Hi All,
During the pandemic, I binged watched a wonderful sitcom called The Middle. You may have heard of it. I was instantly charmed by the character of Sue Heck, played by Eden Sher. I looked her up to see what else has she been in and found this show. A show that I admittedly was very skeptical of. An animated Disney show about a magical princess? Surely as an adult I couldn’t enjoy this.
I was wrong.
I watched the first episode and was delightfully hooked. The storylines, humor, art style, voice acting and character development drug me into this amazing world and wouldn’t let me go. Before long, I found myself watching the very last episode. I have never laughed as much, or cried as much, watching anything until I came to this show.
I fell in love.
I wanted to say this because I‘m honestly angry at the hate directed to the show over it’s ending and it’s handling of…let’s call it inter-character relationship development. The anger isn’t because I feel Star vs. the Forces of Evil is above criticism. Nothing is this world is and there are genuine issues with the story and the handling of characters.
What makes me angry is how so many of the commentators, especially YouTubers, seemed to want me to hate the show for these flaws. I rewatched the show and quickly discovered I couldn’t hate it and if anything, I loved it more. Despite it’s flaws, it’s wonderful, it’s perfect.
I’m glad I gave Star vs. a chance. I‘m glad I watched it. I’m glad it exists.
There are a lot of pieces of the show that makes me especially like it. I would love to share them if anyone is interested. And if you’ve made it this far, thank you for reading.

(Looooooong post alert)
Hi all.
I only joined Reddit a couple weeks ago after years of occasional lurking, and I posted this on a general sub, and got roasted to the point I had to delete the post to prevent going into negative post karma (I went from 90 post karma down to about 10 over a few hours).
At the risk of seeing a repetition of a barrage of abuse (I was called an idiot/ loser, and my replies got downvoted into being hidden), I re-post it here, just curious if the FIRE crowd has a different perspective.
For the record, I AM NOT doing what I'm doing to scrimp and penny-pinch. I genuinely enjoy my healthy packed lunches over unhealthy bought lunches that takes up 1/2 my lunch break while waiting in queue. I buy tech that suits my needs instead of paying extra for features I don't need. The things I enjoy in life most (running, walking, snap photography on my phone, family movie nights at home) happen to be free or cheap. As for heating in winter, I grew up in South Island of NZ without heating in winter, and my winter school uniform was shorts and I used to ride my bicycle to school through frosted grass, so I'm not about to start heating up the house for the mild Sydney winters. My kids aren't cold, and they keep taking layers off.
So here's the post. Fire away folks!

I am a 40M suburban dad in Sydney. Dual income, 2 children under 6.
I work in a professional capacity, and while I don't want to reveal my annual income, I'll drop a hint and say I paid over 100K in personal income tax last year (wife paid a bit less but not a lot less).
With that sort of income, many will say that just about everything is affordable to me. I am aware there is a cost of living crisis out there, and don't wish to come across as insensitive. However I would l like to share some of my tips on how to live on the cheap.
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1) My groceries are cheap
I don't eat meat/fish/eggs/dairy. Yep, full plant based diet since early 2021, for my health/animals and the environment (I've heard all the arguments against veganism so let's not get into it here).
I live on beans/ rice/ vegetables/ fruit/ nuts and seeds. I go through two bags of the 'McKenzie's 12 blend soup mix' per week, at a cost of $4.60 per week. Brown rice I eat costs $19 for 5kg (I usually stock up when they are half price, at $9.50). I consume 200g of rice per day, which is about $2.66 per week when bought on special.
My other staples are steamed/sauteed broccoli, cauliflower, green beans, zucchinis, sweet corn, sweet potato, eggplant, kale, and fresh cherry tomatoes, red capsicum, cucumber, lettuce, as well as chia seeds, hemp seeds, roasted cashews and almonds. These aren't expensive items either.
I don't eat vegan sausages/burger patties or cheese. I eat a whole foods plant based diet.
My snacks are fruit. Usually apples, bananas, kiwifruit, grapes are staples, with occasional berries when they are cheap.
Also I don't buy any processed food. No potato crisps (they were $3-4 per bag when I stopped buying them, but I've recently seen them selling for $6.50 a bag), no biscuits, no chocolate, no lollies, no cakes or cookies or anything with refined sugar.
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2) I don't buy lunch when I'm at work
I pack my own lunch the previous night, while I'm cooking dinner. Lunch is basically a 2/3 serving of the vegetables/beans/rice I had the night before. as I find bought lunches are unhealthy, and aren't substantial enough to fill me up. My packed lunch probably costs me $3-4 in ingredients.
I used to buy lunch every day, at a cost of $10-12 daily, which meant around $2500 per year on lunch alone. Now it probably costs around $840.
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3) I don't drink alcohol
I went through a craft beewine/cheese/cured meat phase for about 10 years, but gave these up not long after I gave up eating meat or other animal products. I've spent 0 cents on these foods in the past 2 years.
When I was a regular drinker, beers at the pub used to be $7.50 for Tooheys/Resches/Carlton Draught and $9.50 for the likes of Balter, Pirate Life, Feral, but I believe they cost up to $12.50. No thanks.
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4) I don't buy coffee or eat in cafes.
I went through a trendy cafe phase in my 20s and 30s, and thought nothing of paying $24 for a cafe breakfast and $4.50 for a large flat white. Now I make my own coffee at home. I buy green beans at a cost for $12 per kg and roast them myself (I bought a coffee roaster for $950 four years ago which has paid for itself many times over), and use 10g of coffee per cup, which works out to be 12 cents per cup. My soy milk costs $2 per litre, and I use around 150mL per cup of coffee, at a cost of 30c per cup. So my coffee costs around 42 cents to make.
I haven't eaten in a cafe for about 5 years now.
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5) I almost never order in, or get takeaway
Not that there are many good plant based meal delivery/takeaway options out there anyway, and I find ordering in/takeaway meals to be expensive, unsatisfying, lacking in substance and not worth the cost. I avoid refined sugar and there is far too much in most takeaway meals for my liking. I eat them begrudgingly, occasionally (when my wife orders them).
The cost of a meal is the cost of material, labour, business insurance, electricity/gas, rent, advertising, accounting + the profits.
The cost of my own meals are the cost of the materials + gas/electricity. Huge difference.
I honestly enjoy my own meals more.
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6) My fitness routine is free
I don't go to the gym. I do 100 pushups, 20 pull-ups, and 50 sit-ups every day (without fail). I also run a total of 15-20km weekly, and enter 2 marathons a year at a cost of around $100-140 per event. My running shoes cost me around $120-140 every 18-24 months.
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7) My entertainment costs very little
I pay $120 per year for a Disney+ subscription, mainly for my children. It has more content than I could watch in my lifetime. We do a Family Movie Night once a week, usually Disney/Pixar animation films.
I also watch stuff on Youtube, and don't pay anything to skip ads or anything.
I have been to the cinema twice in the last 7 years, to see the latest James Bond and Top Gun 2. I stopped going to the movies regularly when the cost of a movie ticket hit $20, also around the time streaming services became available for $10 a month.
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8) I don't use heating in winter or cooling in summer.
I am rugged in up 4 layers at the moment. I wear a thermal top, a knitted top, a polar fleece jacket and then an Oodie on top.
In summer I don't use the air con. It's singlets and shorts in summer, and when it gets too hot to sleep, it's a fan on timer to switch off after 1 hour, and it works every time.
I live in a townhouse and pay around $200 per quarter for electricity (for a family of 4). My next door neighbour pays $800 per quarter, as he heats/cools his home all the time.
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9) I don't spend much money on clothes or shoes
My favourite clothing brand is yd, my socks are from Target and my shoes are $120 Adidas sneakers.
I have clothes and shoes for every weather and every occasion, and don't buy new clothes or shoes unless I'm replacing old ones to be thrown out.
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10) I don't spend much money on the latest tech.
My hp laptop cost me $1200 in 2017. Still runs like new, and unlikely to need an upgrade for another 5 years. My phone is a Samsung S20 FE, which I bought 2.5 years ago for $750.
My Galaxy tablet cost me $280 earlier this year. I buy a new one every 5 years on average.
I can't fathom paying $3000 for a 14 inch Macbook, $1500 for an iPad, or $1400 for an iPhone.
My mobile plan is through a cheap provider at $25 per month.
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So there you have it, the reasons why I believe I spend less than 90% of people while earning in the top 1%.
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I'm not penny pinching or forcing myself to live like a pauper to save money while denying myself the pleasures I want. We go on overseas holidays 2-3 weeks every year, live in a nice spot in Sydney, own two luxury European cars, and own some pretty nice things.
My hobbies are reading, blogging, going out (which means exploring my favourite parts of Sydney, and taking snaps), posting on various internet forums, watching movies at home.
I grew up in a middle income household and being thrifty was instilled in me from a young age. When I was a student I lived liked a student, and when I started earning I didn't really change my spending habits.
Thanks for reading!

I just realised that if Elon Musk took just 1% of his wealth and put it into a savings account at a bank of a very low 0.5% interest rate he would acquire $5,000,000 a month in interest. I’m eating soup and damper all week long so that I can afford to pay all my bills, and I’m earning above award wages. This is bullshit.

2023: Post #153 Watched May 31st On the Vinegar Syndrome Archive Blu-ray release (VSA-27) IMDB Directed by: Francis Megahy Written by: Robert Easter (as David S. Green), Story by Neva Friedenn and Paul Maslak TSPDT: Unranked
90 minutes. This movie is bipolar. Part of it is a fun, campy martial arts movie about a guy who harnesses his inner chi to fight a superhuman baddie and the other part is just incredibly racist writing that ages horribly and is hard to sit through.
The basic idea is there’s a super baddie running around creating havoc because he can shoot lifeforce at people out of his hand. This is a cause of concern for those on the good side of the law, and Don The Dragon Wilson comes in as The One who can learn the ancient arts necessary to become the Harry Potter to this Voldemort.
There are a bunch of police involved as well due to the killings, and this is where the writing gets dicey. These cops, like all cops, need to have a little aggressive friendly banter while they’re going about their job. Fair, but dayum. The banter in this film was written by a middle schooler who was given permission to be racist. It’s not only offensive but also just highly childish bad writing. I hated it, but I also understand it was of the time and all that.
The lazy racism didn’t hurt my overall feeling for the movie, though, because luckily it wasn’t the point and was just poorly created filler. This is a fun movie with a bit of a silly plot but one that moves along quickly and had me excited to see the final battle between the good and dark side of the force. It’s a very 80s movie that happened to be made in 1994. Good stuff, and a fun VSA release.

What is the role of creativity and art in our lives and how does it shape our perceptions and understanding of the world?

As the title says I am attempting to make a playlist. I currently have some united states of America, HP Lovecraft, and the west coast pop art experimental band. What other albums could I check out that are atleast sort of underground that are from the 60s and psychedelic.

Frequently, especially in my downtime, I get tired of just consuming social media and sitting around on my phone or laptop all day. It feels so draining and useless. Especially now, I have felt an overwhelming urge to create something: to be creative and make something that is my own. However, I haven’t really done something like this before. I don’t know what I’m good at beyond academics, lost almost any creative touch I could have had. For example, I lost my love of reading a while ago thanks to school and cannot stick to finishing a book, even if I am genuinely interested in the plot. I have wanted to create something and have tried so many things: I’ve tried to draw, but found little patience on me completing a piece of art; I’ve tried to write and create characters, but none of my characters stick out to me and my creative writing is awful; I’ve tried to cook, crochet, bake….all of them are just “meh” to me. I am getting so desperate to do SOMETHING meaningful that helps me get me creativity back, but everything I’ve tried never seems to stick. I’m getting afraid that all that I will do is just be in my phone without any meaningful thing to do outside of my school and work: I genuinely feel like I am loosing myself, and I don’t know how to solve it. I want to be creative again, I want to make something that I’m proud of, but I am completely lost in where to begin. I don’t really know why I’m making this post either, I guess to vent? But if any of you have any ideas of what I can do, I would really appreciate it. Thank you for reading my ramblings.

I tore my lateral meniscus about a month ago while snowboarding. Physical activity has been the main way I manage my symptoms. I'm used to constantly being on the move-- snowboarding, skateboarding, hiking, paddleboarding, jumping on trampolines, doing flow arts, etc, and now I have to basically chill on everything because most of the things I do hurt now. I'm going insane guys aaaaaahhhhh 😭😭😭😭 patience is definitely not my strong suit and it feels like my body and my brain are in a constant brawl right now. All I wanna do is go snowboarding. 😭😭

3398 Main St., Unit 8A, Springfield, OR 97478
Until 5:30 PM Saturday June 10th
Brand New Furniture, Air Friers, Converse, Macrame, Framed Art, Children’s Toys, and more! Come out and support children, who are neurodiverse, to have free water-safety and swim lessons!

The so-called Inhumans push, in spite of being a result of the decisions of a despicable person, was one of the best things to ever happen to Marvel Comics. For the first time in god knows how long, they were forcibly dragged into being innovative.
Innovation often comes from working around a limit, and not being able to use ol'reliable mutant origins did exactly that. They not only introduced a whole batch of fresh characters who were an actual minority rather than an allegory for one, all these untested, un-established new creations were immediately granted a solo book, which is still quite rare even today. Some of them worked, like Ms Marvel and Moon Girl, some dropped off the map like Mosaic but it was the fandom's general dislike of Perlmutter transferred onto the fictional race created in 64 by Jack Kirby, not the actual poor quality of the books themselves, that caused the drop in sales.
The fact that such a hated figure as Isaac Perlmutter was able to incentivize Marvel to create whole new successful IPs was a fortunate stroke of serendipity, which in my opinion shouldn't be allowed to go to waste so easily. Outside of the fandom, the Inhumans have near zero brand recognition and absolute zero political connotations, unlike say, Punisher. And yet Marvel had actively attempted and still attempts to 'reclaim' the Punisher from the far right. And even if they weren't fully successful on that front - Frank Castle is still getting published.
Why the hell not reclaim the Inhumans? The Ms Marvel series provided an excellent opportunity for that - I remember I genuinely expected up till the end that we would see some kind of Djinn city in the vein of Shannon Chakraborty's excellent Daevabad series, that would be basically Attilan but with a Middle Eastern flair. There was even a concept art of of such a city published on Twitter by one of the shows's concept artists, which was quickly taken down - no clue as to why.
But none of it matters now, the ship has sailed. I'm in the camp of 'Kamala wasn't broken and didn't need fixing', but maybe Kamala 2.0 will actually be even more successful than her old self. Let's wait and see.

Sorry if the title is not sufficient. I'm trying to locate a book I remember having in my childhood. The basic premise of the book is that the reader is given a safe that they climb into (Bigger on the inside, etc).
There's no text - just art drawn on each page. The cover of the book is made to look like a square parcel in brown paper, tied with twine.
Some of the puzzles I can remember: The first one is a combination-dial safe that you have to crack. Another is a surreal landscape with marble-like balls that have to be pushed along tracks to 'unlock' the next page.
It's purely visual and was meant for kids. There's no writing or text (besides clues for the puzzle in each landscape).
I've been hunting for this book, and cannot remember the title.