As I’ve said, a symbol of luck, not necessarily of good luck. A sort of Memento Mori, but for the fact that no matter how hard you try, sometimes it’s just not up to you.

Oh, no, that particular D20 is a drama queen. I’d rather take a guess than trust that die.

I do have an XL D100 I bought more as a collectible, treated copper alloy! Think it could be classified as lethal under appropriate use conditions!

Not necessarily unique, but I mostly always carry a small pouch containing a full D&D dice set.

I haven’t needed dice in… years, now that I think about it, but I carry them as a symbol of luck. Not good luck or bad luck, just luck, chance. Helps me keep things in perspective when everything goes sideways.

Honestly, I wear a pair of old skinny jeans, the kind with a bit of lycra, bamboo-based socks because fluffy but not cumbersome, and T-shirt with thicc hoodie. This is in 21-22°C.

In anticipation of the funny looks, I’m super-serious about the jeans! They’re nice and soft at this point, and they do a pretty good job at keeping my legs from freezing off! Pretty much wear jeans all year.

And the biggest advantage is that nobody can tell I’m essentially wearing my equivalent for pajamas!

No amount of money could ever determine me to so drastically reduce the quality of my life, let alone my sleep.

If I remember correctly, one such example is the lightbulb. Some of the earliest designs were centered around using longer-lasting filaments than their contemporary counterparts, which meant considerably increased lifespan.

Thoroughly agreed, that’s what I call everything not viewed as immediately societally productive. More of a sarcastic reversal of the main complaint I’ve received throughout my life while just living it.

It really does take a while… Had a 9-month breakdown during the Pandemic, that one was exclusively for mental health care. I literally locked myself in my apartment and did nothing but eat, sleep, play vidya, get high, and have weekly therapy sessions for the entire duration.

It took 8 months to stop being anxious about not being stressed out. Used to wake up every morning with that sharp fear that I’d missed my daily meetings, then it would slowly turn into an “oh, shit, I’m not being Productive” jumble of self-loathing and panic.

This is what life should be like in a sane world. Work should never take up as much of our cognitive bandwidth as it does now.

Agreed, expressed it incorrectly, the burnout is nowhere near the main reason for my taking time off. I needed to take a break from Adult Stuff. I mean, last time I did anything even remotely resembling a vacation/holiday was in 2014, now I’m taking my time.

Also, thank you so much for your kind words! Honestly, burnouts are just part of the routine at this point, I’ll be back on my feet in two-three months tops!

Nothing! I’m super-serious, and I plan on doing exactly that for the following 6 months (quit my job, taking a break to address burnout and reorient): nothing.

By that, I mean I’ll allow myself to get as much sleep as I humanly can, try to feed myself healthier food (and more regularly), develop my hobbies (mini painting, playing the bass, sketching, writing), re-establish a semblance of a social life by exploring the city and its options, spending more time with friends… Pretty much just living life. No goals, no quotas, no deadlines, no performance metrics, no side-hustle, no Work™.

Yepyep, did the same on mine, I just zoomed the page out.

Honestly, really hope they did this on purpose, although I’ve seen plenty of cases where someone forgot to scale the text to Mobile and it went careening off-screen.

Comedy gold.

Because English archaeologists would have been upset by semantics.

This whole AI thing is starting to feel less like focused research and more like Free Jazz jam night at the local dive.

Very much this! Especially with anaesthesiologists!

The walnut tree. Its leaves are dense so it casts a cohesive shadow, perfect for shelter from the sun. I LOVE how it smells, especially when developing walnuts, and green walnuts are entirely unique in how they taste!

Thank you so much! Yes, thankfully those days are far behind me and only the scars remain.

Whoever said “suffering builds character” was talking out of their ass - it doesn’t, but it does reveal the character that was always there.

Honestly, being an amoeba isn’t all that bad of a past life, all things considered! Felt significantly less… biological than one would expect, but it’s as good an explanation as any, to be perfectly honest!