…and that my former boss had read it:
Computers make copy-and-paste really easy, so every programmer falls into the trap once in a while. The lesson you eventually learn is that code always changes, always always always, and as soon as you have to change the same thing in N places, where N is more than 1, you’ll have earned your scar.
Stilton. Ah yes, Stilton. This Insult to Cows Everywhere is considered the very best in England, where deep-boiled eel guts in slippery-gray fester pudding sauce is Fine Dining. Remember: you can’t conquer a worldwide empire by serving good food at home, and this cheese alone launched a thousand ships for sure. In fact, I did a little research and learned that Stilton’s military roots go even deeper: It’s not really cheese at all, but was in fact one of the first biological weapons concocted by those dastardly Royals during the Revolutionary War. The smallest bit could poison any well from New Brunswick to Fort Calistoga. After pitifully snatching defeat from the jaws of victory at Yorktown, they launched a massive cover-up, made like it was food all along, and have been choking the stuff down with their collective pride ever since.
“You need a healthy ego to endure the abuse that comes with any sort of success. The trick is to think of your ego as your goofy best friend who lends moral support but doesn’t know shit.”
“The most boring parts of a property owner’s personality are those which relate to his or her ownership of real estate.”
”Yes, it does seem like a flop in the making, what with all the people wondering just how early they need to get in line to buy one on the first day they’re available.”
“I happen to be an apostle of the proposition that when people pay the real cost of their behavior, we shouldn’t care what behavior they exhibit.”
—Berkeley Public Policy professor Michael O’Hare on transit versus driving.
And curiously enough, taking rejection less personally may help you to get rejected less often. If you think someone judging you will work hard to judge you correctly, you can afford to be passive. But the more you realize that most judgements are greatly influenced by random, extraneous factors—that most people judging you are more like a fickle novel buyer than a wise and perceptive magistrate—the more you realize you can do things to influence the outcome.
From Two Kinds of Judgement. One of the things in life that it took me far too long to learn is that people will totally judge you on shit that shouldn’t matter. To argue that first impressions don’t really matter is to ignore the fact that in most situations they determine whether you’re granted the opportunity to make a second impression.
Of course it’s completely unfair, but trying to condemn reality for its moral failings is a losing game.
“I do ride a bike, but it has pedals.”
—Barbara Levy-Cohen, falsely listed as belonging to an “outlaw biker” gang.