MechanicalMagpie's recent activity

  1. Comment on What's an atypical thing you do that you'd recommend to others? in ~talk

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link Parent
    Im not the person you asked, but i am non-binary so i figured id chime in. The wikipedia article is pretty good and very thorough. If you want a lighter intro, this article from the national...

    Im not the person you asked, but i am non-binary so i figured id chime in. The wikipedia article is pretty good and very thorough. If you want a lighter intro, this article from the national center for transgender equality is good.

    You could also check out Stone Butch Blues by Leslie Feinberg. This book was pretty instrumental to me personally when it came to figuring myself out. 10/10 do recommend, along with anything else written by hir that catches your interest.

    6 votes
  2. Comment on Post something from your notes app in ~talk

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link Parent
    The sentence is "the quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog" because im boring and couldnt remember the cool sentence that uses all the letters. Here is the key. im still not entirely decided on...

    The sentence is "the quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog" because im boring and couldnt remember the cool sentence that uses all the letters. Here is the key. im still not entirely decided on how i want to combine and shape letters/words so I'll probably end up changing some things for using it for english. im gonna toss it at a conlang though, and see how that shapes up.....once i find the notebook i put the conlang in πŸ˜…

  3. Comment on Post something from your notes app in ~talk

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link Parent
    this is super cool, and has inspired me to make my own version! thank you for posting it

    this is super cool, and has inspired me to make my own version! thank you for posting it

    1 vote
  4. Comment on Post something from your notes app in ~talk

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link Parent
    answers 1. no idea strawberry?? ???? kimchi! (though evidently it originated in china before korea put their own spin on it. According to ppl on rednote anyway.) comrade ngl i have no clue what a...
    answers 1. no idea
    1. strawberry??

    2. ????

    3. kimchi! (though evidently it originated in china before korea put their own spin on it. According to ppl on rednote anyway.)

    4. comrade ngl i have no clue what a hyperbolic paraboloid is but it sounds like math and im allergic

    5. chicken eggs! my mom told me for years that we didnt get flu shots bc she had an allergic reaction and she thought i might too (neither of us are, or ever have been (afaik) allergic to eggs.)

    6. avocados, im assuming.

    7. is this the giant bean?

    8. banh mi

    9. chick peas/garbanzo beans

    1 vote
  5. Comment on What do you do with your diplomas? in ~life

    MechanicalMagpie
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    my high school diploma is on a bookshelf somewhere, bc its small enough to fit there. My college diplomas are in the envelope they came in and that envelope is...uh. Well. Its probably in my...

    my high school diploma is on a bookshelf somewhere, bc its small enough to fit there. My college diplomas are in the envelope they came in and that envelope is...uh. Well. Its probably in my apartment somewhere? Most likely in a box that is in my apartment, along with some professional certificates, some old MRIs of my knees, and other assorted detritus. i probably didnt throw it away but i couldnt say what box any of that is actually in lol.
    But, i dont think i actually need any of it? I've never had a job ask for a physical diploma, just official transcripts, and my degrees are basically worthless anyway so Β―\_ (ツ)_/Β―

    1 vote
  6. Comment on Confess your food crimes in ~food

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link
    sometimes ill make a ton of rice and then instead of making a real meal ill just put some rice in a bowl, add about a quarter cup of minced garlic (the jar kind (costco's is really good)), an...

    sometimes ill make a ton of rice and then instead of making a real meal ill just put some rice in a bowl, add about a quarter cup of minced garlic (the jar kind (costco's is really good)), an inadvisable amount of lao gan ma, and some fish sauce or soy sauce.
    and then i eat it with a spoon like its cereal

    i usually make enough rice that i can just rinse/repeat until the rice is gone (usually over the course of the whole day)

    4 votes
  7. Comment on No Man's Sky: Worlds Part II in ~games

    MechanicalMagpie
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    me reading this: "ooh, all that sounds cool, new biomes are super exciting, love the autophage, purple stars sound excellent -- record scratch INVENTORY SORTING?!?!?!?! 😍😍😍 i have yearned for this...

    me reading this: "ooh, all that sounds cool, new biomes are super exciting, love the autophage, purple stars sound excellent --

    record scratch

    INVENTORY SORTING?!?!?!?! 😍😍😍
    i have yearned for this for centuries since 2018
    finally the gods devs have answered my prayers

    24 votes
  8. Comment on What fictional world would you live in, if you could pick any one? in ~talk

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link
    Thedas. Like, yeah, the world is constantly ending, theres a terrible deadly plague that regularly ravages the world and yeah its a feudal monarchy but like......Magic. Id also take Pokemon, Star...

    Thedas. Like, yeah, the world is constantly ending, theres a terrible deadly plague that regularly ravages the world and yeah its a feudal monarchy but like......Magic.

    Id also take Pokemon, Star Trek TOS, or Naruto. lmao. Basically i just want the ability to do some kind of magic, ride or die friends, and the ability to save the world with the aforementioned friends; im not super picky about the where or how lol (inb4 "star trek doesnt have magic" comrade have you seen vulcans and betazoids? that's magic and i will die on that hill πŸ˜‚ also, pokemon are close enough to magic. i too would like to talk to my cat and have them understand me)

    2 votes
  9. Comment on <deleted topic> in ~health

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link
    holy shit. What a horrifying article. only vaugely relevant anecdote when i was three, the family dog pushed me off some stairs, and i fell ~6 feet down to a concrete floor and landed on my head....

    holy shit. What a horrifying article.

    only vaugely relevant anecdote when i was three, the family dog pushed me off some stairs, and i fell ~6 feet down to a concrete floor and landed on my head. my parents didn't take me to the doctor. In retrospect, this was probably due to a combination of this sort of absolute bullshit, and also the hslda recommendations that people keep their homeschooled kids away from cps/cops/whatever at all costs lest they imprison the parents for exercising their pArEntAL riGhTs of educational neglect.
    4 votes
  10. Comment on How do you decide when to buy a book? in ~books

    MechanicalMagpie
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    if its a book i really love or that shaped me as a person, i buy it in physical format. Otherwise, i just go with digital.

    if its a book i really love or that shaped me as a person, i buy it in physical format. Otherwise, i just go with digital.

    5 votes
  11. Comment on Steam Replay 2024: Discussion topic in ~games

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link
    evidently, nearly a quarter of my playtime (22%) was No Man's Sky, which also tracks with the "space" category in the spider graph lol. After that, my top five games were enshrouded, coral island,...

    evidently, nearly a quarter of my playtime (22%) was No Man's Sky, which also tracks with the "space" category in the spider graph lol.

    After that, my top five games were enshrouded, coral island, stardew valley, opus magnum, and immortal life (filling out the other side of the spider graph with "farming sim lmao")

    honorable spider graph mentions are "programming" and "cats" from the zachtronics and devcats games respectively

    what im saying is that my spider graph is a trapezoid and i clearly have a type when it comes to video games lol

    2 votes
  12. Comment on Your partner asks for your phone, you refuse over privacy, they tell you they don't trust you. How do you respond? in ~talk

    MechanicalMagpie
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    My response would probably be "Damn, comrade, well it was nice while it lasted πŸ––" I'm not a child, and if my partner feels it necessary to look through my phone like I am one, I'm out, full stop....

    My response would probably be "Damn, comrade, well it was nice while it lasted πŸ––"

    I'm not a child, and if my partner feels it necessary to look through my phone like I am one, I'm out, full stop. Tbh if someone I'm dating gets to that point, then things were broken way beforehand and this is just the last straw.

    I also wouldn't hand my partner my whole physical journal or pieces of paper that I wrote down my social media logins on either, so it seems a bit weird to think of doing all that in one fell swoop by handing over my phone.

    And, in the spirit of fairness, I can't think of a reason I'd ask for my partner's phone either. If I thought they were cheating or doing something harmful, I'd either talk to them about it or get my shit and go, depending on the severity of whatever was going on.

    Edit: punctuation

    10 votes
  13. Comment on Longevity of tech equipment in ~tech

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link
    i have a lenovo t450s thats basically my media center, and by "media center" i mean i threw fedora on there and i basically use it as a youtube/nebula/personal cloud storage media machine with the...

    i have a lenovo t450s thats basically my media center, and by "media center" i mean i threw fedora on there and i basically use it as a youtube/nebula/personal cloud storage media machine with the occasional foray to the high seas.

    The lenovo's predecessor was a samsung laptop from 2010-ish? It had no screen, no backplate, the battery was held in place with electrical tape, and and the only reason i had to get rid of it last year was because it drowned during a water heater incident and sadly didnt turn back on even after i dried it out.

    i also have an old kindle 2 somewhere, the kind with a physical keyboard. I got it secondhand off of woot back in like 2012, and its been happily chugging away ever since. Presumably it still turns on lol

    Edit: Saw someone else mention their 3DS - That too! it doesn't hold a charge very well but other than that it works just fine.

    1 vote
  14. Comment on Why do you live? in ~humanities

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link
    When i was a kid, it was because i wanted to see if things would get better, and because i thought death might be boring, and for spite. Now, I'd say probably inertia? Like, im not particularly...

    When i was a kid, it was because i wanted to see if things would get better, and because i thought death might be boring, and for spite.

    Now, I'd say probably inertia? Like, im not particularly depressed, or miserable. My life is fine, i like my friends, my job is fine, i enjoy my hobbies. But I guess it just kind of feels like i achieved my goal, right? i got to see what was on the other side of hitting 18 and getting out and living a life and tbh its kinda mid lol. But its not bad so like Β―\_ (ツ)_/Β―

    1 vote
  15. Comment on How do people get over enshittification? in ~life

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link
    For me personally, for clothes i just try not to buy too much new or online, and if i do buy new or online, i assume its gonna be dogshit quality regardless of the reviews. I'm fairly decent at...

    For me personally, for clothes i just try not to buy too much new or online, and if i do buy new or online, i assume its gonna be dogshit quality regardless of the reviews.

    I'm fairly decent at mending, so if something pops a seam or wears a hole, i can repair it (or repurpose it, if it's too damaged to be worth the repair). i also wash on cold and dry low/short, which, even if the fabric is trash, means its getting less wear-and-tear. Heat is the enemy of synthetics (and even natural fibers like cotton and linen, tbh, but they can tolerate it a bit better ime as long as the clothing article doesnt shrink so much that youre testing the seams whenever you wear the thing....which I've definitely done lol)

    Would i love to have sturdy non plastic clothing? absolutely, but that basically means either making it myself or spending a ton of money that i dont have, and while I do like making my own clothes, i also have a full time job and making clothes is A Lot Of Work.

    I guess, overall, my advice would be to either get into mending/making clothes, or find friends who are/are willing and trade them something in your domain of expertise. mending/making can definitely give you a feeling of....accomplishment? i guess? when you can look at something and go "i fixed that" or "i made that" or "my friend fixed/made that for me" and it really does counteract some of the misery about how shit-tier things are.

    (apologies if this comes off as preachy, im going for neutral to excited bc i really do enjoy sewing and mending and costuming and all that lol)

    6 votes
  16. Comment on Make it ephemeral: Software should decay and lose data in ~tech

    MechanicalMagpie
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    I'm pretty sure they're saying that "the trash bin pretty much only exists in email clients and operating systems, for the purpose of cleaning up old emails and files, respectively" but i read it...

    Yes, the trash bin was created as an appoximation of this, but the bin seemingly did not make it farther than file or email management software.

    I'm pretty sure they're saying that "the trash bin pretty much only exists in email clients and operating systems, for the purpose of cleaning up old emails and files, respectively" but i read it very differently bc the number of people I've encountered who store things in the recycle bin/deleted items folder and then get upset when those things are deleted is greater than zero and endlessly frustrating. if you wouldnt use your physical trash can as a file cabinet, dont use the digital trash can as a file cabinet either.

    All that aside, i dont really agree with their premise. Maybe i just dont use my technology the same way as them, but i cant think of a single piece of software that i would want to (or trust to?) auto-delete my stuff without my input. would i like my software to give me the option to easily set up rules/tasks to delete old files? i mean, maybe. but i feel like if i truly wanted something to be ephemeral, id just???? use paper???? like paper still exists. Something something use the right tool for the job or whatever.

    4 votes
  17. Comment on What are you reading these days? in ~books

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link
    Time To Orbit: Unknown which can be read at the link for free. I loved it a completely reasonable amount, by which i mean i bought physical copies of the entire story and i have zero regrets. I'd...

    Time To Orbit: Unknown which can be read at the link for free. I loved it a completely reasonable amount, by which i mean i bought physical copies of the entire story and i have zero regrets. I'd describe it as far-future semi-hard sci-fi with a side of mystery novel and a small yet delicious helping of modern internet culture, but viewed through a funhouse mirror. Highly recommend if you like mystery novels, sci-fi, or both.

    1 vote
  18. Comment on Race Science Inc. | Undercover in The Human Diversity Foundation, the million-dollar race science company in ~society

    MechanicalMagpie
    Link
    holy shit. At first it was just....garden variety "oh, these folks like to willfully misinterpret science and theyre also incredibly goofy" and then all of a sudden it was "oh...oh no, they're...

    holy shit. At first it was just....garden variety "oh, these folks like to willfully misinterpret science and theyre also incredibly goofy" and then all of a sudden it was "oh...oh no, they're genuinely making actual real-world steps towards committing violence in the name of white supremacy."

    perhaps i make too light of it but Absolutely wild that that one guy literally broke up with his girlfriend so he could spend more time.....peddling white supremacy and trying to become a cult leader???? That's. Sad, honestly. I can't imagine being so disconnected from the actual, real people around me that i think the best way to live my life is by trying to start a violent cult centered around a mythologised non-existent past, as though *I'm* going to be the super special dictator who solves all the world's problems (for me and my besties *only* 😀) and definitely won't get overthrown by my own henchmen (and/or literally anyone who isnt drinking the chūnbyō juice I'm peddling) for being an absolute, insufferable tit.
    6 votes
  19. Comment on What vegetable are you? in ~food

  20. Comment on D&D does dystopian children's fantasy: Looking for some ideas in ~games.tabletop

    MechanicalMagpie
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    something about this made me think of Inkheart series Basically, the main character and her father have the ability to bring characters from the books they read into the real world....for a price....

    My idea for the reason why the story went wrong is that someone is rewriting it, possibly due to hating children or hating happy endings or something. I wanted a BBEG but I can't think of one.

    something about this made me think of Inkheart series Basically, the main character and her father have the ability to bring characters from the books they read into the real world....for a price. For everyone who comes out of the books, someone from the real world goes into the books. iirc, the real world people who get pulled into the book world become part of the story, so it changes as its being read, and ofc bringing people with magic powers into the real world causes all kinds of havoc.

    1 vote