Daily discussion thread: 🚫🧟📺 Thursday, June 13, 2024

Thanks for the support yesterday everyone. I had a decent night sleep and am feeling better.

You got this. You are actually in a stronger position now, as the comfortable lies are now off the table. Time to look for a better place.
You will find a job at another company, get a raise, and wave that stack of extra cash in their faces
so many hugs 😘
I'm glad you're feeling better! It's difficult to weather but you're doing great! You will find something that pays better anyway, you got the skills that pays those bills bro. 💜

Mickey says "brrrr?"

I get unreasonably irritated by the pop-up chats when online shopping. They obscure the screen in the worst positions to get your attention, and pop up within 5 seconds of landing on the site. No, I do not want to chat to ‘Hailey’. I just got here, put away your chat bot and let me browse please. And then it whines when trying to close the chat window, are you sure you want to close chat? Look mate, if I wanted to be harassed by aggressive sales staff I can do that in person, I don’t need the service extended to online shopping.

I hate this too. I hate it even more on news websites. I sometimes read drive.com.au for their wild stories about a P player doing 130km/h above the speed limit or whatever, but they also sell cars too. Every time I try to read from mobile, some randos face pops up in the bottom of my screen and starts flickering at me asking if I need help. No I don't fucking need help, I just want to read the article. Seriously.
Yes! I online shop to avoid people, especially forced up sell litanies at the register.
Or worse - frequent popups of 'SomeBozo in Buttsville bought such-and-such!'
Cool. Even if the popups don't fully block what I'm looking at the flickering appearances of those messages is still breaking my concentration and causing visual stress

They do the opposite for me. No matter how many check boxes I tick or notes I make saying to get a signature and not to leave things, they don't even fucking knock. They throw it sideways at my front door, snap a photo, and walk off.
Also funny you bring this up, because I ordered a heater at the end of last month from Kmart, and they're still saying they haven't received it. I message them and they're like "sorry we haven't received it, it muster still be with the sender", I message Kmart and they're like "well we have it to the courier I don't know what more you want from us"
Until now I've never actually had couriers please lose a package, or just knock it conveniently off a conveyor belt where it'll probably sit for 4 years. They've always delivered, just poorly

A weird side effect of going through winter carless is the mental health boost from the enforced walk when I have to go into work. Definitely doing better than normal so far. Who would have thought that exercise and a little natural light would do wonders.

Narrator: everyone....literally first or second on every mental health suggestion list...

Lol I feel the same. I say I hate going out, but really I hate the at-home-before-going-out part. Once I'm out, I feel great and so much better

I have a doctor I have to see every 2 weeks. She's an almost 4 hour round trip on public transport.

It fucking sucks, but she's amazing. First paycheck of new job, I'm getting a car.

Bike? Ebike?
- Even an escooter that you can take on the train. Depends of course on where home and doctor are.
  It can be two hours to go a 20 minute drive from suburb to suburb if PT insists on taking you via the city. A 20 minute drive is around the end of a comfortable escooter range.
- Good idea actually. Will look into it.

I bought a lottery ticket. I would love to win my money back lol

Braved the chilly air and got my partner his anti-sads from the pharmacy. I love using the local pharmacy instead of the chain; they know me now and it's so lovely having a little chat with the pharmacist and the cashiers. A little jaunt around the block and back home with a warm coffee.

All is well.

went out for a walk yesterday, ached just a little afterward but today I am 100% better

Yay!
- I think I've lost a lot of fitness the past 8 months 😞
Oh I did the same thing this evening! I was feeling down still so went for a walk and it was nice. I don't quite feel 100% better, but I feel happier. The cold air also seemed to unblock my nose a bit
Awesome!

Just retested. Still positive. Like TinyBreak, the line showed up before the liquid got to the top of the window.
Not surprised, as I'm still definitely symptomatic and the cats are being very cuddly. I just wish Sammi wouldn't kick litter all over...

TinyCat is all about the cuddles too. Its funny, I'm fine one minute then brain dead the next. Food deffo helps!
:/ you poor people. COVID sucks. Hope you're feeling better soon
oh no, take care youse all

Here's an odd one.

Random dude probably 20yo rocks up this morning, starts whipper-snippering the front lawn. I go out ask him wtf are you doing, he says sorry I got the wrong address jumps in his car and drives off...

I'm still scratching my head.

Same thing happened to us once. The dude did both nature strips. Beautiful job he did AND it happened to be my husband's birthday. He came back the following week to do across the road.
Husband thought I'd organised it as a surprise. Nope.
- Shouldn't have told him! "Oh yeah I forgot I booked him. Happy bday hubby!"
Could be the scam where they do work then over bill you for it unauthorised?

If I'm feeling better by the weekend, I think I want to go and get out and do something. I'm feeling a bit trapped and unhappy with what's happening here, so maybe going and doing... Something is a good idea.

I used to do things and go places, then I just sort of stopped. I mean, I still go places and do things, just not really solo anymore. But maybe a nice meal somewhere and a movie is what I need.

I think that's a great idea. Maybe check out Meetup and see if there's something interesting there?
- I'm not sure about that. I think I kind of want to escape into a social setting, but without the socialising (like going to a cinema, or having dinner somewhere)
Wanna go for lunch?
- Aww, that's sweet, thanks FM! I'll probably have a late friday night and probably won't be up til lunch time, plus I'm planning on just spacing out with my headphones for most of the day. But thanks for the offer

Went for a drive at lunch. On the way there I saw this... figure. Face totally covered, just sitting by the side of the road. Still there when I came back. Hadnt moved in 10 minutes so I figured I'd call the police non-emergency who directed me to 000. I'm really hoping it was just someone throwing out a sex doll or something. Now I'm worried it was just someone having a mental breakdown or something and I've made it worse by getting police/ambulance involved.

You may have saved someone's life. Don't over think things. They're in the right hands now.
- yeah I hope so. Or at least the cops have a laugh at the sex doll being thrown away. Without seeing a face its impossible to know.

There's a few coppers outside my place and because I cant see because of my fence I opened the gate and asked what's going on. The one copper says "yeah ah just someone tryna get away. Don't worry we got him". I said "no worries" shut the gate.

It was right outside my drive way so I couldn't use my binoculars 😔

Mind you I went out in my cat pjs and what I describe as a native American woollen blanket with sleeves. It's an interesting little number.

Today is payday, I'm starting at an overdraft of $50. Gonna suck, can't get the new shoes I've been needing a while(my current ones have holes, which is fine when it isn't cold.) But I think I'll be fine. Lots of cheap ramen in my future.

Big batch of bolognese frozen might almost be cheaper and healthier. At least it'll make you feel better in the cold.
- When we had really tight fortnights, 2 minute noodles and gigantic batches of spag bol or beef chow mein were what we lived off of. I can't stand them because of that reason, but they are all quite good cheap and well rounded meals. You can skip or substitute the beef to make them vego or cheaper if need be too
Ramen is great, love me noodles. Cheap meat and some broccolini and/or Bok Choy elevate them so much. Add Hoisin sauce and soy sauce and bam - you got yourself a restaurant quality meal right there
Bolognese is great for freezing, and the longer you leave it the better it tastes. Better if you can get the mince for cheap (right before it goes bad, when the shops have discounted it).
Rice is great paired with leftovers. If you have a rice cooker, add some paprika to the rice and water and then let it cook - the paprika will flavour the rice.
I'm not sure where you're located, but Cheaper by Miles is great for cheap groceries and deals. You are beholden to whatever they have in stock at the time, but cheap snacks, meats, veggies, noodles are usually stocked.
Regarding shoes: I feel that. Could try Savers or OP shops, they sometimes have really good quality shoes that have barely been worn, for cheaper than $50.
- I flavour rice and mashed potatoes with all sorts of things. Chicken stock/salt, paprika, all purp spice, cayenne pepper, really whatever floats your boat

well suddenly the feeling sick makes sense, that was the fastest positive line I've ever seen on a rat test. It wasn't even a minute!

Crazy when that happens lol like "yup, definitely covid, no two ways about it"
I hope it isn't too bad for you, and that you feel better soon 💜
- Cheers, its not too bad to be honest. None of the brain fog of last time, just a light case of the dumb. More like a bad cold if anything.

I wish I could fit on a cat tree in front of the heater and be cute. Maybe in the next life.

She is so beautiful!
- It's how she gets away with all the shit she puts me through lol
Beautiful Gibson, how could one not want to be you? 💜🙌💜

Didn't really warm up today after a bungled site visit meant an hour in the cold without enough layers on. Total brain fog at work like I could barely remember my name let alone do my job. The sads are definitely hitting. I watched the last episode of Tales From The Loop which is sad enough itself, but somehow the thing that made me most emotional was seeing Cole walking the sunny meadows, flowers and grass waving in the breeze... I wanted to touch the sun...

Thinking back to the last few winters from 2020 on, they were all significant low points of the year - aside from getting my PR a bit over exactly a year ago. That was glorious until shtf in July at work.

Anyway, I know my risk factors, so I've arranged social things for all 3 of the next days, I'll try taking my meds again now that my sleep schedule has reset, and I'll prolly have a coffee at work tomorrow (green tea is not cutting it). I need external motivation to exercise, that's probably the biggest thing missing. If I get a decent tax return in July I think I'll look into a personal trainer for even a month, even though I'm very cagey/picky about such things.

It sounds like you've got a plan, which is a great step. Exercise, for me, is almost as powerful as the meds I take for depression.
As an aside, tales from the loop is absolutely amazing and the body swap episode brought a tear to my eye.

Semi hoarder parent is being forced into Care. I’m to write a list of things I want retrieved. Very difficult since I’ve not been to this particular house and everything I can think of wanting is super susceptible to rats so probably doesn’t exist anymore.

I've dealt with this situation, full on hoarder/slob lazy bastard. If it's personal and can be washed/disinfected then keep, can't be washed then good bye to it.
Photos, heirlooms, objet d'art, personal collections, documents.
- I’m doing this remote, so hard to judge. Guess I’ll ask for a video call? Pretty much everything sentimental I can think of is fabric, paper, or leather. Not optimistic given rats.
- Er, an emerging one who hasn’t quite got to the legal limit? Deciding the solution to the rats stealing the dog food is to put out an extra bowl rather than dealing with the rats?

Good very early morning. It's BRRRR.

Brrrrr mode activate.

Still stuffy and gross. Worked up a sweat just loading the dishwasher and taking the garbage to the chute! I'm working today though for the first time this week at least.

Breakfast 🍏🍎🍐🍊🍋🍈🫐🍓🍇🍉🍌🍒🍑🥭🍍🥥🥦🥑🫛🍆🍅🥝🥬🥒🌽🥕🥐🍠🫚🥔🧅🥯🍞🥖🥨🧀🧇🥞🧈🍳🥚🥓🥩🍗🍖🫓🍕🍟🍔🌭🥙🧆🌮🌯🥗🍲🍜🍝🥘🍛🍣🍱🥟🦪🍥🍘🍚🍙🐠🍤🪼🦀🐙 🍗🥮🍢🍡🍧🍰🧁🥧🍦🍨🎂🍮🍭🍬🍫🥜🌰🍪🍿🍯🥛☕️🍵🍺🍶🥤🧋🧃🥂🍷🥃🍸🍹🧉🔋

Tacos and tea please.
- 🌮🌮☕️
Peanut butter and jam everything!!!
- 🥜🍓🍇🍒🔨
Coffee, two hashbrowns, and a roasted portobello mushroom please
- ☕️🥔🥔🔥🍄‍🟫
Butter and brie baguette please. How long until the restaurant transitions to food truck?
- 🧈🧀🥖
  Not for another 3.5 weeks
Baked stuffed potato please
- 🧈🥓🧀🥔🔥
Fried catfish please
- 🐟 I assume you mean the regular variety and not the after eight one

It's so cold I don't want to do anything 😔

Supposed to go to the gym but it's freezing outside!

those ones where you dont wanna go BUT you end up going are the BEST though. You feel like a god afterwards!
- I ended up going! Feel heaps better.
God today was really cold, hey. By 2:30pm I could see my breath.......
- My house hasn't got insulation so I close pretty much every door and run the gas heater.
  Not cheap but beats seeing my breath

I'm still feeling crook :/

At this point it's mostly a gnarly cough and my nose turning red from all the tissues, but I was hoping I'd be better by now. Not COVID though, so that's a plus I suppose

Comment I’m not posting on that Other Site. Flair request: fed a boiled owl to my cats.

Nooo. I put my tin of charcoal pencils on my bed to do a quick stick vac and then they fell off. Snapped the leads off two of them. And it was a tin with plastic grooves for them to sit in too, intended to protect them during transport. But they were sharpened shorter so there was room at the top allowing them to fall and break at a vertical angle.

I'll sharpen them again.

If I had the energy I'd get a small shallow wooden box with a closure, cut a piece of foam to wedge inside, and then make slashes in the foam to hold the sharpened charcoals gently in place. Perhaps hollow out the foam around the tips to allow space so it doesn't put any pressure on the most delicate part.

If I wasn't constantly so exhausted and depressed with no proper workspace I could make some cool things.

Edit: Also the art book I'm working through very slowly is like $40-50 on ebay. It feels like all of the really solid tradish art books are going out of print and becoming really expensive if they're even available. I did see a bundle of three similar ones for about the same price 🤔 To be honest it's still cheaper than the art classes I see

Have you tried Anna's Archive? Link I don't have a problem using this for out of print stuff and stuff that Amazon Australia AND Goodreads has blocked for Australia. Also anything that's too bloody expensive and I can't find it secondhand.
- Ooh, ty! I don't think this particular book is out of copyright yet though (borrowed a copy from the library) so I hope this site doesn't get in strife...
  Oops. It looks to be a torrent site and I don't have a vpn 😳
  Edit: As much as I hate to use Amazon I managed to find a used copy in England for $30 with $5 delivery, I jumped on it because I think it's the best I'm gonna get.
A brush roll with ties will hold them safe. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=make+up+brush+roll&iax=images&ia=images&iai=http%3A%2F%2F4.bp.blogspot.com%2F-2MuQ4uHC4HE%2FUXBizUgK2PI%2FAAAAAAAANsQ%2F0I3KiNSsv0A%2Fs1600%2Fmakeup%2Broll-up.png
- It might be a little flexible to protect them from my clumsiness. I have a sketching kit of that stiff non-woven fabric with elastic loops to hold those charcoals but don't trust it. If dropped or squashed even a slight angled impact might be enough to snap them off
  Edit: Also the charcoal might rub off on the lining and transfer to my hands, and then get touched onto everything. That stuff is almost as bad as glitter

Anyone got any office chair recommendations? Time for an upgrade with EOFY sales. Not looking to spend crazy money. My current chair is a cheapie from Officeworks which has served me well during the COVID years, but starting to get worn down and uncomfortable.

the Bathurst from Officeworks is alright. I do seem to have to replace it ever 2 years or so though.

Paaaakiiiidge

In other news, $boss has fallen to the same plague i had a couple weeks back and is rapidly learning empathy

My pakig is at the post office but the post office is inconvenient to get too :(
- bashtards. I spit upon them

Could I run a HDMI cable through my walls for less than the price of a cheap gaming PC?

It's one of those things that could theoretically be a dig job. But I don't have the tools or experience or the desire to get under the house

depending on length? Yeah. Probably cheaper to get a sparky to do a professional job than it would be get an Xbox X or PS5 anyway. My brother in law doesnt even have a monitor, just leaves his rig plugged into the TV full time.
- About 10 metres in a straight line. I'm thinking a female to female cable in the wall, then I can run regular HDMI cables in and out. I've got a hectic rig with a 4090 one room over from the TV so it beats anything you could get for the $700-800 space
- I used to use a cheap old tv as a PC monitor. Besides needing to sit further back to not be able to count the pixels, it was fine. Had sound, too
  Edit: oh actually now that I think about it, when turned on, it would start on ATV with the static. Not that bad, provided you're not staring directly at the screen and you're not in a dark room
Could also try in home streaming options. You can stream the display from your PC to a TV. If either is on WiFi this can be pretty choppy.
I personally use Moonlight for this. It has an android TV app. Sunlight on the host PC since I have an amd GPU.
- If you're wanting to go this way, probably better off running an ethernet cable and then you can permanently sue that for internet too, not just screen mirroring
- I've got a Shield connected to the TV and I tried the Nvidia GeForce app. My PC is WiFi but the shield was Ethernet and there was too much delay for elden ring. So a racing game to entertain the kids won't work either.
  Maybe I'll get them to run Ethernet between the two rooms whilst I'm at it as well
Only problem is that you might need to upgrade the cable in a few years when new protocols come out (if you update your gaming PC and TV to newer stuff) but yeah getting some proper faceplates and a cable installed is a neat way to go about it. I think installing one and even 1 cable upgrade would be less than any kind of half decent gaming machine. It should be anyway.

Have gas ducted heating, is set at 22. I get cold. I can happily not need ac in summer, but winter without heating is intolerable.
20 during day, 18 for sleeps, 17 if his lordship is out tomcatting (i run hot)
About 21-22. Insulation isn’t great here and will drop back slowly to 18, the skylights open vents aren’t helping either.
Trying to save on energy so I’ve gone for the oodie instead of keeping the heating on after seeing my last power bill skyrocket.
The ducted heating is set at 20 deg. I turn it on when the temp drops to 15 deg. When it reaches 20 I turn it off as the house is good for maybe 3-4 hours before it drops to the 15 deg threshold again. This is sufficient for an evening, and the house is cooler and it's easier to sleep once the temperature drops down. In the morning I turn it on for an hour or so as this heats the bathroom to about 22 deg which is ideal for showering etc. and I always have a nice warm fluffy towel. I turn it off after that, as the sunshine (when there is any) keeps the house warm through the daylight hours. This does me for winter, and the bills aren't too outrageous so far. Also, running the ducted heating on this schedule means that in rainy weather I can put any wet washing on a rack over a vent in the morning and it's dry and ready to put away by the time I come home. Heating is so damn subjective and personal - what suits one person might not suit another.
We used to keep ours on either 19.5 or 20 with a fan speed of 2. It was warm enough to keep things warm but never hot. But none of our rooms really have decent insulation, so we were all sort of adapted to it being 12-18 in our rooms.