't get something, or whatever. But then you get past that and, uh, you know, aside from that, just, you know, it's gonna sound cheesy, but like, uh, just being kind to people, you know, like, uh, it goes a long way, you know, like it's, it's not just your developer skills. Like, uh, I, I think in my career, like people have enjoyed working with me and. And I don't mean that, I'm not trying to say that in a cocky way. I just mean just by being fine and kind, that changes like a whole dynamic of, of like the people you work with and all those things together have just made my career pretty, pretty successful I think so, uh, that's what I would say. Yeah. And I'll just,

Bekah:

I just wanna add to that because it's impacted my career immensely to be able to learn from you Nick, and to have that understanding and to know that I can go to you if I need career advice, if I need support, if I have a question that I don't know. And like that idea of structured YOLO is one of my favorite things since starting virtual coffee years ago now because like there are times where I'm like, I cannot do this. And in the back of my mind, like this little, this little feeling comes ahead and it's like structured yellow. And I'm like, all right, I got this. You know, like, it's just that bit of confidence that I didn't have because of the words that you said years ago. Now to be able to bring that into the things that I'm doing, so sorry,

Nick:

gonna make me, gonna make me cry on the, on the live, sir.

Bekah:

That's, that's all I want. It really is for you to cry,

Nick:

cry, cry and, and, and stitch me up. That's, that's, that's the criteria. Cry and stitch you

Bekah:

up. That's what I'm here for. You know? And also to be like, get back out there and do the thing you're supposed to do. You

Dan:

know? Maybe not at the same time the crying and the stitching. Yeah. Yeah. You know, but I feel like you don't want the per person stitching you to be crying

Nick:

at the same time. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Oh, I'm

Bekah:

so sorry. All, all of those things have been incredibly important to me. in the last couple of years. And I just wish for everybody who listens out there to realize that there is a support system for you. There is an opportunity for you. And sometimes it's very hard and sometimes you're gonna have to go out of your comfort zone. And yes, sometimes it doesn't make sense at all, but you do the thing and it provides returns that you never, ever thought that you would

Nick:

get. Yeah. And, and I just wanna say like for you, like I, I'm super happy that I've been able to support you, but you also have to remember like, even though I'm supporting you, it's, it's you who did it in the end. You know what I mean? Like, I, maybe I gave you that slight little push maybe, but it's really you that did it, you know? So just, just remember that too. So thanks Nick.

Dan:

Thanks Nick. And thank you everybody. Uh, this was a great season of the Virtual Coffee podcast and we'll be back. I don't know. When does season eight start? I always forget. We

Bekah:

recorded a new episode already. We already

Nick:

did It starts in an hour. Uh, I want starts, I starts an I want Triple B Back in the chat, James. Quick. Let's, let's get the show on the road.

Dan:

Uh, alright, well thank you everybody. Thank you and Nick so much for coming on this. That was a special surprise. I didn't know Anco was gonna come on.

Nick:

Um, so that was, I didn't even know I was

Bekah:

Yeah, yeah. Hey, I figured that out,

Nick:

right? Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yellow. Yeah, there was an opportunity. I took it.

Dan:

Uh, all right, cool. Well, um, I thank you both and thank you Michael. You have

Bekah:

no hair. It's still not there. Okay. Uh, you can go put some moisturizer on your beard or something, but I'm, I'm not Yeah, no hair to watch.

Dan:

Watch. Yeah. You know, right. Okay. Uh, so catch up Allen talking to Michael somewhere on Twitter or I don't know where. And, uh, yeah. We'll, we'll catch you, uh, next season, All right. Bye y'all.

Nick:

Hi everybody.

Dan:

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Virtual Coffee Podcast. This episode was produced by Dan Ott and Bekah Hawrot Weigel. If you have questions or comments you can hit us up on Twitter at VirtualCoffeeIO, or email us at podcast@virtualcoffee.io. You can find the show notes, sign up for the newsletter, check out any of our other resources on our website VirtualCoffee.io. If you're interested in sponsoring Virtual Coffee you can find out more information on our website at VirtualCoffee.io/sponsorship. Please subscribe to our podcast and be sure to leave us a review. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next week!

The Virtual Coffee Podcast is produced by Dan Ott and Bekah Hawrot Weigel and edited by Dan Ott.