Last sprint retro

Positives

1. I got more done with my stricter sprint practice and daily standup notes.
2. I treated writing as a reward, but this was also a negative. See below.
3. I greatly reduced social media and other negative internet browsing.
4. I got reading time in.
5. I finally started working on previously neglected tasks like house projects.

Negatives

1. While I treated writing as a reward, because of this, I didn’t actually do it most days.
2. I missed a day at the gym, I missed some meditation sessions, and I did pretty poorly on the evening fitness tasks.
3. I spent a lot of time on Jira automation learning and the blog post. I don’t view this as fully negative since I made a conscious decision to keep going with this.
4. I procrastinated somewhat on house projects even though I made some progress.

Ways to improve this week

1. Add less story points per day to try to do more writing. Try to stick to around 5.
2. Add story points to meditation since it is done during working hours.
3. Keep going with the FocusGuard Chrome extension. Complete 4 30-minute work sessions per day with this on.
4. Really try to do the evening fitness task to help with sleep.
5. Don’t put off the house projects until later in the day.

Data

• Story points completed: 41.25 (Note: this involved a few evenings and weekend days so is not indicative of 5 working days.)
• Story points not completed: 17.5
• Percentage of sprint story points completed: 70%

End of Sprint 3 Week 46

Sprint goals

• Initial story points: 33.75 (5.75 less than last sprint)
• Get fan in the kitchen up after finishing fixing the ceiling.
• Complete the scope work for cooking app outlined here. Continue to think about this project.
• Do reading and writing.
• Go to the gym everyday and get into a regular meditation practice. Do physical activity before bed.

Beginning of Sprint 4 Week 47

Standups

November 18

• Yesterday: Attended the Big Magic meeting. Continued to tweak the Jira automations and wrote a post about it. Went to yoga.
• Today: Went to yoga. I’m behind in planning this week.
• Challenges: I’m already behind on the day’s tasks since I didn’t do sprint planning on Friday.

November 19

• Yesterday: Spent half the day behind planning this week. Added support for sprints on blog. Did reading. Went to yoga.
• Today: Went to the gym. Cooking app planning around The Practice. Prime the ceiling. Read. Write.
• Challenges: Losing half a day yesterday to plan this week derailed most things.

November 20

• Yesterday: Went to the gym. Reading time. Added h1 when on the home page for SEO. Added my name to meta title for branded searches. Primed the ceiling. Did the longer meditation series.
• Today: Went to the gym. Cooking app planning around The Practice. Texture the ceiling. Read. Write. Rake leaves.
• Challenges: Did not get to app planning, writing, or evening fitness. Not everything is getting done. Will need to think about narrowing down priorities.

November 21

• Yesterday: Went to the gym. Reading time. Meditated. Attempted to texture the ceiling but the can of texture was too watery and dripped right off the ceiling. I have a sponge being delivered today to try to texture with that instead. Raked leaves. Thought a little more about the cooking app around The Practice.
• Today: Went to the gym and did the Ashtange yoga video. Texture the ceiling if the sponge comes early enough. Read. Write. Fix markdown on article summaries or get HTML working instead.
• Challenges: Did not do writing, evening fitness, and one of my meditations. I may rethink my days next week after listening to Tim Ferriss on a podcast about how he structures his days.

November 22

• Yesterday: Went to the gym and did the Ashtanga yoga primary series. Read, did the meditation tasks, wrote, and even did the evening fitness time. Got HTML working for article summaries. It was the first day I got through all of my tasks.
• Today: Went to yoga. Texture ceiling. Read. Write. Look into Feedly alternatives and migrate my setup so I don’t need to renew Feedly for another year. Plan next week.
• Challenges: N/A