It’s definitely like this. I don’t entirely mind it for myself, because it reminds me to log off before I can get into a doomscroll where I’m assailed by my family member’s awful opinions. I only use FB for marketplace/buy nothing groups, and the barrage of shitty ads/promo posts helps me log off as soon as I’ve found what I need (or have given up on finding what I need).

I believe some of it is cold war sentiment, but also, the fact that Russia has remained a political enemy of the US. I also suspect a part of it is that it’s harder to find Russian (or Russian-speaking) actors who would agree to play such dehumanizing roles, but obviously, a lot of actors don’t have the luxury of choosing. A big improvement would be to have actual Russian-speaking consultants involved in casting - which, IMO, would be good for casting any actor for a foreign-language-speaking role. It’s bizarre to me that it’s not already a bare minimum requirement for people to be fluent in the languages they’re speaking.

It’s extremely frustrating to me as a native Russian speaker (just commented about this in another thread), since Hollywood looooves Russian villains but hates hiring Russian actors. I actually could not watch later seasons of Stranger Things because of this. I’ve lived in the US my whole life and am now way more fluent in English than Russian, but chose to watch some episodes in Russian because it was way more bearable.

Totally agreed. I’m Ukrainian and nothing gets me as heated watching any movie as Russian villains (almost always played by non-Russian-speaking actors). Hollywood looooves movie villains that reflect the government’s Big Bad Wolves and it’s just disgusting to me. Beyond the obvious facts that xenophobia is bad and using the film industry to stoke the fires of the US’s international feuds is bad, it just fucking hurts the way it feels like people put on costumes to approximate my dad’s appearance and voice because it’s the most basic shorthand for “evil” they can think of.

Get some rest! Hopefully when you come back the mental load is lighter and things work out, but at the end of the day, none of this is more important than your health and well-being.

Cucumber because I love cucumbers and zucchini doesn’t bring me that much joy

Yay!! Lost has become a pretty underrated show, it always makes me happy when people are still watching and talking about it ♥

Thank you!! That’s very validating to hear 😊

The Princess Bride is as wonderful a book as it is a movie! You’re gonna love it 😊

I’m gonna be cleaning my apartment because we’re finally getting a couch!! And I need to get the place in order so it’s easy to maneuver it in. We’ve lived in our place for a few months already but still in box city… so it’s nice to have something to force me to unpack and make it look presentable.

Fair enough that for higher-level cooking, it probably isn’t nearly good enough. My current rental has a glasstop stove and I’ve been really happy with it because the main thing I was worried about was the heat level - everyone warned me that getting a good sear was impossible, but my food is still coming out great. I’ve been experimenting with different pans to get better results and it’s been pretty good for me so far. But I don’t really work with recipes that require lifting/tossing because I’m too weak for any of that, even with normal pans 🥴

As far as the difference in health, it’s really staggering. To say it’s less healthy is, of course, accurate, but it also feels like an understatement. Continuous exposure to benzene is extremely harmful, and the fact that it’s highly linked to asthma, lymphoma, and leukemia, and that any amount of exposure is considered unsafe, makes me feel like it’s completely not worth it residentially. I would rather have worse food and better health (said as someone with a lot of health issues ruining my life already).

This is how I feel. I’d rather have things be fragmented than be too big to fail. A lot of people have joked in the past few years that it feels like the internet only has 4 sites on it now; I’m pretty happy to be back to browsing multiple. It reminds me of following multiple forums around the same topics back in the day. Variety is the spice of life!

Yep, my old oven always made me feel like hell, and the ventilation was godawful. There was a “vent fan” but I’m not sure if it did anything. In hindsight now I’m like 🙃

Have you tried an induction plate? It’s only one burner obvs but seems like a great way to get the benefits of induction in a rental. I’ve never tried it, just something I considered buying for myself, haha.

For a snack, I really like just heating up some frozen edamame in the microwave. Depending on the portion size, expect maybe 1 min of microwaving; let it cool off for a few mins because they always come out boiling in my experience. Salt em with kosher salt (or regular if you don’t have) and squeeze the beans out of the pod in your mouth. Easiest way to get a little bit of veg and protein, hands down.

It’s not the laziest, but this one can be prepped and made in the air fryer in <15 mins and it’s honestly AMAZING. Could probably be really good with some heated up grilled chicken slices for protein, too. Requires a lot of fresh ingredients so it’s more of a rare treat but it’s sooooo good.

Agreed, I pretty much never use my oven anymore because the air fryer is so much more convenient. I love frying veggies in the air fryer, usually zucchini or broccoli. Season them with whatever you like, Italian seasoning is usually a winner for zucchini imo, or if you’re really going for a lazy meal, just salt and pepper are still good. I only really use the air fryer for sides though; wish I had a whole meal to recommend :(

As a transplant, my view is that the most productive discussion around reddit is how to replace the spaces people lose when they stop using it. I enjoy beehaw way more than reddit overall, but a lot of my favorite communities don’t have equivalents on Lemmy. I didn’t use it as a content aggregator, I used it as a community space, and that’s much harder to replace.