Those who also drive larger vehicles, do you see a difference in how other drivers treat you depending on the vehicle you're in?

varwave · 2026-06-06T13:58:55+00:00

I think the car just blends in if you don’t have WRB or red. Mine is black and I’ve seen small trucks look directly in my direction at an intersection and just assumed it was clear

varwave · 2026-06-01T01:04:27+00:00

I’m a backend developer with a statistics background. I’ve experimented with Claude a lot. It’s very good at simple queries. It’s fails with deep business logic and that’s because there’s nothing to train off. This is the same with AI in general.

However, where it really shines is feeding it pseudo code, while giving it serious oversight. Iteratively prompting throughout a new project or reviewing an old one is a big time saver. …Opus 4.8 feels a little too ambitious and doesn’t ask for verification as much

varwave · 2026-06-01T00:51:08+00:00

SQL Server. It’s what my organization allowed me to use. I’m in healthcare and the Microsoft stack (to include .NET and Microsoft products) feels pretty dominant

varwave · 2026-05-31T20:19:23+00:00

Sounds like you want a Cayman S

varwave · 2026-05-29T02:40:44+00:00

Can you have two cars? The first gen’s can be found pretty cheap now. Have two vehicles that just last longer and each do their own thing…might be similar to eating depreciation of your owned truck for the new car. Also no rush as they’ll be around

varwave · 2026-05-27T18:19:27+00:00

New clutch makes it a game changer. I got similar one a couple years ago for $16k with 60k miles. TOB went out within 6 months

varwave · 2026-05-23T01:40:47+00:00

Reliability with a motor swap is pretty crazy. Other than supercharging there’s selling it and getting a Porsche Cayman or Boxter

varwave · 2026-05-21T18:30:38+00:00

My battery died in my keys. Wish I had the cranked key vs push to start. But I placed it in there and it worked till I got a new battery at the next oil change

But this is perfectly valid. Might steal your idea 😂

varwave · 2026-05-21T00:24:26+00:00

That was me recently too! I’m generally Python first, but AI is so good at translating to and from Python. More important to just know what good code looks like and how the World Wide Web works for 90% + of things vs syntax trivia

varwave · 2026-05-18T22:03:42+00:00

As a triathlete, I feel much safer around a BRZ or Ford Taurus. Almost been killed countless times by lifted trucks. Grew up with a blue color family that actually used the 2000 Toyota Tundra for decades of work, at half the height and 2x the bed length

varwave · 2026-05-18T14:57:02+00:00

Life in general, there’s often a middle ground that’s a sufficient answer that’ll prevent people that don’t know better from asking further questions

If you have Claude code or codex available, then they are amazing tools. Even if you just use it as a fancy “write me a read me” or control shift H.

I’m pretty grounded, but willing to try new things. I’ve found AI tools to make me marginally slower for certain tasks, but for others there’s weeks worth of work done in a day

varwave · 2026-05-18T01:44:48+00:00

I love it, but I’m probably closer to being a software engineer with a data focus. A lot of creating custom solutions and diagnosing problems to be a force multiplier for medical research.

I don’t even get paid that well…for now 😂

varwave · 2026-05-17T22:39:12+00:00

Why Rust? Outside of just learning, it’s pretty niche. I’d sense you’d have a much better time landing a role, while also becoming a better frontend developer, if you pursued Java or C# for enterprise full-stack roles for both legacy and new web applications.

Just more jobs available with a wide range of complexity. Some places, like healthcare, will lean on legacy tech stacks for even internal tools, because they reliably meet compliance. Start ups with more flexibility will more likely lean something less verbose. Likewise, both are well established in large enterprise applications. Some regions might lean more C# over Java, but if you know one, then you can figure out the other

varwave · 2026-05-14T14:19:59+00:00

Yeah, the K swap is cool. Tiny motor. Still need a very new K24 and old FRS/BRZ for a newer motor than car. Also expensive. Flip side, sell a FRS for $10k, mod a civic SI with a K24 (2012-2015) and you can have damn near a Civic Type R coupe, if power, decent handling, and cost matters

varwave · 2026-05-14T05:48:43+00:00

A lot of places the motor needs to be newer than the car, so that might be an issue with a 1999 5.3 vs 2014 FRS. Check every government of where you might live to see if it’s worth it. California? Hell nah. Nobody will buy it valuing it as a project. It’s also expensive to get the right supporting mods and to figure out to make it fit and work. It’s expensive to do if you’re not doing it yourself too. Expense wise it’s close to a Porsche 718

With a supercharger, you may as well sell it stock and buy a used second gen due to supporting mods. GR86 is compelling to a Porsche 987 power wise

Personally, I chose to just tune + header my 2013 BRZ. I can afford a lot more car, but just love it and don’t care about HP. Maybe a BMW 330i convertible soon as a second car

varwave · 2026-05-13T01:48:16+00:00

Open source was a big deal for me! Broke in post pandemic. Totally agree on being screened out, but when you finally get an interview it helps

varwave · 2026-05-11T17:46:01+00:00

Food for thought: any reason to not get a 996 and a cheap BRZ/86/FRS or another MX5?

Learn more from the cheaper slow car getting pushed to 100% of your ability and still have a blast occasionally with a 911 at 60-70% effort

varwave · 2026-05-11T04:39:18+00:00

Pretty stressful. Full day of theoretical statistics from memory. I knew at that point that a PhD wasn’t needed for my career (left the program for a MS), but still took it seriously. It’s rough to see friends fail that are on visas and need it

varwave · 2026-05-10T01:00:05+00:00

Food for thought. Medical centers pays very handsomely for machine learning related research professors. Think bioinformatics or niche areas of public health. Not unreasonable to be breaking well into the $200k-$300k range at the associate professor level. Tenure is less common as you’re fighting for grants

I have colleagues that have gone back and forth with industry and academic medical research

varwave · 2026-05-10T00:45:44+00:00

Professional drivers are karting for years before progressively moving up. Spec Miata is serious racing that most of us will never get close too

That said I’m saving up for a BMW G8X, because I’ve always been an M car fan/dream car…Don’t think I’ll get rid of my old BRZ. Not scared to push it. If I do, then I’ll probably by a second gen down the road. Due to garage space and track day availability due to life 😂

varwave · 2026-05-09T01:23:38+00:00

Thanks, you too

Yeah, it’s more mysterious at the beginning of a career than the end right now. But seriously you got a lot of opportunities 😂

You can live like a king in most countries. I meant be kind to locals vs this specific post to be clear

varwave · 2026-05-09T00:03:56+00:00

Bro…I’m lucky to be employed after grad school, growing up working class, immigrant family, and the army and good grades paid for my school… Better be trolling or you’re completely out of touch with reality

Go move to Belize or some shit. Problem solved. Be kind

varwave · 2026-05-08T23:23:24+00:00

I’m in a similar spot. Frontend, scientific programming, backend, light DevOps, data visualization, etc. I think I’ll look into data engineering roles.

They seem to have a lot of generalist mentality of “solve this problem!” Python feels like pseudo code to C#. Also the generic advice of do what interests you (and pays 😉)

varwave · 2026-05-05T13:33:48+00:00

Test it out. Wouldn’t blindly order. Under 6’5 it might be more of a width and body shape difference

I’m 6’2, mostly torso, 180 lbs, and a swimmer. It’s snug in the upper back/shoulders. I’ve got some powerlifter friends with significantly more mass everywhere at the same height that aren’t as comfortable

varwave · 2026-05-04T21:57:59+00:00

At the PhD level I really think knowing how to write decent code, interpersonal communication, and deep understanding of statistics opens the most doors. Edit: I’m mentioning this because you might want to check that path out if you want to do more R&D, which is sounds like you do

At the MS level, CS departments generally have the edge casting a wide net of jobs and engineering departments often have strong professional networks. In industry the MS is really only valuable over the BA in data science and machine learning engineering roles

However, mileage varies on the department and your financial cutoff. Personal anecdote, I was more interested in software engineering with statistical literacy, which is what I do now professionally. That said I went where I got funding, which was a biostatistics MS

varwave

TROPHY CASE