Life has been busy lately—full, productive, and constantly scheduled by work, everyday responsibilities, or plans I made for myself. It’s not that everything has been bad, but there have definitely been a few things recently that made me want to vent.
The misery of inheriting terrible code
First, work. That part is normal enough. Things have been especially busy lately, and I’ve ended up taking over quite a bit of legacy code.
I really have to wonder what kind of mindset produces code like this just to save time. For the person who has to maintain it afterward, it’s enough to send your blood pressure through the roof. The structure is all over the place. I can put up with that. The naming conventions are a complete mess. Fine, I can tolerate that too. But the part that really gets me is when everything is dumped onto a single page—one page, seven or eight thousand lines long. Even dragging the mouse to scroll through it feels exhausting. I’m honestly amazed at the eyesight and patience of whoever wrote it. For that, all I can say is: bravo, bravo, bravo!
People say the old generation plants trees so the next one can enjoy the shade. That’s great. But when the people before you dig a hole and the people after you have to fill it in, that’s a very different story.
That said, complaining is one thing. I’m still relatively new to the field myself, and who’s to say I was any better at the beginning? In the end, all you can do is fix things little by little.
Funeral noise right next door
Then there’s what’s been happening in my residential complex. Someone passed away, and for the past couple of days there’s been nonstop drumming, gongs, and firecrackers. It’s happening in the building right next to mine, and the noise has been brutal—enough to make a person feel genuinely worn down.
Let me be clear: this is not disrespect toward the person who died. I’m only talking about the situation itself.
It started around 10 p.m. last Friday. I had just started drifting off to sleep. Nights are usually fairly quiet, so when firecrackers suddenly went off downstairs—my apartment isn’t on a high floor—it scared me badly. My daughter was startled too and immediately started crying.
The moment it happened, my heart sank. When you hear firecrackers that late at night, you know what it usually means, and you also know it probably won’t end quickly. Around here, once something like that starts, it often goes on for at least two days. Sure enough, the firecrackers kept going on and off through the night, and it wasn’t until around two or three in the morning that things calmed down a little.
The next day was even worse. Firecrackers all day, drumming and banging all day. There was no staying at home, so we had to go out just to get away from the noise.
And then there was this morning. Mondays already feel tiring enough, but around three in the morning the funeral procession started, with firecrackers and ceremonial cannon blasts continuing until five. There really isn’t much to say about that except that it was miserable.
Running on no sleep, then getting blocked in
After barely resting and already feeling irritated, I ran into another problem inside the complex: someone’s car was parked in a way that blocked the road and made it impossible to get through.
I was already short on time. There’s road construction all over my commute lately, and there’s no easy way around it, so traffic is bad to begin with. I’d planned to leave earlier for that reason, only to be stopped by a car parked carelessly in the middle of the way. Nobody was inside. It’s just low-quality behavior, really. The road doesn’t belong to that person. You can’t just leave your car wherever it suits you and act like no one else matters.
When I park, my first choice is always a proper parking space. If there truly isn’t one, I’ll pull off to the side—but at the very least I leave enough room for other people to pass. To me, this is completely a matter of personal consideration. You may think, “I’m only stopping for a few minutes to run upstairs and grab something,” but why should everyone else be forced to wait for you?
In the end, it’s simple: make things easier for others, and you make things easier for yourself too.
The road feels dangerous everywhere
The commute didn’t get any better after that. I was driving straight through an intersection with the light, and a car trying to turn cut directly in front of me. That sort of thing is common enough. Usually I just shift a little left and avoid it.
But this driver took it even further and swung straight into the innermost lane in one move. This was a one-way road with four lanes, and I had no choice but to slam on the brakes. If dealing with the aftermath of an accident weren’t such a hassle, I might have just hit the gas and gone right into him.
Driving lately really does feel like an exhausting long-term challenge. Danger seems to be everywhere.
I’ve been driving for five years and have never had a scrape or an accident. What I’ve learned is that avoiding hitting other people is actually the easy part. The hard part is making sure you don’t hit anyone and they don’t hit you either. That takes a whole different level of awareness.
So really, the only thing to do is drive carefully. Don’t hand your life over to someone else’s judgment, especially when everyone expects everyone else to yield first.
There are honestly a lot of frustrating things in daily life right now—at work, at home, on the road, everywhere. All you can do is stay alert and keep adjusting your mindset as best you can.