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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 13th, 2023

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  • I forget the specifics and who came up with it, but: pick an amount you haven’t written before. Then, write that much without looking back. If you can set your word processor to only keep your current line visible, even better. Once you’ve written that many paragraphs or pages, do a fast edit. Use a timer so you can’t linger. Then write that much again with the same strategy. After 3-5 times, do a more thorough edit of the whole thing.

    It’s not necessarily how you always want to write, but it can help getting over that initial confidence block as an exercise.




  • Great, and where local is the best choice they should do that. But nobody can seriously argue that reducing the ability of government to shop around for the best cost/quality balance is a good thing. It’s not like the only options are buy everything American or everything from China. I’d like qualified experts making that decision, not legislators.

    You create bad incentives if you artificially reduce competition like this. Not every good or service will have tons of American choices, so you end up with a handful of companies who know the government has no other choice.




  • Not being in constant contact with everyone you know, and not having a neverending stream of notifications assaulting you via your phone.

    When you got to see relatives who lived far away, you talked about what had been going on in their life because you probably had no idea.

    You read, listened to, or watched the news when you wanted to, unless someone you know told you sooner.

    If you had to wait somewhere without a book or magazine, you just sat there with your thoughts. During childhood, you learned how to be bored and practice imagining things.


  • It really depends on your taste. If you enjoy pop, 1989 is a good entree. If you enjoy moodier stuff, folklore is not a bad choice. If you enjoy country, try Fearless. You could also just sample some hits and, when you find one that’s ok, try the album it’s on. If you really want to run the gamut, going in chronological order is a good way to see the evolution of her sound and songwriting. The Taylor’s Version albums are worth listening to instead of the originals, though you can skip the bonus tracks if you’re not a huge fan.

    That being said, you could justifiably come out on the other side still not liking her stuff. But I hope you’d at least have an appreciation for the artistry.


  • She may not be your cup of tea, which is totally fine. No music is for everyone. But to say her music is not creative or good like Michael Jackson and Madonna is silly. It definitely reveals an unfamiliarity with her catalog. While I like Madonna, she has not competently covered as much ground as Taylor Swift has been able to.

    I used to not really like Taylor Swift until I actually sat down and gave her music a real listen, then I got what all the hubbub was about. She has a lot of albums for her age, and there’s relatively little filler on them (some have none in my opinion).




  • That is exactly my point. It’s not worth asking because it doesn’t tell anyone anything they don’t already know. The ones employers ask are the same, though they want you to blow smoke up their ass about how it’s been your dream to write backend code for an insurance company since you were a kid.

    I don’t like wasting time in interviews on questions or exercises that don’t help at least one party decide if the other will be a good fit. Unless you a hiring for a position where someone regularly needs to lie about why they’re engaging another party, these questions are rarely if ever valuable.