Well yeah but you have those long wait times to deal with right?

Here in America, I only had to wait 4 weeks for a video conference (in-person would have been 6 weeks) with my primary care physician so she could recommend me to a specialist that doesn’t have any openings until mid-August. Thank goodness I live in the land of the free where I only have to wait 3 months to see a doctor who has about a 20% chance to cancel on me last minute due to a “scheduling issues” and leave me hanging for another 4-8 weeks.

AND I get to pay for some of it out of pocket despite paying monthly for better than average medical insurance!

USA #1

What did you pay for that DP from a gas powered blower? Just curious…

Diagnosing people you’ve never met is generally a bad idea.

They review hundred of hours of hidden toilet cam footage. How else would you investigate?

I think a better way to phrase that might be: I’m not going to trust a cocaine addict who tells me that cocaine is a safe and healthy alternative to my morning cup of coffee. I would like to see those findings peer reviewed and replicated by people that don’t have a vested interest in making access to cocaine easier.

Sorry, let me rephrase for you: I’ll just go ahead and uproot my entire life to move to a country that sells Chinese cars.

Some real examples that are specific to the trip I take:

There is no rail service that goes there. It would be a combo of trains and busses that takes significantly longer and costs more than the gas.

Our dog comes with us, generally isn’t allowed on mass transit, and the much longer trip would stress her out if she was.

There is little to no mass transit in the town they live in to get around once we arrive so we’d end up borrowing or renting a car anyway.

With limited amounts of time off, making the trip overnight adds a full day of getting to see our family to the trip.

The only other realistic means of getting there is flying but, I enjoy driving and hate everything about air travel. It’s a pretty cheap flight for one person but becomes more expensive once you add in the rest of the family and the dog can’t come.

Edit: formatting

Sure. But first you need to build one that takes me there.

who wants that?

I do. We have family that we visit a few times each year. If I leave at 2am and drive straight through, we get there in 7-8 hours. If I make the drive during the day, it takes 10-13 hours.

Cool. I’ll just go ahead and abandon my whole life to move to China.

You’re not wrong.

I also saw some evidence further down this thread that oil companies provide funding to this group that I had previously been unaware of. I deleted my comment shortly after that but it might still be showing up because federation can be screwy.

Non-violently blocking the entrance to an oil refinery = good protest

Defacing ancient monument temporarily = bad protest

The best part is I haven’t seen the name of the organization mentioned once in the comments so far.

The simpler explanation is that the majority of humans are stupid and like attention.

Which is why people are still talking about their last stunt right?

There’s no need for the media to spin anything, the protestors committed vandalism and, unless they are protesting the existence of prehistoric monuments, they did a really shitty job of even calling attention to their cause.

I don’t say the wage slave part outright like that. I say the part about retiring with a smile like I’m joking but then use the opportunity to point out that I think about and plan for the future and that I’m financially responsible. Then I ask about the company’s benefits package.

Covid made thing weird for a while but my career has had a generally upward trend. My current job is a pretty serious step up for me in both salary and benefits and has a pretty clear path for future progression. I lost out on some of the creativity that I enjoyed in prior positions but I gained more free time to engage with my hobbies.

I’d say it’s been working for me but your mileage may vary based on your delivery and what kind of job you’re interviewing for.

Thomas Jefferson would never roll over in his grave. He would have his slaves roll him.

Why do I care about what a video game youtuber thinks?

I agree that paying an adult for consensual sex shouldn’t be illegal but, it is. So, the “party of law and order” should be held to their own shitty standards.