Reverse first-world problems: What good thing happened to you today?

igor_kavinski · Sep 26, 2024

MrSquished said:
View attachment 108232

Love everything about that space except the opaque curtains. I would personally keep the curtains drawn but still have enough light rays get through for that nicely lit afternoon lighting but without the added nuisance of someone coming up to the window and watching me from behind.

igor_kavinski · Sep 26, 2024

Lost_in_the_HTTP said:
Is that legal?

Conflict of interest?

MrSquished would've shown her some good time too if he felt like it

Red Squirrel · Sep 26, 2024

I really don't print often and have a Brother printer that's never given me issues. I put a brand new cartridge in it in 2020 and didn't really print that much since. Today I go to print and it says the cartridge is end of life, which is really weird, considering the old cartridge lasted like a decade and it was the one that came with the printer back when I was in college, which got way more mileage than this one did and ever will.

I start googling to see if maybe there's a way to reset it and I did find some stuff to try but it was not working. While playing around with the toner I noticed 2 sightglass looking things that lined up with similar ones inside the printer. I suspect it's some kind of sensor. I put tape on both of them and put the toner back, and I can print now.

highland145 · Sep 26, 2024

Assholes.

lxskllr · Sep 26, 2024

I'm currently looking for a cheap printer, but I'm not sure it exists. I need to print large format(11x17) b&w only, and I almost certainly want laser. I'll even hand feed the thing one page at a time. It doesn't have to be convenient, but it has to work. No HP, must have linux drivers. Anyone know of such a thing?

highland145 · Sep 26, 2024

Red Squirrel · Sep 26, 2024

Brother is normally known to be good... except this little issue I just had did not impress me but it's the first time I have any issues with it related to it being an asshole. It also works nice in Linux. I'm just printing direct to it over the network though, I don't have a print server setup. I kind of like how easy Windows does it and how it just loads the drivers on the client automatically and stuff, I couldn't be bothered to try to setup a print server in Linux.

snoopy7548 · Sep 29, 2024

I finally put the clear coat on my speakers. I still have to do the bottom of one of the speakers, though. Then I can wet sand and buff. You can really see the metallic sparkle when a direct light hits it.

If I had to do it all over again, I'd invest in a HVLP sprayer. I made a lot of mistakes and wasted a lot of time, and there are a couple flaws that I just don't want to spend time fixing, but it's coming out OK for just using rattle cans. This was my first time doing this, so I guess I can use it as a learning thing. I spent more money on spray paint than I did on the damn speakers.

snoopy7548 · Oct 6, 2024

I wet sanded the speakers starting with 800 grit and ending at 1000 grit. I cut through the clear coat in a spot on one speaker so I didn't want to keep sanding more than I needed to. I had to re-apply the color to that speaker but I clear coated it right afterwards. This should be the last coat of clear. Next weekend I'll wet sand starting with something higher than 1000 grit, maybe 1200, then on to buffing and polishing.

They're looking pretty dang good so far, though. I've pretty much got a mirror finish but you still see some ripples (some of those are because I didn't do a great job making everything perfectly flat, so they won't go away, but whatever, I've spent too much time on this). I can't wait to see how they turn out in the end.

spacejamz · Oct 7, 2024

I am planning buying some some new tv's to use a PC monitors.....

I bought a 43" TCL QLED at Best Buy last week for $349 and it included a $100 gift card. I bought the 2nd one today and it is now on sale for $249 (no gift card though) but I used the $100 gift card from the 1st one. Best Buy then price matched the cost of the 1st one so I got it for $249 as well. So ended up getting both TV's for $400 plus tax...

Lost_in_the_HTTP · Oct 7, 2024

Run one through a KillaWatt and tell us how much juice they suck. Last Flatscreen I had (still do) burns 80 watts just on standby.

spacejamz · Oct 7, 2024

Lost_in_the_HTTP said:
Run one through a KillaWatt and tell us how much juice they suck. Last Flatscreen I had (still do) burns 80 watts just on standby.

uses about 70 watts when it is on....shows zero on standby....

Lost_in_the_HTTP · Oct 7, 2024

Yeah, 'On' is what I meant. Idle screen when powered on, no programming displayed.

'Off' is what they call standby these days i guess.

70 watts is till too much when it might be running for many hours a a day.

I don't even want to think about what my 27" JVC CRT was burning so many years ago.

Red Squirrel · Oct 7, 2024

Come to think of it I should test my 4k monitors. They throw off a decent amount of heat so I suspect they must be using a good 50w or so maybe even more. My office gets very warm when I'm working from home and have all monitors turned on. The work PC surprisingly only uses like 15w, which is pretty crazy. As I upgrade stuff in my server room I'm thinking of using such PCs instead of building custom servers as the power usage is just so much lower and they are also super cheap on Ebay. Hard to justify a custom build now cost and power use wise.

spacejamz · Oct 8, 2024

Red Squirrel said:
Come to think of it I should test my 4k monitors. They throw off a decent amount of heat so I suspect they must be using a good 50w or so maybe even more. My office gets very warm when I'm working from home and have all monitors turned on. The work PC surprisingly only uses like 15w, which is pretty crazy. As I upgrade stuff in my server room I'm thinking of using such PCs instead of building custom servers as the power usage is just so much lower and they are also super cheap on Ebay. Hard to justify a custom build now cost and power use wise.

I run a Sony 65" (main PC display) and two Samsung 40" screens (for work) daily..will be adding 2 of the TCL 43" screens...guess I should figure out the total draw of all of these screens...

IronWing · Oct 8, 2024

The Hunt for Purple October

Muscadines and persimmons in the maritime forest of the Outer Banks.

lxskllr · Oct 8, 2024

How are the persimmons? It looks ready. I'm unfamiliar with muscadines. My fall target is some pawpaw. I know where a patch is, but I have to make the time to go back to it. I saw a small one I might be able to dig up. It'll keep the one in my yard company since it's partner died. I suspect it was girdled by cicadas.

IronWing · Oct 8, 2024

We haven't found any pawpaws this year. We found them one year at Merchant's Mill Pond. The persimmons were dead ripe, perfect and falling off the tree. Muscadines, the local cultivated variety are called scuppernongs, are wild grapes somewhat like concords but infinitely better than concords. The cicadas were deafening this morning.

Red Squirrel · Oct 8, 2024

The weather is really starting to cool down and it's great having a free source of heat now. Been keeping the house warm exclusively with the wood stove so it's costing me nothing. My gas bill dropped to $100/mo since I put in a heat pump water heater last year, but I suspect it will drop even further in the next couple months. I will still end up using the gas furnace as I won't have enough wood to heat 100% with the wood stove but it should still put a big dent in the bill.

I do need to run some ductwork and an inline fan to blow this heat over to the main part of the house though as right now it's mostly concentrated in the basement, and running the furnace fan helps a bit but not that much.

Lost_in_the_HTTP · Oct 11, 2024

A: Wood ain't free.

B: I had a PawPaw tree in my yard. Came up wild. How? I have no idea since I've never seen one nearby for the birds to have dropped a seed. Ate two or three of them one year. Interesting little things. Tree died though.

C: Never throw anything away. I needed to move my air compressor. That made the feeder/whip hose too short unless I could turn the outlet from the compressor. Needed a 1/4 Elbow. Figured I had one ... somewhere. Started looking for one of these:

In a small bin drawer of brass air hose fittings, I found one of these:

Worked great. Probably better for air than black pipe.

That fitting has probably been in that drawer for well over 15 years.

Red Squirrel · Oct 13, 2024

I'm on night shift so missed the SpaceX stream so just getting around to trying to find it now but did not want to know what happens until I see it "live". I unfortunately did find out via searching.

Now I know how my dad feels when he tapes a hockey game and someone mentions the score before he gets a chance to watch it.

sdifox · Oct 13, 2024

Lost_in_the_HTTP said:
Yeah, 'On' is what I meant. Idle screen when powered on, no programming displayed.

'Off' is what they call standby these days i guess.

70 watts is till too much when it might be running for many hours a a day.

I don't even want to think about what my 27" JVC CRT was burning so many years ago.

Peak electricity price here is 15 cent per KWH. That buys you 14 hrs of tv.

Red Squirrel · Oct 16, 2024

Found $40 outside just shoved into a railing outside McDonald's when I was going there for a coffee with a friend. Felt bad to take it but at same time, if it's not me it will be someone else. No idea how it ended up there or why someone put it there and forgot it. Hopefully it's not laced with fentanyl or anything lol. It felt a bit suspicious for it to just be sitting there but what's the worse that can happen. Hopefully I don't have some biker gang knocking on my door soon.

When I find money like that I always feel kinda bad knowing there's probably somebody out there looking for it, but kinda hard to try to trace that so just donated $40 to the food bank to make up for it. Pay it forward.

spacejamz · Oct 23, 2024

I pre-ordered Deadpool vs Wolverine 4k blu ray a few weeks ago which has release date of 10/28 (next Monday)....

It was delivered this morning....

IronWing · Oct 23, 2024

We found what appeared to be a steel lid from an old cardboard can at our quarry. We were able to determine that it is the top of a 1920s vintage Kingston vacuum fuel pump.

Like this one:

Reverse first-world problems: What *good* thing happened to you today?

Lifer

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Diamond Member

Diamond Member

Lifer

Lifer

Lifer

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Lifer

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Lifer

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Lifer

No Lifer

Reverse first-world problems: What good thing happened to you today?