Well, It’s been months since I’ve posted anything here. Naturally, instead of writing something new, I decided to move my blog to Github Pages. Rational, right?

(Sidenote: I love having all of my writing in a git repository. Github Pages is a pretty awesome feature of an already awesome service. The layout of this site was inspired in part by @al3x’s blog. It’s a nicely-designed site with great content. You should be reading it)

Anyhow, things have been really busy around here. It’s been 104 days since I started working full-time at Alamofire, 108 days since I moved to Austin, and probably about an hour since I calculated those numbers and nearly soiled myself.

I’ve got some more substantive posts on the way, but I thought I’d warm up a little by unpacking the more salient events of the past 100 days.

Work and Projects

So. Gowalla.

It has been incredibly fun and rewarding to work on Gowalla full-time. It was my favorite project to work on as a freelancer and it continues to present a lot of interesting problems to solve now that it is my main focus.

We just wrapped up the 1.3 release of Gowalla and I’m already hard at work on Gowalla 1.4. You’ll find that 1.3 has some nice new features, enhancements, and fixes in it, so look for it in the App Store soon.

Gowalla has easily become the most widely-used piece of software I’ve ever worked on. I am completely amazed and humbled by everyone who has used it and given us feedback on it. Seriously, it’s the best feeling in the world knowing people who I respect and admire are using an application I worked on. Really. A huge thanks to all.

I’d be remiss not to mention how much I’m enjoying the day-to-day at Alamofire HQ. I really couldn’t ask for a better group of people to work with. My coworker @bb tweeted this a few days ago and I couldn’t agree more. While I’m still working on the “hard to leave home in the morning part”, the “hard to leave work at night” part is completely accurate. As much as I enjoyed working solo, I really enjoy having these folks to work with and learn from.

Also, playing 8-player Gears of War matches during the workday? Yes please.

Outside of the day (and who am I kidding, often night) job, I have a number of side projects spanning the Mac, iPhone, and web that I’m starting to dedicate more and more time to as I finish up my last nagging bit of client work. I’m really excited about them and hope to reveal more about them soon.

C4[3]

I went to C4[3] back in September, my second time attending the event. In many ways it warrants its own post, but I feel the time has kind of passed for that.

This year was even more fun than last year possibly due to the fact that I knew way more people than I knew coming in last year (that is to say: zero). It was also a much more comfortable experience having shipped an application prior to this year’s confrerence.

Last year I felt pretty awkward being one of the younger guys there and not having a shipping application to talk about when someone would ask “So..What do you do?” (This was only compunded by my normal introversion). It was nice to be able to answer that question easily and with a demonstration in many cases.

The speakers were fantastic this year. My favorite talk was given by my friend @importantshock on MacRuby and it’s importance. It was an informative (and really funny) talk. I’ve actually started using MacRuby on a small project of mine.

Other highlights were Matt Drance’s talk on being a Good Developer, Augie Fackler’s talk on DVCS’s, as well as all of the Blitz talks.

It was really great to be able to see my friends from all over the country that I generally only communicate with over Twitter or email. I’m already looking forward to next year. Easily one of my favorite weekends ever. Hats off to Wolf for putting it on.

Austin

So far I’m really enjoying living in Austin.

The best part: It is Taco Heaven. As a matter of fact, at the time I’m writing this, I’ve eaten tacos 5 days in a row for at least one meal.

I’ve found a couple coffee shops I like. My favorite at the moment is Thunderbird Coffee. They have great coffee, friendly staff, a nice patio, beer, and live music some nights. Jo’s coffee is also a great place within walking distance.

I love movies. Natrually, I love living near The Alamo Drafthouse.

Also kind of a big deal: Bands I like ACTUALLY COME HERE. I only recently realized how often (it seems weekly) I could go out and see a good live band that I know of. (For instance, I’m going to see the Mountain Goats on Wednesday.)

I still feel as if I’ve barely scratched the surface of all Austin has to offer. Hopefully in the coming months I’ll have a more informed impression of living here.

Onward

It still feels odd to think that it’s only been eight months since I left school. While some people have criticized me a bit for that decision, I still feel as good about it as I did the day I made it. I’m happy now and I certainly wasn’t happy then. I get up every day for a reason. My reason. That matters.

(I’m sure I’ll have more to write about this particular subject soon.)

So, in the forseeable future I’ll be working hard on Gowalla, hopefully unveiling some of my personal projects, and working on making some more changes in my life that I’ll try to detail here. I also have a nice, full directory of nearly-finished drafts for this site on a pretty wide range of topics that interest me.

That’s change number one. I’m going to try be little bit less of a perfectionist and actually publish the things I write instead of letting them sit on my machine as I edit them ad infinitum.