Week #17, 2026: Great Success Comes from Doing the Boring Work

Since the end of Q1, I have been focusing more on designing software and doing some docs work. I know many engineers don’t enjoy the design process and would prefer implementation (which is fair, to be honest; I enjoy that as well), but I do enjoy designing software. I spent many hours over the past two weeks zoning out and working on some designs that I am planning to implement at my company. It is not always exciting work, but I keep getting reminded that boring work is usually where the good stuff starts.

Also, I did finish my draft for my upcoming r/RedditEng blog post, which is planned for the end of June. I am so excited for this piece. It is about the work I did in Q1 this year and kinda summarizes everything I went through. I am very proud of that work.

Right now I am in the middle of an on-call shift. Any software engineer reading this knows about these shifts. Surprisingly, being on-call as a software engineer is very hard to explain to non-engineers. We are not doctors, but we also have a buzzer that pages us in case of problems. So are we kinda doctors, but for software?? I guess…Shrug

During on-call, I need to be close to my laptop. I have less than 10 minutes to respond; otherwise, the buzzer will page a colleague of mine. I don’t like disturbing anyone else, so I try to be very responsible while I am holding the pager. This also means I have to do all of my runs around the block. Let me tell you, doing a 24km long run around the block is soul-crushing. Very boring work. Very necessary work.

Talking about running, I have been feeling great. I love running so much and I cannot get enough of it. There is something on May 1st next week that is keeping me up at night. I am gonna attempt an all-out 5k, which means I am gonna try to hit 4:00 per km. I genuinely don’t know if I will be able to do it, but I am weirdly scared and excited about it at the same time.

I put my name in as well for London next year. It is one of the hardest marathons ever to get into, so I am not too hopeful I will get an entry, but I really really wanna do it one day. I think it is the best marathon in the world. I might honestly move to London just because of running and the running culture there.

✨ Highlights

Best Moments

I had a great time running the S25 Half Marathon last Sunday with my friend. I wasn’t planning on racing it and still was able to hit a strong time (like 40 seconds slower than my PB). I really enjoy races no matter what, especially with people I love.
I went out for dinner with a friend on Tuesday and we had a nice time together.
I had a great session this week designing. I did about 4 hours of focused work and I came up with a system that I am happy about. I hope my design reaches the implementation stage.

Wins

Studying has been good. I am not on track with my plan of doing the exams in April, but I am for sure studying more and I feel the goal that I have in mind is doable this year.
I am losing weight for sure. I have been in a small calorie deficit since the 8th of March but I can finally see some results. It is not easy to be in a deficit while running races and training, but I am trying my best to always be in a 200-300 calorie deficit and yes, the progress is slow, but at least I can sustain it. I am aiming to reach Malaga in November at about 85kg. I am right now 92kg, so yeah, 7kg to go.
I am so fit these days. I feel I am full of energy to achieve great things in my running journey. I am very happy after the half marathon on Sunday.

⚠️ Challenges

What felt heavy or draining?

I am a bit worried about delivering my commitments for Q2 on time. I am a bit behind because I was on vacation and I had to do some design work. Nothing is in the red just yet, but I would have preferred to be a bit ahead.
Lately, my grandfather has been very scared of death. Despite how hard my grandfather and my grandmother are making my mom’s life right now because she needs to take care of them, I do feel very sad when I think about them. They raised me and took care of me when I was a child, and now I am very very far from them and that life. I know this is life, but it hurts to think about it.
One of the major thoughts I am having lately is about the “Staff” promotion. It has proven to be the hardest promotion in my career and I am still not sure if I understand what it takes to be promoted. I feel I am doing a very good job at work, but I am not sure if it is enough. I will see how it goes until the end of the year and see how I should go about this.

What didn’t go as planned?

As I promised before, I wanna be very transparent about my successes and my failures. This weekend I was supposed to do an exam for one of the certificates that I am going for, but here we are and I haven’t done it because I haven’t finished studying. Sometimes, I plan things and they don’t go as planned, which is very human, and I would be naive to think that everything I plan should go by the textbook. The important bit here is to plan again and try to execute on the plan to the best of my ability. Again, boring work.

🧠 Lessons & Patterns

Great Success Comes from Doing the Boring Work. I really believe in this saying so much. Running and studying are great examples of this. We show up every day to do boring and hard runs in training for weeks on end until we go and race and achieve great things. The same applies to studying and career success: you need to do the boring stuff and improve your skills every day to keep growing and achieving your goals. It is not glamorous, but I think this is where most of the progress actually happens.
I like repeating this sentence: Hunger is a feeling and you don’t have to act on it all the time. I think this has changed the way I tackle hunger and losing weight. I do run a lot so I cannot be in an aggressive deficit, but sometimes when I feel hungry, I tell myself that and it really helps.

🏃 Running & Training Summary

This week is the last week before a well-deserved “deload” week. I have been aiming for about 65km per week for the last 3 weeks and will continue until the end of May. My plan is to keep up my “Run to Maintain” plan until then before starting the biggest plan of the year, which is going to be from June until November. I have about 4 races left until the end of the year and I am very excited for training and improving.

Also, I have been doing at least 3 strength training sessions. I think I am enjoying it more than I thought I would. I am excited to see the results of that consistency at the end of the year.

😄 Things I enjoyed

I am reading and listening to The Hobbit right now. The narrator, Andy Serkis, is unbelievable. He is making the reading experience 100x more enjoyable.
I have been watching a lot of Calum Goddard videos and podcasts. I enjoy his dedication and hard work.

🎯 Next Week Plan

Survive the on-call shift and do my best to make the life of the next on-caller easier.
All-out 5km on Friday. Maybe sub-20??? Let’s see
I am gonna see RÜFÜS DU SOL on Friday. I am so excited!!
Declare my 2025 taxes on Saturday. I have to pay a lot of money 😒

Next week is more of the same: on-call, running, studying, taxes, and trying to stay consistent. Boring work, basically. Which is probably the point.

Wish you all a great week!