Some time has passed since my last love-hate post about this stack. Short update: I hate to say it, but cough — I like it.

A while back I wrote a post called "Wolverine + Marten: My story and subjective take." The TL;DR was: I went from skeptic to cautious optimist, the codebase shrunk a bit, and I told you to commit fully or don't bother.

A few months and a lot of production miles later, I want to come back and update that take. Not in the "rah-rah every framework I learn is the best" way — I've been around long enough to know that feeling fades once you hit the rough edges. I've hit a lot of rough edges. I'm still here.

This post is the honest follow-up: mistakes I made, tips that actually moved the needle, recent stuff that changed how I work, and the things that still annoy me.…