Author here - I was on a week-long vacation at the time and had been working on the visualization as a side project before that. I started really getting into the deep end of the optimization work while on that week-long break.

The thing about optimization work is that it's incredibly addicting once you get into it. Seeing consistent, measurable improvement and watching the frame times shrink is so satisfying, plus the process itself is really enjoyable in and of itself.

I definitely agree that the optimizations here are overkill for the actual application itself. However, it served as a great learning experience for me personally and allowed me to write this blog post as well!