The Lazy Programmer

Hello strangers,

I figure the first post should elucidate how I came to be a programmer. As with everyone’s story, my tale could be quite a long one. I’ll try to only include the important parts.

Starting from a young age I was always quite lazy. On every homework assignment from middle school through most of high school, I would take shortcuts and procrastinate. As you can imagine, this backfired a number of times, but was I was successful enough in my lackadaisical attitude that it persisted for quite some time.

Eventually, I landed myself in a math class which allowed and required the use of some programmable calculators. Upon learning that these calculators could be used on a test, I immediately investigated how I could save notes to said calculator. I stumbled upon creating programs for it, where initially I constructed functions for very basic things such as performing the quadratic formula when provided variables. I found this extremely helpful and gradually learned to make more complex programs. My math teacher eventually caught me sharing these programs with my peers. I fully expected to be punished for how trivial they made some of the questions we would be and had been given. Instead, this teacher took the opportunity to tell me of a programming class available to me the next semester. I rebuked the idea, saying I probably wouldn’t be very good at programming. I simply created these programs in order to make my work easier; I made them because I was too lazy to actually do the math. He then told me that laziness of that kind is exactly what’s needed to do well in programming.

I ended up taking the programming class and understanding what he meant. I learned that I was good at using programming in order to come up with an efficient solution to a problem. Continuing to program my calculator, I made it do the work I was too lazy to do. I also delved into making my own puzzle games on the calculator and found that fun as well. Ultimately, I decided to pursue programming as a career.

I now work as a web app developer for a startup in California while earning my bachelor’s degree in Computer Science. I like to think I’ve since grown out of my adolescent laziness, but I still relish in finding efficient ways to solve puzzles and problems through programming.

-Dustin Ficenec