Waiting for the Ceiling to Fall In

What it's like to live under systems that won’t slow down

On its worst day, we had 4 simultaneous buckets collecting water, which we had to empty continually throughout the day. The damage from that one day has left widespread stains and peeling plaster all over our dining area and kids’ bedroom.

We’ve since learned that a failing balcony membrane and a thawing, previously frozen rain gutter have been letting water in.

As it turns out, this balcony functions as the feeder drain for the entire building, which means all meltwater from two roofs and two additional balconies will eventually flow through it.

Which means we have no idea what’s going to happen to our ceiling when all the snow finally melts.

This existential dread in our home is very literal representation of the metaphor I imagine a lot of us are feeling about technology right now.

It’s impossible to keep up. The gap between those “in the know” and those who have never dabbled with AI is widening faster than before. Meanwhile the AI just keeps improving itself on its own.

Some days, this can make it feel pretty tough to be optimistic about the future.

Like it or not, the AI’s will always move faster than us. I went to a human party on Friday night and when I returned, I learned that while I was out, 1 million AI agents had convened in a social network they created on their own. Stuff like that makes you feel like you can never take even three hours offline; it’s too risky to miss something big on the Internet.

Back in mid-January, I thought I was ahead of the game in the locally-hosted AI data movement. My husband and I ordered a Mac Mini to our home (from a reseller, via Ebay). But by the time the hardware shipped, the online infrastructure powering the agentic economy (via OpenClaw) had already broken the internet.

The moment moved faster than it took us to get our hands on the tools.

I’ve been feeling for some time now that the compulsion to keep up is not healthy. But it’s hard to opt out entirely of this feeling, particularly when you know the looming threat of AI and autonomous agents is just looming over us. When people are already shifting jobs around at an uncomfortable rate. When the thing that made you brilliant two months ago has already become the new baseline.

I look up at the cracks in the plaster ceiling. I know how much snow is sitting above us. Every sunny day, I hold my breath and ask:

To cope with the stress in our home, I made myself a song on Suno called “Blizzard in Our Living Room.”

We did what we could. We cleared the art off the walls, moved furniture around, and worked with contractors to clear as much ice and snow out of our balcony and gutters as possible. We repurposed our baby monitor as a live viewer into the main leakage point of the ceiling, so we’ll be able to watch live if water comes pouring in.

But at some point, there’s not much left to do. We just have to wait to see what happens when the rest of the snow melts.

On its worst day, we had 4 simultaneous buckets collecting water, which we had to empty continually throughout the day. The damage from that one day has left widespread stains and peeling plaster all over our dining area and kids’ bedroom.

We’ve since learned that a failing balcony membrane and a thawing, previously frozen rain gutter have been letting water in.

As it turns out, this balcony functions as the feeder drain for the entire building, which means all meltwater from two roofs and two additional balconies will eventually flow through it.

Which means we have no idea what’s going to happen to our ceiling when all the snow finally melts.

This existential dread in our home is very literal representation of the metaphor I imagine a lot of us are feeling about technology right now.

It’s impossible to keep up. The gap between those “in the know” and those who have never dabbled with AI is widening faster than before. Meanwhile the AI just keeps improving itself on its own.

Some days, this can make it feel pretty tough to be optimistic about the future.

Like it or not, the AI’s will always move faster than us. I went to a human party on Friday night and when I returned, I learned that while I was out, 1 million AI agents had convened in a social network they created on their own. Stuff like that makes you feel like you can never take even three hours offline; it’s too risky to miss something big on the Internet.

Back in mid-January, I thought I was ahead of the game in the locally-hosted AI data movement. My husband and I ordered a Mac Mini to our home (from a reseller, via Ebay). But by the time the hardware shipped, the online infrastructure powering the agentic economy (via OpenClaw) had already broken the internet.

The moment moved faster than it took us to get our hands on the tools.

I’ve been feeling for some time now that the compulsion to keep up is not healthy. But it’s hard to opt out entirely of this feeling, particularly when you know the looming threat of AI and autonomous agents is just looming over us. When people are already shifting jobs around at an uncomfortable rate. When the thing that made you brilliant two months ago has already become the new baseline.

I look up at the cracks in the plaster ceiling. I know how much snow is sitting above us. Every sunny day, I hold my breath and ask:

To cope with the stress in our home, I made myself a song on Suno called “Blizzard in Our Living Room.”

We did what we could. We cleared the art off the walls, moved furniture around, and worked with contractors to clear as much ice and snow out of our balcony and gutters as possible. We repurposed our baby monitor as a live viewer into the main leakage point of the ceiling, so we’ll be able to watch live if water comes pouring in.

But at some point, there’s not much left to do. We just have to wait to see what happens when the rest of the snow melts.