Fancy Napkins!

I have a story about heat and flavor. Often the flavor and heat ARE intertwined, if you “cool” the pepper you mute the flavor.

So I make lentil salad sometimes, it’s one of those dishes so much better than it should be - cooked al dente lentils, jalapeno, onion, carrot in a dressing of olive oil, mustard, lemon. My little kids loved it but would whine that it was too spicy. So my older daughter graciously de-seeded and took out the ribs of the jalapenos when helping make it one time and

They whined because it didn’t taste as good. The flavor was contained in the spicier part of the pepper.

Not everything should be spicy but it’s good to have a tolerance because some flavors are in those spicy foods that simply aren’t in the mild versions.

Posture is so important for health, both as a practice and an indicator.

As a practice, stacking your body up in a good position lets it work better and protects your joints.

It is also an indication of strong enough muscles and bones, very weak people or those with osteoporosis often can’t achieve good posture.

It’s also free, nothing to buy, a free intervention that can only benefit you, so why not practice it?

I’m a lady and haven’t had any trouble here. The only place I really notice how ridiculously male - skewed Lemmy is, is on the NSFW. That is definitely all “male gaze” stuff, with the occasional actual lesbian also posting stuff guys like. Even the posts OF men are FOR men, everything posted with some assumption only men are looking at the posts.

The other communities just aren’t so gendered, I don’t notice much whether someone seems to be one or the other, it isn’t relevant to cocktails or cooking or gardening or science fiction.

I hesitate to say this out loud, but mid-50s and nothing hurts yet, except the migraines I’ve gotten since teenage years.

Knees last if you take care of them. Back lasts if you take care of it and are lucky, and don’t get fat, and are lucky, and don’t work a physical job, and are lucky.

Stretch. Exercise. Don’t overeat.

I’m going to second (third, fourth, fifth) the Roth IRA recommendation. You can set it up with Schwab or whoever and can make recurring contributions too (set it and forget it) there are income limits so if you are really raking it in one year you can’t contribute that year but whatever you put in there is still (usually) going to grow in value. If you have an emergency situation and need the money you can withdraw contributions, not earnings, ahead of retirement, so it’s not lost to you, but working for you and much easier at tax time, no worries about how to report it.

New College WAS a school where kids sort of designed their own major, did a project or thesis and defended it. The Veggie Bus that ran on used oil from McDonald’s fryers was a New College project. It was good for hyper achievers who didn’t fit into a canned curriculum. I don’t know that I’d call it “liberal” but it was progressive and challenging.

This apparently annoyed the fuck out of the governor for some reason. Maybe he just doesn’t like the idea of smart weirdos. But it’s those people who move us forward, the smart ones who don’t fit in.

We had an A/P manager who chewed her way through 3 entire staffs before management decided the problem was actually her. Two of them collectively quit in a group on one day! That was the most outrageous I think. How did it take FIFTEEN people quitting because of her management before they fired her?

Also one manager who came in shitface drunk and swinging when she got fired. That was the most dramatic.

The fact that school kids have gotten so much nicer than when I was in school.

Crime dropping worldwide but particularly in my city.

And honestly? Plunging birth rates, even though I have a lot of kids and stepkids and love it. I do feel like it’s freedom mostly, people are more free to not have kids and it will keep the population from exploding.

Marcus King ROCKS and he is not good looking. Charismatic as fuck on stage too.

I think there is about the same proportion of good music to bad as there ever was, you just don’t hear the bad music of the past because it didn’t last. Survival bias, I think it’s called.

You want broad sweeping categories? Maybe categorize by behaviour?

Crawlers Slitherers Swimmers Flyers Stationary creatures Sunlight eaters Carnivores Plant eaters Omnivores

I think decide what your groups actually are first, then label. So a fish in this list would be swimming carnivore.

I’m a lady but have a kids living room (like we have a separate kids wing in our house just because of the way it was added to over the years before we bought it) and when the kids move out that is becoming a space like that. Absolutely a 1950s lounge for us. Pool table!

Yeah, it’s definitely an inexperience/lack of skill problem on my part. I know that because of how much I love manual shift cars. Anything with two wheels I am just trying to keep upright and point it in the right direction.

I do think it’s the car drivers responsibility to watch for pedestrian and cyclist (I am all of these on different days) but my God yesterday during a storm a cyclist drove right through a red light into oncoming traffic right in front of the car in front of me. We desperately need more bike infrastructure here and also for bikers to not drive like they want to die.

I taught my kids to drive using an automatic transmission, then once they were good at handling traffic, and all the more difficult parts of driving I let whoever wanted to learn to drive my stick shift. But I personally feel safer, not less safe, when I have to pay attention to operating the car, and as things stand now, think it makes me a better driver - that may not matter once cars are more advanced but for now, with driver-operated cars, stick shift is the right level of engagement for me to not get distracted. I do hate shifting motorcycles though, because I am not as familiar with it and it makes me feel less safe. Which is how I imagine OP feels.

Monsoon Wedding

Lord of the Rings

If you like fermenting, I highly recommend ginger beer from ginger bug. You need organic ginger for the bug (I think the non organic must be irradiated or something, ginger alone I find the conventionally grown won’t ferment.) Once the starter is established you can use it to ferment any juice.

Why does it need to “amount” to something? Do you know anything about most of the people who have lived? Do you expect that of everyone around you? Enjoy yourself, enjoy being alive and embodied while you are, maybe you accomplish something for someone else, maybe you don’t, no big deal. Just being here is an incredible thing to have.

Walking?

5 minutes to cafe for toast and coffee, or the closest corner store/gas station

10-15 minutes walk to the closet big grocery store, or pharmacy, better corner store/gas station, also to roller skating and bowling, a jewelry store, like 15 churches, lawyers, medical supply, doctor offices, a hospital, a bank, fast food and small independent restaurants, lots of stuff.

20-25 to work or to the good grocery

It’s certainly not London!!! But if you are inside a mid-sized city there is stuff within easy walking distance, and more within short drive (5 minutes) My husband came from the suburbs and that’s a different story - house farms ringed by roads too dangerous to cross, everyone drives everywhere. He used to think of “close” as anything a 15 minute drive or less! Not anymore.

83 miles from Disney World, that’s probably the closest international landmark, lol. But maybe 4 miles from the beautiful Tampa Theater, which ought to be an international landmark.

For those of us 60 and under

Or who had kids, or an illness or a divorce or death of a spouse, or got laid off, or …