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What did you do this weekend?
As part of a weekly series, these topics are a place for users to casually discuss the things they did — or didn't do — during their weekend. Did you make any plans? Take a trip? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!
I played so much Animal Crossing. It was perfect. Minimal stress, minimal potential loss, plenty of ability to build and grow and share. Hard work and curiosity are rewarded promptly; you get concrete gains for putting in your effort. It's a weird capitalist power fantasy in some ways, but it's also very conflict-light which is exactly what I need right now.
I started working through The C Programming Language. I'm a Python developer, learning Qt/C++, and wanted to challenge myself to complete K&R's book while I'm stuck indoors.
It's finally sunny in San Diego so I've been taking long walks with wife & dog.
I finished refinishing the dresser/changing table for the baby (due April 29).
I finished repainting our rocking chair.
Wife was craving candy so I made a grocery run and picked up a case of Latitutde 33 Mangovesa, played a few hours of Skyrim.
I started reading Enlightening the Mind, Lightening the Heart; Core Teachings of Tibetan Buddhism. I'm enjoying it; I struggle almost every time I pick it up to not prejudge it or project my own understanding onto it, but that's part of the reason I'm reading it.
I had my phone hard reset from which it would never awaken, and had to clear another device with our work's two factor. I tried to register a Yubikey we had lying around, but the while our two factor was compatible and allowed me to register, the VPN wasn't. So 6 hours later, I managed to catch someone from Level 2 who could let me out of the two factor, registered an old phone with a bad SIM card and can ride again. Also, in the market for a new phone.
I'm sorry.
Not your fault, I blame the people who get paid more than I do.
I was commiserating, not apologizing :)
Dealing with phone issues is the last thing anyone needs right now.
Picked up Scrivener 3 beta for Windows. Never realized how powerful and useful a tool it is until I required it. It offers a satisfying degree of organization that was beforehand lacking in my writing. Indigrid's note-taking is great up until the point where you have to organize the notes into a coherent set of details.
The beta has an "expiration date" – and presumably will not work after it – so I'm trying to make the best out of it. Already considering buying the full version when I have the cash. The UI could use some improvement – like the fullscreen mode (aside from Composition mode, which has its own set of challenges to overcome), or at least a smarter set of toolbars – but it's a good tool otherwise. If anything, it fascilitates writing more than it organizes it, for me; organization is a nice bonus.
Nothing much otherwise. I think I've gone through a repeated flu infection, which is why I've been feeling so fatigued lately. Sucks, 'cause creativity is bursting.
TL:DR: I spent the money I had trying to get my bike working perfect, now it doesn't work at all.
I spent a bunch of my provincial covid-19 stimulus cheque on biking-related things for my moped/scooter (think electric honda ruckus). The weather was looking great, so I figured what better time to do bike maintenance? Well, I bought a much thicker, much better-fitting, much less-falling-apart leather jacket at a second-hand shop. I bought new rear-view mirrors since one broke a year or so ago and I've been living with only one. I bought turn signal blinker relays since often my signals didn't work, all sorts of nice heatshrink tubing and connectors to redo some of the wiring so it was less of an electrical hazard. I spent nearly half of the money I had on little things for my bike, only to have it break down unexpectedly in the most expensive way.
My bike's controller is made by a tiny Russian company who's only posted on social media a half dozen times in almost as many years. Rumour has it they're still in business, but good luck getting ahold of them. My motor controller is basically unobtanium.They show up maybe once a month used, for nearly the same price as they were new five years ago.
So now it looks like I need to spend somewhere between $700 and $2000 to get a replacement. The same model I have miraculously showed up for sale at $700, but it's barely adequate for what I want already, and the brand has been known to fail unexpectedly.
As for replacing it, apparently I can either spend $700 throwing good money after bad, getting the same experience I had before, or there's another sketchy Russian company making a controller that's a lot better than what I have. It only costs $900, has double the performance, but has a backorder that could last 6 months to a year, due to covid-19 delays in parts manufacturing. Finally, the last option for a new controller is if I somehow became rich overnight, there's a Canadian company, ASI, who makes a controller that looks on-par with what I have, and has stock immediately, has an actual warranty policy, but costs $1710 freaking dollars. And that's not even an upgrade over my current controller's power, it's just more reliable.
Basically I'm screwed, and my only source of transportation is out of commission. I spent a few hours each day on saturday and sunday going down to where it's parked and trying different workarounds I could think of, but it seems like the controller is toast. Walking it home will take a few hours and is mostly uphill, so I'm going to see how much it is to rent a box van with a hydraulic lift so I can take it back to my friend's house.
##Weekend Ranking:
Ah, yes, clothes of asbestos. Drapery worthy of kings!
It was a joke of course, but in all seriousness, you do start thinking about the flammability of things when commuting anywhere involves sitting on top of a hundred pounds of lithium batteries. My roommate loved to calculate out how if my bike's battery gave up all its energy at once, as lithium batteries sometimes do, it'd release 18 megajoules; equivalent to 9 sticks of dynamite.
The leather jacket probably isn't a whole +1 fire resistance, but it's better than nothing, and I do avoid wearing nylon while riding the bike for that reason.
Been playing a lot of World of Warships and a little bit of Minecraft since the urge has returned seeing the new season of Hermitcraft, which is always fun to throw up on a second monitor and passively watch.
Hoped I'd be interested in Animal Crossing but watching on Twitch I don't think I'd be able to play in long term... I guess I was hoping for more like Stardew Valley, but was misinformed.
Been saving a surprising amount of money being stuck home 24/7 and still working in a fairly essential field, so I've put together a new PC build to buy once the world becomes a more normal place.
https://pcpartpicker.com/list/8Gqq7T for anyone interested. Just threw it together so haven't done a huge amount of research so a lot will probably change. Will be a welcome upgrade from an FX-6300/R9 380 !!!
I got out and walked 18 holes of golf first thing Saturday morning at the municipal course. It was much needed. I was worried about unnecessary interactions with people during a pandemic, but I got there early enough to start a solo round before the first tee time rather than being paired up with strangers. Was also able to prepay over the phone and go straight to the first tee box. All in all, it felt like a pretty safe experience.
Oh and I took afternoon naps on both Saturday and Sunday. Also much needed after a very busy work week cooped up at home.
I tried to set up mpd on my home server. Well I succeeded in that but I couldn't get it to play over pulse on my laptop, since I installed bsd on my server and it's using sndio. I tried installing sndio on my laptop but that didn't work either. I just got frustrated. I might try again tomorrow.
I also crocheted a hat!
We binged Car Master: Rust to Riches when the kiddo wasn't awake. Otherwise basically entertaining our toddler while she's unable to visit friends.