My method is hoping that I'm just old and western enough that I'll be dead before the real bad shit hits me. I'm 35 though, so... let's say there's a smidge of optimism in there.
196
Be sure to follow the rule before you head out.
Rule: You must post before you leave.
Not just those under 40. I do feel bad I sorta got a brief taste of "good times" and worry eventually younger folks will think the post 2000's are normal.
46 checking in, and yep, shit is on fire. GenX knows what's up.
Yeah, I'm juuuust old enough to have a firm memory of when things that were laughably petty were the biggest problems in the world. You mean to tell me the PRESIDENT got a BLOWJOB?!
All the real issues that sowed the seeds for our intractably broken future were sidelined and mostly ignored. Desert Storm, woowoo go world police. LA Riots, oh you crazy minorities and your intolerance for extrajudicial murder. Climate change, what's that?
Desert Storm was the good one. Sadam invaded Kuwait, a large international coalition ended the occupation. Today's analogue would be NATO entering Ukraine, kicking the Russians out, and showing that wars of aggression are unacceptable.
Iraq in '03 was the problematic one. Falsified casus belli, war crimes galore.
To keep your sanity you just have to lower your expectations.
I, for example, am really stoked for the burrito I ordered. Fuck, it’s good to be alive.
As someone who ate a burrito a few hours ago, I am no longer stoked
You ever had a deep fried burrito? That shit is life changing and good enough reason for me to keep going.
Something called a chimichanga in my neck of the woods. You can get one smothered or dry. You can even get one stuffed with fruit and covered with sweet and spicy sauces
i was and still am confused that chimichanga isnt a universal term
if i may ask are you from southern usa area?
I'm stoked about having learned how to repair PCs in my last 6 hour hyperfixation, and then actually fixing two PCs.
Oh man, that's the good shit right there! Ride that dopamine wave.
I am! I am also sleep deprived lmaooo.
First time in years though I felt genuinely content with my life and it's over something as insignificant as this!
My parents once asked me why I didn't have enough savings to buy a house yet.
I almost lost my shit.
ask them why didn’t they have savings to “buy a private yacht yet” at your age, because I would guess it’s roughly similar in the proportion of pay/cost
I'm 35, and if you squint a bit at the mortgage, I "own" home. With my partner. And we'll be paying it off for another 27 years. And we're the lucky ones of this generation.
Buying a home with saving, fucking lol
The only people my age that I know who own their own house are also drug dealers.
Guess I should sell drugs if I want a house.
In comic, dystopian reality, selling drugs (really just weed) was how I graduated college debt-free, and graduating without debt was the only way I could take out/afford a loan for a house.
So apparently, it's true what they say, whether planting or selling trees, the best time to do it was 10 years ago. The second best time is now! (Except don't)
I'm not sure if selling weed alone would be good enough in a legal state. I could corner the market on LSD tho. Ain't nobody got that 'round here!
I had a legitimate talk about doing this with my girlfriend. As much as I hate how sketchy it is, it still just seems sooo tempting.
Funny fungus is cheap, quick, easy and low stakes with decent margins if you're careful. Or so I've heard
But is it worse than tricking other people to work 40+ hours a week doing whatever you say and giving you most of the value they create? Because that’s the other option.
Plus if you buy a bunch of houses you can get them to give back most of the money you pay them.
Just accept the fact you’ll never own a house and will forever live in a shoebox.
Every day I wake up exhausted trying to look for a silver lining but more often not finding it until sleep.
The century of find out with almost no active participation in the previous century of fuck around.
A lot of "climate collapse global late stage capitalism and food is more and more plastic" stick with very little "convenience products are kinda nifty" carrot
It's kind of bittersweet being a very tail-end Gen X person. On the happy side, I got to do my childhood and teen years in the "fuck about" era, but on the unhappy side my entire adulthood has been in the "find out" era, and I get to remember what it was like briefly living in a world that wasn't entirely going to shit.
Thank you! This was very well put. Felt like a big puzzle piece just fell in place and this discomfort of not knowing why stuff feels so weird nowadays let go a bit. ❤️🤜
Tbf it was slowly going to shit back then too.
Eh. It didn't really start going to shit until 2001. Things stayed pretty darn good after 92. Not a lot of decades with that track record.
I mean, in the 90s we bitched about mostly distant global things because things were pretty good in general for most. And we had time to worry about less-catastrophic domestic things like Mumia or Peltier or what have you.
Now things aren't so good and we end up bitching about far more local things because things around us are so bad.
It's a great trick
my whole childhood in the 90s was the "ozone layer is dying" but at the same time optimistic outlook on life?