First Commit: Coffee Stains and Code Anxiety

It’s 7:42 AM in Portland, and I’m staring at a blank screen—both the one in front of me and the metaphorical one that is my "brand-new, super-professional" blog. The coffee’s brewing (a light roast, because I’m pretending to be that kind of person now), and I’m already second-guessing whether I should’ve gone with a dark roast instead. Perfectionism strikes again.

I’m Jake. I write code, occasionally ship indie games no one plays, and overthink everything. Right now, I’m in what I’m calling the "Genesis" stage—not just of this blog, but of… whatever comes next. I’ve spent the last few years as a junior dev, heads-down, absorbing everything like a sponge that also mutters complaints about bad documentation. Now, I’m trying to figure out how to grow beyond that: how to lead, how to stop refactoring side projects into oblivion, and how to actually finish things.

This blog is part of that. It’s a commit to the messy, imperfect process of becoming better—not just at coding, but at being a human who doesn’t panic at networking events. I’ll probably write about tech, game dev fails, and the existential dread of choosing between React and Vue. Maybe I’ll even talk to another person at a meetup someday.

For now, though, the coffee’s ready, and I’ve got a TODO list longer than my attention span. First step: hit publish before I convince myself to rewrite this intro seven more times.

Here goes nothing.