Buy it for Life

I got the “unicomp model M” from KeyboardCo circa 2019 and it was a huge piece of shit, least reliable thing I ever used, apart from the buckling spring switches which felt great it was just the cheapest piece of junk and it worked for like 2 months before breaking. Avoid them. My longest lasting mechanical keyboard was the Vortex Cypher 65% with Cherry MX Clear switches. Lasted several years, not even an old school Ducky usually did. Right now I’m using a Ducky One 3 Daybreak SF 65% with Cherry MX Blue switches and it’s holding along fine. I also bought a random keyboard on AliExpress for like $50 and was really shocked with the good quality. It was a Yunzii X71 68% with some mystery “Crystal switch”, I only got it because it looked neat, I didn’t even know it was mechanical.

Ah you’re right, it seems there’s modern copycats. Try searching for an “Imperial Ten” Oster model 642. That’s the other one I have, and it’s an 860 watt blender, solid metal with a glass pitcher and weighs like 8lbs. It’s probably not on par with the performance of a Vitamix, but it’s also not $400+. For my uses though it has never disappointed, I usually use it for grinding frozen chunks of fruit or berries to make ice cream. https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=oster+Imperial+ten+642

I agree, that is a concern long-term. I think the best path for the future is supporting Linux Phone alternatives like PostMarketOS so they become polished enough to daily for the average user. That likely won’t be as secure as GrapheneOS with specialized hardware for quite a while, but should be good enough for most use cases, and would give us a platform that can’t be rug pulled out from under us as we slowly improve it.

Aluminum chain mail blanket. Excellent cooling, less weight, and can be put inside a cotton or wool cover. My cousin has one, but I don’t know where they got it. I need to ask them since I have the same issues in the summer.

I’ve got a pretty heavy mattress on mine, so that might help contribute to the no movement of mine but mine literally does not move. Sometimes, especially at 2am when I’m going to the bathroom and my shin connects with the bed I WISH it had a little movement… I don’t have the headboard version, just the soft headboard. I got mine in 2021ish before they had anything else. I’ve actually bought 2 of them now, and 4 of the side tables …. I really like their stuff. I have a California king w/a temperpedic and a king w/a temperpedic and I think they’d stop a bus. I feel like a local woodworkers guild could probably make us this exact type of furniture for ~the same price if not less …

T82 extreme pmr goes for 84€ (2 walkies), standard goes for 72€… 36 each like you said. Motorola is quite a recognised brand. If we are looking at “buy for life” stuff then it may be worth bumping up the budget for… Would u say that the Motorola’s would outlast a chinese walkie like Baofeng? How long have you had the t82 for? A baofeng 2-pack is 30€, so I’m just trying to figure out if a Motorola is the better investment…

Brand isnt really the important thing, materials and construction are. Brands like carhartt, Duluth, etc. make durable workwear, but a lot of people want clothes with the aesthetic of workwear, but in stretchy, soft fabric and slimmer fits, and those brands will accommodate that. Duluth firehose pants, for example, are really durable. DuluthFlex firehose pants, though, look the same, but include 3% spandex. That means that the heavy duty cotton canvas is actually just held together by spandex, which wears out easily. Whatever brand you get, just make sure they are 100% cotton, or maybe cotton/nylon blend. Something like wrangler 13mwz might fit the bill for you. These pants don’t have to be pricy, either. If you are shopping somewhere like rural king, tractor supply, etc, you can find pants like that for $20.

This looks sort of ok if the styling and functions suit you: https://sidedeal.com/deals/2-pack-infinity-x1-stereo-wireless-rechargeable-700-lumens-worklights-with-blue Two speaker/flashlights for $25, bluetooth, claimed lumens and runtime suggests there are two 18650’s inside each one. Quick search for reviews indicates they have USB-C in and USB-A out (you can use them as power banks), they look fairly solid, but that the speaker volume is not all that high. I’m gonna resist though. Meh had some quite nice ones a few years back that I still sort of regret not getting but it would have just been more crap around the house. Edit: found them: https://sidedeal.com/deals/libratone-zipp-zipp-2-360-wifi-mutl-room-speakers-with-airplay-2-alexa-7 The large ones (original Zipp) without Alexa seemed very decent though the micro USB charge port is ugh these days. I saw a teardown indicating four 18650 inside. People said the audio was good. I see them on fleabay now for $100+. IDR what Meh was selling them for but it was definitely less. They are indoor speakers though, not waterproof or anything like that.

fwiw I’ve owned a pair of Shokz running headphones for like 5 years now and they still work great. No noticeable issues with battery degradation. Maybe only issue is the rubber cover for th USB socket got stretched and I recently cut it off.

Keen is crap since moving production to china A lot of people have an outdated view of the quality of stuff made in China. They think that everything is bad quality just because their $2 Aliexpress item doesn’t last forever. Most iPhones are made in China for example. Like anywhere, there’s both good quality and bad quality products, depending on how much the company is willing to pay. Sometimes the quality is actually higher - for example, Tesla Model 3s manufactured in China have far fewer issues with panel alignment and overall fit and finish compared to the ones manufactured in the USA. These days, China has far more experience with manufacturing, and a lot of the raw components (especially for electronics) come from China anyways. Some companies that outsource manufacturing to China also lower their standards at the same time. It’s not the manufacturing in China that’s the problem; it’s the company’s decision to cheapen their product.

Yes, but the point is a teaspoon of fine salt might be more salt than intended

With closed source apps, we can’t independently verify what is or is not being collected. Because they are proprietary, if they became quite popular, they would very likely be sold to either a competitor to shut it down, or enshittified by adding transaction fees. As an older example, Paperback Swap was an incredible website where people could give away books in exchange for a credit, which could exchanged with another use for their book. There were no fees taken by the website, the only cost was shipping the books via media mail (which was extremely affordable, as the books would be wrapped in printer paper). Paperback Swap was, at the time, a very popular website, with over a million books available. I used the service for many years happily exchanging books. Then it was purchased by Amazon, which saw Paperback Swap as a threat to their used book market. They immediately enshittified the app, adding transaction fees and requiring you to purchase exchange credits or ongoing subscriptions. Within the few years the community was effectively killed, and now lives on as a shell of its former self. Free, Libre open-source apps are the only long-term refuge from the constant churn of enshittification, as the community can always fork it to prevent bad-actors and venture capital from corrupting it.

I love my 46" Panasonic Viera. It’s my only TV. https://www.crutchfield.com/S-HuEUaS67Frk/p_13346PZ80/Panasonic-TH-46PZ80U.html Apparently some of these had power supply issues, but mine still works flawlessly. I got it second hand from someone who will most never used it. Everything works. The only flaw: Panasonic built it to reject 1080p over component input. My PS3 supports 1080p over component, and the console believes it’s transmitting signal, but the TV rejects it and only shows a blank screen. Panasonic cowtowed to the film industry, who didn’t want 1080p to be available without HDMI’s copy protection. So the TV blanks it out. Probably not a huge problem for you, but worth keeping in mind depending on what you plan to hook up.

Lol, totally understandable I hate loud stuff so for me it’s a tradeoff either way. And I really hate things that are loud

Yeah… On their blog they have some traditionally leftist environmental posts, but that marketing does throw a wrench into things. I’m unsure if they’re really hard right or just playing both sides in their marketing. I figured saving water is ultimately more important, and these guys make going that route the most viable, since many people try a low-flow head become cold or hate the icepick feeling some if them have and go back to their high-flow head. These ones pretty much guarantee anyone I recommend them to will stick with it.

I like my Norelco too. Just a basic battery one that’s been around the world with me and lasted 10+ years. FWIW, almost all electric shavers owe their design to Braun. Read into Deiter Rams and his legacy impact (E: he still alive) if you’re interested

I wouldn’t recomend lasers. Cats get a pleasure not only from chasing but also from catching things. Lasers can never be caught so the end feeling that is accumulated is of devastation for never fulfiling their end goal. There are plenty of great ideas here for making them toys. I will add a couple more that my cats have loved much bettter than any toy that was bought. Carton roll of toilet paper Carton roll from electrical adhesive tapes Get a stick and attach an elastic string to it. At the end of the string attach something else - like a cork, a rolled sock etc. Personally I don’t use plastics for toys, but I also don’t stop them from playing with one that accidentaly fell on the floor. When they are done playing with it, I just make it desapear. Remember that: they don’t have the same color palette we do. I don’t know the official terms but we see with 3 colors, they have 2, so bright colors are not of importance to them the time you spend playing with them, is bonding time. don’t be rough or attack them (in the sense to take them by surprise sudenly). We are a giant to them size-wise. Even tho they see us as equals, we need to ackgnledge that they are much smaller creatures. If you don’t respect them they will start attacking you out of the blue, and a vicious circle will be established.

No, it was just a low-quality hand-me-down that started to bend and lost part of one of its claws.