I married my first wife when she was 18 and I was 20. We went through a lot of hardship. It should not have worked out: we were both poor, from broken homes, in an LDR from different worlds. She was the popular girl, I was a shy and awkward nerd. When we got married, we had only been in one another’s presence for a few weeks total. I went into the marriage not expecting a path or plan, as my parents were toxic which ended with my mother’s suicide, and my mother in law had been married 4 times before she became single for the last time. None of us had healthy marriages to draw from. At our wedding, her relatives even said, “I give it two years, tops.” We were desperately poor, and struggled most of our marriage with health and money issues.
But we made it work for 25 years. We’d still be married, but she passed away ten years ago. We became “foxhole buddies,” us against the world.
Yeah my childhood sucked, and knowing I’d have another 12 years of abuse with nobody taking me seriously because I’m a kid? No thanks. I could put $10mil to good use right now.
Moe (萌え, Japanese pronunciation: [mo.e] ⓘ), sometimes romanized as moé, is a Japanese word that refers to feelings of strong affection mainly towards characters in anime, manga, video games, and other media directed at the otaku market. Moe, however, has also gained usage to refer to feelings of affection towards any subject.
Moe is related to neoteny and the feeling of “cuteness” a character can evoke. The word moe originated in the late 1980s and early 1990s in Japan and is of uncertain origin, although there are several theories on how it came into use. Moe characters have expanded through Japanese media, and the concept has been commercialised. Contests, both online and in the real world, exist for moe-styled things, including one run by one of the Japanese game rating boards. Various notable commentators such as Tamaki Saitō, Hiroki Azuma, and Kazuya Tsurumaki have also given their take on moe and its meaning.
The ironic thing is that they because successful because of civilization and pack mentality, but are so conceited, they think all that infrastructure (public roads, doctors, restaurants, etc) exists simply because they exist. It’s weirdly how toddlers see the universe, and why tantrums between the two groups are so similar.
Having seen these in a demo, they have weight triggers to prevent that. Also in or demo, one got stuck on a power cord, the other on a electrical plate in the floor.
Having worked for both, I would say that most government offices are eternal, whereas private companies can vanish quickly. Sometimes without warning. Its really hard to kill a government office.
Makes me wonder, how did a necessary office survive during a junta or an overthrow? For example, how did the office of a postal clerk change from 1925 to 1955 in, say, Berlin? How does the average Salvadoran DMV worker view the changes in El Salvador since 1980?
How was a tax office run in ancient Babylon versus a modern one today?
I bet there’s some weird insights into human civilization to be found in those stories.
Worked a job where I had to be a Linux admin for a variety of VMs. To access them, I needed an VPN that only worked inside the company LAN, and blocked internet access. it was a 30 day trial license on day 700somthing, so it had a max 5 simultaneous connection limit. Access was from my heavily locked down laptop. Windows 7 with 5 minutes locking Screensaver. The ssh software was an unknown brand, “ssh.exe” which only allowed one connection at a time in a 80 x 24 console window with no ability to copy and paste. This went to a bastion host, an HPUx box on an old csh shell with no write access to your home directory due to a 1.4mb disk quota per user. Only one login per user, ten login max, and the bastion host was the only way to connect to the Linux VMs. Default 5 minute logout for inactivity. No ssh keys allowed. No scripting allowed, was like typing over 9600 baud.
I quit that job. When asked why, I told them I was a Linux administrator and the job was not allowing me to administrate. I was told “a poor carpenter always blames his tools.” Yeah, fuck you.
My wife stayed in a rural town near Shichigahama for a week. Nobody spoke English except a few students. But the citizens did speak Japanese louder and slower, showing that’s a universal trait. It actually helped, as my wife knew SOME Japanese.
My school banned D&D as a form of gambling in the 1980s. They shut down the D&D club and everything. I was VP of the science fiction club, and we were supposed to sign a statement that said we understood that we would not condone gambling or game playing of any sort, and this included board games. I never signed it.
I got all of that except “shag ye x,” because it sounds like “shag (fuck) you x,” where “x” is the subject that is a bit vague. Like, “I’m trying to shag you, love?” or “Fuck your ex,” as in, the last person you broke up with?
This has been my experience as well with Aliexpress. I know there’s a huge caveat emptor going on, but it’s like you said about batteries and storage, be careful unless you know exactly what you’re buying. Like a 64TB SSD for $15.99 proooobably not the real thing. But I have gotten a lot of SBCs, some stuffed animals, and cheap costume jewelry for my wife (who knows it’s cheap, but doesn’t care). Weirdest “quality” purchase? My “gold colored” tungsten wedding ring was $10, comfort fit, and in 6 years still looks like the real thing. But didn’t dent like my original wedding ring (which is why I needed a replacement, got smashed in a door accident). I’d never buy anything that I knew might cause a fire (like batteries) or possibly poison me (like pills).
Wish and Temu ripped me off in some of my first purchases. I was only out $30, and I know it was possible, so I just deleted my account and the apps.
Bank of America. I have dealt with them on a corporate level, multimillion dollar assets, mind you, and seen gross incompetence and negligence that scared me. I’m talking about constant insecure data practices, inconsistent rules, terrible record keeping, and asset mismanagement.
The biggest weakness appeared to be how they treated their employees. Our “local branch” went through multiple managers in less than a year, and when we did business with the “employees du jour” in our quarterly meetings, they all acted like scared college students. Unprepared, inexperienced, and some cocksure with blatantly wrong information. And some downright unprofessional. For example, we had a meeting where they kept pronouncing our company name wrong, spelled our name wrong a different way, and kept adding parts to it. Like:
“Okay, as president of Reginald Incorporated–”
“Remington. Like the gun.”
"Regingun international - -
“No no. REM MING TON. Remington.”
"Right. Remington International - -
“Incorporated. There is no ‘international’ in our name.”
“But you’re a Japanese company?”
“No. We’re American. We do business with the Japanese.”
“Oh. Huh. Okay, as president of Remington Incorporated of Japan - -”
“NO. Just ‘Remington Incorporated.’ That’s it.”
“Oh wow. Sorry. I’m going to have to fix that on this paperwork, then.”
I have my mom’s old Smith Corona electric typewriter, possibly from the 1960s, but I haven’t researched it deeply yet. It comes with a hard suitcase with a 3-digit combination lock, and a novelty dust cover that says “Typewriter!” in a bold font. My mom died in 1987, and I just took it. Last used in 1998 when my mother in law borrowed it, and it caused a fight because she died unexpectedly and her estate executor wanted to sell it, not believing it to be mine. He was under the impression it was an antique he could get good money for, but I stole it back. Last appraisal was mid 2000s, and in new working condition, I could MAYBE sell it for $30. But it’s one of the few scant possessions I have of my moms, so I keep it.