Angry_Maple

If you're ever looking for cheap jewelry/earrings, you should be very very careful.

CTV Marketplace did an investigation a few years ago, and they found that a lot of children's jewelry contained high levels of lead and/or cadmium. These pieces were found in multiple places, including Claires and H&M. Some children's makeup was also contaminated.

Free seasoning

Live and let live. Their choice doesn't have any impact on you

Not to mention some of Gen Z is still only around 12 years old.

I think you raised a good point. A household where one or both parents is heavy into coding or missing would probably help them more than a household that only relies on 'smart' technology. Either of those options would be way more helpful for these skills than growing up without any technology, which is just reality for a lot of people.

I know someone from Gen Z who is horrible with computers. I also know someone from Gen Z who is fantastic with computers.

To be honest, I don't think any generation is immune to this, despite what some want to think.

My personal experience might be biased, but I've also seen a lot of millenials in their early to mid 30s who struggle with almost anything online. Too damn many. I've also seen some people from Gen X who are beyond tech illiterate. We don't really talk about those guys though.

There is still time to fix this problem with the younger Gen Z, but there's almost never any discussion about actually doing that either. "Gen Z" also includes kids who are around 12, but we often act like Gen Z all grew up into adults. Let's get some of that school funding back ffs! Kids have to learn from somewhere, and many of their parents seem to not care about teaching them any of this stuff.

Many of us were lucky enough to grow up when most of this technology was still developing. We HAD to troubleshoot things if we wanted them to work. Fewer things were locked behind "customer service" and crappy warranties. You could physically open things up to fix them without having such a high risk of breaking them in the process.

If they want more people to switch to EVs specifically, they absolutely need to try to make some changes if they can.

Chargers: In a world where many people are living in old apartment buildings and condos, people are going to need public chargers. I don't just mean enough for 20 people. If we want a big societal switch, we need to be able to assure people that they won't encounter what happened in Texas recently. 60 chargers is still pretty rough if your city has half a million people in it.

Cost: MANY people can only afford used vehicles. This is not only because of the up-front cost. Parts for repairs can become a massive factor when deciding what type of car to buy. Even if you can get a used car for 6K, you might not go for it if you know that certain important repairs will cost you up to 20K.

Design: There are concerns for a lot of people with things being too screen-based. Some people like knobs that you can change without having to look away from the road. How many functions will be stuck behind a subscription? Will an update brick your car? Is it ok to tow normally, or will it sometimes require a special flatbed that most people can't afford? Do we have the battery fire thing under full control yet?

If every single car eventually becomes too expensive, driving will either become a "caste" thing, or people will put things together at home that might be even worse for the environment. Shoddy DIY repairs can also count for this.

I hope that works better for other schools than it did for mine.

Most of the students that went to the school that I went to opted for a "spare" class instead of taking photography, business, arts, programming, or any of the other creative courses. The tools were there in my case, but most people just ignored them in favour of being able to leave school early, or in favour of taking an extra long lunch. They ignored the after school stuff too, because they wanted to spend time with their friends somewhere else.

We had a pretty good photography course too, they covered almost everything and there was even an option to take it for multiple years/grades if you wanted to learn even more about it. The kids at my school who usually did things like Tik Tok and Vine in the bathroom didn't seem to really care for those courses. Social media was just fun for them, they never intended on making anything of it.

There has to be some solution that we aren't seeing yet. There has to be some common ground between "let the kids do whatever they want, regardless of their education" and "dystopian hell".

It would also help if kid's parents were more involved overall, although you could also argue that a huge part of the cause is the insane hours that many of the parents have to spend working to let the family survive.

This all sucks. I hope someone is able to make your idea work, truly. We need a solution, asap.

It didn't have a removable battery, but I used to use an older Asus Zenfone 3 ZE552KL that really kicked arse.

It had cards slots, a headphone jack, a built in radio that used wired headphones for signal, and the damned thing was as reasonably waterproof as I could imagine a smartphone to be. It's camera was pretty great for the price, too.

Well, one day it fell very hard on a sharp rock, and the screen shattered. The crack made a hole a few milimeteres deep, and it was about a centimetre wide. It might not sound like much, but the crack in the screen was very much there. My happy arse managed to then have it fall out of my pocket and right into the flush of a high-powered toilet.

I left it to dry for one day, and it worked almost like new again. It still powers up today, but the since security updates stopped years ago, i don't use it anymore. IIRC, it wasn't too expensive, but I forget if there was a sale going on at the time.

I hope I can find another phone like that around that general price point one day. I can dream haha.

I'm not sure I could forget that post if I tried. The same goes for the post about the "swamps of dagobah".

Some of it's also probably situation based.

If you hit on every single person of the gender that you like at one gym, they'll probably start to feel like you really just want just anyone who will say yes. They'll probably feel like you don't like them for them, and that you're just trying to keep your bed warm. Most people who want relationships want to be with someone who likes them individually as a person. Try not to write "scripts" for the situation in your head too much, either. If you do, it might crash and burn the second that someone goes off of that "script".

It's kind of tragic how all of this has become. A relationship likely won't fix any problems you might have with yourself, nor would it fix most of the other aspects of your life. A partner will also have their own needs and wants, and you should try to have room to provide some of that before you start dating.

Don't listen to guys like Tate. If he really had good advice, more people from his fan base would be in a happy relationship now, no? He makes money by making you continue to watch his videos. That's all he cares about. He's giving you bad advice so he can keep making money off of your sadness. That's not a bro thing to do.

Don't follow the plot of any rom-coms. That behaviour is usually a fantastic way to get a restraining order and absolutely ruin any chances you might have had with that person.

Find the little things that make you happy. Gardening? MTG? Video games? Hockey? Drawing? MMA? Take the time to properly enjoy those things that you love with the people who are already around you. It will help build some of that confidence. Let youself be passionate about your hobbies sometimes. It's ok, I promise.

Try not to worry too much if you mess up or if you ruin your chances with one person. There are over 8 billion people on earth, so there's almost always someone else you can try with. NO ONE succeeds 100% of the time, and that is more than OK. That is human.

Don't beat yourself up over not succeeding right away. Unless you are literally currently on your death bed, you still have time.

Outside of the dating stuff, be kind to youself, and try to make sure you're taking care of yourself. Self care isn't just fitness and healthy eating. Sometimes could be having pizza in the bath, sometimes it might be playing DnD over multiple continents, sometimes it might be watching cartoons, and sometimes it could even be something like skincare. Your happiness is important, and you should treat it as such.

As long as it doesn't harm anyone else in the process, please do what you need to do to feel happy. Life is too short to pause your happiness for someone who hasn't shown up yet. Life is too short to wait to improve things until you meet someone who hasn't shown up yet.

You deserve happiness, and the sooner you acknowledge that, the better. Find happiness despite what life might throw at you. Try to find joy even in chaos, and always remember that bad feelings usually don't last forever. You can get through these hard times.

I think I've decided to not publish anything that I want to keep ownership of, just in case. There's an entire planet's worth of countries, which will all have their own sets of laws. It takes waay too long to polish something, only to just give it away for free haha. Someone else is free to do that work if it is that easy. No skin off my back.

I think it's similar to many other hand-made crafts/items. Most people will buy their clothes from stores, but there are definitely still people who make beautiful clothing from hand better than machines could.

Don't even get me started on stuff like knitting. It already costs the creator a crap ton of money just for the materials. It takes a crap ton of time to make those, too. Despite the costs, many people just expect those knitted pieces for practically free. The people who expect that pricing are also free to go with machine-produced crafts/items instead.

It comes down to what people want, and what they're willing to pay, imo. Some people will find value in something physically being put together by another human, and other people will find value in having more for less. Neither is "wrong" necessarily, so long as no one is literally ripped off. (With over 8 billion people, it's bound to happen at least once. I feel bad for whoever that is.)

That being said, we'll never be able to honestly say that the specific skills and techniques that are currenty required are the exact same. It would be like calling a photographer amazing at realism painting because their photo looks like real life. Photographers and painters both have their place, but they are not the exact same.

I think that's also part of what's frustrating so many artists. Coding AI is not the same as using the colour wheel, choosing materials, working fine motor control, etc. It's not learning about shadows, contrast, focal points, etc. I can definitely understand people not wanting those aspects to be brushed off, especially since it usually takes most of a lifetime to achieve. A music generator and a violin may both make great music, but they are not the same, and they require different technical skills.

I'll never buy AI art if I have any say in the matter. I'll support handmade stuff first, every time.

Figure 8(a):

The worms are summoned to protect their creator from being exorcised. In this depiction, you can see the exorcism waves being emitted from the cross.