baling hay

How depressing:

I don’t want someone chatting away to me and telling me how “cool” it all is (I’ve lived long enough as a computer programmer to know it’ll never really be “cool” to be one).

How refreshing (following has tongue completely in cheek):

Programming is for world commerce. It is like agriculture or fossil fuels. It is lot a like baling hay. I’ll give you an example: You wouldn’t write a cartoon book with a plot and running narrative just to show a guy how to bale hay! That would frustrate the guy! He would throw that book in the pig’s pen! He just wants to get straight to the nitty-gritty and, for once in his life, just bale hay, straightway!

I am glad that, by and large, I always worked with people who thought that programming was not like baling hay; that it was something fun, something to be passionate about, something to laugh about. Something that could be- that was- cool. (Note that cool, like doing good, should not- does not- conflict with making piles of cash. They are often best when they run hand in hand.)

I’m going to law school because I want to help these cool, hopefully profitable, not-hay-baling people do their thing, and to beat back those who think otherwise. Thanks to why, rml[1], Kathy, and the many others who are fighting the good fight in the meantime.

(See also: code and beauty, or something.)

[1] Yes, I’m still waiting for rml’s poignant guide to the kernel.

[Picture courtesy flickr user jemsweb, under CC-BY-SA.]