5 ms·

Somebody(geek) please reassure me that these 'changes in behavior' are not paramount to becoming a parent because this premise seemed pretty implicit throughout

by mlLK 17y ago

Somebody(geek) please reassure me that these 'changes in behavior' are not paramount to becoming a parent because this premise seemed pretty implicit throughout most items in this list. It's hard enough for me to grow up as is; it's especially harder if you still love being immature (yet playful) towards your peers and are older than twenty-two. EDIT: I've been fired from a marketing firm for forgetting to remove my test word 'Poopy' from a Fortune500 company's web-site (running on WebLogic, yikes). No one knew the word was there for like a week since 'Poopy' was not an actual product it only showed up in their glossary. A week later I told my boss after releasing the next update and removing the test word: she flipped out, told the client, and fired me that following Monday because word got around their (the client's) IT department resulting in someone digging up a cached copy of their web-site's glossary and passing it on to someone higher up the corporate ladder. I'm an idiot for using such a vulgar test word but I had no business working there (in a marketing firm), let alone no business editing 14,000-20,000 lines of XML. (seriously, there were about 3-4 XML files that long) In retrospect though, I'm glad it happened because now (then) I finally had a reason to learn Mercurial (or why version-control is important and how branching could have saved my ass) :P

blantonl 17y ago
(wow)
axod 17y ago
Opposite - having kids IMHO keeps you young, and in touch with your playful side. One of the reasons I had kids early was to do that. I didn't want to be one of those old parents who has already "grown up" and lost all touch with fun.
- traveler 17y ago
  > having kids IMHO keeps you young Let me guess, you think having a mortgage keeps you thinking independently and on your toes, too? It's amazing the conclusions people will arrive at to rationalize their fucked up thinking.
  - axod 17y ago
    I'm not seeing the parallel there. Having a mortgage is pretty much the most efficient way to save money for the future. But I've no idea why that's related to having kids. And what's fucked up about having kids young in life? It makes a ton of sense when you think about it.
    - gdee 17y ago
      You forgot an (IMHO|IMNSHO) or two in there I think.
    - Retric 17y ago
      The problem with a mortgage is it tends to increase consumption. Most people are fine renting a fairly small apartment relative to their needs, but as soon as they are buying a place they start thinking about having an extra rooms just in case etc.
      - axod 17y ago
        I don't think that's the case. Mortgage is just borrowing against your future worth. If some people over estimate that then it's their own problem. The problem is usually silly people borrowing far more than they can afford, and lenders trying to push people into borrowing more than they can afford. But that's not a problem with mortgages per se. Renting is ok if you like throwing money away, or need to move often.
        Retric 17y ago
        It's not just a question of needing to move often as much as benefiting from being able to move often. I walk to work and save a lot of time and money by doing so. But, I was willing to take a job with an hour+ commute because I knew I could quickly move there. PS: The cost of renting tends to balance with the costs of buying a home (including transaction and maintenance costs etc) such that it's rare for one to win out over the other in a healthy housing market. I do spend a lot of money living in this area, but I also invest a lot more money than I could if I was trying to buy in the area even with a long commute. Even with the huge drop in housing costs buying in this area is extremely expensive in large part due to the number of people renting their houses / condo's.
- nfnaaron 17y ago
  "having kids IMHO keeps you young, and in touch with your playful side." Agreed, and since I had my kid later, I'm still goofy and playful. I think if he was years gone I'd be guarding my lawn with razor wire and proximity sensors.j Children give you the chance to appreciate childhood.
- mlLK 17y ago
  I think 'old parents' losing all touch with fun is an unfair stereotype, but I think I understand where you're coming from by narrowing the generational/cultural divide between you and your son or daughter you're minimizing the difference in how you communicate and think.
  - axod 17y ago
    Right. I think it's certainly possible to keep that fun/childish side going, and stay in touch with culture etc without having kids around, but it's much harder. I see what you're saying... I didn't mean that old parent wouldn't be fun, but it's likely to be a different type of fun. One that may be alien to kids. We have several stages of our lives and I thing overlapping with your kids makes it so you can enjoy more of the same things together.
- theBobMcCormick 17y ago
  I think it has for me. At least, it's given me an excuse to keep in touch with my inner child. My sons and I play with lego's together. Watch cartoons and kids shows (I love What's New Scooby Doo), etc. Of course, I'm not sure what's gonna happen with all that as they get older. :-( Maybe I'll really become an old man then.
pvg 17y ago
Sad as it may seem, 'Poopy' is simply not a character combination that should cross your keyboard when working for a client of any size. The clients that can accept random 'Poopy' showing up in their product are few and far in between.
thibaut_barrere 17y ago
> Somebody(geek) please reassure me that these 'changes in behavior' are not paramount to becoming a parent because this premise seemed pretty implicit throughout most items in this list. I'll try to do that! In my experience, having a kid 2 years ago has been the most motivating event in term of self-accomplishment, bootstrapping projects, and moving toward a (much) better quality of life. Of course education is a hard topic some days, but most of the time I just feel very lucky to be living this. And no - I'm not rationalising my mortgage: living (currently) in Paris, we've been very careful to keep a rent instead of mortgage, and to live with just enough surface and in a quite cheap area of the city (this could apply with a mortgage as well). This has allowed us to save a lot, and we're now moving to the country-side, able to buy a house without any mortgage, working remotely and bootstrapping projects in a cheap area of France. So I'd say each one can find its own way. It can be (really) uncomfortable, but apart from cultural pressure, nothing can force you to choose a given path, in my opinion.
BigZaphod 17y ago
I really don't think this particular blog post has anything at all to do with being a parent. That said, being a parent forces you to grow up - but not in the ways you may expect. You can still have fun, be playful, pull pranks, etc. That stuff doesn't have to change if that's who you are. The biggest change, I think, is learning to handle unpleasant events that you cannot control and do not have a choice to ignore. When the baby fills his diaper, you have to change it even if it smells especially bad. When he throws a tantrum, you have to deal with it. When he hurts himself, you have to help him. When he makes mistakes, you have to teach him. The list goes on and on. Many of those things are hard in some way (often due to timing, the interruption, the stress of no sleep, etc) - BUT YOU STILL HAVE TO TAKE CARE OF THEM. Prior to having a child, most people simply avoid or find ways to reduce their involvement in things that might be unpleasant, difficult, undesirable, disruptive, etc. You have no choice when you become a parent but to deal with those situations and you will become better for it.
pudo 17y ago
I like "Poopy". A while back I wrote a mass mailing app for a fund management company. They were sending out frequent updates to the ~12000 investors of their funds which had to be very HTMLy and professional. Well, it turns out that leaving setSignature("sausage") in your code can really get you into some trouble. Especially when you consider that European companies are legally bound to include certain company information in their signatures. OTOH it turned out that this was the mailing that received the most replies ever, most of them pretty cheerful.

by mlLK 17y ago

blantonl 17y ago

(wow)

axod 17y ago

Opposite - having kids IMHO keeps you young, and in touch with your playful side. One of the reasons I had kids early was to do that. I didn't want to be one of those old parents who has already "grown up" and lost all touch with fun.

traveler 17y ago
> having kids IMHO keeps you young Let me guess, you think having a mortgage keeps you thinking independently and on your toes, too? It's amazing the conclusions people will arrive at to rationalize their fucked up thinking.
- axod 17y ago
  I'm not seeing the parallel there. Having a mortgage is pretty much the most efficient way to save money for the future. But I've no idea why that's related to having kids. And what's fucked up about having kids young in life? It makes a ton of sense when you think about it.
  - gdee 17y ago
    You forgot an (IMHO|IMNSHO) or two in there I think.
  - Retric 17y ago
    The problem with a mortgage is it tends to increase consumption. Most people are fine renting a fairly small apartment relative to their needs, but as soon as they are buying a place they start thinking about having an extra rooms just in case etc.
    - axod 17y ago
      I don't think that's the case. Mortgage is just borrowing against your future worth. If some people over estimate that then it's their own problem. The problem is usually silly people borrowing far more than they can afford, and lenders trying to push people into borrowing more than they can afford. But that's not a problem with mortgages per se. Renting is ok if you like throwing money away, or need to move often.
      - Retric 17y ago
        It's not just a question of needing to move often as much as benefiting from being able to move often. I walk to work and save a lot of time and money by doing so. But, I was willing to take a job with an hour+ commute because I knew I could quickly move there. PS: The cost of renting tends to balance with the costs of buying a home (including transaction and maintenance costs etc) such that it's rare for one to win out over the other in a healthy housing market. I do spend a lot of money living in this area, but I also invest a lot more money than I could if I was trying to buy in the area even with a long commute. Even with the huge drop in housing costs buying in this area is extremely expensive in large part due to the number of people renting their houses / condo's.
nfnaaron 17y ago
"having kids IMHO keeps you young, and in touch with your playful side." Agreed, and since I had my kid later, I'm still goofy and playful. I think if he was years gone I'd be guarding my lawn with razor wire and proximity sensors.j Children give you the chance to appreciate childhood.
mlLK 17y ago
I think 'old parents' losing all touch with fun is an unfair stereotype, but I think I understand where you're coming from by narrowing the generational/cultural divide between you and your son or daughter you're minimizing the difference in how you communicate and think.
- axod 17y ago
  Right. I think it's certainly possible to keep that fun/childish side going, and stay in touch with culture etc without having kids around, but it's much harder. I see what you're saying... I didn't mean that old parent wouldn't be fun, but it's likely to be a different type of fun. One that may be alien to kids. We have several stages of our lives and I thing overlapping with your kids makes it so you can enjoy more of the same things together.
theBobMcCormick 17y ago
I think it has for me. At least, it's given me an excuse to keep in touch with my inner child. My sons and I play with lego's together. Watch cartoons and kids shows (I love What's New Scooby Doo), etc. Of course, I'm not sure what's gonna happen with all that as they get older. :-( Maybe I'll really become an old man then.

pvg 17y ago

Sad as it may seem, 'Poopy' is simply not a character combination that should cross your keyboard when working for a client of any size. The clients that can accept random 'Poopy' showing up in their product are few and far in between.

thibaut_barrere 17y ago

> Somebody(geek) please reassure me that these 'changes in behavior' are not paramount to becoming a parent because this premise seemed pretty implicit throughout most items in this list. I'll try to do that! In my experience, having a kid 2 years ago has been the most motivating event in term of self-accomplishment, bootstrapping projects, and moving toward a (much) better quality of life. Of course education is a hard topic some days, but most of the time I just feel very lucky to be living this. And no - I'm not rationalising my mortgage: living (currently) in Paris, we've been very careful to keep a rent instead of mortgage, and to live with just enough surface and in a quite cheap area of the city (this could apply with a mortgage as well). This has allowed us to save a lot, and we're now moving to the country-side, able to buy a house without any mortgage, working remotely and bootstrapping projects in a cheap area of France. So I'd say each one can find its own way. It can be (really) uncomfortable, but apart from cultural pressure, nothing can force you to choose a given path, in my opinion.

BigZaphod 17y ago

I really don't think this particular blog post has anything at all to do with being a parent. That said, being a parent forces you to grow up - but not in the ways you may expect. You can still have fun, be playful, pull pranks, etc. That stuff doesn't have to change if that's who you are. The biggest change, I think, is learning to handle unpleasant events that you cannot control and do not have a choice to ignore. When the baby fills his diaper, you have to change it even if it smells especially bad. When he throws a tantrum, you have to deal with it. When he hurts himself, you have to help him. When he makes mistakes, you have to teach him. The list goes on and on. Many of those things are hard in some way (often due to timing, the interruption, the stress of no sleep, etc) - BUT YOU STILL HAVE TO TAKE CARE OF THEM. Prior to having a child, most people simply avoid or find ways to reduce their involvement in things that might be unpleasant, difficult, undesirable, disruptive, etc. You have no choice when you become a parent but to deal with those situations and you will become better for it.

pudo 17y ago

I like "Poopy". A while back I wrote a mass mailing app for a fund management company. They were sending out frequent updates to the ~12000 investors of their funds which had to be very HTMLy and professional. Well, it turns out that leaving setSignature("sausage") in your code can really get you into some trouble. Especially when you consider that European companies are legally bound to include certain company information in their signatures. OTOH it turned out that this was the mailing that received the most replies ever, most of them pretty cheerful.