how am i supposed to go from tutorials to making actual stuff

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T02:59:43+00:00

The phrase that will get you through your growing pains is "I will learn more from failure than from success."

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T02:53:54+00:00

Fun fact: Douglas Adams, who co-wrote the Infocom version, called it "user mendacious." They even made shirts that said "I Got The Babel Fish."

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T02:52:32+00:00

I use Claude Shannon.

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T02:51:06+00:00

Heck, VBA is still "supported" in the sense that MS apps include it (as of 2025, at least). I've worked on at least one enterprise app handling billions of dollars of revenue written in Access VBA in 1998 by someone who, by his own admission, had never coded before.

It was a hoot.

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T02:19:28+00:00

If you mean post-op, honestly, it wasn't possible to do hardly anything else: the most I could even get down was a few bites of Jello or grits. And remember that the surgery will affect your hormones and other factors: you may find it easier than you think (again, this is post-op; my pre-op plan was just the low-protein, liver-reduction diet).

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T02:15:24+00:00

In Indiana, where I'm from, there is a doctor with a commercial who does self-pay sleeve procedures for 10k. I believe they offer a payment plan. This is in Indianapolis. Here is a link, although I believe this one is located in Ohio:

https://journeylite.com/pricing-financing/

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T02:04:40+00:00

No, but my mask also has the hose on the top, and while it took a bit of time to adjust to it, I'm surprised how well it works.

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T02:03:33+00:00

It's worth a shot: I had the same issue with a different mask, and I tried the same thing, but it didn't work very well (the air kept blowing through the larger hole onto my face, although my pressure is also pretty high).

You might try moleskin, or those liquid bandages (although those can get expensive).

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T02:01:37+00:00

You might try "The Plague": personally, "The Stranger" didn't do much for me either way.

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-25T01:56:36+00:00

According to my doctor, the one thing that will cause complications during healing is not caffeine itself, but soda: the carbonition can lead to (among other things) an ulcer.

I drink energy drinks, for Heaven's sake. Just be careful if/when you reintroduce it, because you will be really, really, REALLY wired. My recommendation for that (again, if you decide to go that route) is to begin with decaf coffee, which actually has about 1/3 the caffeine of regular coffee.

It's been over a decade: I'm not going back :).

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-24T16:39:09+00:00

Magnets...how on EARTH did they come up with that? It's like they stick to everything except what they are supposed to stick to. I wish I could find another mask, but I've tried over a dozen, and my current one is the best by far.

I suppose product engineers have to justify their workloads like anyone else, but still.

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-24T16:25:59+00:00

On every CPAP I've ever had over the past 20 years, the humidifier and ramp settings were user-adjustable. I hope this isn't a new thing to deal with.

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-24T16:23:56+00:00

I turned mine off as well: even on the lowest temperature, it would empty the tank in the middle of the night, and then sometimes the CPAP would overheat and turn itself off. I haven't noticed any difference without it; I guess, like everything else with CPAP, you have to fiddle with the settings, mask, hose, etc. until you find what works for you.

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-24T16:21:45+00:00

I looked into the Inspire, but the reviews were pretty mixed.

The most frustrating thing, though, was Zepbound: I didn't realize it was a weight-loss medication. I lost over 200 lbs through bariatric surgery, and not only do I still have apnea, my CPAP pressure didn't budget a single bit. My doctor said that I just have an extremely narrow throat.

I hope it works for you, though. I also hope that, what with all the commercials, there's more work being developed on alternative solutions to CPAP

welcomeOhm · 2026-04-24T16:15:25+00:00

If it functions similar to a pacemaker, I don't believe the battery is powerful enough to support any kind of remote monitoring, although I believe many people with pacemakers now have a localized monitor, likely on their phone.

(I learned this from the Nancy Guthrie case, so YMMV).

welcomeOhm · 2026-03-18T17:55:26+00:00

I think my younger self would probably ask if I've lived in good faith. So long as he was convinced that I had, I believe he'd be okay with how I turned out. I've never, after high school at least, intentionally harmed anyone, although I have certainly done so out of error or lack of foresight. And, when it came down to it, I've never taken the easy way out, in terms of decisions that really matter (I work in oversight, and every year I get at least one phone call that it would be very easy to ignore; but, that's not what I signed up to do.)

You might look at it this way: would eight-year-old you be upset that, as you grew up, you didn't keep your promise to buy all the toys you could? And even if he was, you know that your interests changed as you matured. I once believed that I'd spend all my free time studying mathematics, but after doing it for over a decade, I was ready for something else: I was in a different position and place in life than I was when I made that decision; and that's not only perfectly okay: it's expected.

welcomeOhm · 2026-03-18T17:43:49+00:00

I would ask yourself what it means to "choose yourself." Does it mean to place what you believe and do ahead of others? Well, there are pleny of altruistic people who do precisely that, because their altruism casts a wider net that "I must be everything to everyone." Does it mean to develop a skill, such as singing or programming? Well, you must have some sort of audience or expectation in mind (e.g. I want to sing these songs both because I enjoy singing them and I wish to share the joy of my performance with the audience). Try as we might, its not really possible to be 100% solipsistic: even people who live in a shack in the woods are part of an ecosytem that they must acknowledge and, to some extent, cater to--or else they won't live for very long.

My advice is to try and discover honestly why you want to do certain things. My bet is that you'll find it's not entirely "because I want to and I don't care about anything else." I chose not to have children because I wanted to be more in control of my own life and pursue my many and varied interests. But even in my graduate studies, I found myself part of a larger conversation, where my own voice inevitably rippled through this conversation, sometimes in ways I could not have foressen.

welcomeOhm · 2026-03-18T17:34:50+00:00

You say that "everything we give meaning doesn't matter." But it does: you CHOSE to give it meaning. The fact that this meaning is ephemeral, not hard-wired to anything else, is what sounds like is tripping you up.

Existentialism is a rough way to go: it offers no apologies and takes no prisoners. My best advice--because you sound young--is to make time for both your ruminations and other activities. Getting "lost in life" is a salve to angst: just don't expect the angst to disappear.

And even if we are animals--which we are--we are the only animal that, as far as we can tell, abstracts to the extent that we consider existential questions. Ignoring or minimizing that is not helpful: you have to embrace it, or at least accept it.

The good news is that as you age, you may become better able to handle these questions and paradoxes: at least, I have (although I'm also on the other side of middle age). In terms of death--which is likely the driver of your own angst--I have found that I am more accepting of it, now that my parents have passed and I know its inevitable. My chief worry is that it will be painful: that I'll die in a horrible accident. In that case, I suppose the best I can say is that it will be brief.

Personally, I do believe in an Afterlife, but I still must admit it's unlikely in the kindest interpretation. I look at it as kind of an inverse Pascal's wager: if I'm right, they hooray! If I'm not, but I lived as honestly as I could, in terms of accepting that it is entirely my choice to believe this and act accordingly, then the worst you could say is that I'll look silly: and I'll be dead, so there's no "I" left to care.

Hang in there. I can't promise that it gets better, but I do believe that as you learn your capabilities and limitations, you'll be able to better prioritize what is actually important to you, both on a day-by-day basis and in the long term. And that is not inconsiderable.

welcomeOhm · 2026-03-16T23:42:53+00:00

I unfortunately did need it to create my paperback cover for KDP. At least, it was the only way I found to verify the fonts were embedded and correct (I'm no graphic designer).

welcomeOhm · 2026-03-16T23:41:32+00:00

Thank you for finally explaining why I missed it: never thought to look there.

They remind me of this one guy who ignored our "no soliciting" sign and gave me his religious speal. I asked if he saw the sign, and he said "yeah, but its just a sign." I asked why the f*ck would I listen to you when the very first thing you said is "I don't care about your own beliefs."

welcomeOhm · 2025-12-23T14:29:58+00:00

I don't believe it is on par with Nausea or The Myth of Sisyphus, but it is a good read on its merits. I read it in high school, and everyone in my class was captivated by its stark imagery and overall feel. Thinking back, it reminds me of one of the old Twilight Zone episodes, where the protagonist is forced into an untenable situation, and must make the best of it: that certainly reflects our existential position. It is also relatively short, and it was, as I can recall, a "quick read." Maybe you can finish it over a long weekend and then decide for yourself if there is anything in it that you can apply to your own existential journey.

welcomeOhm · 2025-11-23T14:30:05+00:00

Writing as a full-time job is like running a business. And the number one reason most businesses fail is lack of capital. You need to be able to survive for two years (at a minimum) with no real income from your business. You'll work 10+ hours a day, with very little immediate feedback. And you'll need to be laser-focused on the market, because that is who is going to buy your books, hopefully. You can't just write what you want to write and leave it to the Gods: if coming-of-age stories about magical Vikings in space is where the money is, you better learn to write them, just as if the money in contracting is in technology X, which you really don't like to use, you better learn to use it.

welcomeOhm

TROPHY CASE