31 ms·

Quit Your Job

• shudza 5y ago
  This reminds me of my 20yo self watching Fight Club for the first time. If you dont get the movie, you wont get this post, so dont bother arguing in the comments. Even still, the post kinda goes to far on some points, and uses a bit hard language for non native speakers (myself included).
• humbleMouse 5y ago
  This is a very long article, and nowhere in it do I see how this guy supported himself after quitting his engineering job. He talks about a few vague references to situations that may be freelance paid gigs, but no specifics.
  • quickthrower2 5y ago
    I assume mates couch + saved some money from engineering jobs
    • deleted 5y ago
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• mmcgaha 5y ago
  Growing up poor white trash gives me a completely different perspective and makes me crass enough to say go fuck yourself you entitled prick.
  • sho 5y ago
    • dang 5y ago
      Please do not cross into personal attack. We don't want this kind of thing here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
      • sho 5y ago
        Dang, look at the context. I was simply repeating his self-assessment back at him, and trying to flip it with a positive message that one's circumstances of birth do not define one's potential - unless you let it (mental prison). I feel like you've taken the exact opposite reading from what was intended. That said, when people don't understand what you're trying to say, the fault lies with you. I'll try to rethink how i can phrase this kind of thing. I was trying to challenge in a positive way but it obviously didn't come across like that.
        • dang 5y ago
          Putting a provocative spin ("you're trapped in a mental prison and proud of it") on someone's personal description and throwing it back at them is not likely to end well. When you add patronizing putdowns ("calm your jets") and outright slurs ("my poor white trash friend"—yes I know the GP used the slur, but it's very different when you use it), you're way into the territory of personal attack. That's no way to send a positive message. I'm sure you had a positive intention, but intent doesn't communicate itself on the internet. The burden is on the commenter to disambiguate: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=disambiguate%20burden%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
    • leecommamichael 5y ago
      > So you're trapped in a mental prison and proud of it? Starting your reply this way is not effective if your goal is changing minds. But it isn't, is it?
      • sho 5y ago
        It is actually. And mental prisons are real, I was trapped in one for many years. I'll stipulate that i have to tweak the way I say things as it's not coming across the right way.
  • dang 5y ago
    Could you please make your substantive points without fulminating or calling names? Perhaps you don't feel you owe entitled pricks better, but you owe this community better if you're participating in it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    • mmcgaha 5y ago
      Indeed you are correct that I should not have made that post. It drags down the discussion and I would not be interested in reading a site filled with posts like that. I will keep it in check the next time I feel that snappy.
• pcj-github 5y ago
  You quit your job and started a blog. Wow. And then you wrote an article on your blog in a hypomanic state describing how you quit your job and started a blog. Amazing.
• oofnik 5y ago
  To everyone complaining that this article is elitist, or written from a privileged perspective, that's beside the author's point. He even addresses this critique succinctly: > This is a key part of what it means to be a responsible elite. You use your privilege and your personal judgment to explore and solve problems that no one else can. It's clear that this essay is not aimed at the everyman who finds meaning in the routine of life. A small number of individuals will read this and find inspiration in its perspective and ambition, even if they might be slightly off-put by its delusional tone. Often an unshakeable belief in one's own ability to succeed against all odds is enough to push one to go try to build something radically new. Personally I've never experienced that sort of absolute certainty, but I have definitely seen it in action. My most original and insightful ideas came to me invariably during periods when I was unemployed, spending my time reading and wondering about the nature of the universe. I've never had the courage to pursue them. I'm glad some people do, though.
• stakkur 5y ago
  Ah yes, the young, childless, mortgageless life of 'quit your job and find yourself'. I appreciate a lot of the ideas the author has, but in these stories there's rarely acknowledgement of the elephant in the room--it's a story mainly for the young and unencumbered, which is a small minority of people.
• biwwy 5y ago
• tsukikage 5y ago
  I'm sure that's all awesome if you can afford to live without income, but what about everyone else?
  • blindmute 5y ago
    Does every article have to be relevant to literally every possible reader?
  • spaetzleesser 5y ago
    That's what I was thinking. Obviously I don't know the situation of this guy but from my experience a lot of people who preach this stuff (or minimalism) either have already made a lot of money or have parents who can support them when things don't work out. It's much harder to jump into the unknown if you know nobody will catch you.
    • gremlinsinc 5y ago
      I've mostly done this....I get bread/butter from freelance, I have ADHD which gives me some major motivation issues already but depression/anxiety/uncertainty and maybe just burnout have led me to go very slow w/ work. I have one client who I absolutely love cause she's not pushy, she's a developer too, and I'm only a cog in their freelance outsourcing - a good one cause she seems to appreciate my work, but I'm not the only resource so basically I can work as much/little, and in 2021 it's been a rough year financially... I've had a lot of time to basically think about what I want to do.... I've come to the conclusion I want to build OS software for co-ops and repurpose as open core for non-co-ops. Think ERP systems that manage point pools for customers, affiliates, workers, etc that can be traded for voting power, and dividends from profits from a network of syndicated worker-owned co-ops.... Example: You work at a WO-pharmacy, and shop at WO-grocery store... you earn x points per hour worked, and x points per dollar spent (upto 10k/annual to prevent whales), perhaps there's a crypto token aspect too that maybe pays out some living dividend too... after you meet a yearly minimum say 500 hours worked, volunteered, or spent you are a 'member' and get full benefits (think like costco) which might include health insurance (eventual goal), equal share of revenue/gains that aren't earmarked for further growth and salaries--equal by point I mean, so each point is 1 share, and if there's 30k in there, and 30k shares and you own 1k shares you get 1k...but points could be syndicated meaning shared across related orgs through partnerships, or single to that co-op, etc... it depends on what they want to do, people still have autonomy. Essentially it's like more centralized DAO's that are networked and have more rules in place to ensure just ownership of more tokens (cash) doesn't give undue power. Co-ops can set hierarchy choices like do managers/execs maybe get more points/weights based on tenure, level, or is it all equal across the board? The ERP should have an easy product/inventory listing/tracking thing with federated marketplace... think shopify but products can be imported from other shopify customers into your store, and it feels a bit more like Amazon or Ebay, and you as the store owner might get an affiliate commission.... eventually we can build an fBA like solution so marketplace members can also charge really cheap shipping...to actually compete w/ amazon... Mom and pops, restaurants, uber-drivers will all have tie-ins to the syndicates so basically small companies and co-ops all can thrive, and big corps can use some of our tools too (but they'll have to pay a premium)... monetization model will mostly be some sort of processing type fee to make nickles and dimes per transaction to pay our devs to continue expanding and things, or perhaps we get shares or something.... I also want to build an intentional community/eco-village with a glamping camp (that is managed/shared by the residents), with earthbag/container homes that are buried... part of me really wants to make this like a big medevil fortress or keep, and go all prepper/doomsday with plenty of rain catching devices, vertical farming, and solar panels.... but I'm not Elon Musk or a 6 figure earner. Currently I'm working more on a SaaS starter for laravel, as a footbridge to everything else. Basically taking laravel jetstream, adding multi-tenancy (beyond teams but like orgs, which can have multiple teams, and members can belong to multiple orgs, with multiple polymorphic profiles (Employee, Vendor, Consumer, as general pre-configured types and unlimited scaling on types depending on model)... Also plenty of easy components and a drag/drop tool to help combine layouts that can automatically make views in laravel so basically it's very low-code, and for us backend guys it's a lot easier to launch side projects if we don't need to worry about ui... I got off on an ADHD tangent here, but my point is... sometimes its better to sacrifice and find something worth growing that can maybe be a side project or something -- if you can get to ramen mrr especially, than it is to work for someone else, and the more people who leave corporate America the higher wages will be for everyone because that drives up demand and lowers supply, so it's a win/win for my ideologies.
• jalino23 5y ago
  I wish I could, still paying student and car loans and rent and utilities bills, insurance, food
• Traster 5y ago
  I'm conflicted by this article. I'm sympathetic to it, but some things just really push past my BS meter. For example: >This is related to why man became stunted with the dawn of agriculture. We traded a life limited by the occasional violent struggle over bountiful surplus for a more predictable life limited by grinding labor after barely sufficient nutrition. Firstly, "man" or humanity did all of their greatest work after the dawn of agriculture. Before agriculture, life wasn't bountiful. It was short and harsh. It's easy to see something good and say "well we became complacent" - well, sure, we became complacent because life got better. There's a certain type of public intellectual in our society who says things that sort of intuitively feel like they should be right, but if you actually stop and think about the explanations, you soon realise they're talking rubbish. I don't even think the conclusion is necessarily wrong, I just think the parallel it is drawing is really bad.
  • slothtrop 5y ago
    I often see anarchists romanticizing primitive society with revisionist ideas about conflict and quality of life.
    • chana_masala 5y ago
      I've seen that too and agree. However to add some nuance as a somewhat anprim, the appeal to me is the raw simplicity of things and direct connection to so much of life. An analogy might be someone who is excited by writing assembly.
      • slothtrop 5y ago
        Speaking for myself, I've dreamed of simple labor when work gets frustrating, but I quickly tire and get bored of it when I do have it. In a state of "flow" however, there's no want for farm fantasies. The ideal for myself is a hobbyist means to work with my hands and turn my mind off - such as cooking, gardening. I think for people like myself, the back-to-nature pursuits are reactionary ideas to stress or bullshit jobs. The appeal is emotional. In truth I have no interest in subsistence lifestyle.
  • deleted 5y ago
• walrus01 5y ago
  In 2022 who still uses the term "courting"? I feel like it's a term used by somebody from the Edwardian era who needs a refill on their moustache wax.
  • rl3 5y ago
    >In 2022 who still uses the term "courting"? This guy, apparently: "When I wasn’t lifting and courting, I was building a network of intellectuals interested in problems of governance from beyond the established liberal democratic paradigm." What a sentence. >"I feel like it's a term used by somebody from the Edwardian era who needs a refill on their moustache wax." I knew someone like this. The running joke was that they were a purveyor of 19th century elixirs, tonics—things of that nature. Then they shaved, and the magic ended.
    • myownpetard 5y ago
      Reminds me of my favorite Key and Peele sketch. "Perchance good sir, could you point me in the direction of the nearest apothecary?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nbq6Wfh9fi4&ab_channel=Key%26Peele https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nbq6Wfh9fi4&ab_channel=Key%2...
    • _moof 5y ago
      That sentence is truly, amazingly bad, and I very much doubt the image it evokes is the one the author had in mind when they wrote it.
    • one_off_comment 5y ago
      That's the exact sentence that made me give up on this... blog entry? Whatever this thing is?
    • Kluny 5y ago
      > interested in problems of governance from beyond the established liberal democratic paradigm So... communists? Hippies? Not that there's anything wrong with either, I just find that such people are really into work-trade and barter, but they always have cash for alcohol and cigarettes.
• ykevinator2 5y ago
  I thought this fairy tale died with Peter thiels quit college for $100k disaster.
  • FFRefresh 5y ago
    Out of curiosity, why do you call that program a 'disaster'?
  • barry-cotter 5y ago
    Some disaster > Although it is still unclear how many Thiel Fellows were actually successful, "Mr. Thiel says companies started by the fellows have raised $73 million, a record that he says has attracted additional applicants. He says fellows “learned far more than they would have in college.” Source: Wakabayashi, D. (June, 2015). College Dropouts Thrive in Tech. The Wall Street Journal@College Dropouts Thrive in Tech ;; > Notable recipients include the following people (year they were awarded the fellowship is indicated in parentheses):[20] > Laura Deming (2011) – founder and partner at Longevity Fund Paul Gu (2011) – co-founder and head of product at Upstart[21] James Proud (2011) – founder of Hello, which made Sense, a sleep tracking device[22][23] Dale J. Stephens (2011) – founder of Year On, formerly UnCollege, a gap year program with training in work skills and life skills[24] Dylan Field (2012) – co-founder and CEO of Figma[25] Taylor Wilson (2012) – the second youngest person to produce nuclear fusion[26] Ritesh Agarwal (2013) – founder & CEO of OYO Rooms Austin Russell (2013) – founder and CEO of Luminar Technologies and the world's youngest self-made billionaire as of 2021[27] Vitalik Buterin (2014) – co-creator of Ethereum[28] Simon Tian (2015) – creator of the Neptune Pine, a crowd-funded smartwatch Cathy Tie (2015) – founder of Ranomics and Partner at Cervin Ventures[29] Boyan Slat (2016) – founder and CEO of The Ocean Cleanup[30] Robert Habermeier (2018) – co-creator of Polkadot[31][32] Erin Smith (2019) – creator of software to detect Parkinson's Disease https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thiel_Fellowship#Notable_recipients https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thiel_Fellowship#Notable_recip...
• jimbob45 5y ago
  "Never code in any language except Assembly. You should never willingly give up any control over your computer" - Wolf Tivy, probably
  • vzcx 5y ago
    You need to be hand-assembling your machine code. You need to stop using code written by anyone else. You need to be punching in raw bytes to bootstrap an interactive forth environment. Writing your own interrupt handlers, task schedulers, and specialized allocators, bit-banging wire protocols as well as using DMA. You need to control your own computer.
    • smitop 5y ago
      You need to be hand-building your CPUs. You need to stop using CPUs built by anyone else. You need to be soldering in circuitry to bootstrap an x86 environment. Making your own control unit, ALU, registers, memory, buses. You need to control your computer.
      • someguydave 5y ago
        you need to craft your own diodes from thin wire and silicon carbide etc etc
  • someguydave 5y ago
    Actually I think that is exactly the spirit. How can you do something new if you travel the same path as everyone else?
• geekbird 5y ago
  I found myself wishing for hip waders to even try to get through part of this self-congratulatory pile of BS. Reading between the lines told me he quit his job, mooched off of friends and girlfriend/wife, then managed to con people into investing in a magazine. I figure he had a trust fund somewhere, or has the gift of gab and could easily part fools from their cash.
  • throwawayboise 5y ago
    It's also surviviorship bias. He quit his job and it worked out. So what? I can point to my brother-in-law, he's constantly quitting jobs and he's basically broke.
  • deltree7 5y ago
    Note: Author is a Tall, White, STEM educated dude living in America. So, his experiences is very specific to his skills, his reach and societal perceptions about him. It's like getting dating tips from an attractive person or money advise from a trust fund baby
    • chana_masala 5y ago
      > So, his experiences is very specific to his skills, his reach and societal perceptions about him. I mean, that part is true for literally everyone?
      • deltree7 5y ago
        No. We are talking about thresholds. He has advantages that may be applicable to < 5% of the population. If a person quit their job being a short, brown, woman and found happiness and people willing to help them, it is more likely to be replicated by a broader population. It's like an attractive guy giving dating tips
        • chana_masala 5y ago
          I don't disagree. But - >> So, his experiences is very specific to his skills, his reach and societal perceptions about him. This plainly describes everyone's circumstances and experiences. That's all.
• andreyk 5y ago
  "Transform your perspective thus: rather than seeing the job as carrying out someone else’s will in exchange for money, see it as itself your sacred cosmic duty. What important task do you do for the project you work for? How does that project fit into creating a more glorious future? How is that future pleasing to God, the proper order of things, and your own felt value instincts? Your wage is just a budget given to you to help you carry out this sacred duty; give your whole life to the task at hand, and take responsibility for its whole logic. If something in that entire chain of purpose back to the highest purposes isn’t right, fix it. You own the task and the task owns you." Wow, what is this even.
  • LouisSayers 5y ago
    • pelagicAustral 5y ago
      My God... there's so many good comments in this thread...
  • deleted 5y ago
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  • going_ham 5y ago
    Shamelessly copying from Meditations by Marcus Aurelius adding cosmos and fancy word so that homework doesn't look like the original. ;)
    • Trasmatta 5y ago
      Has McMindfulness been succeeded by McStoicism yet?
    • penjelly 5y ago
      i hate how often stoic ideas get rehashed, even marcus was basically just paraphrasing epictetus, but at least that was okay because epictetus didnt write in very readable english
• gunfighthacksaw 5y ago
  Read 1 paragraph before thinking “na I’m alright, you do you buddy”
  • one_off_comment 5y ago
    Me, too. And I even want to quit my job. But this did not inspire me to do so.
• darkengine 5y ago
  I know it's bad form to move so quickly into meta-discussion on here, but I feel a lot of the comments in the thread right now are endemic of a certain closed-mindedness that has, to me, come to define in part the Hacker News zeitgeist, which stands in something of a contrast to the site's supposed founding principle of intellectual curiosity. There is plenty of prior art in Western (and other traditions of) philosophy in the spirit of this essay. Nietzsche and Bataille talked about work in a similar way. Cioran pretty explicitly embraced failure (or the risk of failure) as virtue, as this work does. This essay seems to be saying something like: take a big risk, quite possibly fail, live your principles even if it means being an "outcast", commit to it, and who cares what other people think, because in doing so you will find your people. The response in here seems to be "look at this guy taking big risks and failing, what an outcast." Of course, that is surely the point. I have, as I'm sure many on here have, found success in grinding away at boring problems, suppressing any kind of "call of God" or desire to do something larger, so we could build a nest egg and stable future for ourselves with MAGMA money. This essay is sort of a direct assault on the aesthetics of that approach. As for me, I have grown quite tired of it, so this piece does resonate with me.
  • going_ham 5y ago
    If it does, you will be extremely delighted knowing there is a book by Marcus Aurelius called Meditations. The book withstood the test of time. He has written it clearly and explained his reasons in a proper manner. He was a roman ruler and everything is from that perspective. Most of the people here are probably not making enough money to get by the everyday mundanes of life. So things like self-actualization are far away from reach. Therefore, when someone drops in an article like this, saying to quit job, isn't it disrespectful for those trying to get their needs? Sure, if everyone had a comfort cushion, I guess internet would be a better place. But the reality is quite harsh! Therefore, people may say harsh things but they don't mean it. It's just to get by. I hope this isn't offending!
    • thelettere 5y ago
      The notion that one has to take care of one's "needs" before pursuing anything "higher" is a lie and an excuse. The number of great intellectuals and writers who lived at least a portion of their lives - and often more - in absolute penury is testament to this. Einstein for example nearly died of starvation, yet he kept working. One could make an argument that it is because of real world difficulties that one is able to do great work. What did Jesus say about the rich man and the kingdom of heaven? The times in my life when I've lived on the edges are the ones that have laid the groundwork for everything worthwhile I've done in my life. Success and comfort too often bring stupor and cowardice, and not worthy ambition.
• Ostrogodsky 5y ago
  Hahahaa, gotta grant it to the author, he has the rare talent to induce in me uncontrollable laughs with every single paragraph. The other "author" who comes to my mind now with that exquisite skill is Eliezer Yudkowsky, hell, I would pay some amount of money to watch a conversation between that pair. Not even 20 seasons of South Park would be that hilarious.
  • dang 5y ago
    Please don't post personal attacks or call names in HN comments. It's not what we want here. Maybe you don't feel you owe the "author" better, but you owe this community better if you're participating in it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    • sdze 5y ago
• codeafin 5y ago
  Had to double check to make sure it wasn't an Onion article. He certainly has been having a crisis, and as someone else mentioned here, recently read Meditations by Marcus Aurelius and tried to mimic the writing. But instead, came across as another stressed, lost mind with their head too buried in social media, thinking they have to be at their absolute highlight of their life at any given moment. I feel sorry for this wife he "courted", she probably asks him to at least help with the dishes sometimes but is responded with another tyrade of "You don't understand, woman, I need to focus on my God-given task of building my little blog with my intellectual friends"
  • taurath 5y ago
    Perfect encapsulation of the critique to the point that this feels like a parody itself.
  • tootie 5y ago
    • coldtea 5y ago
      >is the lifestyle of someone with 100% confidence in their social safety net Sorry, but millions of working and middle class people without any "net" have done it in history, I'm sure millions have done it in the US, and millions will continue to do the same thing in the future. As for "whitest"? Tons of blacks have quit their jobs and safety nets and tried their luck in what was termed "the great migration", while having shit for a safety net. And tons of white, latin, jewish, etc. people have done it post WWII, all the way to today. I know at least a few people in their 30s and 40s with harldy anything in their name, that quit a shitty (but steady) job and travelled the world on a whim, with almost nothing in their pocket (and no safety nets). You only need to not have people depending on you (like small children). You don't need a degree, parents, generational wealth, or even money in your bank to do anything. And it doesn't need to come to some happy rich ending where they made money in their quiting job/travelling/etc. Some just come back and eventually get another job. Some just find a partner or a new country to stay, and that's it.
• iandanforth 5y ago
  Such drivel. If you really want to move people to act give them a clear roadmap for a lifestyle that supports years without meaningful income. Did you have $1M in savings? Did you have rich parents? Did you just live off your SO's income? Did you have financial dependants like children or elderly parents? I hope I'm wrong but this just reeks of intense privilege being misconstrued as nonconformity.
  • dang 5y ago
    "When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. 'That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3' can be shortened to '1 + 1 is 2, not 3." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  • psyc 5y ago
    1. Don't have kids 2. Work at one or more MAAAMs for 10-12 years, while living on $40k/yr 3. Retire, maintain lifestyle If you somehow run out of money, just pull a Michael Jordan or a Jay-Z Variations include working 3 years on, 2-3 years off, or working 3-4 months per year. The point is that if you're a programmer and you don't have children, you don't have to work very much.
    • decebalus1 5y ago
      That sounds great. Unfortunately in America, healthcare costs depend a lot on how well your employer negotiates with an insurer. If you're on your own and you want the same level of coverage, you're gonna have to pay a lot more money. If it wasn't for that, I'd have totally taken a sabbatical since Covid started.
      • gbudee 5y ago
        If you're in a state which signed on for post-Obamacare Medicare expansion (or WI, which self-funded BadgerCare), you may be eligible for free health care without a wealth test. In other words, if you cut off your income to rely on savings, you may be able to get good healthcare from the gov't, until such a time as you start making money again.
• aeturnum 5y ago
  So many wild things in this, but I was curious about this aspect: > It also helped that I was unemployed. I had time to court her properly. Does anyone find this kind of situation helps their relationship health? I've started relationships between jobs and started them with people who weren't working. It's not always long-term poison, but a big part of a relationship is figuring out if your two lives will work well together. I find that's easiest to figure out if neither of you is in a temporary situation that's radically different from your future. Sometimes you get lucky and you survive the transition - but in my experience you'll be on the strongest footing if you don't need to navigate a major transition!
  • SkipperCat 5y ago
    When men talk about courting a woman. It just sounds like they are either hunting an animal or performing a job. Seriously, if she (or he) likes you, then it just clicks. Talk of putting effort into it removes the humanity of the other person and also gives creepy people the perspective that someone "owes" them romance because they put the hours into it. It's just gross and misogynistic behavior.
    • joyeuse6701 5y ago
      For some people… many people struggle with establishing romantic relationships, men and women alike. I’ll be first to admit that the phrasing used by the author is dated, however
    • betwixthewires 5y ago
      This comment says more about you than them. It never "just clicks". Meaningful relationships take work. In the modern adversarial dating environment, people are very wary of one another. Helping someone get to know you means getting them to let down their defenses. People are defensive and cautious these days for good reason, but often times it means meaningful connections with potential just don't happen out of apprehension. These days, a lot of people want a readymade partner. All the tough work of becoming should be finished, there should be no personal growth left to do. If he/she doesn't already have everything you expect then time to look somewhere else. This is unhealthy. We have to rediscover how to look past the trinkets and into the human being we say we want something more with. It's a pretty idea that people just click, that true love happens effortlessly, but it is not true, and it is a perfect fiction that destroys peoples reasonable expectations and destroys their lives in the process. How many people waited for perfection like that until they found themselves alone at 40? The only thing that just clicks is sexual attraction. If someone believes someone else owes them romance for putting in effort they have no idea how to go about it, perhaps they never will. When you meet someone who you think is special and you decide to do the work of getting to know them and putting yourself out there for them, you do that knowing that they might not reciprocate, you accept failure as a possibility and you choose to take that risk and engage gracefully.
• nzmsv 5y ago
  So this is the male version of the trophy spouse stereotype. Focuses on lifting and courting, has an education just to check off a box, writes pseudointellectual drivel to pass the time. Just as likely to be replaced by a fresher model in a few years.
  • dang 5y ago
    Please don't post this sort of snarky internet attack to HN. It's not the culture we want here, and it's against several of the site guidelines. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    • _l4lu 5y ago
      Thank you for holding up a mirror, dang! Being publicly called out came as a bit of shock and really got me thinking. The comment above really isn't me. Or rather, it is clearly me (since I posted it), but I don't want it to be. Where I disagree with you is the implication that undesirable people bring bad behavior with them and pollute this site. I think it's the opposite: something about this site brings out the worst in otherwise reasonable people. Or maybe it's all social media. In any case, the negative effects clearly outweigh the benefits from participation. This will be the last comment from this account; I'll send a request for deletion. Thank you for accidentally curing my HN addiction! I'll be mindful of the door on my way out :)
    • jonstewart 5y ago
      Serious question: Palladium’s other cofounder is a white nationalist neoreactionary. Is one degree of separation from white nationalism sufficient distance for HN culture? It is very hard for me to see such dross posted and discussed seriously, earnestly, when everything I’ve been taught about critical thinking as a hacker is to be skeptical, whether of function return codes, technical documentation, or people writing and/or funding obscure online long-form magazines with strong ties to white nationalism/IDW/alt-right/neoreactionarism. As a DC resident, one year after Jan 6, it’s dismaying to see Palladium on the front page, and discussed so credulously here.
• taurath 5y ago
  Letting the fields go fallow to allow for rejuvenation rings like a very apt allegory to me. Breaking routines, finding out who you are outside of work is actually one of the most luxurious things one can do. It’s a great time for healing. But most can’t afford to do this at their lifestyle level. There’s lots of cognitive dissonance over what makes our lives rich in the tech world. However there also a lot in the post which seems to hold high minded eruditism as some peak of existence :) still some good point buried.
  • spcebar 5y ago
    I think this is the most cogent take on the essay I've read. I wonder where the middle ground exists between letting the field go fallow and feeding your family is. If you quit your job and then need to pay an unexpected medical bill— or decide to have kids and realize you have no savings— I wonder if one might rethink the spiritual fulfillment they found in unemployment. But on the other hand, if you spend your entire life grinding at a job to make enough money to protect yourself from emergencies and support a family, you might look up at retirement age and wish you had spent more time with your kids. It would be nice if we lived in a society where the sabbatical was normalized. That seems like a conceivable middle ground.
    • taurath 5y ago
      Covid has opened a lot of eyes. When mortality is on the line in a job people start to think hey what does this really mean. Hoping the current and upcoming generations will make choices towards a better future.
• shaneprrlt 5y ago
  The "virtues" of poverty? Poverty is hell for people who can't choose it. What a cruel statement.
  • chasd00 5y ago
    Yeah. I grew up working poor my wife grew up go-hungry-poor, we’re close to out of debt and living comfortably with two kids in our 40s. Poverty? No fucking thanks.
  • margalabargala 5y ago
    That's your opinion. The author apparently has a different one. I would point out that in Western society there have been groups such as religious orders dedicated to the "virtue of poverty" for at least 8 centuries[0] so this is not exactly a new idea. I'm sure that back then, the ideas probably elicited at least one similar reaction from someone in the equivalent of your position. But enough other people found those ideas sufficiently inspiring that the group has persisted since 1208. It seems unreasonable to call "cruel" something that has given meaning to so many people. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_of_Assisi#Founding_of_the_Franciscan_Orders https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_of_Assisi#Founding_of_...
    • pseudalopex 5y ago
      Religious orders are voluntary.
      • margalabargala 5y ago
        Yes, just like the lifestyle that the author promotes here. They are not forcing you to quit their job, they are encouraging you to voluntarily make that choice. If the article was titled "Join the Franciscan Monks" and was about the benefits the author perceived from making that choice rather than what they did, the article would similarly mention the "virtues of poverty". One person choosing, for personal reasons, a situation that another person had forced upon them and dislikes, is not inherently cruel.
  • 5y ago
• wnolens 5y ago
  Tried this. Quit and lived a truly romantic life for 2 years. Most happy time of my life - really. But my ventures didn't succeed. With no partner or family to fall back on, I did contract development to not piss away savings. Hated the work, ran out of novelties to indulge in my free time, and became severely depressed. Suggesting that anyone other than himself should do this is naive. "Do what most people are doing unless you have a really good reason not to." Jordan Peterson (paraphrased) Privilege wasn't a good enough reason for me =\
  • maxduckworth 5y ago
    What did you do at the end of the two years? Were you able to move back into a full-time position successfully?
    • wnolens 5y ago
      Yes, I peeled myself out of bed to leetcode and got back into full time. It wasn't fun. I was pretty confident I could get back in, that was the safety net that let me walk out of a job with nowhere to land. Honestly didn't imagine I'd use it, and I don't love it. But it beats the alternative right now. My entitlement was through the roof :) I'm more grounded now.
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• betwixthewires 5y ago
  I love this article. It feels like an articulation of the past 5 years of my life. Even the introduction to it mirrors what's going on with me the past year. I certainly have periods of time where I doubt what I'm doing, where I wonder if I have what it takes to see my vision through. Articles like this help me to clear my head and keep going, and they're the primary reason I spend time perusing this site.
• ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
  Great article. I can very much relate. I’ve been writing open-source software for a very long time. This was mostly because I earned my pay as a manager. The job paid … not great, but enough to keep the lights on, and to let me save. It also wasn’t particularly demanding, and gave me time for extracurricular coding. I needed to code, to keep my chops up. Even in “nights and weekends,” I was able to get some fairly serious work done. Then, in 2017, my company dragged all the distributed engineering back home (Japan). I knew it was coming for years, but had no interest in bailing. I had a team of engineers under my command, and would remain until the end. Then, I found out that no one wanted me. Some folks were quite blunt about it. After a few months of being insulted and patronized, I decided that, even if I found a job, I would be treated like garbage. I had no interest in that. Fortunately, I am able to retire early (not that early. I was 55, when I left my job). I need to work. If no one wants to pay me, I’ll do it for free; which is what I’ve been doing for the last couple of years. I took the first couple of years to learn up on stuff, and re-establish a full-time self-discipline. These days, I work harder than I ever have in my life. I’m at my desk for at least eleven hours a day, seven days a week. It’s not all “production programming,” but most of it is. The difference in productivity is astonishing. I often get more done by 8:30 AM (the standard start time for my day job), than I used to get done all day. My GitHub Activity Chart is solid green (and not “gamed,” either). And I’m really enjoying it. I’m quite aware than many folks would find my life unenjoyable, but I’m weird. I like it. The last year or so, I’ve been writing a fairly ambitious social media-like application, with some friends, as a 501(c)(3). It’s nearing completion, and is work that I’m proud of. Of course, like every project I’ve ever done, I’d like to rewrite it, using all the stuff I’ve learned, but I won’t do that. I’m pretty used to shipping, so we’ll have something nice.
  • MuffinFlavored 5y ago
    > These days, I work harder than I ever have in my life. I’m at my desk for at least eleven hours a day, seven days a week. Is this what makes you happy? A lot of people might criticize this as unhealthy. This statement does not contain a lot of "balance". Where's the exercise? Cooking for yourself? Socializing with others? Spending time with loved ones/family? Working on hobbies? I too am at my keyboard a lot. A lot a lot. I just don't know if it's a noble "I work hard" or "addiction".
• treerunner 5y ago
  Lost me at California as center of universe. And again with the musk name drop. So much for off the beaten path.
• allendoerfer 5y ago
  This article makes me anxious that I just might not have any interesting ideas to share with the world, that I might be stuck in my own perspective and that others will see right through all the fancy words I come up with to masquerade it. I think I might not be able to refrain from smiling when being called an intellectual. Only positive outlook: At least I do not think I will ever go as far as calling myself an intellectual in my own essay.
  • mrjangles 5y ago
    now that's an amusing take. But would you go so far as to call yourself an "elite" like this guy does... >This is a key part of what it means to be a responsible elite. The best description I ever heard of an "elite" is "A term used ironically to describe someone so out of touch with reality that they think people are using it to refer to them unironically."
    • allendoerfer 5y ago
      And I just thought elites had to be the men buying hygiene products labeled "tactical".
    • sho 5y ago
      Around the time I signed up for this site, I thought the same as you. 10 years and a couple of successful startups later - perspectives change. I don't know if I'd actually unironically call myself "elite" but we need some name, right? The fact is there's a large number of very, very capable people out there who probably don't need to work for anyone else again if they don't want to. But they get jobs anyway because that's just the kind of people they are. I know quite a few of these people. This essay is a CTA to them. Give it a few years and you might find yourself in the exact same boat. And in case you hadn't realised, this whole site is the poster child for a "privileged elite" deciding the world needed something and just going and making it, and thank the gods he did.
      • allendoerfer 5y ago
        Do you think the people you are describing do not realize themselves that they do not need to work? You claim to be part of them, did you need that essay to realize it? You just stated you created a couple of startups during the last 10 years, so you seem to have already quit your job a long time ago.
• kitx 5y ago
  Such a wonderful read. Think of childhood or teenage years when you spent hours building things for the sheer joy of it, profit motive be damned. More of us could do with sabbaticals to explore projects like this as an adult. Build out in the open, perhaps it will work, maybe it won’t. But you’ll learn a vast amount, have fun along the way, and probably learn what you should be doing instead. Bookmarked, because I know I’m going to have to re-read this.
• beckingz 5y ago
  Prosperity gospel with a technical flavor. The assumption that any worthy cause will by financially self-sustaining as an 'empire' has led to a lot of value driven companies destroying all their good will and noble intentions.
• beckman466 5y ago
  > I’ve heard that middle-class people with respectable jobs have fewer kids than people who don’t work as hard. how can someone in good consciousness write this? really blows my mind.
  • youngNed 5y ago
    Agreed, this line was as far as I got. Actually, I read a little more as I thought the article was satire, but yeah.
• sho 5y ago
  Wow. This really spoke to me. This is a key part of what it means to be a responsible elite. You use your privilege and your personal judgment to explore and solve problems that no one else can.
• bitbang 5y ago
  Can't decide if I think he's trying to start a cult, or the next wework.
  • jonstewart 5y ago
    Neoreactionary IDW cult, but gussied up as respectable long from journalism. It’s worth doing research about Palladium.
• themacguffinman 5y ago
  "If you lose everything you own, you generally still have your network and skills" I get the general call to action that those who have excess resources should leverage that to take big risks, but this really undersells the possible consequences of losing everything you own. No, you don't always keep your network and skills. Sometimes, you lose everything. You lose friends from fallout or you belatedly realize that your network isn't as resilient to you becoming a penniless loser as you thought. Sometimes you go into debt and make enemies. Sometimes you become homeless and then develop a mental illness or a drug addiction. Sometimes you skip the homeless part and just commit suicide [1]. How many people can stomach that kind of outcome? I do like the general message which I think should be said more often but I feel like people who charge ahead on this call to action should also triple check that they can truly accept the actual risk they might incur. I also think the amount of risk you take has diminishing returns. Making "fatal leaps of faith" doesn't seem to be as necessary or pragmatic as it's presented here. [1] (heads up: this is a link to a suicide note) https://archive.fo/QaLIw https://archive.fo/QaLIw
  • agumonkey 5y ago
    Also skills are highly relative. You could be great in some workplace but in another you'd get confused. And the things you were home with are now disregarded.
  • JimboOmega 5y ago
    It smells like privilege. That isn't to say that the OP was protected regardless. But the mindset that lets you do this is a mindset that comes from a background of abundance. Where you can always get another job if you want one, where you always have friends or parents who will bail you out or give you what you need. A background where things just always seem to work out.
    • Blackstone4 5y ago
      Yeah it can come from a background of abundance but does not mean it is not a good attitude to have. I have spent most of my life with an attitude of scarcity and I was jealous of others. It held me back in so many ways and made me unhappy. Now I try to live with positive outlook on the future and try to make things happen with a belief that things will work out some how in the end. Impoverised people could benefit from some of this thinking (balanced with realism) since it could help improve their circumstance.
• cutler 5y ago
  The author lives in a self-centered universe in which the virtues of service and responsibility to others count for nothing. Any goal associated with financial ends is reduced to a blind alley which obfuscates "true" goals but there are many charitable goals which involve exclusive focus on purely financial intermediate goals. Providing for one's family is the most basic of such goals but the author seems to be focused on self-centered goals. Preaching about the "virtue of poverty" when you are privileged enough to be able to choose it instead of it choosing you is just so middle class. We had enough of that during the industrial revolution.
  • srcreigh 5y ago
    > This is a key part of what it means to be a responsible elite. You use your privilege and your personal judgment to explore and solve problems that no one else can. > If you have the resources to spend some time exploring, if you are on to interesting threads of novelty that few other people have, and if you have the spirit to tighten your belt, throw out your map, and explore off-road, then your real job is to do so. It's not really self-centered.
• dsizzle 5y ago
  > You get good ideas from years of hard leisure. The article seemed longer than it needed to be, but that's a good phrase, "hard leisure."
• holtkam2 5y ago
  Two words: survivorship bias. How many people out there followed a similar strategy as the author, only to fail miserably?
• namose 5y ago
  I don’t get the obsession with building an “empire”. Why is that even something people find noble or the actions of a “responsible elite”? Imperialism quite literally has destroyed the lives of millions of people in the service of a privileged few. If you really wanted to be a responsible elite build public goods, not an empire.
  • bamboozled 5y ago
    If you have nothing to offer, you build and empire to create importance for yourself. At least the illusion of it. The most wretched shit people I’ve ever worked with are empire builders.
  • saos 5y ago
    It’s like the current obsession in the U.K. around building a property empire. It’s weird.
  • srcreigh 5y ago
    Maybe you do get it. In my opinion, his empire is the very public good itself. What is building an empire? To gather the resources, make plans, complete projects, gain collaborators, provide services, pass the torch. Defeat problems for public good, defeat temptations to extort exploit and abuse...
• janikvonrotz 5y ago
  not all leap of faiths are equal.
• jonstewart 5y ago
  The author is Wolf Tivy, a cofounder of Palladium Magazine. Palladium Magazine is funded by Peter Thiel. The other cofounder of Palladium is Jonah Bennett; he now works at a stealth web3 startup and he says on his website he’s a political moderate. However, he also used to work at Tucker Carlson’s Daily Caller and pal around with white nationalists and neoreactionaries. He resigned from Palladium after those ties and several hateful emails came to light: https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2020/03/04/emails-reveal-identity-longtime-white-nationalist-propagandist-onetime-conservative-insider https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2020/03/04/emails-reveal...
  • vmception 5y ago
    Why dont we like Peter Theil? A couple of interesting things and people have come out of the Theil fellowship I don't personally think he went far enough to be an anathema as I would also consider leveraging political standing in any society where there are power vacuums, assuming his foray into courting a conservative administration is why people still dont like him
    • wbsss4412 5y ago
      Foray implies it was a break from his previous trajectory. He founded a mass surveillance company and is generally right wing/conservative.
  • hidudeurcool 5y ago
  • blindmute 5y ago
    How does this relate to the content of the article?
  • smsm42 5y ago
    And this concludes our demo of "guilt by association" concept.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
• ostenning 5y ago
  This article resonates with me quite a lot especially after two years of repeated lock downs and travel restrictions, I reflected on my purpose more than ever during this period. I came to realize that the most valuable possession I have is my time, that life is exceedingly short and that we can only really dedicate ourselves to one project at a time. So, I reduced my hours down as a swdev to a handful of days every few weeks to pay the bills and maintain a humble quality of life and began building my own project relating to electronic music instruments. The result is that I've become a much better engineer, learning embedded Rust, circuit and PCB design. These are skills I could never have learnt in my siloed web-development job, despite the pay being very reasonable. But most importantly I am happier, less stressed, feel more connected and confident I'm building a vision for my own future that I can see myself doing into old age. And I'm happy to announce that my first Eurorack instrument is in its final stages, it may not be an immediate financial success but life isn't about avoiding perceived failures, its about having a great time and pushing your own self-imposed limitations. At the end of the day everyones path through this world is different, we all come from different backgrounds and we all face different obstacles and challenges, its important to stay true to whatever is true for you. Just don't accept a pay-check because society tells you to.
  • marshmellman 5y ago
    I’m considering the same and pursuing electronic music instrument projects. I’m very curious to learn more about yours and your background, is there a good way to?
• joshthecynic 5y ago
• bawolff 5y ago
  I was nodding along until i reached: >Yes, even the bane of Darwin’s faith—the humble ichneumon wasp that lays its maggots inside the living bodies of caterpillars to eat them from the inside and burst out on maturity like some alien xenomorph—is a beautiful creature with a sacred task. Like many parasites, its role in the great chain of being is to test the health and defenses of its caterpillar host population. Its predation weeds out the sickly, preventing the much uglier injustice of collective weakness and disease, and spurring the evolution of stronger and even more beautiful life. Even fearsome Nemesis, born from chaos via night and darkness, is ultimately the hand of God and the minister of justice. Even the supposed exceptions to justice prove its rule. Which sounds like a self-indulgent justification to hurt others for your own gain while still being able to sleep at night.
  • hsn915 5y ago
    > justification to hurt others for your own gain You're jumping into conclusions. His sentiment is better understood in terms of the balance of nature. He posted this on his Twitter a while back: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysa5OBhXz-Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysa5OBhXz-Q The video is titled "How Wolves Change Rivers". "When wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park in the United States after being absent nearly 70 years, the most remarkable "trophic cascade" occurred." As the video explains, unchecked herboviore species has caused a lot of damage to the environment, grazing much of the vegetation. The introduction of wolves radically changed the behavior of the prey species and they start avoiding certain places like valleys where they can easily be trapped. This allowed the vegetation to regenerate and trees started to grow. This resulted in birds moving in. Beavers started to increase, and the dams they built provided habitat for a bunch of other species of animals. And so on and so forth. The regeneration of the vegetation provided stability to the banks of the rivers so they collapsed less often.
    • bawolff 5y ago
      I'm not disputing the ecological affects of predation. I'm disputing its use/applicability as a rhetorical device to further an argument about how to live a "good life". After all, this isn't an essay on ecology. This paragraph wasn't simply added because ecology is cool. It was added to further an argument.
• lookingforamuse 5y ago
  Despite sounding a little delusional, the author puts forth some good points. The evolution of our society depends on new ideas and in people who are willing to develop them. As the author points out, some of these ideas succeed, while some fail. The process works in a Darwinian fashion. As for me, I envy the inspiration and purpose felt by the author. I had the experience of living in leisure for a while, and while it was good, I certainly felt like the money slaves mentioned in the text. No matter how much I read, how much I talked to other people, no inspiration ever struck me - so I decided to keep working at a normal job.
• camillomiller 5y ago
• jarek_kruk 5y ago
  This article seems elitist to me. Not everyone is in a position to take "active unemployment". People are from different walks of life, it is a lot easier to become a thinker having large nest egg from either high earning position or inheritance than when juggling 2 full time jobs to provide for your children.
• 40four 5y ago
  I don’t know if the OP is the author of this article or not, but all I have to say I want to buy into the overall concept/ thesis. But the writing is so erratic and turbulent, it is really hard to follow the author’s train of thought. It feels like they are trying SO hard to come across as deep and intellectual, that they lost sight of how it comes across to the reader. It’s like they are trying to force as many ‘big’ words into every sentence that it gets distracting. There is no cadence to follow, it just turns into this big word soup, and I was never able to extract the essence of their thesis.
  • hsn915 5y ago
    It probably means you are not the target audience. I found the flow of ideas make a lot of sense. Perhaps you don't have the "ambient background" of the mindset of the author. Maybe reading a few other articles (just pick randomly) from Palladium magazine can help you get a grasp of things -- if you are interested.
  • d23 5y ago
    I honestly just ran out of steam by the halfway point. It felt like every paragraph could have been reduced to a sentence and every section reduced to a paragraph.
  • MarcellusDrum 5y ago
    This article left a bad taste in my mouth as well. Just an article full of humblebrag, and giving advice that only work because the writer was lucky enough to have friends/family that accepted him being an unemployed leach.
  • srcreigh 5y ago
    The author is well read in philosophy, and the article (what I read in the first 1/4 or so) is a work of philosophy. I have a minor degree in philosophy. To me it is interesting and at a good pace. For example the author doesn't descend into shallow made up lingo, they aren't too formal or abstract, the ideas are organized into sections, there's a development of the ideas, there's poetic illustrations interleaved with stories, etc. I liked some of the themes of taking responsibility and venturing into the unknown. EDIT: I read the rest. The spiritualizing and financial stuff is a bit clumsy. Mainly from lack of context. Based on this writing alone, the author could be anywhere on the spectrum from absolutely insane to level-headed trying to focus on spirituality qua creative pursuits. I also spot another lack of context in the audience being considered responsible elite, meanwhile belief in bountiful surplus and the audience needing more materials. I guess he may have a different article regarding "non elites" and the bountiful surplus, or maybe he believes the bountiful surplus is only for the elites. All in all interesting and kinda lukewarm, if only because possible craziness hides behind ambiguity.
• mlatu 5y ago
  > If your role in the universe is structured work within order found and built by someone else, those off-road investments are pointless. nobodies role in the universe is to work for someone else. can we stop repeating the trigger phrases from our cbt sessions colloquialy known as school? edit: PAH! elitist muck! he basically says: if you got money, just quit your job, through amassing wealth you have been chosen by the spirits of the iluminati and blessed by the rothschilds to quit your job and become the next edison. you dont have money? ah, tough luck, look at the time, ciao
• baxuz 5y ago
  I have to say that the guy raised a huge red flag for me already in the first paragraph: "I hit the gym, pursued the most interesting and important ideas I could find, and started looking for a wife." Ho boy, I'm getting some Christian fundamentalist vibes with that sentence formulation. Like, a mix of a holy mission, an objectifying checkbox and a "time to get a wife to generate progeny". So I continued reading: "The squirrel has no way of knowing or checking that his instinct to bury the nuts will lead him to new life in the spring; he can only trust that God has given him what he needs." "When we must we defer to a master who teaches us what to value, let us do that consciously and explicitly and personally. Let us aim to be uplifted thereby as we take responsibility for more and more of the task we are given, until the student surpasses the master to receive their visions directly from God." "How does that project fit into creating a more glorious future? How is that future pleasing to God, the proper order of things, and your own felt value instincts? " "God’s Trust Fund The reason taking responsibility for the question of ends involves a leap of faith is that you actually have no sure-fire way to ensure that your visions are sound and good." "Even fearsome Nemesis, born from chaos via night and darkness, is ultimately the hand of God and the minister of justice. Even the supposed exceptions to justice prove its rule." "If your vision is beautiful and sound, it will flourish. Resources will unexpectedly come out of the woodwork to support it. If your vision doesn’t have that virtue, you will be struck down for its lack. That’s life. It is also justice. Where this justice conflicts with our own human desires, perhaps it is we who are wrong, not God." "So take the leap, and have faith that God’s trust fund will come through with what you need." Having read the whole article, the ongoing theme is "God" and "faith" and the whole article oozes with the unflinching conviction of a religious fanatic. The man glorifies struggle and sacrifice for a "higher purpose" and then attributes good outcomes to the will of a divine being. I can't really stand behind that kind of reasoning, and I can't really understand how the HN audience resonates with this article. Maybe it's the hustle success story of an entrepreneur that is appealing to the audience, but the guy is actually sending a very dangerous and misleading message.
  • blindmute 5y ago
    Could you elaborate more about why hitting the gym, pursuing interesting ideas, and looking for a relationship are red flags?
• jopsen 5y ago
  The claim that innovative breakthroughs doesn't happen as a result of structured 9-5 work is missing a citation.
• jopsen 5y ago
  The claim that structured 9-5 work doesn't bring about innovative breakthroughs needs a citation. Sure, we all love to think that major innovations are drive by a small team of dedicated renegades. But reality [citation needed] is that most innovative and breakthroughs comes as a result of gradual improvements stacked on top of each other. Wind power, Battery prices, Computers, The internet, etc. none of these huge changes were brought about by a small team of thinkers working in their garage. We tend to only notice breakthroughs when they happen suddenly -- but most of them are gradual, the result of hard work and competition.
• brainwipe 5y ago
  Privilege dressed up as purpose. Don't quit your job; find a job that fulfils you and change.
• jeffrallen 5y ago
  In 2004, I quit my engineering job to work in humanitarian aid. I found a wife, a family and a new country.
• BLKNSLVR 5y ago
  "Started looking for a wife" No need to read further. I wonder if he already had a dog, or whether "looking for a dog" is an activity that requires a wife?