evilchili @evilchili@mastodon.social

Hey. I'm a guy in his 40s doing platform engineering at AWS (sorry). I'm married to the best person I know. We're raising twin 6yr old twin boys to be empathetic, careful and considered members of society, I hope. It's really hard.

I dig #music. I drink #coffee. I play #boardgames and run #DnD. I have a half-blind greyhound, Rufus; he's a lovable idiot.

I post random nonsense about my day, music I'm listening to, and what I'm having for lunch.

#introduction

you know how a coupla years back, just as the Outage Machine was really starting to hum, there was this orthogonal push to stop tweeting about your lunch, because nobody cares about your sandwich? that was the thing I loved best about Twitter: people sharing their most mundane, their most regular experiences. It's like a warm blanket, mercifully free of judgement and outrage. I'm no Buddhist, but I really dig the concept of the sacredness of the every day.

I had grilled cheese with bacon, btw.

I should not be allowed near a mixing desk.

I downloaded MIXXX to give it a whirl, pointed it at my library and the CPU fans in my laptop ate working so hard it's skittering across the ottoman like an unbalanced dishwasher.

If you think politics is broken by the need for endless rounds of fundraising, check out an elementary school some time.

#DadOps

good morning my little whack crews.

Before Fergie arrived, before Babu left, before will.i.am. went Full Bono, Dilated Peoples was a crew worthy of respect. #np

current I Have A Cold, Fuckit I'm Making Cookies status:

Capitalism is bad but getting a replacement disk for my NAS in < 2hrs on a Sunday morning is pretty alright.

Daily Question Book: What is something someone told you that isn't true?
Dingus: Sometimes Pops farts and then tells me it was the dog.

#DadOps #🐕💨

This winter, EXTERMINATE cold with this one-of-a-kind hand-knit hat! This unique item is not sold in stores, so go back in time and marry my wife before I do to get yours!

I'm a fifth of the way through Alan Moore's _Jerusalem_ and so far nothing has happened. I've accepted that this is so, and no longer expect a sudden rising action. The prize is the prose: funny, touching, real. #Books

I finished the draft of my very first academic writing, a paper entitled Control Theory for Distributed Systems: A New View Of Operations At Scale.

I've forgotten why I started this and all I know is I never wish to do it again.

Anyway enough heaviness, the boba tea place across the street serves teas in the most amazing Ghibli mason jars. Look at this shit:

Anyway Amazon is complicated, my feelings about it are complicated, and it would be good of we all bought more records from the hippie with the scary basement store full of milk crates than MP3s online.

Hating myself -- hating ourselves -- for being complicit in the suffering of others is unproductive; there's no escaping it. Acknowledge your complicity, do good works and support others who do them too. Love each other.

I am not swayed by "amazon is more evil than X" arguments; there's no purity to find in capitalist entities and no matter where you buy your shoes sooner or later somebody is getting fucked. Selling shit better than walmart sells shit is like the most banal, unimpressive evil a corporation can be guilty of. My labour contributes, but my dollars, even the ones spent elsewhere, contribute just as much or more. none of us are free of sin.

I won't be sorry to see Amazon taken apart, its many pieces spun off and left to succeed or fail without the domineering clout. Hell, nationalize it. Get your taxes owed. We'd be better off.

The article is pretty accurate, I think; never had a meeting with Bezos so no ideas there, but otherwise it is a way better look at the internal culture than the 2015 NYT piece. It's hard working for AWS, as much as I love the job and the people. Probably I'll quit some day.