sidereal

sidereal, 5 months ago to random

I'm reading a book about traditional Arab sailing ships in the 1930's

“… the total number of persons officially onboard… [was] 131. Actually there may have been 150. [Captain] Nejdi and all the Arabs hated these official accountings. Even if he had tried to have them all correct, they would still have been wrong. He did not try at all, and the more wrong they were the better he was pleased."

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

Got tired of having this conversation over and over again so I just spent way too long making this:

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

Most of my criticism of Biden is actually because I DON’T want Trump to win. If you still don’t get that, I invite you to reflect on how you may be part of the problem.

Supporting people while they make shitty decisions doesn’t win them elections

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

Seeing a lot of people saying things like "why don't Americans protest more." I'm not exactly sure how to respond because:

1. In 2020 America had the largest sustained series of protests in world history. Americans protest plenty.

2. American activists are shot by police at a very high rate. Don't forget this.

Americans protest at a very high rate already. We don't protest more because so many of us have been murdered and our police are very dangerous. Hope this helps.

sidereal, 2 months ago (edited 2 months ago) to random

Alcohol is boring as hell. In my book, not drinking alcohol is one of the coolest things anyone could possibly do.

sidereal, 3 months ago to random

Both atheist people and religious people who lack nuanced takes are boring.

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

The fun thing about security culture is that there are no truly safe courses through the next couple of years.

You can, of course, avoid detection indefinitely by not doing anything and not networking with anybody. But given the growing power of the ruling class, is this actually the safest thing to do in the long term? I'm not sure.

That posture of cautious-but-super-woke inaction might be exactly what the ruling class wants you to adopt.

sidereal, 3 months ago to random

IDK who needs to hear this but stainless steel is a relative term. It still rusts eventually, especially if it gets wet, triply so if it gets salty and wet. If you're making, say, a truck out of bare stainless steel, you should probably put some paint on there.

We were not painting trucks this whole time for purely aesthetic purposes. Sorry, "skipping the paint" does not qualify as "disrupting the auto industry."

sidereal, 2 months ago to random

In the past year one of the main things I have learned is that rural America is way more fucked up than I ever perceived as a "city guy."

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

really sucks how many people got arrested because of the kolektiva leak

oh wait

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

I have come to strongly dislike motorcycles because of how loud they are.

I'm aware that motorcyclists think this keeps them safe. I'm also aware there is no statistical evidence that it does. But it's useless to argue statistics with someone who rides a motorcycle.

I'm also aware that motorcyclists think you need to let your bike idle for like 30 minutes before you go anywhere even though you definitely don't.

This post brought to you by being woken up by my neighbor's bike. Please stop

sidereal, 6 months ago to random

My teenage years sucked, it was just watching Bush wreck American, Afghani, and Iraqi society in predictable ways while the adults cheered him on for some reason. My 20’s sucked because of the obvious and predictable results of neoliberals repealing the banking regulations instituted during the Great Depression to prevent another Great Depression. The whole time I was holding out for my 30’s, which have been entirely dominated by covid, another thing which I predicted. Sick of being right.

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

Wow look it's exactly what happened when we got rid of the streetcars. Aged extremely well

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

High speed rail is cool but low speed rail where you can hop on and off more or less whenever you want is cooler.

Hopping freight was a lot safer when those things topped out at like 35 MPH.

sidereal, 2 months ago to random

I wear a helmet when I ride my bicycle. Not because I think they’re particularly important, but because I realized not wearing one is a good way to get victim blamed.

In years of commuting, in Seattle, PDX, and Brooklyn, I’ve only fallen off my bike once (I don’t clip in). Sooo many people asked me “were you wearing a helmet?” Nobody asked me if I actually hit my head (I didn’t).

So I went out and bought a helmet.

Now I mostly wear it because the visor is good for the sun 😎

sidereal, 7 months ago to random

It is impossible for me to get excited about voting when 90% of these people fucking suck and over half of the "super important local elections" are unopposed anyway.

In school I was told the Soviet Union was bad because people ran in elections unopposed but yet here we fucking are. And without even any giant grey apartment blocks.

But I voted, I met you liberals halfway even though it feels like more of a waste of time every year. Will you now please meet me halfway and revolt?

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

My kingdom for modern electronics built to withstand the elements in a manner similar to 1980's payphones

sidereal, 3 months ago to random

Critical support to King Charles for committing regicide by anti-science ideology.

"During an interview with the British media outlet GB News on Tuesday, royal expert Tom Bower alleged that Charles would likely forego chemotherapy treatments in favor of 'natural' remedies.

'The King will not be one for chemotherapy, he has always argued against it,' Bower said. 'He’s a great believer in natural herbs, potions, and things like that.'"

sidereal, 5 months ago to random

Never understood meal prepping: it's like all the work of home cooking, but with a !FUN! twist that ensures your food is never actually fresh when you eat it

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

Love to get away from the big-time corporate censorship on "the other" social medias only to be replaced by the small-time censorship of "instance admins who don't like to see the word douchebag used as an insult"

sidereal, 4 months ago to random

So a bunch of the people I'm organizing with, for various reasons, don't have desktops/laptops. Mobile only.

This means that it's tricky for them to access cryptpads, for instance, because that doesn't work so great on mobile. No PGP email, many other things that desktops are nice for.

I'm wondering if it would be useful for me to get some used laptops, put linux on them, and get them going as workstations for organizers. Not just hand them to people but also show them how to use them.

sidereal, 5 months ago to random

My whole life I felt like just-in-time shipping was a shitty idea and it feels like everything since 2020 has been proving me right

Like the Suez Canal is a no-go zone due to conflict and the Panama Canal is at low capacity due to climate change and apparently the "richest countries on earth" are going to have quite a bit of difficulty with shipments being delayed 2-3 weeks.

That honestly shouldn't make [that] much of a difference, but here we are.

sidereal, 3 months ago to random

If you haven’t seen any fediverse spam then thank the people who run your instance because they are doing a good job.

sidereal, 2 months ago to random

In case you were ever wondering what living in America is like, a buddy of mine who is couchsurfing just got his food stamps taken away by a social worker who very cheerfully informed him "you don't need the help because you don't have to pay rent anymore."

sidereal, 2 months ago to random

I just realized that I've been using adblock so consistently, for so long, that I have basically no idea what the average person's experience of the internet is like.

Every now and then I use someone else's device that isn't so locked down. And I'm floored by how useless and annoying the internet is. IDK how people do this.