Ha, I’ve heard of that one so I caught it. I missed 3 of the passes, though!

If you want a fun experiment of all the things we see but don’t actually process, I recommend the game series I’m On Observation Duty. You flip through a series of security cameras and identify when something changed. It’s incredible when you realize the entire floor of a room changed or a giant thing went missing, and you just tuned it out because your brain never felt a need to take in that detail.

It’s sorta horror genre and I hate pretty much every other horror thing, but I love those games because they make me think about how I think.

Do you have a primary care physician? I think this going on for 2 weeks warrants talking to them about it. If it’s not changing, then the urgent/emergency need isn’t there. Getting to a specialist could be months or over a year though (took me 10 months for first-available appointment with a cardiologist who specializes in dysautonomia issues like I have; someone I met in the waiting room waited closer to a year and a half).

Alternatively, if you have insurance many of them have a nurses line you can call and get input. Like you mentioned you would do as an EMR, they’re likely going to recommend you go to the most extreme care (ER) because they don’t want to risk being wrong. But they might be able to talk you through your doubts. And hey, if it’s insurance they have motivation to get you to the cheapest care possible, so maybe they wouldn’t recommend ER after all, lol.

Lastly, since you’re stuck in decision paralysis, it might be worth taking some actions on your own to see if you can improve the situation. Obviously this isn’t the smartest option, but I know I’m stubborn, cheap, and have white coat anxieties after being dismissed for my health issues my entire childhood, so I tend to go this route often. (Heck, I waited until my mid-30s to seek care that ended me with a cardiologist despite having the symptoms literally as long as I can remember.) You mentioned potassium deficiency and my immediate thought when reading “palpitations” was electrolytes as well. If you have a history of high blood pressure ignore this, but if not, eating salt and getting magnesium/potassium can help a ton. My cardiologist insists I eat 7-10 grams of salt a day. It’s a fuckton, but hell if it doesn’t make me feel worlds better.

ETA: I just want to reiterate my last idea above is a bad suggestion. But I know that’s likely what I would do, so I mention it anyway. Also I had frequent palpitations throughout my life as some of the symptoms I ignored, but I didn’t actually know those were “palpitations.” I thought “my heart is just beating hard/fast today,” and that palpitations meant something…else. It was less than a year ago when I learned it just meant awareness of your heart beating, and I can’t even explain what I thought it meant before that, other than more than that.

Thanks for the clarification on your intent. I understand (and appreciate) skepticism; however, I took your original comment to be a dig rather than helpful criticism, but your clarification here helps me read it more positively.

Someone else commented and used words that aligned with my intent behind the comment, which was just to leave open the door that there are nuances I may be uninformed about. But I recognize I could have been more explicit about what research I had done to maybe establish a little more credibility.

Thanks for responding with such a level head!

Ah yeah, in both cases I’m referring to they were saying the gerrymandered districts meant their blue votes for president didn’t count. I agree that the apathy strongly affects the overall outcome!

In one case, I tried to correct the perception by saying basically when I said here (popular vote determines the state’s allocation of electoral college votes), and I was “corrected” by my acquaintance that the president race is determined by electoral vote, not popular vote. 🤦🏻‍♀️

True, some states are too extreme to ever flip. Then other states like Texas or North Carolina are perceived as firmly in one camp, but they might not be if everyone actually voted.

Exactly what I’m trying to help counter! In just 24 hours I heard two people I know from Texas mention that the presidential vote was affected by gerrymandering. I did my research to confirm that was wrong and have been trying to help fix that false belief since then.

And what you’re saying now is, “What you said doesn’t align to what I think, so I’m sure you’re wrong.”

So here’s proof:

Of the 50 states, all but two award all of their presidential electors to the presidential candidate who wins the popular vote in the state (Maine and Nebraska each award two of their electors to the candidate who wins a plurality of the statewide vote; the remaining electors are allocated to the winners of the plurality vote in the states’ congressional districts). (source)

Ok, fair point, lol.

That’s precisely what prompted this post: conversations with friends in Texas who said their presidential vote didn’t count because of gerrymandering.

I agree districts are fucked, but that doesn’t affect the electoral college outcome. Texas is leaning more blue every year and getting everyone who feels like their vote doesn’t matter out and voting anyway is the first step to changing it. (One example source)

The state has 30 million people. Of those, 8M are in the Dallas area, 7.5M are in the Houston area, and about 5M between San Antonio and Austin. That means over 20 million of the state residents live in one of the 4 largest metro areas which are all majority blue.

Yet only 11M voted in 2020. National average turnout in the 2020 election was 66% but Texas was less than 40%, and it’s because of the exact sentiment you called out.

I’m from Texas (but don’t live there now) and I know how disheartening the voting season always felt. I want to fight the perception I’ve heard now from multiple people in Texas that their vote for president doesn’t mean anything, because it absolutely could if everyone gets out to vote.

It means I didn’t go look at the laws of 50 different states, correct. Doesn’t mean I didn’t do any research at all; I did confirm for multiple states where I heard people saying this (OH, NC, and TX) and I confirmed that only those two states allocate votes based on districts while all others allocate all voters to one candidate. Maybe there’s some other method out there other than district-driven or popular vote–driven; I’m holding space that I could be unaware of something rather than trying to claim I know everything.

You could look at it that way. I think gerrymandering specifically refers to lines being drawn specifically to create advantage or disadvantage in voting though, and we don’t move state lines that way. So it’s more just like bad district allocation?

I don’t disagree, but it’s the system we have and I want to ensure people aren’t disenfranchising themselves in states that could swing the opposite way if everyone actually voted.

ask any group of people who wear bras what the best part of the day is, and they’ll tell you it’s taking it off.

Nah fam. I can’t stand being without support unless I’m in bed. I’ve gotten used to wearing just an elastic sports bra at home, but I can’t stand being without underwire when I’m moving around a lot or out of my house. The bra does not come off until I put PJs on. (And even then, I’ve started sleeping in my sports bra more often than not.)

Getting my first properly fitted bra was life-changing. My chronic back pain dropped by about 70% and existence became dramatically more tolerable.

Can confirm that corsets can be comfy, and particularly good for back pain.

I’ve also actually had a doctor recommend I wear a corset, lol. (Cardiologist recommending abdominal compression to help me black out less.)

Someone already mentioned that cup size has no meaning without band size, but also want to help dispel the myth that D is a “huge” size.

The rule of thumb is that your cup size is the difference between the size of your rib cage and the size around your chest. Then it’s 1” per cup, with caveats and adjustments, but we’re talking basics.

So in reality a C cup is a 3” difference between ribcage and breasts. That’s pretty modest. However in media, it’s often played up that DD is your Playboy model size, but those are more likely to be a G cup or larger, at least if they were sized correctly.

And to put numbers to your points, London’s population density is 14,600 people per square mile, while urban Houston is only 3,340.

And if you want to talk about the broader metropolitan area, then London goes down to 3,900 people/sq. mi., which is close to Houston’s urban area. However, if we look at Houston’s equivalent to that the density drops to 862/sq mi.

Also, London’s metro is 3,236 square miles. Houston’s is 10,062.

Anyone who compares these as equivalent is disingenuous or ignorant (not necessarily maliciously so, but likely just unaware or oblivious to the massive sprawl that Texas cities have).

There are 2-4 HOV/toll lanes in the middle depending on where you are in the city. I only see 2 in this photo, and they aren’t called out in OP’s title.

Similarly, North Carolina allows unaffiliated to choose their primary, but R and D must vote in their registered primaries. Definitely good to know your state’s laws before taking OP at face value!