This started on Wednesday, almost immediately after Trump’s victory was announced. By Friday it was already being reported in grade schools because asshole parents enjoy raising asshole sons, and Trump tells people that it’s ok to be the absolute worst human being they can be.

I have a friend who is a hard Republican. We generally don’t talk politics, but after this started last week he was posting things online being offensive towards women and POC (and the whole “illegals took my job and healthcare”) so I finally had to call him out. His response was basically that he wasn’t aware of any increased discrimination happening against women, therefore he didn’t believe it was happening. I’ve known the guy for 40 years but this may be the thing that breaks our friendship. He claims to be an advocate for people’s rights yet he is painfully unaware of the world around him.

Quite interesting advocating from 1st Amendment rights, while also also deleting content that he personally doesn’t like.

I have four more years to pay off my house. I just have to survive the Trump administration without losing everything.

Wow, how are you retiring at 55??? I’m 56, and have spent this year re-vamping my IRA accounts with the hope of retiring in 10-12 years without any reliance on the social security that will be gone.

[Edit] I see below you mentioned having a pension. Must be nice!

That’s a shame since literally everyone should distrust Edge, given Microsoft’s history with browsers (and everything else). I don’t think anyone matches Microsoft’s caviler attitude of “We know there are hundreds of gaping security holes that allow attackers to take full admin control of your computer, but we’re just going to mark those bugs as will-not-fix and blame the users when something goes wrong.”

You do realize we’re talking about the same society that requires a warning label to not eat the shampoo?

Honestly I’m not really sure about that. What I’ve seen on the idea of damage to children usually has the caveat of “more study is needed”, but of course nobody wants to subject children to such a study on purpose. On the other hand, I haven’t seen any studies yet that concluded long-term use in adults would cause any permanent damage. I suspect there could be outlying cases of extremely heavy usage but in moderation it so far appears to be perfectly safe.

The current belief is that it can affect the brains of growing children, but they’re not sure to what extent. In my state the legal age is 21, the same as for drinking. In adults, straight cannabis will not harm you in any way other than the usual effects of being under the influence and not always making rational choices. Worst case, you sleep it off. Do keep in mind that smoking it can slowly damage your lungs, the same as breathing any find particulates over a long period of time. I personally prefer edibles for long-term use, but the baking process does reduce the potency.

Now, like any drug, the reason you want to take it can be very important. If you need something to escape reality on a permanent basis, obviously you have a larger problem that no drug is ever going to solve. However the occasional evening can be quite entertaining, much like a trip to the water park. Other people (like myself) take it on a regular basis to help with medical problems, usually pain relief or sleep issues, where CBD is the answer rather than the THC component.

For myself, I’ve had sleeping problems for the past 16 years (since a bad car wreck). I worked with my doctor for awhile trying to find something that would help. The problem is, I’m a computer tech and I need my mind sharp for troubleshooting or writing code. All the prescription drugs leave your brain in a fog through much of the next day, and then what use am I? It turns out that marijuana has a fairly quick drop-off, so it can provide help through the night, and is pretty much out of my system by the time I head for work. As with anything, it takes some time to find the right dose. I take it along with other prescription medications to address different issues, but I’ve been getting good restful sleep for the past 9 years and feeling much more like myself again. For these purposes I highly recommend it, but talk to someone knowledgeable to guide you to the right strains and give advice on what to expect.

I’m curious, what part of that do you think will be good for anyone who isn’t a rich which male?

I agree with the wait-and-see approach, but I also know how much damage he did the first time around even without a lot of support. And the amazing thing is that people still think the economy was better under Trump (who barely managed to coast on Obama’s success) than it has been under Biden (who managed to turn around a global economic disaster after COVID). This time it’s all going to be on Trump, and we’re all going to suffer from it.

Unfortunately Trump’s stated plan is to boot out everyone who won’t kiss his ass, shut down “non-essential” services like the education department or national weather service, put someone in control of healthcare who believes all vaccinations need to be immediately banned, and pass national laws against women’s reproductive health care despite his claims of letting each State handle their own business. And yes, on his own he could only do so much, but the Republican party also gained more seats in both houses of representatives which means it will be easier to steamroll through anything he wants. So yeah, we have many many good reasons to be worried.

Putting the “dumb” in dumber. I don’t know how people can be so wasteful. I mean when I buy a car, I expect to not have to take it in for work for a very long time. Imagine my surprise today when I went to get an emissions test and found out the back end of my exhaust pipe has rusted off. The last time I had any work done on it (other than oil changes) was before COVID, when someone hit me. I drove my previous (first) vehicle for 24 years before deciding I needed to get an SUV for towing capacity. Man if I had that kind of crazy money to blow on a cheap cybertruck, I’d be using it for donations or something. I can “prove” my worth by the smiles at the children’s hospital.

Wow, did I hit that one or what? And it’s just so sad.

At least the Delorian had character. You can’t say that about this abomination.

His whining at the beginning certainly had me wondering too.

And then there are the comments – “There just haters there mad cause they can’t afford one them self’s…” Like really, did you even make it beyond third grade? And this is the kind of person who is sticking up for Cybertruck owners? Maybe there are a number of reasons why we point and laugh…

Coming next week – Hamster Ball Desks!

Are you sure this is new? I’d swear all the M-series iMacs I’ve ordered for work over the last few years recharged the keyboard and mouse through USB-C

Seems like a good opportunity to remind folks about the Kiwix project, which allows you to download local private copies of select information such as Wikipedia. It was originally created to provide offline access to content for countries that were otherwise blocked, but events like this have sparked some recent discussion about archiving older files to preserve history.

That’s a shame to hear, but yeah they’ve certainly changed since I signed on. Not that I expect any other to be better at this point.

It’s weird to see T-mobile taking this stance. I switched to them years ago because they were one of the few that supported unlocked phones, and even offered them for sale. Their policies might have changed on this, but I just bought an unlocked phone off Ebay this Summer and all I needed to do was pop my sim card into the new device. Hell I had to specifically install the visual voicemail app because there wasn’t any bloatware on the phone when I got it. So I guess I’m not following what their complaint is about?