> This is a live document. I update it whenever I can. > The last update was on April 28th. Here is my summary of 2025 so far. It includes the books I've read, the songs I listened to on repeat, some games I hope to play, some personal events and photos, and more. # April 📚 Books update: I finished [[Siddhartha Mukherjee - "The Gene"|The Gene]] and can confirm it lives up to the "Biography of Cancer" level. I appreciated the historical breakdown of how humanity advanced its understanding of evolution and genetics in such a short time. In a couple of generations, we've gone from debating whether evolution is a real phenomenon to gene therapy. The first half of the book dragged a bit, but once Mukherjee got to stating important societal issues the gene advancement provoked, it made up for a slow start. Then, I switched gears and started reading the classic [[Peter Thiel, Blake Masters - "Zero to One"|Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future]] by Peter Thiel & Blake Masters. Long time overdue, but I am happy to report it remains as relevant as when it was first published, ten years ago. It sheds some light on how people who shaped big tech see competition, markets, or innovation. I followed the tech trail with a Christmas gift, which was [[Tanya Reilly - "The Staff Engineer's Path"]]. Even though I am not a staff engineer, exploring the higher echelons of software engineering is an interesting read. As usual with this type of book, many practices and techniques Tanya recommends are useful for other lines of work too. In the last couple of days, I've struggled with putting down [[Adam Zadworny - "Heweliusz. Tajemnica katastrofy na Bałtyku"]]. It's a riveting read on the largest maritime disaster in Polish history. As usual in these types of stories, the author reveals a sad combination of bad luck and incompetence resulting in the death of 56 people. Because of feeling somehow drawn to the big water, I used to say that I was a sailor in my previous life. I am scratching that saying; that book spooked me for good. 🎮 And games update: Once I became a father, my time for playing games shrank (from a low point already). The unexpected advantage of that is that I can peacefully wait for game prices to decrease, as there is no point in buying them on day one if I know it will take me months to get through just one. So, like a stingray buried under the sand, I waited for a decent price on [[Alan Wake 2]], and I finally snatched it. I love it. It's a unique combination of scary, off, funny, clever, and sometimes slapstick-like. I am deeply invested in the story because I am certain Remedy will take me some weird places. Also, that Max Payne remake can't come out soon enough (so I can wait months to play it). # March In March, I disappeared into the world of playing guitar 🎸 and had not discovered too many things worth sharing. The only exception is the [Rest is Politics](https://www.youtube.com/@restispolitics) podcast. It's refreshing to get a perspective on global politics from actual former civil servants. # February 🎮 I got back to playing [[Indiana Jones and the Great Circle]], and it's an absolute blast. That game is one of the finest achievements in extending such a well-established IP as Indiana Jones while maintaining the original tone that everybody loves it for. 📚 While wrapping up [[Wojciech Jagielski - "Modlitwa o Deszcz"]], I started thinking about this episode of [Dział Zagraniczny - "Czy w reportażu bardziej liczy się forma, czy treść"](https://dzialzagraniczny.pl/2022/12/czy-w-reportazu-bardziej-liczy-sie-forma-czy-tresc/). It is about whether the form or the content is more important in a reportage. While it was interesting, I don't think I fully grasped what they meant back when I first listened to it. Most of the Polish reportages I've read were written in the past ~10 years, which made them influenced by the "content first" school of reportage. "Modlitwa o Deszcz" was first released in 2002, and if that's an example of the "form first" school, I have to say I consider it equally as valuable. Jagielski's writing transported me to that foreign land of Afghanistan and I enjoyed how unobtrusively he managed to put himself as a character in some of the stories. It made them much more relevant. 🇮🇹 IIRC, if you boast about learning a language, your chances of learning it drop (proven sta£tistically). Well, I'll take my chances! After 225 days of learning Italian on Duolingo, I want to step it up. I read [Językowy Paszport](https://www.planetaabstrakcja.pl/) which, I am sad to say as [Planeta Abstrakcja](https://www.youtube.com/@PlanetaAbstrakcja) fan, is quite a poor language-learning source. But it prompted me to fetch a list of the 100 most common verbs in Italian and ask ChatGPT to generate example sentences in multiple persons. Now, I added them as flashcards to this cool, Markdown-based app, called [[Mochi]]. And thus, Adriano Italiano was born. ![[buongiorno.jpg]] 🎧 A fresh dose of good music coming your way! Lately, I've been catching up on rap sensation Doechii and her album [[Doechii - Aligator Bites Never Heal |Aligator Bites Never Heal]]. My two top pics from that record are going to be [DENIAL IS A RIVER](https://open.spotify.com/track/1eTaznNW4Xxtx9za2SMTXB?si=a8fc3883896d41f3) and [NISSAN ALTIMA](https://open.spotify.com/track/2dKkVF2m160z0RNDN2dddc?si=19024cc6e826447c). A masterful display of storytelling, humor, and flow. Staying in the rap world but switching to 🇵🇱, I like what I am hearing from Hubert. in his latest album [[Hubert. - kolorowe domy|kolorowe domy]]. The highlight so far is [kobayashi](https://open.spotify.com/track/531KYJwPIL9XETttYNsNOL?si=bf17cd455f254f9f). 🧐 An update on my reading. In its first official voting, Saleor's (my employer) book club has decided to read [[Frederic Brooks Jr. - The Mythical Man-Month]]. I am about 25% in, and I honestly don't enjoy it too much. I hoped to find timeless advice on building software. Instead, I found namedropping spaghetti (where the names come from ancient IBM technologies) with little substance. And even when the substance is there, it's either dated (can't blame the book for being originally released in 1975) or surface-level. I also started listening to [[Michio Kaku - "The Future of Humanity"]] on Storytel, which put me in a proper existential crisis. Did you know that humanity [almost went extinct](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youngest_Toba_eruption) 75 000 years ago? A few hundred survived to carry the torch of our civilization, to later create the Holy Roman Empire, Angkor Wat, pizza, and Blur. Thank goodness. 📱 This year, I decided to give habit tracking a shot. Thanks to that newly-found habit of tracking habits, I can now share these fascinating stats with you. This year so far (up to today, February 16th): - I worked out **10 times** - I didn't eat any sweets for **36 days** (mostly thanks to no-sweets January) - I went out of my way to take some quality photos **13 times** I've been tracking all of that in an app called [[HabitKit]], which is solid. 📺 We finished [[Ratched]] a bit disappointed. It started out nicely, outlining the main intrigues, looking nice and clean. But then it didn't manage to maintain my interest. When I saw it's only one season with eight episodes, I thought it was going to be one of these shows that know exactly what they are, they are concise and to the point. Nope, season two was just canceled. ## 26.02 📺 We got up to date with [[Severance]]. How the hell am I supposed to mildly know what is going on when it's been three years since season 1?! 📖 After reading about 50% of [[Frederic Brooks Jr. - The Mythical Man-Month|The Mythical Man-Month]], I decided I had enough and switched to a new book: [[Siddhartha Mukherjee - "The Gene"]]. His last book I've read, [The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7170627-the-emperor-of-all-maladies), left me very impressed. The author can clearly tell the story of medicine like no other. Let's see what he has to say about genetics. 🎙️ I have [[Following#Watching|quite an extensive queue of podcasts]]; something is always waiting to be listened to. However, there is one podcast that takes precedence over all the other. When it drops, I put everything else on hold and switch to it. And I am just returning to my usual queue after binge-listening the latest Acquired episode on the [fascinating, 5-hour history of Rolex](https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/rolex). Now, I'll be in my bunk, lurking on [Chrono24](https://www.chrono24.com/). 🎸 In a quite impulsive decision, I am back to playing guitar. The picture of my son growing up with a guitar around him was just too tempting. Over the last couple of months, I've complained to my fiancée multiple times about how I may never have another shot at learning something so thoroughly as I did with the guitar. Adults just don't get this much free time. Turns out, I was right. Surprisingly, I remember everything, even though the last time I seriously committed to playing guitar was ~9 years ago. I was never particularly good but it would be disheartening to start from scratch. I bought a beautiful Washburn G2V from 1980, and I am looking around for a small but mighty amp right now. I am considering getting a [Vox Pathfinder 10](https://www.thomann.pl/vox_pathfinder.htm). I will post proper photos after I hang it on the wall. 🍩 Tomorrow is my favorite day of the year, [Fat Thursday](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fat_Thursday) 😋. # January 📖 My first read book of 2025 was [[Michał Brzeziński, Paweł Bukowski, Jakub Sawulski - "Nierówności po polsku"]]. It covers the inequality in Poland, focusing on analyzing the income and property data (often scarce, unfortunately) instead of kicking off a class war. 📚 I am currently reading [[Wojciech Jagielski - "Modlitwa o Deszcz"]] which is beautiful in form and dire in content, describing the Taliban revolution in Afghanistan. 🎶 In terms of music, my fiancée had to endure [[Bad Bunny - DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS]] with [VOY A LLeVARTE PA PR](https://open.spotify.com/track/59D4DOkspUbWyMmbAPQkxZ?si=165e2f100d654c9a) on repeat. 📺 I've watched [[Alien - Romulus|Alien: Romulus]], which was decent and left me hungry for some more Alien. I couldn't care less about human characters (and apparently so did writers because there was no building them whatsoever) but the robots, the xenos, and the space station vibes were immaculate 🤌. ○ January is also a month when I received my [Oura Ring](https://ouraring.com/). Going from wearing no rings for 28 years to wearing quite a chonky one (and in July, I'll be wearing a second one 👰🤵‍♂️) was not as bad as I thought. I am happy with the decision not to buy a smartwatch because the last thing I need is another screen in my life. 👶 The most insane part of January is attending the swimming classes with our 4-month-old. The little guy was just a needy potato a couple of weeks ago, and now we are going to the Aquapark with him, and he will soon be learning how to dive. Time flies so freaking fast. 🇵🇱 In a surprising twist, we managed to watch our second movie this month, which was called [[A Real Pain]]. To me, it crumbled under the weight of the topics it tried to touch. Maybe it was the artsy form, maybe it was the length (it was quite short), but every major topic felt a bit underbaked. As a Pole, I took great pleasure in reenacting [Leonardo DiCaprio's "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" meme](https://hips.hearstapps.com/hmg-prod/images/maxresdefault-1605111824.jpg?crop=0.563xw:1.00xh;0.328xw,0&resize=640:*), pointing at every obscure detail of Polish folklore. Even if sometimes they were a little dated (come on, not every car in Poland is 30 years old). 📺 We watched the [[Yellowstone]] prequel, [[1883]] even though we haven’t really watched the original (well, I watched a couple of episodes). It was purely to scratch that Steinbeck itch I’ve been having and I can confirm the itch has been successfully scratched. I didn’t expect it to be so romance-heavy, so I rolled my eyes at a couple of scenes but overall, it was pleasant to watch and listen to. 🎙️Indie goddess FKA Twigs never misses (my only exception is CAPRISONGS) and [[FKA Twigs - EUSEXUA]] is yet another proof of that. My current highlight of that album is [Girl Feels Good](https://open.spotify.com/track/536rHxlVFXGJBO2xWE7HsV?si=XoTPcBa_R46xIgOIKUw7hA&context=spotify%3Aalbum%3A3o1TOhMkU5FFMSJMDhXfdF). There is something amazingly 2000s about that song. # Yet to Come Besides summing up the past 2025, I want to look at the future 2025. Below are some things I am excited about this year: ## Games - [[Doom - The Dark Ages|Doom: The Dark Ages]] looks sick as hell. - [[Kingdom Come 2 - Deliverance|Kingdom Come 2: Deliverance]] is probably my most anticipated game of the year. Hopefully, bugs won’t ruin it this time (At some point I couldn’t move forward with 1 because of a nasty bug. I played this game a couple of years after the release 😅). - I am going to take a loan for [[Civilization VII]] and all the expansions Firaxis is going to push. - Citizen Sleeper was a, hehe, sleeper hit for me. I am looking forward to [[Citizen Sleeper 2|the second one]]. - I couldn’t get into The Outer Worlds but I am still quite hyped for [[Avowed]], Obsidian’s next thing. - I have always felt weirdly drawn by the Metal Gear Solid series but the only one I had a chance to thoroughly play was MGSV, which I loved. [[Metal Gear Solid Delta - Snake Eater|Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater]] remake looks solid, so hopefully I will be able to catch up on MGS. - I have high hopes for [[Mafia - The Old Country|Mafia: The Old Country]]. - I hope [[GTA 6]] comes out this year. That’s more games than I have time for in 5 years, wow. We eating good. ## Other - [[Mickey 17]] - [[Warfare]] - [[The Brutalist]] - [[The White Lotus]] S3 - [[Severance]] S2 - Some trips, potentially Spain 🇪🇸 and Italy 🇮🇹 - Oh, and getting married 🤵‍♂️👰