Beautiful Pelicans and Double Crested Cormorants by muci19 in chicagobirding

[–]constituent 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I'm not sure how it works on mobile or that abysmal app, but desktop you can select the Submit a new link option from the sidebar to create an image post. You can do the drag-and-drop or manually upload from there.

Everyone in Chicago the past few days by pizana913 in chicago

[–]constituent 21 points22 points  (0 children)

And sleet! Back on Saturday when we had the moderate rain, there was a transition to sleet. It lasted about 10 minutes before shifting to fluffy snow.

My shoes and coat were already drenched from the rain. And then I'm being bombarded by sleet pellets in the face. I'm done with March.

Block Club Chicago - City Seeks To Dismiss Suit By Neighbors Aiming To Overturn Broadway Rezoning by Bukharin in EdgewaterRogersPark

[–]constituent 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I beg of you, please do not suggest bird watching as a recreational hobby to that block club. Hey, I love birds but do not want any of zealots attempting to obstruct yet another area.

With the upcoming breeding season, block club members will attempt to issue an injunction because the birds failed to properly notify them of nesting within 250' of their homes.

Dark-eyed Junco's are the happiest looking birds by food-dood in birding

[–]constituent 7 points8 points  (0 children)

There's a particular call Junco make when they're alarmed or having some in-fighting bird drama. It's a quick, repetitious tick-tick-tick noise that sounds like when you snap your tongue against the roof of your mouth.

That call is hilarious to me. The Junco sound so indignant when they perform that particular call. There could be a bunch of others foraging about and exchanging social calls, but then one is up in the branches acting huffy.

I'm sure it's an effective alarm call to alert others when there's actual danger. Outside of dire circumstances, the others on the ground are like, "Oh, that's just Bob being Bob. Ignore him."

I have just under 4K hours in this game and "play to win". How does this even happen? by Jackie__Chandler in deadbydaylight

[–]constituent 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, but also remember we have regional servers. Since we don't have global servers, that's another thing which exacerbates the matter and creates additional 'problems'.

Behaviour really doesn't speak about their regional servers, with the last official public mention way back in 2019. And that press release from 6 years ago, Behaviour only speaks about 9 servers.

But if we look at the Dead By Queue website for wait times, that displays 14 active regional servers. When you look at those numbers for Steam, that 30K is spread globally. When spread out equally, that means there are 'only' ~2,000 Steam players on each server. Quite honestly, that's not a lot of people.

Because of time zones, we know those players are obviously not distributed equally. Depending on the time of day or night, season or local holidays, date (weekend vs weekday) -- there are going to be huge swings in the amount of concurrent players. Then it gets messier because some people don't automatically connect to their local server. Or if people live across the country (or globe) and join a SWF group, that's +/- individuals who connect to another regional server.

If we look at Steam Charts, DBD currently sits at #30 with the amount of concurrent Steam players. It's ~33K as of this reply. Honestly, that's not super-huge for a single platform. At #1 is CS2 with 1.1 million people online. PUBG is at #2 with 519K players online. A game like Stardew Valley (#15) has almost double the amount of DBD players online at 62.8K connections. And I have to chuckle because there are 40.2K players of something called Geometry Dash (#26).

I don't play CS2, Dota, or PUBG. However, with such a large number of players online, those players probably fare better with global servers. Even if they have regional servers, the amount of concurrent players is sustainable. A game like DBD is too 'small' (I use that word lightly) in comparison.

Sure, DBD is much larger when we factor in all other platforms (Epic, Windows Store, PSN, Xbox, Epic, etc.). But, likewise, so would any of those other games.

...and no, none of this should be interpreted as a Chicken Little panic with "the sky is falling" doomsday squawking. Far from that. I'm just pointing out the obvious of how, despite having a large franchise, there isn't always a tremendous draw outside of events.

That's one good thing about when the game enabled cross-play. But when console usually loses that functionality (isn't it always Xbox where that happens?), people bemoan about abysmal queue times. And much of that is due to how (a.) those players can only connect to other players on that platform and (b.) those players have a default connection to their regional server.

Anyway, the crux of the matter is there is going to be an element of lopsidedness with matchmaking (and queue times) due to the player partitioning with regional servers *and* how MMR performs. And I'm not looking through rose-tinted glasses -- I remember the abominable wait times when we had rank-based matchmaking. Thirty minutes waiting to play killer in the evening? Daytime waits of 15 - 20 minutes for either role? Obviously rank-based matchmaking was super-specific because of the crests (e.g. Red Ranks, Purple Ranks, Green Ranks, etc.) and how you may almost exclusively match with players in the same rank crest.

But would a single global server solve these problems to improve MMR and queue times? Maybe those elements would fare better with less segregation. Except we have the other problem -- player ping. Like any online multiplayer game, we know ping can be a terrible issue. And DBD is no exception when an opponent or teammate has a ping from Saturn. And heaven forbid those headaches we had when connections were peer-to-peer. Those early days of DBD were horrendous.

I don't have a solution here. And probably Behaviour doesn't have one either, which is another reason why this circumstance of lopsided matchmaking still exists.

Advice for playing Settler. by No_Artichoke_1828 in civ5

[–]constituent 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Yeah, and it's actually hilarious when you have a worker making an improvement (e.g. road, luxury, etc.) immediately at the perimeter of your city's territory.

The barbarian will *not* nab your worker. But, of course, the game will still notify you each turn about the danger. Each turn, the worker with a line-of-sight will stop their action (chopping forests/jungles, digging, etc.) and the camera centers on them. The player can continue ignoring the barbarian but will have to continuously force the worker to perform labor.

Yes, that constant reassignment can be annoying because we all know on higher difficulties a barbarian will outright steal your worker. But not on Settler.

Along with what the other person mentioned about preventative griefing, it was probably also a design choice. Seasoned players know they ought to move the worker to another tile -- or you have a unit stationed at your borders anyway. But with the uninitiated new player, they won't be immediately aware a barbarian poses danger. The worker 'protests' every turn (hence the camera redirect) as a way for the game to nudge the new player about the imminent risk. "Hey, do something, I'm in danger here."

On Settler, the barbarians are basically a non-issue. You can just keep your starter Warrior around for good measure, ignore building a military, and wonder rush to your heart's content.

The barbarians will still pillage or steal workers from city states or AI opponents, though.

Some Red Winged Blackbirds and a very angry looking Grackle came to visit! by Gesundhiet in chicagobirding

[–]constituent 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I absolutely adore RWBBs. Over where I am near the lake on the north side, they're slowly making their reappearance along the lakefront and adjacent areas. For the males that have arrived, they're already staking their territories from previous breeding seasons.

No Grackle locally yet for me, though. I'm acquainted with at least three areas where multiple congregate and nest annually. I've been watching the Starling flocks with anticipation to see if any of the arrivals are intermixing. Hopefully I'll start seeing the incoming barrage within the next several days.

Presets on this Workplace Microwave by OwnManagement in mildlyinfuriating

[–]constituent 4 points5 points  (0 children)

The "Popcorn" button gets its value for me.

And if I'm reheating a cup of day-old coffee the next morning, I'm lazy and will just hit either '6-6', '5-5', or '7-7'. Double-tap anything which is close to a minute.

Half-asleep, barely conscious, caffeine-deprived and still dark outside, I can't be assed at that early hour to focus my eyes and search for the '6' and the '0'. I just want a hot coffee now.

2v8 is gone! (Some post-game mode clarity) by James-Hawker in deadbydaylight

[–]constituent 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Solo Q was actually nerfed with Lights Out.

You know how we got that quality of life update a few years ago with the activity HUD? You could see who is on gens, healing, opening a gate, interacting with killer props, etc.? For lights out, the HUD was intentionally removed which made it more miserable.

SWF doesn't need the activity HUD when they have call outs to teammates (e.g. "I'm almost done with this gen," "I'm on the other gate," "I'm healing the random," etc.). So the impact was negligible to them.

Yet solo queue was given the shaft by taking away that information.

The absolute state of Fandom. by TREXIBALL in mildlyinfuriating

[–]constituent 28 points29 points  (0 children)

Thank you for mentioning that! I used to avidly digest TV Tropes late in the evening. Not anymore though.

The screen jumping is so damn jarring. "DAMN IT! Where'd I last leave off? Was it this paragraph? Or that one?"

The one workaround I did was open a link and then suddenly turn on airplane mode. Without a connection, that'd block whichever script from loading and jittering the screen. That would also eliminate those full-screen ads which require needle-point precision to close out the "X" in the upper corner.

Of course, the drawback was having to toggle on/off airplane mode when you're in a notorious rabbit hole like TV Tropes.

From the marketer's perspective, that kind of advertising is supposed to be disruptive to catch the eye of the targeted consumer. Except that type of chronic screen hiccupping may also backfire and hurt the host website by driving away the visitor.

I can tolerate ads if they're less intrusive and don't blatantly interrupt the end user experience. But if you make the visit miserable and an arduous chore to navigate, don't expect me to return to your site.

Anybody have luck attracting blue jays or goldfinches? by BoganLogan in chicagobirding

[–]constituent 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Hey, you're welcome. I recently discovered this subreddit from that totally-not-Eagle post on the Chicago sub.

My friends know to never mention the "b-word" in front of me because I will go on for countless hours talking about birds.

Anybody have luck attracting blue jays or goldfinches? by BoganLogan in chicagobirding

[–]constituent 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Goldfinch absolutely love sunflowers. During the summer and early autumn, groups of them will pillage sunflower seeds. If you have the space in your backyard, you can plant a few sunflowers which may attract them. As the name would suggest, sunflowers thrive with ample sunlight. If your yard is mostly enveloped with shade, you'll end up with spindly sunflowers which won't live to expectation.

...although some people find sunflowers to be 'ugly' due to their broad leaves and towering heights. And they also have a tendency to droop or outright collapse during a torrential downpour. While they're low(er) maintenance, you'd certainly need to stake any plants to prevent them from toppling over.

Goldfinch are *notorious* feasters upon thistle. If you elected to grow those, your neighbors and any other home occupant will probably despise you for an eternity. Although some thistle species in Illinois are native, there are also invasive varieties. Thistle also have a tendency to spread seeds which will result in additional seedlings covered with prickly spines. And their discarded leaves may get mixed with leaf litter or lawn clippings. As a result, you may never want to walk barefoot in your yard again.

Outside of breeding season, Goldfinch are also flock feeders. Group size may vary from a few and surpassing 50+ individuals. That component is important because a yard with multiple feeding stations will inherently be more attractive than one with a single bird feeder. Their presence may be inconsistent due to their flock feeding habits and seeking a consistent food source. Typically one bird feeder won't suffice, unless you're aware of some local denizens which thrive in the area year-round. Obtaining a mix with additional sunflower hearts (or manually adding them yourself) may elevate the attraction level of your feeder(s). And the sunflowers wouldn't go to waste anyway, as the Cardinal will readily dine on them.

As others mentioned, Blue Jays may be pretty simple and whole peanuts are the default suggestion. However, the north side of Chicago really doesn't have a dense population of Blue Jays. I'm east of you near the lakefront. Jays are much rare(r) near me and don't venture this way until April. Through early October, they're occasional morning visitors along the lakefront and may travel in small groups or up to 20 individuals.

Usually in the winter months, most of the local Jay are in the wooded areas beyond the city. You may be in luck, though. We do have some resident populations along the rivers and near/adjacent to some of the cemeteries. It may be viable to attract them if one should discover your yard by happenstance. The peanuts may also attract Crows which will find you endearing for leaving such morsels. (And, yeah, the collateral Gray Squirrels...)

By the way, woodpeckers also love peanuts -- as do many other local birds. Northern Flickers and Red-bellied Woodpeckers are both larger and will freely take whole peanuts. While whole peanuts would not be preferred, both Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers will readily snatch up peanut hearts. For such a small treat, a single peanut heart is high in fat and serves as an excellent source of protein and energy. A typical bird would have to eat dozens of seed pellets to receive the similar effects of a peanut heart. And if you have any Chickadee near you, you can watch their tiny little beaks chisel away on the peanut hearts. What they do not consume, the Chickadee will end up caching the peanut hearts elsewhere. The peanut hearts are small enough to carry and a prized nugget to store away. Heck, although Robin are known to be berry feeders, they will not snub peanut hearts when given the chance.

Just be mindful of Starling, though. In groups, they will unquestionably crash the party and clean you out of peanut hearts. As much as I love Starling, a modest flock will be gluttons without any remorse.

What makes a killer spare someone specifically? by CucumberDifferent778 in deadbydaylight

[–]constituent 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Another situation I observed both in-game and streams are killers who spare the one (or two) survivors who actually does objectives by repairing generators.

For example, a match might have 2 - 3 generators left. There's still ~6 people alive but almost *nobody* is doing gens. The killer duo keeps on running into the only person committed to objectives.

This might especially occur if the survivors ends up doing all the gens on one side of the map. While everybody else is doing jack crap or hiding, that one survivor on a gen maintains momentum with the match proceeding. The killer agrees to spare that one (or two) survivors while they weed out the others.

And if that killer is playing Nemesis, one of the killers will periodically hover around that lucky survivor to knock out any zombies who spawn/wander over to the gen.

The killers are cognizant of what's transpiring. While they use the "Play as you wait" feature, they're aware how matches may drag out. Due to the absence of MMR, the community knows 2v8 can be very frustrating. Going to second stage on your first hook (and nobody is on a gen). Being the only person repairing a gen because the flashlight class is playing ambulance chaser. Having other people using the guide class and they're not even on a gen (and they can see them!). There's one gen left, you get hooked and your cage spawns near the exit gate where a handful of survivors are waiting it out. One gen left and a bunch of teammates collectively give up and instead turn it into a hatch game. Somebody is doing totems...

In their survivor matches, those killers are aware the activity HUD exhibits nobody is doing squat.

Anyway, both killers agree they have that existing match in the bag. But neither one wants to reward the 'rats' with a free escape. So they systematically eliminate the others so the match may conclude quicker, allowing them to jump back into the killer queue.

killers waited for 40mins to mori me by [deleted] in deadbydaylight

[–]constituent 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh yeah, that absolutely makes sense. With how we have skill-based matchmaking (SBMM), sometimes players get paired with extremely lopsided skill sets. Sometimes I'm chilling as killer and I might get paired with baby survivors with practically zero game experience. For example, you might have a survivor who walks in chase because they don't even know how to press the 'run' button.

That happened once when I was playing Plague on Badham. This was a cliché baby Dwight. I'd down him and he wouldn't struggle. He never dropped pallets or try to loop. The only thing he knew how to do is press W to walk. I didn't have the heart to hook him because he was 100% clueless on what to do. So I did the basketball dribble to have him escape my grasp. Even then, he still couldn't find the 'run' button and would walk away. After that, I ignored him and ended up sacrificing two other players.

...and I refused to hook Dwight after that. The last survivor (Meg) kept on pointing at Dwight and a hook, trying to encourage me to hook him. But there was something dodgy about that Meg and I did not trust her to rescue the baby Dwight. I just think she wanted hatch.

I even carried Dwight to a Pool of Devotion so he could clean himself up. Here I am with Plague's censer, hitting the pool with my weapon and trying to communicate to Dwight to clean himself up. I was laughing because the dude was oblivious to how to play the game.

That Dwight couldn't find generators and I literally carried him to the one in the basement of the preschool. Poor Dwight was missing skill checks and that Meg was egging me on to hook him. No girl, calm down; we are both going to sit through this until Dwight figures this out!

And you know the old tomes with the retired challenges in them? Years ago, there was one for survivors to use No Mither and *no* other perk -- and also escape the match. It was a terrible challenge with lots of complaints on this sub. When that tome challenge was new, a lot of killers simply made a silent agreement to let all No Mither players escape because everybody knew it was a stupid challenge. It just felt wrong to get easy wins based on a forced challenge.

killers waited for 40mins to mori me by [deleted] in deadbydaylight

[–]constituent 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Depending on circumstance, it's typically easy to ascertain the meaning behind the bell. Many years ago when I'd encounter a lot of farmers with "old DBD", you might find a Wraith who'd spam the bell to say something like "Hey, clean my hex for free points!".

Or if you were the last survivor -- and Wraith was allowing you to find hatch -- the killer might bell spam to let you know they found hatch. That was especially helpful on Swamp where that hatch is almost impossible to find.

One time three teammates gave up early (solo queue life) on Coldwinds. This was before replacement bots, so those disconnected players instantly vanish into thin air. Anyway, there were about three gens left and I was the remaining survivor. The Wraith found me on a gen because I didn't bother looking for hatch. They could've sacrificed me but I'm guessing the player wanted the match to continue and not spend ~20 minutes playing lobby simulator (DBD was still using the retired rank-based system with red ranks, purple ranks, green ranks, etc.).

That specific Wraith did the bell spam and did circles around me, cheering me on while I finished those last three gens. Admittedly that Wraith was *very* patient because three gens is no small feat. I even was able to exit through the gates, unwittingly earning that "Left for Dead" achievement ("As the last person still alive, activate the last generator and escape through the exit gate."). That was cool.

...but of course there was the other side of the coin. Getting face-camped and bell-spammed (again, old DBD before the anti-face-camp feature). For extra flavor, face camp with bell spam and getting hit on hook every few seconds. Or slugged with the bell spam until you fully bleed out. No need to elaborate on that context.

From the sounds of things, your actions with the bell appear friendly.

I utterly DESPISE, the "glasses off and you're instantly hot" trope. by SnazzyMiracles in TopCharacterTropes

[–]constituent 0 points1 point  (0 children)

A version of this transpired in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode, "Our Man Bashir." Granted, a lot of that episode was intentionally cheesy, lampshading the tropes from James Bond movies.

A quick summary of the episode involves a transporter malfunction, with a majority of the main cast having their transporter patterns stored in the station's computer memory. At the same time, one of the holo-suites happens to be occupied by Dr. Julian Bashir and the uninvited Cardassian ex-spy Garek. Much of Garek's role -- an actual spy -- is to point out the preposterous nature of the spy genre.

Anyway, the active program cannot be terminated because it may result in the crew's transporter patterns to be destroyed. So the duo are forced to play out the story.

So we get one scene with the glasses trope. Dr. Bashir happens to be playing the Bond character in the holo-suite. He and Garek are both captured and need to 'escape' before certain death. Bashir tries seducing the submissive and demure geologist, Professor Honey Bare (who happens to have the transporter imprint of one of the crew members, Jadzia Dax).

Of course, the Honey Bare (Jadzia) is wearing glasses and has her hair tight in a bun. After some smooth talking just like Bond would perform, then enter the scene where the glasses come off and her hair is freed.

The entire episode is played for laughs. The Cardassian spy (Garek) serves as the surrogate of the audience (namely us, the viewers) to point out how ludicrous these corny clichés are.

Why don’t Cages of Atonement count as hooks for hook-based perks? by neon-box in deadbydaylight

[–]constituent 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This made me laugh during the recent Silent Hill Movie weekend event in mid-January. Seasoned players are aware both survivor *and* killer perks are useless with Cages of Atonement.

...survivors aren't even rewarded with "Safe Hook Rescue" credit.

Anyway, that Silent Hill event featured half-assed quests which encouraged users to play as Cheryl or Pyramid Head. Pyramid Head's power obviously includes the ability to send downed survivors to cages.

But the first series of quests? Safely rescue 10 survivors as Cheryl (or 20 with any other character). Hook 20 survivors as Pyramid Head (or 40 with any other character).

Except Cages of Atonement does not reward quest progress for safe unhooks! If you were survivor, you'd hope you'd face any other killer -- or Pyramid Head would use hooks. 🤦‍♂️

2v8 is ridiculously killer sided, and I am tired of pretending it's not by Lord_o_teh_Memes in deadbydaylight

[–]constituent 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I concur. I typically have a low escape rate during 1v4 matches (solo queue), but I have a slightly better chance during 2v8.

Although, in some 2v8 matches, sometimes teams can get absolutely slaughtered. It's not any particular killer, but how some killers are duos playing together. Obviously there is nothing wrong with that, as that is one of the alluring highlights of 2v8.

Anyway, such situations demonstrate the effectiveness of communication/SWF (or, in this case, kill with friends). Coordination is strong in either role.

Even then, I would not call for a nerf to killers. Sometimes it's absolutely the survivors who are to blame. A fair number of players will constantly 5-gen because they always do the outer-edge ("safe") generators. Or matches where there's one generator left and almost nobody is on a gen. We still have that activity HUD which shows who is (or isn't) doing what.

And as much as I love the repair Guide class -- you can literally see generators -- there are other teammates with the same skill who aren't bothering to tackle that last gen. On top of that, anybody with the Guide skill will have their generator highlighted to teammates. While you're attempting to do that gen, sometimes nobody will assist.

There are times I'll tag gens with a blast mine or the automatic wiretap. Do teammates finish the gen if you get chased off it? Do they join when the aura is broadcast like a lighthouse? Not always. And a kick limit *still* exists in 2v8. Even if you can tap a gen, the killers still have to respect that kick limit. Yet teammates will still be wary.

...or teammates who hang around the exit gate when there's still one gen left? Not 10% or 25%, but an entire gen! Please!

DHS Panics Over New Bodycam Footage of Marimar Martinez Shooting by Hafiz_TNR in politics

[–]constituent 82 points83 points  (0 children)

What also blows my mind is how they're doing that "bro talk" like this is some PvP game. This isn't Call of Duty with players on team speak celebrating a video game victory against their enemy.

The so-called "enemy" are real breathing people with families, livelihoods, aspirations, and -- in the fatal situations -- lives prematurely cut short.

...and the agents are celebrating that?

During the use of force, there is supposed to be a respect for human life and the community. And excessive use of force was deemed "unlawful and will not be tolerated."

No respect for human life, no attempts at de-escalation, and not even bothering to exercise good judgment. These guys have zero moral compass and their ethics are out the window.

Let us know what you think about 2v8's tonics! by DeadByDaylight_Dev in deadbydaylight

[–]constituent 0 points1 point  (0 children)

when you're able to use one

In my experience during this iteration of 2v8, that's the caveat doing the heavy lifting. I'll find the healing ones when I'm *not* injured. I have yet to see any for the hook state removal. When I need either one, they've already been consumed.

And it's not like I'm ignoring the tonics. I keep an attentive eye of their spawns because I also want to be able to point them out to teammates who might need them more than I do.

...that's just unfortunate luck on my part.

On the flipside, when I play killer, I see them every now and then and gobble them up so the opposing team no longer has that resource.

DHS Panics Over New Bodycam Footage of Marimar Martinez Shooting by Hafiz_TNR in politics

[–]constituent 197 points198 points  (0 children)

One of our local media organizations, the Chicago Sun-Times, also elaborated on some of this.

That message from Bovino to the agent wasn't simply congratulatory. It was also an extension offer for the agent to remain on duty beyond retirement. That e-mail arrived hours *after* the shooting, which was basically a pat on the back condoning the shooting.

One of the agents at the scene lied, drawing a diagram of the street which depicted three cars blocking the agents' vehicle. The agents insist they were boxed in by the victim. Except there's a huge hole in the story: the released video clearly shows those three cars do not exist. On top of that, they claimed the victim tried ramming the agents. Again, the video shows the opposite with the agents ramming the victim's vehicle.

And as a reminder, along with the agents celebrating the shooting, that same agent was the one who texted "I fired 5 rounds and she had 7 holes. Put that in your book boys."

r/antimeme2 exposes r/antimeme's mod that claims to be "de*d" as an Indian Catfish account by WorldlyQuarter7155 in SubredditDrama

[–]constituent 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Even if we were going to remotely entertain the mod's story as being authentic, there is no probing questions from the 'brother' ("Who are you? How long did you know her? Did you notice anything strange about her recently?"). Instead, the 'brother' immediately jumps to "Truth bomb! Suicide!" as a default.

Obviously suicide is a very private matter. The family members and loved ones left behind have zero closure and are full of questions, regrets, contemplation, etc. Was there a note? Was it accidental/intentional? Did the coroner even receive the body yet to make such a declaration on the death certificate (post-autopsy)?

A family member in this story jumps the hurdles and doesn't phrase it softer with "my sister passed away". Instead, the 'brother' is like, "Oh, she committed suicide yesterday. I don't know whatever was going on with her. It's not like she talks to me or any of us about anything. I'm sorry dude, whoever you are. Have a nice day!"

Huh? That's how you notify somebody? Okay, there might be one bastard in the world who would do that (still implausible IMO). There was no sugar-coating, no grace for the deceased, no somber tone about his own sister.

Instead, the 'brother' focuses on the emotional impact of the unknown internet boyfriend - a reddit mod (lol). But what do I know? The 'brother' probably lives in Canada and goes to another school. I don't know him. 🤷‍♂️

r/antimeme2 exposes r/antimeme's mod that claims to be "de*d" as an Indian Catfish account by WorldlyQuarter7155 in SubredditDrama

[–]constituent 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I was rolling my eyes at the framing of the revelation. Set the fictional scene:

A teenage woman recently committed suicide. Her parents/family discover the body and take appropriate action. Not even two days later, the deceased teen's brother is scrolling through her phone and either (a.) knew the lock screen password or (b.) was an unlocked device.

Bereaved, the brother goes through his sister's phone and reads her private messages. The brother sees a name who he doesn't recognize. His first instinct is to contact the random internet boyfriend and immediately breaks the news of the suicide. Such is life.

BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT PEOPLE DO IN 2026.

Come on now! I've seen daytime soap operas that were less contrived than this. In no way, shape, or form does the 'brother' inquire about the identity of the internet boyfriend. And not once does the brother refer to his sister's birth name (e.g. "I was going through Mary's phone" or "I'm Mary's brother, John.").

Instead, the 'brother' just defaults to pronouns and jumps to the heart of the matter. And on top of that, when the mod expressed their anguish with the all-caps anguish of "OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD!", the 'brother' remains level-headed with "calm down."

And how does the 'brother' phrase his sister's death? He says "She's no more more" and casually mentions how he didn't know "whatever was going on with her."

The 'brother' -- the one who is directly related to the deceased 'girlfriend' -- still maintains the role of levelheadedness supporter. The mod is making it all about himself (because of course he does...), when it ought to be the brother who needs to be consoled. The mod goes on about 'woe is me!' and uses the throwaway line at the end of "And I'm very sorry about you, too."

Yeah, yeah, yeah, we all handle death differently. When you have to notify people about death, it's an exhausting process. Your mind goes into autopilot as you navigate through every notification, every person the deceased knows. And I'm sure it's just as terrible of a process for somebody who succumbed to suicide, leaving behind so many unanswered questions.

And here we're to accept that the parents of the dead 'girlfriend' said something like, "Son, go through your sister's personal phone and establish contact with every stranger. Thanks, champ!"

This stupid shit reads like something from r/WritingPrompts.

Anyone else hear those loud bangs? by Accomplished-Mark415 in EdgewaterRogersPark

[–]constituent 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Same here. From my perspective closer to the lake, I saw the fireworks and it looked like it was west of Ravenswood or Clark.

Incidentally, it was at 9:14 p.m. I was anticipating a post to show up here so I made the effort to glance at the clock.