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Once, someone that thought I was some sort of boss asked if it was ok to skip an all hands meeting that was advertised as an in-person required meeting. The reason? They needed to pick up their kids at school.

Of course it’s ok. Always. Never, ever be afraid to skip a meeting to go pick up your kids. Or have dinner with your spouse. Or just go have a beer with good friends you haven’t seen in a while.

Trust me: the meeting could have been an email.

For the past couple of months I’ve not posted anything on social media. I’ve limited myself to liking specific life events for some friends and family and that has been it. Let me tell you, it has been… cleansing.

I’ve learned that my opinion is of no one’s interest. I’ve learned that I should just let people enjoy things.

And if someone is dead wrong… Let them live their lives based on their conclusions and I’ll live mine according to mine. Outcomes will sort everything out.

On my previous post I expressed my concerns about Elon Musk’s handling of Twitter. This week, things have gotten worse. Here are the top headlines at this time:

• Elon Musk dissolved Twitter’s Trust and Safety Board.
• Elon Musk caused Yoel Roth, former head of the board, to flee his home after falsely implying that Roth has advocated for child sexualization.

These latest happenings have prompted one of my favorite Twitter accounts, Popehat, to delete all his tweets and leave the platform. His explanation of why is very sobering. Another of my favorite accounts, pwnallthethings has also announced he’s phasing out of the platform. This sentence in his article summarizes the state of things to perfection: “There’s not much left on Twitter for me beyond the spectacle”.

I’ve made the decision to leave my account open but in private mode. I won’t be advertising it as a social media contact for myself, nor providing content. I’m not ready to completely leave the account as the platform is still relevant and has follow worthy accounts.

Still, I feel uncomfortable staying around.

“I recently learned about this term called quiet quitting, where you’re not outright quitting your job, but you’re quitting the idea of going above and beyond,” reads this NPR article about “Quiet Quitting”, the latest term for the age old concept of doing only what you’re payed to do.

Watching this term trend has made me think of things I’ve learned throughout my career as a software engineer. Here are some random bullet points

• Companies are structured to get all they can out of employees. From the moment a hiring decision is made, a company will try to get a new hire to take the lowest salary possible. After that, they’ll try to squeeze as much as they can from them. Keep that in mind.
• Did I mention companies try to squeeze as much as they can from employees? They’ll create a culture where employees essentially donate their personal devices, cell, and data plans to the company. Do you have company MSTeams, Slack or whatever else installed in your personal phone? There you go.
• “Above and beyond” is turned into the standard to get to the upper echelons. You may have heard the term “+1s”, or what in school was called “extracurricular activities”. Did I mention companies squeeze as much as they can from employees?
• There are times it is absolutely necessary to go “above and beyond”. The days leading up and during a production release are a good example. Yes, it is crunch time with crazy hours to get a piece of software into production and yes, things go on production during a weekend. This is fine. This is ok and rewarding… if your project is actually helping people.
• Going up the ladder in a company is a must to make more money. Having said that, you don’t have to keep going up. Will going to the next level mean you’ll have to do a job you hate? Will going to the next level mean you’ll have to sacrifice life with your loved ones? Know when to say “enough”.

Bottom line: don’t give all to a company and your career without personal reflection.

I can’t understate how heartbroken I am having watched the Arecibo Radio telescope fall this week. I still remember the first time I saw it as kid, just towering over the hills. Last time I saw it was in 2003 as a full grown adult, and I still looked at it in awe. It’s a goddamn tragedy.

It is a tragedy because it was such a symbol of pride. It was a symbol that it didn’t matter that you came from an island 100×35 miles wide, great things could be done in that island, and great thing could await you as well. It fed my fascination for science, for wonder, and it had a huge role in convincing me that I would be an engineer one day… and I did.

I’m angry that you were allowed to go down like that and in mourning. Good bye, old friend. You might be resurrected, perhaps looking like the radio telescope in China’s Guizhou Province, with no need for the gigantic mind blowing structure just… magically floating over a mind bending reversed dome. I’ll mourn that, but if it inspires another generation of kids from a small island to think they can be whatever they want… I’m ok with that.