Are you stuck in a reading rut? Can’t decide what to read next? Overwhelmed by choice? Join me in my reading challenge!

The challenge is simple - read the alphabet. Start by choosing an author whose surname begins with A, next book the surname begins with B and so on through the whole alphabet.

I did this a few years ago after having a baby, and in my sleep-deprived haze couldn’t make decisions easily. The library was too overwhelming and I needed to narrow down my options somehow!

I have additional rules for myself, like I try to prioritise female and POC writers as I find myself tending to read a lot of white men, but it isn’t a hard and fast rule for me - first and foremost it has to be a book I’m keen to read.

I propose organising the comments like this: top line comments will be the letter, replies to that will be the book you chose, plus a short summary or review (even just a rating out of 5 will do) to help others find books they might like, and then people can discuss the individual books under those comments if they like. This keeps everything in one post for people not interested to ignore, and hopefully builds up a nice reference of all sorts of books in one place.

Happy reading!

Edit: I guess there’s a limit on quick comments to avoid spam so we’ve just got the first few letters for now. I’ll come back to complete the alphabet when I can :)

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

Don’t get me wrong. I love Ray Porter narrated audiobooks. Sometimes I’ll give listen simply BECAUSE it’s Ray Porter.

But at some point, every book starts to sound the same, and his tendencies and flavour as a voice actor start to color the story. You can almost predict what voice he’s going to use and when, and it starts to take away from the story a bit.

So I was wondering if you all had any recommendations for great audiobooks that came to mind simply because the narrator was amazing?

I think I feel the same way about RC Bray. There’s always a Skippy just waiting to make an appearance.

Marc Thompson (of Thrawn and Star Wars) is tremendous and memorable as well.

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.

What have you been doing lately for your own fitness? Try out any new programs or exercises? Have any questions for others about your training? Want to vent about poor behavior in the gym? Started a new diet or have a new recipe you want to share? Anything else health and wellness related?

I'm looking into insulating the attic above a closed-in back porch & the estimate also included adding additional insulation on top of the blown-in in the attic.

What kinds of factors can be used to think about the value of additional insulation?

For reference, I'm in Florida & keep setpoint around 80 degrees F most of the time when home, and 86 when not home. Power bills in the summer are in the $150-$180 USD range.

It's currently R27 and the quote is to add R11 to bring it up to R38. Code here appears to put new construction at R38 as a minimum, but looking at some charts - it looks like I might have already hit diminishing returns?

This chart I found on "Energy Vanguard" seems to suggest that going from 27 to 38 isn't much of a difference.

Does anyone else have any insight on when those diminishing returns are hit, and if it can make any appreciable difference in power bills? The house itself is comfortable enough, without large swings in temperature.

This thread is posted weekly on Thursday - please try to post relevant content in here, such as news, updates, opinion articles, etc. Especially significant updates may warrant a separate topic, but most should be posted here.

If you'd like to help support Ukraine, please visit the official site at https://help.gov.ua/ - an official portal for those who want to provide humanitarian or financial assistance to people of Ukraine, businesses or the government at the times of resistance against the Russian aggression.

I've always been a bit of a privacy enthousiast. Have had everything blocked that Google and by extension YouTube wants to scrape off you. This means I've also blocked my view history.

Recently YouTube started giving out a warning on the homepage that you have blocked your view history, that you can change it in your privacy settings and that it helps them serve you better content. What it also means is that your homepage is just one big popup to guilt trip you into sharing your data. The homepage won't show any suggested content anymore.

While it is in their interest to do so and since they are a company wanting to make money it is understandable. Nevertheless it seems harsh from going to see content that you might like to only seeing a big warning sign right now.

What are you experiences with this?

I had a stroke last year, which left me partially paralyzed. I'm doing much better and only my left hand and arm are still somewhat affected. Even though my stroke wasn't related to my lifestyle, I would like to get in better shape, and my PT has recommended getting an indoor bike. I would like one with pulse readers in the handle bars and preferably USB port to connect a tablet or phone to keep track of my progress. I live in Europe, so something available here would also be preferable. Does ~health have any experience or suggestions?

With the next basho fast approaching I was curious about what everyone is looking forward to and excited about.

I'm hoping for a full house of the senior sanyaku rikishi (maybe Terunofuji's knees will be ready for action) and we can see some exciting matches between them. I'm also still trying to decide on new favorites after Ichinojo and Tochinoshin both retired.