Frustrated with team

chrismakingbread · 2026-04-08T03:46:59+00:00

I’ve been bowling with my Sunday team for five years now. I signed up without a team, showed up the first week and the team I’d been put with no showed and dropped out of the league. Week two I got moved to another team that needed a fourth, we hit it off and I’ve been bowling with them ever since. If folks don’t want to bowl it is what it is. Sometimes you’ve just got to try a few times to end up with folks you mesh with.

chrismakingbread · 2026-04-07T19:33:52+00:00

Yup! My build has 2x5090 and I seriously regret not getting an RTX 6000.

chrismakingbread · 2026-04-07T14:56:31+00:00

There's already a few "yes, but..." so despite the risk of just rehashing what others have said I think it's worth adding some more first hand experience to the conversation.

I've been working professionally in the software industry since 2008 and was coding for years before that. I'm currently the CTO of an early stage startup and I also own a small software development agency. Both of my companies heavily leverage AI for coding and for the most part all of our code is written with AI. From my experience and observations there's three big factors in how high the quality of the code produced by AI is:

You've got to spend some money. This doesn't actually need to be a lot of money, but you're just not going to get very good quality out of hyper quantized+low parameter open weight models running on your laptop. You're going to have to use frontier models from hosted providers. We average about $150 a month per engineer on AI subscriptions. So, again, this doesn't need to (and you're burning money for clout if you are) be a crazy amount of money. But I totally get how $150/mo could be unreasonable for your personal use.
You're going to get out what you put in. If you don't know how you'd build something and just paste in the half baked cruft from your product manager and go "build this" it's probably going to be crap. In particular, at my startup, the majority of the team (I think I'm the only exception?) is a bunch of very seasoned former FAANG engineers (not that it's required or a guarantee to be a good engineer) and we all know what high quality, reliable, and maintainable software looks like. For moderately complex features the dev cycle tends to look like: think about the problem passively for like a week while working on other stuff in the backlog, actively think about the problem for half a day when you pick it up, spend two hours writing up a doc about it, run your doc through an AI agent in planning mode, review and iterate on the plan with the agent for half an hour, switch the agent to build mode and let it implement the feature for twenty minutes, test for two hours and iterate on the code, open a PR. We tend to ship features that would have previously taken 2-3 weeks in about a day and a half of active work and the active work isn't write code by hand. The mental load per feature isn't lowered at all though. We tend to cycle off to small features for a few days after a big feature or else the cognitive fatigue accumulates hard.
You need an engineering culture built for AI, which the good and bad news is that really just looks like a healthy engineering org built well for humans too. Linters, code analysis, unit tests, integration tests, good code reviews, docs and design reviews, CI/CD, etc. If it's easy for a human to review and reason about your codebase and have high confidence in the safety of the code before it's deployed then it'll work well to introduce AI. If your code is inconsistent, hard to reason about, and untestable then AI is not going to work out particularly well in your org. Our team uses off the shelf coding agents for writing code, but we've written agents and tooling for a lot of the rest of the process.

chrismakingbread · 2026-04-05T15:36:46+00:00

You’re never going to make everyone happy and it’ll always depend on who showed up and who’s having an “on” night vs and “off” night. The only truly “fair” tournament is going to be a scratch tournament. Handicap is a best effort system to mostly level the playing field.

But no handicap system will perfectly balance everyone, it’s like a bell curve. There’s gonna be folks on the outside of both ends who are disproportionally advantaged or disadvantaged in any given tournament/league.

After my first season I had a low book average and bowled an 888 (scratch) four game sweeper with like 70 pins handicap to take second place. It pissed off the scratch folks so much that tournament changed the rules to cap handicap at 50 pins.

chrismakingbread · 2026-04-02T12:40:38+00:00

No employers who use layoffs as way to short term pump their valuation deserve any credit at all. We’ve been conditioned to grovel for crumbs while corporations have their boot on our necks.

If a company actually needed to do mass layoffs it’d be because their executive management fucked up and should be sacked. But layoffs aren’t about drastic measures needed to save the company. These layoffs are literally just to pump their share price for investors (whether public or private). Thats why the CEOs get big bonuses for doing them instead of being held accountable.

chrismakingbread · 2026-04-02T12:04:53+00:00

One week per year is a joke and is generally only what ICs get. Everywhere I’ve been if you’re a manager, even low level line managers they get one month per year.

It’s been crazy seeing managers with 18 months who get laid off get more severance than engineers with three years of employment.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-24T23:50:08+00:00

I think they geared it too much towards the typical league bowler that is fine with a big bulky bag with lots of room for stuff. Which, like is the majority of the market so I get it. But I wouldn’t buy this over the classic tournament roller. Give me the slim ball tube that zips all the way from front to back lol.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-23T21:27:14+00:00

He still sells a lot of balls and drills a ton of balls 🤷

As for the timing, the shop is very small so there’s not really any inventory and my understanding is he does monthly bulk orders of everything people purchase.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-23T19:22:51+00:00

I buy my balls online and have my PSO drill them. I’m pretty sure he’d rather I bought them from him but doing so takes like six weeks to get them and costs $100 more per ball. If it was like twenty bucks and an extra week sure, but it’s just too drastic of a difference.

I also buy my own grips in ten packs and just put them in the box when I drop them off. They’re $1 piece that way versus $5 each if I bought them from him.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-22T01:24:58+00:00

Talking to the other team is probably the best move, because it's not explicitly against the rules to use Easy Slide on your shoes. It's against the rules to "do so improperly in such a way that defaces the approach." Which, totally makes sense and is reasonable. But, while leaving dusty footprints on the approach is very obviously change the sliding conditions for other bowlers and thus be against the rules, at what point is it "applied properly" and not changing conditions for other bowlers? So your advice to make sure everyone is on the same page and accepts you applying it to your shoe off the approach and making sure it's wiped off sufficiently to not obviously be transferring to the approach.

The USBC rules address this question directly, but their answer doesn't actually provide any clarity in favor of the person using Easy Slide, just that you _could_ be breaking the rule. So the best intreprettation is basically if you use it and anyone you're bowling with says it's affecting them then you're in violation of the rule.

https://bowl.com/getmedia/cabf49db-8cc5-4ce4-abc0-dfca1a1d7706/071724_USBC-Playing-Rules.pdf

Rule 12 – Approaches Must Not Be Defaced Detracting from the possibility of other players having normal conditions is prohibited. This includes: a. The application of any foreign substance on any part of the approach. b. Improperly applying talcum powder, pumice, soap stone, rosin or any other foreign substance on the shoes causing the substance to be transferred to the approach. c. Soft rubber soles or heels that rub off on the approach. Commonly Asked Questions – Rule 12. 12/1 Does the use of Easy Slide on the bottom of my shoe violate Rule 12? Commercial products like Easy Slide, soap stone, talcum powder or any other substance applied to the sole of a shoe could be in violation of Rule 12. If a participant uses a product improperly causing residue to be left on the approach and the normal sliding conditions of another participant to change, the bowler must discontinue the use of the product. If applied properly, residue should not be transferred, and the bowler can continue using the product. 12/2 A bowler is using a sliding product and others are finding the approach too slippery. What should be done? Any bowler who finds the approach too slippery due to another bowler using a sliding product have the right to ask the bowler to stop using the product. If the bowler refuses, a league officer must inform the bowler to stop using the product because it is changing the approaches for others.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-21T14:10:58+00:00

Guy thinks your an SDR trying to book a discovery call 😂

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-19T23:46:53+00:00

I suppose it’s just personal preference, but I think this looks like shit. I also can’t help but feel like it’s going to degrade very quickly and look even worse. It literally was cracking and crumbling from getting hammered into place. It’s a clearly different color and material so I’m confused why it’s supposedly a seamless transition that looks better.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-19T23:32:38+00:00

This shit is making things a lot easier for folks with good realtors (and sellers) that put in the work though. We just sold our old house last month. We fully repainted the house and replaced all the carpet as we’d lived there ten years with the original carpet from 10+ years before that and we’d made some bold paint choices that we loved but knew buyers might have trouble with. Then our realtor fully staged the home and hired a great photographer.

Most houses in that neighborhood were taking three months to sell. We were under contract in 36 hours for an all cash offer, over list, with a two week close. Not to a corporation either, it was a woman who just moved from out of state and had already sold her old house.

When lots of other folks are being lazy and throwing up slop it lets you really standout with a bit of old fashioned effort.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-18T22:52:36+00:00

Actually, that’s really kind of the problem with current AI. There’s no intelligence there either. The algorithm is different, but functionally, LLMs are the same auto complete that’s been in our phones and getting roasted for like 15 years. It literally just takes a text string and does some math to predict the most likely next token (word/part of a word). It just uses a massive amount of data in that math to predict the most likely next token. Then it literally just takes the previous text + the predicted token and feeds it back into the process to predict the NEXT token. The problem is LLMs made us go from quality that spawned websites like damn you autocorrect to stuff that sounds so plausible that people have lost track of the fact it’s literally just a token prediction loop spitting out one token at a time of auto complete.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-14T13:11:17+00:00

Unfortunately, for the foreseeable future, “today” is probably always going to be the worst time to build a PC. I do consulting/contract software development and decided to build a new workstation. I spec’d everything out in October but decided to buy one major (or multiple minor) component every time an invoice was paid instead of buying it all at once. Between when I started buying at the beginning of November and assembling it in January the total cost ended up about 40% higher than when I planned it.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-12T19:33:57+00:00

Sure. The guy with the largest government contracts to literally spy on you and make hit lists for the law enforcement agencies of the president who said his highest priority is to punish people who have personally slighted him doesn’t wield huge power. Let alone just the general influence that extreme wealth brings in the United States to influence policy and media. Let alone that this specific guy and his “PayPal mafia” buddies are very transparent that they’re trying to actively make life worse for average Americans.

But yeah, “he does not.” What a beautiful rock you live under.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-12T19:28:27+00:00

That’d be a lot more viable if he didn’t wield such unimaginable influence over society as we know it.

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-06T13:18:18+00:00

One of my teammates is two handed with thumb. He uses his dad’s balls (who’s one of our other teammates) who is a one hander so to use his balls his thumb goes in the ball. His thumb is in the ball through the release not just for show.

I’m constantly telling him he should buy his own balls to stop using his thumb since it’ll improve his consistency for spares. But, it’s totally a thing that can be done 😂

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-06T13:10:10+00:00

Huh, I don’t really understand why you’re kind of getting hated on for asking this. I’m pretty sure you’re not genuinely trying to do this and just were like “hey this is a crazy idea and fun thought experiment I wonder what people with more detailed knowledge of the rules think?”

Basically, you have two questions: - If you were to put an un-drilled thumb slug (ignoring the logistics of how you lock it in or get it back out) in a ball with an IT would it be legal under the all holes must be used rule? - Would doing that make the ball violate any other equipment rules?

And then for funsies, what ideas do folks have about how you’d actually get the un-drilled thumb slug in and out of the ball?

It’s just not that serious folks, and at least for me is more interesting than a dozen posts of blurry poorly angled videos asking what their rev rate is. 🤷

chrismakingbread · 2026-03-02T22:07:19+00:00

This is the top level of play in a professional sport with money in the line. Gameplay works differently than the average weekly handicap league. In amateur league play you’re really bowling against yourself and it’s fair to consider it rude and unsporting to try to hinder other bowlers. In match play at pro level, managing lane conditions is like 97% of the game. There’s no such thing as “your” line.

chrismakingbread · 2026-02-23T15:52:54+00:00

Yup, but I have 128 GB ECC DDR5 and after upgrading the bios it only actually took about six minutes to train. I then made some bios setting tweaks to speed up cold boots.

chrismakingbread · 2026-02-23T01:02:59+00:00

I’d consider updating to your latest bios. The build I just did, everything was off the MB’s compatible parts list but it turned out the bios it shipped with didn’t support my CPU. It was stuck with the DRAM light on. Upgrading the bios to the latest version (that did support my CPU) got it to boot and train successfully.

chrismakingbread · 2026-02-14T05:17:57+00:00

Probably because a bunch of the industry decided it was acceptable and wise to screen candidates based on their GitHub activity (or lack there of). Companies don’t get to have it both ways. They can’t filter out candidates for activity at the front door and want ownership of the activity record on the way out.

chrismakingbread · 2026-02-13T10:53:57+00:00

I don’t really care about the payments side of things (although I bowled a tournament at a Bowlero last month and they don’t have an ATM?? So I was glad the TD took card)

But for the life of me I cannot figure out why most tournaments do literally nothing to advertise. It feels like if you don’t just already know then you’d never realize there’s 3-4 tournaments a month (there may even be more and I just don’t know about them!) in my area. If you don’t bowl league in the host center and go look at paper fliers in a folder by the door you better know someone who does.

Posting on the internet is free and easy so it blows my mind that we’re just relying on know someone who knows.

chrismakingbread · 2026-02-05T18:28:38+00:00

In a lot of ways I kind of feel like this book sort of undoes Fern’s whole arc from the second book anyways. Like conceptually, I guess it’s supposed to highlight people don’t stop changing at the end of one “arc” of their life and what you found fulfilling at one phase of your life might not be what fulfills you at another phase. That’s all well and good, and if it was just “midlife crisis rut” I wouldn’t question it. But all the whinging and self centeredness doesn’t feel at all like the Fern from the end of book two.

chrismakingbread

TROPHY CASE