Yeah, I need to remember if it was ginko or something else. I’m not the greatest rememberer, so I’ll go back and check the recording. Perhaps not natural meant not native, but I recall being surprised at the description. We shall see, always interesting.

Yeah this is a big problem I see often. You have underground utilities? Tree planting becomes a huge thing. And in a lot of these walkable areas, places you’d want trees, folks tend to also prefer not to have the wires overhead with telephone poles everywhere, and so they’ve been backed into a corner.

I did just sit through a presentation by my local environmental commission where they addressed the issue. The solution seems to be trees bred for the specific environment: deciduous provides shade but doesn’t drop a lot of leaves; can grow tall but the root ball grows in a certain way so as not to interrupt sidewalks and utilities; hearty and resilient. I can’t recall the trees, but they were described as essentially not naturally occuring.

You’ve nailed my languages:

Por favor (you’ll see this later)

Bitte (had to check the spelling, but I knew how to say it)

S’il vous plait

Pleeeeeeeeeease

Por favor

I dunno about Japanese.

I can also say it in sign language.

For reference, I am a 37 year old dude from Jersey. I took French in middle and high school (we got to go to Quebec in the eighth grade because someone thought that was a good idea). We have large spanish and Portuguese speaking populations, and my mom’s stepmother was also from Cuba, so we got some lessons early on. My high school girlfriend did the German thing so I picked up a little (ich haba einen bruder). Wife speaks pretty fluent sign language. Can also say Kurwa, but that’s neither please nor thank you.

I love two towns over from Manville, which was the asbestos capital of America, and I can unequivocally say those morons would vote to bring asbestos back if they could.

That’s the one! Do you see what happens Larry?!

I think your last paragraph hit the nail on the head. As with any drug, moderation is key. Social media is a dopamine drug 100%, and just like some drugs, people cut it with shit that’s bad. It’s an odd analogy, but I think folks (myself included from time to time), spend way too much time here, and if gets in your head. But winter is cold and windy and wet and inside just seems to keep leading back here.

I often argue that Reddit and Lemmy are not the same type of social media that Facebook and the like are, but they’re just as susceptible to influence. Individuals need to think more about themselves and their micro existence, before diving into global issues so much. At least, that’s how I try to avoid the crippling depression that comes from post after post written by chicken little.

This is a serious get off the Internet moment. This place and the predecessor are absolute doom and gloom 24/7, but I took my kids to the park earlier and we threw rocks in the stream and hung out under a bridge, and it was a nice day, and we had fun. I join in my community cleanups, I plant trees, I take part in things, and I love my town. Yeah, on a global scale, it ain’t pretty, but I do what I can to make my little bubble a pleasant place to be.

Must include that if you’re here on Lemmy you were probably on Reddit before, and the latter has been a campaign for doom and gloom for close to a decade at this point. When you surround yourself in folks suggesting the sky is falling, you start to believe the sky is falling.

Aliens?

Well sorry to hear that dude, I was also probably fifteen when I got my letter from Verizon, maybe 16 or 17. Don’t let the passion for sticking out to the man fade, but not doing it on Mom and Dad’s Internet is commendable.

I’m a night seeded. My VPN has, rarely, dropped me off zoom calls, and it has a deleterious effect on my work. So nighttime it is.

Out of curiosity, were you using a private tracker? VPN? Just interested in the circumstances. Obviously something anyone who downloads has in the back of their minds. I remember getting a letter 20+ years ago, addressed to my dad from Verizon, to cut it out. I got smarter after that, or so I think.