Everyone has something they can’t stop themselves from nerding out over - but often it’s hard to find people to talk to about it. So go ahead, share your interests, and tell us about them!
Honestly? Myself. No one in my life asks how I’m doing, what I’m doing, if there’s anything new… Then again I’m too much of a pushover anyway.
I love your posts and have assumed that you chose your username after one of my favorite Trek characters in the history of the franchise, but did you know that Paul Stamets the Discovery mycologist was named for the actual Paul Stamets, a real life mycologist? Real-Stamets is interesting particularly because he is largely self-educated in mycology and who has multiple publications and awards in the field?
I did! You are right in guessing who I named my account after. He’s also one of my favorites. First openly gay main Trek character meant a big deal to me. I know way more than I should about Discovery, including a lot of research and choices when it came to Stamets and Culber.
I love my little gay boys.
How are you doing?
Awful! Thanks though.
:/
It is what it is. Nothing is really going to change it or make a difference. I’ve learned to just… live with it.
Well, I’ll talk about you then. Your Risa posts have been the highlight of my Lemmy experience, and I would say a lot of others as well, considering they’re consistently some of the most active posts on lemmy.world. I came because of the reddit bullshit but stayed because of your memes.
Years from now when people ask “who were the first famous Lemmings?” MY answer will be “Stamets”. You beautiful fucking bastard.
I am glad that people are enjoying them. I only started because I’ve been stuck in my apartment for a month. Can’t walk at the moment and I was losing my fucking mind. Memes have been an outlet for me because I get to look through all the ones I have saved and pick my favorites to post. I’ve been trying to make a couple but I’m not that clever.
Either way I’m glad that I was able to give a reason to stay. Just doing my part.
I think that, most of the time, we’re all locked in our own tiny worlds that are completely filled by our lives, making us forget to really inquire about the people around us. But if you start talking about things, people are usually interested! It’s not an easy thing to do, especially if you don’t have many opportunities - but I can really recommend trying to share some bits and pieces about cool things that the other person might enjoy. Worst case they don’t respond and you can drop it. But there’s also a good chance it will lead to good things! :)
That’s true for a lot of people but my situation is complicated. Like I said before, I’ve just learned to live with it.
Besides, the problems temporary enough. Eventually I’ll die and then it’ll solve itself.
I really, really wish you the best of luck that you’ll have positive experiences in the future.
So mate, how are you doing?
Not great but it’s whatever. Didn’t mean that as a prompt for people to ask me. I just wish the people in my life would ask.
I don’t know if “rarely” is quite the right description, but I foster kittens. I meet lots of people who are excited to hear about it on a surface level and see pictures/videos/play with them, but it’s been challenging to connect with other people who also foster. I’m desperate to trade stories, learn from, and teach other foster parents. I even started a community on Kbin and have posted there a few times, but haven’t gotten any engagement (other than votes) so far.
In case anyone is curious, I’m still confused about how to properly link cross platform, but it’s at fosteranimals@kbin.socialThat’s awesome, thank you for doing it! I’d love to foster as I’ve lived with cats my whole childhood and FREAKING love them, but I don’t think I could give up a single one once they’ve lived with me :( how do you do it?
Honestly, I feel like I discovered a cheat code! It’s always a little hard to say goodbye, but I really enjoy having “illegally smol” kittens around, and they don’t stay that small very long. I only have so much time, space, and money, so if I want new tiny kittens, I have to say goodbye to the ones that are weaned and healthy. Also, most of the people who have adopted my fosters share updates with me as they adjust to their new homes, so I still have a small connection to each of them and know they’re in good homes.
The idea of time. It’s insane to me to think about events happening at different times in different places. Or for the same event to take different amounts of time depending on your reference points.
The sun is 8 minutes away from us, so we are looking at it 8 minutes in the past. If it were to suddenly disappear, it would take 8 minutes for us to find out. That’s mine-blowing to me! It’s like the past, present, and future are all happening at the same time.
Nobody cares to humor me when I bring the topic up lol
I’ll humour you! Time is fascinating and malleable and really quite intangible.
So, if you want, fire away with anything you find fascinating about the concept of time!
I’ve thought about something related.
In one point of view, time traveling to the past can create paradoxes since it alters events after that moment in the past, which could cause you to never time travel to the past after.
After some thinking, I got the feeling that the fixed-point theorem was connected to this. As long as whatever you do in the past causes you to time travel to the past again and do the same thing in the future, the paradox doesn’t happen. What you do when you time travel is like the input, and what you do when you time travel again in the resulting future is like the output.
When the input and output are the same, everything works out.
After searching about this on the internet, I saw other people have thought about and discussed this.
So facinating, even gravity is affected by those 8 minutes. Iow we would rotate around a missing sun, for 8 minutes, same as with light.
This is all also related to relativity, that someone else wanted to talk about in this post, i am just saying ;)
I’m an American who has been living abroad for 7ish years now. I often read comments from people who say they would do it “but the taxes are brutal.” Absolutely not the case. I dug deep into tax programs when I left and can comfortably say I am better off financially now than at any time I ever lived in the States… A major part of that is my tax strategy.
I love talking about this but most people don’t really care or realize how significantly it can change their lives… Eyes just tend to glaze over.
I’d honestly be interested in listening if we lived in the same area. I’m a total noob when it comes to anything beyond basic money management. I hope you find people who appreciate your insights!
As in, you’re still in some way paying U.S. taxes as well as those where you are abroad, or that the taxes abroad are brutal…? I’m not sure I follow which way you mean, mainly as I’ve never had the opportunity to live in another country.
As a US citizen you are technically always responsible for paying taxes no matter where you live. The US has a citizenship-based tax system (you owe on worldwide income regardless of where you live). Most other countries in the world have only a residency-based system (you owe only if you are actively living in that particular country). You are still required to file every year and you’re going to need someone more sophisticated than the dude at H&R Block or a free Quickbooks whatever. You need someone who is comfortable working with expats.
“Doesn’t that mean I have to pay taxes for both the US and my new country then?” No. The US has dual taxation agreements with most countries. That means that, basically, the US will not charge you taxes for things you’ve already been taxed for.
The main goal of paying less in taxes is to reduce your taxable income. The biggest chunk of this will happen with the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion. That essentially says that the first $120k you earn in a year is tax free. You can qualify for it by staying out of America for 330 days per year. There is no requirement to have residency anywhere else… You just have to be outside of the US.
That $120k rises every year. When you make more than that and do start to owe taxes, you will start to owe from the lowest tax bracket as well.
If you make $120k and do this, you just got a $30k raise in the form of taxes you no longer owe… You can pretty much travel the world for free using this money.
Now, I said that most non-US countries have a residency-based taxation system. That generally only starts to kick in after living in that country for 181 days. If you stay there for less time, you don’t owe them any money.
There are also countries who don’t have income tax or do but actively tell you not to pay it.
Living in a combination of these places, and bouncing around every few months you avoid any real responsibility to anyone.
If you do earn more than $120k per year, you can reduce your taxable income even further by doing things like maxing out your 401k contribution… That gets you to $142500 or so tax free. And again, you’d start paying taxes at the lowest rate above that.
Any other thing you mention in your US filing that can reduce your taxable income also contributes… Getting married, depreciation value on a home (US or not), investment losses, etc…
Working remotely from the US also gets you a higher salary than if you had just taken a job in the UK or Germany or Japan or something… So you can have the higher salary and the higher quality of live at the same time. You give up some employment protections and European style summer vacations but I’m personally ok with it.
Also, if you are working for a US company remotely, you can add these expected deductions to you W4 and never get charged for them in the first place… You’d have a MUCH higher weekly salary and wouldn’t have to wait for your tax return every year to take advantage of these benefits.
So spend summers in Italy, autumn in Japan, winter in New Zealand, and spring in Mexico. You earn an American salary, take advantage of lower cost of living, travel the world, and its all basically free… Good luck trying to get me to move back to the US.
There’s more but these are the major points.
My uncle did this in retirement. Dual citizenship US - Italy. Moving to southern Italy village of less than 20k population means 7% flat tax for 10 years. He’s probably saving 100k per year in taxes. Which pays a lot toward a nice villa, a sailboat, dinners out, and travel money.
I don’t know all the details (yet). I also have US/Italian/EU citizenship, so it’s something I thing about. I think about living in a sailboat in the Mediterranean often.
It’s all very interesting. Your method is even more intriguing.
Have any good resources in the topic you can share?
For what it’s worth, I haven’t paid more than ~1% effective tax rate in years. This past year I owed like $50 total… For the whole year. Something like 0.03% of my actual income.
If you want to stay stationary, 7% is pretty decent but you can do better bouncing around.
I’d really love to see some starting point information I can digest on this subject. If you have any please share.
Care to elaborate further maybe with some figures and generalities?
Please share. This is knowledge I would very much like to have.
I guess giving advice on job hunting and interviewing. I’ve done it so much and learned a lot, I can literally SEE how absolutely NOT confident ppl are about job hunting. ( which I get. More precisely they don’t see their value)
More importantly, they are blind to their value on the market and believe a toxic work environment is normal and hating their life because they hate their job making them miserable is just a part of working.
When really, when you see and acknowledge your worth, you don’t take that shit. You have a CHOICE. Employment isn’t a one way street. And employers realize that and treat you with respect.
Idk it’s a whole thing.
It’s interesting that you’re writing this, because I’ve literally just quit my job due to these reasons, and am starting to look for new things. Any particular tips you’d like to share?
Well you got this, and congrats on standing up for yourself by getting out of that shit whole environment. It’s not normal and not something you should accept.
Apply only to jobs you are qualified for that meet your expectations. Expectations? They pay adequately, the hours are decent, it’s not to far from where you live, and their job requirements aren’t insane.
Insane job requirements? Toxic employers say this on their job posting;
"Must be able to work under consistent pressure in a stressful environment while handling multiple tasks at once. Must be able to work a flexible schedule with little notice including nights, weekends and holidays. Must be on call. Must be able to complete other duties as assigned not directly relating to X role. Must be able to take direction. Must be obsessed with customer satisfaction. Customer service, customer service, customer service. (Employers obsessed with customer service care more about the customer then they do about you. So they’ll treat you like shit and let customers treat you like shit. You basically don’t matter)
Any misspellings and their job posting, requiring a cover letter, and requiring quizzes questionnaires and personality assessments. Employers seriously looking to hire the right candidate don’t waste their time on bullshit like that. If you’re qualified they will schedule you for an in-person interview within a drop of a hat.
Look at Google reviews glassdoor and indeed and get rid of your LinkedIn profile (unless you’re in tech) LinkedIn is used to SCREEN YOU OUT.
Employers don’t need to see your connections, a picture of what you look like, and your inspirational statement. all they need is your resume and if they feel that you’re qualified they can schedule you for an interview that’s all they need to know is the information that’s on your damn resume.
Realize you’re worth and have some standards. Don’t let employers dick you around. Because they will and once you show them that you respect yourself and your time it’s easier to weed through the bullshiters and you’ll find and actually good healthy employer.
Anyway lol I could go on all day lol
Can you follow up on the weed you out linkedin thing? I got a job at an engineering firm and set one up because all my coworkers had one.
Do you mean employers look at it to judge you on what you look like and what you post? Or that employers pass by anyone that has one?
They look at it and form a bias against you. Think about it. All you’re doing is making it easier and giving employers reasons to not hire you.
You’re better looking then the hiring manager? Not hired. You’re a republican? Not hired. You’re a single mother? Not hired. Left a comment on a post making employers look unfavorably? Not hired. You’re overweight? Not hired. You’re older? Not hired.
Those aren’t things they need to see or know about. They say nothing about you as a job candidate and your skills and abilities to do the job that they’re hiring for.
This is why I’m against linkedin. You shouldn’t have to show all of that fucking information about yourself it’s private and irrelevant.
The only thing that matters is the skills and experience on your resume. Because that’s what they need for the role right? All the other information about you is not necessary information that will determine if you can do the job or not.
We’ve been using applications and resumes to gain employment for years and years. that’s how people have been getting jobs over the decades. There’s no reason for an online portfolio that tells everything about you in order to get a job.
Don’t hand over ALL that information about yourself to them. It’s irrelevant.
All they need is the information that is on your resume that is absolutely it.
Linkiden and indeed (with the fucking quizzes) is making it easier and easier for employers to not do any of the leg work to find the right candidate. Or even pay attention to ppls resumes.
And vet for the right person for the job. Instead they are becoming nit picky and basing employment off of frivolous reasons and personality questioners that are not a real evaluation of how you will perform in your role, or the work environment.
Gotcha. Yeah, while I do have a photo up, I don’t post anything but updates to my resume. I don’t scroll or comment or anything social on there, specifically because why even would you??
I’m gonna pick your brain in a couple months.
Ok lol
By any chance do you have some go-to examples of good resumes you like to point people to as what to do with theirs vs. what not to do? I realize this will vary given jobs and you should tailor it accordingly, but some base starting points are better than nothing.
https://www.blueskyresumes.com/
This helped me tremendously. Look at their before and after examples.
I did my resume 14 times until I saw this and was finally done using the examples they gave
Oh wow, that’s a load more examples than I’d expected, thanks! I’ll have to look over these for what might apply to what I’m interested in.
Hell yea I gotchu
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Hello fellow Bronie.
Nice! Have you looked at Indian ragas and the scales/modes behind those? That was fun for me, coming from a western music background.
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Glass is great. Yeah, hs’ers prolly wouldn’t appreciate him so much :-) I’ll look into Sarah Thawer…
Cyber security stuff, but like the nitty gritty details and technical stuff. It’s something I’m really passionate about, but if anyone brings up something and I start going into details, their eyes glaze over.
I guess most people like the headline, tldr version only. Lol
I’m not deep in the topic, but I have done some security hardening for embedded devices. Whatever you have to share, I’d love to hear it!
There’s so much lol. I used to be a security software engineer. But people never fucking listen and will constantly fight you so I just gave up and went back to just software engineering.
At my job before last I told them we needed to enforce HTTPS and they said, but what if someone can’t use HTTPS for some reason?
This was an app that held tons of protected health information. I jumped ship as soon as I found another job.
Oh my god this is why we can’t have nice things ffs
Null models for weighted bipartite networks, and why people choose dumb network summary stats because they are lazy
Linguistics and the prescriptive bias of assuming a word’s meaning based on its blatant etymology
How skill makes games less fun and we need to embrace more chance in board games and video games
How cool it would be if we wrapped copper wire around the moon and used the earth-moon system as a huge electrical generator
Trains are awesome and we should have more of them
Well, you can’t mention all those interesting topics and not talk about them more!
I can really only talk about:
How cool it would be if we wrapped copper wire around the moon and used the earth-moon system as a huge electrical generator
You’re referring to induction from the magnetic field of earth, right?
I love linguistics too. I like to make up new words and assign them meaning based on blatant etymological rules. Then I drop them in a sentence like it’s no big deal.
What domain is your area of application for bipartite networks?
Also, most current linguistic work In familiar with ignores etymology i. favor of statistical usage models, but you might have a more particular focus.
Lots of things I’m really interested in are looked down on by other adults I know. I love animation but it’s seen as something for kids. I love video games, but that’s for teens, incels and nerds. And I love birdwatching, but that’s for boring old people. Oh and also whatever my ADHD is making me hyperfocus on at any given moment. I could talk about any of those topics for ages, but more often than not people aren’t interested, so I keep it to myself.
We should be friends. What’s your favorite animated film and/or video game? For me, WALL-E and Borderlands 2. Both for technical reasons more than entertainment reasons.
Hard to pick but for the longest time my favourite animated film was How to Train Your Dragon, the firdt one is really charming. There’s so many good ones to pick from. Wall-E is a great movie, and the soundtrack composed by Thomas Newman is just, chef’s kiss, y’know? Have you ever watched song if the sea? Another good one with a great story and beautiful music. Do you watch animated series? Anything you particularly enjoyed lately?
Favourite video game right now is Hollow Knight, even though metroidvanias aren’t necessarily my thing. I’ve never played Borderlands, what’s the gameplay like?
Borderlands is a looter shooter. You shoot things, they drop bigger guns, you shoot bigger things that drop even BIGGER guns. It’s the FPS version of Diablo.
I specifically love #2 because of the writing. Sure, they have middle school jokes that involve Bonerfarts, but under it’s goofy surface, it pulls you in and builds these characters around you, and it does NOT hold back from throwing you curve balls!
That game honestly made me laugh AND cry multiple times.
Borderlands is soo fun! I’m not the person you’re replying to, but I love it, soo… It’s mostly run-and-gun, but there’s some puzzle-solving, and some light tactics. Very lighthearted fun, the game is terribly self-aware and loves to take the piss out of you and itself.
The original moon landing programs at NASA. I massively nerd out over Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo.
How about a selection of your favourite facts on this topic? :)
The Gemini 8 mission was very nearly a disaster if it weren’t for Armstrong’s exceptional piloting skills. Gemini 8 was scheduled to rendezvous with an unmanned Agena rocket and dock in Earth orbit. The Agena had been a problematic vehicle so the default if anything went wrong was to assume it was the Agena and to decouple. In this case, after Gemini docked successfully, both craft started gyrating in an unexpected manner. Armstrong decouples from the Agena and the movement gets worse (a maneuvering thruster was stuck open) and the Gemini starts to violently spin, which ultimately would have been fatal to Armstrong and Scott. Armstrong realizes they’re in danger and fires the reentry retros, slowing the Gemini craft and aborting the mission early but saving both himself as well as astronaut David Scott.
I feel ya. Space exploration in general is my jam, why aren’t people as excited as me about how there’s theoretically more water on some of Jupiter’s moons than there is on earth??
Cars. And I really like to talk reliability and engine design and other design related stuff, most car people don’t even care about that. (Obviously there are plenty who do)
I’ll gladly talk about cars with you!
Metal.
Soil.
Metals in soil.
What do you want to know?
What would chelate the iron out of soil in Utah?
Why are you trying to remove iron? Make sure you’re correctly identifying the symptoms of toxicity if you suspect Iron toxicity in plants, as this is relativity rare.
To reduce soil iron availability to plants, you need to add a liming agent and target a pH of 7 to 7.5
The difference between town, zip code, school district, village, hamlet, and city where I live. I pay taxes to town A, by zip code is named after a hamlet in town B, our school district is named after town C. If you ask people where they live they will answer any one of these things.
In my opinion the town you pay taxes to is the best answer. The zip code, or location on your address, is deceptive because they are often named after small hamlets where the post office is. This small hamlet is a very distinct place where you probably don’t actually live. School Districts are often named after the biggest town they pull from so if you are not from that town it’s not really accurate. If you happen to be in a city or village that’s a good answer. However hamlets are so small and local that anyone not from the immediate vicinity will have no idea what you’re taking about if you say you are from there.
The parents who misunderstood intermittent punishment and created a generation of kinksters. Woohoo.
What does the “intermittent” part have to do with passing trauma and kinks down?
Psychology and physiology.
I swear my neuroendocrine system’s a lemon. I’ve had to learn basic and not so basic maintenance just to get the thing to run well enough to keep a job. I’ve struggled my entire adult life, and along the way I’ve learned a lot about trauma, stress, energy metabolism, brain parts, neurotransmitters, hormones, nutrition, inflammation, healing, spiritual work, things that alter the Big Five more than the literature says it will alter, etc.
