So here's my situation and what I'm trying to prepare for. My mom is currently sick (we think it's an infection), and last night she fell and threw up, scared me half to death. She says she's fine(ish) now, and we're waiting on test results. It got me thinking how she said I'll inherit her Siamese cat breeding business and it got me thinking a lot about it.

I'm wanting to divide what is currently a purely aesthetic room so the queens can have more room for their kittens who then won't get to hide under/in the couch (yes, inside the couch, because they tore holes in the fabric underneath it, apparently) whenever I try to show them to customers.

I want to divide my dining room from the entry way, where the front door leads into the living room, so the cats don't escape out the front door. Imagine a hallway (12 to 14 feet long) from the front door to the living room (and it's a double wide doorless doorway connecting it to the living room), but one wall of the hallway doesn't exist, and instead opens fully into the dining area. I haven't measured yet, but I'm estimating it's around 12 to 14 feet across, and 9 or 10 feet tall.

I'd like to use something budget friendly (ofc), like plexiglass, acrylic, resin, whatever. Something fully see through (or as see through as possible) so the customers can see them immediately. Proper glass will need a whole installation process and will add to the cost. Also, I'll want to add a door to this new "window wall" so the customers and I can walk in and out, and preferably have it be a sliding door, since I think this is the option that will be the least likely to pinch a kitten.

My dad suggested a garage screen door, with magnetic closing, made of fiber glass mesh, but I can already tell the cats will eventually tear it up and make it look ratty, and also slip out from under it most likely.

We can't use normal room dividers because our cats can sometimes jump from the floor to the top of the fridge, and room dividers are too flimsy. Also I'm not sure how to fasten a door to them (maybe I could just open them, but idk).

I've also half-way crossed any meshes, cages, or fencing off my option list because it looks ratty imo. Btw when I say "ratty" I mean it will make me look like some backyard breeder or someone who doesn't care about her cats. I don't want my kittens to look like inmates lol. But cages/metal bars are a last resort, because I need something, as right now my mom has them set up in what I personally consider to be cages that are far too small to keep the mother cat in 24/7 for 2 to 4 weeks. The mother cat can just about lay down once you have to put the litterbox in. (It's the vertical one with the 3 tier platforms, with wheels and a bottom tray that you can find on amazon)

I've looked all over amazon, just window (lol) shopping/browsing for ideas on what I could use, and omg. Either inflation is horrible, or I'm severely out of touch with what a "budget" option for this project would be.

I've even gone so far as to consult ChatGPT, who was not really that helpful.

A list of things I've thought about already are:
-Garage screen doors (cats will eventually scratch through and slip under)
-Sliding barn doors (for the end of the entry way that leads into the living room, instead of dividing the dining room, but this would give the kittens and queens access to the front door when people go in and out)

• Those DIY metal grid panels people use to build storage furniture (ratty looking, and kind of expensive, but is my last resort as it seems to be the cheapest option I think)
• Ordering a proper glass window wall (this would have to be properly installed into the house, which would cost too much)
• Normal room dividers (too flimsy, too short, no door option)
• Chain link fence segments (definitely ratty looking)
• Decorative metal/PVC room divider modular panels that hang from the ceiling (I can't seem to find a version that has ample visibility without giant holes the kittens could slip through)
• Just building a bigger cage (more expensive than just building a wall out of the panels, and again, it's ratty looking)
• Using clear acrylic modular panels with holes in the corners, chained/tied together to hang from the ceiling (it's an option, but I'm not sure if it's the best in terms of aesthetics & cost, and idk how to attach a door that way)
• 3D printed prefab wall panels (not see through, and idk if/how I'd fit a door on it)
• Prefab floor to ceiling windows (expensive, heavy, needs proper installation I think)
• A clear, plastic tent piece, large enough for a patio (that would also look bad, since it's shiny and most likely will get scratched up)

I may be forgetting some options that I considered already, but I'm a complete novice at construction and home improvement, so I figured you guys probably know something I don't. I need a true barrier, that is preferably as clear as possible.

Even if you think your idea isn't all that good, suggest it anyway because I might be able to springboard off of it. This includes ideas relating to stuff I've thought of already.

Update us on your progress so far!

• What did/didn't you get done this week?

• Anything go according to plan?

• Anything go off the rails?

• Any successes or struggles to share?

• Do you need feedback or help on anything?

This is your topic to share anything and everything you want about what you’ve made so far.

my old regular app has been dead since it got underwent featurecreep and got bought out by underarmour.

lots of apps now have way too many features.. social this, calorie burning that. i know its probably a good thing for them to branch out but i'm one of those luddites that prefer simple and to-the-point apps with no social features, no account needed, etc.

all i really need from the app is gps distance tracking and a clean interface with some basic readouts for pace and whatnot. having audio readouts for pace every kilometer was a nice feature but ideally the app would be simpler than that.

if all else fails i know i can just fallback on one of those 'full featured' apps like strava but i figured i'd ask here before i got too tied into any particular app (creature of habit)

I love fried chicken sandwiches. I have loads of fast food options as well as one off restaurants around me that offer fried chicken sandwiches, some that it is their claim to fame. It doesn’t seem to matter where I go in search of the best fried chicken sandwiches, or how much money I spend, Popeyes is always the best.

Two topics to start discussion:

1. What is your favourite fried chicken place where you live? Bonus points if you live around Vancouver, BC, Canada and can introduce me to a new favourite chicken place.

2. What does Popeyes do to get such consistency across all locations, and why the heck is it so good?

Here's a first world problem: I work remote and sometimes I get bored during meetings. Wondering if you guys had any game recommendations for games I can play on a second monitor or something while I kill boredom in my meetings. Mouse only is probably the biggest requirement, and also something more "turn based" so if I need to I can still pay attention to the parts that I need to.

Some of my recommendations:
Slay the Spire (+ Downfall) - I "beat" all of it (A20H for all characters) so I wanted to take a break, but I loved it.
Monster Train - I didn't get into it as much as StS tbh, it's fineeee but not my personal favorite
Super Auto Pets - I'm not really an Autobattler kinda guy but the slow pace and the rotating sets make this game kinda perfect for what I'm looking for!
Brotato - I've been playing mouse only, but can't really stop it in the middle of an intense run tbh.

Steam or Android games if possible!

I'm in the market for a set of dishes. The consensus is:

• Corelle - lightweight and solid
• Fiestaware - built to last

I'm not a fan of either unfortunately. Not because these brands are bad, but I'm looking for a particular look. Something akin to stoneware with a darker color. I also prefer heavier dishes. Unfortunately stoneware is known (or said) to chip easily. I'm not looking for something that will survive being dropped (I don't remember the last time I dropped a plate). This is the first selling point that gets brought up I've noticed.

What did you choose and what has been your experience? Has your stoneware chipped after washing & stacking?

EDIT
I forgot to provide more details about my situation to help with recommendations.

• I'm in the US
• No family/single, but plan to host for a small group on an occasion (~4 people)
• I'm starting from scratch and would like a set that works in all situations + everyday use. I'm willing to splurge (assuming it's quality and lasts).

I signed up for a class from Udemy. Udemy makes tech classes you take at your own pace. The lessons are many short videos with lectures and some practical exercises.

I signed up for a class that will prepare me to take a certification class for a skill that will help my resume. Complete worth it.

I am about 2/3 done.

The thing is I've getting frustrated and mentally run down.

The course is voluminous. The going is slow.

I know the thing to do is to forget about finishing, forget about the results, and just focus on enjoying each lesson in the hear and now.

I enjoy taking notes, I am good at it, and I find reviewing notes to be soothing/meditative.

I still get frustrated and demoralized.

Worse, I always thought if I got a lot of time to learn something I would sit down at it 8 hours a day and blow it away. I get wiped out at about 3-4 hours. I'm kicking myself for this which isn't helping.

Any advice, commiseration, or success stories?

Our extended family lives in the same city and we're always getting together (brother/sisters-in-laws, their kids). So basically our generation and our kids. Probably 13-15 of us.

We meet maybe once or twice a month, but whenever we meet, kids just go do kids things, dads go over here, moms go over there. One of the dads invariably falls asleep, one or two of the kids kind of mull about not quite fitting in here or there.

I was wondering if any of you had any ideas for something that can be done together that might help build memories or at least structure some time so that there's meaningful interaction and we can get to know each other better instead of defaulting to whatever is least effort.

The only constraint is that is has to be that it's an in-home, indoor activity suitable for teens/pre-teens.

I was stubbornly determined to get my new Yubikeys working for FIDO2 SSH on WSL, which led me down the road to compiling my own custom Linux kernel for WSL with HIDDEV and HIDRAW enabled.

This was my first time ever trying anything like this, and by the end of it I realized that it's not actually so scary to compile your own custom Linux kernel!

Have you ever compiled a custom kernel before? What was the sequence of events that led you to do it?

Choose one series
that you love
that you think deserves more love

Tell us what it is, and why.

Welcome to the inaugural MangaLove post. Passively being exposed to new manga and anime is one of the things I've missed most about Reddit, so this is an effort to bring some of that spirit to Tildes.

Many thanks to @kfwyre and their AlbumLove series in ~music that I plagiarized was inspired by.

Additional Details

What I mean by short/immediate thinking vs. long-term.. let's take the experience of learning a new skill (for example, riding a bike). In the beginning, the skill is difficult as you're carving out those new neural pathways in your mind. It's grating, unnatural, uncomfortable. It seems that the rational way to think about this experience is "yes, it feels uncomfortable right now, but if I keep attempting this, eventually the discomfort will lessen, and it will get easier. It won't be like this forever." For myself (and I assume some others?), I instead get stuck in a mindset of only seeing the present moment: "this sucks and therefore it will always suck!" Yeah, I can catch myself thinking this way and correct it to consider the long-term, but that's not my default. My default is short term, now, only now.

You could expand this to so many things: enduring temporary struggles and not letting them get you down (the situation isn't permanent, it will change), not partaking in addictive behaviors (deciding not to do something that might feel good, because you're considering the long term consequences), procrastination... list goes on and on. To me, it always seems rational to consider long term impact of your actions. If you don't, it seems you're blowing off this entire swath of information which could/should inform your decisions in the present moment.

On the flipside, I'm not saying you should only think of the future and disregard the present... just when making decisions, it seems better to consider both, that's all..

I have been trying for 10 months to change this about myself, yet I continue to slip back into this pattern of constant "now" thinking. I know it leads to irrational decisions. I'd love to hear others thoughts on this. Have you struggled with this? If so, how did you manage to overcome these thinking patterns? For anyone: are you more naturally a "now" thinker, or are you lucky enough to naturally consider the long-term, or maybe you bounce between both? I have no idea if this is a common experience, or if it means something is inherently irrational about the way I think.

So, I think I may have a grand solution to this problem and this also extends to similar forums. There's an app called "Friendly Social Browser" and its purpose is to give you one optimized "app" where you can add your sites and social sites you want to keep easily accessible and be able to navigate them conveniently and have everything in one place so you can easily "channel-surf" while maintaining overall context.

It also improves the rendering and allows you to tweak things to your liking. I would suggest it if you can get used to it since it feels a bit more stable than a random unoptimized browser, but its still true to the actual design of Tildes' web format and doesn't really depart from it in any appreciable way other than augmenting its stabillity.

Obviously there's Three Cheers and Surfboard (which is beautiful) but Friendly is a surprisingly pleasant and effective lateral answer to this question and I would encourage folks struggling with this topic to investigate it further and give it a try if possible.

This is kind of silly. I've been tild'ing a lot recently and have come to recognize some other users, and am wondering how accurate my simple reactions are, or whether they're shared by anyone else.

• deimos - Moon of Mars, and also a character in either one of the early Unreal Tournament games or Quake 3 Arena. Uh, also a figure from Greek or Roman mythology or whatever 😅
• cfabbro - "C fab bro" - Identifies as a "bro", and does something involving fabrication?
• douchebag - Expects to get hated on maybe?
• akir - For some reason makes me think of Admiral Akbar from OG Star Wars.
• algernon_asimov - Has been explained. I too love Flowers for Algernon and Isaac Asmiov.
• boxer_dogs_dance - I picture three dogs on their hind legs "holding" each other's forepaws, merrily dancing in a circle. It makes me happy 😅

Sorry if I've forgotten your username! Reply and I'll tell you what yours makes me think, I'm feeling associative.

Album of the Week #3: PUP - The Dream Is Over

This is Album of the Week #3. This week's album is PUP - The Dream Is Over

Year of Release: 2016
Genre(s): Pop Punk
Country: Canada
Length: 30 minutes
Album.Link

Excerpt from NPR

Where PUP's 2014 self-titled debut was a turbulent affair, The Dream Is Over sounds more controlled. Not that there isn't emotional turbulence here — in fact, much of Dream is about disillusionment, growing up and realizing that you can't get everything you want, starting with your bandmates. "If this tour doesn't kill you, then I will," guitarist Stefan Babcock meekly deadpans in the first moments of the album, before the track explodes into a bar-brawling punk sing-along. It's a hell of a way to open, but it's telling that in the moments when PUP's members need each other most — especially when Babcock yells, "But every line, every goddamn syllable that you say / Makes me wanna gouge out my eyes with a power drill" — they've got each other's backs by shouting a response, no matter how thoroughly messed-up.

Discussion points:
Have you heard this artist/album before? Is this your first time hearing?
Do you enjoy this genre? Is this an album you would have chosen?
Does this album remind you of something you've heard before?
What were the album's strengths or weaknesses?
Was there a standout track for you?
How did you hear the album? Where were you? What was your setup?

--

Album of the week is currently chosen randomly (via random.org) from the top 5000 albums from a custom all-time RYM chart, with a 4/5 popularity weighting. The chart is recalculated weekly.

Missed last week? It can be found here.

Any feedback on the format is welcome ~~

Hey, I thought folks on tildes might have some personal experience here. For context - I'm not stuck on the raspberry pi zero, and I'm open to alternatives. I'm looking at it because it's inexpensive ($15), which is my limiting factor right now.

I am curious to play around with pihole to block ads network wide. I'd also love to be able to run a web server to host my website. After some precursory research, I learned that raspberry pi zero w is a good option.

My question is - are there any other things that are good (or necessary) to purchase to go along with it? Asking because I am going to have to buy it online (one of the authorized sellers), and since I'm going to pay for shipping, I only want to make one purchase. So, if there's other things I need to get, I'd love to know.

Alternatively, if you have personal experience with an alternative device, I'm all ears. (P.S. I realize I could just run pihole on my laptop, but I don't want to do that, as I'd need to keep it running 24/7...) I did see some alternative devices (orange pi, for example). But they were all much more expensive ($40 + rather than $15 for raspberry pi zero w)

Choose one album
that you love
that you think deserves more love

Tell us what it is, and why.

Previous posts in series

Additional Details

I want to start reading more, and I'd also like to start avoiding screens before I sleep, so I'd like to get an e-ink device that I can use for reading.

I've never owned or looked into ereaders before so I'm not entirely sure what the general capabilities are in this space, but heres a list of things that I consider important:

• Absolutely essential:
  • I need to be able to put my own files (epubs, pdfs, etc) on the device to read without being forced to go through some marketplace installed on the device (if anything I'd prefer there to not be a marketplace on the device at all, or a removable one, as I would never use it). Files don't need to be added remotely, as long as I can connect it to my (Linux) computer with a USB and mount the storage or pop out the SD/microSD to do that then that's sufficient.
  • I need to actually own the device, none of the techno-feudalist bullshit like what plagues the smartphone landscape. I want to be able to remove non-essential components (e.g. marketplace) and it'd be nice if I could also tinker and install third party software freely. If possible I'd prefer a device that's mostly or completely open and FOSS by design, but I'm aware that might be asking too much. As an alternative I would also be willing to hack the device to get it in an open, FOSS state if the process isn't too complicated and it's well documented, it'd be preferable if it was that way by design but as long as I can get there one way or another I'll be content.
• Would very much like to have:
  • In addition to regular books, it'd be nice if I could also read manga. These tend to be zip/rar files containing a series of images, so I'd assume support for reading things formatted in that way is probably less widespread if it exists at all on dedicated ereader devices.
  • Some kind of lighting so the device is usable in the dark. I don't know how this would compare to the blue light from screens (if anyone knows, please share) but I'll certainly want to use it for more than just before I sleep.
  • Some kind of system to add notes as I read might be nice, I was never good at studying and note taking in school so I don't know how much mileage I'd get out of it but in theory it'd definitely be a boon to organize information as I read or add notes to myself to look into things later or whatever.
• Would be nice to have, can live without:
  • The ability to load music onto the device and plug in headphones to listen to music while I read. Bluetooth for audio devices isn't really something I care about, but might be desireable in case I get bluetooth headphones in the future (unlikely). Unimportant if it has built in speakers or not, as long as I can plug in headphones.

October 1st has already hit in some parts of the world, so Timasomo has officially begun!

Posting in this thread is your official entry into Timasomo. Let everyone know what your actual plans are: what are you going to make?

Once the date turns over to October 1st wherever you are in the world, feel free to start creating!

FAQs

I’m not a child, but I very often eat peanut butter sandwiches for lunch. They’re quick and easy to make, and I can leave them in my bag until lunch and then just eat them as-is. With banana slices inside, it’s a decent meal. I also prefer not eating meat, so it gets points for that too. But it’s not particularly exciting, not particularly well-balanced, and I frankly feel a little childish eating it.

The problem is that I very often have no refrigeration and no means of re-heating. I used to just have leftovers for lunch, but room temperature leftovers usually aren’t the most appealing.

For those of you who don’t buy lunch out, what do you do? Any recommendations for something that’s still tasty after sitting in a bag the whole morning?

There's a good thread going around on Tildes right now about sleep hygiene tips. One of those is making sure you stop using your electronics before bed, to help with circadian rhythms and whatnot.

Determined to make a fool of myself in spite of the above thread, last night I stayed up until 4am in bed reading various junk sites on my phone. As a consequence, I slept in until noon 😭. I don't want to do this anymore! I want a regular sleep schedule... 11-7 or 12-8 would be my dream.

I've tried blocking the problematic sites in the past, and it largely works for me for several months... Until I hit a bad mood patch and get antsy and bored, craving the dopamine hits, wanting to turn my brain off and just scroll mindlessly. (It's very much a self-soothe behavior...)

I think it would be easier to solve this problem if I had an arsenal of things to do that are nice and engaging, but don't involve using a phone or computer. Yet, I'm at a bit of a loss... Seemingly everything involves a computer or screen one way or another these days. I'd love an e-ink device that let's me listen to Spotify or something, but alas, I think I might need to look into low-tech solutions.

What do you do at night that doesn't involve screen time?

Before I visited Suzuka, I found reading people's experiences (mainly on reddit) to be helpful, so I thought I'd post my own thoughts from driving down this past weekend.

I came from Tokyo, driving to Suzuka and parking in one of their official lots, and I stayed at a small resort about 50 minutes by car away from the track. The race tickets, and parking ticket were bought from the official "mobilityland" website, and it was 14,000 yen for a parking pass for the weekend, and I paid I think about 9000 yen to get there, and 6500 yen on the way back in tolls. For two people it worked out to be cheaper then the trains (and more fun to drive it!). They had some cheaper parking options as well in an unpaved lot, but I get the feeling the official parking passes sell out super quick, so you should take what you can get. There was a lot of unofficial lots nearby selling day parking, but I think you'd have to arrive very early to use them since most of them were full by the time I strolled up to the official lots around 9-10am. Speaking of which, if you buy the official parking ticket, you get an exact assigned space to use for the whole weekend, so no roving up and down the lots looking for a space. Also some people were sleeping in their cars as well so that's an option if you want to save on a hotel..

Crowds (cars and people) were managed really well. I was dreading leaving the parking lot at the end of the race, but I got out before it was crowded at all, and was able to make a beeline for the highways.

About the stands, my tickets were in Q1, at the final corners closest to the track. Aside from seeing Logan's accident in qualifying they weren't the best seats. The monitor was absolutely worthless, it was so small and so far away that without binoculars you couldn't tell the position of anyone on the track, or what lap they were on. There was also a pole blocking the middle of the monitor as well which was very distracting. Washrooms were quite far from these stands as well, although underneath the neighboring Q2 stands there was a water bottle filling machine which was pretty nice. Speakers were playing only the Japanese audio, and they have a FM radio station with the same Japanese commentary. I had hoped to get live timings on my phone, but there was basically no internet due to the huge number of people.

If anyone has questions, please ask. Overall I had a great time, although after the exciting Singapore race prior to Suzuka, this was pretty boring by comparison. Max held the lead at the first corner, and he just extended the lead over the whole race. Seeing Perez get retired and then suddenly show up again was really weird/ confusing, also it was good to see Sainz fighting with the Mercs.

So I recently tried to replay Prototype on PC, only to learn that it's essentially incompatible with modern hardware and crashes instantly past the main menu.

I've tried searching other posts on other sites and most people recommend super hero games and Infamous. Well, I don't have a PS, so Infamous is off the table, and super hero games really are not the same. Call me immature, but if I can't massacre civilians in my power fantasy game, it's not really like Prototype.

I've seen pretty much all the AAA games of past and present that get recommended, but I'm wondering if there are any Indie games that aren't at the forefront that I've missed.

I'm not new to two-factor authentication (2FA) as a concept, but available options and how they'd fit into a workflow has always felt somewhat opaque. Everytime I've been required to use 2FA, I've used SMS despite knowing how insecure that really is.

GitHub's 2FA requirement is about to lock me out of my personal account, so I figured it's time to get a grasp on this:

• What second factors are available to me and what do the workflows looks like?
  • Preferably these second factors wouldn't require me to sign up for some associated service.
• What are my options for redundancy?
  • Can I have multiple second factors?
  • Where are you supposed to keep recovery codes? (I've read that keeping them in your password manager essentially defeats the purpose)
• What happens if I screw up and lose my second factor? With services that just have password requirements, you can use your email to reset, are there analogous systems for 2FA?

My examples have to do with tech/media, but it could be anything - old fashioned or "outdated" ways of cooking, communicating, hobbies, or mending things rather than replacing them, etc.

Owning DVDs

Earlier this year my husband and I had an irresistible urge to watch the masterpiece film that is Shrek. I hoped that one of the most popular animated movies of all time would be available at no charge to me, but of course it was not on Hulu, HBO, Netflix, or included with Prime. So that's great, I'm paying something around $50 a month for all these libraries of media, and somehow find myself paying extra whenever I want to watch something specific. Fair enough though, that's part of the deal I guess.

We decide to rent the movie on Amazon for $5. A couple years ago, I'm pretty sure renting movies like this was more around $2-3 and they've been slowly bumping it up. Okay. Everything gets more expensive. We try to start streaming the movie, and Amazon gives us this pop-up that says they've detected the hardware we're streaming it on (it's apparently a bit outdated,) so it's going to choose a specific version of the movie for us, one that didn't use some new technology related to streaming quality. That's fine in itself, but it just got me thinking about how much control these streaming companies have over all of this. My TV is at least 15 years old, works perfectly fine, and I don't see myself replacing it anytime soon. My imagination went the dramatic route, picturing a future where Amazon and its ilk will only stream to newer computers/TVs, either for a legitimate technological reason, or because they've struck a conniving secret deal with the TV manufacturers. Again, dramatic I know, but my point is just the general idea that these companies make all the decisions with streaming; we own and decide nothing.

Ultimately, I realized I could have easily found a DVD of Shrek for $1-2 at practically any used bookstore, and I would have not only saved money, I would have avoided giving my money to Daddy Bezos, and gained ownership of a fairly permanent copy of the movie. And what could be better than the ability to watch Shrek on repeat for the rest of my life?

So basically my husband and I have started a DVD collection. We have date nights at used bookstores and pick up all kinds of unexpected treasures. Childhood favorites we had forgotten about, classics we haven't seen in years, DVDs with extensive special features, some with really nicely designed packaging. For some reason, browsing the DVD shelves is like the fun version of scrolling aimlessly through endless streaming catalogs and not being able to decide what to watch. It reminds me of one of the greatest joys of growing up as a child in the 90s - getting to go to Blockbuster (or in my neighborhood, "Mr. Movies") and frolicking around with your friends/siblings, physically checking out the cases, and debating over which ones are the best (Mom is on a budget, after all.)

I have been pleasantly surprised by how novel and enjoyable it has been.

Owning Music

My second thing started when I realized I really want to spend more time away from my phone. I've also been jogging recently and have been annoyed/confused about what to do with this massive phone that I want with me for music (I try to buy small phones but they barely exist anymore.) Probably inspired by my recent "discovery" of the joys of DVDs, I decided to spend $25 on a tiny, simple mp3 player that clips onto my clothes. A music player that isn't also a social media machine which is connected to the entire world and every human being I've ever known, at any given moment. Just music.

Then I realized that I haven't owned any music (or paid any artist directly for their music,) in at least a decade. I genuinely didn't even know where to buy music at first. The last time I bought music, I was 17 years old and hadn't yet freed myself from the Apple/itunes ecosystem ("freed" myself from it, right into the Google/Pixel ecosystem, of course.) Someone suggested Bandcamp, as when you buy music on there it comes with the option to download mp3s. I've had fun discovering some new artists on the platform. And although I really like supporting artists directly, to make my collection a bit more frugal I've started picking up a couple cheap CDs when we go shopping for DVDs. I just export the music as mp3s with some free software. I'm not an audiophile, and the quality seems just fine to me. Next, I think I'll visit my parents and get some mp3s from their boomer CD collection.

All of this also prompted my husband to dig out an old hard drive of his, which we found had a massive goldmine of all the music he listened to in college (and he had/has fantastic taste in music!) Some of my favorites, plus all kinds of random bands and genres that I wouldn't necessarily think to seek out on Spotify, but they're in my lovely collection now, so why not listen? :)

(A bonus to exploring the old media was finding some ridiculous photos and memes he had saved from college. Bless him and his radical vulnerability, I couldn't believe he was willing to browse the hard drive with me while having no idea what was on it. Thankfully for him, it was mostly just good music, along with photos of sharks with large human teeth photoshopped onto them. He is so pure.)

The DVD/MP3 thing seems like a no brainer now that I've tried it, and I'm sure it will seem silly to some of you, but it simply didn't occur to me for years. Maybe something about my age - being 31 years old, the transition to streaming media happened just about exactly when I graduated from highschool and became an adult. I had no personal DVD collections to bring to my first apartment, and I certainly wasn't going to buy any - Netflix was all the rage, around $8/month, and practically no one actually paid for their own account. And having only purchased one or two physical CDs in my life, I did have a large mp3 collection from iTunes and Limewire as a teenager, but that died pretty quickly once we moved from iPods to phones for music, which happened around the same time. I think I transferred MP3s to my first one or two phones and lost them after that.

Anyway, in a world increasingly impacted by enshittification, with companies relentlessly pushing towards the breaking point of what we will tolerate when it comes to how we spend our time and money, I'm sure there are other "hidden in plain sight" realizations I'm missing out on.

My vacation destinations are already set for the next year, but last night I saw a video about Hoffbrauhaus in Bavaria. It ended up captivating me because it sounds like something really mundane until you look further into it. Learning about the history, the cultural importance, and the general experience of going there really made me want to go.

I live in the Southwestern United States, so travel to me is usually stuff that's in the US or Mexico. One of the trips we're thinking of doing will lead us to Canada for a while. But this part of the world is still relatively "new" and the cultural stuff is just a bit too familliar, and so most of it ends up just looking at pretty views. And I'm getting really tired of nice views.

With that in mind, I'm looking for places to go to add to my bucket list of places that have a lot of cultural value (while hopefully still being accessible to a clueless American) or perhaps has more sensual elements like interesting regional cuisine or visiting a famous historical bathhouse. I know there's tons of places that fit that description, but surely some of you have some favorites you'd like to recommend.

Apologies if posting before October is truly upon us is frowned upon, it's been a while and I don't recall the etiquette! This post is going to be a bit of a brain-dump about how I've gone about allocating my time towards Timasomo 2023. It might come across as a bit self-indulgent, which is not intentional. I think talking about processes is valuable, and hopefully others who are figuring out what they want to do for this year and how to find the time for it may find some inspiration as well.

In my comment on the announcement thread, I mentioned that I don't have a huge amount of time in October that I'll be able to dedicate to the project I'm planning to work on. I decided that I do actually want to get it done, and it'll be a good exercise in working to a deadline and not being too much of a perfectionist.

So I needed to figure out how to allocate my limited time towards the creative process in such a way that I should (hopefully) be done by 31st October. During my masters degree, we were gently guided towards breaking down each of the component tasks of writing the dissertation and creating a gant chart for the project, allocating the time we thought we'd need towards the project. I decided to do something similar for this project as well. It's a useful skill to be able to take a large project and break it down into individual tasks, and being able to estimate how long each chunk will take is helpful as well.

My project is to arrange, record, and film video of me playing a metal version of Reel Around the Sun, the opening tune from Riverdance. It's been an idea rattling around my brain for ages, and I think it should be doable in the time. I'm intimately familiar with the tune already, which helps massively. So that means that there are 4 overall stages of the project:

• Arranging
• Recording
• Filming
• Release

Arguably the Release stage is implied, but I felt it was good to have some time set aside for the actual process of putting the tune out into the world, and posting here for the showcase once it's done. I broke down each of those main stages into smaller portions, typically per instrument:

• Arranging
  • Guitars
  • Drums
  • Bass
  • Keys/other

And so on for each of the first 3 stages, with a few extra bits thrown in for better coverage (mixing and mastering under Recording, for example).

The next stage was to put the month of October onto a gant chart and to start putting things onto it. I split each day into two parts to better capture days where I can put time in during the afternoon but not the evening, and vice versa, and started blocking out the slots that I absolutely cannot fit anything into. Due to my work being fully remote I have left most daytime slots for workdays unblocked, since I can sometimes fit non-work related stuff into the day or my lunch break. I anticipate this being considerably easier for certain stages over others.

Here's the more or less finished chart. Grey is dead time, and the palest colours are to indicate where I will need to make time during work or other activities to get the task done. You'll note that there are some where I haven't got a more solid colour, meaning that I am going to have to steal time from work to get those bits done. Where those exist, I have tried to be more generous with myself, giving at least two opportunities for completion. Where I have the less pale colour is time that I can definitely put into the project, so I have gone to my calendar and actually blocked out the time so I don't book anything else in.

Braindump complete! I now have a rough schedule in my calendar and in my mind that I can run with for my Timasomo project. Of course none of it is rigid, it's a guide, not a requirement. Many aspects will naturally take more or less time than I have estimated, but having the structure there has helped me to realise that I can actually make this work. Bring on October!

I've had an interest in 3D printing since first hearing about it many years ago, but at the time printers were expensive and learning materials and resources were scarce. Nowadays, it seems like 3D printing is as common as regular old 2D printing but I feel left in the dust.

What's really making me want to get started now is I've collected a lot of junk over the years that I've told myself I could repair, but a lot of the repairs would be much easier with a 3D printer and custom modeled parts. Dearest to me would be an old watch that my grandfather gave to me before he died. The part of the watch that connects the strap to the case (lugs, I think it's called?) has broken off and gotten lost, and it's a proprietary part with no replacement parts available. I'd love to just 3D-print a solution but have no idea how to get started.

I consider myself a creative person, I have plenty of experience with Photoshop and illustrator, but I have never once dabbled in 3D modeling software like Blender or AutoCAD. The closest I ever got was peering over the shoulder of an artist who was working on a video game character model in Zbrush, or maybe working on custom Half-Life maps in Valve Hammer. So I'm looking for the most basic, easy-to-follow set of instructions to get me from zero knowledge to successfully printing bespoke DIY repair parts at my local makerspace.

Would also love to have this be a discussion on 3D printing in general. How did you get started? How have the tools and techniques evolved over the years? What do you think are the next big things coming in the hobby? What are things you wish you knew when you started but only learned after mistakes were made? Share your thoughts and anecdotes, I'd be happy to read them.

Hello everyone, my CPU died and I'm at a crossroads and hoping for some advice. I bought my rig 4 years ago second-hand. It was originally built in 2017 using high-end parts. It was not something I was looking for TBH, but at the time GPUs were hard to get and it was a crazy deal. Here is what's left of the rig:

• Motherboard - ASUS x99 Deluxe II, fits Intel i7 LGA2011-v3 CPU socket
• PSU - EVGA Supernova 850 T2
• RAM - 32GB, 4 sticks of G.Skill Trident Z 3200 DDR4
• GPU - EVGA 1080 Ti Founder's Edition 11 GB
• Case - In Win 904 plus - large and spacious case
• Storage - Couple of Samsung SSDs
• CPU Cooler - Have ditched the Corsair AIO, picked up a lowest tier fan for $10 to keep it booting while I figure out what to do

Options I'm floating.

1. Get a compatible CPU, but that socket is harder to come by for my MOBO and likely to be second hand + get a new CPU cooler, and upgrade GPU.
2. Replace MOBO, GPU, and get a new CPU and CPU cooler. The PSU is 6 years old but it's decent quality and 850 watts should be enough?

Price range/goals:

• Happy to spend a bit on something that is mid to slightly upper range, but not high end. Thinking $$ will go into the GPU and CPU (maybe $600-800 USD ea?), something reasonably good that's just before the latest gen to get a discounted price. If replacing MOBO, something simple and medium range would be ideal.
• Play some current AAA games like Baulder's Gate 3 and Elden Ring decently, at medium-high settings (not ultra), and don't need super high FPS.
• Ideally supports 4k resolution for desktop use but for gaming I'd be mostly sticking to 1440p/1080p.
• I don't want to overclock (those days are over)
• Likely to sell in 2ish years, don't need heaps of futureproofing
• If replacing MOBO, open to going to the AMD ecosystem for price/performance ratio. I've only ever used Intel so know less about AMD systems.
• Don't need raytracing, DDR5
• For CPU cooler I don't mind AIO but if anyone has any non-water cooled recommendations I'm all ears

I'm at a bit of a loss at what to do, and there are not many PC-building threads here on Tildes, so I thought I'd ask for some advice. Anyone have opinions on option 1 or 2 above, or is there a third option I'm not thinking of? And does anyone have part recommendations? Thanks in advance.

I figure a new thread might be in order since it has been over two months since the last one and we are continuing to get a stream of new users over time.

Welcome to Tildes!

This is a place for you to ask any question you have about the site, from “what is the moderation philosophy?”to “what does that blue line next to some comments mean?” to “what is the general vibe like here?” Tildes has a lot of documentation, history, and embedded social norms that can be daunting or opaque at first glance, so here’s your opportunity to get on-demand, personal help with anything you need.

Questions about anything and everything are fair game. Follow-up questions are encouraged! No question is too simple.

Also, a quick note: the only person who can speak in any official capacity on Tildes is our admin @Deimos. Everyone answering who is NOT him is just a helpful community member!

It is perfectly okay to ask any question — even if you think it’s been asked before, or even if you didn’t search for an answer beforehand. Just ask away, and someone will answer you!

Previous versions:

• v1
• v2

So the discussion at https://tildes.net/~movies/1ar2/martin_scorsese_says_fight_back_against_comic_book_movie_culture_by_supporting_directors_like made me think about mainstream Hollywood way of movies versus - well everyone else? I am not even sure I like the term "arthouse" movies, because movies are movies regardless of the boxes we put them in, but for the sake of the argument movies that don't fall in the category of traditional mainstream storytelling. Is it just French artsy fartsy pretentious weirdness or is (quote) real cinema (unquote)?

I think my movie habits have been pretty average. I am not American, but most of what I have watched during my lifetime have been Hollywood productions. By a huge margin. In recent years I found myself going more and more bored with both movies and tv series from whatever the algorithms at the streaming services were pushing to me. Not that it was bad, just felt more and more like a product designed after a specific set of criteria aimed at my taste demographic. So I forced myself to break out of the bubble and watched movies totally outside my comfort zone with something I am sure the algorithms would never have recommended me. Started with movies by Kieslowski and Wong Kar-wai. And since then I feel like a whole new world of movies has opened up for me. Not that everything is magically great. There are still pretentious French movies that make me roll my eyes, but most of all it is something different. Story telling rules I thought couldn't be broken are thrown in the air and something completely unexpected appears on screen instead.

It takes some getting used to. I really struggled with a good deal of self-doubt whether I could actually understand these movies, because I have studied film theory or went to art school. At the end of the day it is really just about watching things intuitively and trying not to analyze everything or thinking about what things are supposed to mean, and be curious to why the movie does things that maybe the complete opposite of the film techniques I was used to from more mainstream movies.

This is not to bash at the Hollywood blockbuster way of filmmaking, because when that formula works - it really damn well works. But so can something completely different like Hlynur Pálmason's Godland, Haneke's Funny Games or Bujalski's Computer Chess - just to name a few of my recent very compelling movie experiences.

In the corners of Tildes that I read on, I’ve noticed that a lot of us on here subscribe to online services like - Netflix, Kagi, Spotify, Dropbox, Mailbox.org, Patreon, Twitch, Bandcamp, etc.

I, myself, am kind of stingy about subscriptions but lately I’ve been considering subscribing to some online services.

So I’d like to know which online services (like those with monthly and annual fees) have you subscribed to (which tier if applicable) and which ones do you think is worth it and which ones are not?

To get the ball rolling, the only regularly recurring monthly payments I have right now are with Namecheap for the domain and IONOS for my server (the cheapest tier).

I’ve managed to avoid subscribing for entertainment like Disney+ or YouTube Premium or even music streaming platforms. Though I’m considering Deezer for the hifi option.

I’ve at some point subscribed to Patreon, Bandcamp and Twitch for artists I really liked.

And I’m currently looking into productivity apps that might be worth it to me.

—-

PS: It’s my first time posting and if this post would be better elsewhere, don’t hesitate to move it. Thank you!

Timasomo is "Tildes' Make Something Month": a creative community challenge that takes place in the month of October.

This is its FIFTH year (can you believe it?!).

If you would like to participate (or simply follow along), make sure you are subscribed to ~creative.timasomo.

The Roll Call thread will be posted there on October 1st. That is where people will formally commit to projects for Timasomo.

FAQs

This Thread: Planning!

Post your ideas.

Give feedback to others.

Set up collaborations.

Ask questions.

Everything in this thread is non-commital! Bounce around ideas and figure out what you'd like to do in our communal brainstorming session.

Also, please do NOT start work on your project yet! Stage setting, planning, and other preparations are allowed (e.g. getting supplies/materials, setting up workspaces, etc.), but save the creation initiation for the 1st.

Get excited for a FIFTH YEAR of awesome projects!

Recently I've been getting Instagram ads for those "side quest" decks that are designed to make you do more spontaneous things on a day to day basis. Things like, "Go to a local coffee shop you've never been to" or "Talk to a stranger". I've been slowly sinking into the fall season apathy and winter blues and have been looking to spice my life up, but I kinda don't wanna spend money on a bunch of cards.

What are your experiences with spontaneity in your daily life? Anything exciting that has come out of it?

This year I spent a bunch of time in different countries and wrote about it a month ago here

I'm trying to get back into drawing. Ye gods, my skills have gone downhill. As a total pro, I started out drawing a head and went from there with no care for composition and no clue where I'm going with this one—guess it should be some sorta chibi barbarian or something? Anyhows, any suggestions appreciated.

I know I need some darker tones to give it that spatial feel. Some pencil pieces, even if they're merely sketches, manages to get the tones just right. I think some of it is about having degrees of shading, where some smaller detail have even darker shadows. But it is hard to get right, don't even know if there's a word for it.

Here's my sucky drawing!

Veronique Greenwood

Seattle Times - Link to the article

First of all, this is a lot about me and myself and I'm sorry it's a bit self-centered; it's been bouncing around my head and I want to get it out somewhere. Please let me know if this isn't appropriate here.

Secondly, teachers or those in training to become one: I want to hear your thoughts on this question.

Why am I becoming a teacher?

I've been finding that I'm asking this question of myself a lot lately. My goal is and always has been the same for years: I want to teach, I feel good teaching, I feel I have a purpose and that purpose has been what's driven me forward when I wanted to give up. Truly though - why do I want to be a teacher?

I could do the same style of work in other settings. I could become a tutor, self-employed or otherwise, and assist students in a specific capacity. I could be a YouTuber, creating video essays on self-researched subjects of passion. I could be a writer, bringing the same content through literature to a wholly different audience. In all of these, there is the potential to make more money, reach a wider audience, and leave a more indelible impact upon the world.

So, why am I becoming a teacher?

15 years ago, I dropped out of college, suffering depression. I wasn't the only one depressed; aside from the millions of others reeling from mental health issues, the economy was entering a recession in 2008. I was a NEET - jobless, out of school, and seemingly stuck. My family (read: my dad, stepmom, and sisters) had abandoned me - they had other matters to worry about than their wayward son - and I was fortunate my mother whom I'd dissociated from years before reached out to me. With her help, I got back on my feet, moved across the country, and began looking for work with slight hope. I volunteered one day to read at the school she worked at, and the teacher in the room went to the admins and demanded I be hired on the spot. I was.

Thus began a journey of discovery. I was good at something, and I felt good about doing it. I felt something to replace my depression and self doubt: worthiness.

Over the years, I honed my craft and continued sporadically attending school - when I could afford it - in order to become able to lead my own classroom in our private school/daycare. That was 7 years ago, and I've been teaching prek (4-5 year olds) since then. I'm able to teach reading, writing, mathematics, chess, life lessons, history, biology, astronomy, geology, entomology... the list goes on and on. I have a passion for learning, and for sharing that learning.

Is that why I am becoming a teacher?

The biggest obstacle to achieving my ultimate dream - teaching in public schools - was always the degree. I had dropped out of college twice - in 2008 and again in 2013 - before finally completing an Associates degree in 2016. I felt that, financially, getting my bachelor's would never happen. Massive student loan debt (private debt north of $30k) and low wages in childcare meant I wasn't getting anywhere. Life changes though, and the stars aligned - the private debt was written off, I got out of defaulting on my federal loans, and just in time to qualify for a state program to get me in school again and have a full ride scholarship. It was happening!

Now we live in a post-pandemic world... Do I still want to become a teacher?

At first, attitudes were siding with teachers. There was sympathy for their struggles and worries, the low pay and high barrier to entry. That quickly changed, as it did for medical workers and others in the pandemic world. Teachers struggle more now than they have before. Fewer resources, more troubled students that desperately need help, more resistance from parents and communities trying to prove that teachers and schools aren't necessary in the way they have been, and more burnout and shortages across the nation.

I see all this and yet I press on. Why?

The thing is, I'm not sure. My resolve is strong and I've been persistent and diligent in my schooling. I've worked too long and hard to give up this opportunity. Why do I still want to teach, though? Why not find an administrative job with potentially more pay and better work environment? Why not leave education altogether and use my skills elsewhere?

It comes back to what drove me forward in the first place: purpose. I feel in direct connection with the future by doing what I do. I feel like in some miniscule, imperceptible, but meaningful way, I can help create a better world tomorrow by doing what I do today. It gives my life meaning, and nobody and nothing can take that from me. I've changed hundreds, potentially thousands, of lives already. Students return years later to tell how much I meant to them - these are students I had known at ages 4 and 5 who still remember me a decade later!

So, why am I becoming a teacher?

Because someone has to do it, and that someone might as well be me. I enjoy my work, I enjoy the ups and downs, I enjoy the struggles and challenges and overcoming them, I enjoy making difficult topics understandable to young minds, I enjoy what I do even when I hate it. To me, that's love.

With good luck and a positive outlook, I'll be graduating with a degree in Early Childhood Education next September. It may not be prestigious, it may not make me a lot of money, but it will allow me to continue on the path I've set myself. Thanks for reading.

I find that while romantic relationships are quite specifically defined in our society, friendships don't seem to have the same universally understood characteristics or “road maps” for their development, so I find them interesting to discuss, especially considering the modern epidemic of loneliness many people are experiencing. Most people share the same understanding of what makes someone your romantic partner, but when does someone become your friend, vs. just an acquaintance? What makes someone a good friend or a bad friend - essentially, what can we expect from our friends, and what should we give in return?

I remember a scene from the show “Love on the Spectrum” (a reality show about people with autism in the dating world) that stuck with me. One of the people on the show explained that because he didn't understand socialization very well naturally, he had taken it upon himself to study the psychology behind it for many years, to the point where he became quite a charming and socially capable guy. I'm not autistic, but I was homeschooled up to age 14. I believe it made me quite socially stunted, and I didn't really learn how to maintain friendships until my mid 20s. Instead of learning social skills naturally over building blocks in preschool, I was reading books and journaling about it as an adult. Looking back, I no longer resent it, because being forced to work on it like a skill seems to have benefited me in the long run, and after a very lonely early life, I now have many dear friends who bring me joy.

I have a “system” of sorts that seems to work very well for me. There are three elements: consistency, vulnerability, and adaptability.

#1. Consistency

When people talk about their struggles with making or keeping friendships, this aspect is usually mentioned the most often. People are busy, schedules can get tight, and we all have a lot of things that get in the way of spending time with the people in our lives. Commonly, people aren't sure how often they should reach out to their friends, or worry that they are bothering someone who isn't interested in spending time with them. (Usually friends don't break up, after all, they just fade.) I think a lot of friendships are lost or missed because both people simply stop reaching out.

I never take it personally when I ask someone to hang out once or twice and they don't respond, or it doesn't work out. I just give it some time and try again later, at least a few times. Also, I try to reach out without requiring much time or effort from the other person, like just messaging to tell them something that reminded me of them, without scheduling anything at the moment. It also helps to learn people’s preferred communication styles - some people might never respond to texts, but enjoy casual phone calls, or visa versa. Sometimes I miss my friends but I'm way too busy to do more socializing at the time, so I schedule something weeks or months in advance.

Consistency can come in different forms, some people I see for short amounts of time each week, and others I only see a few times a year for quality time on a vacation. Both are good! Another part of consistency is making an effort to follow through on commitments - it's okay to cancel on friends a certain amount, but it's important to give notice and reschedule promptly.

#2. Vulnerability

A friendship needs consistency as a foundation, especially new ones. However, if you see someone every week and don't eventually learn personal things about each other, it can only go so far. And once you have introduced vulnerability, it can be difficult to find a balance. Many people worry about over sharing, and others struggle to recognize when they might be sharing too much. I try to match the energy of the person I'm interacting with. I don't come out swinging by mentioning my difficult religious upbringing and relationship with my parents (obviously,) instead, I ask people casual questions about their family, for example, and see what they're comfortable with sharing. When someone does share something vulnerable with me, I take note of it, and later on I tell them something of a similar nature about myself. Vulnerability is like a ladder - a ladder that is best climbed gradually.

I find that men tend to struggle with vulnerability the most (perhaps to no one's surprise,) particularly in friendships between two men. A few months ago my husband found out that his mother had relapsed, and he mentioned that he wished he had a friend to talk to whose parent was also an addict. I told him that actually, one of our friends had a father who passed away from addiction, something I knew about him despite being friends with the guy for a shorter period of time, and I said maybe he should talk to him about it. Of course, this is a sensitive topic that some friends simply don't always share with each other, which is not necessarily a bad thing. But it got me curious about the likelihood of men sharing that information with each other, compared to a man sharing it with a woman, or to a woman sharing with another woman. Men and women alike have much to gain when we share vulnerable information with each other in a healthy way.

(side note: I struggle with friendships with people who are very private, or are more likely to share after being prodded a bit. I ask questions, but I'm not likely to push someone who isn't giving a lot of information, so with shy people I sometimes struggle to bring the friendship to a closer place. Most of my closest friends are all extroverts, and I would like to figure out how to get to know my shy, quiet friends a bit better, without being invasive or too intense.)

#3. Adaptability

Where consistency is most important at the beginning of a new friendship, adaptability becomes more important later on, for the longevity of a friendship. An adaptive friendship can survive when people's interests, schedules, and circumstances change. If you know you can have a good time with someone in different environments, a friendship is more likely to survive when people move, change careers, have kids, generally grow older and more mature, etc.

A good example is the fact that I had a lot of surface-level “festival friends” or “concert friends” in my mid 20s, and despite hanging out with them consistently for years, I'm not friends with most of them anymore. This is mostly because our tastes in music or hangout spots changed, and there was nothing else tethering or deepening our friendship, so when those things changed, it ended. On the flipside, most of my closest friends today actually are people who I met at festivals or parties, but it's because I've invested in those relationships and expanded them to exist beyond the circumstances that we met under. I can lose interest in going to electronic music festivals and not worry about losing the friends that I camp with there, because I make sure to pull those friends into my normal day to day life, by going hiking, cooking dinner, getting coffee, etc. I also try to do new things with friends, so we have a shared new experience together.

Another example of adaptability is which social contexts you are in when you spend time together, as in, hanging out in group settings only, or getting together only when a mutual friend is there, vs. spending time 1:1. When I invite a friend of a friend to hang out with me without the original mutual friend, that's taking a step into a relationship that exists independently. I keep this in mind whenever one of my friends starts dating someone that I really get along with and make it a point to form my own friendship with that person, so if the relationship doesn't last, I have the opportunity to keep that person in my life.

Maybe some of these things seem like common sense or human nature, but it certainly took me a while to recognize some of them. Whenever I meet someone I really get along with, I make sure to keep these principles in mind. And when I feel myself drifting away from a good friend, I think about which of the three elements could use some attention.

What are your thoughts on cultivating quality friendships? Does it come naturally to you? Anything you struggle with in particular?

The sidebar description of ~news says

All the world's current events, including politics as well as analysis or opinion pieces.

But most politics articles are moved to ~misc. I've even seen people say that ~news is not for politics. So what determines if news stories aren't good enough for ~news? I get that an article about the estimated 20,000 deaths from a flood in Libya is news. But what's the line for politics and other similar categories? And why not have ~news.politics? I'm sure that must have been discussed before, but I'm not sure if it has been discussed in the context of the sidebar.

Basically, we need to either change how articles get categorized or change that sidebar description.

My SO decided that she'd be a vegetarian after watching the most recent Avatar movie almost a year ago. I am the kind of person that will spend hours perfectly managing a charcoal smoker to make the perfect brisket and whose COVID hobby was making the perfect steak. I love chasing technique and incremental improvements. I hate instant pots and think making soups are boring- I want action and creativity rather than strictly following a recipe. I also enjoy cooking for others but cooking food I don't like to eat and don't like to make saps a lot of the joy out of it. This has been a challenging transition but I just wanted to share what's been working for me so people who are in a similar boat can survive, too, and hear what other people are doing to survive the transition as well.

1. Embrace the wok. Every meal from here on out can be a 1 pot mise-en-place made by action star. There is so much in making the perfect wok meal that it is crazy. Chinese cooking demystified is a great place to start, as is Kenji's book "The Wok." This single-handedly made me realize that I, too, could love cooking vegetarian.
2. To add meat flavor and texture into your meal without MSG, embrace the mushroom.
3. Wheat-started ferments are the next level down on the umami flavor chart without a lot of the vinegar of lacto-fermentation. Fermented soy beans are dope as are various fermented chile peppers (both korean and sichuan are delightful in different ways).
4. To add meat flavor into your meal without MSG, fermented everything is your friend. The Noma Guide to Fermentation is a great place to start and the pao cai pickle jar is the easiest way to have that on hand if you aren't eating pickles every day. Fuschia Dunlop goes into great detail on that in the Food of Sichuan.
5. "Alternative meats" never work if the meat is not the centerpiece of your meal. For example, impossible or beyond pork does not work ever in a pork fried rice because fake meats don't have the required fat content. Personally, I also really taste the pea protein flavor and have given up on them entirely. Use fresh mushrooms instead. Vegetarian mapo tofu isn't omitting the pork but rather adding wok-fried diced oyster/shitake/enoki/chanterelle mushrooms (removing some moisture is key- mushrooms have a lot of water in them) and increasing the amount of oil used since the mushrooms are so absorbent. Basically, impossible meat is impossibly bad- embrace vegetarian meals and their offer of totally unique flavors and textures.
6. A Nakiri or Usuba and a thousand little stackable steel mixing bowls makes the prep experience a lot better. Also, those bowls are like, $2-3/bowl at restaurant supply stores- don't buy them at amazon or walmart. Online restaurant supply stores offer similar prices+shipping.
7. When making dishes, particularly in a wok, your dish can still have fish sauce and other peoples' can have chinese light soy sauce or japanese soy sauce. BTW- another umami bomb- fermented sauces. Thai fish sauce or garum analogues are for you and soy sauce is for your vegetarian buddies.
8. There do exist good vegetarian broths that can mimic the flavor but not the gelatenous texture of a homemade chicken stock. AFAIK the only way to come close to that homemade broth mouthfeel is to thicken the soup in a finishing step with some type of flour (white wheat, teff, arrowroot, whatever you have on hand!). My greatest broth successes have involved a mirepoix, shitake mushrooms, piles of garlic, and tons and tons of nori, roasting or broiling it in an oven to add char, and then boiling it down with black peppercorns.
9. Your new burger recipe is Kenji's black bean burger. It's really good.
10. Most importantly, you can still cook for yourself sometimes. Just because other people don't eat meat doesn't mean you can't on occasion. You can still make The Dish even if you're the only one eating it. Accept that, when you move, you won't become friends with your butcher anymore and get weird cuts on the sly (h/t to Primal Supply of Philadelphia, the best butcher shop in the world).

It is currently possible to block unwanted tags on Tildes. It would be great to also have a feature that allows users to raise tags they're more interested in. Posts with raised tags will get a score multiplier for the user that raised them, in the same way as Exemplary comments get a score multiplier.

An example of a website that implements this really well is https://lesswrong.com, where you can give score multipliers to different tags to raise or lower them on your homepage.

Title says it all. I'm only in my late 20s and I've been his primary care taker for most of my adult life. There isn't any other person I've spent more time with in my entire life. I'm trying to prepare myself for when the moment he's gone and I know it's going crush me all the same.

This will be my greatest loss in life so far. I know everyone goes through something like this. What did you do when a moment like this came? What did you do when it felt like you couldn't get up? I have know idea how I'm going to get through this, I just have to believe I will.

EDIT: Thank you for all your kind words and we'll wishes. My dad passed away September 23, 3:30 PM local time with his boys by his side. I'll love him and miss him every single day.

So for various reasons I can't use paper books very well. I've been reading almost exclusively on epaper for... 15 years or so now?

My current reader is a Kobo Aura One which has done very well but is starting to get a bit tired - the screen is a bit scratched up and the battery life is measured in days rather than weeks (at around 1hr/day reading with the frontlight on low). Plus the usb socket has done that annoying thing where the cable needs to be at the exact right angle in order to charge.

So I'm in the market for a new one. I'd like it to be >7 inches, 300ppi (same spec as the Aura One or better). Overdrive support is nice but not essential. EPub support is a must, as is orange/red frontlighting. Linux slightly preferred over Android. Battery life in weeks. Waterproof doesn't matter. Cloud sync, bluetooth, audiobook support, apps (other than a decent reader), note-taking - I don't care about. It's for reading books, nothing else. Budget is not a huge issue but I don't want to spend more than I have to.

I have had zero time for the last few weeks to look into what the market is doing now and it's been many since I paid much attention to the world of ereaders, so anyone who is more up to date than me who can offer some suggestions would be much appreciated.