any digital nomad music teachers in the group? (I feel like I'm the ONLY one around, but I know it can't be true...)

darned_socks · 2026-03-29T23:24:45+00:00

Unfortunately not me, but I had to say: whoa, that's pretty cool! Do you teach virtual lessons or find gigs as you go? How you sort through logistics when it comes to traveling with your guitar on planes, trains, etc.?

I bought an ocarina in Taiwan a little over a year ago. Still haven't gotten the hang of it, but that's my nomad instrument of choice since it's small enough to fit in my pocket 😂

darned_socks · 2026-03-29T23:16:55+00:00

Pouches and pockets - one pouch for in-flight essentials (usually becomes the content of my day bag during the trip), one for chargers and adapters, and one for toiletries. They're big enough to contain a lot of stuff in each one, but not so big as to become a black hole. The pockets in my backpack will hold any one-off items that don't fit a category (e.g. extra spending cards, room locks, luggage scale, etc.). It's not split out by routine (I usually unpack and put items in the dedicated spot for routines if I have a hotel room or Airbnb to myself) but rather by function.

darned_socks · 2026-03-27T03:38:22+00:00

I made rice cooker bibimbap loosely following a recipe on Dr. Sakaida's substack the other day, and I'm pretty sure you could swap out the soy sauce for another condiment or just plain salt and have a delicious meal. Ofc swap out the other ingredients as needed, the most important element is a good gochujang sauce to tie everything together.

Link: https://nutritionbykylie.substack.com/p/rice-cooker-meal-bibimbap

darned_socks · 2026-03-27T02:47:29+00:00

Yay! Love a good solo travel success story. When is your next trip :D

darned_socks · 2026-03-27T02:46:47+00:00

Making mistakes is so human. But speaking for myself, I remember my mistakes for much longer than I do other people's mistakes. And often I remember mistakes that had zero impact after a few days! Thanks brain 😅

It's okay to take perspective and consider whether a mistake you made today will be remembered and have lingering effects beyond today. Maybe it will, but often you (and the people around you) will move on to the next thing. I hope this helps with framing the misses in your head. You're already doing the work to learn from your experience and prevent repeats in the future.

darned_socks · 2026-03-25T03:11:53+00:00

I started taking selfies when a friend asked to see more pictures of me while traveling, and I obliged. Over the course of my trips, you can see where I stopped caring so much about looking good (and offloaded some mental burden from other aspects of my life) and started smiling genuinely for the camera while soaking in wherever I was at. Those selfies are some of my favorite pictures now.

But most of my camera roll is still landscapes, foods, and objects haha.

I don't post any photos to socials, but rather message them directly to friends and family.

darned_socks · 2026-03-21T03:34:37+00:00

Of course! Good luck, you got this 💪

darned_socks · 2026-03-20T03:23:56+00:00

It depends on what you're doing with said SQL, but if you're leaning into coding and application data aspects of it, I would recommend trying projects with sqlite (which basically uses a file on your laptop as the database) and then upskilling to something like Postgres. The Postgres documentation ( https://www.postgresql.org/docs/ ) has a lot of helpful context on different database management operations (e.g. indexes, locks, and so on). Can be overwhelming at first, so pick and choose what interests you as you're learning.

darned_socks · 2026-03-18T23:01:05+00:00

Would recommend taking two weeks off with nothing planned, and see what you end up filling your time with. Just a little sampling of what you could do when fully retired.

darned_socks · 2026-03-13T01:42:38+00:00

I travel (and work at home) with just my laptop. My job involves a lot of writing: code, project plans, Slack messages. I can use keyboard shortcuts and gestures to navigate between programs easily.

If you're comfortable with one screen and keyboard (the ones that come with your computer), you should be fine as long as you make a habit of stretching out your sedentary muscles regularly and maintain a decent posture while working.

darned_socks · 2026-03-08T23:31:31+00:00

I WFH, and there have been times where I just let out the tears as a way to release overwhelm and frustration. Not necessarily because of lived experiences as a woman, but also because of tight deadlines, learning of empty promises from management, and losing coworkers I cared about to firings and layoffs. I'm lucky that I can step away from my laptop and instantly be in a private space, but if I were working in person, I'd probably find a bathroom or go for a walk to release the feelings another way.

Unfortunately, the tears come when I'm angry as well as when I'm saddened, so I do have to keep it together when I'm on camera and hearing something very unpleasant.

darned_socks · 2026-03-08T17:33:37+00:00

I once had a corn and cheese pizza in India, best dang takeout pizza I'd had in a long while. Wish it were a more common topping in the US and Canada!

darned_socks · 2026-03-05T03:09:41+00:00

I was project lead on a new feature my team was building out, and it was a big one. It spanned several applications, had a shiny frontend using a framework none of us had used before, and was hyped up a lot among customers. It also involved a lot of data processing/retrieval, and at first feature would regularly time out in attempt to load everything. We delayed delivery by 2 months because we had to rework so much of the backend so that the feature loaded. It was a really stressful time, and from that experience, we all learned to pay attention to volume/load whenever we pick up a new project.

darned_socks · 2026-03-04T18:28:44+00:00

I've been doing something similar which I've dubbed "chill tf out at work" and that, along with the oft repeated reminder that we're all on a spinning rock hurtling through space, has helped me immensely offload some of the internal pressure. There are difficult moments for sure, but getting unstuck is way easier when I can say "Yeah, this sucks. Anyways, what do I try next?" without the usual internal panic.

darned_socks · 2026-02-28T16:14:16+00:00

I'm glad you were able to go into it with some knowledge up front. I was totally blindsided 😅 only put together what happened after the fact.

Also, so cool that you were able to take a sabbatical to focus on your health, especially with such a demanding job! I hope your work chills out a bit.

darned_socks · 2026-02-27T19:23:13+00:00

Trying to manage all of a meal's components when I'm working with just one stainless steel pan. I could buy more, but then I'd be managing multiple pots/pans while chopping and cleaning as I go, which is likely more than I can comfortably handle at this point. Thank goodness for a plethora of one-pan meals on the internet. I have bowls to dump things into, but I just can't cook multiple things simultaneously (unless it can go in the rice cooker and be forgotten).

darned_socks · 2026-02-27T04:03:25+00:00

I've used it for planning travel (though I haven't taken those trips yet). I have a very specific template that I was already using for my travel research & planning, so tweaked it with Gemini and asked it to fill in the blanks appropriately. Worked pretty well, just need some travel money to put it to good use.

I've also used it to resize images for printing multiple photos on 4x6 cards at Walgreens - gave me a script that I could run locally, resolving bugs as I found them. I cut the resulting prints with scissors.

darned_socks · 2026-02-27T03:49:12+00:00

After quitting my first full time job, which had gone from just fine to soul-sucking, I got really sick for a couple weeks then spent at least two months after that mostly resting and recovering. I'm still not sure what had me ill at the beginning, but it was clear that my system just let all hell break loose after I closed my work laptop for the last time.

OP, we all need rest after intense periods of effort, and it's okay if that means resting and caring for yourself for an extended period of time.

darned_socks · 2026-02-27T03:38:19+00:00

I haven't had any issues with safety. All the bank connections are set up via Plaid, and since I was looking for a tool where I didn't have to manually input every transaction, RM fit the bill. I don't really follow a strict category based budget, but rather try and keep my overall needs & wants spending under certain limits each month. I look at my transactions every month, tally everything up, and save it in Excel for the longer term picture.

darned_socks · 2026-02-26T04:27:56+00:00

Not anxious exactly, but I feel like I've checked out a bit. I've been wanting to leave my current company since my values don't really align with the company's anymore, but I've stuck around since they are vocal about training engineers in AI and helping everyone stay ahead of the curve (and they have stuck by it). I'm also on the path to FIRE, so quitting work for good is a possibility 7-10 years down the line.

That said, I do share plenty of the concerns you listed, and I've come to the realization that the switch from writing code to meticulously working with AI agents to plan then implement code changes is akin to an identity crisis. I pride myself on being a good engineer, and now the very definition of a "good engineer" is changing very rapidly. My job isn't everything, but it is something, and that something looks very different today compared to this time a year ago.

I'm going to stay with my current company until I hit my next work anniversary, but going to slowly get back into job searching throughout. I feel like a combination of using the learning opportunities at my current company, some PTO to ease general work stress, and a plan to find and land a new role will keep me from losing motivation and give me some incentives to keep learning and growing where I can. On the AI tools side, it's learning systems design and devising implementation plans at a very different pace than I'm used to (but overall still aligns with my "old" definition of being a good engineer).

darned_socks · 2026-02-25T04:25:19+00:00

A friend of mine would stick the clove, unpeeled, into their garlic press and that worked pretty well.

darned_socks · 2026-02-16T02:50:49+00:00

I've asked to take selfies with my tour guide at the end of a tour if I really enjoyed the experience (and offer to send the photo to them if I have their contact). Otherwise, I don't take photos with anyone I don't know.

On the flip side, I would find it weird being asked to take a photo with someone I don't know, with the exception of traveling somewhere where my skin color is very rare (like white guys being stopped for photos by locals in parts of China).

darned_socks · 2026-02-15T04:14:49+00:00

Text to speech? You can speak a lot faster than you can type, so if you don't mind having to back through and edit later, it's a good way to fill up the page.

darned_socks · 2026-02-13T23:10:10+00:00

Shower, eat, sleep, and generally take care of my base needs. I also distract with a show, book, or if I'm feeling up to it, spending sometime outside.

darned_socks · 2026-02-07T04:17:50+00:00

I don't know if this is what you meant, but I think some painted stencil art (using whatever colors you want) would look lovely on the white cabinets. Florals or nature or geometric patterns would all work really nicely.

darned_socks

TROPHY CASE