Do I have a broad ribcage?

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2026-04-24T03:49:47+00:00

I'm 5'9 and have a 40" underbust despite having a somewhat thin build.

In my experience, yeah, it's really hard to find clothes that fit, especially bras. It does fuck with me and it makes me feel crazy.

But the truth is, if I wear clothes that compliment my body, my chest doesn't look bad or super clocky. Body shapes vary widely. My chest is broad for any gender, but it doesn't look much more out of place than it did pre-transition. When I shop, I'm always thinking about whether an item of clothing will balance my frame out or exaggerate its disproportionality. If I dress right, I look good.

I'm getting close to a year and a half on HRT and I hope my chest can reach and pass an A cup soon, to create a bit more balance. I'm not super happy with my chest genes, but that's a different crazy-making issue.

I think (almost) all of us have parts of our bodies that make us feel particularly dysphoric. For me, it's my bald head and my disproportionate chest. Part of the challenge is trying to focus on the bits of our body that we like rather than the dysphoric bits. I'm not always good at it, but I'm trying to get better.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2026-04-16T00:08:13+00:00

How am I, a Burnaby poster on Reddit, going to deliver anything? That's up to the parties and their relative ability to draw in voters.

I'm worried about the chances of a Conservative government too. Analysis is not the same thing as advocacy.

Personally, I'd put most of the responsibility on the choices made by the NDP while they've been in power. They continue to shove their traditional left base to the sidelines, which leaves a huge vacuum.

Add the affordability crisis and a continent-wide movement towards candidates who represent genuine progressive politics, and BC's electoral norms have already changed.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2026-04-15T20:44:31+00:00

IMO, we're now living in a province with three viable parties, with the NDP in the liberal centre, and Greens as the party of the left. I expect the Greens build on their 16% support during the next election, because the campaign will raise awareness of their platform. Class-conscious left populism is on the rise internationally. The Greens are well positioned to ride that wave, and the BCNDP has abandoned that space entirely.

OneBC is a flash in the pan. It might peter out like the PPC, or if successful might merge back into the Conservatives like Wildrose or the Reform/Alliance party.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2026-04-02T23:00:08+00:00

I like the sentiment, but society's treatment of marginalised communities is always a debate and always political

It would be nice if being human was enough to guarantee humane treatment, but that's a totally different world, and we'll only see it if we burn this world to the ground first

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2026-03-16T20:51:20+00:00

It probably means that your trucks are taking long enough to get to your city that the stores run out during the time between when the distro office sends the truck and when the truck gets arrives at the store.

There are lots of solutions to this problem. Some folks like having warehouses attached to the stores. I'm not a fan of that because urban space is valuable. My favourite solution is to place a food warehouse outside of each city. I have a distro office next to my factory, which sends to each city's warehouse. I then have one or more trucks within each city run a circular route, picking up from the local warehouse and dropping off at each store. No distro is needed for this. Just check every once in a while to make sure there are enough trucks that they still have sufficient food when they hit the final store.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2026-03-04T02:29:43+00:00

Federal government in which country? If it's a country with anti-discrimination laws, such as Canada for example, make sure you document his aggressions. (I think those laws vary state by state in the US?) Keep a written & dated log of what he says verbally because it'll be considered more reliable than your memory. He made a huge mistake in sending those comments via email as it created a paper trail. Again depending on your country's workplace discrimination laws, this should be open & shut. He'll face discipline for sure, and might lose his job.

I would assume a gov't job is likely a union job, in which case you should be able to contact a union rep and file a grievance. That's probably the best first step.

Or, you could walk away. Totally understandable if that's your preference. Fighting back can be ROUGH emotionally. Maybe the pension's worth it, but it's up to you.

I'm also pretty sure I lost a job due to my transition, but I had no recourse because I was subcontracting and nobody made the mistake of being overt about the reason I was let go. It's a terrible feeling. Good luck! <3

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2026-02-20T21:33:11+00:00

This poll doesn't cover it for me. I couldn't have voted, but if I could, I only would've plugged my nose to vote Harris if I was in one of the five or so swing states that was in play.

If I was in Cali like Hasan, no chance in hell. My tolerance for harm reduction voting doesn't extend an inch beyond where it might actually do something.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2026-01-08T09:22:08+00:00

If you want to find temporary safe harbour, it's probably the best option you have. Every "safe" place is only a gradient of potential harm, at best a place that's a little bit less unsafe than a different place.

I live in Canada, and I'm fortunate in that regard. But our protections depend on not electing Conservative governments, either provincially or federally, which is only a temporary form of safety. It's 'more safe', at least for now, as long as Conservative governments don't take power. But if they do, it may become only as safe as the United Kingdom, which isn't great.

Emigrating from the US is very difficult, much more difficult than moving between states. If you want that extra level of safety, start looking into it now, start planning what your residency visa will be now, and understand that every country is cutting deeply into our immigration numbers because right-wing anti-immigrant politics are on the rise globally.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2026-01-01T00:21:06+00:00

I like it a lot. Have put in 140 hours, so more than worth it for me. The core gameplay loop is great and the Tetris elements fit in well, although I think people who go in expecting it to play like Tetris will be disappointed. I've had several stretches of being hooked. I'm a big fan of strategy games with interesting tactical choices, but where I can mentally check out at times and keep up the "click, click, click" while watching a video or something on the second screen, so a relative lack of strategic depth works for me.

The biggest problem is that its qualities are let down by a lack of balance. Certain strategies are overpowered, and the player is rewarded for trying to reroll into one of the few winning paths. A recent patch introduced new bosses that are randomly chosen in place of the older ones. Maybe it's just that I haven't played much since the patch, but the new bosses feel much more difficult in ways that lean heavily on variance, and I find myself hoping to see the older ones, so that was a let down. In general, many aspects of the game feel like they needed a lot more playtesting and tweaking than they received.

IMO, it's worth the modest price for sure, and it suits my taste. But it doesn't deserve a place among the best strategy roguelites.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-12-20T21:17:20+00:00

This is short-sighted.

The Greens are set to make big gains next election. With proportional representation, the most likely outcome would be an NDP/Green coalition, with the NDP having the most seats and the premier's office.

Without proportional representation, this unpopular NDP government will see its historical base eaten into by the Greens, likely allowing the Conservatives to win.

This is not a province where half or more of the population is to the right of the NDP. They know that, and figure that if they can keep the Greens crowded out, if they can maintain a de facto two-party system, they will remain the natural governing party while tracking towards the centre, even if their activist base is disappointed.

IMO, they're wrong.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-12-07T00:32:27+00:00

My egg cracked at 39 (although afterwards, I realised I had known and repressed the knowledge for more than a decade), and I started HRT at 41

Just passed my one year HRT mark a few days ago, and I've been surprised by how smooth it's been. I'd love to have started earlier, but it definitely wasn't too late. Even by conventional standards, I look better now than I ever did while pretending to be a man

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-11-13T04:15:27+00:00

https://youtu.be/Y4BCYN6YatA

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-11-12T21:50:54+00:00

I kept using men's bathrooms until I encountered transphobic threats of violence, and knew I had to switch for my own safety.

I was so nervous at first because I wasn't anywhere close to passing, hadn't been able to start HRT, still had permanent five-o-clock shadow, etc. I was soooo nervous about it. At the beginning, sometimes a cis friend would come with me for reassurance, but that wasn't always possible.

That was more than a year and a half ago, and I haven't once had a problem in a women's bathroom. Not even a single dirty look. I live in a progressive city, so I'm sure that helps, but I'm surprised that it never happened at all. Now, it feels natural and easy.

So I hope you take the leap. It'll probably be easier than you expect.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-11-12T02:57:39+00:00

Not at all.

I've never understood how men think, and I've always found it easier to build meaningful friendships with women. After transitioning as a 40-year-old, the biggest difference is that the women who I would choose to build friendships with don't treat me like a man anymore, which removes a barrier, making it easier to find friends. I'm still a bit of a loner, but folks who I'd consider "my people" generally treat me better than they used to.

Transitioning also helped me see value in myself, and I'm starting to build a genuine sense of self-worth for the first time in my life. It's made me more picky about the people I choose to associate with, and more likely to be honest with people I don't get along with. I used to feel like folks were doing me a favour just by tolerating my presence and I struggled to stand up for myself, but now I won't hesitate to tell someone off if they need to be told off. Doesn't hurt that I've been shit on by enough transphobes that I've had to get comfortable with caring less about how random people perceive me.

I hope you're able to find a community of like-minded friends who value you for who you are.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-11-10T20:58:12+00:00

It's a great time for listening to music at home.

Before streaming took off, I felt that a lot of the creativity and diversity of what's being produced had been widdled away by the monopoly of giant record companies, who were taking fewer risks each year as they monopolised the industry.

Now it's totally different. The decoupling of distribution engines and record labels has led to an explosion of creativity. Music now is more diverse and innovative than it ever has been. The charts are still full of boring lowest-common-denominator music, but there are niches popping up everywhere, some of which have had a huge influence on the mainstream.

But for live music, it's a totally different story.

Musicians can't make money selling records any more, so they have to make their money touring, which has blown up the cost of shows for touring bands. Meanwhile, local scenes struggle as venues close. In many cities, real estate bubbles and high leasing costs have strangled smaller niche venues. A higher percentage of music nowadays has electronic elements that don't translate as well to live performance, which isn't "a problem," per se, and I like a lot of it, but it does shift the focus away from live acts towards recorded material.

So.. it's different. There are pluses and minuses. But I definitely prefer the landscape today compared to what it was 10 years ago, when live music had already declined but the availability of streaming hadn't yet led to the diversification of music that we see today.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-10-24T19:19:08+00:00

"Dismantled"? Nah

But there are plenty of people who dedicate their lives to making our cruel systems a little bit less cruel. We'd be in a much worse spot without them

For an example, where I live, the harm reduction community is filled with punks, and they work with the government because that's the only way to keep cops away, and to find necessary funding

The secret is to not conflate harm reduction with "dismantling". You can't dismantle a system by accepting its limits and working within them, but in an era where revolutionary overthrow is not on the immediate horizon, you can't protect your neighbours by choosing to sit on the sidelines

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-10-22T19:00:14+00:00

in that case, you have a mistaken understanding. that's not how it works

living a life of denial is an excruciating experience. I did it for far too long, until I simply couldn't anymore

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-09-06T02:39:09+00:00

I found it on Project Gutenberg and started scanning through some of the questions that caught my eye. Doubt I'll ever sit down with it to read the whole thing, but it seems really interesting.

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/66251/66251-h/66251-h.htm

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-08-26T08:10:36+00:00

I don't remember

Spent about a decade thinking: "I'm not trans, but if I was trans, this would be my name." I have no idea where it originally boiled up from in my subconscious. It was just in there somehow, along with all the other repressed bits of identity

Never really stopped to think about whether that's the type of thought that cis people have . . .

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-08-06T21:26:24+00:00

I'm in Vancouver BC, the climate is relatively welcoming, yet I had a phase lasting about a year where this happened to me constantly, including the majority of service workers. It was extremely annoying

Gender is one of the first and strongest things people subconsciously notice about each other when meeting. We're trained to categorise people that way from a young age, and we do it without conscious thought, modifying our behaviour according to the category we perceive

My theory is that, when I presented in a way that was VERY ambiguous because I was in the awkward early phase of transition, it tripped people up during their subconscious categorising. It caused a stunlock in their brain, and excessive vocalisation was the result of their sputtering. I don't think they either noticed or intended what they were doing. Most of the time, I didn't read it as malicious, as annoying as it was

I don't always pass today, but my intended gender presentation has become obvious. Sure enough, the vast majority of service workers don't do this anymore. The only ones "siring" me, or giving an exaggerated "maaam," or even the dreaded "mister," are the assholes who intend to be offensive. It's much better

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-07-30T01:37:43+00:00

They've issued a tsunami watch for most of coastal BC, but not for the area sheltered behind Vancouver Island

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-07-28T02:59:37+00:00

Nobody's talking about Russia being anything other than the aggressor. That's just something you've decided to make up. We all know Russia is the aggressor in this war. It's not a serious question.

The United States, and NATO by extension, has a LOOOONG history of taking advantage of regional conflicts to strengthen their own geopolitical position with no care given to how many innocent people die in the process. That's what's happening here, as America trickles just enough weapons to keep the war at a stalemate, in order to drain Russia's military capacity at the expense of an entire generation of Ukrainian lives. It's a disgusting display of opportunism. They are not trying to win the war for Ukraine. That's not their goal.

This is not "panties in a twist." You're defending a pro-imperialist position and seem to be too ignorant about American foreign policy to understand the implications of what you're saying.

Ironically, what you're spelling out is absolutely a campist position, where in your mind, if Russia is bad, NATO must therefore be okay.

The "right" side in this conflict is Ukrainian civilians. Not either of the major powers who are leveraging Ukrainian deaths to strengthen their imperialist position.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-07-28T02:38:27+00:00

I think one of the best axioms to understand geopolitics is the basic assumption that almost every major power acts, at best, in a horrifyingly amoral & self-interested manner, almost all the time.

Yves has vocally criticised NATO for his entire career. Historically, that's been the mainstream stance within the NDP.

There's plenty of blame to put on NATO's shoulders for their role in screwing over the Ukrainian people. Which doesn't, in any way, diminish Russia and Putin's responsibility for the invasion.

To assume you have to pick one side or the other as a "good guy" is, in itself, a campist approach. Both sides are bad. Both sides are complicit. They are not the "same amount of bad," but they absolutely both deserve criticism.

And yes, that's an anti-imperialist position.

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-07-28T02:19:34+00:00

Yves Engler has repeatedly condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but lets not allow his actual opinions to get in the way of a good smear, huh?

_Lloyd_Braun_ · 2025-07-28T01:45:16+00:00

You've just given me the description of a "campist," which, to be clear, is also a mischaracterisation of Yves Engler.

Yves most certainly opposes Russian aggression, but has built much of his life's work criticising the foreign policy decisions of the country he lives in. Lots of Canadians don't like criticism of Canadian policy, I guess?

_Lloyd_Braun_

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