You can tell it’s made up because it has “it’s said that” in it.

Looks like one of these babies

They have played us for absolute fools.

What you said is often true but not always. Some communities prefer person-first language, some prefer identity first language.

For example, generally speaking, “autistic people” is preferred over “people with autism”. The reasoning being “this is just part of who I am, it’s not an affliction that I have.”

I’m not autistic but I have lots of friends who are, and they all prefer to say “I’m autistic” rather than “I have autism”.

Like you said, it’s best to ask, or just copy the language that the person uses for themself.

Definitely, I don’t really like Ubuntu that much even though it’s my go-to. What I like is Xfce. Whether I get it via xubuntu or something else I don’t really care.

I can’t tell exactly where this is but it’s definitely Australia.

Could be Melbourne, not sure.

Cinephile is another common term.

I’m not sure about that. Even wealthy countries can have water problems in times of drought. I grew up during the Millennium Drought in Australia, we had major water restrictions and major campaigns to try to get people to do things like take shorter showers. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000s_Australian_drought

And that’s in a wealthy nation with well-developed infrastructure. Countless places around the world have neither of those, and I’m sure lots of people in those places would love the luxury of a long shower without wasting water.

It’s ragebait. Ignore it. Even if it’s not, attention is what they want. Engagement feeds the algorithm. Ignore it.

My understanding was that most road rules are state-based, not federal.

I’m any case, I’m 100% certain that in Victoria, you can ways chuck a uey unless a sign prohibits it. Doesn’t matter if there are traffic lights or not.

It’s definitely something we have to be mindful of when driving interstate! I think a lot of Vic drivers on holidays get done for illegal U turns.

I’m pretty sure you don’t have to signal when exiting a roundabout in Victoria. We might be the outlier though. In Vic it’s also legal to U turn anywhere, unless a sign specifically prohibits it.

You misunderstand. Larian is the company that made the BG3 video game, and they haven’t laid people off.

However it’s a licensed game. Baldur’s Gate and D&D are IPs that are owned by a company called Wizards of Coast. And Wizards is owned by Hasbro. Hasbro is forcing layoffs at Wizards, specifically on the D&D team because it doesn’t print money as efficiently as say, Magic the Gathering does.

The people at Wizards, i.e the people who actually make D&D are no doubt passionate wonderful people. But Hasbro (and probably some of the Wizards management) are awful corporate parasites determined to suck every last penny from their properties.

They don’t give a shit how loved a product is, if it’s not making $100M per year then it’s basically worthless to them and they won’t fund it. So layoffs happen.

I had an aunt and uncle named Hillary and William.

Usually known as Hil and Bill.

Occasionally known as Hillary and Billary 😄

A bacon meme? Is it 2008?

“You’ll feel better in the morning.”

I get a lot of intrusive, negative, catastrophising thoughts late at night. Worrying about things I would never worry about during daylight.

I always try to tell myself: don’t think about this stuff right now, it’s not helpful. Put it aside and if it still feels important in the morning then you can do something about it. Fixating on it right now serves no useful purpose.

What happens if the two events collide? Do they annihilate each other? Does the resulting explosion destroy the whole city?

It can be hard. Honestly I got pretty lucky in that I was able to find lots of good people through work. There are good and bad parts to the industry I work in, I got hired by a company with a really strong culture that matched what I was looking for. So I was surrounded by a ton of people with similar values and overlapping interests.

Without that, I think mostly it’s about trial and error. If you’re struggling to find the right people, you need to be brave enough to keep putting yourself out there, and to walk away from groups that just aren’t a good match. Like I said, not easy!

Lol yep I’m 34 and also just recently diagnosed with inattentive ADHD. Hence being very aware of different communication styles.

Bit of a left field suggestion but one thing that really helps is finding your people.

In my younger years I sometimes really struggled with casual conversation, I often felt like I was the weird guy who had nothing to say.

It turned out that was only really true when I was spending a lot of time with people with whom I had very little in common. As I got older I eventually found “my people”. Friends who I click with, who I share values and interests with, who communicate similarly to me.

It’s not about finding people who are just copies of you, that would be pretty boring and make for a real social echo chamber. You want a range of friends with different interests, from different walks of life. But you want them to be, for lack of a better term “compatible” with you.

If you happen to be neurodivergent then that adds a whooooole extra layer of complexity to conversational compatibility. There’s a stereotype that autistic people are awkward or socially inept, which is complete rubbish. They just communicate differently to neurotypicals. Put a bunch of similar autistic people in a room together and watch them have no trouble at all making conversation with each other, in their own style.

Anyway, maybe this isn’t relevant to you, and you’re already happy with the people in your life. But it’s worth taking the time to examine whether the reason you struggle to make conversation is because you’re trying to make it with the wrong people.

Man this has been on my game list for so long! I really need to play it! But I have to finish BG3 first!