Imo, you can just jump straight into this one. She wrote it several novels into the Hainish Cycle, but it is first chronologically within the story timeline.

Really, there’s not too much crossover between books. I haven’t read all of them, just picked them up as they sound interesting in no particular order and it’s been fine.

Infrastructure costs would be notable. Vending machines, ATMs, and other money-receiving machines are calibrated for current cotten/linen bills.

Impetus. Changing to polymer bills would take political will and we can’t manage anything productive atm.

Personally, I don’t want Trump to drive the change because he would end up putting himself on the bills, and other distasteful characters from history.

FS1 must be unimpressed with Nebraska this year. Mid-play, they cut away to a Ohio State touchdown. The disrespect!

Nebraska. They should win against Ohio-not-State this week and I think they have a good chance at a bowl game this year.

2nd team is Iowa State; intra-state big’un Iowa State v Iowa is next week.

I’d prioritize universal healthcare, personally.

Yes. I used to say “no” but that was some fucked up internalized religious self-hate shit. I am good. Not perfect, but definitely good within my moral framework and the framework of any people I care about. I have one particular area I’m wrestling with to be “better” and I find it’s far more useful to focus on improving that than on self-flagellating over how “bad” I am.

The Left Hand of Darkness and other Le Guin stories. Good timing on when I started expending my scifi reading in her direction; I was in high school, meeting more people outside my little conservative family and church bubble, trying to form new conceptual models for the much bigger world that I was previously insulated from.

I went to a food fest last weekend and there was a booth for a Gambian restaurant serving peanut butter soup. It was so good. I found a recipe to try making it at home, it happens to be vegan. Imma go out on a limb and say it will be good.

https://rainbowplantlife.com/vegan-west-african-peanut-stew/

I’ve made a few recipes from this same author and have been pleased with every one.

Edit: it was delicious. I thought about adding some chicken since I’m not actually vegan, but ended up not adding it and that was a fine choice. The soup had plenty going on without adding chicken.

Nice win for you. Congrats on the new family.

My Fridays have been slowing down lately. And I work from home most Fridays. So late morning, early afternoon, I start cleaning up the house a bit and doing laundry so I don’t have to do it over the weekend. After work, shower, clean clothes, and go do whatever I’m planning to do that evening. Or sometimes it’s shower, clean pajamas, burrow into a pile of blankets and pillows for a movie night in.

People who hate on their spouses, bragging when they’re “in the dog house”. Divorces exist, Brent, you don’t have to stay married to a person you hate.

Oh, no. If Canada continues with their scratch and sniff money, what odors would emanate from a Trump bill? 🤮

also they were saying that normal rules don’t apply at a border

Yeah, and call it my middle class white American audacity but I’d be willing to go toe to toe with them on that BS for quite some time. I’d be focused on keeping control and being the most pristine accuser in a civil rights lawsuit that there ever was.

I’m read up enough on US Borders and customs policy to know them confiscating and hooking up my phone to a laptop to try to crack my password is a different thing than manipulating me into volunteering my pin. That’s what they’re trying to do, pressure people into “voluntarily” giving their pin, which gets the cops off the hook for following their protocol for conducting searches within their more restrictive rules for cracking into a device. Same as letting them in the front door of my house, if a person “voluntarily” lets cops into their house when the cops apply pressure, the homeowner has allowed them out of all the rules and oversight that come with getting a warrant.

I turn off biometrics and power down. They can ask for the unlock pin, I can decline until they produce a warrant and I can request an lawyer. My risk profile is sufficiently accommodated.

I can see someone with a different risk profile, say, an online presence showing vocal criticism against Trump and goons, and/or not white and/or not a native born US citizen and/or has a travel history to muslim-majority countries might want to take further measures.

I’ve just skimmed headlines and seen a short or two on the guy who gave LEOs the distress pin. I’m not sure why he didn’t decline to give them his pin until they produced a warrant, but I think giving a destruction pin was not the brightest idea. But also, fuck the cops and double fuck border cops playing these racist, fascist games with people’s lives.

Bingo. Sort of. It includes a lot, to go with the massive breadth that the question entails.

Yah, makes sense. There’s still empathy there for fellow humans. I’m just going to focus on getting the asshole making and selling the turd soup out of the picture, rather than expending energy arguing with the guy who keeps slurping it up. Efficiency of effort.

I don’t know whether to assume this question is in good faith or not. Can you restate what you think the OP is asking? It’s not about whether there was ever a time when no work was needed.

I’m not interested in wasting my time against a sealion debating capitalism.

Capitalism

Yes. I typically live far away from family, and may or not not have a significant other or friends to celebrate with any given year. I often get invited by someone, but I don’t always take them up on the offer. I’m no longer religious and tend to avoid overtly religious Christmas celebrations. Sometimes friends are inviting me to join their family who I don’t know. While I’m grateful for the invite, I would rather relax and not navigate strange family dynamics.

Not Christmas day itself, but days before and after my company is mostly closed with just a few people working. I often volunteer to work those hours. My coworkers who care about Christmas more are grateful so I get first dibs on other popular vacation holidays.

It’s a blonde wig. He’s a washed up NBA player trying to make money pandering to the Fox News crowd by pretending he’s transitioning to play in the WNBA.

He has physically and verbally abused his wife and kids. He washed out of NBA and European leagues for being inconsistent, unreliable, and dramatic. He’s said he’ll run for president in 2028. Exactly what you would expect from a Republican “protector” of women.