WxFisch

I feel this way sometimes, then remember what the alternative was and don’t feel as bad. (To save the lookup for those that don’t know, Mehmet Oz was the republican candidate in 2022).

One of the risks around monetizing hobbies is that while you may enjoy that hobby now, doing it to make more adds level of stress and responsibility that can quickly make it into another job that you no longer love. Places like Etsy are competitive and reward consistency in listing and sales, so to have any real success you can’t really list just one or two items and wait for them to sell. You’ll drop far down in search rankings and suddenly your store dies because Etsy stops sending people to it.

This isn’t to say don’t try, but be aware it isn’t as easy as “hobby but get paid for it”.

Yeah, I am very familiar with the clearance process. Not saying lower wage jobs don’t exist with clearances (I mean buildings need custodians and janitors, cafeteria workers, repro office workers, etc), just that I can’t imagine Dominos requesting, getting sponsored, and then paying for a delivery driver to be cleared, it just isn’t needed.

Not in my experience, clearances are really expensive (last I saw it was in the $5-6k range per initial clearance package, and about 2/3s that each reinvestigation). Most secure workplaces will have a lobby for receiving things like this where they will call either a central mailroom to deliver it or whomever ordered it to come grab it (especially if it still needs paid for).

This is a fairly known way reporters track activities around DC. I recall a similar story about the raid on Bin Laden and food deliveries to the pentagon and White House.

Agree 100%, Ars Technica syndicates those stories (they do it for Wired and FT stories too), so they paid ProPublica to republish the story and give full credit to them.

Ars also has traditionally operated very independently of Condé Nast, and their authors, editors, and staff are incredibly active and as up front as possible in their comments and forums. Perhaps Conde is doing something shady, but if so I have decent faith that Ars isn’t in on it.

A gift link to the article: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/15/well/live/guidelines-iud-insertion-pain-management.html?unlocked_article_code=1.IU8.YRQV.JNBVow3EqQvA

I’m curious how everyone documents their core/critical configs to allow the non-technical in our homes work with it if needed. For instance if I’m on work travel and the Pi-hole goes down for whatever reason my wife wouldn’t be able to use pretty much anything online. I can remote in and fix it but that could be hours/a day or two later. Same then for the proxmox stack that everything runs on.

Along the same lines, how are folks documenting for EOL? It may not be a happy thought but we are all going to go someday, so what is your plan and how have you ensured loved ones can access/save important data?

No, it’s just normal DP but edited for content in addition to time.

There’s are two (that I’m aware of) versions of Deadpool that are shown on US TV. One is pretty normal, cut up mostly for time but with all the curseing and violence you’d expect, the other though has hilarious dubs over a good bit of the swearing (which is in theory easier when the main character is in a full face mask I guess?). The one that sticks out in memory is Deadpool’s line “Suck a cock” is dubbed as “ha ha ha”.

I take it you don’t know much of what the federal government actually does or how many of those things benefit you both directly and indirectly.

I won’t argue that the federal government is anywhere close to as efficient as it could be, or that there aren’t bad/lazy workers. But to just make a sweeping generalization shows real ignorance to why so much of these services are truly critical to why the US has been a world power, with a secure, comfortable populace compared to what it will be if those services are cut.

Goal setting is really hard, it’s an entire skill itself that takes practice. One way to start is to look at others around you and ask yourself who you want to be; whose job are you actually jealous or envious of. That’s a good jolt towards answer.

In the same way, look at the people you rely upon as the rocks that hold things together at work and try to determine what sets them apart from everyone else, why are they the go to people and no the person sitting next to them?

This is great advice, and all points I’ve learned as well over the years in IT. I worked help desk as a T3 for a bit and it’s sucked. Even when people were not asses (honestly most weren’t, they were generally professional but frustrated) the shear amount of effort to fix small things was awful and it kept me from working on projects I wanted to actually put time towards. I now work in cybersecurity compliance and essentially just tell everyone they need to fill out more paperwork, slow down processes, and then tell them no. It’s soul crushing. But I like my company and the people I work with (this hasn’t shared been the case everywhere I’ve worked).

For OP:

I think the keys are write down everything, and account for all of your time. If you helped someone there needs to be a record of it. Without metrics your management can’t get you more help if they want to, though it sounds like they don’t want to. Those metrics also give you the ammo you need to defend why things are slower than management wants, or why customers are unhappy.

I am also a big proponent of a strong work life balance. I work 7:30 to 5, at 5:01 I lock my PC and am done for the day. Problems will still be there in the morning, or in Monday. I try hard not to complain shoot them or think about work much outside of that 7:30 to 5 period.

Finally, consider your life plan. Where do you want to be in 5 years? 10? 20? You have to begin with the end in mind, otherwise you wander aimlessly and never get traction towards your goals. For me it’s moving towards management so I can effect better changes in my workplace and company, for others it’s being a true SME that knows everything about a specific topic. It’s likely not working help desk still though (as you note it’s the bottom of the IT barrel, or the trench’s as many call it; good for getting a foot in the door and cutting your teeth, but a really shit career). If you want to stay in IT, then it’s worth specializing. Learn AD, networking, PKI, software deployment, virtualization, or whatever skill interests you, and learn it hard. Then make yourself indispensable (which it sounds like you’ve already done with help desk). Those skills are portable, and most enterprises need them and will pay well for them. That gives you the leverage to negotiate better pay, benefits, working conditions, etc. with management. But don’t be afraid to look elsewhere. Keep your resume polished and apply to things that look interesting. Our world isn’t our parents, it’s a rare company that rewards following the 40 year tunnel. It’s expected that you will jump from company to company and job to job to move up, and IME that helps with avoiding the burnout since at least the people and surroundings change.

Agree 100%. Most of the former Plex users turned Jellyfin users I have come across did so better Plex was broken in some way for them. For me it was the general lack of care in creating/maintaining a good Apple TV app. Over the past few years it’s just gotten buggier and buggier with a lot of complaints on the Plex forums where devs would essentially stop by to say they weren’t working on any fixes.

Jellyfin doesn’t fix 100% of the issues, but at least there is active development on Swiftfin that showed a desire to fully support all devices.

Honestly, the majority of key points to talk about can be found online from respectable sources (for example, this article from Johns Hopkins, though there are many others). There is a better than even chance he has shady looked up the “Is this normal” stuff himself if he has normal internet access.

From a social standpoint it’s going to be different for everyone, teenage years are hard and kids are often cruel. I’d advise to just be there for him on this front, but don’t be pushy. He is going to be moody, lash out sometimes, and act differently. That is all normal. He is going to want to push boundaries and get in trouble (rather do things that will get him in trouble, most folks don’t actually want to get in trouble). Give him safe room to explore who he is and to try new things without letting him fall down too hard.

Lastly, you say there are no trusted male figures in your life, but that doesn’t have to be family. Good friends can also fill that space. I have to imagine there is some guy in your life that could have heart to heart, even just with you to then talk to your son. It’s worth trying to broaden your expectation of what a trusted male figure is perhaps.

I would guess they are looking to use it with pagent to support login with PIVs which is likely required by the servers they want to access. It’s a pretty standard login setup in federal IT honestly.

I do exactly this. My bank will try to use ACH or a one time debit card automatically, but inevitably ends up sending a check each month. What’s better is if I use the bill the water company sends and mail it back with a check there is a fee, but they don’t charge it when my bank sends a check.

And I will continue to use it until they take it away

So the plan is to request an early ballot, then to take it to your polling place and assume the poll workers won’t follow the process and then you’ll take a picture of your early ballot to somehow own the libs? At least in PA the poll worker will just have you relinquish the unmarked early ballot and then you’ll vote as normal. If you don’t have your ballot then you vote a provisional ballot that is only counted once it’s confirmed your early ballot wasn’t returned. It’s not a hard thing and it’s well understood by poll workers on what to do.