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It’s really a shame companies strive to reduce their payroll budgets instead of reducing the tedious burdens of the masses.

You’re sort of mixing metaphysical beliefs here.

The Ancient Greek concept of gods don’t align 1 to 1 with the Abrahamic concept of god, etc.

Each faith has a different concept of god, omnipotence, and what that means. It’s also changed over time. For example, the Romans saw wealth and prosperity as signs of piousness, as one would have to be blessed by the gods to possess so much. Christianity (ostensibly) argues the opposite.

Though, in short, god(s) demonstrates human traits because they’re abstractions from humans, the creatures that created them for various reasons throughout history and modernity. To get specific answers about each faith, you’d be better off speaking to spiritual leaders of those faiths.

I was just looking into this. I’ll parrot the other commenter and say the Samsung Galaxy line of a few years ago are solid gets and you can reliably get one for around that price point. I’ll add on Nothing phone’s previous models, too. Get em both from a reseller, not the brand store. Pixel devices have privacy focused 3rd party OS’s that are supposedly easy to use, but I haven’t looked into it.

Fully Linux phones are not quite there yet for the general marker or the price point you want.

If you’re outside the US or in the US and on Tmobile, you can look into Xiaomi or other Chinese devices, just double check that the radio bands actually work with your carrier. Service is better around cities, from what I saw when looking into an Oppo folding device then deciding to keep my Galaxy Note 20 Ultra. I’m not sure how they work with hotspotting.

Double check the models as some have SD card slots, some do not, if that matters to you.

Find a drain pipe to shout into, that’s your best option.

Everything else is a nuisance to your fellow humans.

As much as I’m laughing at people spending more than $50 on a kettle or toaster or toothbrush or what have you and calling themselves clever shoppers, I think it’s worth spending on anything that goes between you and the ground, e.g. tires, shoes, bikes, etc.

Though I’m sure that adage has also been incorporated into modern pricing models and every damn thing is a fucking scam to manipulate you into thinking you’ve made a shrewd and balanced decision when you spend just a weeee bit more.

I despise every company with a fiery passion.

You spent 120€ to toast bread! I don’t think you get it…

High price = high quality.

The luxury pricing model has totally enveloped markets at this point and the correlation rarely applies now.

A small propane grill, a table and an umbrella will immensely improve your life.

It’s so rewarding to simply grill up some mixed veg and marinated meats with a beer in the warmer months. Container friendly plants will do well there, too. Stuff that likes lots of sun like hot peppers

Way too easy.

Star Trek: The Next Generation
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Star Trek: Voyager

Steam Deck, hands down. It rules being able to play PC games in bed with my partner by my side.

The steam voice chat feature really improved and is very intuitive to use now. I’ll frequently use that.

Oooooooh that makes sense! Thanks for explaining. Yeah I wish we had legislation around it here, it’s stupid that I have to play games to get lower prices on things.

Wait what??

The consumer is barred from swapping providers annually to get better rates? Or are they barred from lying about fake quotes to get a better rate from their current provider?

Edit: By chance did you mean “price walking”? I did some searching online and I couldn’t find anything about the UK forbidding consumers from changing insurance companies to seek lower prices by searching for “policy walking” but I did find something about insurers slowly increasing prices on customers (thus creating the need for the behavior I suggested) called “price walking”, though I didn’t see anything about it’s legality. Admittedly, I’m just skimming while working.

Every year, call your insurance/internet/phone/TV etc. provider and tell them one of their competitors gave you a lower quote and you want them to match it or come close.

They will often give you a better rate just for asking. It’s easier if you do have an actual quote to compare it against but you don’t need one. Everything is made up. Just ask to pay less and threaten to stop paying them and they’ll often just give it to you.

Even if they refuse, just say, “Okay. I need some time to think about whether or not I want to continue our relationship or switch.” Hang up and do nothing.

It’s good to keep in mind that the cost of space exploration vastly pales in comparison to most social programs which also vastly pale in comparison to the military budget.

We should absolutely focus on helping people on Earth, but we don’t need to cut space exploration to do that, just war.

The car from the 70’s survives accidents better because more of it is rigid, but this makes it more dangerous as more of the force of the accident is transferred to the driver.

Modern crumple zones are placed intentionally so that while the car will crumple, the driver will not.

Can one give consent in a situation when they’ve mentally decompensated to a point where they are a risk to themselves or those around them and need intervention?

There’s a $12 bottle of Monastrell that my roommate and I adore. It’s rich and complex with wonderful plum and fruit notes, it’s not too expensive, it’s vegan, and it always seems to be flying off the shelves.

Whenever I see it, I try to buy a case of it and we save the bottles, never opening more than one a night, debating if we should open another cheap red or “one of the good ones”.

It’s not much, but it is a luxury I love to enjoy and share with friends.

Daniel Kahn and the Painted Bird’s song “The Butcher’s Sher” is a fairly quick summary of (including some quotations from) Capital with the bonus of a lil klezmer, but in general I think there’s value in just reading the text.