ex-US Bonds, stocks, and ETFs. For U.S. consumers those types of funds are still USD denominated but they’d be focused on investing in corporations and government entities outside the U.S. Plenty of index funds are set up that way already (for stocks VXUS is one of them, for example).

When Samwise briefly carries the ring he gets visions of gardens and greenery ever expanding… in the cartoon it’s quite amusing.

If it was Bugs I’d suspect he’d just see carrots, carrots everywhere. The question is whether Bugs would snap out of it and be happy with the carrot(s) he already has, or keep the ring and have infinite power carrots :P

You can have things shipped to yourself at the hotel, it’s actually quite common e.g.

Firstname Lastname (Guest)
Fancy Hotel Name
123 This Street
This City, State, Zip Code

That said it might be helpful to notify the front desk that you plan to receive package(s) during your stay in the case they set up a different procedure for that.

Also be aware sometimes you’ll need to check in with the front desk or receiving department if there are any packages for you - More than a few receiving departments at hotels just don’t do the extra work to notify guests that packages arrived for them… this sometimes results in the guest checking out without ever knowing there was something waiting for them to pick up.

Yup I was going to comment the same. The physical passport might be useful after the fact once you’re in ICE holding being processed after x amount of hours/days. But then again at that point they would look you up in their systems so having the physical passport in your wallet may end up being a waste of time anyway.

The fact is if the ICE goon squad you encounter feels like arresting and detaining US citizens they’re going to do it.

And that’s assuming the ICE goons don’t make up charges of assaulting them or similar, in which case I’m not sure if those US citizens being charged get released with a future court date or are detained indefinitely.

The mount terminal command should work. But I’d expect you should be able to right-click an .iso file and mount it that way too. I’m not on Linux Mint but can confirm with GNOME on Debian it’s easy enough to right-click the .iso file and select “Open With Disk Image Mounter”, Cinnamon on Linux Mint should be able to do the same or similar.

Also keep mind you’re probably going to need to do more than just mount a .iso disc image if you want to play an old Windows game on Linux. There’s a few ways to go about that but I’m not too familiar on the best approach when you’re not running Windows games through Steam.

I don’t have the book in front of me right now but I had thought the Ministry of Magic took care of that - meaning they sent wizards to bring her down from the sky, reverse the spell, and cast Obliviate on her and any other muggles that may have seen her in the sky. The Ministry of Magic knew right away that Harry Potter had practiced underage magic outside of school so it wouldn’t take long for wizards to appear at the location and figure out what happened.

Some of that is discussed in the conversation with Cornelius Fudge afterwards.

EDIT: The Fandom wiki mentions it https://harrypotter.fandom.com/wiki/Cornelius_Fudge#Targeting_Sirius_Black_and_rescuing_Marjorie_Dursley

Catholic schools in the 80’s did not have corporal punishment (certainly not the one I attended for a few years). I think that was something from an earlier time period.

To be fair you could just use a different Lemmy instance. From what you said I have a feeling you were on the .ml instance which does have that type of moderation :/

Either way glad you’re still in the Fediverse even if it’s not a Lemmy instance :)

Yes, a lot of us left during the API exodus. Reddit was already going downhill anyway with all the bot spam and shills, that’s probably even worse there nowadays.

Once in a while I do bring up old.reddit to read through some communities that haven’t caught on here (yet), or maybe something that comes up in a google search, but that hasn’t been enough to make me want to log back in there let alone post/comment on anything.

Probably sick of social media. I have a few friend requests/message requests I never bothered accepting since I’m preparing to delete those social media accounts anyway.

I primarily use Bandcamp and Quobuz. 7Digital also sells FLAC music but I don’t use that one too often (they only accept PayPal payments which usually blocks me from checkout).

I don’t know the exact payout to the artists from those sites but most likely Bandcamp Fridays would be the time to buy with the highest payout to the artists. But in general buying music files still earns artists more money vs streaming.

You’ve arrived at your childhood home after a surgery. Your mother has invited you to go for a swim in the pool. The one you always wanted since you were a child.

That is such an odd premise, people typically can’t go swimming in pools right after surgery. But maybe that’s part of the game’s plot, the mother is trying to kill their child via some waterborne infection.

The diameter of the holes are wider for pepper, but you’ll see many places put salt in them.

Oof, same for oregano and red pepper flakes. So many pizza places put those spices into shakers with holes that are too small, it’s maddening!

Haven’t used them in about 10 years so can’t speak to recent experience but before that used them on and off. Experience was okay, a few good dates and a few one off dates where we didn’t really match in real life. Nothing long term.

Overall don’t like those apps, as a hetero short guy I figured I get filtered out of most searches so it takes a long time to find someone willing to meet up for a date, seems easier to talk to ppl in real life (IMO). You sort of know there might be a connection if you can get someone to smile face to face, or you know they are trying to do the same with you, that’s not something you do over an app.

Since you’re in Canada it’s safe to say your brother is trying to be an edgy racist. Or loser as others have pointed out.

Even in the U.S. seeing someone in the northern states display that flag just means they’re being racist considering the entire north of the U.S. wasn’t even in the confederacy. This is also ignoring the fact that it’s 2025 so even southerners that do that shit barely have any real rationale to cling on to, everyone involved in that war is long dead.

I’ve been happy with Strawberry so far. The default music player in Gnome is okay-ish but I wanted a music player that can be set up with multiple music folders and Strawberry can do that.

Yup same here, where I work it’s busy from Thanksgiving through Christmas. Pretty much anyone connected to online / mail order / holiday shopping/selling / shipping industries have no free time right now.

Okay, back to work :P

Look into one of the Windows 11 debloat tools, I’ve had good experience with this one

https://github.com/Raphire/Win11Debloat

I mainly use it to remove default apps, telemetry, AI stuff.

Also use Rufus to create the USB install it should let you create a Windows user without a Microsoft account. Worst case during the Windows 11 install pretend you’re installing for an organization with a corporate domain, that forces the Windows 11 installer to let you type a regular Windows user/password during setup.

That’s usually enough to get you to a somewhat clean Windows 11 install without all the extra BS that gets crammed in there by default. But it’s still Microsoft so it’s quite possible you’ll get a new set of BS to deal with in the next Windows update :P

EDIT: My main driver at home is Linux but the above is what I do with my test Windows VMs and work related tasks.

Just about everything is better than non-stick pans. Like others pointed out the non-stick chemicals will eventually flake off into your food so you’re eating that stuff. And non-stick pans sort of have an expiration date, they will eventually lose all their non-stick abilities at which point you’ll wonder what’s the point of using it anymore.

Beyond that the other stuff is maybe more personal preference. Stainless steel is great keeping in mind you’ll always have to oil it and always have to clean it well. On the other hand cast-iron is essentially always oiled and ready to go so you typically don’t worry about that part of the cooking.

re: your other question I was forced to use something electric at my current home and ended up getting an induction stove after a lifetime of using gas stoves. I love the induction stove so much I’m not sure I’d want to go back to something else. It heats up so fast that I had to re-learn some of my cooking since the pan always reaches the desired temperature in a few seconds. Induction stoves are also safer, there are no open flames and no gas fumes hanging around.

Not sure if it’s really what you’re asking about but the Aqua Teen Hunger Force series has a few fake video games during the series. The Video Ouija episode has two, “Video Ouija” (a game where you summon/talk to ghosts) and “Insult Master” (a game where you insult your opponent), I’d play either of those if they existed LOL. e.g.

Frylock: Okay, Meatwad. Time to put the game up. It’s gettin’ late.
Meatwad: Come on!! Just one more dead person, please? Just one more dead guy.
Frylock: All right, one more.

Meatwad: Spirits that haunt this house. Tell me…what was we talkin’ 'bout?
Game Ghost: My sister’s baby.

Meatwad: Oh yeah, one them other dead boys told me about that. How she doin?
Game Ghost: She’s dead. We’re all dead.

A game I’m not sure I’d play is the one featured in the Black Mirror episode Playtest. It’s basically an augmented reality game that auto-generates your personal fears that you get to experience in realtime. Maybe it’d be interesting to try once, safely, but I don’t know how often I’d want to test my sanity in that way.