Willingness to look stupid
&gt; Going into an Apple store and asking for (and buying) the computer that comes in the smallest box, which I had a good reason to want at the time<p>&gt; The person who helped me, despite being very polite, also clearly thought I was a bozo and kept explaining things like &quot;the size of the box and the size of the computer aren&#x27;t the same&quot;. Of course I knew that, but I didn&#x27;t want to say something like &quot;I design CPUs. I understand the difference between the size of the box the computer comes and in the size of the computer and I really want the one that comes in the smallest box&quot;, but just saying the last bit without establishing any kind of authority didn&#x27;t convince the person<p>&gt; I eventually asked them to humor me and just bring out the boxes for the various laptop models so I could see the boxes, which they did, despite clearly thinking that my decision making process made no sense<p>Oh c&#x27;mon, that&#x27;s not fair. You have to tell us what the goal was. :) I&#x27;m super curious what a CPU designer wanted with the &quot;laptop that came in the smallest box.&quot;<p>Perhaps smallest box = smallest laptop = they wanted to study the form factor. But does the smallest laptop really come in the smallest box? And did the results of this experiment influence your future CPU design decisions? I feel like this arc deserves its own page.