Between photography, motorcycles, and tools (woodworking/metalworking/automotive) this does seem accurate for me - I have ended up spending a fair chunk of money between these over the years. The tools do mean I can do stuff myself though rather than paying someone else so they at least are less of a money pit.

Every now and then I think paragliding would be an interesting thing to try but I have to tell myself another expensive hobby is hard to justify when I’d like to actually own a place to live some day.

I could see the benefits of using Arch just so almost every function my system has is near-perfectly documented in Arch Wiki.

That is literally the main reason I started using it - over time I kept running across helpful Arch wiki articles while looking for info on stuff so when I got a new computer I figured I might as well go with Arch.

I had an old Series era Landrover as a paddock basher when I was a kid, that had a manual choke. It also had a backup crank handle for starting the engine which I had to use occasionally as I was using starter batteries which had been retired from usage in the family cars, a gearbox with no synchro on first/second, and the foot brake didn’t work. Would recommend, I definitely had fun.

Can’t say I saw that coming, particularly after Microsoft bought them. Nice to have a surprise be pleasant once in a while.

That’s one with big potential but not one to lead off with, best to wait until you’ve ‘invented’ a few obvious game changers and established your philosophic credentials before attempting to introduce basic medical hygiene…

Electricity is a hard ask to even attempt to do in ancient times. Luckily there’s a variety of other simpler things to establish yourself as a genius inventor - strirrups, wheelbarrows, magnetic compasses, the idea of a crank handle, and how to use triangular bracing to make a strong truss would be good options.

It’s high quality comedy from Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. The base idea being that the biblical antichrist and final battle is real and approaching but the angel and demon who are meant to be leading the battle between good and evil have decided that after thousands of years on earth they’re actually ok with the status quo.

It’s also a TV series which was a reasonable adaptation (at least the first series, haven’t watched past that) but the book is as usual superior.

Yep, 2k should be the normal hammer and XP should be a hammer with rounded edges and a gradient.

ai slop

Not everything odd is AI, and I don’t believe this image is.

It’s consistent with the era of the monitors, has controls in believable locations on them, has a variety of angles that look right (including the supports underneath the base), and searching tineye with this image returns results with the same photo going back to at least 2015.

Petrol and gasoline are the same thing, it’s just different terminology.

Better not let any clean freaks see this - they’ll have a cow!

The 9/11 attacks were significant here in Australia. It was all over the news for ages and also directly led to other major changes such as a real stepping up of our airport security measures, a swathe of legislation in the name of anti terrorism, and us getting dragged into the war in Afghanistan.

People without pocket knives when they want to get into a box:

Looks pretty thin to me:

The narrow point is about as wide as driving to my nearest beach and that’s a reasonable day trip distance.

Descent was one of the first games I had to play, I remember it fondly. It came bundled with my family’s first computer (along with Lemmings and Simcity 2000) so I spent a fair amount of time on it. The freedom of motion you had in Descent was impressive - albeit easy to confuse yourself with - and something I have rarely seen since.

People sign up to app intended to share personal information about others without their permission, end up having their own personal information shared without permission - the irony is impressive.

Presumably a reference to the town, or more specifically the road sign for it.

That phrase tends to be much less literal when its said by those who are getting honked at regularly to move off from the lights.

If someone is telling you they get honked at all the time for no reason there usually is a reason (or several) and they just refuse to acknowledge what they’re doing.

Closest I’ve come in a truck is an annoyingly loud alert for everything the computer reckoned was an issue and that was painful enough. Every time I’d drive it it’d be blaring the alarm for some reason or another and if it had been a long term company truck instead of a rental I probably would have ended up removing the speaker.

For example the lane departure warning would fire off every time you moved over to not run into someone parked on the side of the road, the close distance warning would fire off regularly when people merged in front of you, and if it was windy it’d set off an alarm to let you know the truck was being blown around when driving. Could be useful if you’re mentally challenged or blind but that sort of thing is just going to annoy anyone who isn’t. You couldn’t even turn the alarms off properly - you could go through the deliberately prolonged procedure to turn them off temporarily but then they come back again every time you start the truck.

I’ve driven an SUV with lane keep assist and it would pull at the wheel trying to follow lane markings that were outdated or ones it just made up, I hope that particular bit of ‘safety’ tech doesn’t make it to any truck I have to drive.

Brake fluid is hygroscopic and will accumulate water over time despite being in a nominally sealed system. Water in solution with brake fluid noticeably lowers the boiling point which leads to issues under repeated braking (e.g. down long steep hills) as the fluid boiling means you lose braking capacity in that circuit.

You should ideally be changing the brake fluid every few years (2-3 being the typical recommendation) and that applies even if the brakes are used less often.