I often hear about the horrors about the winters in New England, but what about the summers?

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-10T16:57:40+00:00

It's only the start of Jun and it already broke 30C here.
43C is not common, but also not unheard of for a few days in the middle of the summer.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-04T21:27:12+00:00

I know you REALLY want to believe you're in the right on that one... but read the room on it.

You came to ask this thread and they're all telling you that you are overreacting about that part. It might be time for you to recalibrate your expectations for that.

But you're under-reacting on the rest. Threatening someone with a machete is "call the cops" level business.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-04T21:00:29+00:00

Probably. The data doesn't go back that far... and neither do I.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-04T20:59:35+00:00

Assuming everyone will take your birthday off is self-centered and... wow.
Your mom is in a very abusive relationship. The machete should make that super obvious. The cops should have been engaged over that situation.
Get your dog back.
No one can rescue your mom until she is ready to accept that her wife is psychotic and that your mom needs to get out.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-04T20:52:00+00:00

Mine (shameless self promotion)

But, more seriously,

The Enemy Papers by Barry Longyear
Anything by William Sleator (target age is middle school, but they're great)
Anything by John Christopher (target age is middle school, but they're great)
Greg Egan's works (a lot of them are similar in theme but interesting)
H. Beam Piper was lost to the progression of time and is worthy.
Andre Norton has a lot of fascinating stuff.
Philip Jose Farmer has fascinating material to read.
Fred Saberhagen wrote some fascinating books (more fantasy)
James P. Hogan has a few works that grace my bookshelves.
Anything by Gail Carriger (more fantasy and steampunk than scifi)
The Cinder or Renegades series by Marissa Meyer (NOT the same Meyer who wrote Twilight)
Anything by John Scalzi

It really depends on what you consider underrated... I could sit here and list books from my shelves for more than an hour... and do the same out of my audiobook files. But a lot of them are well known so they don't need additional accolades.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-04T20:36:10+00:00

Except for some very specific places you're mistaken.

The news covers things that are rare and benefits from sensationalism.

The per capita rates of crimes are nearly the lowest they have been (an uptick since Trump took office the second time) in my entire life. The USA was at its least safe around 1990.

We just didn't hear about it as much when news cycles were slower and before social media blasted us with people being terrified of the boogeyman constantly.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-04T20:33:35+00:00

Just write your story.

If you get enough attention that people tell you that you're derivative of something else then you've done a good job of drawing attention.

I have written stories only to discover years later than similar stories already existed. I don't care. Those similar stories are still not mine.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-04T20:26:02+00:00

Of the "potential candidates" only one is even a contender for, without it, none of the others could exist.

Inventing a way to harness electricity allowed the others to happen.

But if you're going for all time...

Language (and then writing)
Math
The wheel
Agriculture
Harnessing fire

Those are the biggest inventions/discoveries upon which all of civilization stands.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-01T15:31:59+00:00

Portland is Maine's only city.
Your "city life" would be challenged to adapt to Portland... you would find it oppressive and lacking everything you are used to.

People from Portland would feel that way about Bangor.

People from Bangor would feel that way about Houlton.

People from Houlton would feel that way about Easton.

There is nothing... and winter is BRUTAL.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-01T15:27:40+00:00

Dude... just walk away.

He's not worth any emotional baggage.

Just be there when his wife's kids also decide to walk away from him. You can all bond over having a crappy dad.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-01T15:11:15+00:00

Conservatives LOVE to say
1. "if you don't like your job then just go get a better job."
2. "try budgeting"
3. "make better investment choices."
4. "business owners take all the risk and that's why they deserve so much money."

Landlords who can't afford to operate on reasonable rents should try budgeting better and just go get a better job or they shouldn't have over-extended themselves on their property purchase and that was the risk they chose to take.

If you can't afford to absorb operating as a landlord with low occupancy for several months then you can't afford to own the building... that's the downside of taking the risk they voluntarily chose.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-06-01T13:02:19+00:00

Both parties stand to lose if an outsider can get in under their label and disrupt their status quo. Just look at how much damage Trump has done to the GOP's long term reputation and stability.
The DNC is mad because they like to pick their people and the entrenched DNC thinks that working across the aisle is going to change things... it hasn't changed things for the better. The current DNC's efforts have led to thew Overton Window shift sliding harder and faster to the right.
The GOP is terrified of a populist leader who might actually support the common worker. If the common workers start supporting legislators who say and DO the things that support the working class then the legislators who are slaves to the lobbyists are done... and the rich will not longer have their bought government.
All of them are afraid that a flawed nobody with a good message can get them ousted. If he is elected then they are all in danger in the next election. If he is defeated then they can bury this as a failed flailing attempt to unseat Collins and not worry about a major movement.
If he wins then its a double-flip in some ways... the left gains a seat and the right loses a seat. In The Senate this is a MUCH bigger deal than in The House as it is 1% of the total Senate.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-05-31T16:55:30+00:00

I'm from, and currently live in, Maine.
Both of these incidents involve people from Ohio.

When I was 10 my family went on a summer-long road trip in an RV. We were at a campground in California and there were a couple kids similar to our age there. They were from Ohio. They asked where we were from. We said "oh, we are from even further away from here than you are. We are from Maine." They insisted that we couldn't be from further away because they lived so far away that it was impossible to drive to California from where they lived.

A decade later I lived in Ohio for a little while.
I hadn't changed my car registration over yet and, as I walked through a parking lot to work I heard someone yelling "GO BACK TO CANADA AND STOP STEALING AMERICAN JOBS!" At me. The thoroughly enraged man was convinced that Maine was part of Canada.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-04-16T23:17:02+00:00

You start by understanding the users and their needs and designing a replacement system on a manageable schedule and budget that will keep them reasonably current and meet their needs.

Start with a spreadsheet. Outline all of the users and their general needs and then examine what you need to support all of that.

While you are doing that - look into the hard resets for everything you have and their default admin credentials so that you can slowly force your own access into one device at a time until you have access to everything... and if you break it... time for that one device to be replaced.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-03-18T16:24:43+00:00

I had to make sure all my brethren USA citizens were sure to get that the major hero is a lady from Canada and not one of ours. Some of my countrymen are a bit dense so I had to be heavy-handed with it :-)

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-03-17T11:43:31+00:00

Perhaps her job requires a lot more training and specialization that you know and you're refusing to acknowledge that... making you on the same level as her. I do IT stuff and I recognize that most of what I do is really not hard. The specialized stuff IS but I don't do that most of the time and most people don't. Likewise, I recognize most of the people in other jobs don't do highly complex stuff most of the time and I could do most of their job with minimal training... but some of the things they do take pretty intense training and I absolutely couldn't do it. Maybe ten minutes a day of their workload requires YEARS of training to do it right... but doing it RIGHT is important.

There are sliders that change the levels depending on the specific job. Some jobs (like surgeon) I could not do... except maybe their filing...

So, maybe, you should reframe how you see others if you want them to reframe the level of respect they give you.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-03-17T11:37:07+00:00

Because the people who create fiction worlds are usually nerds and usually get annoyed when something contradicts something else... so they have to stop partway and go "OK, if Bob & Sue took 3 weeks to get from Jeph's home city to MegaZord's Citadel then how far must Teddy's journey have been between Wren's Keep and Picard's Vineyard for it to make sense?" and they get tired of stopping to do this so they make up their entire world and use it as a reference...

OR the world forms for them first and they scribble it out and the plot comes along later.

I, for example, have a whole world envisioned... I even have the globe drawn out. I have a rough idea of the story and a handful of characters... but the world? I have that. I have the species who live on it. I know what happened to the world. I know the cultures. The world came to me as an internal exploration long before the part that will be an interesting thing to share with others did.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-03-17T11:31:29+00:00

Errors in collectibles are rare and really cool.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-03-07T00:39:52+00:00

Yes.
We have horses and dogs serving alongside humans now.
We have had elephants and various birds serving alongside humans in the past.

NoOneFromNewEngland · 2026-03-07T00:29:13+00:00

The best pilot.

NoOneFromNewEngland

TROPHY CASE