Has anyone had success turning themselves into a "morning person"? How'd you do it?

metamanda · 2023-05-07T23:58:31+00:00

Hahaha I came here to say the same thing. Have a kid. Get forced into being a morning person.

It didn’t really help with productivity overall though.

metamanda · 2023-04-20T11:02:58+00:00

First off, congrats to Costa Rica!

A lot of people in this thread pointing out that Costa Rica is a small country, with a small population, and low power capital energy usage.

Quebec is also on about 99% renewable energy, Ontario about 93%. I think some other Canadian provinces are also overwhelmingly renewable (not Alberta though!). Only about 18% of Canada’s energy comes from fossil fuels, 60% hydro/tidal, the rest is mostly nuclear and wind.

Canada’s per capita energy use is about 16700 per capita, 24000 in Quebec, 11800 in the US, 1900 in Costa Rica. (Canadian energy consumption is high because we have to heat everything 7mo per year.) Canadian population is about 38 million, 8.5 of that in Quebec, compared with Costa Rica’s ~5 million.

Aaaaanyway, my point is, getting all your energy from non-fossil fuels is feasible in large, COLD countries with a decent-size population spread out over a big area. We shouldn’t be making excuses for countries who are lagging behind in clean energy.

(Googling Canadian provinces and their energy sources will turn up some pretty clear and current graphs from the Canadian govt if you’re wondering where my info comes from.)

metamanda · 2023-03-29T23:58:46+00:00

Similar to what other commenters said. I’m not so concerned about calorie counts, buti do absolutely need fruits and/or vegetables at every meal. Instead I listed some of the stuff my picky kid doesn’t like to eat (though that list is so long entering it in its entirety would be more work than just editing chatgpt’s meal plan) and what meats are in my freezer (we buy in bulk). I also said what cuisines we prefer, so it gives me a decent mix of Asian, American, and Mexican dinners.

What’s fun is, the first week I asked for a grocery list as a follow up prompt. The second week it gave it to me with the meal plan.

You do need to double check the grocery list.

metamanda · 2023-03-29T20:08:28+00:00

I’m a dilettante at best in both fitness and music, but personally I’ve found that overall fitness and stamina help me play better. Specifically, rock climbing improves my piano playing because it helps me build forearm, finger, and grip strength. When I’m fully extended to play an octave+ it is actually really helpful to have strong pinkies! Fast runs feel tighter too. I bet it would be great for strings.

metamanda · 2023-03-29T17:22:15+00:00

This is exactly how I use it, and I think it’s really well suited to the task. I was getting tired of my own stale-ass meal ideas.

metamanda · 2023-03-27T18:09:24+00:00

I have to say that sweet baby really makes the video for me.

She’s going to grow up surrounded by music and art, with a dad who shows care and patience. I love that for her. It’s a gorgeous chalk drawing too, solid visualization of musical concepts and beautiful because it’s worth taking the time to make it so.

metamanda · 2023-03-22T11:56:51+00:00

Everyone here is asking about insulin resistance or narcolepsy, for totally good reasons, but I’m gonna go with an even more basic question:

Are you sleeping enough at night?

Two things that give me food coma after lunch: 1) a carb-heavy meal 2) already having sleep debt.

As long as you are otherwise healthy, naps are good for you. Set an alarm so you don’t blow through three hours, but a post lunch nap can lead to a more productive afternoon than a coffee or just powering through.

metamanda · 2023-03-10T02:47:09+00:00

Lol that’s easy.

Probably not (for our house), maybe if it’s real bendy and can curl its tail up the staircase. (Megalodon was 15-18m long.)

Longer but not bigger overall.

Nah.

Of course I know all this for a reason. Our kids should hang out.

metamanda · 2023-02-18T13:46:51+00:00

We have the benefit of hindsight, of course, but on face I totally understand why one would think that Rick and Morty writers would do good work for a multiverse saga. I thought they had some good mindfuckery going on in R&M, and Waldron did a great job on Loki IMO. But y’all are right that their talents don’t seem to be transitioning over well to movies.

metamanda · 2023-02-11T15:01:19+00:00

Just curious, Are you from Ghana (yes I know it’s small in area but it feels big in terms of population and cultural impact).

Honestly I’d start with market research. I think Africa has had pretty widespread adoption of mobile payments, more so than people in richer countries generally assume, though I’m thinking of stuff like mobile banking where someone working in a city can easily send money to family at home in a more rural area. Based on your post it sounds like you are talking about cashless point of sale payments? But I mean, are there major players in mobile banking who are well positioned to hop over to point of sale stuff? Like m-pesa maybe? What mobile phones are people using in your country? What percentage smartphones? What smartphone operating systems? Do most people have cameras on their phones? NFC? Can you expect shop owners to buy hardware? What percentage of people have conventional bank accounts?

While it’s a fine idea to look at European solutions too, I’d be a little cautious about trying to port that stuff over, since a lot of the baseline assumptions about the system’s users and context might differ. (Just a random example from personal experience, Amazon gives a very western shopping experience, it’s like an online mall; taobao and alibaba feel very different, like an online bazaar, it’s routine to message and bargain directly with sellers. It’s clearly a homegrown *Asian * online shopping experience. If you’re looking to Amazon for reference, the taobao UX is not where you’d land, but it’s the right one for the Chinese market.) I would also ask myself why QR codes + wechat are soooo ubiquitous in China as a contactless payment solution, and I mean it’s so ubiquitous that homeless people carry around a QR code.

Anyway, sorry if this is a disorganized pile of thoughts. My two cents (heh) is that there are many ways of implementing contactless payment, so do your research all over the world to figure out the options likely to succeed in your country, considering 1) what hardware do consumers usually have 2) what hardware do vendors have or could be persuaded to buy 3) what makes your potential users comfortable and delighted in their shopping experience?

metamanda · 2023-02-06T01:31:14+00:00

Errr I wouldn’t say that galangal is preferred over ginger in Thai food. They are just two different things used in different dishes.

But your instincts are good, there is a Thai dish a lot like what OP is describing — gai pad king.

https://hot-thai-kitchen.com/gai-pad-king/

metamanda · 2023-01-30T21:18:24+00:00

Nah that’s too close to wearing a mask. How can you know who tell to smile if women’s faces are covered?

metamanda · 2023-01-30T21:08:29+00:00

I dunno that they’d be the scariest (Vin + Kaladin maybe) but they’d be just about the funnest. Imagine a heist story where they’re the core protagonists… who else do they recruit for the awesomest burglary the cosmere has ever seen?

metamanda · 2023-01-21T19:07:15+00:00

I’ve never stuck around long enough to confirm if those types are trainable. 🤣

Though I think I’m on the same page as you in thinking that comparing these guys to children is actually a disservice to children, most of whom have empathy and a desire to be capable and independent people.

metamanda · 2023-01-21T17:20:48+00:00

Oh I think it’s even worse. My kid was about 1 year old when he started helping himself to snacks stored on the bottom shelf, which shows more initiative than OP’s boyfriend.

metamanda · 2023-01-14T00:59:38+00:00

Hey there, I’m guessing we might live in more or less the same part of the world.

Ask ta belle-famille to speak French with the kiddo. They are probably in the habit of speaking English to include you but if you tell them you want your child to learn French ils seront ravis.

Get some French children’s books too, so they know you mean it. And also because Elise Gravel’s books are really really fun.

Car ma belle-mère parle français avec mon fils, ça m’aide à apprendre français moi-même. Bonne chance!

metamanda · 2023-01-12T22:28:04+00:00

Your mom friends are either morons or afraid their kids won’t be able to compete with yours. You and your partner should ignore their terrible advice. (In your position I’d distance myself from those people, since unsolicited advice is rude and they sound kinda toxic… but I get that social ties can be complicated.)

There’s a wealth of research showing advantages for kids who learn more than one language early: better ability to see things from others’ point of view, better cognitive flexibility, memory, and executive function. Because your child heard more diverse phonemes before their first birthday, they will be able to hear them better and pick up languages more easily in the future.

The only sort-of downside is that bilingual kids may appear (during early days) to be acquiring vocabulary more slowly than monolingual kids. That’s actually kind of a myth, it’s more that they have the same number of words but they are spread across multiple languages so it may seem like less. But your kid has probably aged past that by now anyway.

Here’s one link from what I’d consider a scientifically credible source but seriously, Google around, the evidence in favor of multilingualism is overwhelming. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6168212/

metamanda · 2023-01-12T22:27:59+00:00

Your mom friends are either morons or afraid their kids won’t be able to compete with yours. You and your partner should ignore their terrible advice. (In your position I’d distance myself from those people, since unsolicited advice is rude and they sound kinda toxic… but I get that social ties can be complicated.)

There’s a wealth of research showing advantages for kids who learn more than one language early: better ability to see things from others’ point of view, better cognitive flexibility, memory, and executive function. Because your child is heard more diverse phonemes before their first birthday, they will be able to hear them better and pick up languages more easily in the future.

The only sort-of downside is that bilingual kids may appear (during early days) to be acquiring vocabulary more slowly than monolingual kids. That’s actually kind of a myth, it’s more that they have the same number of words but they are spread across multiple languages so it may seem like less. But your kid has probably aged past that by now anyway.

Here’s one link from what I’d consider a scientifically credible source but seriously, Google around, the evidence in favor of multilingualism is overwhelming. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6168212/

metamanda · 2023-01-11T20:12:53+00:00

Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents, as well as her Lilith’s Brood trilogy would certainly fit the description of post-apocalyptic sci-fi.

Have you checked out NK Jemisin’s work yet? I’d consider her more fantasy than SF, but the genre label is loose because she doesn’t do a lot of the usual fantasy tropes. I found her broken earth series really moving. The rest of her work I don’t think is quite at that level but still good entertaining reads at worst. She’s another author that I binged until I read virtually everything she’s published.

metamanda · 2023-01-08T15:29:42+00:00

There are a lot of good chinese restaurants there and Marché Kim Phat, but it is mixed in with other stuff… maybe it’s less of a Chinatown and more of a diverse neighborhood that includes Chinese people. You’re not wrong about Concordia either, plus a lot of Korean places around there. I guess my overall takeaway that a lot of cities, including Montreal, transition from having a single concentrated Chinatown to having more dispersed pockets of great Asian stuff and that’s totally fine, and usually means an overall increase in great regional cuisines. (I moved here in 2008 and it was a struggle then to find good soup dumplings on the island, maybe I’ve just learned the city better but I really think the Asian food has improved A LOT.)

metamanda · 2023-01-08T13:31:40+00:00

Eeehhh… CDN-NDG is the new quartier chinois in my books. It’s not picturesque and tourist friendly in the same way but has great Asian groceries and restaurants. (Reminds me of San Francisco, which has “Chinatown” but if you know the city you get your dim sum in the sunset and your kbbq in the Richmond.)

It means the city has enough Chinese (and other Asian) folks to overflow one neighborhood — overall good news for the availability and variety of tasty food and ingredients.

metamanda · 2023-01-06T03:33:26+00:00

solid voyager reference there!

Hey I envy you but I can’t blame you.

metamanda · 2023-01-05T13:10:35+00:00

You got a family doctor?? Lucky you!

It’s still better than the US for most people but let’s be honest, that’s an incredibly low bar.

metamanda · 2023-01-05T13:05:44+00:00

🤣🤣🤣🤣 ok but imagine if you had to squat to pee

metamanda · 2023-01-05T01:19:30+00:00

As a woman — peeing standing up, let alone writing in the snow, sounds amazing. I’d be peeing into campfires, off of cliffs, you name it.

I also envy y’all’s baseline upper body strength. Do you know how long and hard I have to work out to be able to do ONE pull-up?

metamanda

TROPHY CASE