Welcome Wednesday: Bad ideas you've committed to?

[Dave LIAO]

👋 Allo Atlassian Community! It's time for another Welcome Wednesday, a chance to participate on the forums about topics that aren't necessarily Atlassian-focused. (See past Welcome Wednesdays here.)

❤️‍🔥 For this week, I'll ask: Is there a bad idea you've committed to?

• What was the "bad idea"?
• Did you learn something new?
• How did the bad idea turn out? Were the results less dire than imagined?

💬 Comment with the bad ideas you were involved with, and what happened! Looking forward to your stories.

📸 Below is my bad idea - I'll explain more in the comments!

[Dave LIAO]

I'll start.

My bad idea? I committed to showing up for the Taco Bell DC 50k ultra marathon - and finishing it. (I'll be wearing the same race shirt that you see in this post's photo 📸)

I also made a LinkedIn post, so you know I mean it. 😆

My thought processes:

1. I've never been part of an ultra marathon (anything over 42k) - can I do it?
2. I like Taco Bell, but I'm unsure exactly how much I like them

I'm looking forward to testing my body's limits, and perhaps having one of the most entertaining obituaries ever 🥲🙃🌮

[Jimmy Seddon]

The bad idea: Participating in the London Extra Life 24 hr gaming marathon.

Did I learn something new? No, but I got to meet a number of new people in the Community with similar interests.

How did it turn out? The mental and physical toll of being an event organizer for a 24 hour gaming marathon was exactly as bad as I was expecting it to be.  But, we raised a record amount of money for our local hospital, and it wasn't bad enough to stop me from signing up to participate again at the end of September. 

[Dave LIAO]

@Jimmy Seddon - 🫠 Don't think I've ever done ANYTHING over a 24-hour period before, not even sleeping!

I've heard of dance marathons to raise money for research - I'd rather do a gaming marathon, for sure! 🕹️

What was your favorite game you played during the marathon?

If know there are certain games I could play for hours... SimCity (Classic), Syndicate, Genshin Impact ... 👀

[Matt Doar _Adaptavist_]

Um, a geeky one here. I decided I could move data from one Jira instance to another at the database level, instead of using the code APIs. To be fair, not all the app data had available APIs. The approach worked ok-ish until I began to understand that some Jira data (such as configuration for dashboard gadgets) has about 4 layers of history in it, and you have to account for each one of those schemas in an long-used instance. 

Took me most of a Christmas break to get it to work. Learned the hard way that just because I can do something, doesn't mean I should.

[Dave LIAO]

I worked with a few folks who would've done EXACTLY what you did, if I ever made that suggestion aloud. 😆😆😆

But hey, you did it once, bravo!

Any parts of that experience that you would repeat? 🙃

[Tomislav Tobijas]

It wasn’t exactly something I committed to, but I learned that drinking on an empty stomach is really not a good idea.

It was an office anniversary party in 2023. I had started work at 7 AM, and the party began around 6 PM. The food was a bit too fancy for me, so I decided to skip it… but apparently had no problem mixing pretty much every drink available, with little to no water. 😂

Once I realized things had gone a bit too far, I decided to walk home and pull myself together. I did that several times, but this time I clearly overestimated myself. As soon as I left the building, I tripped, landed on one foot and then on the left side of my face. Some teammates patched me up, but I still ended up with a minor concussion. 🤕

Moral of the story: eat something and drink water when you’re drinking. Don’t be like me. 😅