Personal-Story on Og Maciel's Journal

Week in Review - Week 42 of 2025

Sat, 18 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Some weeks test your patience. Others your stamina. This week? It tested my calendar, my caffeine intake, my emotional bandwidth—and somehow still managed to remind me why I do what I do. Between last-minute presentations, sprint planning chaos, infrastructure headaches, and keeping my team sane, I also got to celebrate something far more meaningful: 25 years of marriage to the quiet girl who changed my life. Here’s how Week 42 unfolded.

The Quiet Girl Who Changed My Life

Fri, 17 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

My wife and I couldn’t be more different from each other. She’s sweet, and I’m savory. She’s calm and easygoing, while I’m hyped up and intense. I talk a thousand miles an hour but am very much an introvert, whereas she chooses her words carefully and is a social butterfly.

I remember when I first met her. It was April 1999, and I had just agreed to go on a blind date with my friend’s sister’s best friend. I was going through a rough phase in my life—one where I’d pretty much given up on romance and decided to focus entirely on work. One of my sisters kept insisting that I should start dating again. She even set me up with someone she swore would be a good match, telling me we were both Geminis and that I’d just been “looking for the right person in the wrong places.” I wasn’t sure what to think of that at the time, but I went along with it. The date was pleasant enough—she was kind, we had a good time—but there were no sparks.

How a Thumb Drive Saved My Sanity

Fri, 10 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

In the early 2000s, I worked for a government agency in New York as a software engineer using Visual Basic .NET and Crystal Reports — which, in retrospect, was probably one of the less brilliant ideas of my career. I was young, overconfident in my programming skills, and let my ego and emotions take the wheel. I ended up leaving the company I’d worked for nearly four years to become a consultant.

The Night I Became a Man (Musically Speaking)

Tue, 07 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

I first became aware of music when I was around eleven or twelve years old. I remember a party being held at a sports arena in the small town where I lived, and at some point, they started playing an upbeat rock ’n’ roll song. Up until then, I don’t recall ever being interested in music—or even dancing or knowing any dance moves—but that night, something happened. I found myself incapable of not moving and shaking my body, which to everyone else probably looked like I was having an epileptic seizure (not that those are fun or funny). Eventually, I started observing the people around me and copying their moves, and I’m glad to say that night I became a man—musically speaking, at least.