I feel like every single year just gets worse than the last. Very possible it could be as simple as more widespread social media, but 2015 seemed much less scary.

Alongside what cm0002 said, I’ve found that finding recruiters manually and putting yourself out there has significantly increased my callback rate. They really know how to pitch you a lot of the time, and I wish I knew this as a junior.

Basically, look for postings by TekSystems, Jobot and other recruiting companies and put in applications to their systems (make sure to only apply for a few so as to not seem like a “spray and pray” job seeker). Hopefully, you will get a callback and / or emails about positions. Eventually, you will get a call from a recruiter from one of the recruiting firms and they will ask you a bunch of questions about your tech stack, experience, what your preferences are for positions, etc and they will basically file you away for later. When they find a fit, they reach out.

It’s great to have like 5 - 10 of these recruiters (from different companies) since you know you’ll be getting calls even in dry periods like this one.

Also, I really cannot emphasize this enough - LEARN DATA STRUCTURES AND ALGORITHMS. It sucks to get a call from a company, have them set up a technical interview and then fail it and lose out on the opportunity.

This Udemy course is a great place to start if you know JS and it regularly goes on sale for $15 like every two weeks (not sponsored, it’s just genuinely a fantastic course and it’s worth every penny at any price, but for $15 it’s a steal if you know JS): https://www.udemy.com/share/101WNk3@wU2BBFJCNjPisNOAOq7G4IopJulzdWP6mkQD_4_vkOPjMfs8zL8f8CUVsevYRvCjBg==/

Programming (React, JavaScript, Python and anything AI are hot and tend to pay well once you’re in the industry), 3D Modelling, 3D Animation, Game Development, Digital Design, IT / InfoSec work (may need a few certificates to be competitive), Call Taker (these can be brutal, but good companies exist).

If you’re able to walk around somewhat and can sit for very long periods of time, truck driving may be an option (again, depending on your disability specifically). Truck driving is in extremely high demand and pays pretty well, and may even hook you up with hotel rooms if you get the right benefits. You will need to be able to sit in one spot and drive for many hours sometimes though, like 12+ hours.

Writing is also an option, as is drop shipping / starting a print-on-demand company on Etsy (though these will take a while to get rolling).

By stacking, I mean adding the units together on a single tile into armies so the units all fight together. Civ VI does have this, but in a very limited capacity (as you mentioned, up to 3 units). Older games had many more stacking possibilities (Civ III actually had infinite unit stacking, which was cataclysmically crazy lol, but I think Call to Power II really struck a good number with a max of 12 units in a tile)

Recent? None so far.

Somewhat old? Civilization III. I ordered it like 5 years ago and was trying to scratch the itch left by Call to Power II, but the multiplayer is flaky at best on LAN and the tech tree just isn’t interesting to me. Later entries also have the “tech tree doesn’t interest me” thing and also don’t scratch the Call to Power itch (they don’t have the wacky future tech like hover tanks and eco-warfare) but they also look a lot more visually interesting at least.

I miss when stacking was a thing in Civ. Sure it was relatively unbalanced, but that’s part of the fun in my experience.

/end grandpa rant

Are you me, but Canadian? I completely and entirely agree with your comment (USA checking in). Some of our biggest issues are directly caused by our utter dependence on cars, but also by different driving laws in different areas, dumb exit / entrance designs, lack of signage in critical areas (especially regarding high-speed turns) and general disrepair of the roads. These things all compound to make accidents one of the leading causes of death worldwide.

There should be more uniform rules and regulations regarding letting just anyone drive a 2+ ton vehicle, and it’s abhorrent how little you need to know to pass a driving test

How to Disappear Completely is so good

I don’t have any musicians that consistently make me feel that way, so have a list of songs instead:

• The Price of a Mile (Sabaton)
• Doomed (I Prevail)
• Let Me Be Sad (I Prevail)
• Soon You’ll Get Better (Taylor Swift ft. The Chicks)
• Wildest Dreams (Taylor Swift)
• Tess-Timony (Ice Nine Kills)
• When the Party’s Over (Billie Eilish)

Same here!

Windows Defender should be more than good enough for most users. Just make sure to use an adblocker (such as UBlock Origin), only visit HTTPS sites as much as you can (you should see a lock in the corner of the URL bar on most browsers) and ensure you always virus-scan programs you downloaded before running them.

Also, exercise caution on the Internet in general. Never just click “yes” when a program asks for admin permission - make sure you check exactly which program is trying to do it and that the publisher is reasonable. Never exit read-only mode on Office-suite documents unless you know the document is for-sure safe (exiting read-only mode allows macros to run).

Doing all of this, Windows Defender should do fine. I’m assuming 99% of this is common sense for you though, since you’ve already found your way to the Fediverse!

I definitely did lol, I realized later on

In that case, can you point to the specific comments of mine that show that so I can work on myself?

Edit: oh I get it, that went right over my head lol

Somehow, people always reply very rudely regardless of my tone lol. I could be saying “we need to stop global warming” and there’ll be someone like “We ALSO need to REVERSE it dumbass”. Like, this has happened too much, people are way too defensive and will take any chance possible to “one-up” each other

As others mentioned, Stremio + Torrentio is amazing. Just make sure you use, preferably, RealDebrid with it. If you can’t use RD, you can use a VPN, but it will cost you some playback speed.

PopcornTime as others have mentioned is amazing, but sadly I haven’t heard much about it lately. Honestly, Stremio + Torrentio is way better though in my opinion. It’s easy to set up and has a ton of shows.

In Atlanta it’s like a -55% chance it works

I’ve already been homeless before lol, it wasn’t fun. I’m saying it’s just not the same extreme

I’m going to be real - I completely empathize with your sentiment, but I feel like comparing two jobs to actual slavery is off-base.

Is it fucked that you need to do that to survive? Absolutely, it’s completely horrible. The current capitalist hell scape we live in is just miserable, and there’s sadly no end in sight. It really seems like the 1% are trying their best to screw over the other classes. They even lie about the statistics of the situation to try to make it sound better!

However, even with all of that…

It’s no comparison to slavery as we know it. That’s more akin to what our (read: United States) prisons do - pay people almost nothing (if anything at all) to do brutal work for hours and hours.

Traditionally, even the current slavery-esque system that the prisons have is way better than any slavery beforehand - no one gave a shit if your foot was infected, if you were a slave, you had to work or you were beaten / killed in many cases. Prison also pays you most of the time (albeit for criminally small amounts of money).

There was no end in sight, no opportunity to apply for other jobs, you couldn’t say “fuck it, rent be damned” and quit and you damn-sure didn’t have luxuries such as a fridge or plumbing.

There are lots of places still like this today - North Korea, China (Xinjiang), dotted places across South America and Africa (whom I unfortunately cannot remember at this time), Saudi Arabia and the UAE come to mind. In North Korea, as well, you almost never make it out of their system and a lot of the time your family is taken in with you for your crimes. There are countless atrocities happening with the Uyghurs in Xinjiang, China, and there are undoubtedly prison camps in Russia holding Ukrainian POWs.

The idea of working two full-time jobs is not fun, but it’s not exactly on the same level as slave labor. At least you can quit a job and maybe end up homeless, where you likely have a shelter of some kind and / or can seek assistance of some variety. It’s not ideal, don’t get me wrong, but it’s better than outright being maimed and killed.

If you “quit” a job in a slave camp in pretty much any of the places I listed above, you’ll be tortured for days on end and left to die a horrific death (if you aren’t just outright shot). No one will come to help, and no one will care. It’s just not the same.

Thank you for the heads up! The DS3 will always hold a very fond place in my heart - countless hours on Littlebigplanet 2, Battlefield Bad Company 2, Battlefield 3 and Gran Turismo 6 were had on those awesome controllers.

No way to help, but:

TL;DR - my job sucks. Not enough to actually get sympathy from much of anyone, though.

More info if you want it:

My manager thinks he’s the smartest man alive and is instantly better than everyone else on the team, but he’s literally making every single bad choice he can.

I asked him a question about a specific implementation detail comment on an RFC the other day and he kept reiterating the plan for the overall feature.

Like, bro, I literally know the plan, just tell me whether or not the field is able to be used in the URL now. It was just abundantly clear that he had no idea what the answer was, but chose not to say “I don’t know” and instead just kept reiterating the basic plan.

There was no miscommunication on my part. I’m successfully working on the ticket. He just didn’t want to say “I don’t know”. He opted to waste my time as well as everyone else’s on that call.

This, on top of pay issues (IE, them paying me very late), means I’m actively searching again. This job has been the biggest thorn in my ass for way too long.

It’s hard to get sympathy from people, though, since I also get paid very handsomely. I’ve basically realized I need to just stop mentioning my job with people from my hometown. That’s fine, though, again the main issue really is my manager. Other than him, to be real, my life is amazing.

Tuesday - the day right after you started working again, and not the day you can slack on. Also, super far from Friday’s reprieve