TL;DR: I got into Stanford's Code in Place, the free intro-to-coding course I'd wanted for a long time, and I'm stepping away the day before my first section. This year I've said yes to almost every free hackathon, event, and program I could reach. Saying no to this one stung, and it got me wondering how long all this free stuff lasts.
The email came on October 7.
Congratulations! We were impressed with your application! This is a formal invitation to join Code in Place X as a student.
I was so, so, so excited. Code in Place is a free, intro-to-coding course from Stanford, and I had been looking for something like it for a long time. I picked my section time before onboarding closed. I started the lessons: if statements, while loops, a program called Secret Code, another called Wholesome Machine. I got through about three quarters of week one.
Tonight, the day before my first section, I wrote back.
Unfortunately, I won't be able to participate in this cohort. Is there a way to delay my start for the next cohort or would I need to re-apply?
I don't have an answer yet.
This one was the thing I wanted
I've shipped a lot this year without writing the code by hand. But I can only check what I can read, and I can't read all of it yet. I wrote about that gap in I Wrote the Code This Time. Does It Count If the Answer Was Wrong?
I've tried to close it before. I passed the Python basics on DataCamp. But a lesson lets me follow along. Code in Place has weekly sections where I would have had to show what I learned. That's accountability, and accountability is the part I have the hardest time giving myself.
So I'm bummed. Not "valuable lesson" bummed. Just bummed.
The weight showed up all at once
Today, for the first time, I stopped and looked at everything on my plate.
| What | When |
|---|---|
| My day job, running court operations for the county | Monday - Friday |
| AWS AI & ML Scholars nanodegree | Through the end of October |
| HR course at Calbright College, portfolio due | Through November |
| Code in Place, first section | Wednesday |
| LA Tech Week hackathon | Thursday |
| My talk for Los Angeles and Riverside Superior Court staff | Friday |
| Another hackathon (waitlisted) | Saturday |
Learning Python on top of that didn't feel responsible. It didn't feel reasonable either.
The talk on Friday is about how frontline court staff can lead AI work. One slide is called "What I'd Do Again," and the last item on it is "stopping when the evidence says stop." I wrote that about AI pilots. Tonight it was about me.
Not every no has been mine
Earlier this year I got accepted into the Graduate Certificate in Artificial Intelligence for Business at UMass Amherst's Isenberg School of Management. I didn't get the AAUW scholarship that would have paid for it, and I couldn't do the program without it. Accepted, and still not going.
That no came from the money. This one came from me. It's the first time I've had to be the one who says it.
Almost everything this year was free
Look back at my posts from this year and you'll see a lot of rooms I got to be in. Here are three.
| Event | Month | What someone else covered |
|---|---|---|
| Code with Claude Extended SF | May | A lottery "golden ticket," a packed room, talks and hands-on workshops |
| AMD Advancing AI 2026 | July | Free registration, the Moscone Center, lunch, keynotes, workshops |
| Build with Gemini Sunnyvale | September | Google's campus, a three-hour build lab, Google Cloud speakers, swag |
What I paid at every one of those: my time and my travel. That's it.
Every event in that table took a room, staff, and a budget. None of that is free to the people running it. It's a lot of infrastructure, and somebody signs off on the bill.
My tin foil hat says the well runs dry
Here's my suspicion, and I want to be clear it's a suspicion, tin foil hat firmly on. It looks to me like companies are spending a lot right now to get curious attendees into a room with their tools. I imagine at some point shareholders ask what they got for it. If they do, I think the free stuff gets smaller.
That's a feeling, not a forecast. But it's been driving a lot of my yeses. If the well might dry up, drink while it's flowing. I wasn't counting what each yes drew from me.
Which made me ask the question I should have asked months ago. Why are they doing this?
My guess is they want those attendees picking their tools. I think that's a fair trade. I came to learn, experiment, and explore, and I did every time.
Code in Place is the first time the math stopped working. A hackathon takes a weekend. A course takes every week.
The price of the opportunities didn't change. My capacity to pay that price did.
Free still costs time, and this week I don't have any left.
What happens now
I'm leaving Python alone until things calm down. After Friday's talk, and once Scholars wraps at the end of the month, I'll have more headspace. I asked about the next cohort. If I have to reapply, I'll reapply.
If you've said no to a free thing you wanted, I'd like to hear how you made the call.
Is the well drying up, or am I just tired?
Maybe both.
Written with AI assistance in October 2026. The suspicion about the well is mine, not a prediction.
AI Assisted. Human Approved. Powered by NLP.
Top comments (1)
I always like your visual creativity and your simple communication, the image is instant tell the core of your story!
When I look back I also feel some outer pressure, but thanks to Lord somehow I can survive and finally I'm able to communicate my exsistencial jurney in 10 sec:
TS + |> to hack JS
because that is show, how can I balance in those two well + real world activity.