I'm stuck in a rut.

What do you do to get out? How do you rediscover something that inspires you? Or something that you can be passionate about?

I've got a handful of "projects" on the go at all times - writing some music, getting better at the sport I play, learn a new language for work, do some "proper" research. But they all sort of sit there looking tedious on my whiteboard. I'm just not passionate about any of them really (except maybe the sport, but I'm approaching 40 so it's not like I'm on the verge of setting the world on fire with it!).

What do you do to rediscover your inspiration? What has worked for you?

I'll preface this by saying that I'm a high school student, so obviously I can't be facing any real stress, but it seems real enough to me, anyway. My strategy is usually just to bury it in entertainment, but I see a lot of the people around me turning to using substances like nicotine, weed, or alcohol.

I don't think any of these are really good options, so I'd like to hear what you guys do.

I'm not a religious person. I'm agnostic and look at religion and spiritualism from very far, as a curiosity in the humanities.

That said, one thing I believe is more likely than not is the infinite parallel universe theory. The theory that there's an unending amount of parallel universes which contain a lot of the possible states of the universe at all times.

Now i don't believe they necessarily have to contain every state. An infinite set of numbers does not have to contain every number, after all.

However as I'm sitting in a hospital bed after the second worst near death experience in my life, I'm reminded of that theory.

I remember that theory whenever I look at the world and think "huh, I could have died there". A slip in the shower, a small electric shock, a car coming too close. I didn't die, but in very slightly different circumstances I could have. When these things happen I think of my life, my friends, my mom. I especially think about the versions of them in the parallel universes I believe exist.

I make a lot of choices based on this. It's a type of fatalism: I'm not so much worried about death here, as I am afraid about the consequences of it in the universes it does happen.

In other words, I often get sad for the parallel universe versions of my mom. there's a lot of problems with this overall theory, but I can't quite shake it.

I wish I had a dollar for every time I heard a manager complain, “The HR department included ‘must have college degree’ in the job req even though I don’t care” or “They asked for 5 years of experience in a technology that’s only been around for 3” or “I have no idea why they rejected this candidate without even contacting me.”

Still, in many cases you don’t have a choice. If you want to hire someone, you need to deal with HR, at least to a small degree – especially if you work in a big company.

So I’m writing a feature story for technology managers, collecting real-world advice from people who learned their lessons the hard way. Here’s the questions I’d like you to answer:

• Tell me about a frustration you had with the HR department (in regard to hiring). That is, tell me a personal story of HR-gone-wrong. Because we all love schadenfreude, and that gives me an emotional example with which to begin.
• Let’s say you have a new opening in your department. In what ways do you involve HR? (That could be anything from, “give them general guidelines and let them choose the best candidates for me to interview” to “I do the search myself, and use HR only for on-boarding.”) What makes you choose that path? How much choice do you have in the matter?
• What weaknesses have you discovered in your HR department’s ability to serve the needs of a tech-focused department?
• What have you done to cope with those weaknesses? Which of those efforts worked, and which failed?
• What do you wish you knew “n” years ago about dealing with your company’s HR department?
• So that I can give the reader some context: Let me know how to refer to you in the article (at least, “Esther, a software architect at a Midwest insurance company”), and give me some idea of your company size (because the processes appropriate for a 70-person company aren’t the same for one with 7,000 employees).

You don’t have to answer all those questions! I asked these to get the conversation going. Tell me as much or as little as you like.

Please don’t assume that I think HR always sucks. However, there isn’t as much to learn from “why HR is your friend.” The idea here is to help techie managers cope when HR doesn’t offer what you hoped for.

Designing our countries to accommodate cars as much as possible has been one of the most destructive things to our health, environment, safety and social connectedness. The damage has spread so far and deep that it has reached a crisis point in most developed cities in almost every country. The suburbs we live in are subjected to strict zoning laws baring any form of high density building and any form of mixed zoning. As a result our houses are spaced so far away from each other and from the essential services we need that unless you own a car you are blocked from having a normal life. The main streets full of independent stores and markets have all been killed by megamalls 30km away from where people live with carparks bigger than most park lands. All of this was caused by car usage pushing our societies further and further apart to the point where many people find it acceptable and normal to drive 40km each direction to work each day.

One of the more devastating effects of this urban sprawl is the supermarket has been moved so far away that most people avoid going as much as possible and limit it to a single trip every 1-2 weeks. Fresh food does not last 1-2 weeks which leaves people throwing out mountains of spoiled food that wasn't eaten in time as well as the move to processed foods packed full of preservatives. As well as a shift to people buying dinner from drive through takeaway franchises because their hour long commute has left them with little time to cook fresh and healthy foods.

Owning a car in many countries is seen as the only way to get a job. This locks the poor from ever regaining control of their life because the cost of owning and maintaining a car is higher than most of these people get in an entire year. Our city streets which should be places of vibrant liability have become loud, unsafe and toxic.

Elon and his electric cars solve none of these issues. Electric cars are not the way of the future. They don't even solve air pollution issues entirely because a large part of air pollution is brake pad fibres and tire wear which is proportional to the vehicles weight. And these Teslas are not light.

The only solution is reducing personal vehicle usage as much as possible in urban areas. Of course there will always be some people who will genuinely need vehicles such as in rural areas but there is simply no reason to have the average person drive to and from their office or retail job every day. Its wasteful and harmful in so many ways.

There needs to be a huge push to reclaim our cities and living spaces to bring back the liveability that we could have had. In my city some of the side streets were closed to cars and the change was incredible. Plants and seating filled the spots that would have once been a row of free parking. The streets are filled with the sounds of laughter instead of the roar of motors. The local pubs and cafes have benefited hugely. They didn't benefit at all from street side car parks that were always filled by people who have done 5 laps of the city looking for an empty park and do not intend to shop there.

What is everyone's opinion on this topic and what can we do about it?

I am currently trying to learn how to fix things myself by learning how to solder and fix things like that. I also want to DIY some things for quite some time.

My current project is working through the book Make:Electronics , I bought it at humblebundle some years ago. Yesterday I powered a led via a power outlet for the first time, by connecting it to a cut off USB cable. I'll share a picture of the abomination later.

So: what have you built at home? What are you building? What are you planning to build?

Docker recently made it so that it requires you to have an account on Docker Hub in order to download the Docker Desktop Installer. So, here's the links:

https://download.docker.com/win/stable/Docker%20for%20Windows%20Installer.exe

https://download.docker.com/mac/stable/Docker.dmg

In 1977, Stephen King published a novel about a school shooting called Rage. It is somewhat infamous, as it has been connected to instances of real-life school shootings. King, in response, allowed the story to fall out of print and has never reissued it. The novel has a lot in common with other YA stories and tropes: a disaffected protagonist, meddling/out of touch adults, and newfound social connection with peers. While the main character is undoubtedly disturbed, the novel feels somewhat uncritical (or potentially even supportive) of his actions.

Certainly fiction is a space where authors are free to explore any point of view or theme they wish. The beauty of fiction is that it is limitless and consequence-free. No people are harmed in Rage because there are no people in it. Its characters are merely names and ideas--they are a fiction.

Nevertheless, Rage addresses a real-world phenomenon, and the beauty of fiction is that it doesn't live as a lie. As Ursula K. Le Guin writes,

"In reading a novel, any novel, we have to know perfectly well that the whole thing is nonsense, and then, while reading, believe every word of it. Finally, when we're done with it, we may find - if it's a good novel - that we're a bit different from what we were before we read it, that we have changed a little..."

We like fiction because it resonates with us, exposing us to themes that can affirm, shape, or challenge our mindsets.

With this dichotomy in mind, I'm torn between whether authors should be free to explore anything they wish from the safety of make-believe, or whether they have a social responsibility because their words carry messages and ideas that directly impact lives. I'm not sure what to think, and I can come up with great arguments for both sides. What's your take? What social responsibilities do fiction authors have (if any)?

A little bit about me -- I'm in my mid-to-late-20s, male, single, recently graduated college, and I quit drinking about a year and a half ago. I never really considered myself an addict; there was never a point where I wanted to quit but I couldn't and it never interfered with work or school. I just woke up one day and told myself, "I don't want to do this anymore," so I just stopped.

The problem, for me at least, is that I live in a relatively rural part of the world. There's not a lot to do here on Friday night other than go to the bars, which never really bothered me anyways because I work nights anyways and don't really like crowded scenes. Most of my free time is in front of my computer, I've recently started getting into distance running as a hobby, and I like playing board games when I can. All of this is fine except for the fact that I can't really seem to make friends in those mutual areas of interest without alcohol anymore.

I signed up for meetup, which seems like a great way to meet new people, and I'm sure it is, in bigger cities at least. But around here, both the closest board game meetup and run club are an hour and a half away. It seems like everyone around here just wants to meet up to drink, and maybe do some other stuff along the way. (Don't get me started on making my own events here -- crowded bars already give me anxiety so organizing my own meetup with people I've never met before would be a new, special type of hell)

I think at least part of this is compounded with the fact that since I graduated, I've had a hard time making new friends. I work a very isolating job, and teetotaling only further compounds the issue that I haven't met very many new people. It's something I've thought a lot about while searching for a partner as well -- I can't/don't want to meet people at bars, and I don't really find much use out of dating apps.

Sorry if this is unorganized or hard to read, it's just a lot of thoughts I've had over the past year.

edit: another part of it too is that, since I quit without the assistance of AA or any support group, I don't have any like-minded people to do things with.

In the rare chance you haven't heard of Flutter, here's the link: https://flutter.io

Flutter just officially left beta with v1.0 December 4, last year. The code is written in Dart, and deploys on Android, and iOS (and will run natively on the rumored Fuchsia OS).

So for those of you that have used Flutter or are currently using Flutter.

• What are you working on?
• Why'd you choose Flutter?
• What do you like about Flutter?
• And what do you dislike about Flutter?

I'll start:

I'm working on a niche art app. I myself do not do that type of art, but knowing people that do, I wanted to create a tool to fill in the lackluckster market for Chromebooks and Android.
I chose Flutter because:

• I wanted to try something new, and what newer than something that was (at the time) in beta?
• Custom Views in Android are a hassle.
• I will be able to release on both Android and iOS (semi-)natively without having to code it twice.

Here's what I like about Flutter:

• Layouts are really simple.
  (though you can easily let it get clustered if you don't think too much about it.)
• Design isn't an afterthought.
  Animations are built in (and simple), themes aren't hard-coded, and Material Components get more attention here. (Still waiting for Shapes on Android)
• It's fast by design.
  Flutter uses its own custom rendering engine (Skia). I've never experienced any stutter with the built-in components, and when I caused lag (with heavy I/O) Flutter/Dart had tools in place for me to narrow down exactly what was causing it.

What I don't like about Flutter:

• It has poor mouse/trackpad support.
  Right clicks, not a thing. I can workaround this with a double-click/long-click, but for a desktop OS, this isn't optimal. Scrolling, that's panning, this should be differentiated. There's a difference between using a scrollwheel and moving finger around on the screen. According to Flutter there is not. There's also currently no support for mouse hovers which I have needed very much.
  There is a pull-request for adding support for all of these, but the developer hasn't done anything since code review.
• Keyboard support, while there, is lackluster.
  Ctrl, Shift, Alt. These have to be gotten with the meta code. There's no built-in function for checking those. Text fields don't support the tab key to navigate. And text formatting (bold, italic, etc.) isn't possible with text fields without the use of a library (or making it yourself).

I was trying to think of a third dislike, but I can't. My complaints are on missing APIs for Chromebooks. That's it. I really like Flutter, I plan on using it more, and if they won't add support for mouse/keyboard, maybe I'll have to contribute.

I'd love to hear what your thoughts about it is.

Ukraine: new Orthodox church gains independence from Moscow

This is a follow-up to this previous article: Ukraine announced the leader of a new national church on Saturday, marking an historic split from Russia which its leaders see as vital to the country’s security and independence. It seems it wasn't sufficient for the Ukraine Orthodox Church to choose its own leader; its independence (or autocephaly) had to be formally decreed by the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople.

currently 7 hours into a 24 hour shift that will see me through to the end of this project.

this song came on that helped me find catharsis when i last felt like this in 2014.

coincidentally, i'd just finished one of my few milestones in the project

i could take a break if i wanted to.

i could hear the words filling themselves in, treating the song like a template.

decided i'd take a minute to "remix" or "cover" this song for how things are going this time around.

here's the original.

maybe give it a listen, then jump into this piece,

out of words now.

bishop

[Verse 1]
You still cross my mind from day to day
And I mostly cry
Still so set on finding out where we went wrong
and why
So I retrace our every step with a bloodwet knife
Trying to figure out what your head thinks
And my head just ain't what it used to be
So I ask,

...what's the point anyway?

[Verse 2]

I remember bringing boxes up the stairs to your apartment
Knowing love was slipping
rapidly away
I remember the skin of your forehead
Your nose and your lips I'd always kiss when I was out of things to say
You held my hand, and you would always promise me
You'd promise me pretty things but I would never understand
I remember when you said you didn't love me
And I swear not a single force on earth could stop the trembling of my hand

[Verse 3]
I remember how you smiled through the smoke in a crowded little coffeehouse
And laughed at all my jokes
And I remember the way that you dressed
While we wasted all the best of us in alcohol and sweat
And I remember when I knew that you'd be leaving
How I barely kept up breathing and I bet if I could to do it all again
I'd feel the same pain
I remember faded driving through the city in tears
How I wept to god in fits, I've hated Texas ever since

I've found it's true what people say
That death and drugs can numb the pain
And every single day I want to fade away, cus

[Verse 4]
I still remember independence tricked us
And lead us helpless holding cash into a pit to be devoured
I still remember how we held so strong to this
Though we had never really settled on a way out
I still remember your blank face
And how we'd always find a way recommit the same mistakes
I still dream that it would all come back together
Just to fall apart again

[Bridge]
My dear
I hear your voice in mine
I've been alone here
I've been alone here
I've been afraid, my dear
I've been afraid, my dear
I've been at home here
I've been at home here
You've been away for years
You've been away for years
I've been alone
I've been alone
I've been alone
I've been alone

[Verse 5]
I breathed your name into the air, I etched your name into me
I felt my anger swelling, vision black, I can't see
I held your name inside my heart but it got buried in my fear
It tore the wiring of my brain, I did my best to keep it clear
So dear, no matter how we part I hold you sweetly in my head
And if I do not miss a part of you, a part of me is dead
If I can't love you as a lover, I will love you in my death
Anything to see you smile, keep you happy in my end.

I miss music blogs. I mostly used them for piracy in the past but plenty of them (pirate and non-pirate) have been great sources for curated lists of new good music. I'd like to add some more variety to my music discovery methods for this new year, so what blogs do you still follow / respect?

Some previous semi-related threads that might be of interest:

How do you discover music?

How do you keep up with new music?

Music Blogs & Mini Station Rant

With a lot of websites going down the shitter in an attempt to monetize (looking at you, Reddit), I'm wondering where some nice places are online. Nice whether in UI, the community, or really just in general. Below is a small list off the top of my head.

Tildes, because of high quality discussion.

Disroot. It's a slew of useful tools, available for free, while respecting privacy. Genuinely really useful, lots of utilities, good documentation, and a really nice community.

Wikipedia. It's Wikipedia, end of.

Mastodon. This one wholly depends on your instance, but on most(?) the people are nice, and the environment is a lot less argumentative.

Hacker News, high quality discussion over a fair few topics. Very active, too.

Just a bit curious. Currently, mine looks like this. It runs Elementary OS, however considering hijacking it to Bedrock Linux, mainly to get cutting edge software from the AUR (for stuff like Firefox and GIMP) without losing all my data. I think I'll wait for Bedrock to go stable first, though.

It uses the ePapirus icon theme, which is just Papirus with better support for Elementary's UI. GTK theme is (if I remember correctly) Qogir and the Plank theme is the GTK one. What do yours look like?