🇨🇦 tunetardis

This of course hinges on my parents and uncle staying reasonably healthy and financially secure, if they end up as vegetables with a nursing home draining all of their assets or decide to blow all of their wealth in Vegas or something the whole plan could kind of fall apart.

I’m a Gen X with Gen Z kids and this is literally the kind of thing that keeps me up at night. I don’t want to go through a long and costly retirement. My mom got dementia. My dad lived to be a hundred. Either of those outcomes fills me with dread that there is no way I have saved anywhere near enough to make that work. At least I don’t see myself doing the Vegas thing, unless it’s a side-effect of the dementia?

That’s interesting. It’s basically what I’m thinking phones should just have by design. Something that can twist-lock it into place. I guess the question with this after market solution is whether you trust that adhesive enough? It would be better if it were just built into the phone, but it’s nice to have some affirmation that my ideas are not totally baseless and that others have been looking into it. Thanks!

I have no problem with functional protuberances. In fact, I wouldn’t mind seeing more, such as a universal mounting connector of some sort? I don’t know if I am atypical in this regard, but I like mounting my phone on things. Handlebars, car dashes, tripods, mic stands, etc. There are solutions for this, but they invariably involve something wrapping around and blocking some of the front side of the phone, which has become increasingly problematic over the years with screens pushing towards the edges. My bike holder sometimes blocks the front-facing camera needed to unlock the iPhone, for example. But if there were something on the back side that a mounting bracket could securely latch onto, none of this would be a problem.

Among the requirements of the DMA is that Apple ensures that headphones made by other brands will work with iPhones. It said this has been a block on it releasing its live translation service in the EU as it allows rival companies to access data from conversations, creating a privacy problem.

I’m not really understanding this. Where is the privacy problem? What is different with airpods that solves this? At the end of the day, are they not just bluetooth headphones? Do they add some extra security layer beyond what bluetooth itself offers?

I was renewing my CAA today (Canadian equivalent of AAA motor club in US) and they mentioned they do roadside assist for bikes now. So I looked it up and among the FAQ it said:

Do we cover motorized bicycles? Yes, provided they are conventional bicycles with standard pedals and chain and mounted with an external electric geared motor. Motorcycles, electric scooters and mopeds are covered under Plus and Premier Memberships only.

That’s interesting that scooters are only covered by their higher tiers while e-bikes are fine with the basic plan I have. Bikes are looking better and better at this point.

How is the center of mass is lower on a scooter? It is the same or higher.

I guess I was thinking in terms of the contraption itself. The battery and the bulk of the weight would be down near ground level. But that’s a good point about the rider’s position.

The tiny scooter wheels will react enormously to tiny disadvantages in the road surface and the consequences of it. Hitting an tiny rock on the asfalt with a e-scooter will result in way nastier accidents than hitting a similar rock on the asfalt with a bicycle.

Yeah, this was main concern. There are potholes around here that are so bad your teeth may clunk together if you don’t have any sort of suspension, and I can’t help but think it would be difficult to steer your way out of those if you hit one on a scooter?

My main reason for considering a scooter was for hybrid trips where you drive to another place and then ride around. But if anything, the by-laws are even more vague around e-scooters than e-bikes in a lot of cities, so that makes me a little reluctant to take one on the road. Folding e-bikes are getting much smaller now though, so that might be the better option?

I ride a scooter on a regular basis. With regards to terrain: I can do uneven terrain pretty well. The only time I’ve run into trouble is when my wheel got caught on a train track once, but that was easily avoidable. 100% I can assure you they are easier to manage than skates.

That’s good to hear.

As for the brakes, they can definitely kind of suck. My scooter only has brakes on the front wheel, which makes riding in the rain diffcult, but I’ve learned to do slower braking which prevents my back wheel from fish-tailing.

Ohh boy… I think I will insist on rear brakes if I find myself in the market. Wow.

I am curious about e-scooters but have never ridden one. They have a lower centre of mass which, in theory, would offer some advantage over bicycles in terms of the severity of collisions.

Otoh would you not tend to have more control issues over uneven terrain? I think about my inline skates from the 90s. The streets suck here, and I had one too many an instance of a pothole or a bump sending me flying to keep that up.

Scooters have bigger wheels than skates, of course, but much smaller than bikes and they seem to have very low ground clearance. This makes me a little edgy.

My coworker who switched to one after riding an e-bike to work said the brakes were weaker with the e-scooter. That could just be a workmanship issue. I’d have to think about whether physics would play a role there?

Yeah, I guess it keeps you far enough away from the light/heat source to avoid burns. But in this day and age of LEDs, it’s rather vestigial. Maybe you can make a game out of flicking rubber bands through the hoop?

That’s good to know! Actually, now that I think of it, my wife and I visited the one and only mosque in our home town during a public event in a show of solidarity after it got vandalized. And I have to say, it was an absolute food fest in there!

I once had a conversation with my boss who was well-travelled. He said the secret to Europe is to eat in the Catholic countries. If you must spend time within a Protestant country, look around for a Catholic enclave within it. Not only will the food be superior, but people will be falling over each other to make sure you are well fed.

I looked at him incredulously. How can you say that? It’s such a sweeping generalization! And then I went to Europe…

Yeah, I know what true shepherd’s pie is made of thanks to Denis Leary.

I was thinking more Hugh Laurie?

That was epic. Thank you!

I guess I’m the opposite. The sensory nightmare for me involves having to interact with strangers, and self checkout offers the utopian promise of avoiding all that. But it fails only too often, as the slightest problem brings the clerk over. It’s a bait and switch for my introverted ass.

Neigh, this can’t be!

What jumps out almost immediately is that it does not appear to be a loop. Were it a loop, you could have more than one car going around. Should it not at the bare minimum satisfy its own naming criteria?

Wait, they’re not all made in China? Last time we were ordering some for a development board at work, we had to source them from China, though that was admittedly a few years back.

I think that’s part of the plan though right? If they spot a compliance officer walking up, they can drive the patio around the block a bit until he’s gone.

I was kind of hoping for a window view. I can’t even picture what travelling 600 kph at ground level would look like?