No, his mind is not for rent

To any god or government

Always hopeful yet discontent

He knows changes aren't permanent

But change is

- Tom Sawyer by Rush

Let's take a page from the code reviewers handbook:

LGTM

[] Yah [] Nah

Spicy mustard. Yellow is acceptable for chili dogs (only).

As a general rule, I don't eat ketchup. My wife and kids love it, but I rarely have it. I normally eat my fries with nothing but some seasoning salt, but thick steak fries demand vinegar.

A good work environment is extremely nice. But there needs to be a pathway to getting the big bucks. That might be a worthwhile conversation to have with your boss - what he needs to see from you to get promoted. Arm yourself with average salary information and ask what it will take for you to get there. And in a small company that might not be totally in your control. Could require a certain amount of growth or whatever. But if you have a great work environment and a great boss I suspect he'll be open to that conversation.

The problem with small shops, and I have a lot of experience here, having spent my first ten years in a development shop where I was the only developer, you need exposure to other environments, other ideas, other technologies and frameworks in order to grow.

I would be looking for other jobs right now. It might take a while in this environment (I've got 25 years experience and been out of work for 3 months, so it's rough finding a job now) and you aren't going to really grow while you're stuck where you are, unless you are learning from an expert in a lucrative niche (and that's still dangerous long term if that niche dies - I spent half my career on Lotus Notes and worked hard to redefine myself as a Java dev).

If it takes you a year to find the right opportunity, it's best to start now, right? That said, you're a junior developer and it takes probably 5-8 years of experience to become a senior dev and command a reasonable salary.

I'm not going to address your question, but I will say I married at 23, divorced at 30, and married again at 37. And I'll tell you I didn't know what real love was until I married my second wife. I have 5 kids now (3 step) and while life is far from perfect, I'm pretty happy with what I've got.

I can also tell you that your projection of your own lack of self esteem is incredibly unattractive. Learn to love and enjoy yourself and the rest might follow, but until then I can tell you that the way you talk about yourself presents a person that would be very difficult to enjoy being in a relationship with. Your defeatist attitude just sucks any kind of positive energy out of the conversation. You don't have to change that and there is no guarantee of reward if you do, but you should probably acknowledge that you are in fact choosing to be far less inviting than you could.

When I was a young teen, I watched my grandparents' neighbor die of a heart attack in his boat. He leaned over - I thought to get a life jacket or something - and his boat just kept circling backwards. Not much to say. It took the ambulance over an hour to arrive. There was a very small pool of blood, maybe 2-3 inches in diameter, on the floor of the boat.

That's it. Nothing exciting or traumatic.

Oh I missed your reference! Nice!

Have you ever heard of teledildonics? I guarantee if there was a demand, you could eat that. It could be programmed to respond to where and how fast you perform. It would be multi-functional so you could enjoy the devices in other ways.

I agree with your conclusion, but not your reasoning.

I'm sure you're right. I was just being an asshole in good fun.

I saw a video about AI girlfriends, which people definitely think they have right now, and it pointed out that they are just you reflected back at yourself through a funhouse mirror. And that strikes me as being a very apt explanation.

So could you be your own friend? Your own lover? If that's not satisfying to you without AI, I think you'd find AI to be just as shallow and wanting.

Captain Marvel?