birb_cromble
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User ID: 3236
birb_cromble
23hr ago
What would you recommend for a situation like mine? I'm making a fairly large purchase at some unknown future point. The fuzzy timeline means I can handle some volatility, but not "I can ignore it for a decade until things pick up again" volatility. I've been using ultra short term treasuries and other bonds to beat HYSA yields at the cost of some risk, but not so much as equities. This money is very explicitly in its own sleeve - my emergency fund, retirement, and general investments iny taxable account are all set up differently.
birb_cromble
1d ago
At least in my career, the difference between problem solving and problem setting seems to come down to recognizing that multiple problems are actually one problem, and that the problem in question is usually a political one rather than a technical one.
I mostly recognized that by staying at one place for long enough to catch on. There might be shortcuts.
birb_cromble
1d ago
The NDA has expired, so what the hell.
The startup in question was heavily funded by a consortium of automakers. Unlike some of the other shops, their plan was to heavily geo fence their operating area and build models for individual cities. They also freely admitted during the interviews that this was never going to work well enough to work on its own, and the bulk of it was actually going to operate via regular nudges from a call center in the Philippines. They wanted to hire me to write the software for that part of the stack.
Some people here are probably going to reflexively say "well that's not a big deal - Waymo has a human fallback too*, but that's not what they were planning. The actual plan was to regularly have call center workers provide feedback and instruction during live rides "until the ML team can catch up". They figured that they could fake it until they made it, and everything would just work out in the meantime.
birb_cromble
1d ago
I live out in the middle of nowhere. I assume it'll take a year or two to make it out this far.
birb_cromble
1d ago
Is lionfish any good? Cleaning them seems like such a pain in the ass that I've never tried.
birb_cromble
1d ago
I think it's more likely that an old man who flew a lot developed blood clots, but at this point I can't confidently rule out the alternative.
birb_cromble
1d ago
I very nearly took a job with a self driving car startup a decade ago. After seeing a little about how the sausage was made, I've been happy to live so far out in the sticks that it'll be decades before self driving gets any traction.
birb_cromble
1d ago
I'm in a weird place right now where I intend to relocate and buy a house at some unknown future date. I'm building a... I guess you could call it a "risk ladder" for that money.
Most of it is in an ultra short term Treasury ETF. The next tier is state specific municipal bonds and AAA CLOs. After that it's BINC and JSI.
I'm about ready to move up a risk tier, and I'm plotting out what the next steps are.
I think my immediate next tier between JSI and SCHD is something that involves equities rather than debt. Something like JEPI or SPYI seems to fit the bill fairly well. I'm also looking at PFF, but I don't love the Oracle exposure.
birb_cromble
2d ago
I guess I could buy that in the "everything is political" sense, but what does that leave? Sports betting?
birb_cromble
2d ago
What are some of your predictions for the five years, and why do you think you're going to be right?
Hard mode engaged
- No politics
- No war
- No AI
- No immigration
I'm confident that low waisted jeans are going to make a raging comeback in the next couple of years. Not only is the cyclical nature of fashion heading in that direction, but the prevalence of GLP-1 products and will negate the unspoken reason that high-waisted mom jeans got popular.
birb_cromble
2d ago
I'm in a weird place with AI, professionally. They're pretty much worthless in my job for agentic work, but as a better search engine they probably provide low single digit productivity gains to my work as programmer.
Unfortunately, any gain they provide to me, personally, are fucking obliterated but the damage my coworkers inflict on the codebase with it. They uncritically trust it, and they blindly approve AI PRs. At this point, I'm spending more time unfucking the output of gpt and Gemini then I am actually doing original work.
Management is thrilled at how many new PRs and lines of code these new ai-native programmers are creating.
birb_cromble
3d ago
I'd probably start by using Mitchell v. City of Henderson as a template. Start with a heavily armed, hierarchically structured federal agency with an unambiguous power to kill. Have them take over a home for a surveillance operation. Argue that it's not a 3rd amendment violation because of semantic games about what a soldier is.
Boom. Instant drama. Maybe shoot a dog for added pathos.
birb_cromble
3d ago
What are your opinions on covered call funds, like JEPI, vs traditional income investments like bonds or dividend stocks? If you have a shorter time horizon than would be appropriate for something like a whole market fund, they seem to sit at a nice risk/return point. On the other hand, their returns seem to come in the form of ordinary income, which isn't ideal for taxation.
birb_cromble
3d ago
I waited tables and tended bar for years.
I'm thinking more about the restaurant ownership side of things. Unless you own the property, your landlord is going to jack up your rent every year so you're just barely not broke. I know a handful of people who have left the industry for exactly that reason. I might be able to make the economics work with a food truck, but that's about it.
birb_cromble
3d ago
My partner and I are booked for a family dinner tonight, so I made some fresh sourdough bread and hand churned some butter to take with us.
Sometimes I wish that the economics of food service made sense. I don't think I'd mind the long hours and hard work.
Spending is $2,916.38 lower than this day last year. Once the home repair bill goes through this month, I'll probably be even. I hate that I keep losing progress, but at the same time, I've dealt with some very expensive medical bills, home repair costs, and travel due to illnesses in the family without having to cut my savings. I guess I can call that a win.
birb_cromble
6d ago
Firearms are terrible for that kind of thing. Colt, Springfield armory, Kimber, the list goes on and on.
It really seems like "expensive hobby" brands are the worst offenders.
birb_cromble
7d ago
The thing about really big bubbles, and I’m not in any sense calling the top, is that the final run-up is the true test of the investor
I read a biography of Isaac Newton a few years ago, and this is pretty much how he financially destroyed himself. He invested during a bubble, exited his positions at a tidy profit, then watched in envy as his friends with a higher risk tolerance made bank as prices kept going up. He eventually bought back in and things almost immediately collapsed. It really drove home the value of pre-committing to a strategy.
birb_cromble
7d ago
If you ever find that link again, I'd love to see it
birb_cromble
7d ago
At least on the bass guitar side, things have really changed at the lower price points. It used to be that a $300 bass was barely useable. These days, the advent of CNC machining and better QA means that a $300 bass today is probably nicer than a bass that cost $800 back in the 90s. If you're willing to replace the tuners and pickups, it'll compare favorably to an older MIA model.
birb_cromble
7d ago
I'd honestly hold off on Skitarii until it goes on sale. It doesn't feel like it fills any truly unique niche.
It feels like MBA-types are very keen about recognizing a brand-name that has a positive reputation (even or perhaps ESPECIALLY if the brand is all they have, they don't own any manufacturing capacity), and then 'rug-pulling' the fans
Fender is notorious for this. They tend to reshuffle their product lines every year, and this inevitably results in a product line disappearing, only for a new product line with a nearly identical name appearing one quality tier down. It's reached the point where people are starting to catch on, because a lot of buyers on the used market are demanding a manufacturing date now.
birb_cromble
7d ago
Unusual cultivars of beans that you cook with, shipped to your door.
birb_cromble
7d ago
Do you know why the different brands are incompatible? Is it a chemical thing?
What is your rationale for keeping 2/3rds of it? Do you see more upside?
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