Notices by Reay (reay@beige.party)

@dalias @JosephMenn I’m in Canada so not sure this’ll particularly affect me (I also use a third party backup service, so would be less affected than some either way), but I was curious for anyone affected if that would be a usable workaround.

@dalias @JosephMenn Sincere question that just occurred to me: Would a VPN work for this?

@derek I get up in my head about it. Like, I’d seen a debate online years back about it and someone pointed out that reading a book and hearing a book activate much of the same parts of your brain and so what’s really the fundamental difference if we call listening to a book “reading”, but in a quick check online I can’t verify that and then I realize I’m WAY overthinking it and should just enjoy what I enjoy.

… having said that, I’m totally calling it reading for the sake of seeing how many books I can get though (COUGHreadCOUGH) this year.

When I worked in a news environment years back, I found that (hold onto your butts) hearing hours of news a day was an emotional and spiritual grind, so sought out more comedy to offset it. Podcasts especially.

Well, it won’t surprise you to find I’m looking for more comedy these days, plus trying to read (/listen to audiobooks… shut up, it’s still kind of reading) more.

If anyone’s looking for good, funny audiobooks, I’d recommend any by Samantha Irby and at least All Things Aside by Iliza Shlesinger (the only one of hers I’ve tried out), both read by the authors, and SO good because of that.

Added bonus to audiobooks: Apps like Libby let you borrow audiobooks from libraries and are nuanced enough that you can control their speed. Irby talks (reads?) a bit slowly for my tastes, so I notched those books up to an added speed of 15%.

Do check out those books.

And meanwhile, if you have any favourite comedy podcasts or funny books to recommend, please send them my way in the comments.

#bookstodon

@AnthonyJK @falcennial Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I submit Exhibit A: Denmark.

They have an exceptional financial safety net that ensures that every working person can leave their current job to look for other work they’d prefer, while their basic bills are covered. This allows them to take needed time to find work that’s a good fit rather than feeling pressured to take anything they can get.

I assume this also pushes businesses as a whole r o offer good wages and benefits because they would need to entice workers to them instead of offering crap wages knowing someone desperate will just have to take it.

I suspect this may be part of why they’re consistently rated among the happiest countries on the planet.

@Infoseepage @protonprivacy @molly0xfff I signed up for Tuta last night and will be shifting everything there away from Protonmail as quickly as possible.

I can't and won't abide by Yen doing this in the first place, then him blaming the readers for mistaking his words (I mean, are you kidding me?), and how it's all been handled since then, by him and evidently the company as well.

This isn't how you handle things, folks. As the mass exodus should demonstrate.

@GottaLaff @Wileymiller And there will absolutely be those who voted for him who will come to regret doing so — the likes of that lady in his first term whose illegal alien husband was deported and she was explaining that she thought Trump meant OTHER illegal aliens, which was why she voted for him — but yes, to your point, meanwhile, everyone who didn’t vote him has to deal with him, too.

Afternoon, all --

My 14-year-old is considering joining Masto and has some pretty specific interests.

Rather than having them go through the wild west of the global Masto feeds to find accounts of interest like I had to -- that was a loooong process for me initially when I joined, when I had to curate a list of follows by checking out random-ass feeds from everyone everywhere, and it was very much
Post in Tamil
Post about German politics
Dad Joke
Gay porn
Deep dive question about Linux
More Tamil
Photo of tree reflected in lake
GAY. PORN.
Quippy web comic...
-- so to spare the child any undue mental trauma, a) what advice would parents of young Mastonians have for keeping things age-appropriate and practical? And b) could anyone please suggest teen-friendly accounts covering any/all of these topics for me to scope out:

Animals/Oceans (I know of some Hourly/Daily animal photo accounts, but throw them all my way)

Space/NASA

Drawing and animation

Nature

Therian

Caves and cave diving

Creative writing advice

Age-appropriate fan fic

Sure, sex is great, but have you ever seen someone driving super aggressively to get ahead of everyone and then, even keeping a steady, decent speed and driving politely, pulled up next to them at the next red light?

Does anyone have any suggestions for books for a young teen who likes (modern/urban/bit of classic) fantasy (Lord of the Rings movies — books were too verbose and old timey, Fairy Tale by Stephen King), science fiction and/or same with some fantasy mixed in (Star Wars, bit of Star Trek, lighter Dr. Who, will almost certainly enjoy @scalzi books soon) real science (Hidden Figures, chemistry demonstrations on videos are big right now), superheroes (Marvel movies are big), with moving (but not sad) and/or funny aspects being wide open, and a dash of coming of age stories be they LGBTQ or otherwise (Heartstopper)?

Not all in one book, I can’t imagine — that would be one hell of a winding tale — but anything with an element or two or three of those things included would be great.

Looking for a present for this year’s Jolabokaflod — https://www.reayjespersen.com/blog-1/2021/12/24/happy-jolabokaflod/ — and normally we’ve had some solid ideas for books or series that the kiddo wants, but tastes are changing plus the teenagerism angle is making the options more obscure and I have zero doubt there’s plenty out there none of us have heard about or would know to hunt down.

Thanks!

#books

Pulled into a Home Depot parking lot next to a guy I’m pretty sure is a hitman biding his time because he’s sitting in the driver’s seat allegedly *reading a newspaper*.

You know who does that?

NO ONE.

He’s a hitman and/or a psychopath. Those are the only options that explain this behaviour.

@killyourfm Timely. I just got a new (to me) laptop with Windows on it. No more excuses to not finally get a harddrive partitioned (that’s… that’s what one does, yes?) and get Linux set up with a dual boot option to dip a toe in.

It occurred to me when I saw this link on the defector.com website that I’m so out of the loop of the rap world, I didn’t know if it meant about uneasiness and discomfort living outside a city core, or if there’s literally a rapper named Suburban Malaise.

@feld @tomiahonen @martlund YOU DON’T GET IT, MAN.

@tomiahonen @martlund Be curious to know where they get info this detailed about an event that seems to happen riiiiiight before U.S. elections. God knows hordes of would-be immigrants can just hang around for 3 years and 11 months — why act then? — but then they somehow need to make a big rush for the border to make it in just under the wire. 🙄

Stunned that anyone still buys into what is clear nonsense when even cursory questions poke holes in the fiction of jt.

Just sitting in the car in my kid’s high school parking lot with lunch to hand off, blaring Tool.

… as one does.

Please take a moment to appreciate this fine example of dog coat Photoshoppery.

Yeah, so about truck sizes these days…

This truck is legit as far back as it can get in the parking space, but this is how it looks on the aisle side. 🙄

Related: In the next aisle over there was another new model pickup. One full-grown woman walked past it and the hood was up past her chin. From the driver’s seat you’d only see her from the nose up at best.

Another woman walked beside it and literally was entirely under the level of the side windows. Looking straight out from the seats, you wouldn’t have seen her at all.

Sincerely, is there some/any reason for the crazy size of trucks these days? We’ve gotten long just fine with them already larger than most vehicles on the road for decades. Why the recent push for them to be so long and so tall?

@tenzochris @lisamelton Hard same with our dog.

*I brought ball back. Now you throw ball.*

“I can’t throw the ball until you drop it.”

*Now you throw ball.*

“Buddy, drop the ball. Drop it.”

*I’m wag tail. Why no throw ball? Throw.*

“BUDDY…”