Watermark710

My mother-in-law is not long for this world. I’ve known this woman since I was 14. She took care of me when my own mother kicked me out for dating a Mexican girl (my now-wife). She opened her home to me. She made dinner for me more times than I can count (and taught me to cook). She bought my clothes through most of High School. She taught me to drive. She taught me how to use a bank account. She was there for me when my father died, and then she was there for me again when my mom died. She showed me what a good parent is like. She’s the kindest person I’ve ever known. I’ve never heard her say anything bad about anyone. This woman doesn’t have a hateful bone in her body. She has no evil in her heart. I’ve spent the past 37 years holding her up as a role model for my own life.

When my wife and I had an unplanned baby at age 19, she stepped up and helped any time we needed it. She never made us feel guilty. She never guilt tripped us. She gave us nothing but love, and help. If my own mom knew I had a half Mexican baby, she’d be furious. But my MiL never judged me for being white.

She even moved to a different state (NJ–>PA) with us when we decided to relocate to my realize my dream of buying a restaurant. She lives in a MiL suite above my garage, rent free. She still insists on cooking for the family sometimes. I’m at work right now, and she’s smoking some goat for our tacos tonight. I won’t get home for about 5.5hrs, and I bet she’s going to have my tacos ready when I walk in the door.

But age is age, we all get old, and eventually we die. That time is coming for her soon. She’ll be lucky to see another full year. I’m going to miss her terribly. I can (and do) dump ridiculous amounts of money into her care, and it’s worth it. But it isn’t going to be much longer until the doctors tell me there’s nothing they can do. I am dreading that day.

I can’t unload this on my wife, it wouldn’t be fair. She can see the writing on the wall. And she is going to be hurting much more than I am when push comes to shove. I’m going to be the “strong” one, and support her. But Jesus fucking Christ, I am going to miss my MiL so much.

Paragraph 1) It gets very hot here.

Paragraph 2) Even in the winter, we just turn the heat on.

Paragraph 3) I shit a lot.

In short, your teacher was an idiot.

The climate is colder in North America

It’s gonna be 81f (27c) where I live today, and it’s not even summer yet. At the peak of summer, we regularly get temperatures over 100f (~38c). We’ve even seen 111f (43.8c) in my state, and I don’t live in the hottest state, not by a long shot. Your teacher was incredibly ignorant.

It does get really cold here in the winter, but thankfully humans have developed these things called heaters, so it’s not cold indoors. I go from my heated house, to my heated garage, get into my car (which also has heat), and drive to my heated workplace, or the heated supermarket. Then I do the same trip in reverse. I’m only exposed to the extreme cold for 2-3 minutes the whole trip.

As far as shitting, I have IBS-D. I’d be so fucking happy if I could manage to only shit once a day. On bad days, I’m on the toilet 10-12 times.

I think the lead poisoning was not confined to Flint.

We burned leaded gasoline for over 4 decades. The air was laced with lead.

Talking strictly about lead exposure from water pipes, the problem is much more widespread than most people know/understand. The article I’m linking below has an interactive map of all known areas with lead pipes.

https://www.nrdc.org/resources/lead-pipes-are-widespread-and-used-every-state

I bet small amounts on NFL games when the season is active. $10-$20 a week.

I go to the casino a couple times a year with a set amount of money (usually $500), and if I lose that money, I leave.

I’m glad it’s legal. Some folks get addicted, and that sucks, but the same can be said about booze, prescription drugs, and even food. We don’t need a nanny state banning things because some people go overboard.

I use Facebook to communicate with my family, since that’s where our group chat is. I don’t use my real name on there, but rather [MiddleName] [Grandmother’sMaidenName], and my profile pic is a cat. Sometimes I post pics of particularly good meals I made, so they come up in the “memories” feed and remind me to cook them again.

I follow a lot of chefs on Instagram, mainly for inspiration and to find new recipes.

That’s the extent of my traditional social media use.

The discount grocery places near me are incredible. They recently had eggs for 50 cents a dozen. They currently have 10lb cases of knockoff brand Steak-Umms for $37, meanwhile in the normal grocery store a 27 ounce “value pack” is $11. If you’re a snacky kind of person, they sell a 50 count variety pack of Wise brand chips for $5, while at Walmart the 40 count box of store brand chips is $16. 12oz packs of bacon are only $1.99, while the Walmart is charging $7. Shopping there feels like using a cheat code.

The only downside is that you never know what you’re gonna find there. You can’t go in with a list and expect to check all the items off. I like to go in with my list, and low expectations. Then anything I can’t get there, I go to the normal grocery store.

I volunteer at a food pantry and a soup kitchen, and neither of them does any means testing at all. No paperwork, no questions other than the food pantry asking how many people are in your family so they know how many boxes to give you. Each box is ~30lbs of food. We give out rice, beans, canned veg, canned meat, and in the summer, some fresh fruit and veg grown on some land the church owns. We used to give out a lot of potatoes, but then the guy we were getting them from decided that selling them to the pig farm was a better idea then giving them to humans in need.

You mean these?

It got my location wrong. It got my GPU wrong. It said I never left the tab, even though I left it to start this comment. It said I moved my cursor 111 times in 74 seconds, which is absolutely false.

That site is just pointless. Pretty much the only things it got right were my time zone and my browser.

Democrats have control and make a map: Republicans push all the way to SCOTUS, they’ll say you can’t use it. (Still waiting for this to happen to California.)

Don’t hold your breath on that one.

https://www.scotusblog.com/2026/02/supreme-court-allows-california-to-use-congressional-map-benefitting-democrats/

When I see a violet08 post, I upvote. One of my favorite posters in the fediverse.

GenX here, I have a streaming service (Paramount+) for exactly one reason: It comes for free with my Walmart+ account, which I use frequently. Every 6 months I switch between that and Peacock, since both are free and I can change my choice twice a year. So I watch what I want on Paramount+ for 6 months, then switch to Peacock for 6 months, rinse and repeat.

As far as a lifetime subscription to Nebula, I’ve watched way too many sites fail/die to consider a lifetime subscription to anything on the internet. They could shut the site down tomorrow, and now I’m out $500 ($300 if I happen to get a discount from a creator code).

My ancestors had the CCR5-Δ32 mutation, which is why they survived the Black Plague. That mutation was passed down through generations to me. So I am (theoretically) immune to HIV.

So basically, 1/3 of Europe dying almost 700 years ago means I can’t get HIV.

Mind you, I’m not looking to test my luck.

If I see a new Max Miller video is out, I will drop pretty much whatever I’m doing to watch it. I love Tasting History.

I watch Good Mythical Morning/GMMore every weekday morning. Also, Last Meals from the Mythical Kitchen channel. Mythical Chef Josh is probably my favorite online personality. I used to watch A Hotdog Is A Sandwich without fail, but I have recently had my fill of Nicole, so I skip those now.

I watch a lot of Mike Chen (Strictly Dumpling).

JonnyCakes, Sambucha, and L3WG are also folks whose videos I click on without hesitation.

SortedFood might be the best cooking show on YouTube.

The Food Theorists is another great channel. I miss the original host, but the new guy is still entertaining.

JOLLY almost always hits the spot. I have how childish/dumb Ollie’s humor is, and when Josh laughs so hard it sounds like he’s dying, that makes me laugh along with him, even if the thing he’s laughing at wasn’t that funny to me.

The dudes from Fallow provide a lot of useful information, and they do it in an entertaining way.

Hank Green makes some great videos, I just skip the parts where he plays Connections, because watching someone else play a matching puzzle is just not entertaining to me.

Sir Yacht feels very relatable, and I’ve never seen a video from him that I didn’t like. His “professional dumbass” vibe speaks to me.

Sam Reid (the YouTuber, not the Australian actor) is a great content creator, and I love his positivity. I literally have an exact copy of his “IT’S GOING TO BE OKAY” neon sign hanging on the wall of my game room.

Veritasium and NileRed are great when I want a nice science video to go with my dinner.

I have a soft spot for the ladies from Sporked, their taste test videos are informative, and their interactions just seem real, and not scripted.

Honorable mention goes to FaZe Rug. He’s not my favorite, but my grandson loves him, so I always end up watching those videos with the kid.

I’m sure I’m forgetting some, but those are the ones that came to the top of my head.

requires logging in with one’s identity card

Fastest way to get me to never use your site again. I’d rather deal with a few trolls and bots than have to give my ID to every site I want to interact with. That’s some ridiculously invasive stuff right there. Turning every website into their own private Big Brother is the opposite of progress.

Plus, what about when the site’s database inevitably gets compromised, and now my personal info is public?

Not a shill, but I honestly love my Samsung TV. I took it out of the box, plugged in an HDMI cable to connect it to my PC, and use it as a monitor. I’ve never connected it to my wifi, so it has no internet access. I’ve never had to enter my Samsung account info to use it.

One of my gaming buddies is in Thailand, but plays on the American server with us. His ping is regularly 2000-3000ms. When he hits a button, he doesn’t actually “do the thing” for 2-3 seconds. But dude is a fucking genius, and he’s mastered the timing. He regularly outperforms folks with a 28ms ping (It’s me, I’m “folks”).

My wife and I bought those stupid Surface tablets. Not really sure why. Too big to be comfortably portable, too small to be useful at home. At least the magnetic keyboard thing makes a good mousepad for my desktop PC.

People generally date people who live somewhat close to them (I know, LDRs exist).

People generally shop in stores that are somewhat close to them.

I’m smelling coincidence.

I like to grocery shop on Tuesday mornings, since that’s double coupon day at my local grocer. I give my neighbor a ride to the store, so we can use her 5% senior discount and save even more money.

I see the same people at the store every week, because they shop on the same day I do, at the same time I do. We smile and wave, sometimes we chit chat about current events, or small talk like “Man, the weather’s crazy this week”, or “How did your son’s baseball game go?”.

I am not stalking them, they are not stalking me. We just patronize the the same store at the same time as each other.

If you think you’re being stalked, randomly change up your routine. Let’s say you normally go shopping on Saturday afternoons. Go on a Thursday morning. If you still keep running into them, maybe you’re onto something. If not, enjoy your new ex-gf free shopping experience.