Ask Lemmy

Arthritis, so I can predict rain with my knees.

My old person trait is being 72.

I have opinions on my lawn and your proximity to it.

If it isn't done by 10:00 am then it isn't getting done.

I absolutely hate AI.

My age 😁

I've started noticing birds, and worse, I've started recognizing them.

I refuse to use TikTok, Instagram, WhatsApp, etc. I only have Facebook because 90% of my friends and family are there and it's the primary way I stay in touch with them, but I'd like to get rid of that too.

Regarding TikTok, I was serving in the US military as an IT sysadmin when it became popular. But we discovered that the app embedded itself deep in your phone's hardware, granted itself full administrative access to your phone, then started trickling all your data to servers in China. And you couldn't fully uninstall it once you'd installed it once. Your phone was completely compromised if you ever installed that app.

It became a huge security risk and we were told to never use it. It was a horrifyingly effective spy tool China could use to easily collect data on us. That's why President Biden pushed to ban TikTok in the US.

But of course, TikTok became super popular among our civilian population and they refused to give it up, which led to a lot of pushback against the ban. It never held, and now people are still using it and sharing all their private information with China.

Meta does something similar with Facebook/Instagram/Whatsapp, but we at least can keep tabs on what they're doing with your private data, since they're an American company. They mostly use your information to build advertising profiles on you, to better catch your attention with ads. But that information could easily be used against you if federal organizations wanted to. ICE could use it to identify non-white Americans and their daily habits and easily intercept them.

Still, if you don't want your private information being potentially stolen by these companies, it's best to dump these programs. I don't install them on my phone or tablet and I keep Facebook's website isolated on my computer, since it likes to read other open windows and use those sites to fine-tune advertising data for you.

Google has turned into one of these companies that collects data on everything you do, so I'm in the middle of de-Googling my life right now. But it's really hard because they're embedded everywhere.

We're living in a dark time where the only way to prevent corporations and governments from collecting information on you is to stay offline. Which is nearly impossible nowadays. We don't get privacy in this modern Information Age. Not while Capitalism is still a thing.

I love shoehorns and sneeze loudly.

When out eating and drinking, my preference is to go and order food and drink at the counter/bar, rather than install some app or give a website all my personal information before I can order.

Involuntary groans whenever I sit down or stand up.

I refuse to scan a qr code for a menu. Give me a damn piece of paper

Antiques Roadshow is absolutely amazing. It's fascinating to see some of the old things people happen to have.

Anyways, I'm at the point where I'm rewatching a bunch of old shows and cartoons I watched growing up, either through reruns or actually seeing. Mostly reruns, like how I'm currently on season 1 of The Golden Girls, a show I second hand absorbed to the point it's one of my all time favorite live action shows period. I hope when I get old I can be a male version of Sophia.

Also, I don't need a "smart" TV. If it can handle HDMI cables, that's good enough for me. I've been thinking if I ever have to upgrade monitors or get my own "smart" TV, that I'll purposefully break warranty to crack it open to remove any form of camera/microphone and remove anything that allows the device to connect to the Internet, Wi-Fi, or cellular data, or whatever else there is.

The streak of white in my beard?

The fact that 75% of my media consumption is things I've already seen before?

I can maintain eye contact in a conversation and at no point do I want to fuck/fight the other person nor do I believe they want to fuck/fight me?

I can maintain friendships with people who do not share all of my views on things, with a select view even having opposing views?

Comfort wins over style every time, with zero exceptions?

I'm ready for the sweet embrace of eternal slumber.

I like to go to bed at 9/10 and wake up at 4/6

I primarily write in cursive.

I avoid going out during busy times - e.g., rush hour, school zones, restaurants on a Friday or Saturday night.

I genuinely hate new things and most change at this point.

I don't think it's me getting old. I think I was raised differently than most of my peers and exposed to how previous generations actually fought for their rights instead of rolling over and taking it up the ass.

Most of my peers are dumb as shit and have no concept of how much businessmen are taking advantage of them. If someone tells them to buy something, they'll buy it.

I have never purchased a smartphone and don't want one. I still prefer to use a flip phone. Their quality has improved over the years so I haven't been forced to switch yet.

70+ and mine is playing world of warcraft.

I am incredibly difficult to buy gifts for because I have everything I want, which is not much at all.

I try like hell to avoid shopping at peak times. Before Covid, I could shop at 2am, but now I'm one of the oldsters waiting for the place to open at 7 or 8am.

I also like Antiques Roadshow, but only the American version. I don't give two shits about your mums tea set that was signed by the Queen's dog-wrangler that you paid 50 quid for that's now worth 200 pounds.

I always get printed boarding passes for domestic flights.

My age

Some part of my body always hurts. Mostly back, intestines, and joints, but these feet of mine have been finding their footing in this game lately too. Life is pain ;(

I have a drawer in the garage titled "uncle solutions", it has a collection of rusted wire, bits of electric wire and similar shit for "quick fixes". I also just bought me and my SO nordic walking sticks, we still need to get matching trekking suits. Oh and I dream about retiring to a remote cottage and growing my own veggies like proper siberian babushka.

You mean, like, other than twice my age being statistically dead?

Many.

Let's start with neo-Luddite tendencies, e.g. deep suspicion of, and wanting very little to do with: devices with planned obsolescence; devices that basically spy on the user; this push for LLMs and similar generative artificial "intelligence".

Or rather, the people who are pulling the strings, so to speak, behind those technologies. The technologies themselves have great potential, but that cannot be reached under those who presently control them.

Also a strong dislike of people, usually kids, making noise or worse, actually being on my property because they have no respect for certain boundaries, or they don't even know those boundaries exist. Classic "damn kids, get off my lawn" old man attitude.

And finally: I still have a flip-phone and have no other computing devices beyond the one desktop PC I'm writing this comment from.

I'm always up to date on the grocery store sales in my area and when there's something especially good on sale I will show up at the store when it opens at 7:30.

I don't download every new random chat app that's in vogue. I'll give you my phone number and we can text or talk without having to go through more 3rd parties besides the telephone companies we get service from. I hated needing a bajillion different text apps to talk to everyone I knew in the 2000s, I sure as hell ain't gonna start that shit up again 25 years down the road. Unless someone makes something like Trillian, fuck off with your WeChats and WhatsApp and Velcro or whatever the fuck.

No, I do not have whatever stupidly named money transfer app you're using this week, and no, I will not install it.

I prefer an analog kitchen. Spring based scales, wooden utensils, gas stove, glass storage.

Napping