Ah, it was intended as half tongue-in-cheek. Making light of tough situations is usually for the best.

Sorry for not making that more clear. My smiley face budget had already been reached by the latter portion of that post. Anything exceeding one smiley and you end up looking like you're on something, especially on HN. Heck, even just one can be suspect!

Yes it's better to be misunderstood, than to use too many smileys.

Case in point: I'm not sure if your comment was genuine snark, or if you simply refrained from adding a smiley.

It's turtles all the way down. :)

I like that philosophy. Try hard but have low expectations. Makes it harder to get discouraged, when things inevitably don't pan out.

Or it's just a healthy portion of self-deprecating humor.