Rosalia Rambles

Tag: careers

  • Redundancy Review: Day 136-137, “Good Enough”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning adequates and passables, welcome to Day 136 & 137 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Totally did not skip a day because I spent almost five hours playing Clair Obscur last night.

    Nope.

    Would not have happened.

    Did not immediately finish work to have a delicious kebab takeaway before getting fully immersed in the game…

    …yeah, no, after the work week I had and the actual work day I had on Friday, my brain was just fully in the mode of turning itself off and focusing on trying to disconnect myself from my current situation.

    Not that it helped this morning, as I woke up at my regular time of seven in the goddamn morning only to immediately start worrying about work on a day where I am supposed to be trying to disconnect from it all. 

    Trying to separate my emotions from my work is hard sometimes, and again, it is one of those qualities that a lot of people find admirable that I find makes it harder for me to live my life without worry. Having my emotions in my work makes me care more about the end result, which leads to me putting in hard work in order to make the clients happy and my colleagues’ lives easier.

    But when things go wrong, I feel the pain, the hurt, and the disappointment it brings all too much. Even in such a small company where there is a blameless culture and the focus is put on improving the process rather than finding someone to scapegoat, I find it hard to separate myself from the fact that something I did as a piece of work did not yield the optimal result.

    Which is where today’s title comes into play: worrying about whether or not I am “good enough” for the role I currently play.

    The short answer is “yes, yes you are”, the slightly longer answer is “Rosa this is just impostor syndrome and redundancy trauma kicking in”, and the long answer unpacks both of these statements.

    I did not actually interview for my current role, at least not formally. Given that it was a collection of former colleagues retained by the investors to continue the company’s work, all that really happened was two short conversations with the CTO and CFO to explain what needs doing as part of the role, with me accepting a couple of days after.

    Ten days, by the way, that is all it took for me to go from those initial conversations to starting work again. No formal interview, just people asking me back because they felt I was the right person for the job.

    My feelings around this process are… weird. I know for a fact this does happen in the industry at large through the referral process, but it makes me feel as if I did not “earn” my position in a way – but I did earn my position. It was earned through all the hard work I put in at the previous company by making myself adaptable, dependable, and pleasant to be around even in high stress situations.

    This then plays into my greater impostor syndrome, as I sit around after a rough day wondering if I am good enough for any position outside of my current one, that I want to step into another career path not just because I feel there is a greater purpose for me outside of the tech industry, but because I am ultimately not suitable for this career path anymore.

    In my worst moments, these thoughts eat at me greatly, but then I think back to playing Clair Obscur last night: running into the walls, either trying to find hidden paths or disguised switches, jumping around seeing if I am able to bypass any zones through sheer determination & Skyrim-horsing, and discovering broken builds on my own steam.

    Quality assurance is not just a career for me, honestly it stopped being that long ago. It is hard-wired into my brain, bringing all the transferable skills along with it.

    An eye for detail.

    A problem-solving mindset.

    Being able to throw myself at a wall as many times as necessary until it breaks.

    Even if I end up speccing out my career into automation testing, once more embracing the programming life I thought I would leave behind forever, I will always be a manual QA at heart – because nothing brings my soul joy more than pushing software to its absolute limit.

    I am good enough. My bad days do not define me. The mistakes and mishaps of my career do not mean I am not good enough. I am the sum of every success and scar across this long journey.

    One thing that did help ease my impostor syndrome a little was an interview for a store manager retail role. It is not a role I feel I want to take, especially because it would mean leaving my current contract and team, but being able to have an interview again for the first time in almost four years genuinely helped me remember that I am someone with a good breadth of skills and a large amount of my favourite thing in the world: stories.

    Stories about times I helped others, when others needed to help me, and every difficult experience that in the moment felt like it was the end of the world, but now look back at it knowing I got through it, almost with a weird fondness given how everything ended up.

    My love for stories persists, even through the hard times – just wish I had more time and energy to write out the ones still inside my head.

    But for now, we always have food reviews.

    Oh yeah, I have missed getting to write this out. It is time for another exciting edition of…

    Rosa Eats Her Way Around Shrewsbury!

    It has been… far too long since I have got to write that. I have done food reviews in recent weeks but I have not actually talked about any of the food offerings in my adopted home for almost a month, and I have got a good one today.

    On Tuesday, my partner & I went to the market to buy some supplies for upcoming dinners in the week… except that I went ahead to the cheese counter, while my partner’s eye was caught by a sandwich bar.

    Upon returning to him, I fully understood why. They were offering “doorstop sandwiches” with any variety and amount of fillings you like for an extremely modest £5 – more expensive than what you get in terms of variety with a supermarket meal deal, but given the quality of the bread and the sheer amount of food, it definitely becomes worth it.

    And I know that because I returned on Friday to Pete’s Sandwich Bar to get my own creation.

    The above is their doorstop sandwich offering filled with chicken strips, coleslaw, pickled jalapenos, and sriracha mayo. The photo does not do the bread justice, this loaf was pillowy soft but still robust enough to hold up to all the moisture contained within my sandwich.

    Speaking of moisture, this is exactly why I chose coleslaw as my main vegetable filling of choice, and gives me an opportunity to talk about my firm belief that coleslaw is the best accompaniment for any sandwich, wrap, or burger.

    When it comes to adding moisture and crunch to any of the food items I listed, there is no better option than a beautiful coleslaw as it provides equal amounts of both, especially when the dressing is homemade and the person making it has the opportunity to add so many different ingredients such as English mustard, lemon juice, and grated garlic…

    …yes this is just me talking about my own recipe for homemade coleslaw now, being able to consistently make good coleslaw has ruined supermarket offerings for me now it just does not hit the same without my additions.

    Anyway, back on track. This was a fantastic sandwich, and getting to support a small, local business over a supermarket or a well-known sandwich chain that I have not actually eaten at for two years is well worth the extremely small premium I pay on top of a meal deal.

    I will end off this food review though with a bit of introspection. I am extremely lucky to be in a position in my life currently where I am able to indulge in lunches that are made by small businesses, and to also be able to go out to cafes & restaurants as well.

    I know this time may not last forever, especially with my current job uncertainty, but I at least want to take some time to acknowledge that I am lucky that I get to write about good food, even as part of my hobby.

    That will cover everything for today, thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope you are able to relax and take the weekend easy, I know what I will be doing: playing more Clair Obscur.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 134, “Self-Expression”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning impressionists and pointillists, welcome to Day 134 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    One of the first things to fall for me when I enter into a depressive spike is my outward self-expression. My appearance starts to falter as I neglect doing a proper hair wash and shave to use what little energy I have on not smelling like the dumpster I feel I am, and my choice of clothing goes from the goth-lite style I typically enjoy to simple hoodie and joggers.

    It definitely helps me to cope with the depression, I do not need to put much mental effort into deciding what I want to wear and can instead direct that energy into making sure I can do what is absolutely essential for the day.

    In a way though, it becomes a self-perpetuating cycle. I find myself falling into a state of depression, which makes my self-expression slip, which worsens my depression because I struggle to feel like myself, which makes it harder to find the time to dress up all cute and fancy without it feeling like an obligation.

    Writing definitely helps ease that feeling, or at the very least make me feel as if I am able to keep up with a form of self-expression, even if that mostly boils down to letting the words flow out of my head onto the page to make things more quiet up top – very much needed because of how noisy my brain feels right now.

    On the plus side, I know my employment will at least last for the rest of the year, with some amount of uncertainty about what might come next depending on the work output of myself and the people I work with. It provides comfort and anxiety simultaneously, the former from the fact I know I can at least see out the rest of this year working towards a goal, and the latter from once more facing down the barrel of uncertainty in a highly competitive jobs market.

    God this is turning into a proper ramble, I am struggling to keep my head focused on the task at hand and I keep veering off topic to talk about everything going on.

    I think I am just going to do some affirmations before I head to the review segment, both for myself, and anyone reading who may need it.

    It is tough to carry on right now, but I want to keep moving forward.

    There is still so much room for me to grow, I can keep growing stronger.

    My career has not peaked, I still have so much more to give to my field.

    Everything I have been through has helped me become who I am today, I am the net result of every victory and every defeat.

    Things feel overwhelming right now, but I will keep going.

    There is still so much beauty in this world I am yet to bear witness to, and I want to be able to put my own stories into the world.

    I teared up a little bit writing that all down if I am honest.

    Anyway, time to go into the review segment for today, which… is less a review, and more just a discussion about my fursona.

    Meet Rosa, the Arctic Fox & Phoenix hybrid. She is essentially my “truesona”, being a reflection of myself more than an actual character I would embody, down to her having similar proportions to what my actual body looks like IRL. This reference sheet was drawn by my friend Ely, who I think did a fantastic job with the entire thing.

    So, why did I make the design choices that I did with her?

    Part of it comes from my background in playing Monster Hunter. In both Rise and World I had armour & weapon setups that focused on the idea of fire (or blast, in this case) and ice, which slowly evolved into becoming my signature loadouts with me even developing lore based around the two Elder Dragons that the weapons were derived from.

    This elemental aesthetic inspires not only the animal choices for the fursona itself, but for the colour detailing on her as well, with the orange & blue markings representing her two elemental affinities, the colours being matched in the eyes two.

    Fun fact: I have given enough of my characters that are supposed to represent me heterochromia that I have had to write a note down that reminds me which eye is supposed be the chromatic one, as it is always a blue right eye with an unnatural colour for the right eye – orange for the fursona, and pink for any of my Monster Hunter characters.

    But I want to dive deeper on why the phoenix was chosen as one half of this hybrid. The arctic fox part is easy enough to explain: it is a creature associated with cold environments and I absolutely love foxes.

    The phoenix has a lot of personal connection to me though, and it started long before I became a furry.

    Initially, my connection to the mythical creature came through my first D&D character, Marieya Ebontide, someone who I have written a lot of fiction about and still need to give her a proper ending. After coming up with a part of her backstory on the fly for a nothic to dig into, that small fact soon evolved into developing her as a sorcerer suppressing her powers, gifted to her by having the soul of a phoenix.

    Over time, I found myself connecting with the concept of the phoenix more. I related it to my own challenges, how each time I got brought down to my lowest point I would always find a way to rekindle myself to come back stronger than I did before.

    Fire dims, colour fades, and feathers shed – but nothing lasts forever, and whatever is bringing me down low fades, letting my flames reignite once more to let my true nature shine through.

    I will finish up this review by going into the painful and excruciating details as to why my truesona has wings…

    …wings are fucking awesome.

    Simple as.

    While they do a good job at helping hammer home the phoenix aspect of the character, they are mainly there for being damn awesome, even in the small amounts of lore I have written for her I specify that they are not flight-capable wings, primarily there to add lift to jumps or stabilise herself during acrobatic manoeuvres.

    That pretty much covers it all for today, thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope you have been able to get past the hump day feelings and are able to look forward to the weekend coming soon.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 126-128, “Even in the face of adversity”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning villains and adversaries, welcome to Day 126 to 128 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    The core of the Redundancy Review has been vulnerability, about showing the core of myself to the world, to talking about things that worry me and making a written record of my feelings.

    With how deep my recent depression has been, and continues to be, I think it is the right time for me to vomit words onto a page in the hopes of unfucking my brain just a little bit.

    So here goes nothing…

    At my core, I am a deeply insecure person. I am plagued by impostor syndrome on the daily, which infects my work, my hobbies, and my general being. There is a constant nagging voice in the back of my mind telling me that I am not good enough for my current field, hence my desire to switch out of the tech sector into something else.

    Like with a good deal of people in the modern age, I worry about what AI means for my job, about whether or not the field I have worked in for the last half a decade is about to be automated away entirely, even as discussions of the issues of the sustainability of the technology rage on. I know AI can be a helpful tool for doing away with menial and repetitive tasks that reduce friction, especially in creative ventures, but right now I feel the technology is being abused too much for the optimistic view to take hold.

    Most of all, I feel worried that I am going to lose what I currently have: my partner, my friends, the lifestyle I lead. Even when presented with evidence to the contrary, I find myself losing to the throes of a panic attack as I scream and cry for the pain overtaking my body to stop.

    I hold an immense amount of pride for the point I have managed to get my life to. I moved out shortly after turning 24, moving into my remarkably successful tech industry job around the same time… which did end in the redundancy that started this series but let us ignore that bit right now. Mixed in with all those big changes was me starting hormone replacement therapy as part of my transition into being the person I wanted to be, a decision I have never regretted or feel I ever will regret.

    For someone who had to rebuild the core of their life post-university due to having grown disdainful of the subject of their degree, I have done extremely well for myself. Ironically I have found myself reapplying some of my degree knowledge as part of my current contracting role, specifically in the usage of the Unity engine – some habits die hard I guess.

    But now I find myself almost at a crossroads, unsure of which path I want to walk down. Do I fully commit to the quality assurance route, upskilling myself in automation testing and utilising the fact that I do still have a programmer’s brain for good by hardening my skillset to find even better roles?

    Or do I walk away from the path I have travelled so far down to see where the road might fork, seeing where I could put my skills to the test in new sectors, such as charity or civil service?

    At the same time I need to ask myself the question of what this all means for my writing. I still want to tell my stories, even when I find myself with limited time on my hands due to the stresses of this world along with my own mind fighting against me, meaning I wish to pursue the mythical “work-life balance” that so many in the tech industry want to talk down on.

    All of those questions need answers, but they are most certainly not simple answers. So what do I do in the meantime? 

    Same thing as I did when I started working in the games industry, not knowing where I could end up.

    Same thing as I did when I transitioned over to the technology industry, and was unsure of my place in such a competitive industry.

    Same thing as when the news of my redundancy hit, and I did not know where my next paycheck would be coming from.

    I keep going.

    Even in the face of adversity.

    Even when my own insecurities are eating me alive.

    Even when I do not know what path the future will hold.

    I try my best to keep walking, with all the depression, uncertainty, and pain that comes along with navigating the current state of the world.

    And in honour of that, I think I want to talk about one of my favourite pieces of music as a review topic.

    For those unaware, I was just ever so slightly an emo kid growing up… yeah, I know, shocking, a trans girl grew up listening to emo music, in other news a fork was found in a kitchen today.

    But I was definitely someone who, in addition to a healthy diet of Dragonforce and video game OSTs, enjoyed the music of My Chemical Romance, Linkin Park (RIP Chester Bennington), and the subject of today’s review: Three Days Grace.

    What started my interest in the band was, of course, the absolute edgy banger of Animal I Have Become, the background track to everyone’s favourite AMV back in the day. But much like my love of Dragonforce, I went beyond the songs that everyone on the internet knew and looked further into their discography, leading me to discover Life Starts Now.

    It… is actually hard for me to do an in-depth lyrical analysis on this, because I think the entire song is a beautiful tale about never giving up and carrying on even when everything is against you, that it is never too late to change the way you have been living to make a new start. 

    I always like to look at the framing of the song being a conversation between two long-time friends, where one has gone through so much and is desperately tired, whereas the singer is trying to convince them that they have already been through so much that they survived through, that making another fresh start is not exactly going to hurt, and whatever comes next they will likely survive too.

    However, I do want to highlight the bridge, and do a little bit of my own analysis from my viewpoint on it:

    “All this pain

    Take this life and make it yours

    All this hate

    Take your heart and let it love again

    You will survive this somehow”

    There are so many ways I like to interpret this. The fantasy nerd in me loves to see this from the perspective of a warrior sacrificing themselves for their companion, giving them another chance at life while also telling them to not let hate consume them, to choose love instead to overcome the grief.

    But the more reasonable interpretation is the singer telling their friend that for all the pain they feel, for all the hatred they might feel at the world, and for any hatred they may feel at themselves, none of it is worth holding on to. As someone who has had to overcome many traumas in the course of their life, I know that holding on to pain and anger can very often be a choice, at least in my situation.

    Life got a lot better for me once I stopped being angry at the things that were tying me to the past, though this is not to say the emotions are not there within me – they most definitely still are. It is just that I try to live my day-to-day life without holding onto them, and in a way, I have to try apply that same logic to the feelings that the redundancy gave to me.

    It will take time, but I will survive this somehow, because through each moment of pain & heartbreak, there is a chance for life to start anew. I just need to be ready to meet that chance.

    Took a few days off work and off writing, and I feel I have come back still as strong as ever. Though I need a thumbnail picture…

    …yeah, that will do. Friend of mine sent me this image earlier in the week to remind me that I am still able to be successful, even if I do end up changing tracks.

    Thank you for reading the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are, I hope you are able to feel relaxed. If you are fighting your own battles, please know you are not alone in any of them. Help is out there if you need it, and the world is brighter for you being in it.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 120, “Four Month Reflection”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning clerics and healers, welcome to Day 120 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    120 days since I was first made redundant. Four months worth of thinking, reflection, and trying to figure out where to do next. In terms of actual posts, this is the 92nd Redundancy Review since this all kicked off, so only off by a factor of about thirty days due to holidays, breaks, or just not feeling the flow.

    In those four months I have fought the government for what is rightfully mine, waded through job boards in the hope of finding something new, expanded my horizons beyond QA to see what I might be good at, and have now found myself back in the life of a SaaS QA tester within the greater technology industry… for better or worse.

    Part of what drove me to start writing a career retrospective at the start of this week is the fact I am growing incredibly weary with the tech industry as a whole. The start up culture, the grindset mindset, the need to build & scale fast with less… all of it has started to wear me down.

    If we include my time at Codemasters, I am coming up on having worked for half a decade in the technology industry as a QA, with some production on the side. This comes back to something I said I need to keep in mind off the back of my redundancy, that it was a traumatic event, and it is okay to let it change me. 

    And one of those things that might need to change is my career as a whole.

    I have already started to explore other options in addition to balancing my contract work… on top of balancing maintaining a good posting schedule… on top of trying to maintain an amount of social life and relaxation time…

    Being real, things feel hard for me right now. Over the last couple of days I have found myself crying at my desk more often, with even the most routine of work tasks overwhelming me. In between uploads, downloads, or waiting for processes to finish, I take moments to let out little sobs, which shows to me that it is not the challenges of the work getting to me, it is just the nature of the work itself.

    And the mental separation I try to impose on myself that this is a holdover contract role, that it will not be forever is slowly starting to break down as I realise I have fallen out of love with the greater industry as a whole, and to ensure longevity in my future; I need to make a change to one of the biggest parts of my life.

    Saying goodbye to an industry that has honed me, hardened me, and shaped me into the person I am today.

    This is not to say I am going to move away from technology as a whole, because I am perfectly willing to do a job that mostly revolves around a computer, and there is no denying I have made a good career in QA with how long I have survived in such a competitive industry, especially in the recent years of a turbulent job market.

    It is just a matter of deciding where to go, with my current avenues for exploration being in insurance, civil service, and I have also signed up for a charity jobs board – both for QA and writing roles.

    There is a part of me that thinks I am “limiting my potential” by choosing to walk away from tech, that if I committed the energy I am using to look elsewhere to doubling my effort into the tech industry, I could stand to make a lot of money by pursuing even more elite roles within the startup space.

    But the redundancy has changed me. I am distrustful of investor groups, the primary way such companies would be funded. The need to keep scaling up and making things even bigger rather than focusing on steady outcomes is incompatible with my current life philosophy.

    I need to move away from what has been a significant part of my life and enabled my growth into who I am today, to heal from the pain that growth has been accompanied by, and start a new chapter of my life.

    Ultimately, I am still quite young, having not even hit my thirties yet. In a way my professional life has only just begun, with the role I was made redundant from being only my second job ever. 

    There is so much I can do, I just need to find myself to find out what I want to do.

    In the meantime, my contract can hold me over, and whilst I do not want to maintain the grindset mindset, I am also not someone who can half-arse a job. My safety net is actually stronger than it was before my redundancy too, so I am in an extremely lucky position to not be pressed against the wall.

    Ideally I do not want to eat into the safety net and I can transition from my contract into a new role, but I am prepared for any eventuality.

    No matter what, I will continue to write. This story still has several chapters to write, and the stories inside my head still need to be told. 

    Time to get into the review, and I think it is time to introduce a somewhat new topic to the Redundancy Review: hot sauce.

    For those who have been around for the somewhat regular food reviews, you will know I am a little bit of a spicehead, and this definitely extends into my home life as I have a very decent collection of hot sauces within my fridge. Today’s hot sauce is made from one of the spiciest peppers in the world: Bhut Jolokia, more commonly known as the Ghost Pepper.

    This specific sauce is from a small UK brand called Mahi, and this was one of the three hot sauces in their “Discovery Pack”, a bundle offer for those wanting to explore more options in hot sauce outside of the main brands in the UK. 

    With it being such a spice forward sauce, there is actually a pleasing acidic bite that announces itself first before the heat ramps up, though it is actually variable how much heat will be delivered with each taste.

    Sometimes it will be a pleasant warmth that accompanies the acidity.

    And sometimes it will be a deliverance of heat worthy of the nickname my partner gave to this sauce after one accidentally trying it: “Death Sauce”.

    £7.50 plus shipping was the price for the pack of three sauces, and it came in a very attractive box which included a catalogue of Mahi’s other products, most of which I will definitely want to try in future because of how nice everything included in the box was.

    This does however include a Trinidad Scorpion sauce, which is supposedly even hotter than the Ghost Pepper…

    …oh well, as I often yell before doing anything stupid, DEATH OR GLORY!

    That should do it for today. Thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope you are able to relax and that your path ahead in life is clear, if not, then there is nothing to fear. You are in good company with that, and as we all know, not all who wander are lost.

    For more information on Mahi’s products, visit their website here: https://saucymahi.co/ 

  • Redundancy Review: Day 118, “Career Uncertainty, Part 1”

    Redundancy Review: Day 118, “Career Uncertainty, Part 1”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning diviners and cartographers, welcome to Day 118 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Things seem to be returning to normal for me now, I still live the busy life of a SaaS QA professional, but I do not feel the same amount of pressure as I was experiencing last week. 

    It is in this moment though, over four months gone since my initial redundancy and as the five-year milestone of my quality assurance career comes ever closer, that I find myself reflecting on where I am along with where I might want to go.

    I have been trying to write a “living CV” page on this website, though I keep putting it off in favour of other things, so now I feel it is a good time to start off writing a career retrospective along with talking about the moments of uncertainty that have come along the way.

    My career as a Quality Assurance professional started in March 2021, where I joined Codemasters Software Company as a QA Technician. I joined in the Xbox Functional QA team for F1 2021.

    Look, there I am in the credits!

    Honestly, even though it is over four years gone now, and the game is not even available to purchase on Steam anymore which really sucks cause I would love to revisit it for a review, I still hold an immense amount of pride for my first credited video game release – especially when I consider the amount of effort I put into that release.

    Codemasters was my first job ever, so I tried to push myself above and beyond to show what I was capable of. This inevitably led to me getting noticed by the higher ups, not only for my sheer amount of bugs being logged, but for the sheer tenacity I had when it came to throwing myself into test sheets.

    This led to me getting the opportunity to go into the Southam office for a week to try my hand at some audio testing in the, quite frankly beautiful, surround sound room at the recently refurbished QA building. Getting hands on with more specialised testing really left a lasting impact on me, especially as I got the chance to do this only one month into my job.

    Fun fact: this is actually the only time I have worked in an office/in-person setting, the rest of my career has been entirely remote, as I changed roles right as offices were beginning to open up again.

    After that, I continued grinding on. Helping out where needed with requests from my lovely & sweary platform lead (I call him that affectionately, we bonded over colourful language from time to time), continuing to plug away at my test sheets, and maintained the push towards the ever-approaching release date.

    As that time came closer, overtime became available to help push things over the line. Unlike other game development companies which might make crunch time mandatory; Codemasters was on an entirely voluntary basis, with you nominating yourself for certain days to work and it being up to the lead QA’s discretion on who would make it in.

    Now, as I have mentioned I was eager to prove myself and get stuck in.

    Perhaps too eager.

    So I put my name down for every available overtime day between the start of the final push all the way up to the day of the final Build Verification Test (BVT) being sent off to Xbox in order to get the discs manufactured.

    Nineteen days.

    Nineteen days in a row.

    Admittedly, the pay was good. We got time-and-a-half for any Saturday or Sunday work, and considering late May bank holiday fell during this time too that paid double-time – this led to me having enough to buy myself a proper gaming PC once the stressful period was over.

    That said… never again. Never again do I want to work to that same degree because I was thoroughly destroyed by the end of it all. 

    When the eighteenth day came around I vividly remember barely being lucid at my desk. I remember going into work, sitting at my desk, and around eight hours later I logged off before heading straight into bed before day nineteen started with a final rush to do a BVT.

    It was a hard push, and it definitely taught me one of my many lessons about listening to my body.

    Release came and went, but even as the needs of the team shifted with post-launch content on the horizon along with people being migrated across to other projects, my role mostly stayed the same, plugging away happily at my tasks.

    During this time period, a Senior QA Technician role came up within the company, and despite being relatively green I was encouraged to apply by the QA lead and my platform lead. I did land an interview as well where I was complimented for how I handled myself, but ultimately they wanted someone with more experience who could more reasonably step into a platform lead kind of role.

    However, once again, my tenacity and drive did not go unnoticed. Soon after this I was brought into a call with two other stellar QAs from the Playstation and PC team to be told we were going to be made “second-in-commands” for our respective teams, essentially being groomed for management type roles in the near future.

    This meant I was taking on more responsibility, though, given the fact our team sizes had shrunk massively due to projects elsewhere in the company, the team I managed to start off with was ultimately very small. Nevertheless, I was given my first exposure to what it took to organise a QA effort within a large-scale project.

    Though, it was not long though until new hires started rolling in to begin work on F1 22 (EA had decided to drop the “20” part of the name to bring it in line with their other sports franchises) that I got a chance to start guiding and mentoring fresh QAs… which did lead to a funny story.

    It was the week before the Christmas shutdown started, both the QA lead and my platform lead had used some annual leave to add some extra time to a well-deserved break – this left me the de facto “leader” of the Xbox team in their absence.

    One day, one of the newer QAs came to me with a question relating to specific Xbox console guidelines. I was unsure of what he was asking, so I said to give me a minute whilst I went to my platform lead…

    …oh wait, platform lead is not in. That is fine I will just go to the QA lead…

    …no he is not in either…

    …shit…

    …I am the one in charge, I need to get him an answer.

    I hastily searched through the very helpful glossary of Xbox terminology I had been provided at the start of my job to get him an answer, letting them log the bug report correctly and carry on with their day unimpeded.

    F1 22 started on schedule, and whilst I was still required to get F1 2021 over the line in terms of the final bits of post-release content – primarily battle pass stuff – I was still hard at work making my mark on the new project too, hoping to maintain my crown as Rosalia, Queen of the Bug Leaderboard.

    But… I was also wanting for more. First of all I wanted more money, as for all the above and beyond what I was doing it was still minimum wage for the time, but also I wanted a new challenge. Initially I did try branching out into writing roles once more but also kept applying to QA roles as well.

    I interviewed for Immerse, and shortly after I moved into my new flat early in 2022, I got the job offer from them which started my now nearly four year long stint in the SaaS XR industry.

    Although, I needed to tell the people at Codemasters that I would not be continuing my employment with them. Due to the nature of my role, a full-time contract which was periodically renewed, all I really needed to do was give notice that I did not intend to pursue a renewed contract with the company.

    What I did do though was call both the QA lead (who was my manager) and my platform lead. During the call with the former he knew it was coming due to being put down as a reference for one of my applications, but he understood that someone of my skills wanted to try out different environments.

    My platform lead had a very different initial reaction:

    “Who’s upset you? Tell me and I’ll thump them for you!”

    He was a very bombastic character, and even through those jokey moments he understood why I was leaving, wishing me the best.

    I left Codemasters end of March 2022, a week later I would start working at Immerse which began a chapter that has defined, and continues to define, my current adult life. But that story is for another time.

    Still got my name in the credits for F1 22 though.

    So, what does this all have to do with uncertainty?

    Because at every key story moment, from starting out to overtime, the senior QA interview to being the second-in-command, to even deciding to take the plunge to leave: I was uncertain.

    The title is a dual-meaning. I currently experience uncertainty about where I want my career to go in the wake of drastic changes within the last four months, but simultaneously, I have made my career in spite of uncertainty. 

    Even when presented with opportunities where I was never fully sure how they would go, I always said yes.

    When I was unsure on what I should be doing, my head was still down and I still moved forward.

    I am a career uncertain, and whilst I do not know what direction I may take next, I do know that my tenacious & enthusiastic spirit will come along with it.

    Maybe next time I will tell the story about how that spirit persists even when the flesh is spongy, bruised, and extremely tired.

    So many stories to tell, guess that is as good a reason as any to keep writing them down. To be honest the above does not even begin to cover everything I experienced at Codemasters that stuck with me, so even more reason to keep writing.

    But even though I have written damn near 1800 words, I still think I should get a review subject in here somehow.

    Yeah, let us go for the random object I had to hand – not like it is an uncommon theme on the Redundancy Review.

    Well, not entirely random, as when it comes to buying drinks there is one specific reason that comes to my mind whenever I need to buy apple juice.

    Last week was extremely stressful for me, balancing work, periods, and trying to stay generally healthy. Unfortunately for me, one thing always happens when I am placed under large amounts of stress: my stomach starts getting fucked up.

    One thing I have always found helpful in mitigating that is apple juice, especially a more “wholesome” brand like this Cawston Press carton where it is more likely to pure juice rather than from concentrate, it helps put my stomach at rest in a way that ginger or turmeric based products often struggle to.

    This carton specifically cost me £3.95 from a local and small greengrocer that I love going to for its wide variety of more off-brand products than you would find in a supermarket, plus shopping local is always the best route to take where possible. Admittedly it is definitely a steeper price that what you would pay elsewhere, but supporting local can be like that sometimes.

    Anyway, that will do it for today, it has still been surprisingly stressful even though I have managed to find the time to write today. Thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review, wherever you are I hope the Monday blues are not hitting you too hard, and that the week ahead looks clear for you.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 83, “Bitterness, Honesty, & Ambition”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia’s Rambles)

    Good morning seamstresses and crafters, welcome to Day 83 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    It is now six days before my convention and I am most definitely starting to panic and feel the stress holy shit. Was doing some try-ons of the improvised cosplay I am intending to wear and there is definitely still some stuff needing to be adjusted/ironed out for it to be worthwhile, and this is not including all of the other logistical details also needing to be sorted out before we leave on Thursday afternoon.

    Of course all this stress would be moderately reduced if my actual costume plans had come together… and of course I would also be less stressed if I had not had to spend a lot of my time fighting government agencies for money in the wake of my redundancy instead of costume planning but life goes on.

    All of this comes with the thoughts of what it might be like next year to try do this same convention again, and try to reattempt what was meant to happen this year, which leads on to the thought: where the hell am I going to be this time next year?

    My partner and I were talking about how the improvised plan is still not going to be perfect, with him specifically worrying about “it not going right”, to which my very blunt response was:

    “A lot of things have not gone right this year.”

    If you asked the Rosa of March this year about how she felt her year was going to go, she would respond with cautious optimism. She would recognise that the company she worked at was going through some hard times but she had faith in upper management of navigating these issues, and that whilst things might seem hairy, she at least had job security for the remainder of the year.

    And now?

    Well, I am certainly a different person, although I find the words to describe who I am now oddly difficult.

    Part of me wants to call myself a more “bitter” person now, that my redundancy hardened my heart and fully disillusioned me from any corporate structure giving me true fulfillment, even if holding that belief was a fool’s errand to begin with. 

    Another part wants to call myself a more “honest” person, that I have a better read of situations within the industry I exist in and I, however begrudgingly it may be, understand that my position within this industry has now changed, demanding that my approach change with it.

    There could also be an argument made for a part of myself that considers myself a more “ambitious” person now. Before my redundancy was made official I had struggled to write consistently for over a year, instead choosing to push one of my purest passions to the side in favour of navigating through my new life circumstances – something I do not feel I can be faulted for. 

    But now I find myself trying to write every day, with a varied success rate, and exploring new ideas for making my way in this world, desiring to learn something new every day or trying new things and attempting to persevere through my mind telling me I am not good enough. 

    Even if my creative ventures continue to be nothing more than thoughts inside my head, I want to be proud of the fact I have committed to practicing writing every day in one form or another. The Redundancy Review is my living journal through which I build my skills up every day, no matter the weird topics I tackle or the intense emotions I put on show for all to see.

    If anything I write appeals to you, please get in touch. I continue to be available for freelance writing work on top of freelance QA work and I would love to learn more while making your project the best it can be.

    In the meantime though, I need to review something, otherwise the title suddenly makes very little sense, and I think it is time that a little bit of my tech industry background starts to show itself.

    So, am I talking about a piece of work software? Perhaps talking about one of the virtual reality headsets I use on a daily basis? Maybe it is even my work peripherals I want to talk about?

    Surprise!

    It is none of them.

    Instead, we are talking about the all-in-one meal replacement in a bottle: Huel.

    Huel, a portmanteau of the words “human” and “fuel” which shows how techbro this stuff really is, is a brand of meal replacement powders, dehydrated meals, and the subject of today’s review, the ready-to-drink meal. Specifically the Black Edition because that is the one my local Tesco had in stock.

    Initially, I tried Huel on a whim near the start of March having found it next to the milk in my local Tesco. I had some familiarity of what it was but had never considered trying it before that point.

    It is… weird to describe. Due to the fact Huel is entirely plant based with the Black Edition specifically having a base of water and coconut milk powder, it has the consistency of very thin porridge but with a chocolate flavour. Thankfully the coconut flavour is not all that pronounced which is good because I cannot stand the taste of coconut.

    On the surface, Huel is described as “nutritionally complete food”, with the headlines on the bottle reading:

    • 35g protein
    • 26 essential vitamins & minerals
    • 7g dietary fibre
    • Slow-release carbs
    • And Omega-3 and Omega-6

    Back in April I actually pursued using Huel as a weight loss aid, replacing my lunch with it specifically. The logic behind this was trying to make my calorie intake over lunch more consistent as I frequently had indulgent lunches that would hit between 800-1000 calories, this is not to mention that a single bottle of Huel (on average) still has less calories than a supermarket meal deal sandwich.

    It was a tough time, especially as my body had to grow used to so few calories before dinner, but for a time I did feel healthier… until the redundancy hit and I stopped as a cost saving measure.

    Now I view Huel as mainly an emergency/convenience item more than anything else. The two bottles I have pictured are coming with me to my convention as having something to carry around in the back to have as a “meal” if the schedule is as busy as I anticipate it being, leaving me little time to actually sit down and eat.

    In terms of convenience though, Huel is a great option for the days when my brain is just too overwhelmed to make decisions, which is what I see as the best personal excuse to do a meal replacement drink. Some days I am worrying too much about work, personal stress, or otherwise to even want to process picking something out for lunch, so downing a drink that gives me enough nutrition to keep going whilst I let my brain slow down is the perfect option.

    Plus, with the fact these Huel Black Editions were on Clubcard Price for £3.20 each combined with the recent increase in Tesco Meal Deal pricing, this works out as both less calories and cheaper overall, which I think is pretty good.

    But that does it all for today, I am going to head back now to do my actual current job. Thank you for reading this edition of the Redundancy Review, I hope the Monday blues are not dragging you down too much and the rest of your week looks clear.

    For more information on Huel, visit their website here: Huel UK