There’s one of these in a shopping center around me. I flip it off every time I see it.

I mean, I deliberately drive near it, stop, roll down my window, put my arm out, and flip it off very intentionally.

I don’t care if it knows me. I’ve made no secret of my hatred for authoritarianism throughout my life. I’ve gone to more protests than I can count. Besides, if authorities really wanted to do something to me, they’d readily make things up anyway. They don’t need an excuse, so I might as well express myself.

This shit is dystopian as fuck and every time I see it or it blasts out its message about us being watched, it boils my blood.

Fuck it all. This is not okay.

I put off going to such places as long as I can. Sometimes I’ll think, “I could go to Costco after work,” but once work is over I’m like, “Bruh, no, I do not have the energy to put up with that crowded place.”

I’ve been seeking out small, more specific stores lately. I already don’t want to go to Walmart or Target for a number of reasons. Despite knowing they’ll have what I need and it’s not far away, I’ll go farther just to visit the smaller hardware store, or smaller grocery store, or smaller housing goods store, etc. Even without the ethical issues, dealing with the sheer size of those places is too much.

I really hope our generation of collective anxiety could bring about at least one benefit - the downfall of massive stores like Walmart and Target.* Granted, it won’t happen for a while (if at all, especially in rural places), but I highly doubt we’re as rare as we feel we are. Big box stores had their moment, for a generation that wanted that. But times change, people’s preferences change, and just as those stores once drove out local competition, someday the tides can turn again.

*Costco can stay, though. They treat their employees well.

Tangential, ever get to see an aerial view of your own neighborhood? It’s pretty cool. My brother and I are both pilots, though he’s current with it while I haven’t flown in years. He visited my parents’ place some time ago and I got to ride along and take pictures of our old neighborhood from above, while he got to fulfill a childhood dream of flying into/out of the local airport (where we used to sit and watch planes doing exactly that.) It was amazing. :)

Maybe from above. Walking around in-person, I’d be saddened by the lack of trees, color, interesting architecture. I don’t even see any parks or playground equipment - where is the life? Is there anywhere the people can go outside and meet up? There’s no sprawling gardens filling up backyards, no pools, no firepits… I grew up in the suburbs and we had all of the things I’ve mentioned in this post. Even the city-building games I play show more vibrant life than this image.

A few years ago, I drove across the entire US. I had no problem parking anywhere until I got to California. My god, does California hate overnight parking.

I went through 21 states. California was the only one where I had to give up and get a motel. Absolutely ridiculous.

Looking at the examples on the second link, it feels creepy. Granted, I’m not a Grindr user; I’m not even male. If there are gay guys interested in having AI in their app, more power to them. But as a human, I don’t like the idea of an app trying to decide what I like about people instead of letting me put in my preferences for myself. Imagine realizing that you’ve gotten yourself into a bad pattern of dating people who are toxic for you and the app decides, “Hey, since you liked talking to people who have traits of X, Y, and Z, we’re going to suggest more people like that!”

Or, shockingly, you’re into people of diverse stripes, and find the most satisfying experiences to be novel ones. Well, too bad, the AI’s going to assume your past patterns should inform your future patterns, so prepare to be assigned to a niche you can’t opt out of.

“Over the course of a year, You [sic] and Eli had an on-again, off-again conversation that swung between flirty, honest, awkward, and quietly intimate.” Wow, thanks for the creepy stalking of my personal conversations, that totally makes me feel more comfortable. Imagine all those chats culminated in a bad time with Eli and that’s why you stopped talking to him, but the app keeps suggesting that since you had some fun times earlier on, that means you should totally try again. An app doing the work of a pushy ex without being told to. Or maybe your interactions went the other way, and you and Eli now text and meet-up regularly in the real world. But the app doesn’t know that, so it keeps telling you to reach out through their own platform.

Either way, I’m a grown adult capable of identifying my own preferences and making my own dating decisions. It makes me uncomfortable to imagine an AI trying to make those calls for me. Although I’m not their target audience, I wouldn’t be surprised if plenty of Grindr users feel similarly.

Oh hey fellow night owl. I woke up around 2:30am this time, a half hour later than usual. I must be getting better.

I interpreted it the same way. The “body language” of the one in the back, leaning backwards and to the side, combined with the text context, makes me think they’re trying to subtly signal to the parent, “Say no, say no, say no.” It’s easy to imagine them shaking their head side-to-side, while out of view of the asker.

But that’s the funny thing about art - it can be interpreted in different ways. I don’t see someone eagerly awaiting a “yes,” but maybe some people do?

Four kids, one computer. The internet was America Online and had parental locks that disabled it after 10pm or so.

My siblings and I had to schedule when we’d get to use the internet.

Funny thing, MSN Messenger didn’t obey AOL’s timers. For a while I was able to stay online late chatting with friends, even after AOL cut me off. It worked until my mom got up to pee at midnight one night and caught me. She asked who I could possibly be talking to so late, and I had to remind her that the internet is global and it was noon for Australians.

I always appreciate a good Zoidberg quote

Oh wow, that all makes sense. What a masterful game.

I already hated doing the jobs for Micah in RDR2. They were the most frustrating quests. When the twist came later on, I was ready to fight against him.

That’s such a cute story. It reminds me of when I go to sweep the floor at work and curious kids ask to try using the broom. Hell yeah, little dude! Let’s turn this chore into something fun!

It’s so wild how things have become today. When I got my first “grown-up” job in 2007, I had one interview. The first half was legit interview, while the second half was a tour of the workspace, where I was spoken to as if I was already hired. By the end, I was hired, and I stayed with that job for a few years.

I had just turned 18 and was still in my final year of high school. The application for the job was a packet of physical paperwork (no online applications.) I found it by walking around and looking for “Help wanted” signs in windows.

Goddamn, how things have radically changed. These days, I can’t find anything decent without relying on recruiters on Indeed reaching out to me. I have found jobs through searching myself, but they were shitty. Recruiters reaching out to me years ago started me on a career path I hadn’t originally searched for (but that I enjoy and have stuck with since then), and then found me again last year when I was looking for a better company to work for. It’s nice to be sought out, but I’d like more to be able to see all my options and have a choice in the matter. Oh, and it’d be real nice to not have to rely on a private third-party company to know who’s hiring in the first place.

But the work required to research multiple places on one’s own, put in applications and multiple rounds of interviews… it’s exhausting and prohibitive.

Looking back to how I got that first job, it feels like I squeezed through a rapidly-closing door. Hiring simply doesn’t work that way anymore.

It took me a moment to realize you were referring to Cosmo the magazine. I saw that OP’s username is Mr Fish and immediately thought of Cosmo and Wanda.

My work has a DoorDash account and uses it exclusively. When management decides to order food for us, it has to go through DoorDash.

The other week I was told they’d buy lunch for my team. Thing is, we all have different dietary needs. I was told to pick something for lunch, and when I did I was told, “Oh that restaurant doesn’t use DoorDash. Pick somewhere else. Also it’s a $10 limit.”

Oookay. My lunch being at an earlier time than many in my team, a lot of places that I would order from aren’t open yet. I don’t do fast food, which limits my choices further. Then you can’t put custom information in your order (like, “the #14 sandwich, but with no cheese”) which right out of the gate means a lot of options are out of reach. The $10 limit was also ridiculous, as food prices have been rising higher and now even the most basic things will be around $12 minimum. Navigating the site alone was a headache on top of it all, as it isn’t intuitive for someone with dietary restrictions. I eventually gave up and told my manager, “I know this was intended as a treat for us, but this is too stressful for me to try to do while I’m also working.”

Thankfully, someone else already knew of an option that would work for me, so I went with that. It sucks that although my work place is trying to be inclusive, being limited to DoorDash (and a $10 price ceiling) makes that incredibly difficult. I’d rather just be given the $10 and be done with it.

I can see that, I should’ve clarified that I meant American English speakers. I hear some of the most godawful Spanish pronunciations from fellow American English speakers. It’s like they’re not even trying. Perhaps it’s related to learning how to read the language alongside speaking, but even so we’re taught pronunciation rules.

I will concede, something in my brain processes language differently. On the one hand, I need English speakers to repeat themselves more frequently (despite being a native speaker.) Phone calls are hell, and captions on shows/movies go a long way toward my comprehension of the dialogue. On the other hand, people my age aren’t “supposed” to hear some of the subtle differences in novel foreign sounds that I pick up on. I know not everyone hears things the way I do, so if I’m being too harsh on people who can’t help it, I apologize.

Haha, I do think the “raising pitch around strangers” thing is a sort of protective behavior. Like a cuteness reflex of sorts, trying to show that I mean no harm and hope none will come to me. That’s what I figure, at least. I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of women subconsciously do the same thing.

Around family, I’m not sure. It’s possible it’s a throwback to being a kid and being told my voice was “whiny.” Or it could be a side-effect of the deeper voices around me being louder, so I talk that way to make my voice clearer in the mess. I wish I knew, but that’s what I reason it probably is.

(I know you were probably joking, but autistic brains gonna autist.)

That’s funny. My accent in Spanish is… interesting. I learned the language as a teen, amidst meeting people online from all around the world. So my accent has become an interesting mishmash of sources, none of which sound English.

Side note, I can’t stand how English-speakers pronounce Spanish words. All of the Spanish vowel sounds are all right there in English! I understand that Rs, Ds, Bs, Vs, and even Js might be difficult for English-speakers to pick up, but I don’t understand why English-speakers don’t use Spanish vowels correctly. It boggles my mind.