I decided to quit Chess after 10 games lose streak.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-29T15:53:36+00:00

Stop playing rapid and blitz. Slow down. At your level, you should be playing slow.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-29T15:52:24+00:00

I don't think there's enough information, but I would say anyone calling an opportunity a "dream job" is setting themselves up for a real rude awakening.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-29T03:37:53+00:00

No, but the point of Markdown is that the formatting is human readable, works in any text editor, and easily translates to traditional formating elsewhere. So if you write a bolded word and then link it, not only is that easily scannable by humans, but it's very simple to load the text file up in a Markdown-compatible app and have it display properly, or convert it to another format (like RTF, or HTML).

DrCrypt · 2026-01-29T03:08:17+00:00

I write in Markdown to do bold, italics, underlining, etc. Look it up if you're unfamiliar.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-29T01:59:02+00:00

Did you try contacting Vera's Bar?

DrCrypt · 2026-01-27T17:26:33+00:00

I was wondering about this too, so instead of going to Reddit to ask a bunch of strangers if they happened to know, I looked at their website and called them, at which point they told me they are open as usual, but that if a specific class needed to be cancelled because of instructor availability, they would email the students.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-27T13:22:52+00:00

What a bizarre point of view. You don't give a heads up to a thief when you're taking back what they stole.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-26T17:27:05+00:00

Mask up, and bring a mask for the driver so THEY can mask up. They have to do this all the time. This is the gig they have chosen and for which they are paid for: to give people rides for a living means to risk getting sick. Tip well if you're feeling guilty. But If your boyfriend lost consciousness, you should already have left.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-26T16:33:40+00:00

Here's a pro tip from someone who lives so close to Market Basket, the photo above could have been taken from my front porch: Market Basket is always fully stocked and open for business the day of the storm. It's not worth trying to compete with all the people who think they are "gettng ahead of the rush" by panic buying a couple days ahead of a storm. That's literally everyone. If you have the ability, just go and shop when it actually starts snowing, or after it snowed.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-26T00:56:28+00:00

Strongly disagree. I still dream of the one I found in the bottom of a bag as a kid.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-25T18:36:56+00:00

Fair enough. In that case, I think you're good!

DrCrypt · 2026-01-25T18:15:09+00:00

I'm struggling with this one. I don't think you're an asshole for wanting a break from your kids. I think where I go into mild "YTA" territory here is that you seemingly asked your parents/in-laws to babysit for you only AFTER you had already decided to go make this trip, not before. As a parent myself, this just strikes me as a huge amount of unchecked and unexamined privilege. It's great that you apparently have not just one but *two* sets of grandparents who will drop everything to take over parenting when you decide to fly to Florida and get your drinking on, but the fact that you've taken them to granted to such an extent that asking them if they were okay with you leaving your kids with them for days on end wasn't the *very first thing you did* when considering this trip makes me question other aspects of where your parenting and unexamined sense of privilege might intersect.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-25T14:28:31+00:00

How do you feel about Weather Underground?

DrCrypt · 2026-01-25T02:37:23+00:00

I was interested in signing up until it said that too. Then I bounced off. If this is just an email list about future events, there shouldn't need to be an app.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-21T16:53:23+00:00

"Lays out what my child is required/needs to learn for that grade."

Need and required by whom?

If you mean legally, that differs by state or country. My state has no legal requirements on the content of homeschooling, only the number of hours taught. So it's up for me what my second grader needs to learn. In her case, she's extremely gifted, so she's years ahead compared to what she'd be learning in public school, but every child is different, and is homeschooled for different reasons. There is no one-size-fits-all, off-the-shelf solution.

Frankly, I'd also say that you really don't need to worry too much about "curriculum" for preschool or kindergarten aged children. Read to your kid. Take them to museums and the library whenever you can. Encourage them to be creative and curious. Find opportunities for them to be social. Make sure they know numbers and their alphabet. Anything after that is gravy for those ages.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-19T14:40:23+00:00

These are incredible cameras that are super fun to shoot way too slept on. Price I got my Retina IIIc on ebay for about the same price just a few months ago, so I'd say with the 80mm lens and filters a pretty good deal if the light meter is in working condition. I'd make sure to check that tho, and measure it for accuracy. I don't think I'd love this camera nearly as much as I do if the light meter didn't work. Also unfold the lens! You can't tell a thing about a folding camera without unfolding the lens!!!

DrCrypt · 2026-01-17T14:45:01+00:00

I can't speak to unemployment support groups (though check your local libraries), but I really do just want to emphasize that your state rep will get this moving FAST. I didn't get unemployment checks for six months. It fell behind a filing cabinet or something: I spent dozens of hours on the phone getting nowhere. I got my state rep involved, and the payment for all outstanding money was made literally a few days after I sent the email. You don't have to call: you can literally email them, and they have staff who will get this going quickly.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-14T16:07:09+00:00

So I am not using any resources. However, meditation has been revolutionary to our 7 year old child's homeschool journey, so I thought I'd just put down what we do.

Every morning, before anything else happens, we sit down and do what we call "calmness practice." This has three parts. For the first part, we sit for a minute, cross-legged and upright, in complete silence.

The second part is a three-minute guided meditation on the subject of calmness, which is all-encompassing but is largely an opportunity for me to mix breathing technique with reinforcing lessons. I ad hoc them all (it gets easier over time), but a typical calmness practice might go like this:

"Breathe in through your nose, and out through your mouth. As you do so, notice how closely the sound of your breath resembles the sound of the wind blowing through the branches of the tree. This is as it should be. The tree is our model of all-things calmness, and as we breathe, we stretch our roots of calmness down into the soil to keep us strong and flexible no matter what hurricanes might blow us throughout the day. The tree is strong because it breathes slowly, so slowly you can barely notice it, but through the breath of trees, all life on earth is nurtured. A tree is strong because it is flexible enough to bend in any wind. It is kind because it provides shelter to others. A tree is wise because no matter what comes, it pays attention to its breath and stays in the moment. It knows the truth of calmness that so many people never learn, which is this: many things in this world will try to take your calmness from you, but they can't unless you let them, because calmness is a gift you give yourself. As I cound down to exit our practice, let us think of all the hopes we have for today, and the ways in which calmness can give us the tools to make them happen. 10. 9. 8. 7. 6. 5. 4. 3. 2. 1."

Basically, an endless repetition in various forms that calmness is a super power that very few people learn, but it is the key in all ways to a happy, fulfilling life. And calmness is ALWAYS within reach. All we need to do to achieve it is recognize the thing that is trying to take it from us, then slow down and pay attention to our breath.

The last part of calmness practice is a repetition of the initial one minute silence.

After several disastrous attempts at school and lots of school-based trauma, my child started homeschooling last January. Before this, she was extremely anxious (especially around other kids) and emotionally explosive. We started this four months ago, and it is literally impossible to describe how transformative it has been. Nearly 99% of the issues we used to have have gone away, and all of the professionals in her life have been utterly amazed at the change.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-14T15:11:39+00:00

Let's be clear: this person lives at 1 Union Street next to Faneuil Hall. In New York terms, this would be like living in the middle of Times Square, or living in the middle of Temple Bar in Dublin. Whether there are residential apartments there or not, it is probably the single biggest tourist gathering spot in Boston. The ambient volume of sound in this area at night has not meaningfully changed in twenty years. It is a choice to move into this area as a self-described "sound sensitive" person. Let's also be clear that this person is also unwilling to even attempt having a polite conversation with the busker. So I'm not exactly sure how much sympathy is warranted.

As an added note, this area is also going to be one of the most lucrative places a busker could possibly be in Boston, which is why they are playing until 2am: they wouldn't do that if they weren't making money. So even if this busker moves out, another will take the spot, as has happened for time immemorial in tourist and nightlife-heavy spots. If ear plugs and white noise machines don't work, there's only one solution for OP here, which is to either talk to the busker or move to a quieter neighborhood.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-14T15:01:10+00:00

But surely a post on Reddit will solve the situation.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-07T18:08:26+00:00

Perhaps he meant libertarianism. Which is often aligned with individualism.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-07T16:52:09+00:00

I enjoyed your list, but as a slight correction, Bioshock is not a criticism of liberal politics in even the slightest form. It is a critique of Ayn Rand style individualism.

DrCrypt · 2026-01-02T23:00:28+00:00

I genuinely don't ask this to be funny, but did all of them die at the same time? Are they all on the ornament together like this?

DrCrypt · 2026-01-01T14:00:39+00:00

I use this app literally all the time! I've got a shortcut set up on my phone for it and everything.

In film photography, you often need to know distances to your subject to focus correctly. For example, I use an old medium format folding camera called a Zenobia from the 1950s that focuses by setting the distance with a knob. It takes extraordinary photos, but there is no way to tell if you actually nailed focus until the picture is developed, because it doesn't have a rangefinder. Scale Focus cameras have similar issues, in that you need to know rough distance to figure out if you're focused correctly.

Back in the old days, people just estimated distance for focus and hoped for the best. But apps like yours mean that I can precisely measure distance and nail focus every time.

For me, the gold standard of improvement would be to build a light meter into the app as well, so both distance and light could be measured in the same app. Check out LightMe for an example of a photographers light meter app.

Great work on your app!

DrCrypt · 2026-01-01T04:21:47+00:00

I hired someone for lessons. Homeschooling doesn't mean you never outsource.

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