This is a good explanation because it gets at the source. L. Ron was a failed Freudian and had some mental issues of his own, he lashed out at the psychiatry community, and built this whole thing out of a hatred for what (rightfully) rejected him. He just happened to write shitty sci-fi, so he channeled that into pseudo-psychiatry (Dianetics). There’s a reason those e-meters exist: bullshit stress response devices to measure “clearing” certain negative thoughts. They don’t actually work, but that’s the principle: you have a “auditing session,” and let’s say you get asked about your propensity for lying in a certain situation. E-meter response is measured until you’re no longer stressed by the thing you were asked about (according to the meter), you pay them absurd amounts of money, they now have dirt on you in case you try to leave, etc. This is its core, reductively. Anti-psychiatry money mill.

Always liked Power Pete, and if you don’t have vertigo, the Descent series.

Ok so strictly speaking it was a specific mustard colored rectangular Tupperware bowl that often held soup leftovers in the fridge. Occasionally it held popcorn. For a small child who was sick and couldn’t reliably get over a toilet to puke, it was the designated “puke bowl.” For the record, I don’t believe poop knives actually exist, but in this instance, your wife is correct.

You mean the popcorn container/puke bowl?

Nobody’s mentioned the sensory overload that is Buc-ee’s yet?

I’ve had good results with the cushionlab car-specific one. I know they make a regular one, but the car seat shape works great on the particular mesh chair I have for some reason. Getting out for an occasional walk helps a lot too, even 10 minutes.

I was offered $21/hr to remote work at some google outsourced company for one of their LLM projects. It was going to be grueling work, full-time, no benefits. It took about 120 applications (two responses) to even get there, and they ghosted me after a second interview. It’s awful out there and I feel for you 100%. Best of luck, genuinely.

Tradition dear boy

I vote for both bears and twinks.

There’s a lot of good advice here already, so I’ll just add the potentially expensive (depending on insurance) next step: allergen immunotherapy. I’m about as allergic to dogs as you are, and some of the advice I got was “why not make them an outside dog?” — first of all, hell no, they’re family, and second, I lived in an apartment at the time, so that was impossible.

The immunotherapy, or allergy shots, starts with the tests others mentioned. They can do skin pricks or blood draw, and to save you a lot of misery, I suggest the blood draw. Then you get vials drawn up that effectively tincture allergens over time into your body for about three-ish years, so this is a time commitment.

Some advice on allergy medications I’ve received: avoid Claritin and Benadryl due to their links to dementia in long term use, try Zyrtec and Xyzal to see which works best (Costco/sam’s has the best value for these).

A higher MERV filter in my air unit, based on what it could handle, and an air purifier helped me a lot.

Because we need merchandising uwu

Put these babies in sport mode for maximum brrrrrrrt

The interrobang is back‽

The article said nothing about intellectual disability, but it did suggest some older people contextually from their complaints. Here’s an actual citation from one of the complaints that I think sums it up perfectly:

Now, i’m an intelligent [person], at least I consider myself that to be. I am a huge fan of elon musk and tesla. I only bit into this because it did sound too good to be true.

My phone plan just dropped the $10/month discount for autopay because they’re price-gouging shit garglers. The second I clicked on the “port out number” option, they put up a banner offering $10/mo off for the next year. I do appreciate not waiting three hours on the phone just to turn down the offer anyway. MVNO it is!

Uber Meats. Nothing but gabagool on demand.

But seriously, a VPN.

There’s an anecdote about a U2 naming a song “One Minute Warning” if I recall correctly: many years ago, when a UK prime minister learned the US got 6 minutes, they asked how long the UK would have. The response: “I suppose we’d have about a minute.”

There are also many more Teslas on the road, and the “full self driving” incidents are more widely reported on since the new ownership likes to overpromise and vastly underdeliver. Other commenters have already addressed the tech side, but a few years ago, the Tesla-specific FSD was found to be active right up until a split second before some prolific collisions with emergency vehicles, leading to speculation on liability. Tesla aside, I think it’s just laziness on the part of drivers used to FSD doing the menial tasks of driving.

And, on whack-a-mole, when one vape import gets banned, another company starts right up doing a very marginally different chemical mixture and ships it out. They can say “well you banned X, but technically not X” and the whole process starts over.

And a badass confrontation line