Good catch, I forgot that one! And the other classic is having waste excreting plumbing and reproductive plumbing all bunched together.

So many poor “design choices” in human anatomy. (Note, I know there’s no intelligent design).

The optic nerve. External testicles. Lack of decent fur. The way some nerves and blood vessels are routed make zero sense. An immune system that often wants to kill you. The list goes on. I’m sure a biologist or medical person could add plenty more. Many animals have some of these traits, too. If some trait or process is just barely good enough, nature will chug along with it for millions of years. Nature is all about some redneck engineering.

Started paying off debt, saving, and investing consistently over 25 years ago. It has really worked out, and my wife and I are more financially secure than most. Even still, we’re one health crisis away from potential bankruptcy, because we live in the United States.

I remember reading a very long (but fascinating) 11 part series of posts a couple of years ago on reddit about scummy stupid Blizzard. Here it is, if anyone still cares.

https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/riq4fq/games_world_of_warcraft_part_1_beta_and_vanilla/

I feel you. My thoughts often spill out that way, too.

Lots of compound sentences. And a “tone” suitable for USA Today. At least, that’s the vibe I get from ChatGPT.

“Pardon me, do you have any Grey Poupon?”

If the frog starts singing the Ozempic song, do you punch it across the room?

The standard answer is “security”…and that may be true in some cases.

But a lot of it is just job justification. Some beleaguered coder somewhere has to do a thing because their manager has to do a thing because their director has to do a thing and so on. Box checking exercises.

Yes, I have noticed a lot of activity in that community! I do some resin printing myself. Most folks in there appear to be using filament, but I’m grateful they are so active.

It’s not too surprising that some dedicated DIY 3d printing “maker” type people gravitate towards the fediverse.

Fastmail is pretty great, and it lets you create masked email addresses for throwaway purposes if you need one.

I speculate in many cases, suicide bombers are supplied with their equipment by a sponsoring organization, and don’t build it themselves. Obviously, some of them (like the lone wolf types) do make their own. Someone who is knowledgeable with explosives might be too valuable to sacrifice in the attack. Whereas almost anyone can deploy the weapon, it doesn’t take much skill.

I’d love to see more users / activity in the non-political niche and hobby communities. That’s my holiday wish.

Very few sane people want to hold office. The truth of the job is that it’s almost nonstop fundraising. The system is intentionally broken to keep money in power.

Noted!

Hope you enjoy it!

Thanks for the guidance, I was checking out those gift boxes!

Book banners bringing attention to books that scare them is galaxy brain in action.

Yep. It sucks. My doc joked that we all have rocks in our heads, har har.

It can sometimes be treated with a simple technique (more info below, also mentioned in the article above). When it works, it brings amazing relief.

Unfortunately it doesn’t always work. An ENT specialist can help you with it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epley_maneuver

Thank you for posting this! There is a local spices place I really like, but they have stopped producing almost everything. They’re down to a couple of blends.

Is there a go-to herb, spice, or blend from Penzeys you’d recommend for holiday gifts?