That’ll be $9,999

Can we start with the rich?

My first ever car was a 1997 Saturn S. And I don’t think it was a bad car overall, but when I bought it, the thing was very old and had been driven by an old lady who smoked in the car. It was all I could afford at the time, and the price was right for obvious reasons. So we cleaned and cleaned and cleaned and cleaned and cleaned and the smell never quite fully came out. We did a pretty good job, but on hot summer days you could still smell it. It also needed quite a bit of work that we ended up doing and it ended up being the first car I ever rebuilt the engine on.

As for worst car I’ve ever had the pleasure to drive, for a while I was borrowing my mother in law’s Ford Flex. It didn’t have any issues but it really was the worst car to drive. It had absolutely no turning radius. The seats were very large for no reason and were very uncomfortable. The visibility out of the front windshield was trash at night and made me think I was having vision issues. There were so many sounds for everything that you couldn’t discern which sound was for which thing and this made them all useless. The accelerator was so unresponsive, I had to program my brain to floor it ahead of when I needed to speed up so the timing would be right. The infotainment system was complete trash, but really all of them were back then. Loads of other small annoyances that I could go on and on about, but I’ll finish with how the car also just looks awful and I was always embarrassed to drive it. I hope I never have to drive one again.

My father in law was very loyal to the Jeep brand for many decades. He would buy a new Jeep every 3-4 years. His most recent purchase to all of our surprise was a Ford pickup. My last car was also a Jeep and I just bought a Prius. The quality really has tanked and the features people liked have slowly slipped away.

Maybe if their products hadn’t gotten consistently shittier over the years, they’d still have the loyalty they used to to keep up with demand. My dad still has his 91" Jeep rust and all. I still have a 2007 Grand Cherokee Laredo that lasted well over 300,000 miles. My father in law basically gets a new Jeep every 3-4 years. Skip to today and my dad has a Tesla, I have a Prius, and my father in law has a Ford pickup. We all saw the quality decline and the features we loved seemed to slowly disappear as well. I really don’t know what they thought would happen when their cars became nothing more special than any other SUV out there.

I think they do have their own distinct “personalities” but that they are difficult to discern from what’s happening currently until they are further away in time. A good way to really see these things is to watch television that was made at the time as it’s typically depicted by what was culturally relevant at the time. I think one of the best time capsules I’ve seen is The Sopranos as it shows a very realistic depiction of the 00s. For someone who was a teenager at that time, it really did put me right back then and I was even remembering things I hadn’t thought about in years. I’m certain there are other things that will depict the 2010s in a similar light, but maybe not enough time has passed yet to really see the things that made it unique.

Oh shit! That’s a thing? Is it just cardamom steeped in hot water or is it more of a spice/tea blend like black tea and cardamom?

This made me laugh an unreasonable amount. I needed this after everything. Thank you.

The first thing I thought to myself when I woke up on Wednesday and found out was “I hope they get exactly what they voted for”.

This may seem basic, but I think some people really need it. I have a hard time remembering things like birthdays and such. So I make sure to add people’s birthdays into their contact info on my phone. Then it will show up on my calendar as a different color and I can see it coming up and actively try to be on top of it instead of it passing and feeling guilty for forgetting. Maybe you don’t care about everyone’s birthday in your life, but I at least try to add my friends and family so I can reach out to them or try to remember to send a gift to little ones that are far away, etc.

I’m genuinely worried about contraception in general. It’s one of the tick boxes for Project 2025. And I don’t know if that will mean prescription contraception or all of it. Luckily there have been some recent breakthroughs in male contraception that you can buy even if they aren’t marketed as contraception for legal reasons. I’m not normally one to fuck with healthcare that hasn’t been tested and approved, but people will get desperate.

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

—Martin Niemöller

I mean… Why would anybody choose to eat at either of those places when there are loads of better alternatives? At least here in Illinois, you’re tripping on pizza and chicken places. You can choose between awesome local spots or chains if that’s what you want. So why would anyone want this garbage? If any of you out there only have a KFC or a Pizza Hut as your only pizza/chicken option… I’m very sorry.

As much as it was sad to see a lot of restaurants die during COVID, there were an awful lot of sushi abomination restaurants out there that I think we’re all better off without. I actually had to stop eating sushi for a few years because we would try to order sushi and it would just be disgusting. You’d get either 1 of 2 scenarios - it was some very gimmicky sushi that you’d never eat more than once, or it was gross because the quality just wasn’t up to par during lockdown. And sushi is unfortunately one of those foods that’s very unforgiving and if you have even 1 bad experience, you won’t be going back to that establishment. So I can see why a lot of them closed.

Anyone here see The Substance? “That bitch is stealing time from me!!!”

Wait till you find out about Two Men and a Truck!

This is why I started making a lot of my own things. There are lots of options in the store for some items where you can get something without sugar that didn’t need it. But then there’s things like mayonnaise… Let me tell you that mayonnaise doesn’t need any sugar and most brands that don’t have sugar are like $11 for an 8oz jar. So I started making it myself at home. I also started making bread which later turned into a hobby, but now I can’t eat the store bread because it’s too sweet. I even make my own jam now and I know what you’re gonna say “but jam is like… mostly sugar”, but I’ll have you know that jam tastes WAY better with half the sugar that it’s typically made with. It’s an art form to get it thick without adding more sugar, but it’s worth it. Looking back, I know most people can’t make all this shit and it’s really sad that people can’t buy things with less sugar at the store without paying an arm and a leg. It really says a lot about our society that this is true.

Those responsible for sacking the people who have just been sacked, have been sacked.

I’m enjoying the hell out of the wireless android auto in my new Prius. It just works and I don’t have to pay a cent more to use it. We already spent too long waiting for car manufacturers to actually invest in their car’s UI system and it never happened. Apple and Google had the perfect solution and now they’re throwing it in the trash hoping that people will just be ok with the garbage they were putting out before? And they’ll have to pay a subscription to use it to boot? Not a chance!

This is the best answer. There’s a reason that subway maps are often not an accurate representation of where stops actually are on a map, but instead are condensed and made easier to read in a way that loosely shows where the stops are and also makes each stop easy to read along with other key info that’s relevant. When you’re on a train, you don’t need accurate maps of where stop are, you just need to know where your stop is, how many stops away, or connecting trains.

Not that female anatomy is akin to a train system… Or is it?