Things I learned from my father about work
WIP;
When you get stuck, go for a walk
When you get stuck in a computer problem, it is better to go out for a walk.
My father used to have at least two small cups of coffee every day. One in the morning, which sometimes he would let me sip a little, and then another one in the afternoon. As an example he said to go to the bakery and order a small coffee. I could imagine him walking out of the office in bright daylight – something not so common in the old days – and stopping by the balcony in a local bakery, lightning a smoke and ordering a small coffee.
If you got angry with soemone at work, or with your boss, then that was another good time to go for a walk.
He said many times when he returned he found the solution to some problem with networking, programming, operating system, mainframes… I can attest to what he said. It really works.
He told me this before I joined the workforce, probably by early 00’s. I remembered this today, 26th May 2026, after reading this Hacker News post “Taking a walk may lead to more creativity than sitting, study finds (2014)”.