The mastodon stages:
1: getting used to the interface
2: discovering that most people are just people, engaged in everyday adventures, big & small
3: the allure of the notification sound
4: a gradual getting used to the fact that not everything is about US politics, and that it's okay to filter it out on a macro level
5: a quiet moment when you think "there can still be poetry in this world"
6: some sort of reconciliation with the quantum magic that is the federated timeline
7: pineapples