The past two weeks I’ve spent a lot of time traveling,
read two books,
and need to write an article.
This is probably what an urban fake adult intellectual is — “reads on the plane, writes on the high-speed rail.”
(I)
Last week I finished reading “Dollar Cost Averaging Ten Years to Financial Freedom.”
Besides learning about various broad-base indexes and various terms,
phrases like “ten years”
function like periodic mental massages,
making the -15% total return I see in my account look benevolent.
Just as Buffett said:
“You have to be alive to have output.”
Whether your annual return is 5% or 10%,
the longer you live, the higher your overall return.
Of course, when your first item in the void is a Heart of Tarrasque,
“you have to be alive to have output” is not strong evidence.
(II)
Speaking of Dota, I can’t help but lament that I’ve been playing less big games recently.
People used to lecture me: “What’s so fun about games? When you grow up you naturally won’t like playing anymore.”
Now I realize, games are something I want to play even if I have to squeeze time for it.
Recently I only have enough time to play “Arknights,” a Shanghai-local game.
But it’s funny — my interview comment two years ago “I like Arknights”
actually got me to know my good friend Dr. Bear.
So every month when I top up the monthly card for Hypergryph,
I tell Dr. Bear with a straight face:
“I just paid your man’s salary, no need to thank me!”
(III)
“My salary includes a share for me.”
I also say this to hulucc who works at Lilith.
But this ambiguous come-on doesn’t work,
he won’t give me a kickback.
Just when Mia was looking for job opportunities,
she asked me to ask hulucc:
“Do anime-style game companies’ HR really not need to cosplay mandatorily?”
As a professional middleman conveying messages,
like the student in middle school who helps pass notes but always opens them to look:
calmly think, give up thinking, loudly praise, good! Cosplay is great!
(IV)
Mia’s job-hopping path has been pretty long.
Some American said:
With each year’s promotion, everyone gets promoted to a position they can’t handle.
Mia has worked hard at her current company for over three years,
getting promoted all the way, her direct boss has changed four or five times.
This causes the positions she’s looking at now, with 5 years of work experience, to require 7 or even 10+ years.
“How about we count overtime hours and make it ten years?”
I suggest this terrible idea from the side. Mia neither approves nor disapproves.
But being criticized for being too young and inexperienced
is really a happy worry.
Not like coders, who are always criticized for being physically inferior to young people.
As if writing code is youth-only food!
There’s absolutely no such logic in this world!
My ancestors have all been programmers!
I can at least last till 36!
Mia hurriedly comforts me as I’m having an accelerationist fit:
“It’s fine it’s fine, I’ll support you later.”
(V)
Maybe because we’ve been adults too long,
recently Mia and I have been discussing the topic “how to work healthily for fifty years.”
After brief exchange,
we tentatively decided that I’ll be CEO later
and she’ll be HRD as our division of labor.
Given the workplace rule “do not date HR at the same company,”
we’ve also basically determined we won’t work at the same company.
This goal is very clear,
like only needing 700 on the college entrance exam to get into Tsinghua.
Let’s go!
But as the saying goes “more retreats means more paths.”
I also arranged a fallback in case I can’t be CEO:
I can go deliver food for Meituan.
After all, I currently know how to scan bikes to unlock, am familiar with elevator button presses and cancellations, and know the inquiry phrasing of “can I mark this delivered early?”
(VI)
Dreams are dreams, jokes are jokes.
Thinking seriously, the future path still requires personal responsibility.
When I used to walk with Mia at SJTU,
we’d imagine whether one day one of us would study while the other supports the family.
Recently I found the timing was right,
so we developed the idea of applying for part-time MBA.
After all, in celebrity autobiographies,
they all seem to have a phase of working and studying at the same time.
“So the question becomes: where to do MBA in Shanghai?”
Hearing this question, without thinking I answered:
“Of course SJTU! Or do you want to be a free and useless soul?”
My sin.
Apologies to the Fudan souls who are affected.
(VII)
To apply for MBA you first have to understand MBA.
MBA stands for Married But Available,
many people find their first or nth true love through this program.
But this is a problem only after getting in, not important.
During the interview,
there will be three fixed-pattern questions:
“Why are you applying for MBA? Why our school? What’s your five-year plan after MBA?”
These questions must be well rehearsed,
and you should repeatedly ask yourself and repeatedly answer.
So every day I’m muttering in Mia’s ear:
“Idle is idle, SJTU is close to home, we can decide after we finish…”
Luckily Mia has developed immunity to my mischief-loving self.
(VIII)
In elementary school I liked watching a show called “Believe It or Not,”
where they’d half-truthfully tell four stories,
then have guests and TV viewers guess which one was real.
I also like telling friends stories like these,
e.g., spaghetti is actually a deity of a religion,
the 14th of every month is Valentine’s Day,
dialing 12 zeros at 12am on December 12 will get you “sorry, this number is not in service,” etc.
Over time, the colleagues and friends around me also developed immunity.
I hope through my efforts in the future,
all Chinese can be this confident, self-aware, self-strengthening,
have resistance to rumors,
not believing nor spreading rumors.
(IX)
The Beijing-Shanghai high-speed rail has just passed Jinan.
This time in Beijing I had a brief reunion with ldsink/allen.
Before I knew it, their startup has been going for several years.
We all lament that time changes so fast.
My previous company had quite a few 10-year veterans,
but at my current company there’s not a single 10-year veteran,
shivering in rage, the internet industry that eats people changes blood too fast!
……
Of course, the same logic applies to post-90s programmer friends:
SHOCKING! So far, not a single post-90s programmer has lived past 40!
(X)
At the start of the year,
a good friend at the company asked me:
“How have you stayed five years at this company without leaving?”
I went on about company-and-individual co-growth, correct strategy and slow-is-fast, the from-zero-to-one interdimensional journey.
My friend got dizzy listening, and could only ask:
“So actually you’re still bullish on the company?”
I paused thoughtfully, calmly speechless, gave up on inference, blurted out plain words:
“Of course! If I felt this place wasn’t good, I’d have left long ago!”
In some sense, work and dating are the same.
No matter how you list pros and cons,
when you love, you love,
when you don’t love, you don’t.
(end)
Besides investment books,
recently I’ve been reading “Red Star Over China” (alias “Red Heart Shines on China”).
In the book’s chapter “The Origin of a Communist,”
my associations kept popping up.
At one moment “The Golden Fishhook” pops into my mind,
at another “Little Radish Head” awakens memories.
There are many things
that at the time were ordinary people doing ordinary things,
but in retrospect become more fragrant with age,
condensed into stories that can be passed down.
This is probably the charm of time.
(end)