Winter is mostly over and things are warming up. Soon we'll have patios open again which will be nice.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/22499817

I've never taken a vacation, and I'm determined to take on this year in Spring. I'm in Pittsburgh area and would like to bring my dog along (he is too anxious for boarding or a dog sitter), and don't want to put him on an airplane. Any ideas?

The best I've been able to come up with is renting a small island with a cottage on the Great Lakes. My pup could run totally free on the island for a week and live his best life chasing squirrels and swimming. I'm not much of a nature fan, though, so it might be a bit boring.

I'm from Germany and the concept of time zones is very foreign to me since we only have one time zone across the country.

As America has multiple time zones I was wondering which time zone is most commonly used to describe a time nationwide. For example if there is a TV show airing at a specific time or someone wants to describe an event happening in a different State.

I often hear people mentioning the Eastern Time (ET) and Pacific Time (PT). Eastern Time understandably applies to the east Coast including New York City. And as far as I understand Pacific Time actually is the Western time including Los Angeles, which also makes me wonder why it's not called "Western Time (WT)".

So I wonder which time is the one people most commonly use across the States.

And how do people keep track of that time zone if they're not living there? Do most people have multiple clocks on their phone or do they Google the time each time or do they calculate when that time is relative to their time in their head?

My furnace went out again, which sucked. I pay the utility company every month for a service that makes it their problem though, and they fixed it again. They've replaced enough parts in it at this point that I'm wondering how long until I've ship-of-theseus'ed my way to a new furnace.

And does it have what plants crave?

I'd say my favorite drinks are bulletproof coffee and soda water with unnecessarily fancy flavors like cactus rose.

If there's anybody not from the US wandering through here, wondering if there's a noticeable difference in beverage choice in the comments here compared to what you're used to, or if that's something you've generally noticed before.

I've done well over an hour before (one way), but it definitely takes planning so not anywhere close to casual. At that point, perhaps other transportation may be used to return. And/or even if a daily/weekly occurrence, it takes discipline to do things like leave on time and stay informed throughout the day to handle weather events, plus wearing certain clothing to handle sweat and sun and rain etc. Biking is definitely preferable to walking for that level of distance/time, though I've done both.

More routinely, and perhaps with little notice, maybe... 20 minutes? (one way) It's hard to say bc it depends on what stores are where, whether the purchases will fit comfortably into my bag, etc. But I'd leave at a moment's notice for such a trip if need be and the conditions are conducive to it.

What about you: what's your cutoff?

cross-posted from: https://gregtech.eu/post/7570120

Title. It seems like the police just chose a random person to have someone to prosecute.

Getting some more snow right now which is nice. We haven't really had a real winter this year.

Rules:

• You could add or remove states.

Outcomes:

• What impact would the new borders have?

I have pretty simple, straightforward finances. I don't need any pro features.

Does anyone have any shoutouts for their preferred tax preparation software?

I'm from Germany and after noticing that many American personalities have German backgrounds I recently looked up that apparently German is the biggest ethnic group in America and that like 12% of all Americans have German ancestry so basically more than 1 out of every 10 people.

I knew that there are some people in America with German ancestry but I never thought it's that many. I always thought that there were other way more common ethnic groups such as UK, Irish or something Asian/African and thought Germans are a minority. I never thought that Germans are so prevalent in America though and that they're actually the biggest ethnic group. I wonder if that is a topic in American conversation cause I assume many Americans are curious about their ancestry and many might even have had contact to family members that are directly from Germany. And I wonder if they identify as American or German or both? (For example I always hear "African-American" being used but I'm not sure that I heard "European-American" that often)

yay sportsball!

21 year old German here.

This question is for Americans who have been to Germany before (or might've had any interaction with Germans). And I know there are a lot of Americans on this platform who bash and hate on their own country but I hope to get an answer that's as truthful and unbiased as possible.

So as someone who's very sensitive I always felt like people here are way too cruel and direct. It's a prevalent stereotype that Germans are very direct and cold. I know that a big part of this is my own perception and mental state that will cause these types of perceptions independent from the country because there will always be assholes.

But I wonder if it could be true that some of my observation might actually be because Germans might actually be more cruel. If you guys are really honest I wonder if it is possible that Americans might be slightly more nice than Germans and which country you think is actually more cruel in general. (Hope this question is not too stupid)

Hey there, I’m from Germany and have mental health issues such as depression and was wondering how prevalent this topic is in America.

Here in Germany this topic has become extremely normal and pretty much everyone seems to openly talk about it even with strangers sometimes. We have a lot of therapists but it’s often hard to get an appointment since medical care in Germany is free and they have overwhelming numbers of people and the therapists don’t have enough availability to accommodate everyone. The therapists I had so far were pretty good since they really seemed to care about me and often did overtime and such to talk.

I wonder if it’s similar in America that a lot of people go to therapy and openly talk about mental health. What is the situation in America like? Do you have many therapists (especially in rural areas) and how easy is it to get in/finance? Or would you say this topic is generally more frowned upon in America in comparison?

I've been busy with !loops@midwest.social since that's been seeing a lot of activity. The queue is up to almost the end of February, posting every 30 minutes. If you think that's too much, you should see how much I don't post 😄

cross-posted from: https://infosec.pub/post/23402624

The policy set forth in the March 20, 2018, Memorandum entitled "Guidance Regarding Use of Capital Punishment in Drug-Related Prosecutions" is hereby reinstated. In addition to drug-related prosecutions, the policy shall also be applied to cases involving non-drug capital crimes by cartels, transnational criminal organizations, and aliens who traverse our borders and remain in the United States without legal status.

https://www.justice.gov/ag/media/1388561/dl?inline

So... there's that, at least.

I don’t know where else to ask this but I am out. My Latina fiancee has been getting derogatory remarks in public. I’m done. We are both hard-working manufacturers and we are looking at Spain since she is already fluent in Spanish and I am actively learning.

THIS IS NOT A TROLL. I’d like a deeper dive into this as a black man.

For context, I’ve voted Democratic my entire life, same with my family & most of my friends, including most of my white friends. We tend to agree on the obvious issues in American politics like lobbyist & foreign affairs. But we continue to vote Democratic because we see it as the best way forward for progress compared to the GOP.

But my question is why are white people specifically so strong for the GOP? It seems like no matter which election you look at post civil rights, the GOP either comfortably wins the white vote, or narrowly wins it. Despite issues like the war on drugs, early 90s recession, war on terror, mortgage crisis, Trump’s abysmal response to COVID, cuts to Social Secuirty, Tax Cuts for the Rich, etc. It seems like the white electorate always backs Republicans in big numbers. No matter what.

You could say the same for black people and the Democratic Party, but we are a far smaller voting base that can’t really decide elections outside of a state like Georgia (I live in Chicago). But also, the Dems aren’t perfect, I don’t expect any political party to be, but their track record and policy positions work much better for the common man to me.

Obviously there’s a large contingent of white voters who greatly represent the progressive movements on the left more than any other group, but they’re vastly outnumbered by their Republican counterparts. And Trump did worse with white women in 2024 more than any Republican has post-civil rights.

TLDR; Why does it seem like no matter what Republicans do, white voters who always give them a large amount of support? If Dems held policy positions and had the rhetoric of the modern day Republican Party, I doubt black people would support them.

This isn't the greatest ever, but here's mine:

Why does the Mississippi flow south?

Because Iowa sucks!