ramon jb's blog

first of many?

2026-01-02T10:00:00Z

Testing, testing... Is this thing on..?

In terms of tech, this whole blog is held together by the most unstable CSS/HTML/NJK I've ever written but you know what, nothing like figuring stuff out as you go! This blog post itself is a markdown file and the HTML post is made using Eleventy, a static site generator (at least that's how I think it works). I don't need anything fancy/complicated for this site so stumbling on Eleventy was perfect for this. Web development is definitely not one of my strong suits so the fact I have something presentable in the form of a website is nothing short of a miracle.

In an attempt to decrease my social media usage, I've been inspired to give blogging a try. Scrolling through Ye Olde Blogroll and seeing so many other people's personal blogs, it made me want to give it a try. And yes, I do realize the irony in trying to decrease social media usage by creating a blog but what I've noticed when scrolling through various other people's personal blogs is that they're just so neat, unfiltered, and unapologetically themselves and there's something so beautiful about that compared to scrolling on your average social media site.

I believe we all have something to say and share with the world so this blog is my attempt at doing that in my own way.

ode to the bucs

2026-01-04T16:43:00Z

One of my favorite songs by The Strokes is called "Ode to the Mets". According to an article by Sports Illustrated, drummer Fabrizio Moretti mentioned that the Mets and the song evoke "something that you set your heart to and that you love unconditionally but that continues to disappoint you".

That is precisely what I'm feeling as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers wrap up their 2025 season, starting the season 6-2, looking like actual playoff contenders, to finishing the season 8-9 and missing out on the playoffs to the Carolina Panthers due to tiebreakers.

I remember early in the season there were MVP chants for Baker Mayfield and all the hype that comes with being 5-1, on top of the league. If you told me at that peak that we'd miss the playoffs, I would've called you crazy! As the season went on, it became a freefall as the team started losing games and the magic that was there originally was not there anymore. Injuries started piling up, the close games won initially became close games lost. I wish I knew what caused such a collapse with this team but I am just a very passionate Bucs fan that is yapping because I'm sad. How the X's and O's work is completely beyond me.

It makes me think about how I handle disappointing others and how to bounce back from being disappointing. Knowing that you've disappointed someone is a tough pill to swallow but I feel like accepting that you've disappointed someone is the first step to coming back from it. I'm sure the Bucs will learn from this and come back from next season fresh (at least I hope they will).

All of this to say if you haven't listened to the album "The New Abnormal" by The Strokes, definitely give it a listen! Ode to the Mets is one of many great songs on the album.

time to wake up

2026-01-06T13:20:00Z

Lately, I've been feeling overwhelmed.

I took some time off work over the holidays and now that the new year has started and everything else is starting back up again, I think I'm just feeling overwhelmed by it all. I had an amazing time decompressing over my time off; spent a lot of time with friends and family, spent a lot of time on my hobbies, started this blog, so many good things that are good for the soul. I have always had a difficult time with post-vacation blues when getting back into my routine. The better the vacation, the harder the blues hit and safe to say this was an amazing vacation.

I am also feeling a little lost in terms of what to do. I have many good things going for me in life but sometimes I still feel like I'm falling behind and that leaves an unfulfilling feeling that is hard to deal with.

Something I think about a lot is a few panels from Ultimate Spider-Man #1 (the recent run) where Peter is talking to Uncle Ben about not knowing what to do and Uncle Ben drops a nice piece of advice for him:

You ever heard the saying, "inaction is action"?

Well, that's just a garbage way of saying don't spend your life waiting for something to happen. Make it happen.

I love you, son... but if you're walking around half asleep... anesthetized by your own life...

Then wake up.

This post is a pep talk to myself that I need to calm down a bit, slow my thoughts down, find out what I want, and make a step forward. Some steps will be small, some will be big, but making that step forward will push me towards whatever I am trying to do. Don't get held up by mistakes, that's part of the process.

And as the old saying goes, Rome wasn't built in a day.

am i bored yet?

2026-01-15T18:29:00Z

The last book I read in 2025 was 'You Should Quit Reddit' by Jacob Desforges and one of the first books I read this year was 'Digital Minimalism' by Cal Newport. A big thing both books pointed out to me was that a lot of social media sites have gotten REALLY good at keeping our attention and how much of a grip social media has on many of us. Smartphones also play a big part in this because they make it so easy to connect to these sites at any time and that's where I sunk so much time.

Gradually since 2024, I've been more mindful about my smartphone/social media usage. First, I placed timers on the apps I spent too much time on. It worked sometimes and helped with my overall screen time; some days I would fall under the 15 minute timers I placed on Instagram but some other days I would ignore the timer and have 3 hours spent on Instagram. Recently, with inspiration from the books mentioned above, I've gone ahead and deleted Reddit and YouTube from my phone and tablet. Those two sites alone could fill up my whole day if I let them and deleting them was sadly tougher than I expected.

I've limited all my social media usage to my PC which has dramatically helped me reduce my mindless scrolling and YouTube habits. Even though I have access to all the time-wasting sites on my PC, I just haven't used them as much (probably because a PC isn't as convenient as a smartphone or tablet).

Because I'm not so connected on my phone or tablet, I've been spending more time doing other things I enjoy; reading, creating (and fixing) this blog, (attempting) running. And for the first time in a while, I don't feel the need to go down a YouTube rabbit hole or endlessly scroll on Reddit for the next thing. I feel like I'm getting time back that I didn't realize I lost.

I've been trying to find ways to stay informed outside of social media and have been giving RSS a try and it's been a refreshing change. My current RSS feed has some NFL/Bucs news, NPR, and some bloggers that I've enjoyed reading. And yes, I do realize the irony in trying to reduce my social media usage while also trying RSS and writing/creating a blog but something about these things feel different, I can't explain it. Maybe it's how I don't scroll through comments sections on these articles from my RSS feed/bloggers. Either way it's been a good change for me and I'm happy about it.

I feel like this entry is a mess and frankly, I'm only at the start of this 'digital detox' as of January 10th so I can't act like my whole life has changed. I am trying to be better with my time though and this whole effort feels like a step forward. I have so many things to say and thoughts on this attempt at digital detox but perhaps I'll sprinkle those in other entries.

So yes, I'm a little bored but that's not a bad thing!

run!

2026-01-31T14:37:00Z

Today I ran my first 'official' 5K! I say 'official' in quotes because I had run a few 5Ks in training up to this point and this was the first 'official' 5K event I've participated in. I don't think it'll be the last 5K I participate in either because it ended up being a lot of fun.

I started running back in September once my friend brought up the idea of me joining them for a 5K and this was the first time in my life where I actually tried to 'train' for a run/5K. I wouldn't say I had any regularly-scheduled runs but I definitely ran more in these past 3 months than the rest of my life combined. More notably, I have never run a 5K before I started running more seriously back in September so I'm so happy that I was able to do this.

I don't think I've fallen in love with running yet but there are definitely some things I do enjoy about it, such as:

The feeling of accomplishment from going for a run.
The convenience of just putting on my running shoes and running for however long I want to go.

Before I started typing that bulletpoint list, I thought I had way more things I liked about running but those were actually the main points I could think of at the moment.

I have never been much of a runner my entire life; I feel like I can get pretty winded after a short run and after most of my runs, I physically feel pretty beat up. Perhaps I could add some things into my running like stretching or looking into proper form but I am as casual as a casual runner can be; if I want to run, I will go for a run and if I don't want to run, then I won't. I also prefer running in the cold weather which limits my running to about 3 or 4 months of the year depending on how giving Florida's weather feels like being.

In this 3 month stint of running so far, I have got some personal achievements under my belt such as getting my mile time under 10 minutes a handful of times, going for a few unofficial 5Ks, being able to run longer than I have in the past. And honestly, I'm really proud that I was able to put my mind to giving running a more proper try than I have before. I feel like in the past, I would've given up on running after a week or two but currently, I feel more motivated to do more 5Ks in the future and that I can add running in my list of hobbies that I can fall back on.

My time for this 5K was 36:16.8 as you can see above, and currently that's my PR! What a day to break a PR. It was a great morning for running too, the weather hovering around 53°F throughout the run. I tend to get warm pretty easily so running in weather in the 60s and below is just absolute peak running weather for me.

I'd also like to give a shoutout to my friends I ran this 5K with. If you asked me before September 2025 if I wanted to run a 5K, I would've said 'eww no' but now, I'd probably say 'ayy let's run it!' Knowing I was running this 5K with them was a big motivation for me to train and to keep at it.

So yeah, run! Coming from someone that is as casual as a casual runner can be, it was absolutely worth the try and I'm happy I got into it.

golden

2026-02-22T18:31:00Z

It's been a minute since I've made an entry here. That isn't due to lack of stuff happening; if anything it feels like quite the opposite. Oddly enough with all the things keeping me busy recently, it feels like I haven't had much to say. When life keeps me busy, I have a hard time slowing down and processing everything in my surroundings. As of an hour-ish ago with the 2026 Winter Olympics wrapping up, I feel like I have a minute to slow things down and process some things I'm feeling regarding that.

First and foremost, what an amazing iteration of the Winter Olympics these games were! Seeing the world come together for the love of sport and unity, it's pretty amazing to witness. I watched so many events such as biathlon, bobsleigh, figure skating, hockey, cross-country skiing, and many more that I'm forgetting to mention. Seeing all these people's dreams come true in real time is truly awe-inspiring and I don't think I can fathom how much time and work it takes to even qualify for the Olympics. It's a gift to get to watch it (from the comfort of my home).

I feel like every time I've watched the Olympics, I get this rough post-Olympics blues and this time is no different. Watching the closing ceremony, seeing all the athletes waving goodbye, listening to all the great music performances, seeing the handover to the next Olympics host site, it's a bittersweet feeling. The highs of cheering on athletes I've never seen in sports I've never played for two weeks and the lows I experience once the games are over are something I'll always sign up for though, no questions asked.

One thing I've been thinking about is Alysa Liu and her whole story in these Olympics. To briefly summarize, she retired after accomplishing so many great feats in the figure skating world at a young age and then she un-retired two years later on her own terms and ended up winning two gold medals at these Olympics (this summary doesn't do her career justice, I would highly suggest looking into her story).

From learning about her story in interviews and watching her Olympics performances, I feel like anyone can see how care-free she is and how much she loves what she's doing. Never, at any point, did I feel like the pressure of the moment got to her and to witness that on the Olympics stage is absolutely mind-blowing; it just looked like she was just having fun and that fun just happened to be at the Olympics figure skating finals for a gold medal. All of this makes me wonder about my life and how I'm going about it; handling pressure, doing things I love for the love of it, finding joy and happiness in what I do, not caring about what others think and being yourself, and I'm sure countless other lessons I'm missing out on listing. When I think about it, those lessons sound like generic pep-talk but to see it in action on one of the world's biggest stages, that is what's making me question how I'm going about my life. I feel like I sound a bit harsh on myself but I just feel pretty inspired by all these Olympians performing their best in situations where the whole world is watching them.

While I do feel down about the Olympics wrapping up, I also feel that I gained a lot of life lessons and perspectives from these games that I want to carry forward and practice in my life.