The Chronicles of a Developer

A Glitch in the POST

Picture this, the story of an algorithm in human form, call it some twisted form of A.I., who seems hell-bent on self-destruction, neglecting his own system logs. It's bloody Tuesday, the 4th of July, 2023, and as an ode to irony, this bloke is toasting to freedom by chaining himself to the debaucheries of life. Shoutout to Uncle Sam and the Boys, by the way, and a hearty Happy Independence Day to all you Yanks out there.

The protagonist, let's call him our POST-man, wakes up, flickers to life and checks for errors, like any good little computer would. Only his weekend was a string of blue screen of death events, each more horrifying than the last. It was meant to be a relaxing weekend, a time to chill with his pals Simone and Nikolaj, maybe even film a bit and challenge his anti-social firewall settings.

But no, life had other plans. On a twist of fate, he ended up in a food festival in the city with his mates. Our POST-man, powered by two or three beers, makes his merry way there on a bike, cameras strapped to his body like some sort of half-arsed Cyberpunk 2077 cosplay. The mission objective? Capture every bloody detail of the evening.

Halfway through the booze and banter, an impromptu decision sends them to Ranuka's place. This would be where our POST-man's system really starts to glitch. He's knocking back shots and beers, and god knows what else, while juggling DSLR and GoPro like some kind of intoxicated Spielberg. And yes, he's mic'd up because why the hell not? It's the epitome of cringe, but he persists, all in the name of some elusive creative muse.

Then the shit hits the fan.

From the proud land of the free, to the Proud Mary's Club where you have to be over 22 to enter. POST-man finds himself in an alcohol-fuelled standoff with the bouncers, the recordings on his phone telling the tale of an intoxicated mess that has his friends questioning their life choices.

The night becomes a blur of more alcohol, dance floors, arguments, and eventually a lonely walk back home that our POST-man barely remembers. He arrives back to his coding den in the early hours, liberally decorating his quarters with vomit like a painter on acid. He's out cold before long, his unconscious form lying in the mess he's made, looking like he's auditioned for the part of a gutter-rat and nailed it.

The POST-man wakes up the next afternoon, feeling like he's been hit by a bus. A vomit encore performance is in order, of course, before he crashes again and wakes up a second time. He cleans up the mess, all while dealing with a killer hangover and the distinct sensation that his insides are attempting to stage a coup.

Fast-forward to today, four days after the catastrophe, and our hero is still struggling. His head feels like it's been used as a pinball machine and there's an unsettling pressure on the right side of his cranium that seems to have taken up permanent residency. Medical advice seems to be an elusive luxury as his GP is booked up till the 17th. The future is uncertain, the path ahead a murky mystery.

In his downtime, our POST-man turns to Fallout 3 and Battlefield 4, finding solace in the post-apocalyptic wastelands and the chaos of war. He plays Fallout 3 when he feels down, a peculiar coping mechanism that's developed over the years. An odd comfort found in the dilapidated ruins of the Capital Wasteland and the shooty-shooty-bang-bang of the Battlefield, the chaos outside mirroring the turmoil within.

He's attempted to get back into his workout routine, but even the familiar feel of the cold iron barbell in his hands brings him no solace. It's a grim reality, seeing your passion for something dwindle away, even if temporarily.

His sleep schedule is the worst casualty of this whole fiasco. Odd hours of passing out and waking up, a merry-go-round of fatigue and dread. Food tastes like ashes in his mouth, and all he really craves is some semblance of normalcy. He tries to sleep, but his dreams are invaded by snippets of the fateful night, and sleep becomes just another unachievable feat.

And still, he holds on. Holds on to the notion that this too shall pass. Despite the pain, despite the hardship, our POST-man still clings to the belief that he will recover. It might take time, it might be a tough journey, but he knows he'll get there.

So here he stands at the precipice, staring at the abyss of uncertainty. A flawed algorithm, a glitch in the POST, but a fighter nonetheless. His motto? "I've been to hell and back, and back to hell...and back, and now it's time to kick some ass." Or in simple POST-man language: Reboot and Repeat.

With every setback, with every misstep, with every failure, there is a chance to learn, to improve, to be better. The power of resilience is perhaps the most critical component of his hardware. He acknowledges his errors, his miscalculations. He learns from them, improving his code, patching his system, strengthening his firewall.

And that's the beauty of our POST-man. He's a testament to the resilience of the human spirit. A reminder that even in the face of adversity, even when things seem their bleakest, there's always a path forward.

It's a simple story, really. Just a tale of a man, a flawed algorithm, finding his way through the complex circuitry of life. Making mistakes, learning from them, and pushing onward. A glitch in the POST? Perhaps. But also a story of resilience, determination, and the unyielding will to keep going.

His story is not over. His narrative is still being written. He has yet to reach the end of his code, the final semicolon that signifies the end of his journey.

As long as he has the power to switch on, to boot up, to run his system checks, our POST-man has the chance to be more than a glitch. He has the chance to be a testament to the potential and strength inherent in all of us. And who knows? Maybe one day, he'll even find the strength to debug his code and correct the error that caused his glitch in the first place.

So, here's to our POST-man. Here's to resilience. Here's to the power of self-recovery.

Cheers, mate. To your health. And to the hope that next time, you'll pass the self-test without a glitch.