Here’s a look at what I’m up to right now as of November 10, 2023.

Fun

I’m finishing up the revamp of this site. For years it was running on Middleman, a Ruby static site generator. After using Next.js on Hardcover, I decided to move my blog over to it using a Headless CMS approach.

Next on the list to fix on this site:

  • Allow comments
  • Add mobile sidebar with hamburger
  • Finish making the homepage interactive (I have a really fun idea for it!)
  • Offload images from Dreamhost to Google Cloud Storage
  • Add dark mode
  • Do something with my mailing list 😅

Other than that, I’m working on a data visualization based on The Histomap but using social media instead of countries. It’s using D3.js and Svelte. There’s a lot I’ll need to learn – mostly about Svelte and d3.force simulations.

Work

Last month we launched a big refresh of Hardcover (upgrading from Next.js 12 to 13). We launched on ProductHunt on September 30th and reached the #3 Product of the day 🙌!

Before the end of the year we’re going to release a “Year in Books” page that highlights the standouts books and trends of the year inspired by Letterboxd Year in Movies.

Fitness

Not that I’m mostly recovered from ACL surgery (July ’22), I’ve been exercising more. I’ve tried a bunch of different setups for fitness and I’ve settled on something simple:

Workout for 45 minutes, every week day.

That usually means one or two days at the gym, one or two days on the Peloton and a long walk or two outside.

The walk was recommended by my primary care physician to help with sleep and blood pressure. So far it’s been helping according to my sleep tracker.

Finances

I used to be on top of my spending and finances to a T. That’s part of how I retired at 36.

Since then though, we’ve spent more money than expected, not stayed within a budget and haven’t kept track of spending.

If you asked me if I thought we could stay retired for the rest of our life at this pace, I’d have to say no – unless we generate some income in some way (see Hardcover above). We still have about $2m in savings, but that’s slowly going down due to, not making any money for the last 5 years.

For November I’m making it a point to go through our expenses, audit spending and come up with a better budget. We’ve been spending whatever we want lately, and it’s not great for our overall numbers.

Social Life

This was a very social summer (Lake Tahoe Trip, Marilyns birthday, other friends birthdays, music shows, broadway shows, and more). Since then I’ve mostly been taking it easy and trying to recover.

I’m planning a monthly game night here in Salt Lake City at a public place with some friends. If you’re in SLC and want to come some month, email me at [email protected].

What’s Next?

Finish working on AdamFortuna.com, Social Histogram visualization, Hardcover Year in Books, Hardcover Discussions, continuing to focus on fitness and creating better balance in my life between work and play.

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I'm , a full-stack product developer in Salt Lake City, UT. I love enlivening experiences, visualizing data, and making playful websites.

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