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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 12th, 2023

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    1. Started a small mutual fund and retirement fund when I was just starting out and still in undergrad. I did not have much and was fully self sufficient. But someone came to my job and showed us how retirement plans worked and convinced me to start one. Same with a mutual fund. I never put more than $20-$40 in each because I didn’t have much but boy did that pay off.

    2. I purchased a small condo in the city with some of the money I put away in #1. Just sold it recently (20 years after purchasing it; lived in it for 5 years, rented it out for a profit for 15 years). I made a lot of money off that sale. More money than I’ve ever seen at once.

    3. My spouse and I have always lived below our means. Now we’re not frugal - we go out for nice dinners, travel, have kids. We also have good jobs. But, when we purchased a house we could have afforded to get one that was $600k and instead opted for a smaller townhome in a nice neighborhood for almost half the price. Living this way has paid off more than I could have ever imagined. Both of us don’t have to work. We travel whenever we want. We could technically both stop working in our 40s/50s and probably be fine. It’s a feeling of freedom. We’ve never over-extended ourselves. When our colleagues and friends were buying expensive homes and expensive cars and extending themselves, we just didn’t do that.




  • This is actually a terrifying prospect that would only make the situation worse. The kids stuck there and being educated in this propaganda are the ones who will need higher education the most! It is not their fault their parents are living there. And while some parents may have a choice in the matter, many do not as relocating in the U.S. is very expensive and impractical for some families.

    I actually feel like the opposite is needed - that public universities go out of their way to accept kids who were educated in Florida in the hopes of actually being able to educate them and break the cycle that is currently feeding this wave of fascism.



  • Here’s my hope as a 40-something who came of age when the internet was just taking off.

    I REALLY HOPE this is the push we need to move away from corporate-owned social media. I have high hopes for federated platforms and forums that are much more like what the internet was when it started (but better because now we have mobile devices).

    I realize a lot of people see social media as being some evil thing, but we also fail to realize how much good it has done. Marginalized communities have come together online and formed real movements. People living with health conditions have been connected to one another for support and also life-changing resources and care. People who were isolated because of disability found communities.

    I would like to see old-fashioned blogs and RSS make a comeback. I’d like to see forums and federated sites like Lemmy take off. I’d like to see social media sites that have been given way too much weight in society collapse. I don’t think government or reputable media outlets should ever be using a corporate for-profit entity as a means for distributing information.



  • If the content gets great enough, that will happen. Going to take time, but it will absolutely happen. Especially with so many people deleting their comments and Reddit having their feet held to the fire with people making complaints about them violating GDPR.

    Lemmy, Mastodon, and the entire Fediverse are really what the internet was supposed to be. I am glad to see the pendulum swinging back and I hope it continues. I am mostly really excited about the mobile apps being developed for Lemmy. Those are coming along at lightening speed and I those will be THE THING that makes Lemmy happen.



    1. Light/dark theme (that can be set independently or follow the system setting)
    2. A “mailbox” to see the comments/responses back to me.
    3. Ability to post in a community isn’t consistently working for me. Sometimes I hit the “post” button and nothing happens. Then, if I try to “cancel” making a post, the app freezes.
    4. I know this is total fluff, but I love app themes. The ability to change a theme to an app can make it so much more pleasant depending on lighting conditions or mood. Also ability to adjust font size.