334: Name That Bike

04/19/22 • 42 min

Chris got a bike. Specifically, he bought a bike to use in a triathlon he signed up to participate in. Now he needs to name the bike, and speaking of naming things, a more technical topic that he talks about is the Crispy Brussels Snack Hour.

Steph talks about Rescue Rails projects and increasing developer acceleration.

They answer a listener question asking, "Why do so many developers and agencies, thoughtbot included, replace the default test suite in Rails with RSpec?"

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Transcript:

STEPH: Oh, but I recently learned that Robert Downey Jr. in the Marvel movies he's snacking a lot, maybe not Iron Man, but something...oh no, he's stacking a lot. And I'd read that he was snacking a lot on set, and so they just built it in to where like, sure, you can snack as your character while you're doing stuff.

CHRIS: [laughs]

STEPH: And I think that's so cool because I find that I am eating every time I show up to record with you. So I would like the same special star treatment as Robert Downey Jr., [laughs] and I just get to eat during each Bike Shed. [laughs]

CHRIS: All right. [chuckles] My understanding is also that he was wildly the highest paid of all the actors, so I think that should also come along with this.

STEPH: [laughs]

CHRIS: Yeah, there's a lot that we can sort of layer on here, but it makes sense to me, and I'm fully on board.

STEPH: You're an excellent agent. Thank you for fighting for my higher pay.

[laughter]

CHRIS: You are welcome.

STEPH: What a good co-host you are.

Hello and welcome to another episode of The Bike Shed, a weekly podcast from your friends at thoughtbot about developing great software. I'm Steph Viccari.

CHRIS: And I'm Chris Toomey.

STEPH: And together, we're here to share a bit of what we've learned along the way. One of these days, I'm going to say, "I'm Chris Toomey," and then I'm just going to see how you roll with it, although now I'm ruining it, I should have just gone for it. [laughs]

CHRIS: Nothing can prepare me for this despite the fact that you're telling me in this moment. In that future moment when you do it, I will still be completely knocked out of whack. Just like for anyone out there listening, the thing that Steph would normally have said instead of what [laughs] she just said was, "What's new in your world?"

STEPH: [laughs]

CHRIS: And I contractually require that that is the only way she starts this question to me because I get completely lost. She's like, "How are you doing?" I just overthink it, and I get lost, and then we end up in a place like this where I'm just rambling.

STEPH: Every podcast contract you have from here on out must begin with hey, Chris, what's new in your world? [laughs] I will still get to that question. I just also had to tell you my future joke. I'm going to play that. Hopefully, you'll forget, and one day I will resurface.

CHRIS: I can pretty much promise you that I'm going to forget it.

[laughter]

STEPH: Excellent. Well, to make sure I stick within the Chris Toomey contract guidelines, hey, Chris, what's new in your world?

CHRIS: What's new in my world? Now I just want to spend a lot of time putting together my rider. There can be no brown M&M's in the bowl. No eye contact, please. And I can only be addressed with this one question which is, to be clear, very not true, Steph. And I always record with a video because we actually like to have human faces attached to things. Anyway, I'm going to tighten this all up. When we get to the technical segment of my world, I'm going to tell you about Crispy Brussels Snack Hour, so just throwing that out there as an idea.

But before we do that, I'm going to share a fun little thing which is I bought a bike, which is exciting. It's not that exciting. People have bikes. This is exciting for me. But the associated thing th...

Steph talks about Rescue Rails projects and increasing developer acceleration.

They answer a listener question asking, "Why do so many developers and agencies, thoughtbot included, replace the default test suite in Rails with RSpec?"

This episode is brought to you by ScoutAPM. Give Scout a try for free today and Scout will donate $5 to the open source project of your choice when you deploy.

Translate frustrations into professional corporate
Learn Hotwire by Building a Forum
parallel_tests
parallel_split_test

This episode is brought to you by Studio 3T. Try Studio 3T's full suite of features for 30 days, no payment details needed.

Become a Sponsor of The Bike Shed!

Transcript:

CHRIS: [laughs]

CHRIS: All right. [chuckles] My understanding is also that he was wildly the highest paid of all the actors, so I think that should also come along with this.

STEPH: [laughs]

CHRIS: Yeah, there's a lot that we can sort of layer on here, but it makes sense to me, and I'm fully on board.

STEPH: You're an excellent agent. Thank you for fighting for my higher pay.

[laughter]

CHRIS: You are welcome.

STEPH: What a good co-host you are.

Hello and welcome to another episode of The Bike Shed, a weekly podcast from your friends at thoughtbot about developing great software. I'm Steph Viccari.

CHRIS: And I'm Chris Toomey.

STEPH: [laughs]

CHRIS: I can pretty much promise you that I'm going to forget it.

[laughter]

STEPH: Excellent. Well, to make sure I stick within the Chris Toomey contract guidelines, hey, Chris, what's new in your world?

Previous Episode

333: Tapas

Being pregnant is hard, but this tapas episode is good! Steph discovered and used a #yelling Slack channel and attended a remote magic show. Chris touches on TypeScript design decisions and edge cases.

Then they answer a question captured from a client Slack channel regarding a debate about whether I18n should be used in tests and whether tests should break when localized text changes.

This episode is brought to you by ScoutAPM. Give Scout a try for free today and Scout will donate $5 to the open source project of your choice when you deploy.

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TSConfig Reference - Docs on every TSConfig option
Rails I18n

This episode is brought to you by Studio 3T. Try Studio 3T's full suite of features for 30 days, no payment details needed.

Become a Sponsor of The Bike Shed!

Transcript:

CHRIS: Hello and welcome to another episode of The Bike Shed, a weekly podcast from your friends at thoughtbot about developing great software. I'm Chris Toomey.

STEPH: And I'm Steph Viccari.

CHRIS: And together, we're here to share a bit of what we've learned along the way. So, Steph, what's new in your world?

STEPH: Hey, Chris. There are a couple of new things in my world, so one of them that I wanted to talk about is the fact that being pregnant is hard. I feel like this is probably a known thing, but I feel like I don't hear it talked about as much as I'd really like, especially in sort of like a professional context. And so I just wanted to share for anyone else that may be listening, if you're also pregnant, this is hard.

And I also really appreciate my team. Going through the first trimester is typically where you experience a lot of morning sickness and fatigue, and I had all of that. And so I was at the point that most of my days, I didn't even start till about noon and even some days, starting at noon was a struggle. And thankfully, the thoughtbot client that I'm working with most of the teams are on West Coast hours, so that worked out pretty well.

But I even shared a post internally and was like, "Hey, I'm not doing great in the mornings. And so I really can't facilitate any morning meetings. I can't be part of some of the hiring intros that we do," because we like to have a team lead provide a welcoming and then closing for anyone that's coming for interview day. I couldn't do those, and those normally happen around 9:00 a.m. for Eastern Time. And everybody was super supportive of it. So I really appreciate all of thoughtbot and my managers and team being so great about this. Also, the client team they're wonderful.

It turns out growing a little human; I'm learning how hard it is and working full time. It's an interesting challenge. Oh, and as part of that appreciation because...so there's just not a lot of women that I've worked with. This may be one of those symptoms of being in tech where one, I haven't worked with tons of women, and then two, working with a woman who is also pregnant and going through that as well. So it's been a little bit isolating in that experience.

But there is someone that I follow on Twitter, @EmmaBostian. She's also one of the co-hosts for the Ladybug Podcast. And she has been just sharing some of her, like, I am two months sleep deprived. She's had her baby now, and she is sharing some of that journey. And I really appreciate people who just share that journey and what they're going through because then it helps normalize it for me in terms of what I'm feeling. I hope this helps normalize it for anybody else that might be lis...

Next Episode

335: Start Messy

Steph has a question for Chris: When you have no idea how you're going to implement a feature, how do you write your first test?

Chris has thoughts about hybrid teams (remote/in-person) and masked inputs.

This episode is brought to you by ScoutAPM. Give Scout a try for free today and Scout will donate $5 to the open source project of your choice when you deploy.

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iMask
Mitch Hedberg - Escalator Joke

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Transcript:

STEPH: I am recording in a new room because we're in Pennsylvania, and so I'm recording at this little vanity desk which is something. [laughs] But there's a mirror right in front of me, so I feel very vain because it's just like, [laughs] I'm just looking at myself while I'm recording with you. It's something.

CHRIS: [laughs] That is something.

STEPH: [laughs] So, you know.

CHRIS: Fun times.

STEPH: Pro podcast tip, you know, just stare at yourself while you chat, while you record.

CHRIS: I mean, if that works for you, you know, plenty of people in the gym have the mirrors up, so podcasting is like exercising in a way, and I think it makes sense.

STEPH: I appreciate the generosity. [laughs]

CHRIS: Hello and welcome to another episode of The Bike Shed, a weekly podcast from your friends at thoughtbot about developing great software. I'm Chris Toomey.

STEPH: And I'm Steph Viccari.

CHRIS: And together, we're here to share a bit of what we've learned along the way. So, Steph, what's new in your world?

STEPH: Hey, Chris. So I have a funny/emotional story that [laughs] I'm going to share with you first because I feel like it kind of encapsulates how life is going at the moment. So we've officially moved from South Carolina to North Carolina. I feel like I've been talking about that for several episodes now. But this is it: we have finally vacated all of our stuff out of South Carolina house and relocated to North Carolina. And once we got to North Carolina, we immediately had to then leave town for a couple of days.

And normally, Utah, our dog, stays with an individual in South Carolina, someone that we found, trust, and love. And he has a great time, and I just know he's happy. But we didn't have that this time. So I had to find just a boarding facility that had really high reviews that I felt like I could trust him with. I didn't even have time to take him for a day to test it out. It was one of those like, I got to show up and just drop him off and hope this goes well, so I did.

And everything looks wonderful. Like, the facility is very clean. I had a list of things to look for to make sure it was a good place. But it's the first time leaving him somewhere where he's going to spend significant time in a kennel that has indoor-outdoor access. And as I walked away from him, I started to cry. And I just thought, oh no, this is embarrassing. I'm that dog mom who's going to start crying in this boarding facility as she's leaving her dog for the first time. So I put on my shades, and I managed to make it through the checkout process.

But then I went to my truck and just sat there and cried for 15 minutes and called my husband and was like, "I'm doing the right thing, right? Like, tell me this is okay because I'm having a moment." And I finally got through that moment. But then I even called you because you and I were scheduled to chat. And I was like, I am not in a place that I can chat right now. I think I told you when you answered the phone. I was like, "Everything is fine, but I sound like the world's ending, or I sound like a mess." [laughs]

And yeah, so I had like two hours of where I just couldn't stop crying. I partially blame pregnancy hormones. I'm going to go with that as my escape rope for now. So I feel like that's been life lately. Life's been a little overwhelming, and that felt like the cherry on top. And that was the moment that I broke. Update: he's doing great. I've gotten pictures of Utah. He's having a wonderful time at camp, it seems. [laughs] It was just me, his mom, who is having trouble.

CHRIS: Well, you know, reasonable to worry, and life's dialed up to 11 and all of that. But yeah, I will say even though you lead the conversation with everything's fine, your tone of voice did not imply that everything ...