LIFESTYLE Newsletter Vol. 8 No. 3
Nick’s LIFESTYLE Newsletter Vol. 8 No. 3
THIS IS AN INTRODUCTION
Hello again everyone. It's been a few weeks. Weeks that feel like months. Weeks of seeing our net worth drop yearly salaries. Weeks of dreaming about being almost anywhere else in the world because boy is this the dumbest timeline ever. At least we have a HOPE SPOT and exciting new column in this issue to make everything .001% less terrible.
- I was reviewing some email addresses I have. I own my own domain and thus can create anything I want (see Vol. 5 No. 6). That includes DICKMCMUFFINS@lavely.org, which was obviously important enough one day to type in the admin console and create. Maybe I time traveled from the future, knowing I would find it one day and chuckle and share it in my dumb newsletter.
- In a follow up to my company putting me in a long-term retention program (see Vol. 8 No. 2). That is still true, but what they described and what was offered was vastly different. The extra money was the equivalent of 15% of my yearly salary in 2024, vested in company stock over 3 years (so basically an extra 5% per year). I got more than that as a raise. Not quite sure that is an incentive as any company I left for would probably give me that bump regardless. To make it even more of a chef’s kiss 🧑🍳💋, I learned this on a Wednesday and was supposed to be on vacation the following week. Vacation was cancelled because a bunch of shit broke and guess who needed to be there to fix it? Nicky +5%. Fuck that place.
- What a shock - Update: Minnesotans are more prosperous than our lower taxed neighbor states
- So I damn near died watching this. It is the theme to Star Trek: The Next Generation, but with the sound coming from the Enterprise.
- If only I knew some game designers to make a version of this for America. I would be Mr. Lavely (45). I would deal 50 damage and my special ability would be to sigh and absorb damage. Of course, in America we are just hoping our old people die so we don’t have to deal with the inconvenience of supporting them. Probably wouldn’t work here. ¯\(ツ)/¯
-
Leave it again to my parasocial friend, Chuck Tingle, to be able to put into words a lot of my spectrum trot. What a writer! This part nailed it:
even from very young age i see that everyone is DOING THE HUMAN ACT but instead of rejecting that and shutting off i think 'well okay i am just going to do THIS because thats what they actually want’
in other words, most neurotypical buds say one thing that has a kind of spiraling social-cue-related OTHER MEANING (they do this ALL the time) and instead of rejecting that i have trained myself to be REALLY REALLY good at knowing the hidden meaning. it is EMPATHY but on a sort of LOGIC BASED level
and because i have always been pretty good at that, people like to trot around me and say 'wow this is a good friend they understand me’. now for ME that can be a little exhausting and there are things i need to do and stims and all that to release the effort, but overall it is worth it to me
- The world is changing and I am a dinosaur. I went to buy tickets for the Dinosaur Jr. show in July, which is at the Fillmore and is general admission. Tickets were an insane $56 after fees and shit, but wait. I CAN UPGRADE TO A FAST PASS for $33 more. A FAST PASS?!?! This is not fucking Disney World. Standing outside in line an hour before doors so you can get up front is a right of passage for concerts. Guess who is not going to any GA show with a fast pass option? THIS T-REX.
Can you believe this shit?
ITEM THE FIRST:
BASES LOADED: Perfectly timed to the start of BASESBALL (Because there is 4 BASES, not 1, duh), my favorite show on Dropout, Smartypants, had a presentation on the 50 bases of a romantic relationship.
I wish I could share it, but it is on a paid streaming service, so you’ll have to use your imagination or ask me for one of my free month codes.
Obviously sharing the tease of a joke is not as good as being able to share the joke itself, but what can I do here except turn this into a commercial for Dropout?
I’m not a fan of comedy that punches down, I am a fan of things that celebrate joy, friendship and make me laugh. If that is you and you do not have a Dropout subscription, you are missing out. All the links below are to a full show you can watch.
We just finished watching the first season of Dungeons & Drag Queens and it was delightful and had an incredible ending.
Don’t like watching people role play?
How about the game show where the people don’t know the rules and end up in a twisted secret Santa?
How about a presentation on why “The Ocean” sucks?
How about a show where people are given $1,000 to spend on doing something for their friends?
It’s the best!
PS - 50th base is fisting.
ITEM THE SECOND:
CHOO CHOO BUCKAROO! My mind is constantly coming up with dumb ideas. See the above mentioned email address of DICKMCMUFFINS and also HOTFUDGEBUTTS@lavely.org
One of my dumb ideas was to have a campaign of one of my top 10 board games, Railways of the World, where we would travel the world via the many maps available for the game. We have a highly custom version of the game with a bunch of 3d printed things because I love it so much. I made it a tournament with some Mario Kart-style scoring and was off.
I invited some of my favorite gaming buds to join me AND EVEN MELONIE WANTED TO PLAY! I curated a playlist based on the destination for the nights and spent some fun bucks on hats for all of us. We also all got some custom printed 3d train whistles with our names on them. It was like my 5 year old self had a fever dream.
(side note - Love on the Spectrum Season 3 is on Netflix and their is a woman, Pari, who basically lives outside how I feel about trains on the inside. It’s a great show. Little news segment with her here.)
Over the span of around 6 months we played all these maps:
Railways of the World (Eastern US), Railways of Mexico, Railways of Great Britain, Railways of Portugal, Railways of Europe, Railways of Sweden, Railways of Nippon, Railways of Australia, Railways of North America (Canada), Railways of Western US
As we all know, I play games but am not good at games, so by game 5 I was already out of winning and me and Melonie were basically fighting for last place because we play games with FUN & SMART PEOPLE. Since I blew all the money for the tournament on our hats, we all got train stickers at the end. I was able to snatch my SECOND FAVORITE TRAIN, the Trans Europa Express and it is proudly on my MacBook right now 🥳
I’m so grateful I have READERS OF THE LIFESTYLE that are willing to join in my dumb ideas.
Here is a picture of us choo chooing:
ITEM THE THIRD:
THE END OF THE AMERICAN AGE: Well, it’s been quite the past few weeks and I’m sure some of you have been reading a lot of news or news adjacent things out of terror, interest or your quest to try to understand what the fuck is happening. Here are a few things I found that I have enjoyed. As much as you can enjoy reading about this burning hellpit.
The Adolescent Style in American Politics
This is how I’ve felt about this since the start, but maybe add someone who thinks The Godfather is a documentary and they are Don Corleone.
A great, short article about the ramifications of the loss of the soft power, dollar centric global economy and having chaos as the standard.
There are only three possible explanations as to why Americans voted for this man:
- they wanted what he promised;
- they didn’t believe what he promised; or
- they didn’t understand what he promised.
Pick whichever rationale you want, because it doesn’t matter. Whatever the reason was, it exposed half of the electorate—the 77 million people who voted for Trump—as either fundamentally unserious, decadent, or weak.
And no empire can survive the degeneration of its people.
Just brutal.
One of the many shocking stories coming out. Bye bye tourism money.
Conspiracists are about to get a dose of reality
“Our society has been peaceful and healthy for so long that for many people serious disaster has become inconceivable,” Marriott writes. “Americans who parade around in amateur militia groups and brandish Nazi symbols do so partly because they are unable to conceive of what life would actually be like in a fascist state.” Those who attack modern medicine cannot really comprehend a society without it. And, Marriott adds, those who are cheering the rise of autocracy in the United States “have no serious understanding of what it means to live under an autocratic government.”
One last one, a video. Normally, I’m not a fan of punching down, but this is just brutal and hilarious. “I guess the term ‘transition shades’ is scary to them because it has the word ‘trans’ in it” 😂
ITEM THE FOURTH:
Just a quick one, but a few weeks ago was our annual Caprica Day all day Battlestar Galactica fest. For Caprica Day, we dress as if we are on shore leave. Our formal wear is for Colonial Day in November.
I grew my hair out for a whole month and had Melonie cut a terrible dad Marine mohawk and trimmed my beard in a Lemmy. I was hoping to cosplay as a Marine step-dad on vacation in Cabo. I think I nailed the look. The next day I shaved it all off so I could live with myself.
LIFESTYLE REVIEW OF BOOKS - STARRED REVIEW
While having chats with FRIEND OF THE LIFESTYLE Crystal, she has referenced a book, Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver that really gave her insight and wisdom into the current divide in our country. I’m currently 870 in the waitlist at the library (up from 1100!) so I wanted to give her some space to pitch why we should all be in that waitlist. So, over to Crystal:
After the most recent election cycle, I set a personal goal to seek out reading material that would help me better understand those on the other side of the political spectrum and why the Democrats lost. One book that does this exceptionally well is Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver, a re-telling of Dickens' David Copperfield set in modern-day Appalachia. While it is a work of pure fiction with no overt political agenda, it offers a powerful glimpse into the realities of being poor, white, and rural in America. In our progressive cities, it's easy to forget that our concerns are not universal. Worse, we often deepen the divide by looking down on-- or even resenting -- those with different perspectives instead of striving to understand them. This is a serious problem. While one book won't solve it, it will absolutely help to create empathy for these people and drive more conversations about how to create an America that benefits all of us.
THANKS! If anyone else has a book, film, TV or music suggestion for something that touched them, let me know and I might run it in the future. Or I'll just keep plugging Dropout.
THE HOPE SPOT:
While a CRIME WAS COMMITTED, the offender was adorable and doing what anyone of us would do in the same situation, obviously.
And look, there are some countries that actually deal with their attempted coups:
- Brazil's Bolsonaro to stand trial on coup charges, court rules
- South Korea’s Presidential Impeachment Was Long Overdue
Inspiring!
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR (please mark "ok to print"):
So, as of late, I've randomly become quite interested in learning Japanese. I know you have opinions of the best and worst learning resources out there. What is your opinion on language learning for speaking, listening, learning to write, and reading Kanji? What about learning Japanese cultural norms? Thank you in advance for reference to previous newsletters in which you might have spoken about this. Forgive me, I have a bad memory, I use too much recreational cannabis. Thank you as well for your opinions. I value them highly.
Since I am A GOOD FRIEND, I replied to this already, but since I was given permission to run it here, I’ll put the information (and some other things I've thought of since) here on the off chance someone else needs it.
First, learn hiragana and katakana. These are the “letters” of Japanese. https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-hiragana/ & https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-katakana/ are baller resources.
After that, a few recommendations, depending on how you learn:
- WaniKani is a great SRS (spaced repetition system) that drills kanji and words. You can go up to level 3 for free: https://www.wanikani.com/
- Comprehensive Japanese takes an immersion approach that is super interesting. Bunch of videos on Youtube for free and a ton of free content on their site: https://cijapanese.com/watch
- If you like the traditional textbook approach, Genki is the standard textbook used in many classrooms. Most people have a strong opinion for/against it.
- Bunpro is a SRS website to learn grammar and integrates with WaniKani, so as you learn words it incorporates them and takes away the rails: https://bunpro.jp/
- MaruMori is a website that mixes the WaniKani kanji drilling, the Bunpro grammar drilling and provides sample tests and other interactive things: https://marumori.io/home
- The government of Japan produces some learning resources, Irodori is pretty good. Includes a book and some listening files as well: https://www.irodori.jpf.go.jp/en/index.html
Overall:
Japanese is a pain in some ways because every Kanji has 1-10 different ways of saying it. You don’t need to learn all, but you need to understand that 車 (car) can be pronounced “shya” or “kuruma” and when it is each. There are some rules and commonalities, but there are also a lot of exceptions.
Kanji can also have different meanings, 日 is a common one. It means day, sun, Japan or is a counter for days and has 5 different pronunciations.
Grammar is the hardest for me and probably the hardest to drill too. Bunpro is very solid for drilling it, but honestly you gotta immerse at some point and that is where you will grow. I know personally, I will always do better reading than listening. That is true in English as well. Maybe next time I go to Japan, I’ll just bring a whiteboard.
FAVORITE THING TO GO IN MY EARHOLES THIS WEEK:
Jane Remover Revengeseekerz
Fresh off their appearance at number 22 in the LIFESTYLE This is my Jam (2024 edition), is Jane Remover with their new album that was surprise dropped last week. This is the next evolution of the “hyperpop” genre (Charli XCX’s brat is a mainstream example of it, Hannah Diamond’s Picture Perfect might be the peak). Anyways, I like the new JR album, but I’m not sure I love it. Needs a few more listens. It is INTENSE. Hearing Things had a great review of it where they described it as:
This is unrelenting music that pulls together all of the sounds they have experimented with thus far—the EDM blasts, the grunge guitars, the digicore static, the trap theatrics, and yes, the rampant Pokémon samples—and blows them up into a fireworks display you could see (and hear) from outer space.
The below was the second single released before the album came out if you want a taste.
THIS IS THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER
TOO MANY WORDS WERE WRITTEN.
DON’T WANT TO LOSE MY AUDIENCE.
THAT IS ALL.