I Love This So Much

Broke: You’re too young to know what your sexuality is when you’re a teenager.

Woke: You are old enough to know what your sexuality is when you’re a teenager.

Bespoke: Everyone develops at different rates and while some people know what their sexuality is from a young age, other people need to take more time to figure it all out. Both of these are 100% valid and okay.

Today (September 12) is Neil Peart Day.  He would have turned 69.  Even though he is no longer with us, the legacy he left will never be forgotten.  The man, the myth, the legend.  Rest in peace, Neil.

a story in 3 parts

“You don’t need a perfect relationship. All you need is someone who loves your weirdness, wants to spend time with you and respects you.”

—

I like this idea

The other night husband and I were watching a documentary about the yeti where they were doing DNA analysis of samples of supposed yeti fur, and every one of them came back as bears.

Anyway, the next night we watched a thing about some pig man who is supposed to live in Vermont. People said it had claws and a pig nose but walked upright like a man. Now, I happen to know that sideshows used to shave bears and present them as pig men. So every piece of evidence they gave of this monster sounds to me like a bear with mange.

So now the running joke in our house is that everything is bears. Aliens? Bears. Loch Ness monster? Bear. Every cryptozoological mystery is just a very crafty bear.

Bears. They’re everywhere. Be wary. Anyone or anything could be a bear.

no money accepted

cashier: that’ll be 18 bucks please! me: alright! do you accept credit? cashier: no me: ok… i have cash cashier: we dont accept cash either me: ……… cashier: get out me:

Still a lot of bugs to fix.

Who knew that when you give employees the bare minimum in return for their time and effort, they do the same in return? Some mind-boggling stuff, this...

I’ve seen workplace autonomy get reduced at several jobs I’ve worked at and it always follows the same pattern, where the initial change is “that sucks and I think it’s dumb but at least I can see some rationale behind it” and subsequent changes become arbitrary reminders that your employer controls you.

When I worked at a distribution center, we used to be able to wear headphones. Then one day, someone working at a different distribution center got their headphone cords tangled up in the conveyors and was seriously injured, and we weren’t allowed to wear headphones anymore.

I hated the change, of course, and thought it was stupid, and wondered if the incident they mentioned even happened, but I could at least see the logic to it: “wearing cords around miles of conveyor systems is dangerous.”

So people started bringing portable radios and stuff to work. No cords, no blocked ears, no problem. Until those got banned too. Why? Because they could, and they showed that they could when they banned headphones.

Then I worked at a testing center. After a while, cell phones were banned. And again, there was some logic to the decision: for starters, we were surrounded by confidential information, and also needed to maintain a quiet and discreet atmosphere. It was obviously an unnecessary overreach and showed that they saw their employees as children, but they at least had some security concerns they could justify it with.

So people brought in books and magazines to read during downtime. And then books and magazines were banned too. Why? Because they could, and they showed that they could when they banned cell phones.

It’s tied up with the culture of… I don’t know if there’s a term for it, but it’s something we’ve all seen. If there’s no tasks left to do at work, then stare at a wall. If you’re on the clock, then don’t sit down even if there’s no reason not to sit down. Smile. That whole thing.