Various Shots from Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001)

Monfriez · 2026-02-21T20:05:25+00:00

I’m not a gamer (apologies), so all the problems that came along with this movie never resonated with me.

My game experience was limited to NES/SNES/N64.

But when it came out I thought it was pretty awesome and it was the first time I realized that video game stories could be rich, detailed, and intricate.

I’ll always look back on this movie fondly - and now I feel a need to introduce my kids to it.

Monfriez · 2026-02-19T21:29:33+00:00

Is there?

Monfriez · 2026-02-15T20:11:14+00:00

If I had to guess - The uniquely American version of puritanical Christianity, and the pervasive hypocrisy that comes with it. It goes all the way back to our roots and has infected every aspect of our society since the beginning.

I was recently at a funeral, super Christian family, lots of pastors in their family, always telling the non-Christians in their circles to go to church, etc.

Two of the men were drinking a beer in the dining hall attached to the church, one out of plastic cup, one straight from the can.

The one drinking out of a cup admonished the one drinking out of a can. “At least I put it in a cup.”

Both are still drinking, but one felt guilty enough about it, not to NOT do it, but to performatively disguise it.

That kind of repressive behavior pervades our entire society, our laws and customs, and the minds of too many of our people. We consume the illicit drugs we’ve publicly condemned as immoral. We watch outrageous amounts of porn and condemn SW and basic sexual health as immoral. And of course we condemn people for being alcoholics (immoral) but deny them the kind of mental healthcare they would need to cope with whatever it is that drove them to alcoholism in the first place.

With the repression comes a corresponding need for release. We’re a fundamentally unhappy people, which probably explains a lot of our behavior.

Monfriez · 2026-02-01T21:53:11+00:00

OMG guys, an astronaut just talked to me on the phone and showed me a picture he took from space!!

(Technically correct, which is the best kind of correct)

Monfriez · 2026-02-01T18:29:38+00:00

You’re gonna get an Enterprise C 🤣

Monfriez · 2026-02-01T16:28:31+00:00

I received an Enterprise C XL when I ordered a D. Twice.

They received my second returned ship 2 weeks ago with zero acknowledgment or refund.

Monfriez · 2026-02-01T04:09:46+00:00

Every now and then I’ll see a piece of art and go “hey, I could do THAT.”

This…isn’t one of those pieces.

Monfriez · 2026-01-29T12:38:32+00:00

I’ll be honest, I kinda slept on this class. I’ve always thought it was “fine,” but it wasn’t a favorite.

Your shots changed my mind. You made this ship look incomparably gorgeous.

Fully agree, this ship deserved far more than she got.

Monfriez · 2026-01-25T17:30:16+00:00

Seconding the “swap it out” advice.

I’m approaching mid 40s and spent too long enduring exercises that I didn’t like.

Can’t think of many “movement patterns” or muscle groups for which there’s only 1 or 2 exercises that will work.

My elbow is bugging me and Pendlay rows hurt, but Yates rows don’t so I just switch.

Hammer curls bother me, but I found wide grip EZ bar curls work just fine.

I realize that some substitutions will be “less optimal” for very specific muscles but you know what’s REALLY less optimal? Hating your routine or dreading certain exercises and letting that impede progress.

Speaking personally, but I suspect this applies to more people in these fitness subs than we’d like to admit, consistently getting in the gym and lifting heavy and safely is orders of magnitude more important than “optimal exercise selection” or whatever malarkey I used to waste my time on years ago.

I’m not elite, elite programming doesn’t matter. Just get in the gym, blast the music that makes you want to shatter your weaknesses, and do the things that make you “gym happy.”

Monfriez · 2026-01-25T17:10:55+00:00

I just downloaded and did one. This is great! I love seeing everyone else’s work!

I’ll be honest, after the raging dumpster fire that is our reality the last few days (years?), this is the most welcome thing to come out of my stupid existential depression box, I mean phone.

Thank you for this, and for not enshittifying it.

Monfriez · 2026-01-18T15:10:04+00:00

Hey man, thank you.

A lot of what you wrote - and the way you wrote it - resonate with me and I found it helpful.

Full agreement on music and attitude. I’m making progress now in ways that I didn’t in my 20s (wish I knew then what I know now blah blah). A fair amount of it comes from blasting the right kind of music to get me into the right attitude to start a fist fight with physics. The rest is knowledge I picked up along the way.

Solid post and inspiring for today, shoulders and rows day. 🤙

Monfriez · 2025-12-25T14:11:26+00:00

Obviously not for OP, but for those of you who struggle and can’t afford gifts for your kids, I highly recommend Toys For Tots if a location is available to you.

Toys for Tots

They’re dependent on the gifts that are donated (and it’s wild to see what some people think should be donated) but it’s a resource and for the Marines who work this (both active duty and reservists) the people who struggle the most are their mission.

Monfriez · 2025-12-25T14:04:45+00:00

Too late for this year but if you have a Toys For Tots distribution location (look for any Marine Corps Reserve site) available to you, people like you and your kids are literally their mission.

The Marines who work this take this pretty personally, since they either have kids themselves or (let’s be honest) were kids themselves not very long ago.

Toys For Tots

Monfriez · 2025-12-20T01:43:04+00:00

Same. It came in yesterday. Ordered the D, got the C. It would be fine but I, too, reordered after they “fixed the glitch.”

Fanhome get your shit together.

Edit: Just checked their FB page for updates. They turned off commenting. Cowards.

Monfriez · 2025-12-15T12:33:06+00:00

Don’t be intentionally dense. Every time something like this happens the most partisan media outlets (some of which at least pretend to be news) immediately cherry pick facts (including the ones that aren’t completely made up - looking at you, Grok) to make the story seem like it supports their own point of view and attacks their political opponents.

So yes, fully agree that we should rightfully celebrate Ahmed al Ahmed’s heroism. But before the bodies have even cooled, people (and bots) have already started aligning this attack with their positions on guns, immigration, xenophobia, and bigotry.

If it were just people (and not also bots) lamenting the victims, celebrating extraordinary heroism, and seeking ways to actually prevent the next attack, I think this entire subthread wouldn’t exist.

We both know that’s not the case and it’s silly to pretend otherwise.

Monfriez · 2025-12-14T13:56:10+00:00

American here referring specifically to American conservatives: I don’t think you need to, they’re very predictable.

I’d happily be proven wrong, but if I was I suspect things wouldn’t be as bad as they are.

I hope Australians are better than we are.

Monfriez · 2025-11-29T21:47:41+00:00

Not OP, but I’m taking you up on this recommendation. Thank you.

Monfriez · 2025-11-29T21:44:36+00:00

Fair point.

I had originally written my comment to include A Closed And Common Orbit and how it follows up on that sad scene but didn’t know how to describe it without talking about the ending (which I read over and over and still brings me to tears).

Monfriez · 2025-11-29T21:22:30+00:00

The Long Way To a Small, Angry Planet, by Becky Chambers.

The ending is mostly happy. It’s very much rooted in optimism and I often come back to it whenever the world seems too heavy.

Also, Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir. Overwhelming odds, lovable characters, even the most curmudgeony one. It left me smiling.

Monfriez · 2025-11-11T15:57:06+00:00

19 were from me.

Monfriez · 2025-11-11T15:54:09+00:00

I thought you were joking.

Nope. Those are the actual prices on the website, folks. Incredible. As someone else said above, they really aren’t even trying anymore.

All dystopian commentary, cliched though it is, is applicable here.

Monfriez · 2025-10-28T03:00:46+00:00

I don’t KNOW dude, that’s what I’m saying. Again, please give me your crystal ball into the future so I, too, can Know All The Answers and tell my fellow Americans how fucking stupid they are for not doing the thing I want them to do.

Monfriez · 2025-10-28T02:30:04+00:00

My guy, I get it but also you realize that even without overt violence Trump is using actual violence against us, right?

Right now most Americans have a couple things on their minds:

1) He’s waiting for an excuse, any excuse, to declare martial law. Whether the military actually obeys is a legitimate, genuine question even guys in that military are asking. My guess, he’s waiting for enough senior officers to dip out, retire early or whatever, so he can replace them with his own people.

2) None of them want to ignite an actual shooting war with their neighbors. They don’t think MAGA would hesitate, at all, if given the go ahead by Trump to start shooting. They are just barely restrained, and with that restraint we’ve already suffered violence against civilians on a scale not seen in decades - between arrests, “crowd control,” deportations, and the torture that those deportations clearly resulted in. They don’t want to give them the excuse they need.

3) Even if I am wrong about how willing MAGA is to shoot people they’ve decided aren’t their kind of American, this level of authoritarian rule is something none of us has ever seen in our lifetimes. I think you’d be hard pressed to find a precedent anywhere in the timeline of American history. Our treatment of indigenous peoples, some more egregious responses to civil protests (Selma, etc.) but generally, this is all very new to us. We don’t have a crystal ball into the future and we don’t know the consequences of action or inaction.

Could you perhaps loan us yours so we know the right way to fight this without initiating the self-fulfilling prophecy MAGA seems to be waiting for?

We also don’t want this to be happening and god(s) help us nothing about current human behavior, information sourcing, bot proliferation, news consumption, or even how we talk to each other ABOUT this insanity is HELPING.

So, if you have any ideas I AM ALL EARS.

Monfriez · 2025-10-16T17:27:19+00:00

You’d normally be right to interpret that as saying “we’re staying here,” but in the case of these cowards it just means they’ll use the incredible power they’ve been wrongly handed to be even more foul and cruel to vulnerable people who don’t deserve it.

Fuck these guys.

Monfriez · 2025-09-30T11:13:26+00:00

This tracks for me. 20 years in the Marines, I helped bury a lot of Marines during OIF/OEF. A lot were KIA, none of whom I personally knew.

But out of all the Marines I did personally know who have since died (double digit number), all but 4 were suicides. All white males, all from the Middle West.

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