Well, also no. I mean, I do, and so do many of my friends. But many people rely on all seasons. It’s… Not the best plan. But a lot of people do it.

This is us basically. Though we’re pretty busy, so we usually try to cook 2 maybe 3 meals a week, and eat the leftovers on the days in between.

Don’t get me wrong, we cook good stuff, we just purposely make a lot. I’m not going through all that effort for one tiny meal, unless it makes sense to do so, like we won’t be home for meal times or something so it would go bad.

But we keep some premix stuff around, and I have a few fast but not so healthy scratch recipes I can whip up in a jiffy. That’s usually us on Tuesday nights.

I’ve got one where I literally just throw rice, chix broth, frozen precooked (by me) chicken, frozen mixed veggies, and garlic/other spices into a rice cooker. That way I can just slap it together, jump in the shower, and eat quick before leaving again. Sometimes life is just that way.

I was reading your post and I briefly thought you were trying to say it IS expensive, not that it is not. And I was like is this guy on crack, cubing is cheap as chips.

Anywho, glad to see I was wrong. I learned cubing at the same time as my buddies kids did, and while I never got faster than I think a minute and a half? They are well under a minute now, it’s crazy.

I still cube occasionally, but mostly just to fidget while watching TV 🤷‍♂️ Also so I don’t forget how to do it.

This is where I’m at too. I was literally just talking to my friend about this last night.

We both know of several people who feel very strongly that the pandemic is still in full swing. They won’t go out of their house without a mask, they get their groceries delivered, they won’t come to any social events for fear of getting sick, and they only work from home. They’ve basically trapped themselves in their house, out of fear.

In my opinion, which is only an opinion, I think these people have an undiagnosed mental illness. Some sort of excess anxiety that was triggered by the events of lockdown and the early pandemic, and now they are unable to reset back to normal.

I don’t mean that in a bad way or a rude way, I’m legitimately concerned for these people and don’t know how to help.

For your average Joe, COVID is just a reality we live with. I don’t want to get it, but I can’t afford to lock myself down, nor do I think it would be healthy for me mentally if I did.

Bluetooth has a general lag of several milliseconds, tens of milliseconds probably, for me. But it’s close enough to not bug me when watching videos. And I never have cutouts, not unless I walk very far away. Just tonight at work I was using my pixel buds, left my phone on the desk, walked to the bathroom probably 40 or 50 feet away and through at least 3 walls, didn’t miss a beat 🤷‍♂️

My old BT headphones back in the day couldn’t go 20 feet across the room line of sight.

BT has definitely gotten way better in recent years.

Yeah I’ve seen the movie and the final pane of this comic got me as well. I think it’s because the bricks he’s running on at the end are the same as the well, and the boulder is too smooth and looks like an opening to the well, like the cat is matrix running down the wall of the well 🤷‍♂️

Very confusing perspective, even if only for a moment.

My wife has an iPhone, I have Android. I’ve easily bought her twice as many lightning cable replacements over the years, compared to USB C ones.

Micro USB is another story, that port never should’ve existed

Used to be the socket with micro USB, but USB c is much more resilient. And any damage usually occurs on the cable end and not the socket. So worst case just replace the cable

Bidet master race.

Got myself one with heated seat, heated water (tankless water heater, not a connection to a hot water tap that takes ages to warm up), and even a hot air dryer thing that I only really use in the winter.

Cost a hundred bucks, best hundred bucks I’ve ever spent, I’ll never go back.

Cold water ones are good too, more practical even, but the water gets cold here in the winter, make your brown eye blue lol

Some people like tinkering. Big Clive has a series of videos on Dubai led bulbs. The government mandates that the bulbs be extra efficient and last extra long, so they are built with more filaments driven at a lower current. They run cooler and last longer. You can do a similar thing with American bulbs if you’re handy with a soldering iron.

Honestly, with how poor many of these things are mass produced, opening them up yourself is practically a personal form of quality control. Whether you modify it or not I bet it’s less likely to die prematurely or burn your house down than those of a regular person who doesn’t open them 🤷‍♂️

Eh it works just fine 🤷‍♂️

I was with you until the minute late thing. That’s crap. Grace period?

Not that I try to be late, I’m 99% early. But I’d be ticked to lose an hour because of couple minutes late on a bad morning. Though I guess some people may need that painful motivation to not abuse the system.

This is very insightful, thank you

I’d have to check my logs, but it was something like spring or early summer. Honestly though the solar cycle has a much larger effect on propagation, and right now we’re near solar maximum so things are really hopping. At the beginning of COVID we were just starting to come out of solar minimum.

I haven’t been super active lately, so I can’t comment on how often you’d be able to make contact. But with some coordination it’s definitely doable. Especially if you get some decent metal in the air.

You still have US citizenship? You might be able to do your testing in the USA over zoom and use a reciprocal license, though I haven’t looked deeply into it.

I had a similar but very different experience. At the beginning of COVID my buddy and I got our ham radio licenses.

One of my earliest contacts was a guy in Japan, over 6000 miles away! Nothing between us but some wire strung up in a tree, and a couple of radios. Using the ionosphere to bounce our signals around the world.

So. Stinking. Awesome.

I’ve been hooked ever since.

It’s funny because it’s almost the opposite of your story, you were using the amazing new technology and infrastructure to make the trip. These days we take that very infrastructure for granted.

It’s fun to try doing it with as little infrastructure as possible!

Kids these days

Thanks for the recommendation!

I like the fold concept in theory, though it’s a bit exhausting protecting the screen all the time.

Being able to set the phone anywhere at an angle to take a picture has come in handy super frequently.

If this phone was full price though I think I’d be mad. I baby this screen line no tomorrow, and I’m diligent about keeping my pocket free of any dust and lint, let alone dirt or bits.

I’ve got a tiny scratch in the middle of the fold, and the entire fold area has long tiny cracks forming from folding. I’ve only had this phone for like 7 or 8 months.

My buddies broke in 30 days of buying it, and he had to fight to get it replaced.

Again, I like the idea, and I enjoy using it. But there’s still too many pain spots for me to make the jump. It’ll have to get a lot cheaper or a lot more sturdy before I’ll get another.

I had the original Galaxy Note and loved it. Then I went to oneplus one and loved it. Then I went Nexus 6 and liked it enough. Then I got the first Pixel.

I’ve been pixels ever since. But there was a deal on the Galaxy flip5, $0 up front, $300 over 2 years. I couldn’t pass it up, for the novelty if nothing else.

There’s a lot I like about this phone, but a lot more that I don’t. I’m looking forward to going back to Pixel when I can.

This phone is missing so many standard features, and so many others are locked behind Samsungs walled garden that I refuse to sign up for. It’s just a mess. I’m frequently frustrated.

I did it! See above. Thanks for the idea!

It works!

Not bad! Though I used Bisquick, for better flavor, and for the work involved dirtying bowls and measuring cups I’d rather just use a pan.

In fact I made extra and made three pan sized pancakes in the time it took to make one big fluffy potcake.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great Idea and it totally works. If I were gonna do it again seriously, I’d get a dedicated pancake mix that uses just water, to maximize the simplicity, which is the goal I think.

It was fluffy and delicious, though I will say a lot of pancake flavor comes from the crispy edges and the thinness of the cake and you lose some of that with the thick potcake.

Glad I tried it, thanks to op for the idea!