bolido_sentimental
No bio...
User ID: 205
bolido_sentimental
1yr ago
I was surprised to see in /r/dankchristianmemes, a heavily upvoted thread about wanting traditional hymns, but not wanting "conservative/far-right ideals" in the church. All the comments are about how great it is that mainline Protestant denominations are affirming of all kinds of alternative lifestyles.
https://old.reddit.com/r/dankchristianmemes/comments/11i1mit/is_it_too_much_to_ask_for_both/
Honestly this really made me think. On Reddit, the gun people are leftist, the Christians are leftist, etc. etc. I spend so much time on Reddit that it makes me think leftism has literally taken over everything. Then I went to church this morning and realized there's an entire big population of people who don't use Reddit, have never heard of Reddit, and who still exist across the whole spectrum of political belief.
I need to get off of Reddit.
bolido_sentimental
1yr ago
What's the cheapest acceptably good 9mm carbine?
bolido_sentimental
1mo ago
That's probably what I need to do, honestly.
Any suggestions for where to start?
bolido_sentimental
1mo ago
I've often felt that a significant part of the defeat of the Big 3 was just mind-share. I daily a Buick from the 2010s, and it has met my needs in every way. I've never had to put it in the shop beyond tires, fluid changes etc. It's a great car in general. But by the 2010s, the battle was already lost - there was no car that Americans could put out that would displace Toyota and Honda in the minds of the American public.
On Reddit, if cars are mentioned in any thread, you will never see a recommendation other than Toyota or Honda. It is 100% lockstep. Even if you could get 90% of the reliability from an old Ford Taurus at 50% of the cost, the hive mind has decided. I do get that - I've ridden in a Pontiac Le Mans. I've driven a Plymouth Volare. They fucked up for decades. But I hated it when the Big 3 bailed out of the sedan space, just because there are far fewer options now; and by the end, the cars were quite good.
The way it worked for me was like this:
- You go to your local staffing agency in the nearby strip mall. Every town I've ever lived in has several of them.
- You fill out some forms they give you, which include what type of work you can do. For me this was just, "labor."
- They call you in a day or two and say "XYZ Corp. needs some material handlers starting this Tuesday. They're paying $14.50 an hour and there's mandatory overtime. The shift is 2:30 to 11:00 PM. Stop by here before then and we'll give you your badge and show you the safety video."
- You go and do that, and then on Tuesday you start working at XYZ Corp.
Depending on the company, they might hire you on to their own paper after 90 days or 6 months or whatever. Or you might stay on the staffing agency's paper indefinitely. I supported myself all through my early 20s doing jobs like this.
The actual work consisted of such tasks as:
- Taking boxes from a conveyor belt and loading them into a truck.
- Unloading things, from a truck, and placing them onto a conveyor belt.
- Taking objects from a conveyor belt, and putting them into boxes.
- Inspecting bottles of mouthwash on an assembly line, and doing weighing and cap tests once an hour.
- Digging holes.
- Watching a moving belt of electronics recycling stuff and picking out trash.
- Assembling books-on-tape packages.
- Loading big metal components (I genuinely don't know what they were) into this machine that would put a liquid coating on them.
I met many people whose entire working lives consisted of these jobs. I almost was one myself. I remember reading Slate Star Codex on my phone in the break rooms of these places, lol. There was never a resume involved. A lot of times these dudes also knew about casual work on the side. I still remember my buddy Luis, who every Saturday morning at like 5:00 AM would send me a text that was just an address and a work task. "8737 Maple Avenue. Fence posts. Eighty dollars." He would always be pissed off at me at our next actual work shift if I didn't show up.
I do concede that if, when you're at that level of the economic ladder, you decide to go and work for, e.g., Kroger or T.J. Maxx or some other significant corporation, yes, they may ask you for a resume. I actually remember consciously thinking about what the options were: you could work in a call center, you could go do fast food, you could work retail, or you could take a factory/labor job. I hated talking to people in a "customer service" kind of way, so for me the choice was always obvious.
My hobbies that involve spending money are primarily:
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Hunting for old golf clubs at thrift stores and flea markets. Less than $100 a month. (I couldn't even explain why I do this. I just get the urge.)
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Driving around and taking pictures of stuff. Well less than $100 a month (just gas and snacks really).
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Reading; buying books at the used bookstore up the street. $50 max a month.
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Working out at the Y. About $45 a month in membership.
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Occasionally drinking at bars, breweries, etc. Probably not more than $100 a month on average, but months with special occasions do pop up and drive this up.
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Video games... I don't really play a ton, and usually when I do, it's one game for a long time. Like $25 a month tops.
That's pretty much it. I'd have to do something really unusual to even hit 10% of my budget. I guess the key is that I like to cook and prefer to cook, so I go out to eat only 1-2 times a month. Other hobbies I have just don't cost anything. I play guitar but I like the guitar I've got; I like to work on my garden but that's free. I take a lot of long walks, that's free; I write, that's free. My friends and I hang out at each other's houses a lot, or else we do stuff that's like, "Let's go and look at x. Hmmm, that's a cool x."
bolido_sentimental
10mo ago
Finished The Big Short today. Remarkable how much it all resembled a game of musical chairs - no one wanted to be the one left holding the bag at the end. Also a great example of "people won't understand something if their job depends on not understanding it." I didn't see much in there to make me think that something similar couldn't easily happen again.
bolido_sentimental
1yr ago
You know, I actually found Count Zero and other, later Gibson works very hard to deal with for specifically that reason. A friend of mine keeps trying to get me to read The Peripheral, but I spend so much time just trying to understand what is going on that I end up bailing out. I do understand the appeal I think, but a little bit more explanation than what he gives us would be welcome.
I'm nearly at the end of Haruki Murakami's Novelist as a Vocation, in which he reflects on his process and on his career. There's something about the way Murakami writes about writing, that makes you the reader think you could do it too: that while there is a minimum talent threshold, if you clear that then it's just a matter of having enough work ethic and self-reflectiveness. Perhaps that's true. But another takeaway from the work, and something which Murakami never truly addresses or reflects on, is that he obviously has a really immense work ethic himself. He drives himself quite hard, and also seems to have no interest in the kinds of distractions which are so disruptive to younger generations. To hear him tell it, he genuinely spends all of his time writing, exercising, reading, and listening to music. Good recipe for productivity if you can stick to it.
bolido_sentimental
3mo ago
This event really made me realize how much time I spend lurking on the Motte. I should do something else with my time.
Thankfully I don't need to do a cold approach, I'm talking about a girl I already know. I just saw her today in fact. This situation is more like the norm of dating from 50 years ago, where you meet people via organized social activities and build up a relationship organically; or at least that's what I'm hoping to do. We'll see how it works out this time. It may indeed be something that's only possible for me because I have a decent level of height, idk.
bolido_sentimental
1yr ago
The thrift store near where my mom lives always has a ton of golf clubs available. I have long considered putting a bag together out of them. What would be the next step? What's the very first thing you need to do in order to start?
Like - when I took up tennis as a kid, I got a buddy, two racquets, and some balls, and we went to a local court when it was deserted and hacked around all day until we started figuring it out. I don't wanna go take up room on the golf course when I have no idea how to hit the ball straight.
bolido_sentimental
1yr ago
What are the places in the world today with the lowest digital penetration? Are there still any particular places you could go and see hardly any cellphones?
This post raised a few interesting points for me.
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Despite being online for many years at this point, I don't think I've ever seen a cigarette recommendation thread.
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Nor do I ever hear people talking about the different brands and their properties. Not even smokers. People have serious preferences about Coors vs. Miller etc., and will discuss them, but I'm not sure that's the case with cigarettes.
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I realize I actually don't have much of a vocabulary to discuss the nature of different cigarettes with. I would be really curious to know if people had better ways of talking about them 60 or 80 years ago.
Anyway, here's what I can remember:
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Pall Mall: Seriously offensive and nasty. If somehow this is all they have, go to another store.
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L&M: Just barely acceptable.
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Chesterfield: Probably the best really cheap cigarette. They taste fine, but they burn very quickly, you don't get a lot out of one.
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Parliament: Pretty harsh. The recessed filter doesn't do anything and you will quickly cease to notice it. Too expensive for what they are but I guess they do look cool.
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Camel (Red): The best cigarette. Once I found these I stopped buying other ones. This is probably what most people do, they find the one they like and they stop shopping around. But what if there's a better one out there?
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Camel (Blue): Doesn't taste or feel like anything. I would extend that to pretty much all light cigarettes. I suppose that's what some people are going for.
Unfortunately I can't report on the self-medication aspect. I just like stimulants.
bolido_sentimental
1mo ago
I drive the American brother of the Vauxhall Astra and I really like it. It's been a dead reliable car with all the features you describe. Mine is a 2014. I've driven it for five years now and have never needed to do maintenance beyond what's in the owner's manual. (Except one time I had to replace a shock absorber because I hit a pothole very hard. That's not the car's fault.)
bolido_sentimental
3mo ago
I've wanted to be a father for a very long time. I could imagine my kids, but for a very long time I couldn't picture the woman who would want to have mine. After I bought a house, I couldn't find a local woman who wanted my children.
How did you eventually resolve this?
bolido_sentimental
5mo ago
What do we know about the effectiveness of donating money to political parties and campaigns?
What I'm getting at is - I often hear about "Candidate X is out-fundraising Candidate Y 2 to 1," or something like that. But how relevant is that to political outcomes? It occurs to me that I can't see the direction of the causal arrow here. Couldn't it just mean that Candidate X is already more popular, and therefore raises more money? What is that money used for?
If I want Candidate X to win, does it follow that I should donate money to that candidate or to their party? If I wanted the Democratic Party to win in my area - should I donate money to them? Does it matter at all? I just can't quite see the relationship of my donating money to achieving my desired political outcomes.
bolido_sentimental
6mo ago
That poster is freaking incredible lmao. Awesome stuff.
bolido_sentimental
9mo ago
For my birthday, a friend of mine got me a golf book, The Eternal Summer by Curt Sampson. It follows the majors in 1960, a transitional period in the professional game where Ben Hogan was waning, Arnold Palmer was at his peak, and Jack Nicklaus was just starting to emerge.
I'm not really expanding my mind with this, but reading about golf is relaxing to me. One thing it's got me wondering about, is why golfers often seem to peak much sooner than their physical abilities do; and then some mental factor makes them decline. The example in this story is Ben Hogan: dominant in the early 1950s, he was still able to strike the golf ball extremely well as he aged into his 40s, but somehow lost his ability to putt. Why does this happen? One would imagine you'd lose ball-striking first and putting last. It's one of the oldest questions in golf, and I don't know if it's ever been satisfactorily answered.
You also have players like Rory McIlroy, who burst onto the scene and won four majors very young, and has not been able to win another one since 2014. He remains an overpowering driver of the ball, and somehow the finesse areas of his game have declined; this, even though he's lost absolutely none of his physical ability. Why would a player of golf, a game which seems to reward incremental improvement over time, peak at age 24?
Someone in the Motte recently observed that people in creative areas are most productive from 25 to 40, and then the rate of new production drops off steeply. I wonder if there is some related phenomenon that happens in golf. Troubling as I hurtle towards 40 myself, lol.
I am a golfer, although I'm a super casual and have not been doing it for very long; and equally important, I already have multiple full bags' worth of clubs I can play. I think for me the appeal is that it's so fun to see how all the different ones will hit - especially given that there are several thrift stores within 15 minutes of me that price them at $1.00 a club. "Hmmm, that's an interesting bounce on that sand wedge. I wonder if it'll help me play out of trouble? Let's just find out." It combines well with another hobby, which is: going to the driving range and practicing. Sometimes I'll just take an entire bag of "new" thrift clubs and test them all out. It makes for a really fascinating afternoon for less than $20 - if you're into that kind of thing.
In terms of gems, honestly, that's even more uncommon than I anticipated. If you consider the "big" manufacturers to be Callaway, Titleist, Ping, Cobra, and TaylorMade - I've seen clubs manufactured by those companies in the last 25 years, like... never. Genuinely just about never. In the age of the Internet I guess people know how much stuff is worth, so those don't end up in places like that. Once I saw a set of King Cobra II irons that was missing the 9, and an ancient TaylorMade Burner 5-wood with a tiny little head. (I did buy that one.) I've heard of people reselling thrift store clubs and making money; I guess those folks just get to them first.
As far as playable clubs go, though, I've found some really nice stuff. I have a Nickent Super Concorde 7-wood that plays beautifully. I even found an ancient Northwestern 1-iron so I could find out if they're really as hard to play as people say. (Answer: Yep. They certainly are. But it gives me something to aim for - when I can hit that 1-iron off the deck, I'll know I've truly accomplished something.)
bolido_sentimental
10mo ago
I did in fact do this today - I visited Ripley, Ohio; Aberdeen, Ohio, and Maysville, Kentucky, three small towns on the Ohio River. Just picked a spot on the map where I could say, "I've never been there."
It was great. Really relaxing - it always feels nice to get some time alone in the car on an open highway, to think about things. Weather was pretty good - a little bit of gentle rain that kept me from taking quite as many pictures as I would have liked, but this also kept it cool. I had a surprisingly wonderful pork tenderloin sandwich in Maysville.
Here are a few pictures I took today if you'd like to see.
bolido_sentimental
1yr ago
That feels accurate for sure. In those days, in the place I lived, it felt like all the non-Baptists (including me) were being dominated by the Baptists, and we probably were pushing back against that.
Plus a lot of my friends were really into Korn. I'm not sure anyone does that except to be contrary.
bolido_sentimental
1yr ago
Do you know of any articles or writings about the impact of this on NLP and NLP labs, or fora where they're discussing it? I'm curious to learn more about that or to hear it from them.
bolido_sentimental
1yr ago
I just had the realization that maybe I, a middle-class man, could be having lots of kids (a desire of mine) if I would just go meet a nice working-class girl; and that I've maybe subconsciously been trying to "date up" this whole time. I am a fool!
(This is actually not sarcasm.)
bolido_sentimental
1yr ago
The fact that Afroman lives in Adams County, Ohio is the craziest part of this to me. That's literally Amish country. Many miles from anything.
Miller's Bakery out there has one of the largest selections of jams and jellies that I've ever seen anywhere.
Yesterday I obtained a new cat. She is ten months old and very precious.
In my house, she has opted to hide either in my closet, under my bed, or under my couch the entire time. I cannot be sure she has eaten or drunk anything, though she did use the litterbox well. I am always keeping food and water available to her.
Can you advise me on how to handle this situation? Or even offer reassurance? I feel very concerned for her.
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