What Are You Thinking About?

[Blazing Puck]

There's just something inappropriate about a complete stranger asking me about if I'm going to vote or not. It's none of your goddamn business as far as I'm concerned take that bullshit to someplace else 

Edited September 8 by Dusty Shackleford

[The_annoying_one]

You don’t need to tell me that we never talk. You’re just as capable of picking up the phone as I am. 

[Jman]

Golf is hard.  My brother wants to get me into it causally, but damn if it ain’t hard.

It’s fun though.  Not as fun as jiu jitsu for me, but fun.  Probably easier to go golfing with friends than getting them on the mat though.

Then again, (I don’t normally say this because it feels like bragging but I’ve been around you all so long you probably get I’m not) I’m a black belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and I started golfing yesterday.  There’s going to be a difference in skill set relative to the activities.

Edited September 8 by Jman

[viperxmns]

Man this transition to fall I kinda prefer needing 0 blankets to sleep vs needing 3 blankets to sleep as long as there's no mosquitoes around

[Blackrose321]

Ugh, I hate having to get tough with my friend when she doesn't finish her work on time and won't answer messages. It gives me so much anxiety but I'm supposed to keep things on track and she's making is so damn hard.

[André Toulon]

5 minutes ago, Blackrose321 said:

Ugh, I hate having to get tough with my friend when she doesn't finish her work on time and won't answer messages. It gives me so much anxiety but I'm supposed to keep things on track and she's making is so damn hard.

I made the mistake of getting a friend on at a job I had years ago. I eventually became shift super and I was supposed to keep people in line. It was a cake ass job...we all got fucked up during work...there were almost no actual rules, but this asshole just made it a point to be the most useless cog in the machine.... basically bringing heat to us because people kept complaining about how he was rude, did nothing and I was doing nothing about it.

I didn't want to piss off the people I got trashed with nightly to coddle a dude who obviously didn't want to do the one thing that would allow us to keep operating unsupervised, so when the boss let him go, he got mad that I didn't speak up for him. Fuck that dude.

[Blackrose321]

5 minutes ago, André Toulon said:

I made the mistake of getting a friend on at a job I had years ago. I eventually became shift super and I was supposed to keep people in line. It was a cake ass job...we all got fucked up during work...there were almost no actual rules, but this asshole just made it a point to be the most useless cog in the machine.... basically bringing heat to us because people kept complaining about how he was rude, did nothing and I was doing nothing about it.

I didn't want to piss off the people I got trashed with nightly to coddle a dude who obviously didn't want to do the one thing that would allow us to keep operating unsupervised, so when the boss let him go, he got mad that I didn't speak up for him. Fuck that dude.

That is such a shitty way to treat a friend who helped get you a job, I'm sorry you had to deal with that. Are you guys still friends?

In my case, my friend actually referred me for the job after insisting she would be okay with having to answer to me. I'm not her boss but I'm in charge of keeping her on track and she's not making it easy. I think she has trouble setting boundaries, so other clients take up a ton of her time. She's a nice person so she doesn't mean any harm but, without meaning to, she's kind of taken advantage of our boss's patience, because her other employers are more demanding. She missed two of our meetings last week because she let a previous meeting run over by one hour - why is it more acceptable to blow off our meeting than it is to contain that one? I don't think she's realized what kind of message she may be sending without meaning to.

I also think she gets overwhelmed and procrastinates as a result. We had two weeks to build, one week to test. I think it's likely that she didn't use that first week and tried to shove everything into the second week and the testing week. I think she sees "three weeks" and doesn't follow the precise plan for those three weeks, figuring she can get it done even if she starts late...even though she usually doesn't.

The procrastinating, extra long meetings, and missing deadlines all combine to make her more stressed and therefore more likely to continue procrastinating, taking long meetings, and missing deadlines...I'm trying to get her to stop, even just for her own mental health and happiness, but it's hard. So this time I've insisted on having a meeting to discuss why we were late - I want her to reflect on it. Did she use all three weeks correctly? Did she run into an issue and, if so, why didn't she communicate that? Was the timeline too short to begin with, should we build in more time in future projects or will she waste any additional time we try to add anyways? We really gotta nail this down, we've got big things to get done and this has been a major roadblock in getting them done.

[André Toulon]

2 minutes ago, Blackrose321 said:

That is such a shitty way to treat a friend who helped get you a job, I'm sorry you had to deal with that. Are you guys still friends?

 

FB friends, yeah but I hope I never actually see him again.

[Insipid]

I love "In the Air Tonight," but hearing it played in any show or movie is so fucking corny, mostly because it's overplayed.

[The_annoying_one]

I just found a giant tree limb down in the middle of my front yard. There are no trees in my front yard and we haven’t gotten any bad weather today. 

[Blackrose321]

I was today years old when I finally got my first orthopedic boot. This really helps my social awkwardness and feelings of insecurity. 

[viperxmns]

The longer you peer through a microwave window the less you see

[UwPp]

7 hours ago, viperxmns said:

The longer you peer through a microwave window the less you see

I read it wrong and was wondering why you pee on your microwave. 

[Doom Metal Alchemist]

It bugs me that Babe Ruth's nickname was "The Sultan of Swat" rather than "The Sultan of Swing."

[Blazing Puck]

I open my bedroom curtains this morning and I see a huge spider hanging out on my window. In the past the appropiate reaction would be just move or maybe burn the place down. But this my apartment and you're not welcomed here and I will defend my home at all cost

R.I.P. Spider

Edited September 10 by Dusty Shackleford

[naraku360]

5 hours ago, UwPp said:

I read it wrong and was wondering why you pee on your microwave. 

It's just what you do when you're a peer.

[André Toulon]

3 hours ago, Dusty Shackleford said:

I open my bedroom curtains this morning and I see a huge spider hanging out on my window. In the past the appropiate reaction would be just move or maybe burn the place down. But this my apartment and you're not welcomed here and I will defend my home at all cost

R.I.P. Spider

Just now realizing Ricky was the product placement guy

[The_annoying_one]

My dogs have been embroiled in a massive barking contest since 9 A.M.

Make it stop…..

[Blazing Puck]

8 hours ago, André Toulon said:

Just now realizing Ricky was the product placement guy

Speaking of Ricky I forgot to mention something when I talked about his death scene. The guy that shot him was aiming straight at him from the backseat, so instead of running to the side he ran straight ahead in the line of fire. Tell me you want to get shot without telling me you want to get shot. 

 

Edited September 11 by Dusty Shackleford

[Blazing Puck]

So much twerking going on 

[mthor]

DeeDee's fourth day of high school - eight fights, one gun falling out of somebody's pocket. She's all excited - one of her friends got video.

[The_annoying_one]

Without going into any detail, I think the past few days have given a very long overdue boost to my self confidence.

It feels….fucking great, honestly.

[Insipid]

33 minutes ago, The_annoying_one said:

Without going into any detail, I think the past few days have given a very long overdue boost to my self confidence.

It feels….fucking great, honestly.

Sounds like someone got lucky 🚬

[The_annoying_one]

1 minute ago, Insipid said:

Sounds like someone got lucky 🚬

I wouldn’t quite go that far, unfortunately. 👀

[Blackrose321]

So, schools are apparently moving away from giving kids homework and parents are thrilled because it's just one more thing they can be neglectful about.

And yet... https://www.npr.org/2023/06/21/1183445544/u-s-reading-and-math-scores-drop-to-lowest-level-in-decades

Where do you send your kid that the academic culture surrounding them won't rot their brains? Homework is too hard? Wtf? I'm just so...confused by and disillusioned with everything right now. My husband and I were thinking of trying to start a family but this shit is concerning...

[Insipid]

I really wish there was more of an effort to learn foreign languages in the Anglosphere. There are way too many native speakers who think English is the default way of speaking, when English has been influenced by so many languages itself.

[Doom Metal Alchemist]

12 hours ago, Blackrose321 said:

So, schools are apparently moving away from giving kids homework and parents are thrilled because it's just one more thing they can be neglectful about.

 

Do you have a link for this? It wasn't in the link you posted.

[Blackrose321]

3 hours ago, Doom Metal Alchemist said:

Do you have a link for this? It wasn't in the link you posted.

The link I posted was about test scores, not homework or parental reactions to it. There was a viral Tiktok video about opting out of homework and apparently the reaction from some number of parents was generally positive. I don't have Tiktok so I can't read the comments in full but here's an article about it: https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/mother-teacher-email-homework-tiktok-b2610648.html

If the 15-20 page packet was for an entire month, that's a max of one page a day, excluding weekends. And if we're being realistic, given the age of the child, there probably weren't that many questions per page. The kid fell behind and his mom apparently only tried to help him catch up at the end, ultimately deciding to opt him out of it entirely. Big wtf for me. She let him fall behind, thereby causing unnecessary stress.

Also, if you search for info about homework loads, you'll find countless articles and opinion pieces on it from both sides. Additionally, you'll find teachers saying that their students can't read at level and giving them poor marks doesn't hold them back, they still pass without addressing the problem. You'll have to look for those videos and articles, they're interesting. Over 70% of Americans can't read beyond a middle school level as it is. I don't know how too much homework is to blame but I know it's still up for debate. I know COVID had an impact but poor reading comprehension has been a problem for a while now.

I'm not opposed to only assigning meaningful homework or even less homework but I worry about the end result in a society where parents are already leaving too much to schools to handle, and education is being defunded. I don't believe for one second that the average parent is picking up that slack at home, especially not given our current test scores.

I just see this as a total devaluation of education, and a dumbing down of the population. Teachers tried to point out that kids always hate and worry about school at first but you can't opt them out in week 4.

[Blackrose321]

Quote

They added, “As for homework, I agree with you. I never sent home homework unless parents specifically asked me, and I always let them know it was optional. I did, however, tell parents to read a book to their child every day, so that was their only ‘homework.’”

How many parents do we think read to their kids every day in place of homework? That line just completely threw me. Again, our reading comprehension as a country is too low so I don't know how that works out in the end.

https://www.uscareerinstitute.edu/blog/which-countries-have-the-highest-and-lowest-literacy-rates

https://www.thenationalliteracyinstitute.com/post/literacy-statistics-2024-2025-where-we-are-now

Quote

“My kids get SO much homework,” one wrote. “They’re GRADED on it too, starting in first grade public school! The pressure on these kids is insane.”

Like...yeah, I got graded in first grade, too. Why is that suddenly inhumane? I'm sure we can tweak things but throwing the baby out with the bathwater is a bit much given our current performance.

[Blackrose321]

Final thought lol - if ~94% of married fathers and ~72% of married mothers have jobs, who is checking in on the kids who aren't getting homework? What about the kids who get poor marks in school that aren't properly addressed AT school? My dad got home at 4:30 and fucked off the rest of the day. My mom got home at 9:40 after working 12 hours and picking up fast food for dinner before bed. Ain't nobody reading to us latchkey kids. 😅

 

(Sorry for making three posts in a row, I didn't want to overdo it in one. I'm trying to find info and formulate a response on my phone which I also hate doing...)

[Doom Metal Alchemist]

The 15-25 page packet for the month IS insane. It's human nature to procrastinate, studies have been done on this. You don't have to reduce the amount of homework, just give a week's at a time instead of a fucking month's. Hell I think bar book reports any assignment I had even at that age was due the next day or in two days. Just hand the homework out bits at a time, don't hand them a huge fucking month's worth all at once.

And even if the kid realistically has enough time to finish it on time they still don't have the where with all to look at that giant fucking packet and think of it like they just have to consistently do a little bit at a time for a long period. Just the sight will stress them out.

[Blackrose321]

20 minutes ago, Doom Metal Alchemist said:

The 15-25 page packet for the month IS insane. It's human nature to procrastinate, studies have been done on this. You don't have to reduce the amount of homework, just give a week's at a time instead of a fucking month's. Hell I think bar book reports any assignment I had even at that age was due the next day or in two days. Just hand the homework out bits at a time, don't hand them a huge fucking month's worth all at once.

And even if the kid realistically has enough time to finish it on time they still don't have the where with all to look at that giant fucking packet and think of it like they just have to consistently do a little bit at a time for a long period. Just the sight will stress them out.

Or maybe his mother could have unstapled the packet and brought out one page at a time. But not everyone is a problem solver I guess.

Also, you kind of skipped the entire part about teachers no longer assigning homework after you specifically asked me to research it for you and provide a link. You kind of demonstrated why not assigning homework is a problem - most parents *don't* pick up the slack. They can't even commit to one page of kindergarten homework a day. No thanks.

Plus, you ignored that the solution the parent opted for was one page of homework a month... there's definitely a societal problem at play which was the entire point of my original post. I specifically said not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Edited September 12 by Blackrose321

[André Toulon]

1 hour ago, Doom Metal Alchemist said:

The 15-25 page packet for the month IS insane. It's human nature to procrastinate, studies have been done on this. You don't have to reduce the amount of homework, just give a week's at a time instead of a fucking month's. Hell I think bar book reports any assignment I had even at that age was due the next day or in two days. Just hand the homework out bits at a time, don't hand them a huge fucking month's worth all at once.

And even if the kid realistically has enough time to finish it on time they still don't have the where with all to look at that giant fucking packet and think of it like they just have to consistently do a little bit at a time for a long period. Just the sight will stress them out.

I want to see this study, because that seems really arbitrary considering the massive rift between how each individual learns. I would have loved to get an entire packet at once, knock it out in a weekend and never have to look at it again. Even as a child, my OCD made me do "hard" shit first so I can enjoy myself later. 

When my 6th grade science teacher left to have a baby, she left packets with the school work for the year and the sub just gave them all to us at once. I knocked that shit out and fucked around the rest of the year. 

But on the core topic, it's just teachers becoming lazier, which I would too if I were being paid nothing to babysit your crotch fruit all day,  and parents assume education is someone else's job and they don't want to be bothered. 

It's why the kids are dumb now...they know they can Google anything and they know if they look hard enough, they can find completely false information that supports their wrongness if they try hard enough. It's why I pulled them out of home schooling. I couldn't be home to teach and the curriculum was almost 100 percent Google scavenger hunting.

Edited September 12 by André Toulon

[Blackrose321]

4 minutes ago, André Toulon said:

But on the core topic, it's just teachers becoming lazier, which I would too if I were being paid nothing to babysit your crotch fruit all day,  and parents assume education is someone else's job and they don't want to be bothered. 

Absolutely, parents are causing problems and that's why I don't trust them to pick up the slack at home. I saw one video posted by a teacher who said that no matter how many 0's they write in their gradebook every kid is going to pass to the next grade. And this is far from being the only time I've heard of this happening. Here's a more recent case: https://www.wsbtv.com/news/local/henry-county/henry-teacher-fired-not-giving-students-unearned-grades-plans-run-school-board/PF55WJPGIRD6FB6HOQCMGCXDVQ/

Mind you, my original point was really just about not assigning homework, not whether the packet was a good idea. That said, you won't be able to convince me that critical thinking skills wouldn't have helped here. You break the packet apart, set an age-appropriate time limit to work on homework, then you follow it up with something fun. This would have worked for the majority of kids. It would have established a habit, bonded parent to child, and showed them how to begin managing big feelings. I know that takes more time and energy but why have kids if you don't want to raise them? They're completely optional...

[Insipid]

Chappell Roan has really exploded in popularity. I'm so happy I got to be a hipster about her.

[Doom Metal Alchemist]

3 hours ago, Blackrose321 said:

Or maybe his mother could have unstapled the packet and brought out one page at a time. But not everyone is a problem solver I guess.

Also, you kind of skipped the entire part about teachers no longer assigning homework after you specifically asked me to research it for you and provide a link. You kind of demonstrated why not assigning homework is a problem - most parents *don't* pick up the slack. They can't even commit to one page of kindergarten homework a day. No thanks.

Plus, you ignored that the solution the parent opted for was one page of homework a month... there's definitely a societal problem at play which was the entire point of my original post. I specifically said not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Didn't try to imply the mother was all in the right, just why the fuck are they assigning a month's worth of homework at a time now? What's the purpose other than to give kids like buddy an opportunity to goof off the whole month after a homework binge? Just seems stupid and what was the problem with assigning bits at a time like how it's basically always been done? What possible advantage could there be?

[naraku360]

3 minutes ago, Doom Metal Alchemist said:

Didn't try to imply the mother was all in the right, just why the fuck are they assigning a month's worth of homework at a time now? What's the purpose other than to give kids like buddy an opportunity to goof off the whole month after a homework binge? Just seems stupid and what was the problem with assigning bits at a time like how it's basically always been done? What possible advantage could there be?

You know what's stupid?

Homework.

[Doom Metal Alchemist]

1 minute ago, naraku360 said:

You know what's stupid?

Homework.

"What's the deal with homework? You're not working on your home."

[The_annoying_one]

Just realized today’s Friday the 13th.

Honestly, I just realized today’s Friday.

I have no idea where I’m going with this thought.

[ghostrek]

Why am I watching the anime Grenadier the Beautiful Warrior? That's what I'm asking a lot in my head how in the heck did she hide bullets in her cleavage?  And why no one has metal detectors  

[Blackrose321]

We're spending the weekend at an amusement park. It's the perfect weekend for it but I don't think I've walked this much since I went to Disney when I was 11... Does everyone just walk around with sore feet or is there a trick?

[ghostrek]

4 minutes ago, Blackrose321 said:

We're spending the weekend at an amusement park. It's the perfect weekend for it but I don't think I've walked this much since I went to Disney when I was 11... Does everyone just walk around with sore feet or is there a trick?

what park is it? @Blackrose321 yes there is a way to walk a lot 

Edited September 13 by ghostrek

[Insipid]

My mother says I speak Japanese with a Chinese accent. Oh, I am ruined. 😂😭😭

Edited September 14 by Insipid

[Blackrose321]

20 hours ago, ghostrek said:

what park is it? @Blackrose321 yes there is a way to walk a lot 

We're at Cedar Point. We drove here Thursday and then went straight into the park from 6-10:30. On Friday we went in 11-6 and again from 8 to 11:30. Today we were there from 10 to 3:00, just got back. We're planning on going back again by 8, when the fright night stuff starts back up.

The main issue is from the knee down, I just get incredibly achey. I know we've been on our feet a lot the past few days but I'd like to work on it for next year. I was doing cardio boxing (took a break, starting again in 2 weeks) but that obviously doesn't put nearly the same amount of pressure on your legs. I know there are programs like couch to 5k but I need to build even more resilience than that for a park this size. It's just been so long since I did anything that had me walking so much for multiple days in a row.

It probably didn't help that I hurt my ankle in July and have been wrestling with an ankle wrap/brace the entire trip.

Edited September 14 by Blackrose321

[ghostrek]

2 hours ago, Blackrose321 said:

We're at Cedar Point. We drove here Thursday and then went straight into the park from 6-10:30. On Friday we went in 11-6 and again from 8 to 11:30. Today we were there from 10 to 3:00, just got back. We're planning on going back again by 8, when the fright night stuff starts back up.

The main issue is from the knee down, I just get incredibly achey. I know we've been on our feet a lot the past few days but I'd like to work on it for next year. I was doing cardio boxing (took a break, starting again in 2 weeks) but that obviously doesn't put nearly the same amount of pressure on your legs. I know there are programs like couch to 5k but I need to build even more resilience than that for a park this size. It's just been so long since I did anything that had me walking so much for multiple days in a row.

It probably didn't help that I hurt my ankle in July and have been wrestling with an ankle wrap/brace the entire trip.

My neck of the woods kind of I never been to Cedar Point but I used to walk about 7 miles a day give and take at the job I used to do I'm comfortable Footwear is always key @Blackrose321

[Blackrose321]

3 hours ago, ghostrek said:

My neck of the woods kind of I never been to Cedar Point but I used to walk about 7 miles a day give and take at the job I used to do I'm comfortable Footwear is always key @Blackrose321

Do you have any suggestions? I've actually been wanting to get a new pair but I couldn't decide on a brand.

[Insipid]

I made a comment on reddit with thousands of upvotes. I had to pull a vain fuggs here.

But really, I get worried, cause of course there will be a few weirdos going through my entire comment history when this happens.

[ghostrek]

1 hour ago, Blackrose321 said:

Do you have any suggestions? I've actually been wanting to get a new pair but I couldn't decide on a brand.

it hard to say I personally have tough feet so I mean my feet have been   blistered over a few times may I suggest a decent  insole  and comfortable and popular fitting but where  and obviously no high heels or wedges if female

Cowboy and work boots obviously not useful either

[viperxmns]

I keep drink this but my brain not get any gooder and milk too dumb to not keep getting drank what a sacam

[The_annoying_one]

My phone battery’s health is “significantly degraded”.

This ain’t good.