Weeknote 58

Work reflections

The past week at work was relatively busy, and at times somewhat testing on my skills and nerve as a designer to take on a steady flow of somewhat negative user feedback about changes I've helped to design. I've also been busy preparing my first design-focused workshop to generate some ideas from the team for some upcoming improvements we've planned on part of the UK Government website's publishing platform.

Outdoors

Over the weekend, I ventured outside of London to go walking in The Chilterns near Wendover. My train strike-busting route involved a slow journey via the Metropolitan line to Amersham, far out in zone 9 of London's tube map. Along the walking route, we passed the HS2 construction site, which was deathly silent and sad to see in such an incomplete state. I feel like I'm in a small minority still supportive of the much curtailed railway construction. We're in desperate need of HS2 to tackle the climate emergency, along with relieving capacity constraints for local trains and taking long-distance freight off the roads.

Further along the walk, we also passed the 16th-century manor house Chequers, the official country residence of British Prime Ministers since 1921. Possibly Rishi Sunak was there at some point recently, or at one of his countless other private estates, planning further ways to throw fire on the climate emergency.

Eats

Closer to home, I joined X for another helping of Peruvian food at one of my favourite North London restaurants, Tierra Peru. We also tried another place for arepas at Brick Lane food market, which were fine but somewhat lacking the punch of flavours and dough texture/crispness I enjoyed at Wandsworth's Quinoa Arepa. I hope to have more news on street food finds soon, having recently discovered a few new places near to my client office work location in Whitechapel which I commute to occasionally.