This week the trio diverges from the normal format as they do an interview style episode on the topic of remote work. Brandon dives right in with questions on how to do it well, what are the pros of working remote, why Kris and Toran like working remote and concludes with how to land that first remote developer job.
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Toran Billups - 00:03 - You're listening to Developing Fatigue. I'm Toran. Today, I'll be joined by my two cohosts Brandon Williamss and Kris Van Houten. And today on the show we're going to talk about remote work and a little switch up. We're actually having Brandon interview Kris and I in a weird style because Kris and I work remote and Brandon does not. So we're trying to convince him of course. So Brandon, why don't you throw a rough question at us. Take it away.
Brandon Williams - 00:31 - So you already stole my thunder here, but I was going to say you guys are trying to sell me right now on why I should want to work remote. So I'm going to let you know how you're doing throughout the podcast,
Kris Van Houten - 00:44 - With a thumbs up or thumbs down?
Brandon Williams - 00:48 - Yes. All right. So first and most important question I have, when you work remote, do you get to work in your pajamas?
Kris Van Houten - 00:57 - You want to answer that one, Toran?
Toran Billups - 00:59 - Uh, I mean, I think you can right, Kris?
Kris Van Houten - 01:02 - you can. And when I first got started I did, but for various reasons I stopped
Toran Billups - 01:11 - Is it because you felt bad about yourself.
Brandon Williams - 01:14 - Uh, well I guess we want to get into it. The reason I stopped working in my pajamas was because I feel that there is a, a mental benefit of actually preparing for your day and part of that preparing for your day is actually putting on clothes. And so it just kind of, it's all those little steps to kind of get your head in the game and be like, okay, it's time to work and not sit down and play video games for the next eight hours.
Toran Billups - 01:39 - I think there's some truth to that. A friend of ours, uh, I was actually talking to him about, you know, working remote and dressing up for it. He actually puts on a suit and kind of explained the same thing that like his kids would see him and he would kinda just be dressed down and they'd be like, oh, what's, you know, what's dad doing? Why can't he come hang out with us? He looks like this on Saturdays. And so he started wearing a suit when he was at work and it was almost like a, a very visual signal to his kids. Like, Oh, we don't bother dad when he's dressed up because that means he's at work and then when he would dress down after work, it was like a visual signal of course that he's off in his kids. He really bought into that from the family side. So I thought that was cool.
Brandon Williams - 02:15 - Well, a little bit more serious. Um, do you get to work whenever you want? I mean if you're working remote and you're not in the office, don't, don't you kind of get to set your own schedule and just show up when you want work a couple hours here, take some hours off.
Toran Billups - 02:29 - Kind of. Yeah, I mean I think this is one of the things that I specifically like about working remote is the flexible schedule. Maybe not to the degree that Brandon is talking about. We're just like randomly I, I'm working at like two in the morning or something, but my schedule is pretty. It's pretty flexible, but it's kind of Nice. What I do is I get up around six. I kind of log in and do some shallow work, like email and things like that before everybody's in the office, uh, about the time people start coming in the office and they're on east coast time. I usually go for a run, so I run like a 5k every morning and so half hour after I'm done with that I come back and just sync up, make sure everybody's still alive and there was no fires. And from there we sort of get into my work day around lunchtime and then, um, you know, whenever there's kind of a down moment or there's no meetings happening in that afternoon, I'll go for a bike ride. So I like it. I liked the fact that I can be a little more flexible from the scheduling side, allows me to get out and be a little bit more active than I was otherwise, which is kind of Nice. And uh, you know, if you want to take two or three showers a day, that's an option. Right, Kris?
Kris Van Houten - 03:30 - I guess that's an option, but just not what I choose to take
Toran Billups - 03:35 - zero shower plan or
Kris Van Houten - 03:37 - I have a shower plan at least once a week and then beyond that it's just whatever. Oh, they're going to find out. I'm actually serious now. Yeah. So for my schedule it's, I, I'm like Toran, yes, I can, I have some freedom and liberties and when I work, but uh, Kinda like kids, it's better if they have a schedule and a routine. I find that the same for even grown adults like myself to kind of have the same thing. So, you know, Toran has, has his setup or his morning routine. Mine is, I try to get up between 7, 7:30 in the morning, typically make breakfast for my wife, my kids and myself. And then ideally it'd be at my desk around 8:38, 45 and I kind of have like a whole morning routine, like I'm not actually working yet. Um, I kind of just have some quiet time with myself and a kind of mentally prepared myself for the day. You don't get my coffee ready to take my vitamins, all that stuff.
Kris Van Houten - 04:36 - And you know, that way when I'm done with all that stuff, my, my brain is kind of primed for the day and that I'm able to get into work and start knocking stuff out. And then I start work about 8:39. I usually wrap up about 4:30 or five, um, which is kind of Nice because the company I work for is located in Austin. I am in North Carolina, so I'm actually an hour ahead of them so I kind of have like a good hour, hour and a half in the morning where it's kinda like quiet. I don't have chat blowing up on me and uh, I don't have a lot of interruptions so I can actually get a lot of stuff done that first hour or two a without having to be interrupted a lot. So yeah, that's kinda how my work day is structured on my end.
Brandon Williams - 05:21 - Interesting. So you guys both mentioned a little bit about families and how working remote impacts your family. So, um, I know you guys are both married, so do your wives like that you work remote? Um, do your kids like that? You work remote, how does, how has that changed your relationships at home? Working remote versus working in an office?
Toran Billups - 05:42 - I like Kris jump in here because he has got a lot more kids.
Kris Van Houten - 05:46 - Yeah, no, I think this is. This is a great question and it's also very important to question. So before I was working for my current job, so my current gig is the first time, first job I've had work at work remote full and you know prior to that I was driving an hour each way and just because of how the schedule worked out, I was getting home almost every single night after the kids and my wife had already eaten dinner and it was, this is kind of hard. Like I, I enjoy sitting down and eating with my family and just getting to hear about their day. How was school? What was your favorite part of your day? What was the worst part of your day? How can we make tomorrow better? Things like that. And I was missing out on a lot of those conversations because he know if the kids get home from school and be starving by the time I would get home. So my wife just started feeding him earlier, uh, and so when I started working remote it was just like that barrier was gone. I'm getting two hours of my day back every single day and so, you know, I could hang out my kids up until the point where up until the point where I have to go step into my office and I could hang out with them immediately after I step away.
Kris Van Houten - 06:48 - And the nice thing is that there's also times throughout the day life be like right now it's summer and my kids come in probably a few times a day just to like talk for a minute or just know, come in and cuddle and hug for, for a minute just to talk about something. And I love those moments. I love that I get to have those interactions with my kids. Uh, you know, my wife has more access to me where she can just come in and ask me questions about what's going on or if we need to kind of plan something really fast and it's not a huge hindrance to my day. It's not a huge burden. It's actually nice being able to see my family, uh, even though yes, I have four kids and so it gets loud sometimes, but that's why I fork out the money for nice headphones, but I will say that it has definitely been a huge benefit and my wife would also attest to that, that it's, it's been awesome being able to work from home and, and have that access there.
Toran Billups - 07:38 - Yeah. And similar bro. I don't have near as many kids. I just had the one kid, he's 12 going on 13 this year and you know, one of the things I think about as he's becoming a teenager and uh, eventually a man is the more time that I get with him around this age, I think the better, the better impact I can have. Um, I just remember there were times where, you know, my dad worked six days a week. I didn't see him a whole lot and wondering what impact that had on me as well as other kids, of course. So the fact that my son is also homeschooled helps. So he's at home. My wife's at home, I'm also at home. And so that's just makes for an interesting family dynamic. I think the only thing that's really been weird about it because of course all good things, you know, on the family side is really making friends with folks who are not in that same, that same worldview where like you're around your family that much. And so it almost feels weird to people like makes it harder for me to make friends locally because a lot of people are like, that's weird.
Toran Billups - 08:35 - And I'm like, I kind of, I mean like you may think it's not going to be enjoyable, but like you were saying, Kris, those moments where you actually get to spend time with your kids during the day is just really a special time. And at the same time I do, I do sort of educate my, my wife and my son on deep work. This idea that I need to be really deep into work. They know that because I walked the door for those moments. So there are literally usually about three hours during the day that I completely locked down, shut the door, lock it, tell my wife, hey, you know, if you actually need something emergency, call me. Otherwise my phone's face down, I'm not going to see a text or anything from you. And that's just a productivity thing, which we can talk about later. But I think it was really one of the big benefits of working from home that I struggle with is when I go to the office, it's just like, oh gosh, there's so many distractions. I can't get anything done. So. Yeah.
Brandon Williams - 09:22 - Hmm. So, um, besides. I'm glad I teed this up this way. Are you guys kind of lead into this family is obviously a very big factor in why you guys work, but what other things factor into um working remote being important to you.
Toran Billups - 09:38 - Yeah. I, I could probably steal that, the rest of that thunder on focus. You know, I mentioned that when I'm in the office and just experiences I've had in office, I'm too much of like a social person. I like to talk to people and kind of get to know them and one of the nice things about being remote is that there's just a bigger barrier to that, which could be a negative, but one of the things that's interesting is I can sort of shut out the world for these times and get heads down and get real work done, which I just, I really struggled with that in the office anymore as well as of course the schedule is kind of nice to be able to go out for a run or go for a walk or something like that if the weather is actually in a good place. So I know Kris has a much bigger list than me. Mine's pretty good.
Kris Van Houten - 10:19 - I saw so. So the, the, the primary reasons besides proximity to family that I like to work remote? Is that what the question is
Brandon Williams - 10:27 - Yeah, that. Yep. Great way to sum it up.
Kris Van Houten - 10:29 - Yeah. So I think um, for me like, like Toran said it, it's, it's a productivity thing. Uh, I think that everybody is different and how they work best, which we've talked about in previous episodes. And for me, just being able to work uninterrupted is, is huge for my productivity, you know, and I know I mentioned it like my kids come in throughout the day, they're not really supposed to, but um, but I don't have a lock on my curtains that separate me from them. So, um, but it's, um, it's one of those, like, I, I welcome those distractions because I want my kids to be able to see like what, uh, what I think I have as a good work ethic. And so being able to teach that to them by them observing it, which has fostered a lot of your conversations with my older, my older two kids about, you know, what I work on all day, like what is code, what does the program, yada, yada, yada. So it's been a lot of fun doing that.
Kris Van Houten - 11:23 - Uh, but to, to answer your question, it's just, it's also a time efficiency thing, you know, I'm getting it, like I said earlier, like I'm getting two hours back in my day by not having to drive into an office. Uh, and you know, I, I'm not, I'm not getting distracted by like what I call the water cooler talk, you know, the little side conversations and stuff like that and granted sometimes on chat, my coworkers and I have a bit of banter, but you know, it's not something that's a huge distraction for me, but honestly those are the two biggest things is, is you know, proximity to my family, being able to be here for them with them, uh, and just getting back that extra time throughout the day and being able to actually go heads down and focus with a minimal, a list or a minimal set of distractions throughout the day.
Brandon Williams - 12:10 - Maybe we've already covered this, but you guys just let me know if we have or if there's other things that you want to add to this, but what practices or habits do you need to develop to become a good remote worker or a good remote developer? I know you guys kind of said focus and stuff like that, but is there other things that you need to do?
Toran Billups - 12:29 - Yeah, the one that could, you know, we could even talk later about like kind of a negative for people who are new to remote or maybe people who work remote on have been for a long time is you have to know how to get a word in edge wise during meetings because a lot of times when you're remote that phone is, you know, literally just a Cisco phone open to the whole room. Except maybe you were one other person who is remote and you have to almost time your interruptions because truthfully that's what they are. And so I think one skill that's very practical and and honestly not taught, it's, it's kind of learned through experience is waiting for those, those sensible cues in the middle of a conversation or in the meeting to jump in and give your, your take on something. And that is really hard for awhile. In fact, I think every time I start a new remote job, getting a feel for that sense all over again with, with different people is, is a whole challenge unto itself because you have to feel, you know, I don't want to offend someone by jumping in, but you know, if I don't say anything then I'm gonna regret not jumping in at this point or if I don't jump in now, it'll be awkward later when I'm like, so 45 minutes ago.
Toran Billups - 13:33 - You kind of have to find a way to, to still be productive by contributing to these meetings. And I think that's ultimately one of the things when I was a younger remote that I would say I didn't have that skill and I wish someone would have taken me aside and said don't just hate meetings outright because they're more difficult. Find a way to embrace what makes them different and get good at it. And so I think that's one of the practical pro tips I've got anyway.
Kris Van Houten - 13:57 - Yeah, and if you want to get like really nerdy about it, you can be like, well, if I enter up now, the average latency is going to be about 100 milliseconds based talking in between now and then they're gonna think I'm interrupting and we're going to become a jerk. So there's all kinds of ways you can psych yourself out there. Yeah. So like I said, this is my first job where I've had the opportunity to work remote and there's definitely this, if I want to say a learning curve or an adjustment phase to where you realize you have all these freedoms and you could take advantage of that if we're not careful. Uh, you know, like, well no one's watching what I'm doing now so I can just kind of fool around for 45 minutes to watch a movie or something like that. Like, I've had friends who do that and I was, I, I lucked out by coming across a couple of articles actually while I was interviewing for this job about working remote and things to make sure do or things that you set up in place, uh, to make sure that you actually are productive to make sure you're not falling under those spells.
Kris Van Houten - 14:58 - And so one of those traps I guess. And you know, for, for me, like I said earlier, yeah, there's all kinds of liberty when it comes to working remote, but you have to implement like artificial boundaries for yourself to prevent you from, you know, slacking off or from, you know, losing focus or getting distracted by a lot of things. You know, I, I have add ons on my browser that prevent me from going to like social media sites and stuff like that throughout the day. Uh, and, and stuff like that. That way I'm less tempted to be distracted by those types of things. I, like I said earlier, I have like this whole morning routine that I kind of go through to kind of mentally prepare myself for the work day and uh, which is something I would not be able to do if I was in a car, you know, kind of having those same routines and uh, you know, and so all of these different things kind of get my brain ready to be like, okay.
Kris Van Houten - 15:54 - So as soon as I say let's start the day, I can kind of hit the ground running and be as productive as possible and I find that the days that I don't do those routines, I'm just so distracted and I get so sidetracked by everything that I go to stand up the next day and just like I don't, I don't even know what I did yesterday. I was on the Internet but I don't know what I was doing. And so yeah, like I, I'm a big advocate for routines and, and putting structure in place to make sure that you're not taking advantage of the, the freedoms and liberties that you're being afforded by a working remote for your employer.
Toran Billups - 16:33 - Yeah, and I wanted to give another pro tip that, uh, I remember I brought this up when Kris and I worked together, but I kind of continue this everywhere I work remote, which is in these meetings, even if it's a one on one meeting or the whole, the whole room you have your camera on. One of the things that I think really sets apart great remote folks is, you know, they, they want to see the other humans they work with and there's this idea of the half life of trust, which is every six weeks if they have not seen your face, they may not actually believe you exist. So you should probably have your camera. But it's a real thing. Like people tell me all the time at work right now. They really appreciate that. I have my camera up there just like, oh, this is so cool. You just like letting me into your office here. And I'm like, well, you know, this way I think I'm a little bit more vulnerable, a little more human for the conversation because that's who I am. I'm not hiding behind anything. And I think that's made a big difference. And so I think when I was working with Kris back in the day, I remember that I kind of started this big camera movement and all the remotes, suddenly we're like, get your camera. And then we did. And I feel like meetings greatly improved. People understood and respected the human side of who we were. We weren't just cogs cranking out code. And I thought that was kind of cool.
Kris Van Houten - 17:40 - Yeah. Yeah. Um, yes. Uh, if you want, we can talk a little bit more about how we tips for your employer, I guess for your coworkers and stuff. Like what makes things better there. Uh, but yeah, like Toran said, I'm a big advocate because of what Toran kind of implemented. We're when we worked together is had your camera on a uh, if they can't see you, if they're going to forget that you're there, so they're going to forget to ask for your input or if you're trying to give your input, they're not, it's just harder for them to recognize that you're still a part of that meeting if they can't see your face. And so, you know, where I'm at, we have big screen TV's and all the conference rooms, so if I sign on, they see my big face, uh, in hd if, if no one else is on the call and be at Toran, like you and I started doing that when we were in a stand up together. And that's, and what was awesome is that immediately we kind of started doing corny things together. Like we would start to even the answer, like bear hugs at the end of meetings, but it sounds silly,
Kris Van Houten - 18:39 - but those things all helped to build camaraderie so that now when I, when I'm getting off calls, uh, you know, one of the people on our team to reset, like, she's still like air hugs, Kris air hugs. I'm like, all right, here we go. And so, like, and if I was, if they couldn't see my face, the chances of that happening are basically nil. And it just allows us to. I feel that washing and seeing people's visual cues that they give off in their faces is, is huge for trying to understand and trying to read what they're actually saying. Uh, and so yeah, that's been, that's been huge for us. And one other thing that I'll throw out there just in the form of communication is, you know, when you're not in meetings, it's really easy to, if he's, I, I felt it's really easy for your other team members to not want to reach out to you because they just think like, oh, well he's, he's just busy. Like they can't see that I'm busy, but they just, they assume you're, you're super busy so they don't want to interrupt you.
Kris Van Houten - 19:36 - And so one thing I, I basically tell my team and I remind them often is that I want you to pretend that I'm sitting right behind you and that if you have a question, you turn the ground and just be like, Hey Kris, I got a question except for in this, in this circumstance it's you clicking a button and starting a phone call with me or sending me a message and just be like, Hey Kris, I got a question and if I'm busy or if I'm out to lunch because I'm a different time zone, I'll get back to you as soon as I can buy one. I don't want you guys to ever feel that I'm too busy to talk to you because part of my job is making sure you guys have all the information that you guys need to do your job as well as possible. And so, you know, and I again, I had to remind my team have that on a regular basis. And so those are two things that I'm definitely a big advocate of a at the workplace when it comes to working remote that have. I've seen a definite positive result from from occurring those things.
Toran Billups - 20:30 - Yeah. One, one of the jobs I worked remote actually I was consulting and I was kind of mentoring two guys on that team and I actually just left a Hangout up on my iPad all day that the Hangout with just pointed at me because they were actively being mentored so they would just jump into the Hangout whenever they had a question and it wasn't even really like the, yeah, the break and chat or like I don't know if he's busy, they could actually join the Hangout and see me, which I don't advise this all the time. In fact it breaks up the whole deep work concepts, so not for everybody, but in this particular case it was great because my job was more primarily mentoring them and so it was awesome. They could just be like, oh my gosh, I want to talk to Toran as if he were right next to me. Well here's this Hangout with his video always on. I can actually do that. So
Kris Van Houten - 21:11 - yeah, I like that idea. Obviously it's not going to work for every team, but that's a really clever idea to have in place.
Brandon Williams - 21:17 - Gosh, I love that. I love that you guys really emphasize the camera because I. So much of communication is body language and like you were saying, those visual cues of facial expressions and stuff like that. So you guys tackled one of my other questions was how do you, um, I was going to ask me, you guys already covered this. How do you manage that communication and the meetings with your team teammates? Um, so
Kris Van Houten - 21:42 - I will add to that really fast if I could, um, part of it comes in that year. Your employer has to be on onboard with a remote employees as well. You know, I've, we've actually lost some people at my work because on their particular teams working remote, which is not working well for them, uh, to where the communication was really poor that they were trying to improve it. Uh, but it just, it wasn't working out well on their particular team. Whereas, and they're working on an entirely different product. Even a how right on our team, it's almost like remote first and a lot of ways, like every meeting I'm a part of has we use zoom for our video conferencing. And so every meeting I'm a part of has the, the Zoom Conference id already attached to it. It's like basically by default and all my meetings and you know, like, because my company has bought into like we have remote employees and we need to make them feel like they're actually a part of the team. And so, uh, it's definitely something where if you're working remote you need to make sure you're considering working remote for a company.
Kris Van Houten - 22:44 - You need to talk to them about like what are they doing to facilitate, promote employees to make sure that they still feel like they're a part of the team. Uh, you know, where I work, we actually have people whose jobs it is to, you know, make the culture of our company great. And you know, they have people whose sole focus is like, how do we keep a remote? People still plugged into the culture even if they're 2,000 miles away. And so, you know, it, it does take an intentional effort, uh, and at least at my company, I feel too very well noticed on my side. I feel very well accommodated for, uh, all the things they do to make me feel like I'm still a part of the team even though I'm in North Carolina. So
Toran Billups - 23:23 - yeah, one of the things that I actually appreciated about that, that setup Kris Kris's talking about, I just want to give more praise to that remote culture is, you know, it's pretty nuanced. Like a lot of people who haven't worked remote maybe not understand or appreciate the little things like Kris is talking about. One of the other ones I want to mention that very much helps I think improved the remote culture is the ability to travel. So when I worked with Kris, I could literally at any moment book a flight, travel down, hanging out all week, pay nothing, and then come home and no one said anything. Like I could literally do that at any point. And not every company is that way. Some companies have travel budgets and you actually have to have approval and things. I get it. It's not cheap to do this, but what I loved about that is it really, as Kris said, remote first it, it made me feel like if anytime I need to come down because of a personal issue and I need to talk to someone in person and handle this or we have a big planning meeting, I want to be there in person. Those are things actually I just preferred and they would. They were totally down for that, which has kind of a big deal to not bat an eye if you want to come fly down.
Kris Van Houten - 24:20 - So they, they, they worded it as you know, to have remote developers fly down to Austin is an investment in the team to help build a camaraderie to help build the team closer together because, you know, whenever I fly down I'm setting up lunches and dinners with other people, taking them out to dinner and you know, that's on the company's dime. But you know, it's just an opportunity for us to hang out after work. And so when they come down they're able to just invest a lot of time and the other team members that are on site,
Brandon Williams - 24:47 - very good. So let's say you guys have sold me on being a remote developer. How do I go about getting my first remote job
Kris Van Houten - 24:57 - so I can tell my story how I got my first remote job. That was a. I was living in Hamilton, Ohio, which if you haven't looked it up on a map, it's a very small town just outside of Cincinnati. And I got like I was being offered the only coding job in the city that I think existed. And, and this was like down the street from my house. I'm like, car, this is great. I can basically walk to work. That'd be great. I was like, but wonderful. I can go one step further. And actually worked from home. And so I just happened to google a ember jobs remote. That's exactly what I googled. That's the, you know, the javascript framework that I was working exclusively in at the time and came across the job posting that got me the job I'm at today. So for me it was just a, a google, Google search away. So Toran, you probably have a much more exciting story though than that.
Toran Billups - 25:47 - No, I think that is a tricky thing. You know, I am pretty good friends with kind of a community college here. A friend of mine that works there I should say, and he's, he's always kind of hitting me up with hey you know, so and so is going to do the computer programming course and they're asking us, you know, how do you get a remote job and can it be your very first job because they have someone at home that they're trying to take care of, but they heard that you can also work from home. And my feeling is always that, you know, the very first remote job is probably. I mean definitely not your first programming job unless it's just freelance and you're kind of messing around it to get paid on the side or something. But for me I think truly one of the things we didn't talk about as a pro tip that Kris was kind of dancing around is to promote, you, you kind of have to have your ducks in a row, you have to be heads down and you have to be thinking about the output that you're going to have for that day, uh, because ultimately you are judged hands down on that output.
Toran Billups - 26:42 - Uh, and if so, if you are still very much in the learning phase and I'm talking like super early programming, learning where you may spend a day just looking for a semi colon that may not be the best first remote job option. Certainly work with other folks and level up your skills. But I think the remote jobs I see people are still, even though I don't want to admit this, people are still treating that a bit like a privilege. Like hey, given your output you can work remote. Um, I don't know if that was Kris's experience as well. I know Kris is output is phenomenal. So it's probably never once been a discussion, but I've certainly talked to friends of mine who worked remote for a short time. But let's just say the output was not meeting expectations. And I think they very quickly got reeled back into not working remote full time anymore.
Brandon Williams - 27:27 - Well, I think that kind of wraps up this, this set of questions I had for you guys and we kind of talked about the different aspects of what it looks like to work remote. How do you, um, why do you like to work remote? And then how do you get that first job? So let's kind of transition now into our big wins. So a Toran, Kris, who wants to start that off?
Toran Billups - 27:48 - I'll jump in here because, uh, my secret to landing that first remote jobs, of course giving a conference talk, that's actually how it happened. So of course Kris asked me and I ignored him as I always do, but my, my big win this week is actually I'll be speaking at a conference in September. It's a ember camp and the talk I'm giving us is fast feedback, forward progress, so very ominous title. I don't know, it's hopefully an interesting talk. It's September 20, first in Chicago. So
Kris Van Houten - 28:16 - Nice. You're going to the windy city. Uh, I guess, uh, my big win is that, you know, I've been really dabbling in learning react a lot lately. I've been working on a personal project, uh, which is kind of, I've taken about two years off from back end development and I definitely feel rusty and I definitely feel like I want to get back into that domain. And so part of this little personal project I've been working on obviously requires a server and an API and data and all that stuff. So just been having a lot of fun digging back into that realm over the last couple of weeks. So setting up like a graph Ql, a server and actually writing tests for it, which is a whole challenge to learn how to write tests or a node based API, which I hadn't done before. So yeah, just learning about the back end of a bot development again has been a lot of fun and yeah, that's my big win for the week. What about you, Brandon? What you got?
Brandon Williams - 29:12 - My big win for the week was last week we went on a family vacation and it was, um, it was a lot of fun just hanging out with my kids, doing a lot of hiking and walking. I'm going to an aquarium here in Cha down in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Um, it was just a, it was just a blast. The kids had a good time. I had a good time with my wife. So, um, yeah. Family vacations for the win. Alrighty. Well, uh, thanks for. Thanks for letting me interview you two. This was a lot of fun and uh, I hope somebody out there got something, some valuable information out of this on why you want to work remote, how to work remote, how to, how to set yourself up to get that first job. So
Toran Billups - 29:55 - yeah, thanks for running it Brandon. See you guys next week
Brandon Williams - 29:58 - later