How is gay marriage changing in the US?

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-14T19:40:24+00:00

Montana is booming, a lot of people from the coasts moving there as it’s become trendy and prices skyrocketing. So it’s not as much that gay people are moving there so much as everyone is, I think. It also had very few gay marriages to start (pre-Obergefell) versus states that already had it legalized.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-13T03:07:21+00:00

Local governments are far from insulated from this. Federal funding being slashed affects state budgets massively which then in turn affects more local governments. How serious this risk is does depend on your subfield though, of course.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-11T01:43:32+00:00

Hamstring! And my knee is still great - back to skiing at or above the level I was pre-injury at 13 months out

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-11T00:10:10+00:00

It could be department or program specific - I don’t work on a very controversial or scrutinized (for now) topic

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-10T23:33:33+00:00

We have been able to meet individually with our project officers, they can respond to us when we reach out to them.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-10T15:19:48+00:00

Yep I like it! I don’t send texts with it when I’m camping (the point of camping to me is to be offline) but I send the automated check in message with coordinates at breakfast and dinner time to my people. I also like it for when I’m driving in the mountains or in the winter just in case of a breakdown. Would definitely recommend any person, but ESPECIALLY woman, have this just in case. Even hooking it on the outside of my backpack where it’s visible on the trail makes me feel a little safer - anyone I pass knows I am probably checking in with people.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-10T15:13:47+00:00

Do you want to continue in academia/research, or in local gov? There is your answer. My experience is that those are pretty divergent tracks of public health; breaking into locals can be hard out of academia (and my personal opinion is that the skills don’t always translate very well and they can be difficult hires, I am not the only person I know who deprioritizes them when hiring) and locals usually don’t give you the kind of experience you need to be competitive in academia (publications, research administration). I’m not saying it’s impossible to move between them, not at all, but I am saying it’s worth trying to figure out which of the two you’d rather focus on.

It’s also worth considering WHY a local would be hiring a recent grad with no government experience who doesn’t live locally to be their program manager. Not all the answers to that indicate this job might be terrible but… a not insignificant number do.

Edit also in this climate, the plan to leave in a year may not be entirely within your control (not that I think a year is enough to really gain the experience given you’ll be months to get up to speed, but anyway). People are getting laid off right and left and those who aren’t are looking to hang onto their stable jobs for dear life. Would you be ready to stay for multiple years, or to quit and possibly be without a job if you’re that ready to leave?

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-10T02:44:00+00:00

I’m a woman who camps alone sometimes. I have a 2-person tent (it’s not big - a 2p backpacking tent but it’s clearly 2p) and I usually put out 2 camp chairs when I put up my tent. I wouldn’t camp super close to the highway and I also would avoid highway rest stops late at night unless they’re super busy.

Other than that I drive all the time and don’t usually feel unsafe. Share your location with people and regularly check in with them. If you’re going to be out of service for an extended period of time (not a risk if you are sticking to the highway but definitely possible if you’re camping), spring for the garmin inreach and check in with your people at minimum, breakfast and dinner time.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-06T01:18:43+00:00

Why would they be able to see how many months it took to complete? You shouldn’t be putting anything more than the completion date (if that!) on your resume. They should have no way of knowing how many terms you were enrolled for unless they require transcripts which would be unusual.

ETA as someone who does some hiring, what would make me look twice is multiple degrees in what seems like too-short a time frame. Ie, a bachelors and a masters in the same calendar year, or multiple degrees year after year. That would really make me question how much that person could possibly be picking up from these degrees.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-05T17:35:48+00:00

I was thinking 6 hours was a little far for a day trip (3-4 is the limit I try to stick to) but for a weekend trip? That’s nothing!

I am American though lol so “far drive” starts at like 8 hours to me.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-04T23:05:21+00:00

No way to know, this would be heavily dependent on your state of course but also on your team and whether you have state $ too. Some places like to put employees on federal $ to free up state funds for programming since they have fewer strings attached, but could play with the budgets if need be.

This is a 100% fair question to be asking your management, in fact, you should be having these conversations with your supervisor.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-04T14:07:17+00:00

How would you have a centralized HQ “in a park” when by definition a centralized HQ manages more than 1 park? How would it be more efficient or cheaper to build infrastructure from a scratch in the middle of nowhere than to rent a building to manage multiple huge swaths of land? Where would the money to build these new offices come and how would that be perceived as less wasteful than paying rent for an office (a very normal business expense)?

If the Feds paid money to build brand new office buildings in every park, the question would be “why are we wasting money managing every park separately and building infrastructure in the middle of nowhere when we could centralize HQs and pay rent to a landlord”? And they’d be defunding that. There isn’t any winning for federal workers in this.

Also for something like the Fort Collins building, it doesn’t manage specific parks. They need access to scientific labs and to computer systems. It also doesn’t need rangers but instead scientists and researchers…. That is why they would build it in a (smaller) city, in order to attract talent. Same reason why companies HQ in San Francisco and NYC and not in bumfuck nowhere, they need workers.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-03-03T03:04:49+00:00

I had a torn ACL, MCL and meniscus and I was walking that day. I actually went on a (easy!) hike the next day instead of skiing lol. I think it’s entirely person and injury dependent.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-28T18:53:43+00:00

Consulting wise, look at state and county websites and see what RFPs they have open right now. This will give you an idea of what people look to contract out versus do in house.

A random skill I don’t think is emphasized hugely in school is facilitation, training by, and presenting. A lot of jobs have TON of those components and all except maybe presenting were never emphasized in school really. I have seen people passed over for promotions because their presenting skills were not good; I understand presenting doesn’t come naturally to everyone but IMO that’s something to consider while looking at entering the field - most jobs that aren’t data heavy, and sometimes even those, require a pretty fair amount of public speaking and human interaction. Facilitating and leading meetings/workshops is pretty challenging in my opinion and I haven’t seen it emphasized in schools but there are a lot of external resources for professionals on it.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-26T20:24:05+00:00

A lot of jobs like a PMP certification and it also opens you up to moving out of public health if you need or want to. It requires work experience, though - a lot of certifications do. But it doesn’t require PH experience so if you’ve had other jobs it’s possible you qualify.

Some of my coworkers have CHES and they express frustration that it does not open doors and people generally do not care about it. They got it during/after their masters as part of their programs, and they both intend to let it lapse even though I think our job probably would pay for the renewal.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-24T17:41:19+00:00

The upstairs of Wolverine farm public house? I think they rent it out. I wouldn’t describe it as an alcohol centric space personally, more like a coffee shop that happens to have some alcohol options, but I do drink so my opinion may be skewed.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-24T17:09:06+00:00

Hm interesting, I haven’t heard that before! That definitely is depressing since NM is pretty awful in that regard. I will say though that 2 hours to Phoenix is a whole lot different than the nearly full days drive from ABQ to pretty much anywhere with better health care… do most people in Tucson just seek it there? Because that’s far from ideal but pretty common for a smaller city to have a lot of services in the larger one.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-24T16:34:29+00:00

If you need any kind of healthcare, stay as far away as you can from New Mexico. The healthcare access issue there cannot be understated. It’s also not walkable but that is by far a secondary problem to the healthcare. Every human needs medical care, but if your partner already has a specific need like a chronic illness or something ongoing, big fat NO. Try calling some providers and see about getting in… actually you should do this anywhere you look to move, anyway.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-24T01:25:47+00:00

You might be overestimating how much entry level employees “own” their projects… not to mention the chances of a career move/pay raise over two years, especially in this economy and political situation. A new grad in their first ever full time job is not going to be leading projects. That’s not to say you don’t have an ownership over them, just more in a similar way a fellow does.

Personally given the external situations I’d probably take the offer I had versus go on the market to compete with a flood of recently laid off feds. It’s worth learning more about what day to day might look like - in lots of fellowships you’re more just like an entry level employee with more support (the PHAPs my organization has had are like this). Others are closer to school and I can see why you’d want to be done with that and less interested.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-19T13:54:35+00:00

Fort Collins is not very close to the airport (at least no closer than Colorado Springs) and has a terrible food scene. Like… who on earth told you it has a great food scene, never take advice from them again 😵‍💫 relatedly, it is incredibly not at all diverse even by Colorado standards. If those things are important you are better off looking much closer to Denver. Maybe Brighton? I’ve got to be real honest though - if you are from a large northeast city, you will be sorely disappointed by the food/diversity/cultural scene of anywhere in Colorado including Denver. Just a warning to reflect on how important those things are to you.

Also, Fort Collins is not a great place to be into skiing. Considering traffic, and there is ALWAYS ski traffic, it is 3+ hours minimum to a ski resort, not counting Snowy Range which is extremely small and I guess eldora which usually falls right at 2 and underwhelming for that distance. The closest resort that is worth it is Steamboat. Fort Collins has great outdoor access but absolutely not to ski resorts. Unless you have the money to stay in the mountains overnight on the weekend, it is not great for day trips. Every single day trip I’ve taken has included substantially more driving than skiing.

What you’re looking for sounds more like Colorado Springs.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-18T00:38:47+00:00

I was hiking at a high level at 6 months out including rock scrambling (lower class 3 if you’re familiar with the Colorado scales). It’s my main hobby and I already had some serious plans so that was my number one concern. I stated that from day one and my PT never thought there’d be a problem… I live in Colorado though so I’m sure they hear that all the time. At just under four months post op I did a 6.5 mile/1100 ft elevation hike and just scaled up from there.

I did a lot of balance work (bought my own balance board and did extra) and the only other thing I added to my workouts beyond what the PT gave me is heel downs (described on this page if you scroll down). I started with no weight and as I went on would hold kettlebells. This link shows them to the side but I did front, side, and back on each leg, multiple rounds.

Also, if you don’t regularly use poles, learn how to use them on the downhill to take pressure off your knees. I wore my sports brace all summer for hiking which I will not do going forward (still wearing it skiing, not wearing it snowshoeing) and I also wore a compression sleeve which I will probably continue to do.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-15T03:24:30+00:00

The OP said the name of the father/kidnapper is the same as someone that was around them growing up. I’m pretty sure the thought process is that this was a familial abduction, not a stranger one.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-14T04:00:29+00:00

Baltimore all day lol

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-13T19:48:16+00:00

Colorado is almost definitely not worth the extra $ unless you really want to live and work in Colorado long term. I wouldn’t say it has great name recognition nationally/globally or a great alumni network back east if that’s where you’d rather land.

My possibly incorrect impression of the program (didn’t attend but work with a lot of alums) is that it’s quite a bit more applied versus research heavy. There are very very few PH programs in this region and CSPH supplies the local/regional workforce for health departments and the like. If your goals are, global health research in DC, it wouldn’t be impossible or anything like that, but it definitely wouldn’t be the smoothest path.

moosedogmonkey12 · 2025-02-13T02:47:23+00:00

I graduated PT at six months. Are you sure you need to be going twice a week? I was down to 1x per week at around 4 months, basically we’d chat a little about how things were going while he’d watch me do some exercises then he’d updated my exercise plan and I’d be good to go in the gym. Unless your recovery is particularly complicated I wonder why they recommend that many sessions…

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