totm nov 2023 Thread to discuss negative things in a very general way, just see where it goes y'know?

[Superfluous J]

12 minutes ago, Okhin said:

Is that even legal ?

Generally in the US the actual owner of a property has the right to entry to inspect the property itself (not its contents) or perform maintenance with 24 hour notice.

At least, that's what all my leases have told me over the years.

Edited October 8, 2020 by Superfluous J

[Nuke]

1 hour ago, Okhin said:

Is that even legal ?

when they do that at our place its usually just to inspect the fire equipment. i think its an insurance thing. they make sure the detectors all have batteries and make sure the fire extinguishers are full and that's the end of it. 

they also tell us that our unit is one of the cleanest in the complex. which is odd because i only really spot clean as needed and i sweep up all the cat hair every couple months (there's usually enough to make another cat). 

Edited October 8, 2020 by Nuke

[Superfluous J]

47 minutes ago, Nuke said:

they also tell us that our unit is one of the cleanest in the complex. which is odd because i only really spot clean as needed and i sweep up all the cat hair every couple months (there's usually enough to make another cat). 

Having had a job where I saw the insides of people's houses, I'm not surprised. People are disgusting. Every time I have dishes filling the sink I just remember that at least I don't have to literally climb over stinky piles of garbage to reach my kitchen.

[kerbiloid]

When almighty AI will rule the world, the disgusting humans will receive a handful of food and won't need to wash plates.
A minute later they will receive a handful of water to drink, and that's all for the next four hours.

This will solve the problems of hygiene, full sinks, unwashed dishes, and fat body positivism.
Also they will need no kitchen, fridge and so on.

Edited October 8, 2020 by kerbiloid

[richfiles]

Welp... I mopped and swept and vacuumed and scrubbed the walls and toilet and tub and sinks and put the new blue water thingy in the toilet tank, and used the foamy bubbles... We have really hard water at my apartment, enough that I buy my drinking water from a water purification shop just down the street from me (literally 7 blocks) for 25 cents per gallon. I have a 5 gallon dispenser in my kitchen... Anyway... Scale and crusty crud always build up in the sinks, and it's always a pain in the ol' cockpit warmer to scrub and scrub and scrub that stuff away... My hands and wrists are sore, my back hurts, and I want a shower SO BAD, but the landlord could knock at any moment... So nope... Shower can wait.

Today was a little depressing too... I had not really gone into the back room and dealt with any of my cat's stuff, nor gotten rid of her old litter box, etc... I really hadn't done anything in there at all, save for some emergency spot cleaning, in regards to the... accidents... that she had before becoming so mortally ill. It's not like the room was dirty... I had done a thorough deep cleaning literally a week or two before... Ultimately, it was time. She passed on May 15th... It's October already... I put all her toys inside her little "kitty cave" that I'd made from the plastic shell of an old blue and white Mac monitor. It had been fully gutted, and had cushions inside, and she could sit inside where the screen would have been and curl up to nap. I put it away on a shelf. Her window cushions were all packed into a milk crate and placed on said shelf also. Her favorite toy, her froggy, has sat on my work bench though, since the first day she was gone... 

Here I sit, really wanting a shower, with a sore back and worn out hands, waiting for a landlord that could have been here an hour and a half ago, but has decided to put my apartment much later on the home invasion list... Here I sit, utterly devastated that I'm not bribing my little sweetie girl with tuna and shrimp (that was her favorite) so that I could snatch her up and put her in the dog sized kennel I got for her (only the best), cause she never liked strangers in her place... I will never do that again with her... I miss her so much... 

Edited October 8, 2020 by richfiles

[tater]

My idiot governor has banned Halloween.

If we lived on the coast, she'd ban the tide, too. She'd ban it at high tide, then when it receded, she'd say "we did it!" Then it would come back, and she'd have to ban it again.

Needless to say we're completely open for business trick or treating in my neighborhood, AND the neighbors are having a party.

[kerbiloid]

That's a "Trick or treat!" of 90th level.

[tater]

8 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

That's a "Trick or treat!" of 90th level.

Well, in my neighborhood when the kids were little we'd often get invited in for drinks at each house, which considerably slowed progress around the circle. Kids need to work for their candy here, it's a substantial climb up the hill from the bottom of the street to the top, maybe 100m+ vertically (the street is a ~1km loop).

Regardless, anyone more than ~3X more concerned than they were last year is not being rational.

[TheSaint]

All hands, stand by for an important announcement!

Drum brakes are a PITA to replace.

That is all.

[StrandedonEarth]

11 hours ago, TheSaint said:

All hands, stand by for an important announcement!

Drum brakes are a PITA to replace.

That is all.

This is news? I’ve known that for at least 30 years. I won’t touch them, although disc brakes are easy 

[TheSaint]

1 minute ago, StrandedonEarth said:

This is news? I’ve known that for at least 30 years. I won’t touch them, although disc brakes are easy 

I realized some time ago that the primary calling of my life is to serve as a cautionary tale to the younger generations.

I did get the one side done, after many failed attempts and finely-crafted profanities. I think I have the moves down now, I am hoping the other side goes faster tonight.

[cubinator]

12 hours ago, TheSaint said:

All hands, stand by for an important announcement!

Drum brakes are a PITA to replace.

That is all.

You mean brake drums?  

[TheSaint]

20 minutes ago, cubinator said:

You mean brake drums?  

Oh, the drums were the easy part. But the shoes, the levers, the springs, all the fiddly bits that sit inside the drums, that's what was giving me fits for three hours last night. The return spring is really tight, and you have to pull it into place without displacing any of the other parts that are resting between the shoes, like the adjusting screw, the anchor spring, etc.

Edited October 15, 2020 by TheSaint

[kerbiloid]

Well, it  was your fury road.

Spoiler

 

[Entropian]

On 10/12/2020 at 1:24 AM, tater said:

Needless to say we're completely open for business trick or treating in my neighborhood, AND the neighbors are having a party.

Seriously, though, be careful.  COVID-19 is not joking when it comes to long term effects, even in asymptomatic cases.

[Superfluous J]

I think my Twitter account got hacked.

Now no one will know all the important stuff I'm eating!

Exit

Ah no they're just having issues. My witty remarks on life will have to wait.

Edited October 15, 2020 by Superfluous J

[tater]

4 hours ago, Entropian said:

Seriously, though, be careful.  COVID-19 is not joking when it comes to long term effects, even in asymptomatic cases.

Nonsense. All viral illness can have long term impacts in a small % of people. COVID-19 is no different. The long term effects for people not hospitalized or vented approach zero. The US has had at least 80 million infections by now (CDC estimates 10X tested cases as a rule of thumb), it could in fact be higher. The news (which seems to be driven to terrorize people) loves "long covid," but fails to ever provide incidence figures to justify the concern.

I remain 2-3 times more concerned than I have been any other year of my life since that's the maximum risk relative to seasonal flu for my age. My risk from seasonal flu is of course close enough to zero it is unconcerning to me.

I have no desire to get the flu, BTW, I don't like being sick, I get a flu shot, but COVID-19 is just not concerning to people who are not elderly, or seriously compromised. For people under 65, flu kills something on the order of 2-3 per 10,000 flu cases (and flu is not well measured at 75k tests a year, total in the US, vs a million a day for covid). Covid-19 is perhaps as high as twice that. I'm not in the 2-3 next least healthy people per 10,000 the category of "all people under 70."

BTW, people need to also remember that ~50% of COVID-19 deaths (a higher % in many places) occur in patients who reside in nursing homes and long term care facilities. This population constitutes ~0.5% of the total US population (I presume it is similar elsewhere). Half the deaths in 0.5% of the population. It's entirely fair to half the IFR down to 0.14% for the 99.5% of us who do not live in nursing facilities because the rest of us do not require 24/7 medical care. Even then, the risk of poor outcomes is massively skewed as a function of age (older is worse).

Edited October 16, 2020 by tater

[TheSaint]

Tonight, the left rear brake: 1.5 hours. Half the time of the right one. But, that said, I hope I never have to do this job again.

[StrandedonEarth]

6 hours ago, TheSaint said:

Oh, the drums were the easy part. But the shoes, the levers, the springs, all the fiddly bits that sit inside the drums, that's what was giving me fits for three hours last night. The return spring is really tight, and you have to pull it into place without displacing any of the other parts that are resting between the shoes, like the adjusting screw, the anchor spring, etc.

 

19 minutes ago, TheSaint said:

Tonight, the left rear brake: 1.5 hours. Half the time of the right one. But, that said, I hope I never have to do this job again.

Experience is a great teacher. i learned pretty quick that having the specialized tools for drum brakes would help a lot, but I wasn't about to buy them either.

On my last few cars it seems that I can't even get the drum off to just check the brakes. Which is probably a good thing from a brake dust point of view.

[Nuke]

so star trek is a dystopia now. 

[TheSaint]

3 hours ago, StrandedonEarth said:

Experience is a great teacher. i learned pretty quick that having the specialized tools for drum brakes would help a lot, but I wasn't about to buy them either.

On my last few cars it seems that I can't even get the drum off to just check the brakes. Which is probably a good thing from a brake dust point of view.

Yeah, no special tools here. The tool for the return spring might have helped, but I also watched a couple of YouTube videos where the guys said the special tool for the return spring was junk. I just used a Phillips screwdriver and a lot of determination and choice words. The only other special tool called out in the FSM was for the hold-down springs, and I just used a socket on a extension, worked great.

It's all back together now. Took it for a test drive. Everything is working, no rubbing or pulling, but I think I need to adjust the rear brakes, feels like it's riding hard on the front brakes.

1 hour ago, Nuke said:

so star trek is a dystopia now. 

It always was, you just were following the people at the top of the food chain.

[tater]

Made Green Chile Stew just now, it's in the dutch oven cooking. Also experimenting with fall cocktails (just sips, then chucking and changing at this early hour).

Wife had to recertify today (multi-hour surgical boards exam), as did her partner. He's taking it in the afternoon, then coming over for dinner and a drink, so I figured I'd be ready with something seasonal (it's totally GCS season here). Actually, our neighbor across the way was taking her version of the test (they have different subspecialty versions) at the same time, maybe she and her husband should come over as well...

[Kernel Kraken]

My computer just got a BSOD and died for the 3rd time this week, so that's pretty fun. Thankfully I'll be building a new one as soon as the RTX 3070 drops.

[SOXBLOX]

Had to fill out a government form today. As usual, I had to print my name in all-caps. 

As a seemingly unrelated fact, I have been learning Russian.

The problem? Now I can't stop writing my "N"'s as Cyrillic "I", which is a mirrored N. So my writing resembles that of a child, as I attempt to concentrate on my strokes. Any of the Russians on here have this problem in reverse? 

Edited October 18, 2020 by SOXBLOX

[kerbiloid]

Unlikely, as Russians use Latin letters for maths.

You can also replace R with Я.