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✨easily traumatized nihilist✨

Just trying to search (using DuckDuckGo, because I already know Google's fuckin useless) whether its advisable to put a small bandaid on a coldsore, particularly with medication on it, particularly overnight or out and about.

EVERYTHING IS JUST ABOUT PRODUCTS.

No simple resources for information. No simple facts. "What's the best hydrocollood bandage for coldsores?" "Coldsore bandage walgreens." "coldsore bandage near me." Best MAKEUP for hiding coldsores.

Wtf y'all? I hate the future.

There's no reasonable escape. No mainstream search engine uses regex anymore. You can't even -minus out or "quote in" terms with reasonable accuracy. Half of the results are AI trash to sell you products, maybe a lucky 1-in-10 is simply there to inform you. More like 1-in-50 most times. It was once noted as a landmark that Google users rarely navigated to page 2 of search results, because they found what they wanted on page 1.

Now I'm regularly diving 3, 4, 5, sometimes more pages deep.

I'm doing it, btw. I'm gonna put a bandaid on a coldsore I just medicated.

As far as my mostly informed layperson's knowledge can say, there are probably some benefits to covering a cold sore at least for certain times and activities & few significant risks. For me, I don't want to fuck up my sore with my pillow, blankets etc while I sleep & risk spreading the outbreak, causing more pain, or slowing healing. 🤷

I'm mildly allergic to some bandage adhesives & maybe that'll make it worse, idk.

I hate that huge, expensive, energy intensive swaths of fanatically advanced technology is working away, heating the planet, sucking up money & resources, not primarily to power cutting-edge medicine, augment educational environments, or make the world more accessible & equitable.

A lot of it is now just expensive garbage, more dead technology like fucking landlines and broadcast television that were to death by greedy companies, advertisers, & scammers.

The young & the old a like are more disenfranchised than ever from technology, some people are just giving up. Why wouldn't they? It's functionally worthless to them. Neither searching nor social media are ways to learn something or discover new art or businesses. Every Windows system is bombarding you with popups & questions which you can only postpone & never say "no" to. Everything demands an account (with your LEGAL NAME to boot! Unreal!!). Any joy is interrupted every 2 minutes with ads!!!

Best of all, you often aren't even allowed to GET YOUR SHIT FIXED!!

The enshittification is getting so rapid & aggressive that all that work getting personal computers into every household & a laptop in everyones personal collection & a smartphone in every pocket is worthless. Wasted. Why should we keep using technology that is so explicit with its contempt for us as users? & thats so transparent about its need to milk us for all we're worth so some fuckwads can buy another election cycle?

Out with the smart phones with the apps for every fucking grocery store, coffee shop, and healthcare company we've ever visited. Out with the computers which are now designed to be gigantic smartphones instead of robust machines with meaningfully different interfaces (not to mention anemic web experiences as websites are primarily designed for mobile viewing). Back to coupon clipping and sending postcards, i guess.

Oh, except the USPS is getting enshittified too. Oh well. 👁👄👁

FUCK we don't have the little bitty bandaids i need!! Fuck kill me lol I'm going to bed, goodnight. 👽🛸✨

Update: I got the little spot bandages I needed, been using a bandaid & medicated ointment for my coldsore (one of the worst outbreaks I've had in years, oddly, not sure why). I'm doing it like this EVERY TIME!!

Using medication on the coldsores has helped speed up healing for many years, but the addition of the bandaid has also protected the sores & kept them from excessively drying out, cracking, bleeding, etc.

No fucking thanks to Internet searches for helping me lol. All me, bebé. 🤷

I do change the bandage a lot though, bandaids don't love sticking to your mouth area much at all, so it starts to peel off by itself anyway. Same with when I wear a mask at work. The mask holds a lot of moisture in around my face, so the bandaid doesn't last under the mask anyway, so I don't use one while working. I also don't use a bandaid for periods of time when I'm just at home. So the area does air out regularly. Its mostly at night that I get the most benefit, sometimes when I'm out.