Yesterday, we spent the day wandering through Brooklyn, and our last spot we stopped at before meeting with our friends for a birthday event was A&A Bake & Doubles Shop in Bed-Stuy. It’s a Trinidadian shop that a husband-and-wife team from Trinidad opened back in 2002 and is known for their delicious doubles, roti, goat and other meat stews. We didn’t have much room in our stomachs after our mini-food crawl, so we ended up just getting a potato roti and a double. This shop is so famous and respected that it even won a James Beard award as one of “America’s Classics.”

I think that this is pretty symbolic that a Trinidadian restaurant would win an “American classic” award for food. It shows what this country was meant to be — a country of immigrants built by immigrants and fed by immigrants (well, minus the Native Americans, but we won’t get into that here). What made me sad after learning this, though, is that I’m sure many Trump-supporting, anti-immigrant Americans would not agree with a business like this getting this award. We are a country divided, and I really do not see the end of that or a potential mending anytime soon.

With five straight days of work, that ultimately left me too drained to finish my video in time to publish it today. So I ended up having to overcompensate and spend five hours this evening editing my video to upload to YouTube, and it’s still not done; I still need to adjust volume, color, and add music. This social media/YouTube channel work really is like a full time job, except now, I have two full time jobs that I’m trying to succeed at. It’s not even just the process of editing the video to consider; there’s also creative edits that you have to spend time and energy thinking about so that not everything is in order and so predictable. A lot more goes into creating these videos than anyone would initially think about. And the frustrating part is… the average watch time is still only a couple of minutes… Where is the love and appreciation when I really need it…?!

Does anyone want to be my YmF assistant? 😀

While I’ve always worked at companies that are happy to give ample time to allow its employees to vote on Election Days, now, I actually work at a company that grants Election Day completely off for all employees — this is definitely a first. In addition to this, throughout the year in a year of COVID-19, the leadership team has been striving to be equitable with employee treatment, so we’ve been granted “wellness days” off in addition to national holidays. We now have next Friday as an additional wellness day for us to not work.

This makes me pretty happy, especially since I just started my new job, and I now have a day off to look forward to at the end of week 2. But I also feel very grateful and blessed that I work at a company that’s making a strong gesture to show that they really, truly do value voting, and they’re making that obvious through this action.

I feel pretty tired, both mentally and physically. It’s not like my paid work has ever required any hard physical labor, but I still feel tired nevertheless with all the new information I’m taking in, people I’m meeting, and new processes I’m getting used to. Plus, just the physical aspect of being in front of a computer for hours upon hours a day again feels draining. It also makes me realize how poorly equipped our apartment is for a proper home-office setup because nothing is right, whether it’s the angle of my elbows at my keyboard, the level of my computer screen to my eyes. Our dining room table is really the only place where we can work, and with both of us working, that means sharing the table.

I get a work stipend to spend on home office setup, so I’m thinking about things that will be good for my physical health, like cushions for my seat, back, and wrists. These all seem like little things, but the little things not working are ultimately what get people injured. And it can be pretty painful. I’m still waking up with tight hands and fingers. These are “white collar” work dangers. 🙁

Interviewing for a job fully remote over Zoom is strange. Beginning a new job fully remote over Zoom is even stranger. You have all these new colleagues, new processes, new computer and applications, and everything is 100% over a computer with no in-person interaction period. Today was the first day at my new job, and it felt a little bit unreal: I logically know I’m a new employee at a new company, but it still doesn’t feel real because I haven’t met a single person I now work with.

It was still a good experience, though. This company was the only place I’d ever interviewed at where I felt positive about every single person I interviewed with, plus the product and direction of the company. And after a full day of onboarding and meetings today, it still feels that way. People seem genuine and humble, passionate and bright, but no one seems to drink the Kool-Aid *too much* and no one seems to push any cult-like beliefs. It seems… chill, for lack of a better word.

I used to say that the last company was the best place I’d ever worked while at the same time also being the worst place I ever worked. With this company, I hope this really will be the best place I will have ever worked. Fingers crossed.

Everyone is trying to get on the TikTok band wagon when it comes to having an interactive, vertical video experience. Instagram created Reels to compete with TikTok, just in 15-second increments. YouTube just rolled out vertical videos whose drafts cannot be saved, so in other words, you need to do them instantly and upload them, though you won’t be allowed to monetize them yet. I spent a good hour last night playing around with the Instagram Reel settings and felt exascerbated; text and icons get cut off. There are no grid lines showing you where the cut offs are in the final cut. When you want to add effects, it has to be at a very specific, non-intuitive stage, otherwise you have to restart the entire reel. The TikTok experience has a few of the similar issues, but it’s definitely smoother.

I can feel my age when I am using these new products, though. I can hear my internal voice griping that it’s not intuitive, that it takes me a while to figure these steps out. I can feel myself get irritated that I’m not getting it as quickly as I once thought I understood new, budding technology. I guess this is 34?

Today, Chris and I went exploring in Harlem and went to the only remaining location of what used to be the soup dumpling spot just two blocks away from us (Thanks, COVID!), an Asian-inspired tea spot, a Southern restaurant whose speciality was fried chicken and egg nog waffles, and a fine-dining spot for snacks and fusion-cocktails (mmmmm, mango lassi and rum). In between, we sat at the tea and dumpling spots so that I could virtually participate in my friend’s baby shower over Zoom. It wasn’t as awkward as I thought it was going to be since it was all virtual with over 30 participants in Group 1, many of whom did not know each other at all or very well, but it actually was smoother than I thought it would be. We did introductions, went through some games, and also guessed the circumference of my friend’s growing belly. What made it kind of hilarious was when people started pointing out that her husband’s belly is just as round, and someone asked him to measure his belly too; his belly was only half an inch bigger than hers! He shared that neighbors were concerned about his health and suggested that he lose weight. Apparently his parents have told him the same.

We’re all getting older, and with that comes a slower metabolism and likely a more sedentary lifestyle. I hope for their future child’s sake that they’ll take good care of their own individual physical health and try to get more exercise and eat better. We owe that, at the very least, to our future generations.