I've been using this account as my primary for about a week now, and I'm think I'm settled on using it for the foreseeable future, so I guess it's time to do another #introduction post.

I'm a dad of four kids, and a web developer. I have a college degree in #Theater (or #Theatre) and had aspirations of being an actor. I kind of fell into web development as a career. It was a hobby back in high school, and I just needed to pay some bills after college, so I ended up doing this.

I always have aspirations to do other things, but for now, I'm pretty happy spending most of my time as a dad and husband.

Some day, I'd like to get back into #acting, or maybe do some #VoiceActing. I also enjoy #writing and will, from time to time, post some #MicroFiction, usually from somebody's #WritingPrompt.

I love #StarTrek, and usually watch at least one episode nearly every day. I like all #SciFi really, though, as well as #fantasy. I used to read a lot, but find I don't have as much time or mental capacity for it as I used to. I also enjoy watching #anime, and have really been enjoying the new episodes of #Bleach lately.

Feel free to follow me if you think we have similar interests, and I may follow you back, if I think likewise.

#WebDev #PHP #BackEnd #Laravel #introductions #Parenting #DadLife

I recently read through the Inclusive Language Guide put out by the Academy Software Foundation (part of the Linux Foundation).

I think this is a great guide, and I went back to it today to check myself on a term I regularly use, but is specifically singled out in this guide as being ableist. The phrase is "sanity check". I assume the ableist implications here are obvious, so I wont' go into that.

But I'm having trouble with an appropriate alternative. The alternatives suggested in the guide (validation check, consistency check, logic check, gut check) don't quite match up for me.

I would normally use this phrase like this: "Hey, Vanessa, could you have a look at my code? I think I've got everything here, but something is bugging me about it; could give me a sanity check?" Everyone I work with understands that usage. By it, I mean, "Can you make sure that I didn't miss something obvious?"

For now, I think I'm just going to say that: "Can you make sure that I didn't miss something obvious?" But it's pretty wordy, and I'd like to find a more concise way to say that that would be easily understood by other developers without having to use all of those words.

Any suggestion?

#AskMastodon #AskFedi #AskFediverse #BoostsWelcome #Inclusion #StayWoke

I'm having heart surgery this week. It's a pretty common procedure with low risk and high probability of success, but they are cutting my chest open and tinkering with my heart, so it's not nothing.

But, my five-year-old, since learning that I was having trouble with my heart, and the doctors were going to help it, has been super adorable. Multiple times a day she comes up to me and kisses me on my chest, because she wants to kiss my heart to make it feel better. She brought me some water last night telling me it was good for my heart

#Parenting #KidsSayTheDarndestThings

This is a hate crime, and also looks like it slaps.

#Oldies #MillennialMusic #OverTheHill

Yesterday, I got a text from an AI recruiter called Riley from Apex Systems. It said it was reaching out about a backend developer position, and if I'd like to hear more, to reply "CALL" to receive a callback from it.

I was tempted to get the callback out of curiosity, but the whole thing was just too weird.

Since I didn't reply, it followed up today with an email with more information about the job. The job was using a language I've never used before, it was a contract position (I currently have a permanent position), and making just a bit more than half of what I'm currently making.

So, basically useless. And the fact that it addressed me by my proper name (Daniel), when I go by Dan everywhere online and on my resume made it so much weirder.

I would describe myself as an AI skeptic with serious concerns about the technology, but I don't complete dismiss out-of-hand. I use an AI coding agent from time to time, and brainstorm with ChatGPT regularly. But I don't think I'll interacting with any AI recruiters any time soon.

It might as well be a robocall.

#AI #AIHeadHunter

Here I am at 6am, sitting on the floor of my 8-year-old's bedroom, quoting René Descartes, in an attempt to convince him to get out of bed and get ready for school.

#Parenting

Reinstalling macOS:

• You have 3 hours and 30 minutes remaining
• After five minutes: You have 1 hour and 15 minutes remaining
• After twenty minutes: About a minute remaining
• Two more hours: About a minute remaining
• Until the heat death of the universe: About a minute remaining
• Startup chime

Can I just say how annoyed I am by Elon Muskrat naming his AI Grok? "Grokking" has been a word that I have used since I read Stranger in a Strange Land (probably about 30 years ago), and I really don't like that it's going to be redefined to mean "Asked Twitter's AI bot".

#ElonMusk #𝕏 #Twitter #Heinlein #Grok