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Joined 2 months ago
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Cake day: July 14th, 2025

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  • I graduated in 2011, and same. My high school had a pretty janky mix of various Dell Inspiron towers, running mostly Windows XP but with a handful of Windows 2000 and ME machines that for some reason (prolly hardware too old) escaped their upgrades. We went through impressively comprehensive MS Office training and even Computer Tech classes (essentially an intro to an intro to computer science where we learned data concepts and built a PC).

    A few years later, 90% of those machines had been scrapped, the mandatory courses were all gone and the kids all had cheap crappy Chromebooks. Now any tech courses are just electives and the students are expected to magically know how to use the software they’re required to use. (Because “they’re young, of course they know it!” Nevermind that they’ve only used iPads since birth).

    Consequently, any class involving a computer, even if it’s just word processing for English essays and such, has the teacher taking time out of instruction to show the students how to use the stuff. Otherwise there are problems. It’s a sorry state of affairs and a lot more kids are getting left behind when it comes to tech. Google might be the worst thing happening to education now if it weren’t for the GOP.







  • My favorite blinker scenario locally is this really disgusting offramp/series of interchanges/spaghetti abomination thing on my way home from certain directions. I take every possible lane change and right turn for nearly 2 miles on this part of the route, so I just activate the blinker once and it stays on for a solid 3 minutes until it shuts off on its own.

    • Start on 2-lane 55mph turnpike with exit coming up on the right in ~.75 miles
    • right blinker goes on as the turnpike gradually widens to 5 lanes, adding new lanes on the right every ~.1 miles - I leave the blinker on as I hug the solid white and slip into each new lane as it comes
    • After .2 miles of being in the rightmost of the 5 lanes, I slip onto the exit ramp - blinker is still on (lol)
    • After another .1 miles, the ramp splits and I take the right side of the fork - blinker still on
    • Yet another fork after that where I stay to the right again
    • Another roadway merges in on the right which I have to cross in front of
    • Come up on a T intersection of the off-ramp with the surface street and, you guessed it, the blinker is STILL ON, and it’s another right turn for me
    • That last 90° turn is enough steering wheel rotation to trigger the automatic shutoff of the blinker coming out of the turn
    • I grin like an idiot and cackle with glee the rest of the way home as my partner in the passenger seat quietly shakes her head. Fucking glorious