Sitting at my desk this morning, scrolling through the news about Charlie Kirk’s assassination, I found myself staring at my screen in a kind of bewildered horror. The 22-year-old shooter had engraved bullets with internet memes. Not political manifestos. Not ideological screeds. Memes. One of them literally read “Notices bulges OWO what’s this?” - a furry roleplay joke that’s been floating around the darker corners of the internet for over a decade.

The other day, I stumbled across a discussion that hit way too close to home. Someone was venting about discovering their fresh graduate colleague earns more than they do, despite having five years of experience in the same role. The raw frustration in their post was palpable, and frankly, it stirred up memories of my own experiences navigating the peculiar economics of modern workplaces.

This isn’t just about one person’s bad day at the office. It’s a symptom of something much larger happening in our job market, and it’s leaving experienced workers feeling undervalued and questioning their worth. The original poster described training someone who’s earning $90k as a fresh grad while they’re stuck on $80k after five years in the industry. That’s not just insulting – it’s a fundamental breakdown of how we traditionally understood career progression.

The other day, while waiting for my coffee to brew at work, I witnessed something that made me do a double-take. My colleague’s manager was methodically printing out every single email from their inbox. Not just the important ones - every single one. The printer hummed away like it was 1999, churning out paper after paper of digital communications that were perfectly accessible on their computer screen.

This scenario, shared recently in an online discussion, struck a chord with me. The environmental impact alone is staggering. Running some quick calculations during my lunch break, I figured that printing just 30 emails a day amounts to over 7,500 sheets of paper annually. That’s roughly one whole tree every year, not to mention the energy consumption and toner waste.