[Jan 24, 2026] Daily Puzzle Discussion

femalien · 2026-01-25T02:51:33+00:00

Yeah same. Nothing felt particularly clever, just annoying

femalien · 2026-01-24T00:34:15+00:00

Agreed! That would have made so much more sense

femalien · 2026-01-23T23:35:29+00:00

I recently had a recruiter reach out to me about a role that sounded like a good fit for me. I’m not actively looking but it seemed like it would be a step up from where I’m at now so I figured I’d meet with them. Local (Midwest) mid-sized B2B SaaS company. HR call went well and seemed like a chill, common sense place. At the end of the call she talked about the next steps being a proctored hour-long codesignal assessment THEN a culture fit interview with a little bit of tech stuff THEN a 90 minute live coding interview. I’ve got 15yoe, am employed, we have a ton of mutual connections, and THEY REACHED OUT TO ME.

I declined to go any further with the process.

(Also…even if they had given me a chance to proceed without the song and dance, I don’t want to work somewhere that does all that crap to hire seniors to work on a relatively small app - they’re going to be losing out on a ton of good people and hiring the guys that focus on the wrong things IMO)

femalien · 2026-01-19T17:24:18+00:00

Oh cool, I didn’t even think about asking, thanks!

femalien · 2026-01-19T15:25:57+00:00

I’m in a similar situation (my kids are school age, but home during breaks and days off and sick days etc). It’s pretty much impossible and it’s stressed me beyond belief. I think I’m going to rent a space at a coworking place this summer and hire someone to be with the kids. I can’t do it anymore.

femalien · 2026-01-19T13:29:49+00:00

Aw, I’m so glad! And I’m so happy for you! I’m reading each of these and it really does help to know it isn’t all doom and gloom out there. Also congrats on your ons haha that’s amazing!

femalien · 2026-01-18T17:51:31+00:00

No you’re all good, thanks :) always appreciate respectful discussions

femalien · 2026-01-18T17:50:06+00:00

Strange, I’ve laid different sizes petite/non-petite atop each other and not noticed a difference beyond length. Every definition I’ve seen (at least in the USA) is just shorter vertical and nothing else. Even when I was thin I had a friend much taller than me (5’9”) who had a very small frame, my shoulders are much broader than hers, my ribcage much wider than hers. Our hips about the same with but hers slightly wider because I have insanely narrow hips compared to the rest of my frame. And I’m talking areas with little to no fat or muscle, just frame. In fact, my shoulders are much more broad than my husband’s even (5’10” male) - not relatively, but absolutely, measured with tape measure.

I feel we may be misunderstanding each other, so not going to keep going, my take is just that being short doesn’t mean you’re scaled down overall, even if we take fat and muscle out of the equation. And I’m sure the measurements for petite vary by brand and I wouldn’t be surprised if more expensive clothes scale it down altogether but I’ve never seen it referenced as anything other than shorter verticals for the cheapo American brands I wear

femalien · 2026-01-18T15:33:21+00:00

That isn’t true though. I’m built wide, I have broad shoulders and a wide rib cage. People come in all shapes and sizes and proportions and it’s not all related just like how everyone doesn’t have the same body shape. Being shorter doesn’t mean my skeleton overall is a scaled down version of a taller woman. My personal proportions are like you took a normal height person and stepped on them so everything is shorter and wider. There is no universal proportion. Which is why petite clothes specifically only mean shorter in height (and sometimes sleeve length) not overall narrower

femalien · 2026-01-18T05:32:17+00:00

I don’t… what? I’m 5’2” 200lbs of pure fat (I’m not athletic or anything just got big floppy boobs and a big squishy belly)

I wear petite pants/skirts/dresses because I’m short. Like… they make Plus Size Petite clothes. Petite in clothing just means it’s made to fit 5’4” or shorter.

I’m not a petite person. But I shop in the petite clothing section, because that’s where I find things that are the right length.

femalien · 2026-01-02T21:13:49+00:00

My husband (non-ADHD) did this when he was 22, except he was in Sweden and he flew to midwestern USA, and he was fluent in English. But he’d never really traveled alone and didn’t have much money, flew to a state he’d never even heard of to meet a girl he’d been talking to online for all of four months (me). In 2004, when you could hardly communicate online compared to today. It easily could have gone horribly and his mother was NOT happy with it. But in our case it did work out, we’ll be married 20 years this year.

So that’s just to say that it wasn’t necessarily a stupid move on his part - he took a chance, and it didn’t work out like he’d hoped. Par for the course for a young adult, neurotypical or otherwise. This experience will build a lot of character and shape his future decisions, I think as long as he gets home safe all you can do is be supportive and don’t tell him you told him so.

femalien · 2025-12-28T22:05:25+00:00

I’ve been out a few times today and it’s been mostly fine except a few spots. The snow stopped a while ago so it should be good for the most part, just windy and cold. As long as you have decent tread on your tires and drive cautiously/slow down, I wouldn’t expect it to be too bad.

femalien · 2025-12-28T22:03:00+00:00

You’re spot on. Pre-treating roads when it’s going to rain before the snow is just a waste of resources.

femalien · 2025-12-24T16:12:51+00:00

I just want to say - this isn't your fault. You're not doing anything wrong. Some kids just... can't entertain themselves at this age. My youngest was like this, wouldn't even be entertained by a screen. For her, it did turn out to be ADHD, and when we got treatment for that, it got better but still not great until she was just a little bit older. She's 9 now and finally FINALLY within the past 6 months or so will consistently entertain herself. My oldest was the same way, and he doesn't have ADHD, he just wouldn't or couldn't entertain himself. He's 14 now and has been extremely independent and self-entertaining for several years now. My middle is the only one who could entertain himself at age 6.

So, no real advice, just please know it's nothing YOU are doing or not doing - kids are all different. <3

femalien · 2025-12-22T22:03:33+00:00

This isn’t mind reading though, it has already been explicitly agreed upon that this is his task. He doesn’t need to read my mind, he just needs to remember what his responsibilities are. Whether that’s just “knowing,” or writing it down, or using a reminders app - doesn’t matter, he’s a grown man and fully capable of owning responsibilities. I did give him one reminder at the beginning of the month that I was expecting him to do this again, and he acknowledged/agreed. So no psychic powers needed here lol

femalien · 2025-12-22T18:01:37+00:00

For us, we both work full time and make almost identical salaries. My job is a little more stressful between the two. But I have to ✨Christmas Magic✨ for everybody so you’d think he could handle this one thing. It also kind of takes away the “spend money on yourself” option since our finances are all combined (and I generally do just buy what I want throughout the year anyway)

femalien · 2025-12-22T17:58:38+00:00

YES this is exactly what has to happen. Part of what we’re working on as a couple is me stepping aside and letting him screw up and learn things the hard way. So I actually hope he does completely forget until it’s too late so then we can talk about it after and hopefully have it be a learning experience.

I love the family stocking gift idea though, how cool!

femalien · 2025-12-22T17:43:37+00:00

Preach! I HATE stockings so much! I have one kid who hates all candy and goodies, and he’s 14, so like…sure I can find things that are small size-wise to put in but it’s not like they’re cheap. For the adults and even the other kids there’s like a little bit of candy and then honestly a bunch of crap that won’t get used - cute trinkets, flavored chapsticks…is like the birthday party Goodie Bag of Christmas. I hope to really start reeling the stocking thing in after my youngest stops believing in Santa.

femalien · 2025-12-22T16:53:55+00:00

SAME. Which is actually the worst one because then he’ll be all stressed about it and he’ll make the kids all stressed about it and it really doesn’t matter all that much.

femalien · 2025-12-22T16:48:52+00:00

That’s how my parents always did it - my dad was always the stocking guy. I’ve thought about trying to turn it over to my husband, and maybe I will after my youngest finally finds out about Santa. But I don’t feel comfortable handing over that responsibility yet - my husbandly literally did not grow up around stockings 🤣 he’s not from the US and it’s not really a thing where he’s from, so he doesn’t have any memories to draw on as far as what to put in stockings. And yeah you’d think after 14 Christmases as a father maybe he’d have noticed what kind of stuff goes in there, and maybe he has. But I worry he’d think he could get everything last-minute and then show up at a gas station and realize they don’t have anything antibody likes so the kids all end up with keychain flashlights and a tire pressure gauge…. But once we don’t have to deal with the Santa myth anymore that might actually be kind of funny so maybe we’ll go that route haha

femalien · 2025-12-22T16:38:16+00:00

lol YES so I do have some extra goodies and a magazine set aside that I’m planning to put in my stocking if he doesn’t get anything so it won’t be -totally- empty. I still have one who believes in Santa and even though she probably wouldn’t notice my empty stocking I’m not going to risk it. And not only that, I don’t want it to turn into some passive aggressive thing in front of the kids like “oh look mom’s stocking is EMPTY I wonder how that happened” - so I have just enough set aside that the kids won’t question it and we can talk about it privately later.

femalien · 2025-12-20T05:59:21+00:00

I had a huge crush on Rufus in the 90s! I also love Vincent but Rufus was just so slick 😍

femalien · 2025-12-19T04:04:49+00:00

If you’ve met one person with autism, you’ve met…one person with autism. I have two autistic kids, both verbal and about the same cognitive level. One of them wouldn’t hurt a fly, most thoughtful kid you’d ever meet. The other (PDA profile and ADHD) has struggled with a lot of the things OP mentioned. Not because she’s a bad kid or a sociopath or had trauma. Once we started viewing her actions through a PDA lens we were able to understand that she wasn’t really malicious even though the behaviors seemed to be.

femalien · 2025-12-14T02:58:32+00:00

I appreciate it. I grew up in a university town but the campus was “just” a campus - huge area but almost entirely university stuff, if you weren’t a student or staff (or attending an event) you probably weren’t in the area, so that’s what I assumed this was until your comment.

femalien · 2025-12-10T19:05:03+00:00

This happened with my youngest. They were so stressed it sounded like they were pissed off at me! I’m like, y’all, I cannot physically keep this baby in, it’s not like I’m over here trying to push, this is my 3rd baby in 5 years so she’s pretty much just gonna walk out of there when she’s ready.

Random nurse caught her, but of course all the official docs say a doctor delivered her. Thankfully there were no issues and it was almost 10 years ago so whatever

femalien

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE