With such sharp, acidic wit, you might say the prose is… Lemony.

“He was my fourth cousin, thrice removed. He just couldn’t stay away from the bottle and started many brawls at the reunions, baptisms, and funerals.”

This is a phenomenal resource! In all my years, I haven’t actually heard anyone say “once removed” in story telling. I would almost feel weird saying it, despite it being technically correct. It’s like saying “whom” out loud, you might be right, but people start mocking you.

Yes I need better coworkers, what are you gonna do…

The point you raise reminds me of when Signal dropped SMS support, after my efforts to convert all the non techie people in my life over to it. So sad when it happens…

If you don’t want to attempt cleaning it, you could just bury them outside?

Edit: Everyone didn’t like that.

Keep it on your shelf forever Wrap it in layers of newspaper and toss it out Just clean it. It’s glass. Use an ultrasonic

I have a guideline I like to follow when putting together my pizzas, I like something spicy, something savory, and something sweet

Spice: banana peppers, jalepenos, or yes, hot sauce if that’s what I’ve got

Savory: bacon,chicken, pulled pork, sausage, pepperoni, mushrooms,

Sweet: onions, picked red onions, roasted corn, pineapple

You can blend stuff (put tandoori chicken on the pizza) for even more interesting combos!

I feel like one of each gives a great result.

I started talking to them about my problems and feelings. I don’t talk about my problems with them for the sake of trying to workshop a solution, but rather to share that I’m going through a difficult time. Socially, atleast where I come from, this isn’t something that men normally do.

Let me put it to you this way. You can have a long, entertaining conversation about video games for a few hours with your friends. But at the end of the day when you come home, do you know more about them? I’d argue that you learned more about their thoughts, but you didn’t learn much about their feelings.

I slowly became aware of this fact, after a long time in therapy. A friend would ask, “how do you feel about the election?” And I would respond, “I think politician A is going to win because…”

This is no different than the video game conversation. Imagine if instead I had said “I feel a sense of dread about the upcoming election. I am scared that politican A is going to pass legislation that makes my life more difficult”.

That’s such an awkward thing to say for me, because I’m so uncomfortable talking about how I feel. But the recognition that the wall exists is the first step, and the second is choosing to lead your life differently.

Some of my conversations are “meta” with these friends: “Well, that was an interesting side tangent about steam engines. But I’ve been trying to make sure I check in with my friends more often about how they’re feeling. How are you feeling today?”

And yeah, my friends can sometimes also respond with their thoughts. So I just gently tug it along by then mentioning how I find their answer relatable, because I often respond with feel questions by stating my thoughts, but I am really interested in how they feel.

My friends are quite receptive to this. I get the feeling it’s because all people are craving more authentic connections, but are struggling with saying the vulnerable thing, and not wanting to look weak/stupid. I get it, because I’m the same way, but I’m looking to change that. If you can show them that you won’t judge, possibilities start to open.

I just got out of a 10+ year relationship a couple months ago, rather suddenly and not of my own volition.

How weird, I’m going through the same exact thing as you. In my case I do have a circle of independent friends, but I’ve had trouble going from “friends” to “close friends”. Honestly what I discovered was, that was my own doing. It’s really easy to keep things on the surface with people, and not tell them what you are really struggling with.

Over the past few months I made a commitment to start being more open with my friends, and it’s really opened my eyes to 1) how wonderful they are as people, and 2) how much people are willing to open up to you once you show them that you’re willing to be a “trusted person”.

Anyway this isn’t what you asked, the way I met them was always through hobbies (music, martial arts), or friends of friends. I know you mentioned money is tight, so a hiking group or book club might be examples. You already know this, but IRL always beats online, atleast for me. Something about seeing other humans nourishes the soul in a way I can’t quite understand.

I do a mixture of ketchup, mayo, garlic powder, onion powder, and msg, and slap that on cold cut sandwiches!

I know I can’t actually help you, but I have to say, I’m excited for you. You sound like you have carefully thought through your ideas, and concluded “I don’t personally have a future in India”. You are in a tough spot financially, but I can tell you have the fire inside you. You’re going to find a better country to live in, and change your circumstances, like so many Indian ex-pats before you! You can do it.

Well, I guess spirit is technically the cheapest. So that might be worth it to people all on its own. But I find the seating to be very cramped, I don’t like the feeling of being “nickel and dimed” with their “charge for everything” scheme, and when I rode spirit they would have extremely generous take off and landing estimates so that even with many delays, they are still “on time”.

None of this is really malicious, I think they are clear about the fact that they offer cheap tickets for a cheap experience. But man, as a customer, it feels bad. I will just pay the extra money and go with something else.

Friggin’ Spirit Airlines!

This is a completely fair point. If I were given the proverbial golden keys to rewrite bidding practices, I imagine whatever I wrote would be subject to perverse incentives of some kind.

Do you think education is generally moving in the right direction? I have a few people in my circle that trained to be teachers and left the profession because of the lack of support from admin when dealing with troubled students (and troubled parents). They described a staff that was upside down, similar to a hospital (everyone is an admin, a very small part of the staff is actually teachers, and they never make the rules).

On the other hand it sounds like the mechanics of disseminating knowledge have increased tremendously due to research supported practices. I just wonder if the next generation is doomed, I guess.

Yes, another tragedy is when sales guy from company A talks to sales guy from company B.

You want a submarine to also fly into space? Oh yeah, we can do that! Our engineers are really smart, shouldn’t be a problem. We’ll have that design over to you in 2 weeks!

Later, when talking to the engineering team…

Well, I don’t see what’s so hard about it. We’ve had submarines and planes in WW2, you’re telling me we can’t innovative and combine those ideas? Well, this is an opportunity for you guys to really show off the engineering ability of the company… And I can’t move the promise date now, I already talked to him on the phone and I’m about to go on my cruise. Call me if you need anything!

Excellent point about government sponsored anti corruption measures, too. Here in the US our government contracts award “points” to businesses which are minority or woman- owned.

In practice, the same construction companies simply institute shell companies, and make their wives/daughters/sisters the owners of these shell companies, charge a premium, and have the “owner” subcontract the work back to the same old company, effectively making themselves an extra 20 percent…

Small businesses (which may be minority or woman owned, but they don’t play golf with the government buyers) are still totally forgotten.

I’m an engineer. When you see something really badly designed and think “wow, those engineers are so stupid! I could have done a better job myself!”

Please know that we did think about it. It’s just that some guy with an MBA decides the schedule, and another guy with an MBA decides the budget, and terrible designs get released no matter how much we protest. I’m sorry we couldn’t figure it out fast enough and cheap enough, though.

And yes, we do mistakes all the time too. It’s just that we usually know about the obvious ones.

I guess their company might have a BYOD policy… Damn I hope that’s the case.

I think PhotoPrism