Notices by David McMullin (mcmullin@musicians.today), page 2

@liztai
Years ago I (Irish-American) was on vacation with my wife (Chinese-American) in Southern California, and we walked holding hands past a gaggle of Asian-American teenagers. Someone said, “I’m a banana! My spoon is too big!” and they all laughed. I didn’t get what it meant until later. My wife’s parents are from China, she’s fully bilingual in Mandarin and English, and even my Mandarin is probably more than those kids know. But she was with me, so: banana. It still annoys me.

@liztai
Filtering aggressively keeps the toxic stuff out, but doesn’t keep me from compulsively checking. In the past, I’ve set daily screen time limits on apps I use too much. Like parental controls, so it makes me enter a code if I want to keep using it. That helps. And a substitute habit helps. If I want to scroll on my phone, read a book there instead of checking social media. It’s still screen time, but it’s immersive concentration, with a different effect on the mind.

@nigelharpur @thanius
It took me about 2 weeks on mastodon to have as many people following me as after 6 years on twitter, and now there are 5 to 6 times as many, just from natural gradual accretion as I interact with people.

The best part is, nobody cares!

If a conversation seems interesting, people join it. They don’t check first to see if you’re in their league, or how engaging with you might affect their brand image.

@inthehands
This is really true. Anyone who says they’ve never heard some jerk do this is not to be trusted. But something I’ve noticed through the years is that people test the waters like that around me less and less; it’s been years since it happened. Part of it is that I just don’t have to be around those types much anymore. But I also flatter myself to think part of it is because they can tell it wouldn’t fly, so they keep it to themselves.