numberfour002 @ numberfour002 @lemmy.world

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2 yr. ago

For me it was the original Resident Evil on the Playstation.

It was the first time I saw live-action digitized full-motion video on a gaming system. I know there were a lot of FMV (Full Motion Video) games in that era on other systems, but I didn't own those other systems and I didn't know anybody who did. So, it was all new to me once I played a Playstation.

Resident Evil was also the first time a video game had ever given me a jump scare. Early in the game a zombie doberman bursts through a window unexpectedly and I was hooked! I loved introducing my friends to the game, specifically so I could see their reaction when the dog shows up. So much fun.

Honestly seeing and hearing Super Mario World on the Super Nintendo was kind of wow, too. The graphics boost compared to the 8-bit systems I was used to was incredible. And the sound quality compared to the other 16-bit systems I'd played (Genesis and TG-16) was a leap above. The experience probably pales in comparison to modern games, but back then there was wow factor to it.

To young me, Street Fighter 2 Turbo was pretty wow as well. It was "literally" the same as the arcade version to child me. I could not believe the home version was so close to the real thing, because prior generations of game systems like the NES couldn't come close to that level of performance.

The answer is "it depends". There are so many hoops and loopholes and gotchas built into the system that 2 identical people with the exact same background and ailment(s) could go see the exact same medical staff and yet still end up having to pay 2 completely different amounts for their care. But it's more complicated than that, because there are a myriad factors that come into play (insurance versus none, location/state of residence, etc) so there's no one concise and accurate answer to these types of questions.

Most non-wealthy people who don't have insurance, but who don't qualify for government/public medical care, simply go without care. Or they use the emergency room loophole to get some kind of treatment. The loophole, with lots of nuance and caveats, is that the emergency room has to at least give you enough treatment to temporarily stabilize your condition, regardless of your ability to pay.

For check-ups and counseling - In a lot of places that sort of stuff requires you to pay up front. You can sometimes haggle or work out a payment plan. If you're poor enough to qualify for government aid, it may be free. Otherwise, you're expected to have insurance and pay the co-pay. If that doesn't apply, these places usually have a "cash" price that's slightly more affordable, but still usually require payment ahead of time.

For meds, you basically always pay up front. There's really no concept of pharmacies providing medications in a manner where you can pay later. No money means no meds. It's also ridiculous to even ask how much a person would expect to pay for meds, it could be as little as a few USD to thousands, really depends on the meds, quantity needed, location, etc.

Xrays - This is where debt might actually come into play. You usually pay for these after the fact. If you go to the doctor, you might have to pay the standard fee (or copay) up front, but all the other services/tests/etc are charged after the fact. So you'll end up getting a bill after you've gotten the xray and consultation. To be honest, I don't know the average out of pocket cost for an x-ray if you don't have insurance, but it would differ from location to location and region to region. If you don't pay that bill, you'll get harassed and most likely you'll have to change doctors because the office you owe money to won't see you again until your debt is paid or you've worked out a payment plan.

For people with insurance, there's pretty much always a maximum yearly out of pocket amount, after which things are basically all paid for by insurance. Again there are nuances and caveats. And the maximum out of pocket varies by insurance policy, number of people insured, etc, but $8,000 - $20,000 are not uncommon amounts. To be honest, I don't even know what mine is, I've never actually reached it. Not everything is covered by the maximum out of pocket, though.

$27,000 medical debt could possibly be from someone who was uninsured or it may be several years of medical debt.

To give you an idea of how crazy the system is: I had a hairline fracture several years ago and what was deemed as "good" insurance. By the time everything was done, it ended up costing me around $3,000 out of pocket. That's for co-pays, x-rays, medication, etc over the course of months.

On the other hand: A family member of mine had a heart attack, required emergency surgery, had no insurance, and had no money to pay for anything. In the end cost them less than a few hundred USD out of pocket. Hospital wiped the debt clean. Government programs and drug company programs paid for meds. Eventually disability stuff kicked in and took care of everything else.

If he's late 30s to early 40s then he did not age well. I know several full blown alcoholics in their 50s who look younger than the guy in this photo.

I dry them in a food dehydrator or in the oven. There's no way I could leave them out, exposed like this in my part of the world.

My first thought as well: Those would be covered in flies, ants, and/or other bugs if I tried it around here (which is not Mexico). It makes me wonder if this photo is taken some place that doesn't really have much in the way of bugs, as hard as that is to imagine, or if they go to great lengths to kill all the pests in the area to prevent them from taking over the tomato yield.

No dead animal pics for me, but lots of random bugs, flowers, mushrooms, leaves, rocks, and sunsets.

Same for the fish, the cycads, and the ferns. But not the unicorns.

Your sodium, cholesterol, and blood sugar levels will earn gold, silver, and bronze medals for their Olympic-grade high jumps. And that's how you know it's healthy.

We're all eating craps on this blessed day.

It's definitely a fair bit of effort and responsibility to keep this many fish in this size of tank, so it pretty much needs to be a labor of love. Cichlid tanks like the one in the photo might be a little less work / stress compared to a typical saltwater tank of similar size, but they can still be a lot of work.

I wouldn't want to take on the responsibility of upkeep on this tank, but I am certain if I had something like this in a nice spot where I could stop and lounge for a bit, watching the fish do their thing, in that moment it would be quite calming.

Same principle with captive birds as pets. The sounds of a happy, healthy aviary can be so soothing (with the right birds of course). However, birds are a lot of work. And the cost of caring for them, I mean, just wait until you see the bill.

In all my adult life, I can only think of one friend of mine who would absolutely be down for going out and hunting for bugs. Fortunately, some of my friends have young kids, and young kids love to go bug hunting.

Still wish I knew how to find more adults who would be enthusiastic about going on a bug hunting adventure rather than just being weirded out by it.

In other words "We gon charge for the pron."

Alternative alternatively: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels

1. Sperm is not an animal.
2. Sperm will drown in lotion, tissue paper, toilets, mouths, assholes, various fruit, couches apparently, condoms, and probably an order of magnitude or few more places than just this small list I've constructed.
3. Sperm don't have a mouth and thus cannot bite.

My keyboard certainly doesn't have throe in its dictionary. But it also doesn't have throw. Or through. Or really any words because it doesn't have a dictionary.

I can't answer affirmatively. However, today there are numerous posts on Reddit about the fact that they are considering charging money to access certain subreddits. As you would expect, most of the top comments in those threads are not happy and there are numerous comments along the lines of "I wish there were Reddit alternatives" or asking if there are any.

I did not see any responses mentioning Lemmy or the Fediverse, and I looked for it. Now, to be clear, I did not read every comment and every reply in every one of those threads, so it's possible Lemmy was mentioned and I simply didn't see it. But it certainly wasn't prominent in any of those threads at the time I checked.

Usually just flip on some Murder She Wrote when I need to get my Dick in the mood. Been married 43 years come November.

Am I missing something? I just checked and it seems like it is currently showing:

Harris 208

Toss Ups 111

Trump/Vance 219

In your original comment that I responded to, it sounded like you're making the case that mixed and non-white people should start asking white people those questions as a matter of policy, and not just those times when a specific white person asked first. That's why I was curious what you thought the effect would be.

That being said, even if you meant that people should only return the question if the white person asked first, that's something which would just be normal and instinctual for most folks, I would think? Like if someone I'm getting to know asked me my favorite color, I'd probably follow up with the same question after I gave them my answer. So it seemed a bit weird to see a call to action to do something that I would have otherwise thought most people would already be doing (at least in my experience, which I certainly am open to the possibility that my experience is atypical of what racial minorities endure).

And although I am white, and thus I'm certainly coming from a place of privilege, I am a minority (lgbt) and have had my fair share of experience with inappropriate and/or weaponized questions, so I'm not coming from this from a place of complete naivety. I'm certainly aware that sometimes people will ask questions like "are you the boy or the girl in the relationship" from a place of authentic and unintentional ignorance, but that it's quite often coming from people whose intent is to be derogatory.

Out of curiosity, can you explain what effect you believe this might have?

I am glad to be wrong, but I feel like most white people in the USA wouldn't be offended or even find that to be a strange question. They'll just answer it as best they can: Florida, Sacramento, born in Boise but raised in Fairfield. Or if you press about ancestry, most white folks will gladly say French-German, Irish, etc and then maybe even ask you the same thing because they're genuinely curious and because it's a natural way for an otherwise polite, as you put it, conversation to steer once the topic has come up. Probably most wouldn't even recognize if another person were asking that question specifically to make a point about racism/prejudice/etc.

I really doubt that many white people have had these types of questions weaponized against them so unless they are made aware of how offensive it can be or how it betrays their own biases/prejudices (which we all have by the way), they may not even know. I would think that explaining how those questions impact you negatively in a supportive and understanding way will get you much further with most people than being retaliatory or intentionally inflammatory.