I didn't "get" the horse thing

Like some (most?) people, I looked at horse people and wondered "why". My Mum is a horse person, she'd rave about how much she loved her horse, but the words never really meant much to me. I always empathised with my Dad who, like me, found things like motorbikes and tractors more interesting and fun.
I thought, why would you want to invest time, energy and money into this 500+ kg animal which, as far as I could tell, didn't do much other than stand completely still all day and eat grass?
And then there's the actual riding, horses are animals, they are famous for getting scared of things such as a puddle, a plastic bag and the wind. Why would I not just use a reliable thing like a bike or car and master that? I honestly couldn't think of anything worse than wanting to go on a trek somewhere and your dumbass horse going "nah I don't like that brush" and you having to take a detour. It sounds frustrating!

So I tried horse riding

I started dating someone who was also a horse person, my Mum is a horse person and I felt like I was both missing something and also maybe it would be good for my relationship. So I thought, fuck it, why not let's give it a go. A new hobby is always a good thing.
My initial thoughts were luke warm. It was difficult as hell, which probably was the main thing that kept my interest. I feel confident getting on any machine and learning the controls in an afternoon, but a horse was like learning to drive again, but worse because each time I went to learn the car had a different opinion that day.
I felt like I struggled. I got laughed at and I laughed with the people at the stables as kids the age of 10 or 12 were running circles around me.
I could go one day and feel like I had it, the horse would listen and I knew what I was doing only to go back the day later and struggle to get the thing to go forward.
It took a year, minimum because it's hard to really put a finger on when it clicked, to actually sit on a horse and consistently get basic forward, stop and turn, never mind everything else. And I swear to god there is a lot of everything else.

Horse riding is really complicated

A horse, as mentioned, is a real living breathing animal. What that guy had for breakfast today is going to effect your ride today. You don't get that on a motorbike.
I'm writing this section before I even get as far as owning a horse too, so bare in mind these are all riding school horses, not my own.
So you sit on a horse and you know the mechanical signals to move the animal the way you want. I won't go into detail. As a rider, you have to both read the animal, as you would a person in a social setting, and also set the tone on the horse too. By sitting on that horse and giving clear, no nonsense instructions, the animal also builds trust with you too. Both on a momentary and a long term basis.
This means that, you could sit on a horse and give it the right mechanical cues, but the horse will go "nah" or it half ass it. As a rider, it take so, so much practice to learn how to pick up on these cues and also correct them and, even better, avoid them in the first place! And it's obviously even harder when you are learning at a stable and you aren't sure you are going to get the same horse every lesson.
OK, still with me? Because so far we've sat on a horse.
The horse can spook, the horse can be lazy, the horse can be really energetic, the horse can be stronger on one "rein" (the direction of travel around a riding school) than the other, the horses tackle may be uncomfortable for the horse, the horse may have sore feet, the horse might have a really boucy trot or a slow canter or goes straight into gallop from walk. The variables are impossible to list. As a software engineer, the thought of trying to ride a horse programaticially sounds nigh on impossible. It's all vibes.
And that's part one of this massive post, it's all vibes.
It's the vibes. You spend years learning how to vibe check a half ton dog so you know ahead of time it's probably not to pleased about the upcoming bush which is a slightly different colour and you can do something about it.

Horses are weird animals

So far in this post, I've been learning to ride and I've started to understand, ok, there's a lot going on there. I can trot, I can move the horse but I can't really do much with that beyond go for a nice walk really. There's a lot more to do.
Around this point, thanks to the aforementioned partner, I was gifted a horse. He's a handsome quarter horse named Brego (yes, named after that Brego).
I was told "Brego is lazy, he'd rather stand there than throw you off, perfect for learning" I was dubious.
I met this horse, he didn't say much, or do much. I can read dogs, but this man was giving me nothing.
Needless to say, I started riding him and it was a rocky start. He lived up to expectations and he refused to go out of sight of the house, and I didn't have the skillset to know what to do with him.
I got a horse trainer over and she gave me the tools, which springboarded Brego and I off into the woods for some adventures together.
It's taken another year, a lot of questions, getting thrown off (not Brego as promised) and many, many neck scratches but I'm getting it now.
They don't really communicate like other animals, a lot of it is silent and very subtle. Posture, ears, eyes, jaws and being tense are all little signs of horse language.
Nowadays Brego will see me across the field and push all the other horses out the way to see me, then just stand there. He just likes to hang out with the boys, you know?
So that's part two, the animal bond and it's a great feeling! It is like a big, weird dog. They all are full of this bizzare personality that horse people keep trying to put into buckets, but it doesn't really seem to always work.

Putting it together

Having an animal you love and trust, who also loves and trusts you, through hard work ontop of the honestly rediculous amount of skill and patience required to vibe check a horse and ride it is a huge payoff.
Riding a bike or car feels to me like refining a process. I can learn it reasonably quickly and then it's years of practice to get various experience and learn various niches.
Horse riding it seems like there is always more to learn, I don't know how to format it in this post without it going on for thousands of lines.
Just consider learning to ride, learning to jump and learning dressage on one horse, then having to apply that to another with a different temperament. There's obviously a lot of crossover, and you can learn how to ride a horse with a similar personality but every horse is unique, so you're learning how to adapt and thrive with each different animal.

Everything else

I didn't know where to put this but I wanted to call out the sheer volume of knowledge in the hobby/sport. I was so unaware of this before I started to learn.
I already mentioned sitting on a horse, going forward and the intricacies there. But there is so. Much. More.
The basics, like walking, trotting, canter, gallop, turning. Multiply that by the horse itself, riding a lazy horse is a different skillset to riding a wild beast with no stop peddle. I've seen people try to bucket horses in around 6 to 10 different types. Like I said above, I'm not sure about the buckets but these are by people who have more experience than me so maybe there's something there.
Then you've got more advanced riding sports, jumping, dressage, cross coutry, racing. Obviously not everyone is going to learn and get into all of these but they are their own sports which I haven't even touched yet.
Then on top of that you have non-riding skills. That is the community is very keen you understand and you are comfortable with horse care.
We're talking stable care with mucking out, water and food, brushing before and after, tacking up and down, taking care of the tack, hoove care. To some extent there's other stuff like teeth, vaccinations, quality of life, etc etc.
I'm listing stuff and these all have depth I don't understand, there's stuff I don't know about because I keep getting told in a matter of a fact way "oh did you not know about blah?"

Horses are cool

They are massive dummies but they are cool. I used to think horse riding was a sport for lazy people.
But lord, I feel like I have to apologise! It's so damn hard and uses so much of my brain that I realize it was me on my motorbike that was the lazy one all along!
I love learning and I feel like I learn all the time riding. The fact the fatty I'm sitting on likes me too is a good feeling too.

Feel free to ask any questions and please share your thoughts and experiences with horses!
Are/were you also like me?
Are you a horse person?
Do you think you'd ever try horse riding?

Maybe you ended up on an email chain you weren’t supposed to. Maybe you stumbled across a gift from your partner in its hiding place. Maybe you heard a friend talking about you without them realizing you were there?

This can be about something serious, funny, sad, lighthearted, etc. Anything goes.

Tell us the story: What did you see/hear? How did it impact you/others? How did you feel about it?

I thought I would share this story as I've been thinking about it ever since coming out as transfem and it always makes me smile.

for every year it's been going on -- which is two... but I digress -- I've helped out at a major trade show to put some iconic industry products on display as mainly fully working examples for people to play around with.

I noticed this lady looking at one of our exhibits and struck up a conversation with her as I had done with countless other people that day. turns out she was working at the company who built that exhibit during its production run in the early eighties! we spoke a lot about her experiences with that company.

after a bit, a few more people from that same company came over and they were all reminiscing about their time working there. it was at this point I realised she was trans because she kept saying to all these old guys "you probably knew me by a different name back then"! they were all really accepting and had no issues, goes to show older people can and do respect trans people!

it really inspired me to meet not only a trans elder but a trans elder working in my industry, who had worked on an exhibit I had set up the day before -- we opened it up later and found her initials on an electrical testing label from 1983! in meeting her it feels like I saw a possible future for myself, which is not something I had properly envisioned before, not on the order of decades at the very least. I like the idea of having a future. it gives me something to strive for. I want to be the lady who goes to trade shows and regales bright-eyed students with tales of a long and fulfilling career in my industry. I want to have stories to tell and I want to be there to tell them. meeting her made all that seem that much more possible.

I hope this makes someone else smile like it does me and I'd love to hear more stories like this if anyone is willing to share!

I recently finished The Bonehunters, the 6th book in Malazan Book of the Fallen and taking the advice of @DynamoSunshirt I decided to post this to see the thoughts and opinions of everyone here on this book in the series, and by extension how it builds upon the previous books.

I've felt like each book in the series has drawn me further in, and this was no exception. One thing that I've found in reading large scale series with multiple POVs is that there are often ones that I'm not interested in or find less appealing than others while reading it and look forward to getting back to my favorite characters. There wasn't a single character in this volume, and so far in Malazan, that I wasn't interested in following.

I'm wrapping up my work day and don't have a lot of time to write out all my thoughts on the book but wanted to get this posted while it was on my mind and then add in more later.

I loved seeing so many potlines from the previous books start coming together.

The siege of Y'Ghatan was completely unexpected and was riveting to read, it being one of the longer chapters in the book kept me up late one night because I had to see how it wrapped up!

The end of the book felt like we were witnessing a pivotal moment and what seemed like a rapid fall of the empire. So many injustices with the Wican Pogrom and how the Chain of Dogs was being treated. I was honestly rooting for Tavore to usurp Laseen.

Heboric's potline feels like it is not completed and that the Jade Statue and all of those souls will have an impact on the storyline later on. I'm also left wondering what Hood wanted from Ganoes as part of the deal to let Heboric out of Hood's realm.

Karsa Orlong continues to be awesome and has become of my favorite characters. His self-assurance and introspection along with the seeming threat to civilization he represents is fantastic. I also saw a reference towards the end of the book about certain Tobalki possessing warrens of their own. I'm curious if he has reached that point and how exactly that works with all the other mysteries of the magic in this world.

I have a friend who has already read all 10 books, and I've been bouncing ideas/predictions off of him which has been great.

I am currently starting book 7 and would appreciate if any spoilers for the following books, or other books in the Malazan setting, are avoided.

With the recent news about Synapse, I am a little on edge with the safety of my money. I am currently living in France for school, and am hoping to immigrate here permanently. All of my savings is in USD, so I need a way to easily and cheaply convert between USD and EUR, and be able to spend EUR locally. After a ton of research, I decided to move almost all of my banking to Wise. They don't offer traditional banking features like in-person branches or checks, but I didn't use those anyway. I can get a local bank number in any of the many countries they support. The savings account APY is insanely high (higher than I have seen from even the best high yield savings accounts. I have a debit card that allows me to spend directly from any one of my bank account currencies, and auto convert to other supported currencies. And the USD account is insured by FDIC passthrough insurance.

In the thread about the Synapse collapse, people were saying that passthrough FDIC insurance doesn't always mean that the customer's money is actually insured. And apparently some fintech services will just lie about what is covered by FDIC insurance. I am not a lawyer, and I have no idea how to validate Wise's claims about passthrough FDIC insurance.

I was recently able to open a France bank account, which was surprisingly difficult. (To open a bank account you need proof of address, like a cell phone or electricity bill. I don't pay for utilities in my school apartment, and to get a cell phone plan I need a bank account. That was fun to try and navigate.) I have these bank accounts currently: my Wise account with US USD, Belgium EUR, and UK GBP, a US Credit Union account, and a French EUR bank account. My US credit union and French banks give a very low or zero APY, so keeping my money in my Wise accounts is preferable for that reason. But I also can't afford to loose all my savings if Wise collapses. My question is this: Is Wise safe enough for general money storage, or should I use it just for converting between currencies and keeping a small amount for spending? If Wise isn't safe, what about another similar product? I have heard of Revolut, but I didn't do much research since Wise seemed better for my use case.

I dont know how many people here play Runescape, but the latest seasonal League has just started a day or two ago.

It is a temporary event during which you start a new profile and all the xp rates and drop rates are boosted considerably, making it really fast to level up and progress.

Ive been having a blast with it. Its a fun way to try out skills you dont typically enjoy and get up to hogh level quickly.

For those playing, what relics and areas have you chosen? Ive unlocked Kandarin as my first area and am currently levelling slayer so I can finally try out the trident of the seas on my ironman account.

To me this is the best thing I've ever seen, movie or series or otherwise. Characters, artstyle, writing, animations, worldbuilding, character depth, mental issues and disability representation and the music.

It's bold, it's flashy, it's outright heartbreaking and earth-shattering yet comforting and soft when it wants to be and then totally can spin the story again in a new direction. Bravo.

And I've seen anything from the Shawshank Redemption and The Dark Knight on release to obscure anime and bad TV series these past 25 years.

I bow to the incredible talent that has made this possible.

For many years, I’ve been relying on a budgeting system I came up with that leverages the unlimited free savings accounts offered by my credit union, and the scheduled transfer functionality in their online banking. I have a separate account for every recurring bill. I also have accounts for different types of expenses like groceries, car maintenance, clothing, travel, etc. Altogether I have about 50-60 accounts.

I am salaried so I get a predictable paycheck at predictable intervals. After every paycheck arrives, a flurry of scheduled transfers distribute the money among all the accounts. These accounts are my budget — if I go to the movie theater, for example, I’m not allowed to spend more than what’s in my Activites account. I rely heavily on my online banking app and often pull up the balances to see how much I have to work with. Most of my paycheck is allocated but there’s always a little bit left over in my checking account, which is used for discretionary spending and provides a little cushion if I need it.

Most of my bills are on auto-pay. I have scheduled transfers in place to move the money back into checking when it’s due, just in time for the payment to process.

This system works for me. I like how earmarking and separating out funds for specific purposes as soon as I get paid prevents me from spending that money on other things. I have some annual subscription renewals that I don’t even feel because I set aside a couple bucks every pay period and the money’s there when I need it. I like that this system doesn’t require complex paid software or tedious reconciliation processes. It’s admittedly a chore to make adjustments to anything because the online banking system wasn’t designed for this sort of workflow. Once it’s properly configured, everything is automated and it basically runs itself. I’ve added a couple supporting tools over the years: a spreadsheet to plan the whole budget before I create all the scheduled transfers, and a CLI script that projects upcoming balances for n years so I can optimize my biweekly allocation sizes for their corresponding monthly or annual payments.

I don’t know what to call this system. It’s similar to the old envelope method except I’m using actual bank accounts and never handling cash. I’ve heard that YNAB is similar but haven’t looked into that one. I can’t be the only one managing their money this way! Does this have a name? I’d love to hear resource recommendations for this sort of budget, and please share your own systems and tools as well!

I don't know what I intend for this post to be - I guess I just need to get my thoughts out somewhere. If anyone has any advice, I'd appreciate it - but I'm not expecting anyone to read all the way through this or anything really. If this isn't appropriate for Tildes, feel free to remove it.

I recently graduated college and moved to San Jose, CA for work. And let me tell you, I am not liking it here at all so far. Work itself is great - it's interesting stuff, I like what I'm doing, and I feel like there's really nowhere else I could be doing it. But dear lord, has my social life evaporated. This does not feel like somewhere that someone in their young 20s should be living. I live in downtown, and it's mostly apartments, tech companies, and a spattering of bars and restaurants frequented by tech bros in their 30s. Which is fine, but not at all the social scene I am looking for.

I work with a handful of people my age, and while we do things outside of work every so often, they're really not the same kind of folks I got used to hanging out with in college. They're all super career/status-oriented people, which is not me at all. I've definitely selected for meeting these kinds of folks by working at a tech company, but that's really not the kind of people I usually vibe with. In college, I made a lot of really close friends who were mostly "weirdos", without any better way to put it - lots of queer leftist folks, people into strange art and music, people I could really be myself around. Maybe I have high standards for what I look for in friends, but I really do not see myself becoming close with any of the people my age that I've met around here so far. I have nothing against these folks - we just share different ideals. But I feel like I am constantly censoring myself and am unable to really just be me here.

Of course, to find the kinds of people that I want to hang out with, I probably chose the wrong career path and wrong place to live. I was wary of moving to San Jose since the sentiment I'm sharing here is widely echoed online. And it feels bad proving my fears correct. I looked into moving to San Francisco, Berkeley, or Oakland, but decided against it because I was afraid the commute would burn me out. But now, I am regretting that decision hardcore. I have never felt lonelier in my entire life. I would much rather spend three hours commuting every day than spend my weekends alone.

I started adulthood during the pandemic, and I moved out of state to go to college. For the first two years of school, I had a really hard time meeting people and making friends since my university was really strict on COVID restrictions, and we didn't have in person classes until halfway through my second year. That part of my life was really lonely, too - so this isn't new to me. But somehow, being surrounded by people who are nothing like me feels way lonelier than being around nobody at all. And what hurts even more is seeing all of my friends back in college / high school thriving, and feeling like I'm drowning. I feel like I sold my friends and happiness for a job and money, and it feels terrible. Nobody I knew from college or high school lives here - I had zero connections moving up here.

And this isn't for a lack of effort - I've been trying to figure out where to meet people. I've looked at meetup, and all the events around here seem to be networking, business, and tech related. I've gone on Bumble BFF, and everyone on there just wants to "network" or aren't my vibe. I've been going to bars, coffee shops, etc by myself to try and meet people, but haven't been successful. I've signed up to volunteer at a local animal shelter, which I figure might be a good way to meet people, but they don't have any open shifts yet. I've looked for live music events near me, but there isn't really a lot in the scenes I'm into. I don't know what else to do.

Everything in this place seems to revolve around careers, money, status, networking, and tech. It feels terrible, it's like a physical microcosm of LinkedIn. I know I'm going to be moving to San Francisco as soon as my lease is up in August. I feel like I'll have a way better chance of meeting people who are like me and are my age up there. But in the meantime, I need to make the most of where I am. I'm sure there's people like me somewhere around here, but the issue is meeting them. Where do I find them? How the hell do adults make friends, and close ones at that? I am surrounded by a lot of lonely adults - lots of folks at work who never married, don't do anything fun, and live for work. Do I need to get out of here before this place eats me alive? I don't want to end up like that.

I know this will pass, or at least I hope it does. I know my life isn't over. I just feel like I'm squandering my precious 20s, if there is such a thing. At least I have a roof over my head and a dream job. I guess the grass is always greener, but I feel like I'd rather be struggling to pay rent and be surrounded by close friends than have a full wallet and an empty living room like I do now. The pandemic was a really terrible period of my life, and I won't go into detail about everything going on in my brain, but I feel like I'm standing on the precipice of that kind of depression again.

Anyway, this post isn't really coherent or organized. It's more of a rant than anything. I just needed to get my thoughts on to paper (screen?), and posting here seemed better than screaming into the void. If you read this, thank you :)

EDIT: Wow, I didn't expect so many replies, recommendations, and support on this post. I fully expected to get no replies. Thank you everyone, really. I suppose part of my situation is I need to stop being so negative - while I am genuinely unhappy here, this isn't forever and I can't do anything besides keep trying. If nothing else, I can always move in August (or before then, if I can figure out a way to break my lease without emptying my bank account). Until I move or find connections, I'll get good at enjoying my own company. And I'm also eternally grateful to have made amazing friends in college and High School that I can still talk to, even if they're hundreds of miles away.

I thought I would share my thoughts and experiences daily driving Linux (Fedora KDE Plasma) for the past week.

Why did I switch from Windows to Linux?

My plan was to switch to Linux once Windows 10 hit EoL in Fall 2025. This was due to my computer not supporting Windows 11. This past September, my computer broke (probably MoBo), and so I swapped out my CPU and MoBo, which probably can support Windows 11. However, this hardware swap unactivated my Windows, Microsoft support was not helpful, and I am not a fan of the direction Windows is heading in (removing local accounts, Recall, and a general vibe I get from Microsoft of removing control from end users). So, I decided to make the jump to Linux a year sooner than expected.

My Previous Experience with Linux

So I would say I am moderately experienced with Linux before this. Personally, I have setup a Proxmox server, in which I setup an openmediavault NAS, and played around with various desktop distros for personal curiosity. I also switched my old laptop over to Linux a few years back, but had very low requirements of the tasks that laptop had to perform. I also took a post secondary class on Linux, primarily covering system administration tasks like BASH/PERL scripting, Apache server admin, LDAP, and file sharing all using Ubuntu. So going into this I had a moderate amount of experience, all within Debian based distros. The bigger change with switching my desktop is that it is my primary computer, so the expectations of what it needed to run was higher.

Why I chose Fedora KDE Plasma

I did a post about a month ago asking for recommendations to look into: https://tildes.net/~tech/1ji6/switching_to_linux_looking_for_distro_recommendations
I settled on Fedora KDE Plasma for a few reasons:

• I appreciate the philosophy of not being rolling release like Arch, but also a quicker release cycle than Ubuntu and its forks. I felt this was a good middle ground where I get newer advances without dealing with stuff breaking frequently when there was a new update.
• It can handle most tasks graphically, without having to dig into the console often (more on this later).
• I appreciate the Windows-esque styling of KDE Plasma. I got used to Windows so didn't want a radical shake up. However, it feels to me like a better version of Windows (or maybe just not touch screen oriented and ad bloated).

Headaches/glitches

Some of these are ongoing, while others were issues that I have worked through

• FIXED: Installing nvidia drivers via RPM Fusion. Before installing drivers, the computer was unstable and frequently froze. I ended up just loading a command line only interface and manually typing in the commands to install RPM Fusion and the nvidia drivers. I was planning on installing it via command line anyway, so the main headache here was typing it out instead of copy and pasting the commands in. I also had an issue where I initially installed the wrong drivers.
• ONGOING/INFREQUENT: Occasionally when I wake the computer from sleep, at the lock screen, my mouse is responsive, but my keyboard is not. Also, selecting the virtual keyboard does not work, as the virtual keyboard does not load. I tried waiting for the computer to go back to sleep, and then wake it from sleep to see if it reloads things properly. The computer does not go to sleep normally, so the solution right now is to just shut down the computer and then it is solved.
• FIXED: Steam launched games not closing properly. Specifically Far Cry 5, which runs properly, when I exit the game, the process does not fully close down. From my perspective, it seems like it has, but Steam indicates that it is still running. The solution is to go into System Monitor and close down the Steam application with high resource usage, as that is actually the game still running in the background.
• ONGOING/INFREQUENT/PARTIALLY FIXED: When I wake the computer from sleep, and login, there is a large amount of visual glitches and artifacts on my desktop environment. It is both in applications and especially on the Panel. The current solution is to run the command systemctl restart --user plasma-plasmashell which drastically improves the situation, but the glitches are still partially there. This has just started last night, so probably a computer restart may solve the problem, but I am trying to avoid having to constantly restart the computer.
• FIXED: As Far Cry 5 was a brand new game, when launching it from Steam for the first time, Ubisoft's software wanted me to enter a CD Key, but Steam was not giving me one. Thinking this was a Linux related issue, I switched to my Windows install, and had the same issue. Turns out it is a Ubisoft bug in their software that also impacted Windows. I found a solution online on how to solve it for Windows, did that and authenticated the game. Then I switched over to Linux and the game ran well.
• FIXED: KDE Wallet Service was doing an excessive amount of prompts. I uninstalled the software, but the prompts continued. Turns out it needs to be disabled before being uninstalled, or the prompts continue. So I had to reinstall it, disable it, then uninstall it. Annoying but minor and it is fixed now.
• ONGOING/INFREQUENT/PARTIALLY SOLVED: When waking from sleep, sometimes my background image on my primary display does not fully cover the desktop. This is most likely due to my primary display being 1920x1080, and my secondary display being 1600x900, so the image is not being scaled independently for both displays. The solution right now is to open the settings to change background, and load any image, but not save changes, as this causes my original image to be reloaded properly

Installing/Running Applications

I have been primarily using Flatpaks to install applications. Overall it has been a smooth process. One pain point I have is it seems that the Minecraft Official Launcher for non-Debian systems is kind of clunky requiring me to login to my Microsoft account every time I open the game. This will probably be solved by switching to a third party launcher in the near future. The one software that I haven't gotten around to installing yet is DaVinci Resolve.

What Surprised Me so Far?

There are a few things that have been a pleasant surprise:

• I use the console more than I expected going into it. For flatpaks, I tend to just copy and paste the commands into console. RPM Fusion also had a GUI based install option but I preferred the console option instead. I also have VIM installed, and use that as my digital notepad, just doing simple console commands of vi fileName in my home directory. I was not expecting to use the console as much as I have been, and I think that is partially due to now being more experienced with it, I gravitate towards using the console which I know how to use instead of learning how to do some tasks via a GUI..
• Most things are running better than expected. I haven't touched many games yet, but I haven't had an issue with it yet. It is worth noting that I do not play competitive shooters, so anti-cheat is not something I will have to fight with.
• Libre Office can open my .docx files. I was concerned I may have to convert my existing files to .odt before I can use them, but that does not appear to be the case. I will probably use .odt for new files going forward. It is also worth noting that I haven't worked extensively with my .docx files yet, so there may be some incompatibilities I have yet to encounter.

Overall Thoughts:

Overall I have quite enjoyed running Linux. It does require some tinkering as glitches appear, which currently I am fine with. If I had less free time to tinker and solve the issues, I would probably find Linux to be less viable and more frustrating. Also, most of my glitches can be solved by restarting the computer, although I am trying to find solutions that do not require that. I find it allows me to use the computer and change it to how I want it to be, which I have felt like Windows has gotten increasingly hostile towards the user. A good comparison on this is how the default applications that KDE has included are easy to remove, whereas Windows used to (not sure if it still does) reinstall Microsoft Teams when you uninstalled it.

Edits:

• Added the glitch with background image
• Added more information on my background with Linux, including using it on my laptop

Churchill Solitaire is a mobile game that you can play on Apple or Android devices. It came out in 2016. I found out about it in 2018. It had some very good reviews. It was mentioned that the game is difficult to beat. At the time I was playing some different solitaire games on mobile so I decided to try another. I paid $4.99 to unlock "all deals and free play".

The game is pretty good. $5 was a little expensive to pay for a game that only had one variation of solitaire. For example, I had the game Solebon Pro which has 160 variations. That game cost $10.

So Churchill Solitaire is not a great value. Not all games have the same value of course. But the reason I stopped playing it is because it charges you to get hints and undo moves. A game that is this hard just wastes your time if you can't undo. You can get quite near the end of a session and need to completely restart because you had several choices earlier and picked the wrong one.

Here is the In-App purchase list that is currently on the App Store in 2024. I don't remember if these prices were the same in 2018, but they are the current prices if you want to unlock any of the features:

• Undos - 15 Pack $0.99
• Hints - 15 Pack $0.99
• Undos - 100 Pack $5.99
• Hints - 100 Pack $5.99
• Unlock All Deals & Freeplay $4.99
• Game Pack 1 $0.99
• Daily Game (Monthly) $4.99
• Game Pack 2 $0.99
• Game Pack 3 $0.99
• Undos - 50 Pack $4.99

I understand that the developer should get paid money for unlocking the basic game. I understand that making additional winnable deals may take developer time (most deals are unwinnable in this game, but there is a "campaign" that has winnable deals). I understand that having a daily game may cost the developer to maintain servers and create winnable deals.

But I don't understand charging for hints or undos. I mean, I understand it from a greed perspective. But not from an "I respect the people who paid money for my game" perspective. Yes, I know about Candy Crush and all the other super addictive mobile games that are pay to win and farm money from whales. But this one just pissed me off in particular. This is the mobile game equivalent of heated seats in a BMW.

Since 2018 I've only bought 2 mobile games. So sorry other game devs, I don't even check the app store for games anymore.

Edit: It has been rightfully pointed out that this is a bit of a cranky post. I didn't make clear my intention. Maybe someone can recommend some recent small mobile games, like card or sudoku or something, that aren't pay to win. I am aware of one: Good Sudoku.

I often tell myself that I'm "already dead". I lost my ego long ago and I often don't mind looking dumb or making mistakes, because at the end of the day, why does it matter? We're all going to die and my existence will not change the earth's future.

Thinking this way has GREATLY helped me look forward to the future and reach true happiness. It feels like whatever happens, I've already reached rock bottom so I can only go ahead.

Having said that, ever since 2016, every year has been better than the last. I now have a good fulfilling career, I have a very good group of friends, I'm good financially and I have all the freedom in the world.

Why do I live? I live for experiences, I live to create memories, I live to explore, I live to create, I live to better myself.

So, what are your reasons? I'm always curious about other people's life stories.

I was thinking about one of the threads here about missing the specific subcultures on Reddit. Maybe we just aren't in the habit of sharing our interests or want to know who else is interested in the subculture.

If absolutely forced to, I could probably blog about:

• Occasional game learnings - either new games or specific mechanics in games
• things in relation to the city I live in (I still check this on Reddit)
• Recipes or foods I've tried to make or bought and liked with a bent towards fermentation, coffee, plant-based stuff
• smart articles I thought were worth recommending to others, or fun facts.
• software - nothing super technical, but either small projects, language learnings, thoughts around companies. Maybe occasional "software used to make art" stuff I stumbled upon
• Episode reviews of detective shows, kdramas, and anime
• Deleting Instagram and trying to export my saved posts without using a script (my advice... code review something online and use that script) and other things in relation to introversion

I watched the video "Dirt-Cheap Solar Generator Setup - What Can It Power?" by Alex Beale yesterday. In the video, the presenter purchases a cheap solar panel and power bank for a total of $250 and tests household devices to see what kind of wattage it can take.

Turns out the cheap device can power most household objects. I'm curious if it's possible to try a similar setup to meaningfully cover my electricity usage on a day-to-day basis. Unlike the creator of this video, I don't have a yard. I'm exploring whether a solar solution could work with my constraints.

I wanted to share this idea with Tildes and hear any ideas/feedback/experiences from people who have tried something similar.

My goal

• Investigate whether it's feasible to save money with this setup
• If so, find a setup that I can use to power some or all of my household devices off-grid
• Pay less in electricity costs
• Be able to rely on my power bank when the building's power goes out

My current situation

• I live in an apartment in an urban area in the US northeast (southeastern Pennsylvania).
• I do NOT have a balcony (sadly).
• I have two south-facing windows and four west-facing windows (two of which get a LOT of light, two of which get a decent amount but not as much). However, my south-facing windows don't get direct sunlight most of the day since there is a building in the way (just a bit in the late afternoon).
• The dimensions of the windowsills are about 16 inches in depth and about 55 inches in width. That's enough for a small or medium-sized solar panel, but not most panels designed for outdoor use.
• I can open the windows all the way and it would be physically possible, in theory, to hang something outside rather than keeping it on the windowsill (we'll get into this...)
• I pay for all my electricity. The heat/air is central and inaccessible, as are a couple of the overhead lights (there are only a couple), but everything else could theoretically be replaced with energy from a power bank, I think.
• I already have a power purchase agreement with a renewable energy supplier. All my energy is "green" in the sense that I'm making it slightly more economically feasible to produce green energy.
• In a less expensive month, the bill might come to around $75. In an expensive month, it might come to around $350. If I heated the unit as much as I would like, it would be higher.
  • I'm pretty sure most of my electricity use is the heat/AC.
  • I'm pretty sure most of the remainder is the washer and dryer dishwasher, followed by the washer and dryer.
  • I spend some amount heating my water otherwise (shower, sinks), but I can't address that with a solar panel.
  • I wouldn't mind saving money on the rest if that's all that's feasible.

My power needs (I think)

• I don't know much power my oven uses. It's electric, which the internet says averages around 2500 W.
• My dishwasher runs at 120 V and 18.7 A. That is... uh... 2244 W. Also a lot.
• My dryer says 120 V on the machine, and if I look up the model number, it seems to be at 15 amps. So that's 1800 watts.
• My washing machine, uses....... IDK how many watts. No information on this thing exists. But it uses a 120 V outlet. The internet says an average washing machine could use up to 1400 W (sounds high, but okay).
• My computer has a 520 W power supply, but I doubt it ever uses that much. It's old and mostly runs Solitaire. Maybe one day I will get a fancy new machine that does like 1000 W.
• My fridge uses 115 V at 4.5 A. Let's pretend that's 120 V and say 540 W.
• I can't tell how many watts my TV uses, but the internet says it could be up to 200 W.

I would want a bit of breathing room with the rated wattage so that the power bank doesn't explode.

No way I can run all these devices simultaneously off the power bank, but perhaps I could time them. Even partial coverage could be adequate if it makes financial sense.

Possible spatial configurations

I see a few possibilities here:

1. Stick a bunch of solar panels in the windowsills, propped up at a suitable angle.
2. Stick the panel directly in the window like an air conditioner. In this case I would want to use a two-sided panel, since there would be some ambient light coming from the inside. This would inevitably reduce my home's energy efficiency, which I would have to account for.
3. Weld some sort of counterweight to a mounting system that I can use outside the window to perch the panel at an ideal angle. This would also reduce my home's energy efficiency, but maybe by less since the gap could be minimized. It is also probably illegal. And dangerous.
4. Just fill my living room with solar panels. I will need to have a conversation about that. But it could be done.

I think #1 is the only one that is actually reasonable. #2 would cost me too much in heating bills to make any sense. I think #3 would get me evicted or sued by the city. And #4 is unreasonable considering that I like to use my house to live in.

My budget

I would maybe spend $500-1000 on this if the payback period was a few years. Not more than 5 because panels by then will be a lot more efficient.

I guess I could spend more than that if it makes sense. I have good credit and a high credit limit. I don't make that much money but I could save for a bit or carry a balance for a bit. I think I would draw a hard line around $3000.

The power doesn't go out here too often, so that isn't the main selling point, more of a nice-to-have.

My research

I'm just looking on Amazon. I know I could maybe get something a little cheaper elsewhere. I'm searching for "power bank with solar panel".

• 4000+ W range: OUPES Mega 5 for $3300+ with panels (I think?). That's a lot of money for something that might not even work. And I don't believe it would be $3300, most other models I'm seeing are closer to $5000.
• 2200 W range: Jackery Explorer 2000 for $2500 with the 2 panels. Maybe this could cover my energy-intensive appliances, one at a time. Still expensive. The solar panels will... maybe fit in the window with about 1/2 inch to spare? I could angle them slightly if needed?
• 1800 W range: (maybe) Anker SOLIX C1000 for $800 with 1 panel. It also says 2400 W so idk what it is really. Can't determine the width of the solar panel.
• 1000 W range: EF ECOFlow River 2 for $700 with 1 panel. I am also not sure how big the panel is.
• 600 W range: SinKeu Portable Power Station for $230 with 1 panel.
• 300 W range: Marbero Solar Generator for $230 with 1 panel.

I'm discovering that these companies never specify the dimensions of the solar panels because they assume no one would ever use them indoors. Probably for good reason. If they don't fit horizontally, I guess I could stand them up lengthwise.

I'm sure it would be possible to find a cheaper solar panel separate from the power bank. But as a ballpark, those are my initial numbers.

Math

Imagine I spend $2500 on the 2200 W Jackery model, with 2 panels. I could put them in the two bright west-facing windows. Let's just pretend they can get their maximum output and that charging time isn't an issue.

Let's say I use this every time I run my oven, dryer, washer, or dishwasher (not at the same time), and otherwise I connect it to my fridge and most other electronics. (I know I said my oven could be 2500 W, but I usually just use one burner, and I bet that's more like 1500 W.) Let's pretend the hassle of running all those cables has been solved somehow.

I really don't know exactly what my electricity breakdown is. If I have the heat/AC mostly off and am not in the unit a whole lot (e.g. traveling for some of the month), that's when I end up with a $75/mo bill. But if I'm out of the unit, that means I'm also not using my dryer/washer and other devices as much. I guess the fridge was still on. The $350 side of things is because it's hot and I'm running the AC more, and maybe slightly higher dryer usage for some laundry-related reason. So maybe I'll say the minimum I'm spending on non-heat/AC electricity per month is $50-100, and at most maybe something like $150.

So in this super optimistic scenario, the portion of my monthly electricity bill I suspect I'd be able to theoretically save would be $50-150. Let's just say $100. That means it would take 25 months to pay back if all goes well. Honestly that's not so bad.

If I instead bought the 1000 W ECOFlow setup for $700, I could cover all my non-intensive electrical uses. The main beneficiary would be the refrigerator, the computer, and maybe the television. I think the savings there would be like $25-50/mo at most, being pretty generous. If I say $35, that would be about a 20-month payoff. That's also pretty good, but if it'll take about the same amount of time to pay for itself, I'd rather get the higher-wattage one.

Numerous caveats:

• It's not always sunny in Philadelphia.
• The panels will not be at 100% efficiency because the window is cloaked in shadow half the day, and there is no way I get the angle perfect, and maybe the glass affects how much energy they can absorb or something (would it help? hurt?). This isn't inherently an issue, except...
• ...that the charging time for the power station might be long. Some of the reviews say 6 hours in maximum sunlight, so for my use-case there's no way it would be faster than 12 hours for a full charge, and probably more. I use my appliances kind of a lot. The fridge is always running, and either the washer, dryer, oven, or dishwasher are running a pretty good chunk of the time. I think that I could get by with this... but I probably wouldn't be able to use it as much as I'd like (there are often moments where more than one is running simultaneously), so...
• ...the payoff time wouldn't actually be 25 months. I suspect there are some factors I'm not thinking about that would reduce the realistic amount of energy I'd save here. Let's say it is half as effective in my setup as a normal person's, because the sun is half as visible or something, and the charging time is too slow to use often, or whatever. At a 50-month payoff (4 years), I would start to get skeptical. But not inherently opposed.
• I use my windowsill for other things that like sunlight, like plants. I would have to move the plants that really love the sun somewhere slightly dimmer. Is it worth it???????
• I also like to look out my window, and if I had a huge solar panel there (especially if I had to stand it up vertically for space reasons), that would be a bummer perhaps.
• Constantly charging and discharging this thing probably reduces its effective wattage output fast. I.D.K. by how much. But there might be a point where I can't use it for my high-wattage devices, which would largely defeat the purpose of buying an expensive model. Not clear to me what the timeline for that would be.
• I still can't figure out if the panels would actually fit in my windowsill.
• Since it wouldn't be able to run more than one energy-intensive device simultaneously, I'd have to be careful not to keep it plugged in to too much stuff at once. It would overall be a bit of a hassle to plug in the panels and the charger and everything. Maybe the panels could stay plugged in, but even so.
• Running extension cords all over the house and putting a giant solar panel in even just one or two of the windows would result in a catastrophic domestic state of affairs. I can just imagine the eye-popping that would happen if I set that up unilaterally.

Takeaway

There is almost definitely something I am not considering. My math is so napkin-based, so imaginary and so optimistic.

But even if the practical efficiency isn't great, I feel like this could maybe possibly actually work, and could save me a bit of money. I would just have to spend it all up front. I mean I don't have $2500 on hand. But I could scrounge up part of it and put the rest on credit. And it would make for living room conversation with guests?

Realistically this seems like an amusing but too-annoying to actually do sort of project. If you know anyone who's done something silly like this and had it work, let me know! I'd be curious what their experience was.

Inspired by a recent conversation I had with a fellow museum lover: what is your favorite museum or favorite museums? Why? Curious to learn about some really interesting and unique places that other users might have been to.

This is such a vague thing to post, but in the past few years I've been wrestling with my increasing introversion. I'm always tired. I was talking about my feelings towards friendships to a friend (without an intent to say anything negative) and found myself surprised at how little I mentioned any benefits from companionships. What weighed on me was the time spent, the work spent, the money spent on trying to "keep people happy." (I have a few other closer friends, so it's not the way I feel about everyone). It's a weird position to be in as someone who had once tried hard to make new friends. I find myself struggling with the guilt for how I feel and the desire to just recess, to focus on myself, and to attend to my desire for stability (especially financial stability-- I feel like things have gotten more expensive). I have deeper and more commitments than I used to, which should make me feel so fortunate. However, as a result, they are also in competition for my time / energy.

I've been feeling really weighted down by this lately, so I'm curious to hear from people who may have gone through something similar. A part of me feels that perhaps if I made my life more stable (a cheaper mortgage instead of renting in a major / global city, a higher paying job, lower-key friendships etc.) then I would feel happier on a day-to-day level.

edit: clarified some things

What are your ten favourite movies? My daughter asked me this the other day - we were watching Cabin in the Woods, which is one of my favourites, and I said that it was a top ten movie for me, and she asked me about the others. Now I want to hear yours!

after the comments in my previous topic, I proceeded to try Notesnook and Joplin after having issues with Nextcloud Notes (that I have already documented in my previous post)

Notesnook ain't bad if it's your jam. I found it easy to use and quite nice U.I. the only dings against it (obviously subjective) is that it really isn't supportive of markdown in an easy way, you have to pay for it cause there's no self-hosting option and you have to pay for the ability to have more than 5 tags.

Joplin's only ding imo is just that it has no web browser interface, but beyond that, there's nothing else fuctionality-wise I can really count against it, the U.I. is rather dated but the functionality is so stable that I am more than willing to deal with a dated UI. and I can self-host using my nextcloud instance so that's a great plus in avoiding additional charge.

So I personally recommend Joplin if you don't care about a dated UI in order to avoid having to pay a subscription if you are willing to self-host.

In other news, by the time I finally imported all my Nextcloud notes to Joplin, the nextcloud Notes App had managed to wipe 60 of my notes empty. I love nextcloud and its let me do wonderful things but the notes app they have is incredibly buggy when combined with their android app and how they are trying to implement markdown support.

It's that time of year again: October, spooky month! The perfect time to share creepy/spooky/unexplainable stories! I asked last year and we got some neat stories, so figured I'd ask again. Anything goes from creepy experiences with creepy people, to hauntings, to weird memories you just can't explain.

"Scavengers Reign" eluded me when it released last year, but I was made aware of it after MAX canceled the show in May (Netflix has since picked it up but may or may not put in for more, is how I understand the situation).

The trailer has been posted here but I wanted to check in and see how everyone else felt about it (keep it spoiler free!). Personally I was enthralled all the way through. It has such an interesting blend of Miyazaki-esque "creature-y" world building with more meditative displays of nature and the violence and balance that is integral to it. If that sounds at all interesting I would suggest watching the first of twelve episodes, you will probably know if you are interested or not after it's over.

Here's hoping Netflix green lights more, assuming the creators want to continue. It really could stand as-is with where they left it.

I've been thinking about keeping a diary to improve my English because I rarely use it, but I don't know what to write about... So, if you keep a diary, what do you write in it? And what do you use/prefer, app or paper?

A little over a year ago I posed some questions on Tildes about used electrics.

Shortly after that topic, I went put and purchased a 2016 VW E-Golf. I think that my experiences might be useful for anyone that is considering an electric but struggles with range anxiety or just wonders how practical a car with low range would actually be. When looking at used car prices, I was shocked at how cheap a low range electric car was compared to longer range EVs. I picked mine up for $10,500 out the door.

For context, I live on the outside of a small city in the Midwest. It gets cold here. I am also in a two car household, the other being a hybrid. There are two adults and children in the house.

The Golf has a roughly 20 kWh battery. Over the year that I have driven it, I have averaged 4.5 miles per kWh. That sounds like a range of 90 miles, but that doesn't tell the whole story. On cold days when resistive heating has to be run, the mileage drops by around 30%. On a nice mild day, I can get it up to 6 mi/kWh on a trip if I am off of the highway.

I did not need to install any additional charging abilities in my garage. I have the charger plugged into a random 110V outlet in my garage. I was prepared to shell out a bit of money for an electrician if the 110 circuit didn't cut it, but over a year of use I have not actually run into a scenario where I needed to use more than the trickle charge.

I work a hybrid setup. Twice a week I need to drive into the office around 20 miles away. The office does have some electric charging stations on a 220 circuit but I have not felt the need to charge there on any occasion.

The shorter range does mean that some coordination is required between the two adults in the household. If one of us needs to travel out of town for work or something involving the kids, the other has to limit their travel. In practice for our house, this annoyance ends up being more a concern for which vehicle needs car seats than a concern for mileage. Exactly one occasion this year we have had to adjust plans to deal with having a limited range vehicle.

Overall, I really have been thoroughly happy with the low range EV choice as the primary vehicle in a two vehicle household with a backup for longer range trips.

I’m a young student, and I’m going to start 6th form in 2 weeks (taking maths, further maths, physics and computer science). With this approaching change to my life, I realised that soon I will have to make large decisions which will affect my future career. Despite this, I have little knowledge of what most people do day to day for their jobs, with my knowledge practically limited to a basic understanding of my mother’s work.

For my sake, and that of any other young tildes users, could you explain, without any assumption of previous understanding, what you do at your job, and what that involves.

So, I'm debating switching to a debit card for daily purchases, since the mental accounting gets confusing with a credit card and it's easier to overspend. The only thing holding me back is the fraud protection that comes with a credit card. Are there any (US) checking accounts/debit cards that match the level of protection you can expect from a credit card? Is such a thing possible?

Have you ever had a dream you couldn't stop thinking about the next day? Or provoked strong emotions or actions out of you during your waking life?

Whether you view dreams as spiritual or scientific phenomenon, there's no doubt that our brains are capable of evoking very powerful and vivid imagery.

Have you ever had a dream you felt deeply connected to? Do you have a favorite dream? A least favorite dream?

What is the most profound impact a dream has had on you?

I thought of this question as we're spending three weeks in an RV with two adults and two large dogs. Its working but there are times when we're tripping over each other, even though this is a 40' long vehicle, there just isn't a lot of floor space for a couple of very lazy hounds. But its adequate.

But that got me thinking about living in small spaces. Over the years my living space has varied a great deal. The smallest was three months living out of a Toyota Previa minivan. The Previa has exactly 4' x 8' of room behind the front seats which was enough for a bed with some bins underneath and not much more. But since it was just me, it was fine, but not luxurious.

And Ive lived in a couple of small homes, including a cabin that was 12' x 20' for quite a few months. I built a tiny home on the same yard that was only 10' x 10' inside and was very efficient with a cantilevered queen size bed protruding out the back of the main living area and an outdoor bathroom beside it. It was in a warm climate so a lot of time was spent outdoors.

Raised three kids in a 900 sq ft house that had the basement rented out so that was kind of tight. But with a backyard with the kids to run around in, it was livable. I think the biggest house we've ever lived in had about 2000 sq ft of total living space, up and down.

Im a proponent of living small though. I think in general, many people buy far or rent far more space than they need - when I look back at the homes of the 40s and 50's parents raised 6 kids in houses that would be considered tiny homes by today's standards. Not sure how we got to "need" so much space.

How much space do you need to live comfortably? Curious to know the difference between north American standards and other places.

What's the thing that was promised, not delivered, and just really upsets you?

For me, it's "The Doors of Stone" promised by Patrick Rothfuss. Every couple of months I think about how badly I'd love to read this book and it just really makes me angry. When I first read The Name of the Wind, I was awestruck. I just freaking loved this book. The Wise Man's Fear was a wait, but when delivered, it really satisfied me. Now, it's been 13 years!! Some days I think to myself, "I'm not even going to read his stupid book when it comes out." But, I'm kidding myself. Of course I'm going to read it...if he or I don't die first.

I've been on a hunt for a new monitor for over a year now. Something that can be for personal use and WFH with these specs:

• 4k
• 144Hz
• MiniLED
• <=34" (no curve)
• Built-in KVM switch

Having briefly experienced the INNOCN 27M2V, I expected a "perfect" monitor on the horizon.

Soon after I stumbled into a blog post announcing BenQ's reveal of a monitor that featured all the specs I wanted. I've finally got my hands on that monitor today having waited ~6 months.

First impression was the size. This monitor is a thicc boi. Made me think of a television, but not as heavy as I expected. I mounted it on my monitor arm (VESA 100) without problems.

The OSD is nifty and easy to navigate. There are 5 "quick menus" (ALPHA, BRAVO, etc.) that let you customize settings for each and quickly switch between them. These menus can be customized to select 3 "favorite" settings (e.g. brightness) so that you don't have to dig through the entire menu.

• What you see when you initially open the OSD
• Customizing quick menu favorites

After tinkering a bit, I've fired up Prince of Persia The Lost Crown. I've set the display profile to use the per-configured "Fantasy" color mode (with mini-led enabled). Honestly I don't know what I'm doing these settings, so I don't know whether this monitor is calibrated at all, but it was gorgeous. I don't think any picture I take will demonstrate how good it looks.

I don't have much to say about the KVM yet. But I connected my keyboard+mouse to the monitor, then connected the USB to USB-C to my desktop. I also connected my work laptop (USB-C to USB-C). Everything works, but it'll take a couple of days of normal use to see if there are hiccups. I like switching between desktop (waking from sleep) and my work laptop then vise-versa. I'm curious to see if the "auto scan" works like I want it to.

Unfortunately, I've discovered 2 "stuck" sub-pixels. According to BenQ's dead pixel policy, this is "acceptable". One of the sub-pixels (green) is almost in the center of the screen and I zero in on it almost immediately. I'll reach out to their support regardless because I prefer not to have defects at this price ($1199.99). If I'm lucky I'll discover another stuck sub-pixel.

BenQ's Specs

I've been mulling over this question for a while.

I genuinely can't remember the last time I was "bored". There are so many demands for my attention, opportunities for entertainment, and things to do that I'm never starved for stimulus.

I think back to my childhood, when boredom was either something to be overcome and at times a paradoxical motivation: how many hobbies did I pick up or things did I learn because they were more interesting than being bored?

I think of my students now, with phones, and wonder if they ever experience boredom anymore because they now have unlimited individualized high-interest content available at their fingertips 24/7.

So, my question for everybody here is: do you get bored?

If so, what is it like?

If not, why do you think that is?

How do you feel about your own boredom or lack thereof? What's the good and what's the bad of it?

It's 2024 if I remember correctly and budgeting is a fairly common practice. Companies are obsessed with data. Yet when I got to the store and buy a videogame, dap drywall joint compount, and 3 avocados the transactions is just the store and the amount. It'd be nice if I could track what I've been buying, categories them into entertainment, home improvement, and groceries respectively.

I'm guessing this information actually is tracked but is only used for marketing purposes. But I'm curious, does anyone have more information on why transactions can't at least optionally support extra metadata about what was actually bought?

A couple months ago I made this post asking for nonfiction books to read. I read several recs from there, here are my reviews!

Kingbird Highway: The Story of a Natural Obsession That Got a Little Out of Hand - what a fun book! I read mostly spec fic and this felt a lot like an epic quest story. It was also interesting (and sad) to see the background effects of climate change with birds constantly moving farther northward. Recommended if you want some light reading and to get extremely excited about birds, vicariously

The Ascent of Money - A really interesting history text that also explains a lot of financial market concepts. The author is center-right and I disagree with some of his opinions on particular developments being good or bad, but there's a ton of information here and I think it's a great book to have better financial literacy, but I'd still categorize it as "satisfying curiosity" and not "everyone should read this."

The Perfectionists - A bit disappointing tbh, it started out strong but then it started being a bit esoteric in what it covered. I watched Longitude after it was mentioned here, and discovering that movie was the best part of this book so I recommend watching that and maybe not reading this.

Sleepwalkers: How Europe went to war in 1914 - My favorite recommendation from the post! It's very long and a bit dense, and there's no way I would've gotten through it if I hadn't been both reading a physical copy & listening to the audiobook at the same time. There are too many names to do just audiobook, but having both was a great experience. I wrote some notes about this to hopefully make your life easier if you read this too, and you should, I highly recommend it!!!

I also read a couple books recommended by HN in various threads:

• The War That Killed Achilles: The True Story of Homer's Iliad and the Trojan War - tbh I have no interest in reading The Iliad itself, but this is a fantastic secondary source and I'm glad to feel somewhat familiar with the text after reading it
• Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character - another secondary source about the Iliad, although this one is a bit more distant from the text. Enjoyed quite a bit & it's very interesting, but it's emotionally difficult to get through.
• Two Wheels Good: THe History and Mystery of the Bicycle - this was not fantastic and had maybe two chapters total that were actually the history of the bicycle, the rest was "random anecdotes from my life or vaguely-bicycle-related topics that I personally find interesting." Some sections were interesting, mostly I felt lied to by the title.
• The Trouble with Physics: The Rise of String Theory, the Fall of a Science and What Comes Next - I had read The Elegant Universe in high school, and this book is in some part a response to that one. I found The Trouble with Physics a weird compromise between not being too technical but still providing detail about the state of the field of physics, and it didn't work for me too well, but I was a math major and took several physics courses in undergrad so maybe that's just how it is to read a popular science book in a field you have some background in. I didn't necessarily want equations, but some actual math terms would've been nice instead of just saying "haha it has nice math properties." Anyway, if you're interested in the state of the field of modern physics it's maybe worth reading but also you could just watch this YT video instead which my friend linked to me after I told him I was reading this.
• Chip War: The Fight for the World's Most Critical Technology - this was the book that actually inspired me to make the post here, everyone should read this. Semiconductor manufacturing is one of the most important supply chains in the world today, and I didn't know anything about it prior to reading this book.

I want to ramble about Alastair Reynolds' Revelation Space series/universe. I will avoid spoilers.

So far, I have read:

"The Prefect" 2007
"Revelation Space" 2000
"Chasm City" 2001
"The Great Wall of Mars" (Novella) 2000
"Glacial" (Novella) 2001 (I haven't finished this yet.)

I’m an occasional listener to “The Sword and Laser,” a book club/podcast where they read a book each month and discuss it, alternating between sci-fi and fantasy. I usually don't read the books, just enjoy the conversations, but if the early discussions sound interesting, I will read it before I get to the spoilery episodes.

One such case was when they read ‘The Prefect’ in 2021. I had heard of Alastair Reynolds and Revelation Space and had considered reading him before. If I remember correctly, they said it was a good way to dip your toe in the universe with a story that takes place in it but isn't really connected to the main series, so it doesn't spoil much.

I liked ‘The Prefect’ but didn't love it. It was set in this huge, complicated universe but had this small noir detective-type character we were following. It felt like seeing a narrow flashlight beam, aiming into an opaque mist of stuff that I couldn't quite make out.
I liked many of the little pieces floating around the universe, but I didn't quite trust that it was real and would have internal consistency.

I saw “Pushing Ice” (an Alastair Reynolds book that is unrelated to Revelation Space) recommended somewhere late last year and decided to try it. I loved it, even though the ending left so much unanswered that it was disappointing. I can see how it may make sense to do that for some stories. Still, I have this distrust of the author's intent sometimes. If it feels like they are including mysterious background info without any thought of how it all connects, it bothers me. Even if the story or characters are good, it is distracting. I'm afraid of getting a "Lost" or "Game of Thrones" type ending where I don't feel like all the threads paid off or had any real purpose. To be clear, "Pushing Ice" was nothing like those endings. I feel like it earned its story. It just didn't fill in the universe as much as I wanted. I still didn't fully trust Reynolds as an author.

A few months ago, I decided to try the first proper book in the series, “Revelation Space”. I was surprised to see that I already owned it on Kindle. The first chapter was very familiar. I had bought it in 2013! As I read, I remembered I had gotten bored back then and left the book after a chapter or 2 to read something else. The beginning was a little boring. Again, it's set in a world I don't know and I'm not sure if I care about. In this book though, the perspective changes often. Multiple points of view seem to help me triangulate the world. It takes half the book, but I eventually fully buy-in, and then the world seems incredibly full. References to unknown factions, historical events, religions, movements, etc. They all feel like real plausible things with their own potential histories. Instead of the misty, non-tangible fluff, they seemed like when I read "The Prefect" or the first part of this book.

I finished “Revelation Space” completely satisfied and excited to dive into the series. I did a little research and found there are a lot of options for reading order. At this point I’m fairly certain I want to read every book in the series, so I am not too concerned with reading order, I just want to find a fun way to keep the things fresh as I explore it. I decided to read “Chasm City” next as it seems like the next thing in terms of publication date.

"Chasm City" was great! It followed the same pattern for me, with the beginning and the main character being the most boring parts of the book. But by the end, I felt like I knew the universe better and saw a bunch of interesting, fun stuff along the way.

I then read “The Great Wall” a quick novella that was awesome! It tells an origin story for something that has been mentioned but left ambiguous in all the other books. So satisfying.

I started reading another novella, “Glacial” today. So far, I'm really curious, but not sure what it's about.

The Great Wall reminded me of a book I read probably twenty years ago, “Hellstroms Hive” by Frank Herbert. I can't remember the details, and I think I may reread it now to take a break and make sure I won't burn out on Revelation Space. After that, I think I’ll jump right back in with “Redemption Ark” the next main novel in the series, which I believe follows the story of the novella I'm reading now.

Unless someone else has a better suggestion for what to read next in the revelation space universe? I've already bought the “Galactic North” collection to read those two novellas. But Im not sure if I should read any of the others until after I read further in the main novel series.

Any other opinions on revelation space?

I daily drive Pop!_OS, which uses the GNOME desktop environment. I know that DEs are a hotly contested space among Linux users, and my use of GNOME wasn’t so much a choice as it was a default: it’s what came with my distro.

I like GNOME. I don’t really understand the hate it often gets, but I also don’t really have the legacy understanding of Linux that a lot of people do, and it seems like a lot of distaste lies there. I’m as casual a user as they come — Linux for me is like a Chromebook: it “just works” in that I pretty much need it to get me online and manage some documents. (I do also play games on it, for which Steam and Proton have been a huge boon.)

I also have a Steam Deck, and it uses KDE’s Plasma on the desktop side, so I got to see what that was like. I also like KDE. It’s very different from GNOME, but I can see the appeal. It feels more like Windows but also has a lot of little nice touches and additions. Also, no ads.

This got me thinking: what if I tried using KDE instead of GNOME on my laptop?

I assumed that this would be a big deal. Like, I would have to completely gut my distribution, or reinstall it fresh. Multiple hours of work. Lots of preparation. Looking up myriad terminal commands I don’t understand and hoping they do what they’re supposed to, because if they don’t I’m really screwed — as soon as something goes wrong “under the hood” I’m dead in the water when it comes to fixing it.

But I was looking on System76’s support site and they made it seem super simple. A single terminal command to install the whole DE?

It can’t be that easy, right?

I am astonished to say that it WAS.

I ran the command, had to select between gdm3 and sddm (a choice which I didn’t understand at all so I searched around a bit before just going with the default: gdm3), and then rebooted.

I can now select between GNOME and KDE on the login screen, and both work flawlessly. It was so easy.

I don’t know who to credit for this. Did System76 do a great job of making this easy on their distro? Did the KDE team work hard to make their DE effortlessly plug-and-play? Is this just a general product of the way Linux handles its different components?

I don’t know but I’m willing to spread the love around to anyone and everyone who contributes to Linux and all of its facets. It’s wild to me that I can so easily reskin my entire operating system in the same way that I used to do with Winamp back in the day. I keep waiting for something to go wrong, but after a few days of this, I’ve realized that everything still “just works,” automagically.

A big thanks here to anyone who has a hand in open-source software and making computing better for people like me, who have (mostly) no idea what they’re doing.

I picked ~misc and don't really have an idea of what tags would be appropriate. If there's stuff I can include in future posts like this I'll be glad to make sure they're there, just let me know. There probably won't be one for a long while but I'll remember. Technically I am advertising myself a bit, but I think I've framed it well enough that ya'll will see it's not really the point of the post. I'll never be bothering ya'll with offers and ads and shit.

This is a continuation from a post I made a while back about how it's going with the endeavor I've set in front of myself. In some ways, things proceed as I'd hoped, while in others there's been need for flexibility/adjustment. I wanted to give an update because a few big steps happened this past week which hopefully mean moving into a busier phase of the whole thing, and to add to the corpus, create the proof of what this all was as it begins if that makes sense.

The biggest thing has been an article published in our local paper. Two, actually, which were combined together into a front page spread I did not expect. Yes, there's a photo of us and our contact info in there, and yes, you're welcome to reach us if you've an idea for something you'd like to do. You'll be talking to me, and I'll be happy to go over details and land on pricing that actually does work for both of us. Primarily we are offering the space, with some ability to accommodate large groups and connections with folks who can provide stuff. It depends on what you want, how things will be priced. The less you need us to do, the less we need to charge. We don't want to regularly be a place where folks stay overnight, but I can probably swing that from time to time for someone coming from far away. If you aim to do something in the near term, do be aware it is hot as shit down here and very humid. The house is a-ok staying cool, but you'll want to be prepared for Mississippi in the summer. I have a dog too, so if you've got allergies you'll need to prep accordingly. She's gonna be 16 this year, she's nothing but friendly to people and sleeps a lot. Pets are welcome, provided they are house-trained and well behaved.

I am intentionally avoiding the internet on the whole for reasons I'll get into, but I do want to extend an offer to this forum in particular, as thanks for allowing me the space for expressing my thoughts as they took shape. I'm aware the site is public facing - what I'm going to share here is public already. I have to bite the bullet on sacrificing some anonymity and just try to control how that anonymity goes away, is how I've come to see it. You won't find me on social media, and what exists for the house/my grandmother is wildly out of date/largely inaccessible - it's gonna stay that way if all remains up to me, so this is just about the only way for someone outside of Brookhaven to know of us at this time. I'd like for at least a few people to know what we were up to, in a form that serves as proof of my intent from its actual beginnings. While the plan took shape before I ever wrote about it, it was in writing about it that I was able to make it clear to myself, what I aim to be doing, so I feel like it's part of completing things to share this stuff here.

The paper is very much a local thing, they got a few details wrong and you'll probably pick out how the quotes don't quite sound like me if you've read a lot of what I've posted. It's fine, the details in need of correction aren't critical. There isn't a lot in there about the more high-minded stuff I like to write about, because I'm not there yet. For now, it's simply building a business out of something, I have to make the something from which that business will spring. I'll think more about where it goes when I've got it moving. The article was free, which was pretty awesome. The paper is in a slow time, and it's mostly one guy doing a lot of the writing, they were just happy to have something to include. I think he did great.

The articles worked, too. I got calls the day the print version went out, and am expecting some followups soon to set dates and square away payment. I go walking downtown every day in the afternoon, and got some extra attention. While it's possible, while the pressure is light, I've been taking advantage by trying to advertise almost solely through word of mouth and face-to-face interactions, fully aware it will take a while for that to have an effect and that I may need to branch out fast if pressures change. Thus far, it's been the local paper, a print ad in a different paper that goes out primarily to local businesses, and a radio ad. There's a couple of reasons I've stuck to stuff like that.

The first is that I think it will provide a good foundation for sustaining the enterprise. If it's possible to have enough business to stay around purely from what exists around me, that means I can capitalize maximally if/when we do extend advertising outside our area, and it means security if for whatever reason those means can't be utilized. I don't want to be dependent on the internet for a livelihood if I can possibly manage it. It's not so principled a position that I'd refuse to do it at any point, rather it's like a back-pocket option, something to be engaged with strategically at what I determine to be either the proper time or because the needs have grown past what I can sustain without it, if that makes sense. My aim is to be a part of this town, to be of it, so I want to keep what we're doing as local and simple as possible. I have to be ready to constrain everything and take care of my grandmother too. I won't let that priority slip and will endure whatever hardship is necessary to fulfill it. It's easier to do that the smaller things are, a bit of a balancing act.

The second reason is much more practical and kind of silly. My grandmother's computer is the biggest security risk I think I've ever encountered in person. I refuse to introduce new online components when such a risk exists, if that makes sense, and I will endure whatever hit to efficiency/development it means until I can get it corrected. Her usage habits are minimal which is a lucky thing - she sticks to old fashioned stuff for almost everything. But, a priority of mine is that she can see and understand everything I'm doing, so I need this machine to be in a better state before I can take some of the steps with that. The challenge of it isn't technical at all, I could get the thing in good working order in a day, probably.

To give you an idea of what's difficult here, imagine for a moment you just ignored the internet as a whole since it began. You used it, you know how to do some stuff on it, but only by way of memorizing actions, the steps necessary to do a thing you wanted, a setup someone made for you. You never really engaged with what the stuff you use is designed for, you didn't follow how any of it developed, you're (blissfully, I'd say) unaware of pretty much that whole end of things. It's very difficult to explain the danger of something like an AI phishing scam, to someone who for all intents and purposes, never learned what phishing is, and further doesn't tend to believe in the shittiness of other people. That last part is one of the reasons I love my grandmother as much as I do, but it does make this task harder, and delays further action on my part.

I've gotten the machine to as secure a state as I can, and have gotten the data backed up, so hopefully movement really gets going on this and I can feel better about spreading out our net, so to speak. I think what frustrates me about it is having been there across years of time - a lot of why this machine is the way it is, is because other people took it upon themselves to "fix it" and almost none of them knew what the hell they were doing. They didn't explain anything to my grandmother either. Their interactions mean misunderstandings on my grandmother's part, and the lack of a foundation of knowledge means it's starting from zero in a way I have never actually encountered before doing this kind of work. I've gotten close, seen some pretty absurd things, but the lack here is just of a different kind, more complex than it seems. I've been writing about it separately/on my own because I think the experience stands as a sort of ultimate test of a lot of the stuff I did before I got here.

There is also health to think about. The priority, for now, is to set things up in a way which is compatible with what my grandmother can do. I'm trying to set up situations that let her do the things that make her happiest, and do all of the nitty-gritty shitty stuff myself. That means house maintenance, yard work, grocery shopping, cooking, arranging for stuff like an electrician when something breaks, learning how to do some of the fixing myself. I've only ever rented. I've never been in a position to maintain a house before, and as I'm sure plenty of you know far better than me, that's a good bit to learn all on its own. Especially with a home as old and complicated as this one with an owner who hasn't done a lot of that herself. Can't exactly tell me what needs doing when someone else was being paid to come do it for years. I feel good about it though, I like to learn and I like to fix things, and there's lots of opportunity. I've been able to eliminate a lot of costs and reduce regular expenses by taking on a lot of what others were doing and applying effective fixes to longstanding issues. It's very fulfilling, like getting to do the type of work I always hit a wall with in all my other workplaces, improve and optimize. That it's for my family brings together a lot of what matters the most to me, keeps me constantly motivated.

The town is nice too. It's been a few months so I've gotten more acclimated, the slower pace of things and friendlier atmosphere really does a lot for me. Here are a bunch of images of downtown I took on some of my walks. Because of the slower pace, I can be measured, precise, take the proper time to consider things and work out problems without feeling like I'm in some inner state of siege/under the gun all the time. At first I missed a lot of what was available to me elsewhere, but as time went on I came to realize a lot of that just didn't matter as much as I thought it did. As much as I love a good Indian restaurant and a computer store, not having them is not the detriment my mind used to pretend it was. Along with that has come an explosion of creativity, I've done a ridiculous amount of writing and reading, and am slowly getting myself up to snuff drawing things. The house exists on an art school campus, and from what I've gathered reading local magazines the presence of that school has done a ton to really give this place character and variety. My hope is to really lean into that, support it and see if we can have our space be a place for folks to work their creativity. Connections are taking shape and that's made me real happy to see. I cannot tell you how heartwarming it is, for example, to talk about this stuff with the guy who does a radio show and then hear him on the radio a day later saying "this place is really good you should go see it!" Folks are really beginning to grasp my aims when it comes to the scale and type of stuff we want to do, and I haven't really encountered much suspicion/doubt/etc. Folks tend to just trust the simple motives. I can't ask for more than that, the sense of gratitude I wake up with every day is beyond my ability to capture here.

So, there you go. Another step taken, one more further toward whatever comes, as precisely as I can manage to get to the goals. I wanted to post the followup because I said I'd do that and as part of the effort itself, share the vision and the way it plays out in the hope others spot what my eyes miss, and/or that they might take something useful for themselves from it. I'd love to read it if you have thoughts, opinions, advice, experience. Or if you just want to talk about the high minded stuff, I do like doing that. Helps me stay consistent. Anyway, i've said plenty, so off I go to walk around downtown again. I've got that phone on me all the time, call/text whenever (text if it's after 5pm CST, is my only request with that). As always, I very much appreciate you taking the time and giving me your attention.

I don't want to say I'm an alcoholic but I might be. Over the last several years, my drinking has increased from once or twice a week to daily, to the point where I'd start my day off in the weekend with a drink. I knew it wasn't good, but it was a habit I fell into.

Obviously I'm aware enough about it to do something. I've quit smoking cigarettes, so I at least understand the quitting process, but I also don't want to (and don't think I could) give up drinking forever like I did with quitting cigarettes.

My wife is also a drinker, but is much more moderated about it. Thing is, it meant that even if I didn't buy drinks for me, there's always been drinks in the house and so... I drank that. I've finally convinced her that for financial and dietary reasons it would be beneficial to us to stop buying drinks for at home. For my own self, I know that if I don't have a drink around I just won't drink.

This works great but, I find myself lost and listless now! It's a frustrating feeling that I remember well from when I was quitting cigarettes, and I know I just need to work through those moments and keep myself busy otherwise. With the nice weather, I've been biking a lot more and spending more time outside with my kids. At night is when it's toughest - those times after everyone else is asleep and before I go to bed.

I'm not really looking for advice or anything, I just want to share somewhere my experience so far, because it feels good to write about it and express my feelings. Maybe it'll help.

Also if anyone has a suggestion for something to replace beer, I'd appreciate it. I don't like fruity, or soft drinks. Currently I'm getting by with enormous amounts of sparkling water but sometimes I want some flavor, but most drinks that aren't beer are cloyingly sweet and disgusting.