Distraction from the Epstein files, amongst other things. I straight up call this the Epstein war.

Congratulations!!! Glad I could be of some help. Enjoy :)

This is not the reason. There are US bases in the UAE.

My body runs like an oven when I’m asleep. To that end, I have the heating off by the time I’m in bed (winter), and if the air still isn’t crisp enough, I’ll open the window a crack.

In the warmer months I straight up cannot sleep if the windows are closed.

Edit: forgot to mention that I am in the UK

Not really, aside from sometimes taking short breaks when the notification for maintenance comes up. I ignore it most of the time and do it a bit later.

Don’t mind at all! I’ve had my OLED for about 5 months now, and I use it a ton - about 60 hours a week combined across work and personal use.

Most decent OLEDs come with built-in protective features.

Mine notifies me that it’s due for “pixel refresh” (a 5 minute sequence where it looks like it’s off) every 4 hours of continuous use. I either let it do it and take a break, or it’ll just do it the next time I turn off my display.

There are other mechanics it uses to prolong its lifetime and prevent burn-in, e.g. my display is actually slightly larger physically than it’s reported resolution, and if you look at it very closely, it actually slowly moves the output from my PC around the extra space 1 pixel row/col at a time. So no UI elements will ever stay on the exact same pixel all the time.

I’ve never had to worry about burn in myself; I think the norm is that OLEDs largely take care of themselves now.

Thank you. Honestly I don’t have an ideal answer for you. I would have said the same thing (“women”), although I see why people take issue with it.

I think “people who can get pregnant” is marginally better than “people who get pregnant”.

I love this comment so much you have no idea

I know people will disagree, but as a trans man I personally find language like “people who get pregnant” really dysphoria-inducing and uncomfortable. It’s still better than AFAB/AMAB though.

Oh yeah, this is super relatable.

I have a very complicated relationship with my heritage. (I come from a Middle Eastern country.)

As a teen I would stay up at night wishing I was white (because my white friends’ parents were OK with me being queer. They showed me a kind of love my life was so sorely lacking in.)

Whenever I’d come home I’d have to put the proverbial mask back on, but no matter what, I couldn’t work my way out of being a disappointment to the family. I felt like a prisoner in my own house and I knew other people had it different.

My mother also used to throw my medication (antidepressants) away because “chemicals bad” and it’ll “ruin [my] brain”, essentially. And so I’d deal with withdrawal too.

I was victimised by a combination of difficult life circumstances, and (really, mostly) a rigid, conservative, and intolerant culture.

As an adult now, my feelings about this are not so black and white; I am proud of where I’m from. But I do feel for younger me. And I’m still damaged from my childhood. Always will be.

Honestly, she might have the same thing I do. I don’t know if it’s got a name or anything, but absolutely all red wine tastes like balsamic vinegar to me, almost indistinguishably so, even when I’m sharing it with someone who’s talking about how this one is “fruity” or whatever.

I went through a short phase of thinking I was being pranked. So I’m with your sister on this one, minus the sangria bit lol.

I do it by hand because I rent a small 1 bedroom flat. Those don’t typically have dishwashers here.

My last place had one though, and what an absolute godsend. I’ll definitely get one when/if I ever buy my own place.

Finally! I’ve been on Cosmic for months. Waiting for search results to be relevant again, rather than assume I use Gnome.

Tasting History with Max Miller has a video on exactly this topic! Highly recommend it.

Not at all. On the contrary, I found them quite liberating, for 2 main reasons:

• not having to decide what to wear every day
• I was in a British private school, where students came from upper middle class to upper class backgrounds. A lot of the really rich students were shallow, superficial, and cruel. If we didn’t have uniforms we would have had a serious bullying problem against those who couldn’t afford to wear high end/designer brands.

The only downside is that we had to pay for the uniforms, and they were quite expensive compared to the awful materials they were made of. I had 3 sets on rotation.

Syria indeed! I haven’t been home since 2010 though.

No need to excuse your Arabic haha, I don’t speak a lick of Hebrew (yet?), and my own Arabic is probably at the proficiency level of an 8 year old.

I live in the UK and am very passionate about learning languages. I’m working on my 5th - Chinese.

Levantine Arabic speaker here. 👋🏽

I break almost every stereotype from my country of origin… I’m quiet, on time (much to the dismay of people who give me a time 1hr before they actually expect me), and can’t grow a thick/full beard to save my life.

Being an engineer is pretty stereotypical, although that’s true for a ton of Asians, so not awfully specific.

I guess… speaking strictly in silly technicalities here, then the stereotype I “fit” is “terrorist” (on the basis that people where I live – the UK – are getting arrested and charged with terrorism for expressing support for Palestine/criticising the genocide.) Obviously, I’m being facetious here, but we live in an insane world.

For context, I’ve lived my whole life as a ‘displaced person’ / immigrant without a permanent home, so I don’t feel that there is one place that has particularly shaped me or my personality.

Any guesses for where I’m “originally” from?

Edit: I’d actually never heard that stereotype about Filipinas! The only one I know (applies to all genders) is that you guys are incredible singers. :)

I don’t feel like I can give you literal conversation starters that aren’t super boring or generic (like chats about the weather), without way more context than is possible to obtain at this stage.

But, one thing that did help me strike conversations and eventually friendships with people, was just hanging around campus doing stuff that piqued other people’s interest.

A couple of times it was me playing on my Nintendo 3DS between lectures, and once someone even came up to me to compliment my Sony Discman.

Other times it might be something as simple as there not being any empty tables in the cafeteria, so you ask to sit with someone. If they’re not clearly busy or studying, you might start by asking what course they do, how they’re finding it, etc. These are all fairly passive approaches though, and that’s possibly related to my extreme introversion.

A slightly more active suggestion – take advantage of group assignments! (As much as I hate them.) Make plans to meet up. Get a few hours of work done together then hang out with a few beers or a soda or whatever. Win-win.