Not OP, but with the aforementioned schedule, there are still weekends before and after that are still very valuable. The weekend before vacation could be used to catch up on chores and errands that would be nice to get done before the vacation, plus maybe pack. Then when you get back, your coming home to a clean place and not having to deal with running around straight away. Just be ready for only two days of work. Then another weekend to get rested up before a full week of work.

Two weekends bookending two half weeks of work bookending a week off from work is very nearly the same as a week of vacation and a week of staycation for only 5 vacation days. Sure you can’t go out of town for an extended period with that plan, but I’m kinda ready to go home after 4-5 days away anyway.

I appreciate the nuance and detail of your comment. I wanted to make sure I started with that so you don’t think I’m just here to shit on your comment. I’m upset that we’re here and slapping bandaids on this shit instead of actually thinking about solutions.

Congress can’t pass a budget, but they can raise their own pay. They haven’t passed any meaningful legislation in two years, but they can raise their own pay. They can’t raise our minimum wage, but they can raise their own pay. Idk about you, but I’ve never gotten a raise for pisspoor performance at any job I’ve ever held. I’ll be receiving a 3.5% raise in a couple weeks, and I’ve very much earned that, and it’s thankfully a bit higher than the ~2.8% inflation over the past year so it’s an actual raise. Not everybody has been so lucky. I’m completely on board with paying Congress well so that it’s not gated off for only the wealthy elite to have access to, but let’s not pretend that passing a raise for themselves right now is eradicating all semblance of corruption once and for all.

Why does Congress actually need to be in DC anymore anyway? Why not have an office in their district and securely remote vote? Having them in DC maintaining two residences is costing them more, keeping them physically distanced from their actual constituents, and making corporate lobbying significantly easier since they can easily talk face to face with dozens of reps/senators in a single afternoon. We could also raise the cap on the House since it’s been undersized for proper representation for decades; no need to cap it to a number that can regularly gather in the chambers anymore. I’d rather they just stay in their district and lock their pay to their local inflation rate. If they want better raises, then they need to actually help their district.

It’s not too difficult to buy a pack of boneless skinless chicken breasts, prep them, throw them into the oven, cool them, and slice them up. That’s an option if you want a new little project to master which is also serving your function of healthier, fresher lunch meat.

Easy rundown: trim off and discard fat. Butterfly the breasts. Spray a sheet pan and put them on there. Either put Italian dressing or custom seasonings and white wine on the chicken. Throw the pan into the oven at 325°F until it hits 160°F (165 is food safe but residual heat will get it across the finish line). I’d set a timer for like 20 minutes and then temp and assess. It’s easier to slice up without tearing if the chicken has had a chance to cool down.

I have been taking more or less the same sandwich to work for about ten years now. Whole grain bread, mayo, two slices of cheese (different kinds), and a bunch of lunch meat (usually turkey or chicken). Rarely, I’ll sub a good mustard in for the mayo. Or I’ll add tomato slices or avocado. A while back, my wife pickled some cucumbers so I had homemade pickles on my sandwiches. For a good while now since then, she’s been pickling jalapenos for me to put on the sandwiches.

If I didn’t have that, I’d probably reach for my spicy BBQ sauce or Sriracha from Underwood Ranch. They’re not paying me, but I really want them to succeed so I can keep buying their sauces. They got fucked over by that green cap rooster brand that makes Sriracha, so now instead of supplying their peppers to them, they just make their own shit and it’s amazing. They have a garlic pepper sauce that I blew through really quickly. That shit would probably slap on my sandwiches too, but it didn’t last long enough to try lol. It was good in mac and cheese though. And stir fry.

Is it weird that I try to make sure to say fuck somewhere whenever I recommend any specific product just to avoid any accusations of it being an ad? This isn’t an ad. Fuck Disney. Cum on a Big Mac. Shit on a Bugs Bunny plushie. There, now no corporation would want to be associated with this comment.

My wife and I hung out with a couple just a few times. They were cool, but it’s hard enough to find time when my wife and I are both off and awake; lining that up with two other working adults (plus they have a kid) was impossible to do regularly.

I can get along okay with pretty much anybody, but most people I’ve met have proven to be a little too incurious or even hateful for me to want to go out of my way to spend time with. With every passing year, I value my time more and more (as I’m sure almost everybody must) so it’s hard to justify setting time aside for building friendships with people if I don’t naturally want to hang out with them. That having been said, I work rotating 12 hour shifts, so I’m not off every night and weekend like a lot of people are, and even if I am off I may be swinging my sleep schedule to prepare for not being off. A lot of people just can’t understand that yes, I may be off that day, but I didn’t get home until after 0500 and I need to sleep at some point. Or yes I’m off that day, but I need to be in bed by 2000 at the absolute latest because I need to get up at 0230 for work the next day.

I would recommend making a friend or two with neighbors if your work schedule isn’t as shitty as mine is lol. Especially if your neighbors suck less than a lot of mine have. Just don’t force a friendship where there doesn’t need to be one just so you can feel better about asking them to water your plants while you’re away for the weekend. If they’re cool, they’ll do it for you just knowing that they can ask you to return the favor down the road.

The generation that raised you will say “yeah, duh, it’s common sense” without a hint of introspection to realize that it was their job to teach you this kind of shit.

Between the Technology Connections channel on YouTube just being legitimately interesting and having just bought a house, I’m speedrunning a lot of information about DIY maintenance to mitigate the disasters. When it comes to knowing how your water heater works or where your main water valve is, better late than never. Routine stuff like cleaning your dishwasher filter and running the machine properly will have immediately recognizable effects that greatly benefit your life. And unlike other people who you’ve heard shit like that from, I’m not selling anything lol.

I for one believe that the question of whether a food service establishment has rats is very relevant to the business.

The character of the staff and clientele as well as the financial state of the staff as a direct result of how stingy their employer is can also be very relevant. Do you want to eat somewhere if the people preparing your food there will sell their morals and decency? Kinda seems likely that I could pay somebody there $100 to put their pubes into your quarter pounder.

I don’t think they want the identity of the rat getting out. I’m willing to bet that there are plenty of people who really want to publicly remind everybody that snitches get stitches. Word on the street is that this rat can suddenly afford a $60k hospital bill, unlike UHC customers whose claims get denied every day.

As a rule of thumb, it’s good to clean that filter roughly every month. Since you’re using rinse aid, I recommend just cleaning the filter every time you top that off. To minimize how much the filter catches, give dishes a little rinse before loading to at least knock off the bigger stuff.

There are a few things that most people don’t know to do for optimal dishwasher effectiveness:

• Don’t use pods. Ideally use dry detergent, but liquid is good too. You have no control over pods.
• Don’t cram it full. Give everything space and have it all face down and/or toward the center where the jets of water will come from.
• Don’t put big shit in there that will block the spinning arms from spinning.
• Put a little detergent on the detergent door for a little assistance in the rinse cycle.
• You probably don’t need to fill the detergent door (unless you’re doing a heavy load of stubborn shit), and overdosing the detergent could be contributing to cloudiness on your dishes. Obviously, close the detergent lid. If not, you’re throwing all of your detergent away in the initial rinse cycle.
• Run hot water through your kitchen sink until it feels hot before you start your dishwasher. Your machine doesn’t use much water, so it might just grab cold water from the pipes instead of hot water from your water heater if you don’t do this. And everybody knows that hot water is better for cleaning most things.
• The dishwasher takes like 3-4 goddamn hours to run, but it uses way less water and soap than if you handwashed that shit yourself, plus it can run while you work or sleep.
• Most things can go in the dishwasher. The only stuff I don’t run through there are knives, my cast iron cookware (including Dutch ovens because they’re just cast iron coated in enamel), and things that explicitly say that they’re not dishwasher safe.

Follow those simple steps and your dishwasher will work better and you’ll feel like you reclaimed a bunch of time compared to handwashing or rerunning the dishwasher.

Oh no.

Anyway…

Dope! I appreciate you taking the time! So it sounds like a slightly less bloated version of 10 that gets more support, but it may not be exactly legal and breezy to obtain for my personal home use.

With the possible exception of finding drivers for a device or two, it sounds like I’ll be better off just pivoting to a Linux distro mid 2025. I have been happy with SteamOS on my docked steam deck with m+kb and controller, so I’m sure I won’t be missing much by picking a popular distro that I can find troubleshooting guidance for when I hit inevitable snags.

A few questions since you seem to know much more about this than I can probably even find from searching:

• What is “IoT”? What is “LTSC”?
• Other than update support, how is this different from my existing home laptop’s Windows 10?
• Is this free? Will there be obnoxious limitations or reminders to pay to activate?
• Why should I as a medium skill home computer user without work needs opt for this over Mint, Ubuntu, Nobara, Arch, or whatever other distro somebody would insist I use? I don’t need Office.

Just choosing to phrase it with an air of plausible deniability paired with a pun related to the industry.

So deny their preventable death?