Later on, I worked at a healthcare company that used a cluster of Alphas running OpenVMS or whatever the hell that OS is called. This was circa 2011-2014. It was DEFINITELY NOT COOL ANYMORE. That hardware was really old and the software on it was subject to frequent restarts due to memory leaks. The company used it to try and operate order intake for a multi-site online pharmacy. The system was impossible to interact with, it had a bizarre TCP socket based API, one awful, buggy, SOAP service, and otherwise data could come out via reports generated in a binary file format. Not strictly DEC's fault as the Alpha hardware did last a long time, but it was generally an awful experience for me to have to deal with that particular system. The company tried and failed to replace it so they doubled down, bought the source code for a ridiculous sum in the millions of dollars, and proceeded to try and maintain it themselves by hiring crusty old timers whose people skills were either way out of date or never existed in the first place.

Oh, and the repairs to the hardware were through a local computer salvage firm that basically bought boards and other bits off of EBay. This is a major player in the online pharmacy space, mind you.

That's a good list, but I find it's very difficult for any one person to live up to all of that. It's asking a lot. How is my role going? They're asking a lot of an introvert who is fun to work with but not great at motivating others or being empathic. I'm a decent leader, but not a great leader, nor will I ever be. It's just not my gift and while I try to improve those skills, I know that I will only get so far because I'm not a corporate person at heart. I have no great respect for how US companies are managed, no great respect for managers, especially the MBA variety, whom I compare to parasites--blood sucking, unethical scoundrels. I don't wish to be "the worst of us." I get that many of them didn't set out to be that way, but something about corporate culture germinates profound psychopathy in people.

Not going to lie to you, being a "software engineer" (an extremely loaded term these days, and I argue, one that isn't a correct labeling of anything we do--there is no "engineering" whatsoever) and the role is not worth the money they pay you. "Information Sharecropper" has a more honest ring to it.

What I am wondering is why no significant outbreak in Indonesia? Philippines? Southeast Asia? India? If it is a pandemic, those countries will be hit hard. I would also expect Rio, Mexico City, to see huge increases in cases before Europe and the US. So far that has not happened.

Zero privacy, bathrooms are disgusting, kitchen is disgusting. I just give up. I work at home as much as possible.

My current house has 4 people and 4 bathrooms.

Clown world.

I grew up pretty damn poor. Anyone that looked at me as a kid would have said I had no future at all. I picked myself up and worked hard, sacrificed good times, and cut as many financial corners as I could for too many years. It's been a fucking grind. Regardless of my skin color, it was no cake walk, I felt very little "privilege" as the accusation goes. It was just work, endless work. Especially bad was coming behind the Boomer generation that absolutely hated my guts just for being young. You might say mentors were few and far between and every time I reached out, I got my hand slapped. I was looked at (and still am looked at) as a labor commodity and little else.

Also, it is truly hilarous to me that Goldman Sachs, the bank that the US Govt. BAILED OUT during the financial crisis, a bank largely run mostly by people of a certain ethnicity, has any moral standing whatsoever. These fools should be out of business for what they did, not laying down this crap!

Also BlackRock--what a POS company that is! They came in to a well regarded local firm and absolutely gutted it. Want to know why? PENSIONS. They had to get rid of anyone with a pension, so they did all kinds of miserable fuckery to pull that off.

We made it through together. When you have children you have to accept that you may lose them and must be prepared to handle it. Still in all, several years got eaten up there with worry, doubts, and fears.

We had a 100% healthy "Double-Rainbow" son in 2010, he's just about 10 years old now.

Keep your head up, be kind to yourself, and be aware that LOTS more people than you imagine have gone through this.

I grew up in Upstate NY. There were plenty of warm winters in the '70s and '80s. I don't think anything is remarkably different.

Also, we had some summers that were freezing--like you never wanted to go swimming the whole summer except maybe one week in August. Other summers were blazing. My parents' old farmhouse didn't have A/C. They still don't have A/C now.

Doesn't Norway have huge taxes on automobiles which chill ownership? If so, then population is not relevant. If only 10% of people can afford to own cars, then the number of crashes and fatalities will certainly be low.

The US standard of living is far higher. Whether that leads to more fatalities or not is anybody's guess. I would prefer the idea that we don't bother teaching people to drive very well or that people don't value developing their own good driving skills.

The problem with Chemistry is that to do anything interesting professionally, you must have a PhD. The PhD in Chemistry is a long, difficult slog.

Back in 2007 I had funds in NetBank which happened to be the first bank to fail during the crisis. My money was bailed out 100% by the FDIC. But it was a tense time and a lesson I won't ever forget.

Today, banks can fail and the laws have now changed such that savings accounts may be used to "bail in" this time. So beware--cash is not safe, actual hard cash is not safe (can get stolen, safe deposit boxes are not allowed to hold any cash), gold and silver must be in hand, but are not safe for the same reasons as cash. No investments are safe, not even money market funds--those nearly broke the dollar peg in 2009/10.

So what should we do? Bitcoin? Give me a freaking break, lol!

We went to FL in 2009 and I remember vividly how many condos were on sale for unbelievable prices. The thing was, you could not get financing and I had no idea how long any recovery would take if it ever came at all. I expected another leg down, not a recovery. The only reason we had a recovery is because Bush fired up the printing presses and Obama kept them going. Then gas prices went totally insane which is how they bailed out all the banks--on our fucking backs! And NOBODY went to prison! Oh, and the worst part was all the "Peak Oil" propaganda all over the Internet which had to be a psyop because they had to justify the high oil prices which were in no way justifiable at all.

So after long consideration, I think this time we really should just shoot the bastards.

I have job-hopped many times hoping to find a place that values developers. After 9-10 jobs I now realize my mistake. There aren't any. Every place I have worked is more or less as I just described to you. This is 21st century business. This is what they didn't explain in college. This is what is wrong with all business in general is this commodification of people--they don't care if you're a good developer or a 10X problem solver, most are happy with cheap. If the labor comes from India or China or anyplace with a contract that puts the laboror in a one-down position of servitude, all the better because those people can be exploited much further. Again, they don't even care about quality, they desire only "good enough."

Now, there is something worse. White males are considered less attractive people to hire. They are trying to punish us for being intelligent and successful. If you don't believe me, just wait, in time you will experience it yourself.

Free = infinite demand. I don't think that will ever work anymore than throwing open the floodgates at the border and letting in all the world's surplus population who want to come and get free benes from us and wipe their asses on our flag.

When something is given away for free, people value it less. So making college "tuition free" e.g. saddled to the taxpayer, is not going to produce quality graduates or get us any kind of ROI for us lowly, un-represented, long-suffering American taxpayers. So I suppose if we make it "free" that could be final nail in the coffin.

With the limitless debt situation we have in the US right now, the Fed could just print off another $2-3 Trillion and paper over the whole damn thing. All of us will be poorer, of course. You like getting paid in Monopoly money, right? Zimbabwe dollars all right with you?