Just say no. Decline meeting requests. Set your own priorities. It’s not like they can fire the guy who operates the CI and apparently the physical security systems as well while still writing code for high priority projects.

Having a mentor like this is unfathomably valuable. The kind that knows exactly when a printer problem should be fixed with a sledgehammer and are not afraid to apply the “fix”.

Imagine asking a person a math question like what 2 times 3 times 7 is (without you knowing the answer). If that person immediately goes like „42“ you‘ll most likely think that it’s a joke response and the person doesn’t take your question seriously. If however that person takes a few seconds to think you are much more likely to believe the answer.