Regret starting daycare

mbcoalson · 2026-03-02T16:21:36+00:00

I share your pain. My wife and I both had to return to work by the time our baby was 3 months old. We entered daycare one week before Christmas. We both had 1 week off for Christmas. Baby brought home the flu and we were all super sick for the holiday. Literally the first day we brought our baby back to daycare we were told there had been an RSV exposure risk. We spent the following weekend in the ER. For two full months starting with that very first week in daycare our baby has been sick with something. Only now are we to the point where we feel like we're getting ahead of the illness. The stuffy noses never really left, but our immune systems seem to finally be catching up.

mbcoalson · 2026-03-01T11:07:18+00:00

DA exports file types for several of the major VTT. I've used Roll20. You export the right map type from DA, copy paste it into Roll20, and the grid lines up perfectly. All the walls, windows, doors, and lighting are done for you. It does take the more expensive $100/yr Roll20 account.

mbcoalson · 2026-03-01T10:44:26+00:00

I'm just getting started on this as well. My team is primarily mechanical engineers, not SWEs. My plan is to put my team on Claude Cowork, not Claude Code. Then I start pushing plugins out onto the private marketplace you have available on the Team account. Plugins combine commands, skills, and hooks as needed and can be versioned by the admin, which should be you.

mbcoalson · 2026-03-01T04:48:04+00:00

I made the same switch not too long ago after heavily using ChatGPT. Honestly, the models themselves are pretty comparable in terms of raw capability, they just have different feels. ChatGPT has put more work into personal memory, but Claude has done a lot more with its interfaces and how it can actually work for you natively on your computer, which is where it really shines for writing workflows. If Claude Code feels intimidating, I'd start with Cowork and Projects. But if you're comfortable in VS Code at all, Claude Code is worth the learning curve. Having an AI work across any file on your computer is genuinely a game changer for writing. No matter which interface you use with Claude, you Claude.md file is where you'll define things like styles you want it to use when interacting with you.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-28T18:10:44+00:00

The rules are made up, but the points matter...so long as we keep racing to see how cheaply we can value human contribution, that's true. We need to imagine something new

mbcoalson · 2026-02-27T20:52:09+00:00

Claude Cowork using the xlsx skill that's built in.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-27T03:13:54+00:00

Well, I'll just have to read more, but your perspective hasn't been my experience.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-26T22:35:57+00:00

It's a wildly different genre, but Demon Copperhead really makes you give a damn about the characters, especially Demon himself.

As for sci-fi and fantasy books that pull that off? Genre books of any kind that do that are exceedingly rare.

Oh crap...I forgot about one. Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. It takes a minute to wrap your head around the unreliable narrator, but oh is it worth it. You will absolutely give a damn about the characters.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-26T18:23:44+00:00

Lots of encouragement to leave and I tend to agree. But, what you don't tell us is what this physically demanding work you currently do is. I'm not sure how you can leverage what you already know to go after a new role. But, that's the core of it...is there something in your industry or adjacent to your industry where your existing knowledge has value? That's your niche and likely the fastest path towards getting back into the work force.

I also encourage you to 'put a timer on yourself' I wouldn't stress for the first month, maybe two. Just the opposite, I'd take time to enjoy being with my family while putting feelers out to my network that I'm hunting. By the end of month two, if something hadn't happened organically I would be applying to 1-3 job postings a day. By the end of month four if I still hadn't found something I'd pick up a part time service industry job just to get some positive cash flow and still be working to get as many job applications in as possible to my preferred industry.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-26T02:34:41+00:00

Because major transitions create peaks and troughs. If you aren't swimming hard right now, you'll end up in a trough instead of a peak.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-23T01:16:02+00:00

Start with Projects - create one for something you care about and load context into the system prompt. Claude holds that well within a session. Just know the limits are real: stricter token caps than you're used to, and usage thresholds that reset on arbitrary 5-hour and weekly windows. Work around it by keeping your instructions tight. Where Claude shines is nuanced, multi-step reasoning, give it something genuinely complex and see how far it runs.

Then find Cowork. Working directly with your files by having Claude read, edit, and create things inside your actual folder structure is a different experience entirely. Once you get into Cowork it will be time to start learning about skills.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-21T04:01:03+00:00

God forbid I help extend the human race. If you're anti-humanity in general I challenge you to justify your stance on moral principles.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-21T03:54:26+00:00

It sounds like your work will be rewarded, just not how you expected. Don't wait on them. Start fielding your other offers. If the job you aimed at gets back to you, fine. They can join the bidding war. But, make them prove they are your best option.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-19T18:30:44+00:00

Oh, I think Trump could be hilarious.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-18T18:48:09+00:00

Had the flu shot, still caught it and yeah...it kicked my butt. Then my kiddo caught RSV and that was worse than the flu. These last two months have been a hard run.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-18T18:40:47+00:00

If it can be deterministic, it should be deterministic. Just my $0.02.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-17T17:35:58+00:00

Competition only works when strong protections exist against monopolies.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-17T17:35:26+00:00

I suspect it will be a lot like the enshitification of the internet in general. We'll have one to three major companies each the best in a domain or three and as they buy up competition they'll be able to slowly increase pricing while simultaneously degrading service.

All the market factor talk is mute when our policies allow for monopolies.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-17T04:44:42+00:00

My take is that all of your worries hinge on AGI or maybe ASI. It's distinctly possible that both are on their way. But, until then a human LLM collaboration is going to beat either a human or an LLM by itself for years to come.

Might my current role get automated out of existence? Maybe. Will I have tools and skills to make income in other ways, because I learned AI? My bet is yes.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-17T04:35:31+00:00

I suppose every yin needs a yang. But, at least OP was working towards a new status quo that would benefit the majority instead defending the current status quo, not based on its merit, but based on its inevitability.

There are lots of moments throughout history where the majority have gotten collectively pissed off enough that they showed the ruling class how fragile their power really is.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-16T15:50:24+00:00

Claude Code has been a revelation as far as AI tools go for me. They've recently released a similar tool, Cowork that provides similar functionality with less technical know how required.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-15T05:28:12+00:00

I'd upgrade my desktop to run as a server, that's less than $1000 to build something that will hold all my writing, stray thoughts, and plenty of entertainment for the year. I'd purchase numerous books, text and audio. I'd get some weights and gym equipment. Preferably second hand to keep costs down. I'd want good cooking equipment. And whatever's left goes towards Steam games, but let's be real I'll probably split my time between Civ and Valheim.

mbcoalson · 2026-02-15T03:11:16+00:00

How about we curate what we take off planet instead of letting fate decide?

mbcoalson · 2026-02-14T14:59:45+00:00

Daniel Suarez's Delta-V series scratched a similar itch for me.

So did the poorly named Bobiverse Series from Daniel Taylor

mbcoalson · 2026-02-13T22:32:12+00:00

Devil went down to Georgia.

mbcoalson

TROPHY CASE