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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: July 20th, 2023

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  • The conversation would be entirely different if they had attacked military targets and not civilians. A
    Military base or political building and then suddenly they’re resistance fighters with a lot more backing.

    But they attacked civilians at a festival and kidnaps multinational civilians who have no impact on the regions politics. That turned just about everyone against them.

    I’ve yet to hear anyone defend hamas. I’ve heard people defending Palestine, which is where I am. But it’s more defending the innocents that aren’t involved than Hamas. I’ve heard people be anti Israel, but many of them don’t support Hamas either. And those who are ok with killing civilians because of their government are already pretty lost. I’ve also seen anti US since we’re involved and while I wish we just weren’t involved at all, or at least trying to negotiate a ceasefire, most of those people are just “USA bad, disagree without thinking” types. Overall though there has really been no defense of Hamas at all


  • Idk where your coming from but as someone who had $12k in an HSA and employer medical that’s bs.

    I went to the eye doctor and needed glasses. Tried using my HSA. Nope. Not an approved medical expense. Tried paying a copay at the er. Nope not an approved medical expense. Wife got a kidney stone removed via surgery. Wanted to pay coinsurance. Nope not an approved medical expense. I needed a cpap for my sleep apnea. Nope not an approved medical expense. Year rolled over and all that money disappeared. I asked where it went and was told I either used it or lost it. So I got rid of it. Fucking garbage.

    As for the employer coverage, we had a zero dollar deductible plan. My wife gave birth last year. Ambulance ride from her work? Nope, not necessary. All the gyno visits? Nope, not necessary. The ER visit when she slipped and fell at 6 months? Nope, not necessary. The 2 week hospital stay when she went preeclamptic? Nope, not necessary. The delivery? Nope, not necessary. The NICU stay for our premature daughter? Nope, not necessary.

    I payed $1700 per PAY for my health insurance and they didn’t cover a cent from our entire family last year. We racked up over $70k in medical debt. Our MOOP was $5k/$10k and they said none of it applied.

    Hospital sent it to collections because we couldn’t fit their minimum payment of $9k/mth (fuck duke lifepoint but this is an insurance rant). We complained to the pa board of health insurance and were advised to get a lawyer but no lawyer would take it. They said it would be years to get anything back, let alone the full amount.

    We ended up proving that my employer doesn’t offer comprehensive insurance. The main component is covering pre and post natal care which they claim to, but they deny every time. So now we have insurance through penni for $60/mth with government help. Oh and we went through bankruptcy to get rid of the collections debt.

    Fuck Cigna, fuck duke lifepoint, fuck insurance, fuck for profit healthcare, fuck the American healthcare system.


  • You can file bankruptcy independently. It’s a bit more complicated but possible.

    I just went through it and honestly, I’m so relieved. It’s not something you want to go through, but sometimes people fuck up and can’t unfuck their finances. It helped me and my wife unfuck our finances. We declared bankruptcy in March and were debt free by May. We now own a house and are actually able to live our lives how we want. Our daughter turned a year and we decided to throw her a massive bday. We put 2 grand into her party. Something we couldn’t have done with our debt. We’re going to a couple USL playoff games this season as well.

    On top of that we got new flooring in our house, something we desperately needed. We just had a new furnace installed. I have a quote coming for replacing our stairs that are falling apart. The loans are a pain to get but it’s doable and we’re paying them off before the interest gets too bad. Again, something we wouldn’t be able to do in debt.

    Bankruptcy shouldn’t be something anyone wants to do, but also don’t be afraid of it.




  • Some very important notes for your son:

    Caves are cold so not many insects go down there.
    If he got bit by a tick check for tick diseases. I know the big one around here is Lyme Disease. If he has a bullseye shape around the bite that’s a sign of an infection. I don’t know if other tick diseases are prevalent in your area.

    If he was in close contact with bats and may have been bitten get him checked for rabies. While very rare, there are still occasional cases across the US. It can remain dormant for a very long time but once it crosses the blood brain barrier and infects the brain there is no help. It’s better to get him checked and vaccinated early than wait and see.

    Just some numbers on the rabies, there are about 5k animal cases reported yearly nationwide, mostly wild animals. Only 1-3 yearly reports in humans. So it’s rare and unlikely, but it’s just not something you fuck around with and risk.


  • It’s been about 15 years since I’ve been spelunking. I did it a lot in the scouts. Started with Bear Caves in Blairsville, PA (just a name, not actual bear caves). Those were fairly easy and well explored. Nearby there is Lemon Hole cave which involved rappelling 80ft into the cave. That was a lot of fun.

    But probably my favorite cave would be the loyalhanna creek cave in Ligonier, PA. If you ever travelled from Ligonier to Latrobe via US-30 you’ve passed this cave. I passed this cave weekly growing up but I never knew it was there until I was 16 years old. It’s right off the side of the road but there’s a ditch hiding the entrance and even that doesn’t look like an entrance. You get to squeeze under the hillside into a 1’ gap and the wiggle your way for a few yards on your back to get into the actual cave itself. Then after you get in, it starts to sink in that you have to do it again to get back out. Probably the tightest spot I’ve been in. I’m laying on my back and my stomach is scraping the ceiling. I was a skinny little fuck back the too. Couldn’t wear a hard hat because it wouldn’t fit. Had to slide it beside me.

    Totally unrelated website to that story has some pictures of the cave but it’s a really unknown cave so there’s not too much info on it. Definitely a fun cave though for anyone in the area.

    https://mountaincatgeology.wordpress.com/2009/04/22/loyalhanna-creek-cave/


  • Every form of production will have defects. The goal of perfecting production is one to be sought, but never achieved. We should always try to make food production more efficient with less loss, but there will always be loss, and always be waste.

    Even new means of production like lab grown beef can have waste and loss in batches that don’t “grow” properly because they didn’t mix hormones correctly or whatever. I actually don’t know how the science behind that works, but I do know it’s a process. And where there’s a process there’s room for error. That’s where we get loss from.

    We’ll never make something fool proof. Perhaps lab grown meats will be the most efficient form of product in that they have the lowest loss and production can be tweaked fairly quickly so there’s not a lot of loss and ramped up for shipments to areas with food shortages. Honestly, lab grown in my opinion has the best chances of being a major breakthrough but it’s still too early to be sure.


  • Honestly I think we need more voting options. Some that I would think would expand on up/down votes:

    I like this
    I don’t like this but the content is good (think news articles delivering good journalism on bad news)
    I don’t like this and don’t want to see more (irrelevant content to you)
    I disagree with this post
    Content is irrelevant to the community
    Content is spam/harmful/etc

    That’s obviously not what they would be called, but those are the feelings the votes should convey. And those can be expressed in a simple upvote downvote front to end users as well.

    I like this and I don’t like this but the content is good both deliver upvotes

    I don’t like this and don’t want to see more doesn’t do either, but tells the algorithm that you don’t want to see that stuff (I don’t even know if any fediverse stuff ranks with an algorithm.

    I disagree and content is not relevant both downvote, and content is harmful both downvotes and reports in one action



  • Uprise42@artemis.camptoAsklemmy@lemmy.mlStar actually have colors
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    1 year ago

    Stars can appear red or blue depending on the direction they are traveling. It has to do with the frequency of light they put out. As they move away the frequency gets lower, which we interpret as red. As they get closer the frequency gets faster which we interpret as blue.

    I am not an astronomer or even a casual stargazer. I took a single class in Astronomy in college and this was a neat fact I picked up. I remember next to nothing else from the class other than the fact that you can fit every planet between the earth and moon.




  • Uprise42@artemis.camptoMemes@lemmy.mlEVs
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    1 year ago

    Very. And I’m actually in shape comparatively.

    I live in a very hilly city with very few sidewalks. Even going a block away typically needs a car to be safe. A car is a necessity even in the city because of its layout. Ya, it’s a fixable problem but let’s be honest. You can’t bitch about people not using bikes in a place that’s not safe to use them. Change needs to come from the top down.

    I’m 230lbs at 5’11”. I’m obese. I’m also probably healthier than about half the people I know.

    I’d love to change, but with degenerative disc disease it’s tough to walk through the store at times, let alone actually work out. I threw out my back standing in line at the post office last week.

    Where I live, there’s a lot of elderly people. It’s a very aged population. I’d imagine they’re going to struggle to be healthier just like I would. So expecting biking and walking out of this area is just not going to happen.



  • Just bought one recently. We walked in and the guy immediately started showing us ones for as low as $200. I asked what the difference was between those and the display models and he started showing us some of the floor models. We really didn’t feel much difference between any of them. The ones leaning up were absolutely not worth it and uncomfortable but we went with a $1k hybrid because it felt the same as a $5k premium Stearns and Foster. We got a Sleepy with a medium stiffness. It’s a combination of memory foam and springs. It helped my back pain and I got the best night sleep in years the day we got it.