A couple of things I should probably point out: the SXSW was supposed to be a team trip and the point was for everyone to have the experience of interacting with a bunch of top notch startup people (we aren't from the valley) and I only proposed it a few weeks ahead of time after we had a lot of people telling us that it was the single most useful thing to attend all year (I didn't even know about it before then). Only two of us ended up going, but that wasn't my intention.
When we landed the YC interview, it meant flying from NYC to LAX for a ten minute interview. We were told that only I needed to fly out, but I said everyone should go because they deserved the trip. This was obviously not the cost-efficient approach, but I think it was a lot better for the team.
As for the Goldman comment, I find this to be a typical programmer retort to any questioning of what they are doing: "If you're so great, why don't you do it yourself?" In fact, I didn't question what he was doing for way too long precisely for that reason, and I think that was a mistake. Now as for doing it myself... there are some areas of technical knowledge that I do not have, which is why I brought people on. Now that I'm on my own again, I'm doing my best to get it done myself.
Hey, you probably wouldn't want me as a cofounder, fair enough. I appreciate the better luck next time comment though.