Same man, where do these people get their flashlights

Edit: Thank you for the countless tips on where you guys buy flashlights. But neither am I in the USA nor do I actually ever need a flashlight. I have two at home and I don’t think I ever actually used them for other than fun. I guess the follow up question is what do you do with all those flashlights?

Literally the first person I thought of when reading the title of this post

Dude I was born in the early 90s and even I assumed “Pagers” was something I am not familiar with when I read the news. The name of a city? A guy? Some ethnic group? Some new military car? At some point I thought the news outlet just meant Prague (especially since I read it in German news first). I never would have guessed they literally meant pagers. Took me like 2 news report headlines and 4 mentions on lemmy to be like “oh wait what for real?!”

You’re right, I’m from Germany

I’ve known one woman who sometimes wore the engagement instead of the wedding ring but this was very odd and uncommon. I know everyone keeps their engagement ring but hardly anyone ever wears them, let alone on a regular basis.

While I don’t see the necessity in wearing a ring in the first place - yet I am a sucker for rings - what always gets me is having a fancy overpriced engagement ring that you’re supposed to wear for a short period of time and then a simple wedding ring that you’re supposed to wear forever.

Same, I hate muscles and fat on guys. Although that’s difficult to admit openly since a guy saying he is into heroine chic would be a social outcast, so why should it be acceptable if a woman says so. I like skinny guys and my husband is skinny af. I am by no means unattractive either.

My question to OP is - you seem to get rejected because of your looks, yet these beautiful women (by your standards) went out with you in the first place if I read that correctly. So there must have been some attraction in the beginning. At the very least they talked to you. But something along the line happened that made them not want to commit to you.

In general, we find people attractive because we like them. We don’t like them because we find them attractive.

It can very well happen that when you meet someone in your everyday life and get to know them and then happen to fall in love, they absolutely don’t fall into your “scheme” or “type”.

Also, everything seems to have to be a gift now. Can’t just buy a thing and give it to them. It has to wait to be a present. Or maybe that’s just my wife.

We specifically don’t wait for holidays to give things we want to gift to our daughter (soon to be 3). On her birthday in two weeks she will get a book, a plush animal, and a second hand peppa pig puzzle (I hate peppa pig but she loves it and she doesn’t even know there is a show). That’s it, but she gets many things throughout the year. My husband hates holidays and celebrations, I think that’s where this feeling of “let’s please not make a huge stock of presents to give her twice a year” came from. And it is so much less pressure to find “the perfect gift”.

And you can get rid of things much more easily. I don’t know about you, but if I got a bad birthday present, I tend to keep it, because it was a birthday present. Same for children’s stuff. She got that for her first birthday feels different than she got that when she was around 14 months. Somehow it’s less sentimental, and I am an awfully sentimental and nostalgic person, so this saves my ass.

Another point is that can change interests so quickly. I would not dare to buy her something peppa pig themed right now for Christmas or plan ahead for her 4th birthday. Or let’s say she needs a new bike - why would I wait until the end of summer to give it to her just because it’s her birthday.

But talk to me again on September 9th, I usually get very sad that we don’t celebrate with a crap ton of presents and decorations and a big party right before her birthday.

In The Big Bang Theory without the laugh track, Raj becomes just a huuuuuuge asshole.

To be fair, with or without a laugh track, TBBT is depressing as fuck. I feel incredibly sorry for the faith of most characters.

I used to get ukrainian emails every now and then. And then once I got a “confirm your signature to the petition” email and I checked. It was a petition to allow men to leave the country. A girl with my name signed it (wanted to sign it), and she stated wanting to leave with her 58 year old dad as the reason.

I ended up signing the petition myself, stating I wanted XY to leave with her dad as the reason.

I still wish there was a way to get in touch with her. I guess it was the same person who every now and then signed up for newsletters etc. I hope they found a way to leave. I wish there was a way I could help her directly. I keep imagining it was me and my dad stuck in a war torn country. My father has a super popular first name so the chances aren’t even that low that our dads share the same name too.

Serious question: How does a trial separation work with a child? I remember having a divorce scare when I was little and it still haunts me. I can’t imagine telling my kid “well we are separated now because we want to try out how it would be if we divorced” and letting it live through that limbo of uncertainty. Even if we get back together - that will they won’t they seems to be too much to bear for a child. We are always told to be clear and consistent with our kids and this is definitely the opposite of it.

It is very vain. They just assume that their taste is superior hence the best has “very good taste” because it’s their taste. Pfff.

Same. My partner needs his quiet time and alone time and just a spouse and child (I am the primary caregiver) is so overwhelming. I never expected to become the parent of an only child, I felt like just me and my sister was so little when I was growing up. But now this is what I am stuck with. Just one child and a spouse I hardly interact with because it’s too much and meditation and peace and quiet is making them more happy than time spent together.

I’m sorry that was your shower thought

Penne al aspirine

Wait so you had to eat pasta to ease the pain or did he also recommend some pain relief medicine?

Ok as someone not from the states, wtf are boneless chicken wings?

I did in another comment above!

Ideologically, I can follow your argument. I just don’t think this fits with the AA philosophy. But that being said, AA is not the one and only or the gold standard for self help groups. It’s not a one size fits all. For me, AA is almost too religious and also didn’t fit into my life back then.

In my early 20s I actually went to AA meetings over the course of probably a year. I kept it very secret, as I did with my very problematic consumption.

It was a group of probably 15-20 people, most aged 40-70. I was by far the youngest there. And let me tell you they would not have appreciated someone coming in who is under any kind of influence, including marijuana (even if it had been legal back then). Some people smoked cigarettes but even that was kind of frowned upon. At some point I mentioned that I have been getting into non-alcoholic beer, and even this was controversial, because I allegedly was masking the behavior and a slip back to alcoholic beer is easy. With that same logic, any kind of coping by using alternative drugs is just redirecting your addiction. In the group there was a strong belief that you are an addict for life and that you have an addictive personality type. And at least to me it’s kind of true. As a side note: Nowadays I am drinking sugary lemonade as a treat (something I would have never done in my 20s) and a fuckton of specialty coffee. For me, this is ok, and it works. But I understand if in their philosophy this is not a good way to go about your problems.

Anyway, at another point someone else asked about benzodiazepines to ease the first transition. This has also been controversial, and while you can get this prescribed when you are becoming sober, everyone recommended not to do it. There seemed to be a strong belief that the best (or only) way to go about your addiction is to rawdog sobriety - don’t mask, don’t cope, face your feelings and pains and reasons for your consuption. Only then can you move on, forgive yourself, ask others for forgiveness, and all of these famous steps.

There is also a clear rule that you come sober. Although this is specifically in regards to alcohol, I am really sure any other mind altering substance that numbs or excites you would have led to you being excluded from this week’s session.

Now, this is my experience with one group outside of the US. Also, I was a very shitty member and should not have been there to begin with. I made a joke, a competition out of it, I’m not even sure why I kept going there. I went there drunk, but no one ever suspected anything. The paramedics hardly suspected anything when I had 3.5%o blood alcohol, they assumed I had a slight migraine. I went to AA with literal booze in my handbag just for the thrill. I did so in university and relationships and with my family, and I was always so successful, I think I just wanted to see how far I can push my behavior before someone notices, before someone stops me, before I fuck up.

I stopped going to AA because I went abroad, but it was just a great excuse to stop going. The truth is I wasn’t ready to stop drinking quite yet. Committing to never having alcohol again when you are missing the one thing in life that you have actually wanted and you’re just 22 is just really hard.

Tl;dr: I would not recommend marijuana use in AA groups, to be honest neither during/before, nor in between meetings. It might not be the community you are looking for if you want to cope with your addiction by using an alternative drug. Whether or not it is a smart or sensible thing to do might be up for debate, but from my very limited experience with AA this would neither be ok for the group, nor go with their philosophy.

You’ve never been to an AA meeting, have you?