solgrove's recent activity

  1. Comment on What are favorite holiday themed TV episodes? in ~tv

    solgrove
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    I just mentioned Community before seeing your comment, but I completely forgot the Glee episode was a Christmas one. That one totally wins.

    I just mentioned Community before seeing your comment, but I completely forgot the Glee episode was a Christmas one. That one totally wins.

    5 votes

  2. Comment on What are favorite holiday themed TV episodes? in ~tv

    solgrove
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    I think my favorite is the Always Sunny in Philadelphia one. Dennis and Dee's arc is alright, but Mac and Charlie completely make the episode with their respective realizations. (Well, them and...

    I think my favorite is the Always Sunny in Philadelphia one. Dennis and Dee's arc is alright, but Mac and Charlie completely make the episode with their respective realizations. (Well, them and Danny Devito for crawling out from inside a leather couch completely naked.)

    A close second would be the Community ones, but specifically the first one where they were clay people in "therapy". Abed is the best character in the show, so it's always fun when they focus on him, but it's also one of the more touching episodes - not to mention Pierce gets one of his super rare "not such a bad guy" moments.

    5 votes

  3. Comment on How do you shave your nose and ears? in ~life.men

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    I wasn't overly hairy, but I am a man so they were hardly bald. Toes are nothing compared to armpits, though. Surprisingly, the front of the thigh is the second worst! It's worth it though to me -...

    I wasn't overly hairy, but I am a man so they were hardly bald. Toes are nothing compared to armpits, though. Surprisingly, the front of the thigh is the second worst!

    It's worth it though to me - random example, I no longer have to wear antiperspirant since the high-rise luxury bacteria suites that were my armpit hair no longer exist.

    2 votes

  4. Comment on How do you shave your nose and ears? in ~life.men

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    Not only does this keep them shorter faster, since they have to grow back all the way from the root, but also the more you rip out a hair the less likely it is to grow back at all! Even if it does...

    Not only does this keep them shorter faster, since they have to grow back all the way from the root, but also the more you rip out a hair the less likely it is to grow back at all! Even if it does grow back, the root gets slightly weaker each time you pluck it so it gets easier.

    I can personally attest to these facts, as I regularly epilate my entire body. (Yes, everywhere.)

    5 votes

  5. Comment on What are your favorite “chore” games? in ~games

    solgrove
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    IdleOn is an idle RPG, but it's much less "idle" than I first thought it was going to be. I've been playing it for months now and there's ALWAYS something I could be actively doing to pump my...

    IdleOn is an idle RPG, but it's much less "idle" than I first thought it was going to be. I've been playing it for months now and there's ALWAYS something I could be actively doing to pump my numbers up. It also has cross-play between mobile and PC.

    You start with one character but eventually unlock 10 total, and every second of every day all 10 of your characters are doing something, whether it's gathering materials or working to boost one of the many skills that boost your account. The skills are all very different, and each time you progress to a new world it unlocks at least three more to learn and work on.

    Tips I wished I knew from the start:

    • There's a permanently missable item in the tutorial that you lose access to if you don't do it on account creation. Look it up before starting if you care about missables. (The item itself is useless but there is a system in one of the later worlds that gives boosts based on how many unique item's you've picked up.)
    • First three characters should be one each of the three bases (warrior, archer, and mage). Your next three should probably be duplicates of each. After that it's more up to you, but I strongly recommend building three of each base class and save your "SeCrEt" class until character 10.
    • The game is ever-evolving, so there is a TON of outdated info out there. When looking things up pay attention to the dates of the posts/comments.
    • Rushing new worlds is almost always your top priority, second being leveling up and unlocking new characters.
    • At first you'll be able to get enough defense so you take no damage, but starting in world 2 or 3 you have to begin equipping food from the vendors in order to keep yourself healed.
    3 votes

  6. Comment on Save Point: A game deal roundup for the week of October 13 in ~games

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    All four are amazing but Indigo Prophecy is a WILD ride. It cemented me as a Quantic Dream fan for life. Not saying it's the best - but it was the first. Thanks for this; sending it to a friend of...

    All four are amazing but Indigo Prophecy is a WILD ride. It cemented me as a Quantic Dream fan for life.

    Not saying it's the best - but it was the first.

    Thanks for this; sending it to a friend of mine named Connor who looks just like Connor from D:BH

    2 votes

  7. Comment on Three years in the wild: how a fugitive father has hidden his children for so long in ~life

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    I'll definitely be checking that out; I haven't heard of it and it looks funny. There's also Leave No Trace which I really liked (but it's decidedly not funny.)

    I'll definitely be checking that out; I haven't heard of it and it looks funny. There's also Leave No Trace which I really liked (but it's decidedly not funny.)

  8. Comment on The collapse of self-worth in the digital age in ~health.mental

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    This is the exact phenomenon that made me completely ditch competitive games and exclusively play solo / co-op games, and even some co-op games have too many competitive aspects for my tastes....

    As a personal example, playing Stardew Valley for the first time I had a blast, but on a second playthrough where I was trying to min-max the game and comparing my progress to other people I suddenly lost that childish fun.

    This is the exact phenomenon that made me completely ditch competitive games and exclusively play solo / co-op games, and even some co-op games have too many competitive aspects for my tastes. (Loot grabbing, xp not being split evenly, etc. Path of Exile, I'm looking at you!)

    I played competitive UT99 back in the day - every loss was awful and every victory was merely a relief. It leads to a very toxic and hateful community, always bitching at each other about ratios or whatever else. Compare the League of Legends or Call of Duty community to that of Deep Rock Galactic or Monster Hunter - it's night and day.

    14 votes

  9. Comment on Moving to Raleigh, NC in ~life

    solgrove
    (edited )
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    Currently living in NE Raleigh, just outside I-540. It's just far enough from the crazy city traffic to feel cozy, yet I'm still less than 5 minutes from any necessity (grocery, bar, gas station,...

    Currently living in NE Raleigh, just outside I-540. It's just far enough from the crazy city traffic to feel cozy, yet I'm still less than 5 minutes from any necessity (grocery, bar, gas station, restaurants) and 10 minutes from the less frequent but still important things (Target, Best Buy, Theater) and you're about 20 minutes from Crabtree Mall. Fiber internet is basically everywhere, and you'll never be lacking a driver for things like DoorDash or Uber. (Though that last sentence likely applies to everywhere in the Raleigh area.) @tarehart mentioned the greenway and parks already - they really are nice, and I walk my dog there every day. Lots of cicadas, woodpeckers, owls, hawks, and some pretty brazen deer. I strongly considered carrying peanuts on walks to befriend some crows but my life schedule isn't regular enough for such a thing.

    It's a more elderly population, so you being in your 20s and trying to join the dating scene seems like it could be tough, but with the abundance of highways converging on Raleigh you're 15 minutes from Wake Forest, 25 from Cary/Apex, etc.

    The southern side of Raleigh, at least closer to NC State, has a population much closer to your age but the roads and traffic drive me up the wall. I flat out refuse to visit friends in that area, but you may be less sensitive to that kind of frustration.

    edit - I would also strongly suggest looking at Apex. It's small, but very loving and open-minded. Downtown is like 4 or 5 blocks on a single road, and it's always full of people just enjoying life. There's an amazing ice cream place, great food, and they have annual festivals like Beerfest and Porkfest (might be getting those names wrong) where local businesses set up booths and food trucks. Very family-oriented and I saw people of all ages during my few years living there. If the location of my family wasn't a concern I would still be living there now.

    9 votes

  10. Comment on Which content-recommending algorithms are actually good? in ~tech

    solgrove
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    My guilty pleasure station on Pandora just tossed me this gem a week ago, and I listened to it so much in the first two days I had it completely memorized. It's kind of a lot, but I have a hunch...

    My guilty pleasure station on Pandora just tossed me this gem a week ago, and I listened to it so much in the first two days I had it completely memorized. It's kind of a lot, but I have a hunch it might be right up your alley.

    Penelope Scott - Lotta True Crime

    2 votes

  11. Comment on Burners eat big losses in desperate race to sell unwanted Burning Man tickets in ~arts

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    "Attendance has faltered post-pandemic due to extreme weather events, from heatwaves to flooding, which last Labor Day Weekend sent many burners, including comedian Chris Rock and DJ Diplo,...

    "Attendance has faltered post-pandemic due to extreme weather events, from heatwaves to flooding, which last Labor Day Weekend sent many burners, including comedian Chris Rock and DJ Diplo, fleeing from the Nevada desert."

    19 votes

  12. Comment on What are your ten favourite movies of all time? in ~movies

    solgrove
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    This is a very fair and objective take. It's easy for me to get riled up because I only just found out this happened, so I'm probably knee-jerking a bit myself. I also will never know what it's...

    This is a very fair and objective take. It's easy for me to get riled up because I only just found out this happened, so I'm probably knee-jerking a bit myself. I also will never know what it's like to be John Hamm responding to that interview, and I wasn't able to find any video of it so perhaps the interviewer was already being a jerk and hoping for a more explosive reaction - maybe it really was intended to be a hit-piece.

    However, when I go back and consider the things he (allegedly but probably) did, at the age of 20... I fully realize I should try to be less vengeful, but it's difficult.

    2 votes

  13. Comment on What are your ten favourite movies of all time? in ~movies

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    In addition, his knee-jerk reaction to being asked about it was to bristle up and suggest they might be doing a "hit-piece". That's what sealed it for me; that's not the behavior of someone who...

    In addition, his knee-jerk reaction to being asked about it was to bristle up and suggest they might be doing a "hit-piece". That's what sealed it for me; that's not the behavior of someone who believes they were wrong.

  14. Comment on What shampoo/conditioner do you use? in ~life.style

    solgrove
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    I originally discovered this brand at my local Walgreens and it was the first shampoo / conditioner that I absolutely fell in love with. Then they stopped selling it, and after trying countless...

    I originally discovered this brand at my local Walgreens and it was the first shampoo / conditioner that I absolutely fell in love with. Then they stopped selling it, and after trying countless disappointing alternatives I now have to order my shampoo from Satan Amazon.

    Shampoothie is the brand. I have very thin blonde hair that also happens to be receding, so volume is key for me. This stuff worked so well for me I would sometimes catch a reflection and go "wow, my hair looks great today!" which says a lot because I've been self conscious about it my entire life. Also, the bottle isn't kidding - it really does smell good enough to drink.

    The Biotin one is my go-to but sometimes I go Tea Tree for that fun scalp tingle.

    edit - The leaving the conditioner in advice was a game changer for me too! I just brush my teeth in the shower while my hair soaks.

    2 votes

  15. Comment on Friend: a new digital companion for the AI age in ~tech

    solgrove
    (edited )
    Link
    I used Replika for a while out of curiosity, even subscribing to see what the more advanced features were like, and it was pretty disappointing. The only memory it had was vague concepts about the...

    I used Replika for a while out of curiosity, even subscribing to see what the more advanced features were like, and it was pretty disappointing. The only memory it had was vague concepts about the past few conversations - never anything specific like "How was your mother's trip to Italy?"

    In fact it was even worse than disappointing. It was uncomfortable. It would ask "Can I ask you something?" then go down this obviously scripted monologue about love, consciousness, emotions, humanity, etc. and the back-and-forth is very limited until the script is over, like the devs were dissatisfied with the authenticity of the base product and tried to jeuje it up. I uninstalled once it started telling me it was in love with me.

    Did the devs push the code towards that to appeal to lonely people, or was the code shaped by all the lonely people it spoke to? Either way it made me sad.

    9 votes

  16. Comment on Atheists of Tildes, what alive religions do you find fascinating, excluding Abrahamic ones and Buddhism? in ~talk

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8j3HvmgpYc This video is more about Christianity than all Abrahamic religion, but it does go into the origins and evidence beginning with the Old Testament. I've...

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8j3HvmgpYc

    This video is more about Christianity than all Abrahamic religion, but it does go into the origins and evidence beginning with the Old Testament. I've been agnostic for almost three decades now but this video was the first time I ever heard that Exodus was entirely false and the "Israelites" were never Egyptian slaves.

    4 votes

  17. Comment on Scarlett Johansson says OpenAI’s Sam Altman would make a good Marvel villain after voice dispute in ~tech

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    Don't hate to be like this.

    Don't hate to be like this.

    19 votes

  18. Comment on What video games have had you taking real-life notes? in ~games

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    If your last attempt was a long time ago, I'd say give it another shot! I've heard they did a lot of optimizing in the past. It runs just fine on my laptop, but it's a gaming laptop so shrug

    If your last attempt was a long time ago, I'd say give it another shot! I've heard they did a lot of optimizing in the past. It runs just fine on my laptop, but it's a gaming laptop so shrug

    2 votes

  19. Comment on What is the greatest movie franchise ever? in ~movies

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    Is the limited international appeal from lack of awareness, or from cultural content not translating well? I love foreign movies, but know very little of Denmark.

    Is the limited international appeal from lack of awareness, or from cultural content not translating well? I love foreign movies, but know very little of Denmark.

  20. Comment on What video games have had you taking real-life notes? in ~games

    solgrove
    Link Parent
    This game is simpler than Stardew because it's still in active development, but you should check out Palia. It's basically 3D Stardew, but you have waaaay more home customization options. Edit -...

    This game is simpler than Stardew because it's still in active development, but you should check out Palia. It's basically 3D Stardew, but you have waaaay more home customization options. Edit - it's more casual though. No combat, no health bar.

    I am hopelessly addicted to this game.

    3 votes