Well, the good news is that according to this list, your instance already blocks Threads.

25 isn’t too young, and makes sense if you have focused on education and career. I followed a similar path in that I spent a lot of time in education, only starting to properly consider courting someone around the age of 25 or 26 after I finished my PhD. Things were complicated somewhat by Covid, but I got married last year at the age of 30.

As to losing weight, I can’t speak much from experience on that, but losing some weight may be a good idea, as much for your own health as anything else. Unless you are really overweight (in which case it is a medical issue that you should address), I think you shouldn’t worry too much about it in terms of dating.

The understanding I’ve generally heard, and which seems supported by the context, is that the fig tree symbolises the unfruitfulness of God’s people. This is particularly apparent in that both Matthew and Mark record it as happening alongside Jesus casting out people trading in the temple (Luke records the cleansing of the temple but not the fig tree thing). It is then followed by Jesus telling a series of parables against the religious leaders. There may also be a relation to the parable of the barren fig tree earlier on in Luke 13.

I can understand why people wouldn’t specifically talk about the fediverse on other sites. It just seems like there is a lot of coverage of X and Meta in the news, but there doesn’t seem to have been even a passing mention of fediverse sites in most of what I’ve seen. I guess the more established social media sites are still a lot more significant than fediverse alternatives though.

What’s sad is that people aren’t talking about Mastodon nearly as much as they are talking about Threads and X. It just doesn’t seem to get much publicity outside of the fediverse.

The admin made a post reporting on the finances.

Technically a general eye doctor would be an opthalmologist. An optician is someone who makes lenses. The person you see for an eye test at the opticians is an optometrist (someone who measures what strength lenses you need).

Thanks for your detailed post. I appreciate your measured response and approach to defederation, particularly given the personal attacks you suffered. I’m happy with your approach - as long as users who do break the rules can be dealt with, there is no need to defederate.