From prison to software engineer

Hello friends, This week I've been busy recording the Intro to Postgres course that we'll be releasing in the next few weeks. I already have it scripted out and planned, so now the process is just a mere matter of putting it on to tape. Historically, I've kind of done the preparation and recording at the same time, but I'm trying to update my style just a little bit by having quiet periods of work in the morning just preparing. Then when it comes time to record, the process is a lot easier because everything is already prepared and I'm not having to prepare each video as I go. So far, I like this process a little bit better. It separates the work and makes the recording process less daunting. Hopefully I can finish the recording process much, much quicker because I've already done all of the preparation process beforehand. I also [released](https://youtu.be/AEPf9zUI_fQ) a podcast episode this week with a guy named Preston Thorpe. Preston's story is interesting because he is currently in prison and working as a full-time software engineer at a database startup called Turso. His story is really inspiring. After getting into drugs as a young man, he turned his life around in prison and started studying computer science with all of the time that he had inside. Now he earns a salary, pays a portion of that to the state of Maine, and has already bought a house across the street from his parents for when he's released soon. It's a really inspiring story of redemption. Even if you’re not a database person, I’d highly encourage you to listen to the first part of the episode where he shares all about his journey. --- ### Thoughts from the week I want to give you guys an update on my No Social Media Before Noon experiment, and the update is: it has gone fantastic! There have been a few days that I've opened Twitter up at 11:45, but I will give myself a little bit of grace. But on the whole, my life is just much better. It's kind of crazy how much better it is. I come into the office every morning and spend ~30 minutes reading a book, which is wonderful. And then I just… get to work. There's nothing else to do! I'll walk around and kind of tidy up some stuff and then think, well, I'm out of things to do, I guess I'll work. By then, it's 9:05 because I've spent 30 minutes reading and then puttering around and looking at my plants. And then I just get to work. I've also started bricking my phone more in the evenings, and I'm using that time to read as well. I feel like my life has gotten a lot slower, which is a good thing. I am listening to Cal Newport's Digital Minimalism book. I've replaced a lot of podcasts with that. It feels more like one long thought than flitting around between thing to thing. In the mornings, I am currently reading Reframe Your Brain by Scott Adams. It's a very interesting book on how to basically trick yourself into seeing situations differently to your benefit. Very interesting, I would recommend it. At night, I am reading just the most fascinating book in the world called The Intellectual Life. It was written in the 1920s, originally in French. I'm about 50 or 60 pages into it and I've highlighted something on every single page so far. I didn't really know what to expect going into it. I'm not even sure who recommended it! I have a habit of when somebody recommends a book on Twitter, and it looks interesting to me, I just buy it. At some point, it shows up, and at some point, I'll read it. By then, I've definitely forgotten who recommended it. So if it was you, sorry. I did not realize that it was so heavily religious. It's written by a Dominican monk who shares a lot of the exact same beliefs that I hold. That has been a super nice surprise. I thought it was mostly just about how to get good at reading, learning, acquiring knowledge, and being studious. But it has this whole kind of religious or Christian valence on it that I wasn't expecting, but turned out to be a nice surprise. So things are looking up over here in Dallas, and I'm very happy to report that. There were a tough couple of weeks, couple of months… many months there. But I feel like things have turned the corner. Thanks in no small part to my abstinence from social media and my focus on work and reading. --- 🎬 **YouTube** **Rewriting SQLite from prison with Preston Thorpe** As I mentioned above, I talked with Preston Thorpe, a senior engineer at Turso who is currently incarcerated, about his incredible journey from prison to rewriting SQLite in Rust. We dived deep into concurrent writes, MVCC, and the challenges of building a new database from scratch while discussing redemption, resilience, and raw technical brilliance. Check it out on [YouTube](https://youtu.be/AEPf9zUI_fQ) or your favorite [podcast player](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rewriting-sqlite-from-prison-with-preston-thorpe/id1752196733?i=1000734241970). --- ### Things I found this week *Just a heads up that each Twitter/X screenshot has a link to the original post if you want to go follow the account.* [](https://x.com/thecruice/status/1983654916049514803) I often do this at restaurants where I will ask the waiter to send their manager over because I want to tell them what a good job they did. It's always funny to see the terror and then the relief on the waiter's face when you say, "Hey, can I talk to your manager?" They start to like, you know, they start to freak out and then you tell them, "I want to say what a good job you did." And then they're just incredibly grateful. It's just such a wild swing for them, I'm sure. But you have to imagine that managers only ever hear complaints. So to hear that one of their employees is doing a great job probably goes a super long way for that employee. --- [](https://x.com/wrathofgnon/status/1983448905552671019) [](https://x.com/wrathofgnon/status/1983420474739843223) Rammed Earth is an interesting one to read about. It makes very beautiful buildings, it's very eco-friendly, and it's very energy efficient. I once watched a Grand Designs episode about a guy who built a massive house out of cob, and it seemed like a disaster for him. It took him nine years, but the concept itself was pretty cool. I think part of Grand Designs is the fact that most of the projects are usually disasters 😂 --- [](https://x.com/davidshimel/status/1983583700756353411) This is one of the best framings I've seen on this topic. A lot of people get frustrated with the fact that you have to slightly change your communication style to be successful in the workplace. Framing it as an interface by which people connect with you is probably the best way to get engineers and software developers to understand it. You're presenting an approachable interaction point that is well understood by society. You lower the friction of engaging. You can implement it however you see fit! But the handoff point is clear and well documented. --- [](https://x.com/Aden_Yacobi/status/1982929130514760132) [Simeon Griggs](https://x.com/simeonGriggs) tagged me in this one. We've highlighted the Iranian bricklayers in several past issues, and it seems we're finally learning something from them! How gorgeous. --- [](https://x.com/BrynnPutnam/status/1983268422265049304) This is something I'm very excited to see! When my kids get a little bit older, I'm gonna try to institute sort of family game nights instead of just watching TV all the time. We can play a lot of games and something like this feels like a modern take on board games without succumbing to the modern disasters of social media or algorithmic feeds. It looks like a wonderful way to spend time with the family. I think I'll probably have to wait until the youngest ones are four or five to do this, so it's still a few years off, but I'm looking forward to it. --- [](https://x.com/jlongster/status/1983287590108455385) I want this. Let me know if you need my shipping address. --- [](https://x.com/charlesmiller_7/status/1983184257485881645) This has been the case for me throughout my life, but especially since my Vision Quest. One of the things that I realized on my Vision Quest was that I am prone to procrastinating and distracting myself with Twitter, and having blocked off so much of that in my day, I'm getting a lot more work done, and I feel like life is moving more slowly. I feel more relaxed, and I feel like I'm getting more done, and I think it all comes down to I have less anxiety about the things undone, and I'm just doing them. Give it a shot. --- [](https://x.com/thisisgrey/status/1983545677012508880) Your weekly dose of workspace envy 😍 --- If you’ve been enjoying the newsletter and think a friend may enjoy reading it each week too, please forward it to them! They can sign up to receive it weekly here: . That’s it for this week! I enjoy reading all of your replies, so if you see something interesting or just have a thought you want to share, please hit reply and let me know. Talk soon, Aaron {{ ENV.unsubscribe\_personal | default: visitor.unsubscribe\_url | hyperlink: "Click here to unsubscribe." }}