Ask Lemmy

Google your city name and “maker space” to see if there’s any near you. Not only does my local library district have them, there’s another local option with a monthly membership fee. They have large equipment like laser engravers, CNCs, drill presses, etc. They usually also have small stuff like drills that you can check out and bring home. Also a great way to meet other makers in your community

I’ve seen those public bike repair racks with attached tools. I feel like that’s the closest thing to that we have

I use a chainsaw maybe two hours a year. Same with my neighbors, yet each of us owns a chainsaw.

The public library has tools and such in a lot of places.

That's a real thing, there's one near me

Verified: group cooking is the way.

I have friends and family who live in a cohousing building. About 50 people in 30 units. Each apartment is complete but the kitchens are slightly smaller than typical.

Cohousing is mutual ownership of the building. About 20% of the building is common areas, like widened hallways with couches and bookshelves, or a games nook, music room, workshop, laundry, etc. It's basically a tall village, and they are like roommates with privacy.

The giant kitchen and dining room is used six nights a week. One person is chef with a small crew, and dinner is for around 30 people. It costs $5 CDN per meal, though if you raid the leftovers later it's pay what you want, usually $2. The cooking volunteer roster is optional and organized by a Slack channel. Food is usually awesome and everyone wins.

If you want you hardly ever have to cook dinner for yourself.

This makes me think of the Sikh community's charity/giving (can't remember the term) food giving that happens in most towns globally where there a Gurdwara.

There has to be a better way than waves hands everything, really.

I sometimes think about automats, and what a modernized version, designed to both be healthy enough to eat as one's primary meal source without ill effect and efficient enough to compete in price with home cooking, might be like. I suspect it would probably involve a lot of soup and chili and the like, just because that stuff is relatively simple to produce in large quantities, and uses cheap yet generally healthy ingredients

A co-op has been in the works in my town for the last few years and it’s finally about to open. I can’t wait

Plus, nobody needs to see the porn I watch.

That would mainly be because they can't easily get to the library, probably because your city is too low-density and car-dependant.

Once again, all problems are zoning problems in disguise.

If it's only available at one place, it's not freely accessible.

Logistically, how would that work? Libraries would have to be everywhere and they'd have to be massive. The IT infrastructure to support that would be immense. How would privacy work? Where could I go to have a private telehealth appointment, for example?

Nude beaches are nice places for exactly this reason. It's like everyone tacitly agrees not to give a shit.

You can walk past people with your balls waving in the breeze and nobody even blinks - and more importantly, someone can walk past you with their tits akimbo and you don't even blink. It's not sexual, it's not even interesting, it has no significance here. It's like seeing someone breastfeeding: yes, boobs are still great, but we're not doing that right now.

And that's just a really nice headspace to be in. All of the unconscious monkey-politics games just go away, you don't have to think of people in those terms, or concern yourself with where you stand relative to them, because we're just not doing that.

Oh no, you'll see unattractive naked people! Yep, most of them in fact. And honestly that's kind of awesome. 85yo woman pottering around living her best life stark naked and not giving one single shit: you go girl. Fuck yeah. You know how people say they look forward to being old enough to just not give a fuck any more? You can have that yourself right now, right here, for free.

It's funny, walking past clothed beaches afterwards, you realise just how sexualised many swimsuits really are. A bunch of naked people are honestly about as glamorous and exciting as a pile of dead sheep; fashion designers do one hell of a job creating drama and hype around it all.

Most places in the US legally allow nudity, with the main barrier being people calling the police and making a big deal out of doing something legal.

"special cases" being everyone who doesn't live in a town? I'm lucky in that my village post office hasn't been shut down, but I'd still have to drive to collect my post every day. It's much more efficient that a single vehicle delivers post to hundreds of houses.

Maybe it makes sense in urban areas for able-bodied people. Still a drag to have to walk there every day when you don't even know if you've got post because something important might have arrived.

Sorry, I didn't mean to poop on your idea so much, it is a genuinely interesting idea, I just don't think it works with the way society is currently set up in my country