This is what I hate about going on vacation. I never know how many kimonos to pack. General guideline is 3 per evening, but it seems like every trip I always end up having to rewear a garment at least once.

Is there a name for this video artifact effect in this image? I’d love to see a bunch of this.

It reminds me of the early 2000’s digital satellite television. Any time the signal got blocked a bit by the weather, the on-screen content would do this. Very trippy. Later on when cable tv in my area switched to digital, I noticed it happening there, too, but nowhere near as often as in satellite. Now that over the air is all digital where I live, however, I almost never see this happening anymore. I guess it’s not a thing that happens as much with modern encoding formats.

In two different cases where I’ve disputed part of a charge/order, the credit card company returned the money for the entire order like you said. I was surprised they did that, and didn’t realize that was the norm.

On the one hand, I never wanted anything I extra that I didn’t deserve. On the other hand, both times this has happened to me, the companies at fault really, really went out of their way to deserve it. Not necessarily scam level deserved it like this hotel’s smoke detector scam, but still.

Cryptanthus

It’s interesting that now the narrative is that all these words are being censored due to advertisers.

By my memory, at least some subset of these terms was being self-censored because they were triggers or considered offensive for other readers / users of various sites and people were trying to protect others by avoiding words that upset them. That’s what I was told about words like rape, suicide, and profanity like fuck, removed, etc. At the time when I was first noticing a strong trend towards self-censoring, most of the sites I was seeing it on had little to no advertising, particularly not from major brands, so this while that may be the reason for the trend to continue, I’m not convinced that’s why it started or how it became widespread.

People hoping that are likely ignorant of what AI actually is. It’s incredibly unlikely that AI “ends”, at least not if/until things get really bad on a societal level to the point where our species loses its ability to produce and use technology altogether.

YOU DON’T KNOW HOW LITTLE I CARE ABOUT PUSSY THOUGH

Dozens of accounts, yes. But probably only like 3 or 4 real human people if we’re being generous.

It will be interesting to keep an eye on this.

Granted, if I had a dime for every article I’ve read in the past 5 or 6 years spelling out the signs of impending economic doom, I could easily buy a tank of gas for my car.

Having barely survived the aftermath of 2008 myself, it does stress me out to realize that it could happen again and soon and worse. I’d like to think I’m better positioned to handle things now, but as they say in France, shit happens. And it’s stressful knowing that other people will have to go through what I went through and worse.

It’s also unfortunate that official data makes things sound stable(-ish), but on the ground and admittedly in my own little bubble, people are not so optimistic. Manufacturing plants have shut down, people are getting laid off left and right, budgets are getting cut to bare bones, all while prices on daily things like food and energy have spiked.

On the topic of the title: In my own case, I didn’t even pay all of my debts, all it took was to pay off my student loans. My credit score dropped 30+ points from that and has never recovered since.

And to all the liars who said some variation of “it’s just a temporary drop” … You are liars. That is simply not true, at least not for everyone, and you lied. Maybe consider stop giving advice about things when you’re clueless.

And to anybody who might consider listening to those clueless liars, please note that a whole lot of the advice you might read from people online is coming from clueless liars.

Okay, I’ll end my rant there.

This is a variation of an idiom that goes something like “if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will think it’s stupid”.

But as someone who used to raise killifish, I actually found out that there is at least one species of fish that can climb trees.

That’s a spicy meat-a-ball.

Howdy “relative” neighbor.

I’m also in the southeastern USA and I’ve driven by the peach more times than I care to count.

Is failing. Has failed. Same difference I suppose.

A broken clock is right twice a day. At least that’s a saying in my part of the world.

There’s already a term for this, it’s called moonlighting.

Every full-time salaried job I’ve ever had prohibits moonlighting, and specifically calls it out in the employment contract I’ve had to sign when starting the job.

Having said that, I am unemployed directly and entirely because of Donald Trump. Although I have no plans to return to work in the immediate future (because I was privileged enough to be in a position where I was able to save for a rainy day like this), when I return to work I am considering doing this.

As long as I’m making my deadlines and producing quality work, my employer should not give a crap whether I have other jobs. Period. I’ve spent my entire career so far working with bosses that tell me I’m family, but treat me like dirt and discard me at the very first sign of an economic downturn. They are all the same. So, when you treat people like disposable cogs, don’t be surprised when and if those cogs fit a variety of different machines.

To a certain extent, this is why I am trying to stick with a mission driven career, choosing opportunities that I feel actually make some small part of the world a better place. Granted, yes, I’m ultimately doing the job because I need the paycheck since I prefer to have food, shelter, and some degree of freedom/control over my life.

Not everybody has that luxury, though.

And expecting people to play pretend all day as though it’s anybody’s life dream to be typing up OBMC reports because that’s their passion in life and that the people they work with are family and that the ultimate goal of being the dominant player in the disposable widgets industry is for the greater good of humanity – yeah, whatever that’s just subversive mind control games. Glad some people can live in that and deny reality, but for the rest of us, you want me to work, then pay me.

Nah, USB DeezNuts

My current “provider” is an NP. I like her, she’s personable and does the basic stuff well enough. I can understand having her do the basic annual physical type stuff for relatively young and healthy people.

But, for one of my recent visits, they scheduled me with a doctor instead (dunno why), and the experience was honestly almost night and day for the better. Granted, the way my health insurance works (ugh USA), the NP visits only ever cost me a flat amount, perhaps $45 for the copay. The doctor’s visit cost me the $45 copay, plus additional coinsurance down the line that I got billed a couple of months later because the clinic apparently charges two different rates depending on whether you see a doctor or not, I guess?

It came as a huge surprise for me, but wool blankets are surprisingly comfortable in hot weather.

I’m hot natured and I cannot get good sleep when it’s hot. Sometimes even a cotton sheet is just too much for me. But, somehow, a wool blanket is noticeably cooler feeling to me when I’m hot. I don’t understand it, yet I’m not the only one who has experienced it.

I also like the weight of a wool blanket. Something about that is quite calming. Obviously, they’re also great in the cold seasons, too.