Radiant_sir_radiant @ Radiant_sir_radiant @beehaw.org

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Joined

2 yr. ago

Not an entire game, but the freedom ending in The Stanley Parable is truly beautiful.

Apparently there were several unsuccessful attempts .
\ (German only, but hopefully still a little bit funny.)

Same here!
\ I just remember stuff getting weirder and weider. Not that that's a bad thing (especially not for this series), but my brain's ability to store information is directly proportional to the amount of dots it can connect between known stuff and new stuff, and apparently somewhere along season 2 it just threw its hands up and exclaimed "screw this."

Still a lovely series though. I hope Gary at least got a fresh cookie at the end.

Good luck with the interview!

Even if you aren't going to work there for whatever reason, the first interview is normally what sets things in motion and makes other opportunities start popping up all around you.
\ I have no idea why it's this way, but it's my personal observation and what most people I know tell me, so based on lots of anecdotal evidence.

Not too bad, actually!

It's been a while since I've last said that, and I'm not entirely sure why. Maybe I should appreciate the seemingly insignificant things more.

It's summer here, and the sun has shown no mercy for a week now, but we've got A/C in the bedroom and living room so we can actually (mostly) enjoy the hot weather.
\ I've built a PC from spare parts and set it up in the shade next to the pool. This has been my office this week. I can watch the dogs wander around and sniff things and spend the work breaks scuba diving to depths of up to 150cm (5 feet).

Yesterday it dawned on me that this is probably as close as most people I know will ever get to "living the dream". It's awesome. And I'm feeling a bit guilty for having "made it" when so many of my friends haven't (yet).
\ Has this really happened to me, of all people?

I've made a breakthrough at work to automate one piece of particularly stupid and repetitive work, and I can't wait to get it through testing and discuss it with the person having to do that work.
\ The teenage kids have been mostly content and busy, so no unnecessary drama for a while. This alone is a massive improvement of our quality of life.

Now all SO and me need to do is find ways to better defend our free time against work and the kids, and we're pretty much exactly where we've always wanted to be.
\ Oh, and sleep better.

This is probably not what you're looking for, but at the height of Covid I made myself a prototype browser extension that would scan the front page of the two newspapers I read and replace all headlines containing certain keywords with a random dog picture. Everything was hardcoded and it only worked for the two news websites I used the most at the time, but it was fantastic.

Maybe there's something similar, but production-ready and publicly available?

I'm in Florida

Aww, shit. I'm sorry man. Hang on, it's bound to get better eventually.

You have nice chocolate and you are the set for many of our action movies.

Thanks. 🙃 Though I sometimes wish less of those movies were about secret Nazi gold bank accounts. Oh well, can't have everything.

We've actually been to Florida in February, from Miami to Key West and back north all the way to Tampa. Lots of lovely places. Stuff was surprisingly expensive. People were mostly friendly and welcoming, though we generally avoided talking politics. We rented a "mid-size" SUV that was about twice as big as what's considered a big car here. Driving it felt kinda badass, though I was happy to have my very manageable Volvo V60 back after two weeks.

Back on topic: wouldn't the National Guard stop a domestic armed conflict? I mean, it still wouldn't be ideal, but all you had to do is hole up and lie low for a week or two.

Heh, yes we do. There's actually a small bunker in the basement of our house. Though if Covid is anything to go by, the real threat will be the people trying to kill us for our toilet paper and instant noodles. It's a fscked-up world.

I don't know a lot about your situation so cannot really make recommendations, but there's a pretty good chance you could still prepare for most incidents, be it armed conflict or otherwise. If nothing else, this should give you some peace of mind.

If you haven't already done so, stock up on the essentials - water (and one of those water filters or purifying tablets), food with a long shelf life (Huel or similar will keep you fed & healthy pretty much indefinitely) and some snacks. Buy a portable radio, a good flashlight and a powerbank with a crank or solar cells - don't bother with a generator. Assemble your personal first-aid kit with different kinds of painkillers and antibiotics. Get some soap bars, a toothbrush, some duct tape, a paper map of the area, a reliable multi-tool (Leatherman or Victorinox), some windproof matches, some pens and paper and a couple of travel-size tabletop games. Don't forget paper copies of all important documents.

Put all this plus clothes for three days in a backpack (don't forget a rain poncho) and you've got yourself a great tool that you can use to hide at home or if you need to leave in a hurry, e.g. because of a fire.

Keep some cash at home and/or on you at all times. Small bills are better in case there's no change available.

If you really need to leave the country or area during a large-scale incident, have you considered a lightweight motorbike that has good fuel economy, can be manoeuvered/carried around most obstacles and can still go pretty fast?

Also, keep in mind that the biggest challenge/threat in most emergencies is not the situation itself, but the people around you acting irrationally. Remember how Covid had people physically fight each other over 200 rolls of toilet paper.

If I may ask - where are you from (roughly), and do things really look that bad there?

Eastern Switzerland.

I'm trying too much. Many people solve this by giving up. But the real answer is to try harder with fewer things.

This is so, so true. Thank you for this, kind stranger.

We've got plenty of food, water, medical supplies and emergency power. Which means we and a bunch of geographically close friends would either make it through the first months relatively unscathed in our own house, or get killed early in the game for our stuff. If the war came geographically close, we could cross the border to two neighbouring countries within a couple of hours (car) or a day (bike).

I was considering buying a gun, but as the saying goes: a gun without the training means your attacker just got a free gun. Around here there are better ways to protect oneself.

Luckily civil war is highly unlikely around here, and I'm immensely grateful for that. At the moment I'm more worried about a power outage or some other shortage.

Is there a reason why you've stopped taking antidepressants? Asking respectfully, not in an attempt to have you justify your decision, because why would you have to.

Personally I'm an atheist, and thus (by extension) probably a bit of a nihilist - once I'm dead, I'll cease to exist and nothing really matters to me anymore. This means that once I've been gone for so long that nobody remembers me, I've long stopped caring.

I still try to live the best possible life. Because while the world in its entirety may not notice my existence, I certainly do, as does the tiny part of the world I interact with, and I intend to make the most of my time here.

People also tend to underestimate the impact they have one other people's lives. Ask anybody about people who have influenced them, and you will get a huge list. Ask the same person about a list of people they think they have influenced, and the list will be much, much shorter. Until somebody explicitly tells you that you've had an influence on them, it's hard to know about it.

Ever since I've got step kids I can't stop worrying about what they'll learn from me and whether I'll be a good influence or the one they'll point their finger at in therapy session or on true-crime TV one day. So far they appear to turn out great, and every time they say or do something that they might have copied from me, I'm still in awe.

The same is true for other kids in the extended family, students that are unfortunate enough to be mentored by me, friends in need, ...

I'm also prone to worrying about pretty much anything (IT professional with a focus on security - not sure whether it's an occupational hazard or my tendency to worry has steered me to my current job).

Personally I've found that categorising my fears/worries helps tremendously.

If it's a rational fear, it should be something tangible and I can look into steps to alleviate it. Our stock of food, water, fuel and medical supplies f'r instance should comfortably get us through any natural disaster, pandemic or power outage than can realistically be expected.

Irrational fears are difficult, as they tend not to be impressed by the fact that they're irrational and there's nothing to worry about. But I can still try and find other ways to alleviate them. For example when I was a child there was a time when we were piss-poor, and I still worry a lot about money even though we're relatively well-off now and my job is very secure. In these situations I've found that it helps to look at our well-stocked pantry, so that something in my animal brain sees the abundance of food and stops worrying.

If it's something that doesn't affect me directly but still bothers me (e.g. the Ukraine war), is there any way I can help? For example make a donation, influence my country's politics (tough one in 'neutral' Switzerland at the moment), or anything else that makes me feel like I've made a difference?

Also, do keep in mind that most media paint an incomplete picture of what's really going on in the world. Headlines such as "Boyscout helps old lady cross the road" or "today has been a rather nice and uneventful day" just don't make for good visitor numbers.

Enjoying the small things can help. Mindfulness, as in "the ability to appreciate the small and seemingly insignificant things", is a wonderful tool to combat existential dread.

I just think of "normie" as the new "vanilla" - every group that uses it, uses it uses it to refer to people who are not a part of that particular group, so its meaning depends on the context but should be self-explanatory and not (necessarily) derogatory.

As a software guy I like the word for its simplicity and ease of use.

This is the original post: https://beehaw.org/post/7146402

Hey, "I'm happy with it" is as good a justification as any. 🙂

It does make it a challenge though. I don't know of any Firefox-based browser that does that. But then again, I'm by no means well-informed there. Maybe somebody will build one?

I agree in principle - on Windows it's a bit of a cat-and-mouse thing between people building tools to disable Windows telemetry and Microsoft building 'better' telemetry. And don't get me started on Edge. It really is time for the courts to force Microsoft to allow consumer choice once more.

Having said that, it does depend on what your objective (resp. threat model) is whether or not you consider Windows telemetry a problem. Microsoft will know that you've used this web browser for that much time, but not what websites you've visited (unless it's Edge of course). It's up to you whether that bothers you.

It depends on what you want to achieve.

Encryption (if done right) will protect you against people eavesdropping on your connection, but not against tracking by cookies, device fingerprinting or similar technologies. I.e Google, Facebook etc. will still be able to track your every move. A web browser with good ad/tracking blocking will go a long way here, but if technically feasible you'll also probably want something like Pi-Hole to complement your browser's ad blocker and also catch network traffic from other apps.

For better recommendations you'll probably need to tell us about what exactly it is that you want to protect yourself against.

I'm not sure if I unterstand you correctly, but Vivaldi can be configured to have tabs on any side, and (sorta-nested) tab groups if you're so inclined. It's based on Chromium though.

Bit late to the party, but I'd be happy to chip in as well. If not financially, maybe with my small stock of unused "for whomever happens to need one" spare phones. Just let me know how I can help.

EDIT: Found the relevant Ko-Fi.