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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 24th, 2023

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  • I saw a similar thread on Reddit about 12 years ago and one of the suggestions near the bottom that didn’t have any comments on it is something I’ve incorporated into my daily life and it has made a huge difference: Adjust your car mirrors so you have no blind spots.

    Most people have their side mirrors adjusted where they can see a portion of their own car in the mirror. This leaves you with large blind spots. To adjust them where you have no blind spots, sit in the driver’s seat and lean your head over to the left as far as you can (basically putting your head on the window), then adjust the driver’s side mirror to where you can just barely see your car in it. Then lean your head over to the passenger side about the same amount and adjust that mirror.

    When adjusted properly if you can see a car in your rearview mirror, you shouldn’t be able to see that car in your side mirrors, but as soon as a car is no longer visible in the rearview mirror it should be visible in one of your side mirrors. Then when it is no longer visible in your side mirror it should be in your peripheral vision.

    It takes some getting used to, but once dialed in and you’re used to it then it makes changing lanes a breeze. It also helps at night if someone behind you has bright lights because you’ll only see them in one mirror instead of all 3.


  • If you don’t want to pay for a pool then don’t move into a neighbor that has a pool. If you don’t want to have an HOA, don’t move somewhere that has one. If you don’t like how the HOA is run, volunteer to help run it.

    What you don’t do is hold up the rest of the neighborhood that actually wants to take care of things properly.

    The change to the dues required a change to the bylaws, which required 100% participation in voting, and required 60% approval. The change passed with over 85% approval. Most HOA dues in our area are $600 - $1000 per year, and many of those don’t have a pool. There are also many places around that don’t have an HOA.



  • Mostly the neighbors who don’t pay their dues or needlessly hold up needed improvements.

    Our HOA board does a great job, they are volunteers who live in the neighborhood. Our dues used to be $100 a year, plus $150 if you wanted to use the pool. Then the pool needed to be replaced (it was 45 years old) and we didn’t have the money for it, so we changed the dues to $250 and everyone gets access to the pool. That still didn’t raise enough money, so they tried to get everyone to agree to a one-time assessment of $1000 but too many people complained. So they’ve now raised the dues to $350, likely going up to $450 soon.

    The good thing about the higher dues is we will now be able to afford a lawyer to go after the 10% of the homes that aren’t paying their dues. And maybe even force the people who are hoarding cars in their yards to have to move them.

    Edit to add from a follow up comment;

    The change to the dues required a change to the bylaws, which required 100% participation in voting, and required 60% approval. The change passed with over 85% approval. Most HOA dues in our area are $600 - $1000 per year, and many of those don’t have a pool. There are also many places around that don’t have an HOA. The HOA was created at the same time the pool went in, anyone already living in the neighborhood who didn’t want to use the pool didn’t have to join the HOA, we still have a few ‘grandfathered’ homes and I have no issue with them, it’s the people who moved into the neighborhood knowing there’s an HOA and a pool and refuse to pay their share.


  • He really went off the deep end when Grimes dumped him. I’m not saying he didn’t have issues before, but his compete public persona changed when their relationship ended. When his relationship with Amber Herd ended her did an interview with Rolling Stone where he was crying and talking about how life just isn’t worth doing anything of you aren’t in love. I think he really thought that with Grimes he found his true soulmate. My guess is that once she became a mother she realized that he isn’t someone she wants raising her children and she broke his heart and he’s gone full incel now.

    One day she will be free of him and she’s going to tell her story. I can’t wait to hear it.



  • Soul crushing.

    Worked at a place for 16 years, made many close friends there, helped the company grow from a $2M company into a $2B company. Then one day they decided that it looked like they might not be add profitable in the coming quarter so they needed to cut 20% of the company. I was my family’s sole provider and now wasn’t sure how we were going to survive. I did get a nice severance of 6 months pay, but only 3 months of COBRA coverage. I was very fortunate to find a better paying job a little over 3 months later. Financially it was a good thing for us, but mentally I’m pretty fucked up now. I’ve never had anxiety issues but now I’m on 2 different medications for it. I’m depressed. I hate my new job and coworkers. I have no joy in work. I know if I get laid off again that I won’t get nearly as good of a severance package. I realize that my lifestyle only exists as long as my employer chooses to keep me employed. I feel like I not only have no safety net, but if I fall I take my family with me. It sucks.





  • Hi, I also know my industry, with over a quarter century of experience in Fortune 500 companies. The old motto of IT used to be ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ and then salespeople found out that fear is a great sales tool.

    When proper precautions are taken and a risk analysis is performed there is no reason that old operating systems and software can’t continue to be used in production environments. I’ve seen many more systems taken down from updates gone wrong than from running ‘unsupported’ software. Just because a system is old, doesn’t mean it is vulnerable, often the opposite is true.






  • The best raise you can get is by changing jobs. Businesses are not going to be loyal to you, there’s no benefit to being loyal to them - add either a customer or employee. Embrace and welcome change.

    When you get a pay raise immediately increase your 401k (or equivalent retirement fund) by at least 1%.

    Enjoy your 20s, they don’t last long but the person you are today is who you will feel like you are in 20 years. Don’t rush your life. There’s plenty of time to get married and have kids. You and your kids will benefit from you having an extra decade of experience before raising another human.



  • I like the idea on the surface, but no, I don’t want to be forced to vote for a few reasons:

    • A lack of voter engagement is it’s own outcome of a vote.
    • Freedom of speech means being able to refuse to speak, and voting is one of the most powerful forms of speech most people have.
    • I’m not a fan of the government forcing me to do something I might not believe in.
    • There are many people who don’t want to vote for trump but refuse to vote for Democrat and if forced might hold their nose and vote trump.

    Making election day a Federal holiday and guaranteeing everyone has the option to vote would be more effective and have a better outcome.

    Edit: Several replies are basically saying the same thing: you can turn in an empty ballot. But the exact same thing can be accomplished much easier by staying at home. You can’t force people to go somewhere, or even mail in a ballot… they have a hard enough time getting people to do the census. Also, a candidate such as trump would refuse the results of any election they lost that didn’t have 100% turnout, especially if the margin of loss is less than the percentage that didn’t vote.

    Again, I do like the spirit of the idea, but in order to make it work it would take more effort than it is worth since staying home accomplishes the same thing as a blank ballot.