I use AI for very little but I do like using it for stuff I'm just not very interested in but have to get done.

For programming, I don't like it. It's like a master carpenter building furniture from IKEA. Sure it's faster and he doesn't have to think very hard and the end result is acceptable but he feels lazy and after a while he feels like he is losing his skills.

The best days of computing for me were what you remember. A computer was just a blank slate. You turned it on, and had a ">" blinking on the screen. If you wanted it to do anything you had to write a program. And learning how to do that meant practice and study and reading... there were no shortcuts. It was challenging and frustrating and fun.