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InitialsDiceBearhttps://github.com/dicebear/dicebearhttps://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/„Initials” (https://github.com/dicebear/dicebear) by „DiceBear”, licensed under „CC0 1.0” (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)IN
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  • 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.

  • 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.

  • 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.

  • I barely made it through the great recession.

    At one point, I was down to my last $500 USD which didn't even cover the rent coming up due in days, most of my calories were coming from fruits and veggies I was literally collecting from the wild, looking at eviction, and with no job prospects when I was so desperate that I begrudgingly accepted the worst job of my entire life (so far).

    I fought my way into a better job and career over the years, but continued to live like a dude who was only a month or two away from homelessness. I did not take extravagant vacations, wear high end clothes, drive a flashy car, own an expensive home, eat fancy meals, buy lots of "toys". Aside from electronics, almost everything I owned was second hand or gifted to me. People constantly made judgemental comments about my lifestyle, clothes, car, and so on.

    By the end of 2024, I was almost at the point of feeling financially secure in life, considering making some big upgrades to my lifestyle.

    Then in 2025, I got laid off after more than a decade from a company that religiously referred to its employees as family. No warning. In fact, up until that point, all we were hearing was lies (ex: we're doing okay financially, we planned for this sort of thing, etc). I had 10 years of top scores on evaluations, 10 years of impeccable project work, 10 years of raving reviews from my peers. And yet, when the least little bit of financial difficulty reared its ugly head, I was cut in the first round of layoffs.

    Fortunately for me, I sacrificed and lived quite frugally over the years, so I just don't give a shit about the job market right now. I'd love to have a job, I feel like I'm basically living off of money that could be my retirement, but at the end of the day fuck Trump and the flailing Trump economy. If I have to go 10 years without a job, it's going to suck, but I've got this.

    On the other hand, I feel horrified for many of my coworkers who got laid off at the same time, and for the majority of people in general who have lost their jobs because of Trump and his sycophants. Most of them either didn't get a chance to prepare or didn't have the foresight to prepare the way I was privileged enough to do.

  • I bought a handful of cheap / deep discount games during the Summer Sale this year.

    One I wasn't sure about was BIOTA. Turns out it's been more fun than I expected for such a simplistic game.

    I've also been playing Blasphemous. I really like Metroidvanias but these "souls like" style games are irritating to me. Still, it was cheap and I can appreciate the aesthetic.

    I'm looking forward to having more time to play these games, as of yet, it's been like 20 minutes here, 30 minutes a few days later, so it's hard to make much progress and enjoy them with such limited time to dive in.

  • I told my neighbor's dog she was a good girl so she went back home, picked a giant bouquet of daffodils, and then personally delivered them to me at work that afternoon.

    And if you posted that story on certain social media sites, you'd get thousands of upvotes and fawning comments from people who seemingly believe your fake as shit story.

    So I support this image, because it feels like a nice, polite degree of mockery on this trend. And at least it's not as dangerous for the critters as sticking poisonous flowers into the mouth of the family pet for social media clout.

  • me irl

    Jump
  • In my part of the world, there are at least a dozen+ culinary and/or medicinal mushrooms that are distinctive and easy to identify (even by casuals like me). These don't really have any dangerous look-a-likes that also grow in the same area. I stick to those and those alone. Granted, even at 12 or so species that I can ID, that's probably like a tiny fraction of the number of different species that exist in this area.