Monday

Today we planned the new iteration, Iteration Ziggurat. I also made some inroads into the first of three big JavaScript bugs that I have to fix this iteration; I'll also be spending a lot of time refactoring the existing JS codebase, when I'll be paired with Alec. I'm quite looking forward to that. The major step today was adding a new and more descriptive error message, so that when I ran the presenting case again I could find out more about what was causing the problem.
At St Mark's, the Priest Who Hugs Everyone told us a bit about John Mason Neale, a Victorian priest whose feast day it is today. (He wrote dozens of hymns and songs; I'm sure most of you have heard Good King Wenceslas and Good Christian Men, Rejoice.) At the start of a service in our tradition, there is a special prayer called a "collect", which changes week to week and sometimes day to day. The collect for John Mason Neale's feast day is

Grant, O God, that in all time of our testing we may know your presence and obey your will; that, following the example of your servant John Mason Neale, we may with integrity and courage accomplish what you give us to do, and endure what you give us to bear; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Priest Who Hugs Everyone told us a lot about how Neale "accomplished what God gave him to do", but didn't tell us anything about why the collect talks about courage and endurance and testing: Neale was persecuted for years and years for his Anglo-Catholic beliefs, both by church officials and by the public (he was physically attacked because of it on at least one occasion). I did see Naamah there, but she was busy praying and I didn't want to interrupt, so I didn't.
When I got home, it was pizza day as usual. Firinel and Riordon had gone back-to-school shopping, but they came back soon enough.
Elijah reviewed some parts of my huge theme patch, so I'll be working on that on the train tomorrow, trying both to fix those problems and also to root out any bit rot that's set in.