What Is Your Favorite Mouse

When your microcontroller doesn't explode but you're still suspicious... That's embedded systems for you! These brave souls are out here writing code where a single misplaced bit can turn your smart toaster into a small fire hazard. The constant fear of setting a power pin high when it should be low is the embedded programmer's version of Russian roulette. No smoke today? That's not reassurance—that's just the calm before the electrical storm. The hardware isn't working? Good. The hardware is working? Suspicious .

Computer scientists: "Let's discuss if this system can solve any computable problem!" Me, a practical developer: "Cool theory bro, but can it run Doom?" The "Can it run Doom?" test has become the unofficial benchmark for computing devices since the 90s. Forget your fancy theoretical computer science - if your toaster, calculator, or pregnancy test can run a demon-slaying game from 1993, that's when you've truly made it in tech.

The eternal tech support paradox strikes again! Every programmer has experienced that moment of internal conflict. First comes the righteous indignation: "I write code, I don't fix printers!" Then the pause... because let's face it, we do know how to fix that printer. Not because our CS degree covered "Advanced Printer Troubleshooting 101," but because we've spent years debugging cryptic error messages and reading obscure documentation. The printer is just another poorly designed system waiting to be conquered. We'll fix it, but we'll be silently judging the manufacturer's UI choices the entire time.

Nothing says "responsible parenting" quite like abandoning your child with a mainframe computer from the 1970s and a COBOL manual! This is basically the programming equivalent of leaving your kid with dinosaurs as babysitters. That poor child is about to learn that semicolons aren't just for English class and that punch cards were the original "swipe right." The ultimate character-building exercise: debug COBOL or no dinner tonight! Honestly, this might explain why so many banking systems still run on ancient code - those traumatized children grew up and refused to ever touch the code again.

Nothing quite captures the shock of watching your $1000 GPU melt like a surprised Pikachu face. You bought that fancy RTX card knowing it had "issues," yet somehow expected different results? Classic definition of insanity right there. The real kicker is how we all act surprised when technology with known defects does exactly what everyone warned us about. Next time just set your money on fire directly—at least you'll save on the electricity bill.

The ultimate dual-purpose code! When room temperature drops below 23.5°C, start mining Bitcoin to generate heat from your overworked CPU/GPU. Otherwise, just chill for 10 seconds before checking again. Genius solution for winter utility bills - your computer either warms your room or conserves energy while waiting for the next temperature drop. Modern problems require modern solutions that make your electricity bill skyrocket in completely different ways!