Ask Lemmy

I was bored as hell, sitting in a hotel room with literally nothingbto do for three days (waiting to get my passport back from visa processing), so I looked up the phone number of someone I used to know before we moved to opposite ends of the country years ago. I ended up getting an invite to a discord, and we now have two nights per week set aside for gaming together. Not just him, but the others on the discord too, so I'm not as socially isolated anymore.

And when there's no gaming going on, just hanging out in VoIP is still nice. I might be baking stuff in blender or perl, while someone else is painting minifigs or planning a D&D campaign. It's not easy having a social life when I'm a family man with four kids, living in the middle of nowhere with no shared interests with anyone nearby. This is my remedy.

Oh, I got a good one. I started leaving earlier and driving slower. It’s way safer and I get great mileage. It’s also more relaxing to not be so worried about making good time.

Did a sleep study. I was diagnosed with sleep apnea about a month ago because of it and got a machine. Now even if I have a short sleep, I feel more rested that I ever did sleeping a full 8 or even 9 hours.

About 15 years ago I decided not to be in a hurry when I’m driving, and also to not get frustrated with any other drivers. I just figured I’m gonna be spending too much time of my life in a car I might as well not be getting upset about it. For aggressive drivers I make up a story about how they have explosive diarrhea or something else urgent to attend to. It has made a profound and permanent improvement to my life. Would recommend to a friend.

My cat decided to live at a neighbor's 3 doors down. One day I thought "I'll invite her to the barbecue party". Six years later, we're married and have a 2 year old boy (and five more cats).

I made the conscious decision to mask my autism less in private and stand up for my needs more openly.
6 months later my wife left me, telling me she can't take it anymore.

After she had moved out and I realized this was final, a great wave of relief washed over me.
Now I have to pay the rent alone, pay her $1k/month in alimony on top, and somehow still have more money left over than during the marriage, lol.
And I got to keep the cats!

Stopped drinking soda. The weight just fell off

I got hacked on Facebook (2018), stopped using Instagram (2019), quit Reddit (2023) & Xitter (2025).

Now I have only books (lots of audiobooks), Google Keep (own thoughts and pics), Lemmy (random thoughts), and Bluesky (microblog).

My input and output are much healthier, the people I interact with (when actually people) are nicer, and I generally don't feel doomed.

Well, yes, I realize the world is fucked, fucked up, and fucking crazy. I've reduced by orders of magnitude how toxic it is to my headspace because I'm cutting out the worst of the dreck and engaging with more objectively real information. I'm not in screaming echo chambers populated in the millions. I'm happy if I get 10 responses to a post. Updoots are incidental.

Its like leaving L.A. to settle down in Schitt's Creek.

Started putting powdered fiber in my morning coffee and now I have fantastic poops. I also bought a bidet which is nice too.

6 years ago: messaging a person on reddit. Tomorrow is our wedding

I started doing a tiny little injection of estrogen once a week and it totally changed my life. My productivity is through the roof, my confidence has skyrocketed, I'm grinding like there's no tomorrow and I've never felt better. All the techbros should try it if they want to level up their game. Just 5mg/week, it's basically nothing bro. Try it bro you'll never regret taking estrogen once a week. Took me from 0.5x to 10x overnight.

Left school in Boston. Got a job in Rhode Island. Nine months in and I got bored. Started looking at jobs on Craigslist. Didn't find anything local. Started scrolling down the cities in the right column. Made it alphabetically down to Seattle. Never been.

Got the job, moved.

Lived here for 15 years. Bought a house, met my wife. Found a place where I feel like I always belonged.

Went sober.

For me it was a small change. I was having a drink here and there, maximum 3 beers a night. I just found that it made me feel like shit the next morning even after having one, and I no longer enjoyed the feeling of even a mild buzz. There was also a huge relief at not having to figure out which situation to drink in or not. Do I have a drink at this birthday party? After a hard day? While barbecuing? If I am just sober the answer is always no, so it eliminates one choice.

I started putting bananas in the fridges crisper drawer. They keep a heck of a lot longer in there. It's almost as if that's what a fridge is meant for... :O

Now I can buy 14 bananas and they'll be good for weeks.

https://leisureguy.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/rcaf_xbx_5bx_exercise_plans_text.pdf

15 minute a day exercise program.

When I rolled my character on that WoW server, I didn't expect to move so far from home and spend the rest of my life with someone I'd meet online.

I joined a random Deep Rock Galactic lobby once. Usually I host them so it was odd for me join one idk why I even did that. Ended up becoming friends with one of the people in there and they're one of the best most caring people I know. We talk almost every day now

joined an "adult band program" at a music school.

after being vaguely musically inclined since early childhood, 24 years of playing bass, 20 years guitar, six years seriously on keyboards, I've only ever really played by myself along to music that I like.

after a few months rehearsing with the group weekly and taking weekly keyboard lessons, I played four songs on keyboard on stage at a bar with the group. Feels like a monumental leap forward for me. I'm still basically just covering other peoples' music, but now with others and having a blast doing it. This next round I'm also doing a few songs on bass on top of doing some songs on keys.

And now one of the folks from that group invited me to join his band outside of the music school.

Lines up so well with losing my job and having a lot more free time. Keeps me feeling good about myself, gives me stuff to look forward to. And helps me not just wallow in grief and avoidance after our beloved dog of 12 years died late last year (been almost six months and I still cry almost every night thinking about him).

Can't recommend this "adult band program" sorta thing enough if you got some ability with a guitar, bass, synth, drums, or vocals! I'm doing it through a local School Of Rock franchise but there's other places that do the same sorta thing