I just went to the toilet. A couple of times, it hit me too fast so I used a trash can.

It sounds like you’ve confused the Nelson Bears with Berenstain Mandela.

It had to have frills like an Elizabethan collar for some reason.

BC

In all seriousness, I believe it’s because this complex was made from an office building or other similar commercial structure. They tried to add more classical residential features to make it seem less sterile.

Elon Musk.

Wait. Hear me out. The power to summon someone, hold them for an hour and force them to be conscious is really significant. Sure, there’s nothing I could say to have any immediate effect. I’d just mention that he should divest his wealth to the poor or else when my hour is up, someone else is going to summon him. It’ll keep happening until he’s no longer the wealthiest person. Then, keep going down the list.

You and I are friends now, because I would 100% wear an ancient kilt or something similar almost every single day.

I might need some advice. Let me preface this by saying the cylinder must not be harmed…

This is important and highlights some problems with trends in the modern world. At one point, we had an agreement that the average family would sacrifice 40 labor hours to the economy in return for enough resources to sustain a family. Now it’s 80.

Parents should have plenty of time to engage in childish pursuits alongside their kids. It’s natural, traditional, healthy and constructive to multi-generational, extended family households. I know that’s not what everyone wants, but I feel like it should at least be an option.

It should be okay for a person to work 20 hours per week. We have the technology to make that sustainable. If someone wants to work 80 to accumulate luxuries for themselves, I think that’s fine, too. What I hate is observing people being forced to live in poverty while working 40+ hours. I am aware that almost no one working full time is below the federal poverty limit, but that’s because it’s a nonsense metric. It’s unconscionable that anyone should have to live in poverty in the modern world, but it’s insane that full-time wages don’t necessarily cover the cost of living.

I believe this creates a situation which raises children without a sense of community outside of work, and now we’re watching them burn down the village as 70-year-olds. There’s a saying about how bad times create strong people, strong people create good times, good times create weak people, and weak people create bad times. I don’t believe it for a second. Strong people and peoples are those with strong social bonds. They needn’t be biological. Screwed up families exist and it’s okay to get away and find a real family elsewhere.These communities create good times, which create even stronger people.

So therefore, go and do silly things with kids. Play Minecraft or Fortnite or kick-the-can or hide-and-seek, sing baby shark, or watch Bluey. Not just because our future depends on it, but because it’s fun. We are supposed to be happy as a minimum standard. Not all the time, but at least as an average. It’s not even the goal of life; it’s the method. We’re supposed to enjoy doing constructive things. That’s how positive reinforcement works, and the current system is not only failing to acknowledge that, but it’s diverging from it.

Go and be childish.

Maybe in general, but Eastern-Carolina style is the superlative barbecue form.

This must be how the Jurassic Park Scientists felt when they first realized what was possible.

Man, I hate it when that happens.

I wish I could give you gold for this, but all I got right now is this box of one dozen starving, crazed weasels.

Also, there are bars on which’s jukebox one can play Weird Al’s eleven-ish-minute song, “Albuquerque.” Not everyone will appreciate it, so you probably shouldn’t. I just wanted you to know that you can.

It has some strong David Lynch vibes. We’re presented with a pretty mundane situation. Then, the events of the story slowly chip away at the familiar elements of the environment, revealing it to be a facade until we’re left staring at the ever-growing gap between individual perception and empirical, objective reality, calling into question various ontological and epistemological assumptions. It’s like staring at a photograph until we can see it as the cloud of particles that it is and then realizing that it’s always been that way. The intensely surreal feeling reveals itself to be the process of the mind resolving cognitive dissonance while accepting the infinite and stochastic nature of the physical universe. A game, a mislead, a piss beaker, and a bus. These elements changed us as we changed them by perceiving them, and then, life goes on.

Trans people exist. More importantly, whatever one calls taking leave of work to support a partner after they’ve given birth, it’s not going to be a holiday. Things like paternity leave exist because of how much work newborns can be.

If you’re not published, you should be.

For my money, this is the cleverest resonse.

I was trying to point out that this feature may be even worse than that because it doesn’t even require a formal law enforcement request. If this becomes what it looks like, even private contractors will be able to access it without raising any alarms, further lowering the bar.

It’s a combination of two things, the subversion of expectation, which is a common device in jokes, and the criticism of authority, which is another, similarly common, one.

In my comment, I’m pointing out that these cameras are a risk for even broader abuses than just subpoenas, and compliance with law enforcement requests under the guise of finding lost family members.

The responder humorously twists my words to claim that it’s not a problem because the lost family members have already been swept up in an indiscriminate drag net, such that the cameras can not find them.

The joke is on the DHS, and not it’s victims.

I hadn’t even considered this aspect. I guess we can kiss goodbye the witness protection program.