• modern_drift@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Larry. he runs the local comic shop and has been running every competitor out of business for forty years.

    his business strategy? sit on the couch and chill.

    he has an ungodly amount of stories, knows people from every walk of life and a great memory and the charisma to tell those stories that he experienced or was just told about.

  • Okalaydokalay@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    It’s been a few years, but at my old job, there was this woman who came to do a training for us at our job. When all was said and done, I went to thank her personally for coming to do the training for us.

    Can’t remember how, but we found out that she was 92 years old!! Not lying, she looked early 60’s at most! Me and the few people who stuck around were shocked and amazed and asked her questions.

    She told us that she was currently retired but she still loved the field so she would do trainings for a little pay here and there. She told us that she was a nurse in World War II. She didn’t go into too much detail but that was really awesome to meet someone in person who could say that. Not every day you meet someone from that time period or directly experienced the war, especially as an adult, no less.

    I asked her her “secret” to getting to her incredible age. She said she hadn’t had an alcoholic drink since she was 22 years old.

    I’ll never forget that woman. I always think of her when I see alcohol and contemplate my life, to be truthful.

    • BarqsHasBite@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      Really our normalization of drinking needs to be re-examined.

      I remember thinking all the anti smoking stuff wouldn’t change anything. I was wrong. We really can change.

      • Okalaydokalay@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        I agree. I have a drink here and there on the weekends sometimes, but the normalization of getting hammered, blackout drunk is unhealthy. I’ve always thought it was “funny”, for lack of a better term, when online dating and seeing people who have a problem with people who do drugs, even marijuana or smoking cigarettes but their own profile is filled of pics of them with booze and their profile is jokes about getting drunk and alcohol being their personality.

        A little examination on this would benefit society.

        • funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          for me it was my realization that some of my drinking was a mental illness (I was never an alcoholic but I was self medicating with alcohol)

          I feel so much better now I have one or two beers every few weeks

    • BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 year ago

      That’s amazing. I once had a patient who was 93 and very angry to be admitted to hospital because he still had a part time janitorial job he didn’t want to miss. The Dutch are very long lived. Your lady must have been Dutch.

      • Okalaydokalay@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        I wish I would have asked! We’re in the United States but she didn’t have a noticeable accent.

        Crazy how people at that age still want to work!

  • oʍʇǝuoǝnu@lemmy.ca
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    1 year ago

    I used to work with this old guy named Mel in my early twenties at a graveyard job in a cold storage warehouse doing freight handling. He would bike to work 20 km down a dark highway to get to our shift at 1 am, he owned a car just preferred to bike, which I respect. This guy was in his 70s, consumed nothing but a cheese sandwich for lunch, coffee, and smoked heavily. Despite this he was in seemingly great shape and was fastest, hardest worker in the whole place. At Christmas time we would unload 20 lbs boxes of mandarin oranges from 53 foot trailers packed top to bottom, front to back onto pallets, this guy would go faster by himself than two people. He always said it’s just about the technique and how you position your body.

    I knew him in my early twenties before going back to school and he was the only person at that job with a brain so we talked a lot about space and technology and all that. I moved away for school so it’s been like 13 years since I last saw him so I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s dead given his age and how much he smoked but I always wondered what happened to him and if he’s still kicking around. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if this guy made it to 100.

    • all-knight-party@kbin.run
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      1 year ago

      I read his feat of unloading the truck and I was like “yeah, I mean, that’s not too crazy”, then I realized you didn’t mention him using a forklift.

      • oʍʇǝuoǝnu@lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        Yeah, no, to save space they didn’t come on pallets, we would have to load them onto pallets and get them off the truck. Not sure who had the worse job, me or the Chinese guy on the other end losing the truck.

  • atlasraven31@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    I met a scientist researching rust and the rust process. It was a little over my head but if you find new tools being sold that don’t rust, I’m sure it will be her doing.

  • banana_meccanica@feddit.it
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    1 year ago

    No one, and I get it. Get interest if you are interesting or minimally valid. If you don’t have a job, a family and your interests is just stay here… well, you’re fucked, I am and now I can only accept it

      • Call me Lenny/Leni@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        My grandfather. “Fought” the Imperial Japanese as a boy by volunteering to help look for their hideouts, a hobby he introduced to friends of mine who in turn turned it into a pastime of cave exploration. Moved to America, began a bed and breakfast type of thing like nothing ever happened. Most knowledgeable family member I know and never have I ever had an argument with him, ever. Lived long enough to see me graduate plus three years.

  • Helix 🧬@feddit.de
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    1 year ago

    Most of my friends are kind of interesting and unique. I don’t really hang out with people who are NPCs or boring. What would I have to talk about with them?

    A more thought provoking question for me would be which boring people I know. Some stereotypical ‘beer, BBQ and cars’ guys come to mind. I couldn’t live my life only doing work and those boring-ass hobbies. They’re not even real cooks or car mechanics, they just like to grill cheap meat drenched in marinade and own an expensive car and talk about it!