Hello world

Hello

Hi everyone, I'm tetris -- I'm not an active (b)logger, but sometimes I need a personal space to just write out my thoughts, away from the grinding churn of social media.

Small rant about Reddit

(I'm sure you hear this a lot:) I've used reddit for the past decade or so, and watched it start off as a really fantastic idea space for programmers, scientists, and general hobbyist enthusiasts who can respect each other's opinions and talk about their passions without any ulterior motives

Some subreddits have this great sense of community leftover from the Golden Days, but for the most part the site is just a constant barrage of clashing personal opinions geared towards creating the most possible conflict. I waste so much of my day on it for no real benefit, so I just want a break in a slightly more welcoming place

Things I like

Lisp based languages

History podcasts

Repurposing old hardware

Cartoons

Winter sports

Bicycles

Things I worry about, but have no control over

Worsening state of the global inequality

I want to have kids some day, but am just too damn scared to bring them up in a hostile world: competitive schooling for limited jobs with worsening wages and limited housing with unreasonable rent. Who can plan a future around that? I think I'd rather just be a supportive uncle, or a co-parent to existing children who (and their parents) might need the support. There are plenty of kids in the world, I don't need my DNA to be in them to treat them with love and respect. I'll just hole up in my tiny apartment with my girlfriend, and we'll be those nice neighbours who help babysit the neighbours kids when they're working one of their three jobs. It takes a village.

I could talk politics here too, but I won't. It's exhausting.

Worsening state of the world climate

Floods, fires, storms. These are biblical times we're undergoing, and I see no end in sight. You could save your whole life to buy a house, and then watch it get swept away by a flood, or you could save even more and buy a house on a hill and watch it fall away in a mud slide, or witness it get consumed by flames.

I wonder if there are really any safe pockets in the world where anyone is safe. I like to feel that even the billionaires in their underground bunkers can't put all their eggs in one basket, because they don't know either. I guess they'll just migrate from safehouse to safehouse as the situation demands.

A lot of people are going to die in the next few decades, and I wonder if I'm in that pool. I'd rather not be, but if I am, then as long as the offspring of the billionaires can one day re-emerge on the surface of the planet as the last remnants of humanity, and they're holding a complete copy of Wikipedia, as well as all the art, literature, culture, science and mathematics preserved somewhere in their records - then in some small way I am glad. It wasn't all for nothing. My git commits and open source projects will exist in some form. I was here, and I added something small, and it was brief, but I hope people liked it.

Things I worry about, that I do have control over

Finances and Savings

Assuming I keep doing what I'm doing, I should be able to eke out a steady income for a while. It's not much, but then my rent isn't too bad either, and I'm putting a little away every month for some rainy day. I don't really have much expenses outside of internet, electricity, and food. I have no TV and therefore no TV subscriptions, or any monthly media related fees.

I've had some chances to dive straight for the money, but it always seems like it would be a really high stress environment with a lot of finger pointing if things go sour. I'd rather just stay here, with my meager wage, quietly working on small inconsequential projects to which I am on/off passionate about.

My brother is not doing so great. I think he's feeling the squeeze of the job market and experienced a lot of burnout in his last job that fueled his paranoia. He's not speaking with much of the family, but I'm trying to keep him financially stable so that at least he never worries about food or rent. It's a quarter of my income per month, but I don't mind - I worry about him, and throwing money at it buys me some peace of mind and hopefully it will give him some space and time to really find a job he likes.

Health and Girlfriend

I'm getting fat. Before Corona I was an avid cyclist and snowboarder, putting out 100km a week on the bike and hitting the mountain 5 times a year. Since? I've become an indoor cat; soft, round, cuddly. I thought Corona would be a great way for me to learn proper eating habits (e.g. not eating in front of a screen, health meals, fewer takeouts, etc.) but nope, I've just sought more comfort foods instead.

I've got to rein it in. My girlfriend says she loves me no matter what, but I don't want to test the limits of our love, and I know that I'm shallow enough to not reciprocate the sentiment if she gets too far. Or maybe I will. She's different from my ex in the sense that she respects my personal space, has her own happy and quiet personal life, and doesn't need the approval of others to live. I respect the heck out of her, and I think that was the main draw. I see a future built on mutual trust with her, an alien concept in my previous relationship. She wants kids though, and I'm just not sure at the moment. We'll see how far this goes I guess.