And Alito pls

Eric Clapton is wildly overrated

If you think there is even a remote possibility that anything in American politics would involve anything but the very lowest of bars, then you’re gonna be pretty disappointed. We’re at the point where we’re begging half of the voting public to please refrain from electing treasonous, felonious, fascists. The bar is so low, it may be the only place left on the planet that isn’t full of microplatics.

PSA if you have one grandparent who was born in Ireland then you may qualify for Irish citizenship. Getting all the needed documentation together and going through the whole process can easily take the better part of a year, so don’t delay.

Even with citizenship, moving abroad is a lot of work and expense. I no longer have any illusions that “cooler heads will prevail” or that “the adults in the room will maintain the status quo”, so having an out, even an extremely expensive one, is very comforting.

📠

They probably killed Kennedy and MLK but now they’ve lost their edge?

Do you want them to make the retirements age 90? I’d rather not give those assholes a perverse incentive to reduce benefits.

I used to stick to that rule and get a sensible mid sized Toyota Corolla or Honda Accord that’s a few years old as needed. But in 2013 (the last time I needed to get a new car) the cost savings were really low compared to new. I think the used market was particularly hot so you’d save less that 10% of the cost, so I ended up getting my 1st and only (so far) brand new car ever.

Sounds like you’re doing everything you can. It sucks that you’re going through this; I hope the situation improves and you don’t get furloughed.

I’m guessing that if you could get to all your jobs without the car, you would have already done so? Saving on gas and insurance can help, but depending on where you live that might not be realistic.

You could try contacting local food banks and see if they ever make accommodations for people who are working during operating hours. They might not but there’s no harm in asking.

Right now you’re in a serious hole from missing work for a family emergency. I don’t have much advice for getting back onto steady ground aside from being super crazy frugal and working extra hours in the short term (which is fucking exhausting mentally and emotionally and physically). Do you have any long term plans for having more breathing room years from now? If your steady state is “one car repair or illness away from defaulting on payments” then that’s a hard path. Do you or your wife have prospects for better paying jobs in the future? Are there training or educational opportunities that could help? Are there cheaper places you could live (smaller, worse neighborhood?) to save money while working towards better job prospects? Living on not enough money in crappy circumstances sucks but it is definitely more bearable if you know it’s temporary and you’re making progress towards something better.

Good luck.

Anyone who says their smart overestimates themselves. Anyone who says their dumb underestimates themselves. How does anyone even answer this question?

I think it’s possible for someone to know that they are generally pretty smart or not very smart without over or under estimating. A lot of people will over or under estimate but if you’re just looking for a rough placement in a third of the bell curve, there’s a lot of feedback in everyday life to help.

Pedants who choose to make big deals over minor issues are always out to prove something and are objectively not smart.

Some people sincerely have trouble adapting to different precisions of language in different situations. I know some very smart and successful people with autism who struggle with this. It can be super annoying when they are way too pedantic for the context but I don’t think being deficient in this one area makes them dumb.

Up gets me every time.

Not the main character but Gus Fring was a remarkably intelligent gangster.

It is very hard to get assistance in the US. People with children can get some credits to buy groceries , but it isn’t very much. Depending of where you live, if you have kids you can get some small and limited help with housing or get a monthly check (again, really not much). if you have a serious documented disability you can get similar assistance. Injured or retired veterans also get payments, but that’s really just part of the payment for being a soldier. And a lot of folks come home from our endless wars with serious mental and physical health problems and end up living on the streets.

Having a phone or laptop but living in a car or tent isn’t better than having an actual residence. People in the US can become homeless (lose job, run out of savings) and when they do, they will try to hang onto laptops and phones, since they are portable, valuable and very useful (looking for jobs, housing, social services, etc. ). You can get a cheap pay as you go phone for like $30 and hang onto it for years. Here in Seattle you can get work as a day laborer making around $16 an hour, so a cheap phone is attainable for anyone well enough to show up in the morning and dig ditches for a day. Meanwhile, you’d have a hard time finding even the crappiest little studio apartment with a shared kitchen for less than $1000 per month. And you usually have to have 3 months of rent to move in.