I think it's been a good week for me, and by extension, for the company.
It has been a rare occurrence in my life to be working regular hours,
sleeping at the appropriate time, eating some number of square meals in a
day that is greater than one and getting to sleep at a reasonable hour.
Normally, working happens in fits and starts for me, and I struggle
painfully, waiting for inspiration to strike. As I've been hammering myself
into a routine and trying hard to eliminate distractions, though, I find
that my day has a certain natural rhythm.
Over the past few days, I have noticed a serious improvement emerging in my
habits. When 1pm rolls around, I am already thinking about what I'm going to
be coding. If I have a design problem, I start mulling it over automatically
as lunch approaches. I have also started a more regular schedule for
consuming caffiene, which seems to be helping me cope with A.D.D. Today, I
found a sushi place with really cheap lunch specials, and of course the
focus-friendly properties of raw fish are nice to have at reasonable
rates.
What does this have to do for the company? Well, I feel like I'm making some
serious progress on our most serious impediment to open signup right now,
which is really exciting. This is an invisible barrier which has haunted me
almost since my ill-fated experience with E.K. (my first software startup
project, when I was 14). Never got to see an actual box to put that software
in. Never got Divunal to an open beta, into the hands of actual players.
Never got any game at Ninjaneering off the ground to the point where real
customers were playing it. Finally, with real customers actually testing the
software, I'm getting ready to cross a finish line both personally and for
Divmod.
I suppose the eating and sleeping stuff sounds pretty mundane in comparison
to the eve of such an achievement, but for me, they're the same thing. I
don't know how to put it, if you haven't had a few hundred sleepless nights
and groggy afternoons yourself. It's a welcome and long-overdue change for
me, though, and I imagine there are a few readers out there hoping for the
same sort of transformation; I hope it sticks.
I'm going to have to stop with this blog entry now, because it's late, and
I'm tired. I'm going to sleep.