Like an IT Hernia!

I don’t know what I assumed, but yeah, the modern solution is basically, "okay, no ribbon cables, but just cram everything else behind a piece of metal. 🤣

Joke’s on them though because I still have a COM port and its connector is a gray ribbon cable with a single magenta stripe on the side.

You’re right, though the melodrama and swashbuckling of Space Opera definitely lend themselves more towards the soft sci-fi/sci-fantasy end of the spectrum. Sort of, “if the characters and plots don’t need to bear much relation to the real world, why should the setting?”

Our new guy is a mutt (Embark DNA pending) and is still in the goony velociraptor phase, but he already plays with the older one there (only about 4, though) largely by driving him and nipping at heels, and he’s learned to abuse the strap of “potty jinglebells” on the back door just to ask out to hunt for june bugs and investigate everything.

Oh, and our last pup who passed away was mostly Heeler and while he decided after a period as a stray that his ass wasn’t going anywhere he didn’t absolutely have to, he also did a great death-glare, making me question my life choices deep down to my soul. 🤣

I’m not going to claim to fully understand the nuances, but the sea ice will melt at about -2C and glacial melt will deposit ~1C water into the system. If the deep water is steady at 3C or 4C, sending it up could accelerate melting of both.

Nope.

That is, instead of sinking into the depths, surface water is being replaced by deep water masses rising to the surface, bringing with them heat and carbon dioxide (CO₂) that had been trapped for centuries.

I had to look up that last part, as it seemed counter-intuitive, but apparently deep ocean water bottoms out at 4 degrees C.

If they do, they’re called waders.

3, but the pajamas erasure here is unfortunate.

From a Doylist/marketing perspective, though, I honestly think most people gave the novel a chance because Andy Weir made a name for himself with The Martian. In Sci-Fi publishing, he’s the brand, so the publishers can indulge a surprise plot point. For a mainstream movie, “from the author of that one Mars movie that didn’t suck and did quite well ten years ago…” doesn’t really move the needle, but "Ryan Gosling is a…

Well, that just might.

Oh, Peppa is a total asshat, but she’d generally have to eat shit in a way certain other kids’ animation asshats didn’t (coughcalilloucough). There was enough of old-school cartoon and comic strip tropes from Warner Brothers shorts and Peanuts that it wasn’t the worst show to endure.

Daddy Pig was pretty badass when the wolf family moved to town.

I’m a few years out from that age range, but Caillou, Ryan’s Toy Reviews, and motherfuckin’ Blippi made Peppa look like Shakespeare.

Some of the jokes in this show seem targeted to adults, which makes no sense, as absolutely nothing in this show is watchable to anyone above the age of 4.

Clearly you never saw the one where Peppa is a stone-cold bitch when she realizes everybody but her can whistle or learn within seconds.

Utahns generally don’t like to draw attention to themselves as firebrands (e.g. Mitt Romney, Orrin Hatch), so methinks the Senator is planning to get into the 2028 presidential primary.

…or ten.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Little one can be Tails and play coop.

This comic has always resonated with me. THIS is how we incorrigible know-it-alls of the world can use our powers for good, or at least for not actively evil, LOL.

That’s about right. Our cockatiel is a little ham, and our blue Budgie (RIP, Ozzie) had “I have no fucking time for this” energy.

If it’s within your means, could y’all take a long trip out that way?

This is a very good idea, again, if they have means, though it’s probably not absurd if he’s looking to buy. AirBnB’s in Wyoming aren’t super common, but there are options, and frankly most of them are probably “easy mode” in the sense that they’re close to SOMETHING. Get a feel for what it would be like to be stuck there doing your shopping, finding something to eat, finding something to do. Drive to the nearest hospital, then imagine doing it frequently or while in a lot of pain.

Maybe it will be fine, even for ten or fifteen years, but they’re absolutely right to take this one slow and be wary. I know Massachusetts is pretty built up, but it’s not fully paved. I wonder if OP might float the idea of moving another 20-30 minutes farther out and finding a little patch of ground? Or doing something SUPER crazy like moving to New Hampshire? 🤣

As another alternative, if he’s determined to have mountains, something just outside Denver or even, sigh, Salt Lake City would blunt some of the biggest issues. Wyoming has almost literally nothing. Cheyenne metro has around 100k people, smaller than Lowell, MA.

Just to add, my very bookish aunt and uncle moved to the Appalachian foothills outside Charlotte after they both retired from government jobs in DC. After a couple of years of dealing with rural bullshit like annoying neighbors and poor infrastructure, they moved into suburban Charlotte and seem happier.

As everyone else has said, this is a pretty normal hangup, and if it’s really where you plan to live for the foreseeable future, only time will wear down the edges of that anxiety. It sounds like your parents raised you to be very open and you have an honest relationship with them and open invitation to live with them until you find a path that takes you elsewhere. Frankly, that’s great. My own daughter is a pre-teen but honestly I think we’re on a fairly similar path, but that’s more because it’s what feels like the right thing to do and the right way to treat someone, compared to the arbitrarily rigid households my wife and I grew up in. It doesn’t make make it magically not-alien.

It’s only been a month and he likely grew up in a different style of household. Honestly, in the US at least, the communities that most commonly do multi-generational living are very much not the ones okay with unmarried partners staying over. That’s a pretty significant cultural disconnect, and it’s going to be a while before he gets over it and truly believes that your parents are as okay with it as you claim. It’s probably going to require them to be almost comically over the top about it being okay (which has its own social hazards, LOL), or else it’s going to require baby steps. A trip together could help, as someone else mentioned. Or, a movie night that runs long and he stays in a spare bedroom. Eventually, with exposure and with a relationship between the two of you that proves to be solid over time, he may come to feel that it’s less awkward or disrespectful. He might also be a bit (overly?) self-conscious about the slight age difference in front of people whose primary job over the last 20 years has been keeping you safe.

So yeah, he’s sort of bringing his hangups into the relationship in a way you likely find frustrating, but I wouldn’t worry about it, certainly not until it’s been a good bit longer. It’s a common thing, coming from an honest place (and as mentioned, anxiety+expectations could create a lot of issues around the very intimacy you want to promote). In the meantime, it’s fairly easy to work around, especially since you do have the kind of relationship with your parents that makes staying at his place unremarkable. Eventually, yes, he should grow to trust you and your parents enough to believe you all when you say it’s fine, and if that’s still not enough then to have the kind of open conversation with you as his partner to understand why it’s not going to happen. For now, just keep doing things to make him comfortable at your place, but for the most part I’d let this one go.