. . . Shit. Do I need to change away from dark mode? I highly prefer it but I do have mild astigmatism…

Yes. Classically trained, degrees and all. I always had good aural skills; it came naturally to me and formal training just made me better at it. Now I sing and singers absolutely have to know how to do it if they’re sight reading. No instrument to rely on. Some can’t do it; they have to hear it first. Singers get a bad rap by other musicians honestly.

Oh, nothing inherently wrong, but we’ve already had a couple of incidents of bad behavior. My kid got mad about something and sent some angry messages to a group chat that included racial slurs. It was a big learning experience to say the least (for all of us). Since then they’ve learned to unsend their messages, it seems, so while I can say my kiddo learned something, I have to hope that he also learned the things I needed him to learn. Being a parent is so much fun!

Someone is downvoting everything but I agree. I try and keep my helicopter parent impulses under control, but it is nice to know exactly where my kids are. My son (12) has a locked down old iPhone and Apple makes it pretty easy to make it practically a dumb phone. We literally have it set up so that he has to ask for permission before using any apps, with the exception of calling and messaging. (Even messaging is iffy; we want to be able to text him but it opens up texting with friends.) He doesn’t need it at school so he doesn’t bring it, but as he gets older, I’m sure it’ll start to go with him and I’m not upset about it. If he wants to go somewhere with a friend right after school instead of going straight home, it’s fine with me as long as I know about it. Without a phone, it’d be hard for him to make such plans on the fly, and let’s just say that planning ahead isn’t my ADHD-kid’s strong suit (yet—we’re working on it). As long as the expectation is set that he doesn’t use it during school, I think that’s okay; it can just live in his backpack until school is over.

I also had adult acne and ended up finding an aesthetician for facials who set me straight. The biggest thing I was doing to hurt my skin was using products that were way too harsh. I’m sure the facials themselves didn’t hurt, but switching away from benzoyl peroxide products to really gentle cleansers and light moisturizers was what really made a difference. Now I use fancier stuff but she essentially recommended Neutrogena sensitive skin moisturizer (without sunscreen — use a separate, physical sunscreen) which can easily be found at any pharmacy, and for cheap.

Full disclosure though, while I was on the road to recovery, I also got pregnant and then my skin was great. And my new products and habits meant that my skin managed to keep being okay post-pregnancy.

Hopefully the media is changing. Off the top of my head, I thought of “Inside Out,” where the girl is an only child (I think?) and her family is depicted as pretty loving, just going through a tough move. I suspect a lot of kids’ media has also adjusted to two kids max; I’m specifically thinking of shows like Bluey and Daniel Tiger for instance.

I’m really sad as a Millennial that this aesthetic has been dubbed “Millennial gray.” I’ve watched some videos on it that make the case that it’s a backlash from the 70s aesthetic we grew up with combined with poor financial prospects in early adulthood, meaning we couldn’t buy a lot of or very nice furniture. Now that I’m firmly middle-aged, I can afford better stuff and my husband and I are slowly turning over crap particle-board furniture for nice solid wood pieces (often secondhand) in the craftsman style.

I tend to agree with you, but then I remember the convo I had with my mother-in-law about why trans people had to wear clothing that affirmed their gender when it made her uncomfortable…

WTF, I can’t even. I just avoid talking to her as much as possible at this point.

Yes I 100% agree! Making everything automatic also makes people complacent and they don’t check to make sure everything is working as intended. I rather miss my light switch in my car. Daytime running lights are dumb unless they are just always-on headlights and taillights.

It’s a damn drive thru lane, I’m telling you!

It used to be in our bathroom behind a baby gate with a cat door in it (also where we have to keep the cat food), but we got a 2-in-1 washer/dryer combo and it freed up a spot in the laundry room, and I was super happy to get it out of my bathroom! I’ll deal with the occasional heist of kitty roca.

In older cars, where you could manually flip the rear view mirror to dim it, my dad would flip it back and forth trying to flash the person behind him so they’d get the hint about their high beams. Not sure it ever worked…

Back when I still used Nextdoor, I once posted a picture of the regular (green) headlight dash icon and the blue high beam icon, and spelled out what they’re used for and that people should know the difference. I got flooded with hearts or whatever the Nextdoor equivalent of upvotes is, I’m sure all from people who already knew and were also frustrated. There are definitely some people who are either ignorant or oblivious; I wonder if any of them saw my post and learned something? Can’t say the problem got any better.

I’m a bit confused — are you talking to me, or about Amber Heard? Feeling pretty attacked, which, if that was your goal, congratulations I guess?

For what it’s worth, I honestly did not follow the case very closely and what I did see was tons of conflicting narratives depending on where I was reading or hearing about it. I have no idea who to believe. Probably they’re both shitty people.

None of this has anything to do with my comment about the justice system, which was in response to yours asking about the verdict, compensation, etc. as though those things mean truth. I don’t believe they do mean truth; I’ve had personal limited experience suggesting otherwise and there are plenty of cases that have ruined people’s lives that were later overturned.

I’m not trying to be combative, but I feel a bit defensive because of what feels to me like vitriol from a random online commenter. If I misunderstood, I apologize.

This assumes the legal system is infallible.

Honest question from someone who has used a ton of different types of litter-trapping mats: do your cats actually walk on them? My problem with many — well actually, probably ALL of the mats that had any plastic was that the cats would leap over them because they didn’t like the texture. I had a utility mat in front of it for a while that had a fabric top and that went okay but didn’t really trap litter. I’m currently testing what basically amounts to a fluffy rug and it’s going okay I think? Supposedly helps with water/mud tracking also which is great since our litter box is next to the doggie door. (Yes, I have caught the dog grabbing a “snack” and heading outside in the short three minutes before the robot litter box cycles, sigh.)

You’re right and that makes me want to cry a bit.

Yeah I’m with you, sort of already in a way. I’m lucky enough to be able to work part-time and managed to (finally) get a job doing what I decided I wanted to do while in college. And it’s arts-related. So yes, I do enjoy my job. Do I enjoy working? I mean…. Not really, if I’m honest. But at the same time, it gives me an opportunity to better myself in certain ways that I wouldn’t get in my hobbies, and I do value that.

I live in the area and yeah, it’s everywhere. It’s become a game to spot the billboards that aren’t for AI companies.

I think these cloud companies have been pretty successful convincing people that at-home storage is more at-risk than the cloud because you could always have a house fire or something, or your hard drive could fail, or whatever. But it seems the pendulum is now swinging the other way as people get wise to the inherent dangers of only keeping things on the cloud, and trusting a company with your data no less.

Maybe the reason they’re sitting mostly unused is because much of the public feels similarly to OP and doesn’t want to jump through a bunch of hoops just to use a tennis court.