Miles O'Brien

I used to sell and fix bikes, now every time I’m out I’m judging people’s choice of bikes.

Not in the “ugh you’re riding a mongoose?” way but the “you need to give that bicycle to a teenager and get a larger one that fits your size, how tall are you? What kind of riding are you expecting to do?” and many other such questions if I strike up a conversation with them.

I want everyone to have a pleasant time while out on their bike. If they don’t have fun, if they are too tired after a ride, or in pain, they won’t want to ride more, and then less people are out not driving cars.

Lpt: (in general) when riding a bicycle, you want the top section of your leg (femur) to be no higher than parallel to the ground at the top of the pedal stroke, and you want your leg to be extended, but not fully straight, when at the bottom of the stroke. You can injure your hips, knees, and leg muscles if you ride an incorrectly sized bike for long periods.

Most adult bicycles should be measured from the spot where the pedals go to the frame to the hole where the seat post goes in. If it’s not measured in inches or centimeters, it might have letter sizing, and if it has bone of those, I wouldn’t trust the quality of the bike. These measurements are more of a guide, when in doubt, use the leg position rule.

The type of bike you have will change your experience quite a bit. If you try to take a road bike (super skinny tires, often has ram horn handlebars) on the mountain trail, you’re gonna have a bad time. Mountain bikes are geared for more power, road bikes are more geared for speed. Hybrids have a good balance and make light off-roading possible. Downhill bikes are like mountain bikes but with a steeper angle on the front fork, to give you better handling while, you guessed it, going down a hill.

I die a little inside every time I see an adult riding a child sized bike.

“well the teenager at Walmart said I needed a 26 inch bike for the hiking trails so I got the 26 inch bike” he said, standing at 6ft3 next to a 15 inch frame bike with 26 inch wheels and tires about an inch wide…

And now when I see aluminum construction, I wonder how it’s been done and try to figure out the various extruded pieces they used.

Because it’s a lot easier to discredit a religious argument when the sermon cites “4th Thessalossians 67:B” and gives the most generic sounding paragraph with the one weirdly specific phrase they instructed the bot to include and em—dash thrown in for good measure.

At least if they all use the same manual, it’s easier to pull over the ones who are on the fence.

I don’t have a perfect memory but I do have a good one, and I can confirm that the pastor at my parents church when I was growing up re-used sermons from multiple years prior.

So at least some recycle. As expected, they are still just as (ir)relevant.

Ah, then no forced air through ventilation ducts to move air around.

My current house doesn’t have vents either, but I have fans that move air around the important bits that get occupied the most. With my dogs needing to go out, and work, the doors are open enough, and there’s enough leakage to not worry about co2 levels. Except my wife sometimes trips the sensor in the hallway when she takes a long bath while burning multiple candles…

Lpt: if your residence has central heating/ac and was made within the last 50 years then your house is probably getting sufficient airflow.

That solar panel looks useful.

Since I have never gone out in nondescript black clothing at night to destroy these things, I can’t say from firsthand knowledge…

But yes, yes they are. They make great trickle chargers for large batteries that only get used intermittently. Or string several together and enjoy an ebike battery charger. I have a similarly sized and shaped panel I found somewhere that I use to charge my 18650 bank.

I feel very bad for whoever considers me a villain in their story.

Like not to belittle them or their struggles, but uh… gestures to self just look at me…

A couple flock cameras near my town keep getting taken out and put back up.

The latest blurry security camera footage to catch the culprit has led to sweet FA since they ride a nondescript dark color mountain bike, wear all black clothing without logos or text, and seem to avoid riding their bike unmasked near businesses with cameras and houses that might have door cameras.

I don’t even think they know gender/skin/hair color. Anything other than “average human height” really.

Anyway, shout out to everyone who destroys one of these things. It’s illegal, but it’s the morally correct thing to do.

It’s a legal border map, not a landmass map, which is weird to me.

The white brick at the bottom is for detecting large objects (cars) and is either controlling a traffic signal, or is being used to count traffic going through that spot.

An intersection near me uses them to switch the lights at an intersection where traffic almost never comes from, so a timed light is unnecessary, but important traffic still comes from that direction.

Take it from me, you don’t want to go down the “eugenics” road…

I really don’t like ice. It’s cold, slippery and wet.

And it gets everywhere.

Just like the shitty US fascist police…

Even if I did, too late you greedy bigots.

But it also does the dishes without using as much water as you do.

The sad truth is a lot of religious people believe that the end times won’t come unless the earth isn’t livable anymore.

A even LARGER group of religious simply think their sky person will give them a new earth that’s perfect so why bother protecting this one.

They and their supporters are complicit in the murder of the planet at best, and are trashing everything on purpose, trying to claw back any and every support of things that can make it a better place.

I’m sure that England has been glad to be rid of us for quite some time. We haven’t been very good allies in my lifetime, let alone before that.

I’m also equally sure plenty of Americans today would rather be somewhere in the UK.

Nationalists will attack anyone who doesn’t hold their exact narrow worldview from their narrowly defined area, regardless of which nationality they hold.

American nationalists are just called “republicans” (although plenty of democrats could be considered nationalists, it’s a bit of a “not all squares/rectangles” situation)

My parents are definitely in the “resist status-quo change” group, but I would argue they do understand “the cause” at least when it comes to American politics. They’re vocally against fascism in private, but any sort of resistance is illegal and therefore wrong. And it’s too bad these politicians are doing fascism, because they’re supposed to be good God-fearing types who just want abortion to stop.

Without an ounce of thought behind it, my mother will say medically necessary abortions should be allowed, and vote for someone who loudly tells everyone they won’t allow any at all. Will say ICE shouldn’t be executing people, but will happily support funding for them. Doesn’t like that the US keeps putting its military boot into other countries’ doors, but still says “support our troops”

I don’t get the fascination with sports either, but I get emotional about the stories in video games. I imagine someone who loves sports but doesn’t care for video games might view my tears over pixels as pathetic. My outrage at imginary injustice from a judgemental npc as ridiculous.

I have all these feelings for random collections of pixels on a screen. They can have their feelings for random groups of people.

I have to stop myself from mocking my brother in law for yelling at his TV on apparently bad plays, because I definitely have yelled at my screen before over a death, or plot twist.

Anybody have any experience using mesh radios for communication while hiking?

The closest node for either one is 60 miles away, so I’m not really tied to either, but am interested in picking some up for communication out in the field while out of cell range.

I have some tech/electronics experience, and plan on making some solar powered relay nodes eventually so I can slap them on a tree or tall pole, but for now I have nothing.

Recent politically motivated events in my country, as well as weather, have made my decision to have a secondary form of communicating with my wife pretty easy, and I’d like it to be something relatively small I can pack into a bag or pocket, that’s easy for my non-techy partner to use.

English IS my first language and it still tripped me up. It’s an easy thing to swap, especially without much context.