Miles O'Brien

I tried being a moderator on a forum once, and after alerting admins and the FBI about csam less than a week in, I decided I was done being a moderator.

It was a forum for RC stuff, mostly diy rc planes.

Unfortunately, therapy only helps you cope, it doesn’t let you forget.

I’ve had more conversations than I can count with people I would never be able to talk to in person, all using our own native languages.

The original posts are in English, people comment in their native language, and I use a translator, then respond in my own language. Is the translator perfect? No! Neither is theirs.

With the way most translators I’ve used work, it’s easier for the non-native speaker to try translating, since the translator might try and use different words that entirely change the meaning, but likely list possible alternatives. A native e speaker will understand the alternatives while a non-native speaker probably won’t.

That’s my thought process anyway.

Never had anyone who wasn’t pearl-clutching or virtue-signaling complain about it. And I’ve had tons of conversations with people I’d never have talked to otherwise.

The indomitable human spirit.

Also known as “the ability to exist out of pure spite, because FUCK YOU I ain’t collapsing over THIS bullshit.”

Nothing says “we are a free and open community that welcomes others” like moderators banning discussion of poor moderation.

Yes, I do understand what the rule is there for. No that doesn’t make it any less hilariously shitty.

I say “trap” but I don’t kill anything, and they don’t die.

It’s just a sacrificial post I keep near the wood I want them to leave alone.

They’re alive and well in their 2x4s

It’s not owned by me, but it’s tended by me for now. I also am tending to my parents yard this summer, and trying to transplant clover around their yard. Sofar the patches are still green but it’s not quite growing time yet to see how well it’ll take hold.

No I am Unidan Gallowboob!

I usually have to make carpenter bee traps/lures so they leave the exposed wood around my property alone. They’re going to collapse the porch at this rate.

The traps are basically just sections of 2x4 with little starter holes drilled here and there. Idk why but the chonkers seem to like those more.

So far, no traps this year.

I haven’t even seen any hornets or daubers

There’s a guy I know of who keeps bees, and while there are some people nearby who get pissy at him every time they see a bee, most people love how well all the flowers and gardens grow nearby and understand why they do.

This past year I went to someone’s house nearby and their tree was blooming, but didn’t look nearly as good as usual. And then I noticed I couldn’t hear any bees.

When that tree has flowers, it’s filled with so many bees you can hear it buzzing from the road about 300m away.

Now silence.

I haven’t seen a bee around where I live in over a year. And I’m outside a lot in the spring and summer. Usually I get a few buzzing over me when I’m out in my hammock, but I have yet to hear one this year. I’m hoping they’re just “sleeping in” a bit but I fear I already know the truth…

People.

It’s people.

My parents outsource their Lawncare to me, and I have been taking the huge patch of clover near a corn field and transplanting it around their yard. Just cutting a shovel ful of dirt out and swapping them, and watering the area.

No idea if it’ll work the way I want it to, but I guess I’ll see if it spreads this summer.

I’d love to go to my in-laws and use a big seed spreader to throw clover and other native plants around, but that would just lead to them killing it all and hiring a lawn company to replant Kentucky bluegrass or something lame like that.

I keep telling people to let clover grow, and half the stuff that’s supposedly bad for their lawn is actually good for a healthy patch of dirt but someone invented a problem so they could sell the solution.

I’ve actually had landscaping people knock on my door and explain that half my lawn is weeds and they can take care of it for me on a 6 month contract or whatever bs…

Like Bruh my lawn is carefully cultivated to grow all natural native plants, specifically with the intent of boosting local insect and pollinator activity, there’s a reason this half-are is the only place you see butterflies.

I’m not about to let some punk in headphones and a “Lastname Lawncare” t-shirt flatten all of this to 1/2in of plain green uniform grass. That’s boring as shit. And bad for the environment. And boring. as. shit.

Didn’t we have security leaks during his first term too?

Dude straight up stole classified documents, “LOST” (sold) a bunch while foreign nationals were occupying nearby rooms, then lied about it, then tried to hide it, then lied about trying to hide it. Then tried to hand wave it all by saying he prayed declared thought about them being declassified and therefore perfectly legal to do the things he didn’t do.

To name a single instance.

A large portion of the world believes in various deities who “love us” so much they will condemn us to literal eternal torture if we don’t believe hard enough and do what their books say.

This isn’t that far-fetched.

Slightly harder to get in and out undetected, but the targets sure are a lot bigger.

I want to believe

I genuinely think this may have crossed his mind.

Hi, gender is a spectrum and while I fully identify as male and straight*, I had long hair as a child. If my school had tried to cut my hair by force, I would have absolutely thrown hands, and I was not a small child. Apparently I pushed a teacher into a wall as a first grader but I have no memory of doing so.

Hair is not “gender conforming” unless you’re the most vanilla, thinks-flour-is-spicy, “mayonnaise has too much flavor” basic bitch in the universe. If you really think hair has two genders “long and short” then you are just the saddest sack of shit.

Hair is whatever the fuck you want it to be. I decided I didn’t want long hair anymore, so I started getting it cut short. I even had it around 1/4in at one point just because of how easy it was to be done with. Now it’s long because before I got married, my now-wife said she liked when it was longer, so I’m growing it out again until we decide it’s long enough or I get tired of it again. If I wanted to shave most of it right now, I can do that. Nobody controls my hair but me, and nobody has any say in how I keep it, short of safety concerns. (protip: hair ties and a hair net when working with rotary tools, once you’ve seen a video you never want it to happen to you)

Get the fuck out of here with this weak ass bullshit policing children’s hair.

They won’t be happy until everyone is a straight white silent and obedient clone of each other.

*It’s a spectrum, sometimes I want to feel pretty so if you had to stick me in a hole I’d say I’m straight but I’m sure someone could make a convincing argument that I’m at least a little fluid.

Okay so I have a basic understanding of orbital mechanics, I would say astronomy and astrophysics is a hobby of mine, and my content subscription list is filled with space nerds talking about nerdy space stuff.

I do not understand how the rotation of the milky way could be making it seem as though other galaxies are rotating a specific direction.

I understand if you spin in place and are looking at something above you that’s spinning in a certain way, it might appear to spin the opposite way it is relative to the floor, because you’re spinning faster. However, my problem understanding stems from the fact that the milky way is huge and we are rotating around a very large axis, not at a rate that my common sense tells me would be noticeable.

Maybe I’m just not giving NASA and ESA enough credit for their measurement capabilities, but I don’t get it.

And maybe I’m so far off base someone is face-palming into their screen in disappointment that I could choose be so wrong.

If anyone could explain, or post a link to a space nerd talking about nerdy space stuff thats relevant to the answer, please edumacate me!

I like star trek memes.

I have a ton of saved memes.

All my memes have been posted in all relevant communities multiple times.

I’ll never call out reposts because there are always people who haven’t seen something, but it feels weird posting stuff I know has been posted already. Especially when some are at the top rankings in the community.

But I’ll keep up voting and commenting on funny memes because it’s better than staring into the void not doing those things…

Farm just down the road sells dozens for a dollar.

But I don’t really care for eggs, so I’m not seething so much as chuckling at the egg prices in the store.

This morning I passed a dozen for $6.