LakesAndTrees (u/LakesAndTrees)

LakesAndTrees commented on Dan Simmons, author of Hyperion, has died dignitymemorial.com/obitu... · Posted by u/throw0101a

layer8 · 13 days ago

> The Hyperion Cantos is a masterpiece which every scifi fan ought to have read

You have to have some affinity to religious/Christianity/church topics, otherwise it’s quite a turn-off.

LakesAndTrees · 12 days ago

I don’t, and this stands as one of the best reading experiences of my life.

LakesAndTrees commented on Tell HN: I'm having the worst career winter of my life · Posted by u/mariogintili

michaelteter · 2 months ago

I certainly am also. 32 years of professional work. Capable and willing to wear many hats, communicate with people of all walks of life (and neuro-divergencies), and even travel frequently.

Over the last two years I have applied to at least 150 jobs. For each application which would accept a cover letter, I wrote one. And I only applied to roles which I really believed I would fit into - I didn't just spray and pray.

I think I've had 4-5 companies that I got to interview with. The closest one to hiring ended up choosing another guy who had a little more frontend experience (this was for a backend role). But they said they really liked me. That's great, but it doesn't help :)

The rest were usually silent rejections. I'm actually grateful when I receive a rejection email (vs indefinite silence).

Along the way, I've built maybe 8 demo projects as part of the application process. I got to show off a few to the companies, and despite delivering what I honestly believe were clean, quality solutions, I didn't get the jobs.

Eventually I gave up applying for some months. It's just to demoralizing to keep trying and getting nowhere. Now I build things that make me happy (for no money), like my new web game, Vector Defense -> https://michaelteter.com/vector.html

I've started applying to companies again. If nothing happens in the next six months, I'll most likely walk away from my tech career and just get a "regular job". Maybe I'll open a gym in Bangkok; they don't have many, and the few decent ones have surprisingly high monthly fees. I could compete; and I love hospitality and providing nice experiences for people. So if anyone wants to partner with me, hit me up!

LakesAndTrees · 2 months ago

Hey, for what it's worth: that game was a blast. I forgot how much I enjoyed tower defense. Thank you for the 30 minutes of unexpected fun.

Good luck in your search!

LakesAndTrees commented on Ask HN: What tech purchase did you regret even though reviews were great? · Posted by u/xthe

chc4 · 2 months ago

Amazon Fire Tablet, one of the only things I've ever returned.

LakesAndTrees · 2 months ago

100%. Ours has become so inexplicably slow it’s wild, even after factory resets. The Amazon OS experience is also terrible. It sits unused.

LakesAndTrees commented on Americans can't afford their cars any more and Wall Street is worried telegraph.co.uk/business/... · Posted by u/zerosizedweasle

tharkun__ · 5 months ago

Agreed. I usually have to remind the salesperson to stop talking to me in monthly payment terms. I always tell them to talk to me about final price including all interest.

It's a bit of an uphill battle, where you have to tell them over and over. They're just so used to trying to sell the monthly payment. It's really no wonder that people that don't understand interest (many if not most) will fall for this. And if you actually can't really afford the car, it's also understandable why many if not most people will "gladly" fall for it. The alternative is not having the car of their dreams.

That said, financing in general isn't bad. I've financed most of my cars. I wouldn't have had the sort of "emergency fund" to just outright buy the car and financing allowed me to get the car when I needed it instead of buying some "temp beater" and taking even longer to buy the car I really wanted when I needed it and I paid it back with priority (i.e. faster than the financing terms required it).

LakesAndTrees · 5 months ago

This reminds me of my most recent real estate transaction.

Over and over, the agent kept insisting that I increase my counter offer. "Think about it - that's only like a latte a day".

Yes. A latte a day, that I don't already purchase. Over 25 years.

We were talking about close to $50,000.

LakesAndTrees commented on Intel CEO Letter to Employees morethanmoore.substack.co... · Posted by u/fancy_pantser

Mistletoe · 8 months ago

The problem is every tech worker sees themselves as a temporarily embarrassed oligarch in waiting.

LakesAndTrees · 8 months ago

I’d say this applies to a far broader group; I’ll never forget when a professor asked for a show of hands on the first day of class: “how many of you will have more than 10 million?”

More than half raised their hands immediately. It was a Philosophy 101 class.

LakesAndTrees commented on Psilocybin decreases depression and anxiety in cancer patients (2016) pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/arti... · Posted by u/Bluestein

kbos87 · 8 months ago

Yes, the one time I've tried mushrooms it was a very unpleasant experience. For weeks I was left feeling like I had done some permanent damage to my mental health. I eventually got past that feeling and there might be a point I try them again, but not without professional guidance. Psilocybin is powerful and not a remotely recreational thing (for me at least.)

LakesAndTrees · 8 months ago

The first time I tried them, it was like I peaked behind the “curtain” in the Wizard of Oz, and knew even in that moment I’d never be able to unsee or forget it. It was the equivalent of being a child and realizing Santa didn’t actually exist.

Life as I had known it, the things that then animated me, were “shown” to be a pantomime - a joke. It was tremendously sad, and - for better or worse - I’ve never been the same since.

Maybe it was a coming of age experience - something I would have more painfully experienced later anyway. But it cost something significant. It changed me. Still, some 25 years later, I don’t know if it was for the better.

LakesAndTrees commented on The South Vietnamese pilot who landed a Cessna on a carrier to save his family (2019) historynet.com/maj-buang-... · Posted by u/stmw

lr1970 · a year ago

> Basically, imagine if Russia conquered Ukraine and then renamed Kyiv to "Vladimir Putin City".

This is really a poor analogy. Kyiv is the birthplace of ancient Russia (Kyiv Rus) and for both Ukrainians and Russians it is like Jerusalem for Jews and Arabs. It is easier to imagine renaming Moscow into Zelensky City than Kyiv into Putin.

LakesAndTrees · a year ago

Except Ukraine is a sovereign nation - much like Russia (which in today’s form does not hold any reasonable claim to Kyiv) - and renaming either nations capital city to satisfy some man’s thirst for legacy would be equally vulgar. The analogy holds pretty well, from where I’m standing.

LakesAndTrees commented on Show HN: I built a(nother) house optimized for LAN parties lanparty.house/... · Posted by u/kentonv

LakesAndTrees · a year ago

I think the thing that I’m most amazed by - and this setup is truly amazing - is the fact that you’ve got a group of friends to enjoy this with. Good for you; this looks like a blast, and I can only imagine how fun that’d be, compared to years of purely solo gaming.

LakesAndTrees commented on Visualizing World War II nathangoldwag.wordpress.c... · Posted by u/gaws

ww2supercut · a year ago

I recently finished a large World War II project that covered the full timeline of the war, and Google Maps was a valuable tool to follow what was happening in any given battle. The problem is Google Maps has more detail than you need, so trying to follow something like Operation Market Garden is much more difficult than just looking at this beautiful battle map: https://www.alamy.com/a-bridge-too-far-image68088140.html. "The West Point Atlas of War" is another great resource.

Maps cover the spatial side of war, but in addition it's difficult to follow the timeline. My project stitched popular World War II movies together into a chronological series, making it easier to see what was happening across the world at any given time. You can view the episodes and the full blog post here: https://open.substack.com/pub/ww2supercut/p/combining-143-wo.... And in addition "The Second World War" by Churchill's biographer Martin Gilbert, is a chronological, 750 page book that I couldn't put down.

LakesAndTrees · a year ago

This is fantastic. I really admire your dedication to the project, and can’t wait to watch the episodes. Thank you for doing this!

LakesAndTrees commented on Switch 2 will be backwards compatible with Switch videogameschronicle.com/n... · Posted by u/ashitlerferad

ahartmetz · a year ago

That's actually (6) - a living room PC with Steam 10ft UI and a wireless game controller is a thing.

LakesAndTrees · a year ago

That's true to an extent, but it's also quite a bit more expensive than the $300 (CAD) I paid for an XBOX with 2 controllers, and I had the side benefit of being able to easily play with the kids (who find it easy to use).