I went shopping in a new store today. At first I was excited to find something with 100% juice that wasn’t absurdly expensive. But then I looked at the ingredients and saw cochineal extract, AKA carmine, AKA crushes beetles used to make things red.

I just don’t understand. You’ve got this juice, you could totally add beet juice for coloring and achieve a beautiful color. But no, gotta throw insects into it instead. As far as hidden non-vegan ingredients go, stuff from insects tends to fly under the radar. Yet I bet if more people were aware of what they were buying, even non-vegans would take issue with it.

Whenever I play a game with someone new, we quickly realize we have to clarify the rules we're using beforehand, since so many people have their own varieties. What are some non-standard game rules that you/your family/friends follow?

I'll start. My family has a rule where we're not allowed to win on a Wild card. It adds a bit of challenge, and keeps someone from being unbeatable if they play by hoarding wild cards.

[Original text link. Written by [email protected] in response to a meme image that said, "you know what. fuck your favorite song. tell me your absolutely least favorite song, one you just absolutely hate with all your heart"]

I'm a crusty metal head. It takes a lot, and I mean A LOT, to make me hate a song. Design the Skyline's 2011 flaming pile of shit Surrounded by Silence is the single worst metal song I've ever listened to. At a time where we had major musical juggernauts like BTBAM, Periphery, Protest the Hero, After the Burial, and so many other great technically sound musicians just hitting their stride or deep in their prime, Design the Skyline said 'this'll do.'

I could rip into this thing a million different ways. Lets just start with the fucking aesthetics. It's 2011. I'm a year into college. Hipsterism is on the rise. Scene kids are dying out. These guys are the last vestige of an embarrassingly low period of teenage subculture. You got two lead screamers. A gelfling, and Rhea Ripley 12 years before her time. The bassist is little brother Ethan after Mom said let your little brother be in the band. 3 nondescript other dudes wearing girls clothing who are too embarrassed to show their faces at all. And a drummer who is too good for this shit. They're children of that time. The first thing I thought to my self as soon as they show up in the video even back then is, 'we're still doing this?'

The start of the song is the best part. It's this techy synth stuff with great dynamics that fits the era. It's long enough to make you think we're in for a good ride. Then it drops out and the actual band starts and hooooo boy is it bad. It's pure WHAT THE FUCK! The two screamers go back and forth unintelligibly. The guitars are playing fuck all. The bass drops out like fucking Hetfield was mixing And Justice For All. It's just chaos.

Then you get to the chorus. It's autotuned to shit. In the actual video the gelfling is battling snow that keeps falling into his mouth. The Rhea clone is dry heaving and singing at the same time. He legit looks like he's gonna be sick the way he's moving. Then little brother Ethan comes in. He's the most awkward, no confidence looking mother fucker of the whole video. He looks like he spent the whole day getting yelled at to move like this and you'll look cool, but it was really a joke and he just looks stupid. To the point there's a shot of the Rhea clone staring off and rolling his eyes while little brother Ethan is singing, like why is he here? It's just a fucking mess. The best part of the chorus is this is the only time in the whole song it happens.

Then it returns back to the chaos of nothingness musically and you feel shock. Why am I being bombarded by this? What is the point of this song? What is the point of my life? There are legit musicians at this period of time. Misha Mansoor is working hard on P2. The boys in BTBAM are working hard on P2. Everybody is waiting for the next Contortionist album. You got a whole new movement in Djent. Then this shit forces it's way into the spotlight like a distraction from the Epstein Files.

And when I tell you the description I'm writing is nothing compared to the hate this song got at the time, I fucking mean it. They released their record then split up. The amount of hate they got broke the band up. There was no way anyone was taking any of this shit seriously. That's how bad it was.

Here it is. Do not enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViSZI6UJEUQ

The only other songs that makes me a fraction as upset as the above is Pause and Rib Woman on Frosting by Bent Knee. I can't prove it but I really think those two songs caused a rift in the band that got Ben and Jess kicked out the band. Ben with out of control creativity that tanked a record on Pause. Whoever decided to have a high pitched alarm go off for a whole song deserves to be whipped. Nobody wants to listen to Jess moan for a whole song like Rib Woman. They're lucky they had the cover of covid to leave, but man that record really upset a lot of people. None more than the band itself. They'll never say it but it's pretty obvious. The Hyperpop experiment was a failure.

I'm not complaining about it, but it was totally unexpected.

Sometimes to supplement a family's income, I'll have them collect frogs and breed the more expensive ones. I have a family with a full frog collection and had each of the three members (both parents and the infant son) breed whirlyflower frogs in their inventory. I recently had them move into a new house and after some furnishings, their money zeroed out. So I went to sell some frogs.

When I sold just a handful of frogs, something weird happened. Instead of giving me the few hundred simoleons I expected, the household funds turned into §9,999,999!

I figured, well, I was trying to get them more money anyway, so I went along furnishing their house and kept playing. I didn't take a screenshot at the time, but was thinking about this strange glitch today and figured I'd share it here. (Which is why in the screenshot, the funds number is lower and the infant is now a child.)

Shortly after, the game bugged where it couldn't pause and I had to restart the game. Thankfully, I had saved the game inbetween those moments, so the money (and new furnishings) remained. I've had no issues since.

I have no idea what exactly happened. I don't know if it's related to the frogs, to the infant, to the new house (Palomino Junction in Chestnut Ridge), or to the fact that the family income was literally zero. I don't know what triggered it or if the glitch is replicable, but I found it interesting and wanted to share.

I love long-form videos that tell information and stories. Documentaries about most any topics, especially ones that last an hour or more, are my bread and butter. But when I’m using YouTube on my TV, I can’t tell from thumbnails what the quality of a channel is. Sometimes I find gold, but other times it’s obvious they’re using an AI voice over or AI imagery and I immediately turn it off. I’m so tired of trudging through the slop, even though it’s just beginning.

So for now, I figure I’ll check with y’all - do you have any preferred/recommended channels that make the sort of video I’m looking for, that are still human-made? I’d love to hear about them.

I like to be aware of the news, but seeing the same things over and again can really wear down one's spirit. Are there any communities here on Lemmy that you use to take a break from reality? That help you decompress, think about other things, or that make you laugh?

I imagine a lot of us scrolling through the doom every day could use some amusing communities right now. What's yours?

I was browsing for a game and came across this site, which immediately prompted me to select an option. If all you did was read the top part, you’d think “Platinum” would be the best choice. But no. It seems they’re deliberately trying to trick people into giving away the most information by making it seem “superior.”

The burrito bowl I got for lunch today was a bit too spicy for me. Afterwards, my nose got very runny. It’s not the first time this happened, so I decided to look it up. Lo and behold, there is a term for this!

ETA: I didn’t choose the thumbnail, it generated automatically. Sorry if it seems irrelevant to the post.

I'm not sure how or why grape became the default. For the longest time, I thought I didn't like PB&J. But ever since trying it with strawberry instead, I understood the appeal. It's so much better, and now I find it weird that the combination isn't more common.

There’s a guy on our dog walking route that put up several Trump flags last year. My wife and I actually wound up having an interaction with him because he was spying on us through his cameras and got mad that we referred to the flags as embarrassing and said that Trumpism was a cult.

By mid-April, he’d pulled down all the flagpoles and didn’t even take the flags off them, just laid the poles with flags wrapped around them in the dirt by his driveway.

In May I actually talked with him. Initially I had no intention of trying to be nice to him - he just had done something sort of shitty a few days before (encouraging his dog to bark at our dogs). I was going to be like “Look, if you wanna call me gay slurs over your ring camera, that’s fine, but don’t encourage your dog to be hostile to mine.”
But somehow he tied his dog to military service, and while I was fully prepared to connect the lack of a veteran license plate to his statement to call him a liar and a Reddit ninja, he fielded the license plate question and said that he’d suffered a TBI that resulted in an appreciable percentage of brain dying, and that made him unable to be rational when he felt any sort of threat or insult. So he didn’t use the military plates, because he’d had negative experiences with motorists while using them.
I don’t know if I believe that - it seems dumb on the part of the other motorists. But I’m not willing to keep pressing for the sake of picking a fight. I’ll throw a barb, but not over-extend myself. It’s just not worth it.
So I listened, and we chatted - for like an hour and a half. My wife left after a few minutes with the dogs. We talked about politics, the world, our community, and how fucked everything is. He supported Trump because of the 2016 (Obama) economy. He believes in women’s rights. He is conservative, anti-immigrant, and believes in stronger policing. I told him I believe in increased social support, so folks like him can get out of the VA benefits trap. I told him I think the way to stronger communities is through stronger schools and increased civic engagement - more pride, less punishment. He even asked if we’d be willing to help train his dog better, because he notices that ours don’t bark at other dogs, and don’t pull on their leads. I told him I’d have to think about it, and ask my wife, since she’s the one who really had the patience to get our dogs where they are.

We parted - not as friends - but certainly not as enemies. Just - neighbors with a better understanding of each other.

Before I start, I would like to remind those coming from All that you are in an ADHD community. Our "normal" may not look like your "normal," and by being here you might be exposed to new perspectives. Please be respectful.

To "Pin" an Idea

I've brought this concept up in various comments here and there, but I figured the topic deserved its own post. Like many of you, my in-person conversations tend to branch out. My "train of thought" gets derailed frequently, and if I'm talking with neurodivergent friends, our thoughts tend to scatter like dandelion seeds in the wind.

Then one day, I had a friend who started saying, "I'm putting a pin in that," during our conversations. What they meant was that they had a tangential thought that they wanted to share, but they didn't want to throw me off what I was saying. Mentioning that there was a "pin" not only helped them remember that they wanted to share something, but informed me that there was more they wanted to say - in case they forgot the pin, I might still remember. In this way, the "pin" acted as a verbal post-it note when we were unable to actually write things down.

Since then, I've adopted the idea and found it helps cut down on a lot of frustration. I've shared it with other friends, and it's even evolved for us, going from a mere mentioning of "a pin," but to "pinning" specific words that would help conjure the specific thought we want to recall.

For example
Say one person is telling a story about taking their dog to the beach. The idea of the beach makes you think of crabs, which reminds you of a funny story revolving around hermit crabs you used to have. So you might put your hand up, wait for a pause, and say, "I want to put a 'pin' on the word 'hermit crabs.' I have a story to share afterwards," and let the previous conversation resume. Having "pinned" a word that points straight to the idea you want to share, you have a metaphorical "scaffolding" to hold your thought onto, making the transition between topics go more smoothly.

In my experience so far, this has not only helped my friends and me to finally finish more of our stories successfully, but we've also become more mindful of each other during conversations. It's easier to pay attention to a speaker when you're not desperately trying to hold onto a thought that, like a balloon on a windy day, constantly attempts to escape from your grasp. By making a "pin," now everyone in the conversation has a hand on the balloon string - allowing you to focus on the moment more without worrying about your thought flying away.

It may take practice to get into the habit, but it's been worth it for me. Anyway, I just wanted to share this technique. Hopefully someone finds it useful. 🙂

I’ve occasionally noticed ordinary comments with zero upvotes to them. Yet, our own comments are upvoted automatically whenever we make them. So for comments to have zero upvotes, either something I don’t know about is happening, or there are people who downvote their own contributions.

I can’t help but wonder, why? It seems like extra effort without a clear reason.

President Donald Trump revealed on Thursday at the National Prayer Breakfast an executive order instructing Attorney General Pam Bondi to seek out and prosecute "anti-Christian bias."

"To confront such weaponization and religious persecution, today I'm signing an executive order to make our Attorney General, who's a great person — she's going to be a great Attorney General — Pam Bondi the head of a task force, brand new, to eradicate anti-Christian bias," Trump said. "About time, right? Anti-Christian bias. Yeah, never heard of that one before, right?"

"So many times you hear, but you don't hear the anti-Christian bias," he continued. "The mission of this task force will be to immediately halt all forms of anti-Christian targeting and discrimination within the federal government, including at the DOJ, which was absolutely terrible."

Trump suggested the FBI and IRS were "terrible" for targeting Christians.

"In addition, the task force will work to fully prosecute anti-Christian violence and vandalism in our society and to move heaven and earth to defend the rights of Christians and religious believers nationwide," he added. "You've never had that before, but this is a very powerful document I'm signing."

"You get it now. First time you've had it. If we don't have religious liberty, then we don't have a free country. We probably don't even have a country."

Honestly, the entire Siren Song of the Counter Culture album deserves a listen (or re-listen, if you're a fan but it's been a while.)

Are we so alone,
So distant,
So forgotten,
As we think ourselves to be?

These are our lives
But did they ever even matter?
Are we worth remembering?

These machines feed on the tears
Of broken lives and dying dreams
We're throwing wrenches in the gears
Our lives will not be lived in vain

When this is all said and done
We spent this life on the run
Judged by the company we keep

Our language, buried inside
These lungs that keep us alive
We breathe so selfishly

Promises we plan to break
Are made in whispered voices
Cause our despair knows many names

We make mistakes
But we apologize with roses
We never stop to smell along the way

These machines feed on the tears
Of broken lives and dying dreams
We're throwing wrenches in the gears
Our lives will not be lived in vain

When this is all said and done
We spent this life on the run
Judged by the company we keep

Our language, buried inside
These lungs that keep us alive
We breathe so selfishly

We fell from the sky today
We melt into balls of clay
We sell ourselves everyday
Don't tell me how to live this way

Pushed so far to the edge
We teeter just on the brink
You can lead me to the bloodbath
But you can't make me drink

As these machines feed on the tears
Of broken lives and dying dreams
We're throwing wrenches in the gears
Our lives will not be lived in vain
My life will not be lived in vain

Lyrics source

I recently began using concentrates and I'm still exploring different types for the first time.

Recently I got some budder, but I've been having difficulty getting it into the ring. I have a metal tool (originally designed for tobacco, iirc) with three different tips, but it isn't cutting it for this. Although sugar clumps together well and is easy to drop into the ring, so far budder has not been cooperating. It sticks to the tool, it doesn't stick to the ring easily, and I usually end up having to use my fingers (then cleaning them with pumice scrub, because nothing else will get the stuff off.)

I figure there has to be a better solution. So what do you guys use to apply concentrates? Are there any particular tools you would recommend? Or are there tricks to this process that might not be obvious to a newbie? Any help would be greatly appreciated. :)

I love finding new special interests, but the accompanying sleep-deprivation is real.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/21148286

I was kicked off Medicaid at the start of this year and subsequently lost access to my ADHD and depression medication. In February, I moved to a new area and got a new job, but had to wait several months until I qualified for health insurance through it.

After that point, I had to wait for a weekday when I wasn't working and when I had the mental capacity to tolerate back-to-back disappointing phone calls... all without medication that would make the process significantly easier to tolerate. These are only the calls I've made today.

Finally, FINALLY, I have an intake appointment scheduled.

It's absolutely shameful how much a struggling person is expected to do in order to access basic mental health care.

I was kicked off Medicaid at the start of this year and subsequently lost access to my ADHD and depression medication. In February, I moved to a new area and got a new job, but had to wait several months until I qualified for health insurance through it.

After that point, I had to wait for a weekday when I wasn't working and when I had the mental capacity to tolerate back-to-back disappointing phone calls... all without medication that would make the process significantly easier to tolerate. These are only the calls I've made today.

Finally, FINALLY, I have an intake appointment scheduled.

It's absolutely shameful how much a struggling person is expected to do in order to access basic mental health care.