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Yours is a baby compared to mine. It's the original one the house came with. Oil-fired, on demand hot water (no tank) and hot water heating. 68 years old this year and still going strong. We've replaced parts here and there, but I have a feeling anything new won't last anywhere near this long...

It seems like these things reliably spring a leak after you have them a while. Don't they make some with stainless steel tanks so they'll never leak? To me it seems like planned obsolescence.

https://news.yahoo.com/trump-iran-iraq-missile-statement-casualties-war-164434008.html

I've been saying this since day one. He never wanted to be President. He wants to be dictator with a lifetime term. And who knows, he may well find a way to make it happen. That can only happen if the US lets it happen. We killed their general. Iran sent some missiles our way. It could end at...

Well, looks like Doug's worst fears were realized: https://abcnews.go.com/International/iran-launches-missiles-us-air-bases-iraq-us/story?id=68130625 No mention if the "ballistic missiles" had conventional or nuclear warheads.

The Islamic Revolution was a reaction to decades of US interference in the area, including the installation of the Shah who was basically a puppet of the US. While Iran admittedly has stirred the pot for the last 40 years, the US is hardly blameless. That said, we created monsters in the region...

It's pretty obvious most of the countries there have zero interest in democracy. That said, our ME policy should involve one of two things. Plan A is what I described above, which is to basically get them to all kill each other. Plan B is to just remain neutral unless US interests are directly...

Trump's biggest enemy is his mouth. I'm fine with the US taking out generals, religious leaders, even heads of state in Middle Eastern countries. The Middle East is the cause of a lot of the world's terrorism problems. However, I would do things exactly the opposite of Trump. I wouldn't brag we...

Agree with everything you wrote. I'll also add that far too many jobs now require college degrees, even though strictly speaking the job can be done with a high school education. This is likely an end result of far too many people going to college who really shouldn't or don't need it...

Agreed. Loans should be replaced with grants, but we should only give grants to people who will get some real benefit from college, not who will go and get some useless degree where they will never make enough to pay off their loans. To me loaning money under onerous terms to 18 year olds, most...

My loan is held by the feds, not by a collection agency. They tried a few times to sell it to collection agencies but the collection agencies couldn't get a dime off me, so it reverted back to the Feds. I actually got blacklisted by the collection agencies, which means they want to have nothing...

Sorry about that. I've been meaning to post about all this for a long time. Since my holidays have been mostly shitty lately, I guess it made sense to do it in a Christmas/New Year thread. That has its own drawbacks which I'll explain in response to your other points. Good that your siblings...

I should also mention that having an aide come in and help really isn't any kind of a break for me. I still need to get my mother up and put her to bed which are the hardest parts. To me getting a break means someone else is taking care of my mother in their place, so I can do whatever I want...

Problem with both those things is they just don't have the money to either miss work without pay, or pay for us to get help. They're both basically living paycheck to paycheck. As I mentioned also, neither one is physically up to the task even if they could get the time off from work. My sister...

Actually, she's been stable mentally and physically for the last two years but she stabilized at a level where I have to take care of all her basic needs. That includes cooking, shopping, bathing, putting her on the toilet, getting her in bed, etc. She hasn't been able to walk without assistance...

I'm a city person. Always have been, always will be. Either you understand that or you don't. My sister is in Yaphank in Suffolk County. Middle of nowhere. Even she's bored living there but when she married her former husband wanted to buy the house there to be near his sister. Wouldn't want to...

I can't physically drive. That leaves out most of the country. Can't afford a car even if I could drive. I hate suburbs anyway and I hate warm weather. The places where you don't have to drive all have hideously expensive housing regardless of where they are because such places are in short...

Not really. I'm stuck in a place where my life sucks, there's literally nothing I can do now to change it, and there's no future to look forward to (i.e. I'll likely be homeless after my mom dies). About three months ago I got really sick with the flu, still had to take care of my mother, and...

My siblings came by and we all had dinner with mom. Stuffed shells and meatballs. My only wish was that mom had her faculties. Very painful seeing her like this thinking of how she was. Didn't exchange gifts since everyone was too broke to buy anything. Considering this will be my last...

I think we'll eventually get both. As it is now a lot of the divisions in philosophy are between the coasts and the midwest. Honestly, if the country broke up into three parts along those lines it would solve a lot of our problems. As for Trump, I have mixed feelings. Clinton would have been a...

It's symbolic because the Senate doesn't have the votes to actually finish the process and put him out of office. Moreover, with this country having a lot of issues like poor infrastructure, a lousy healthcare system, and a growing divide between the working classes and those in charge, in my...

Getting the extra power isn't a problem. Dissipating it effectively is. 280 watts is a lot of power to get rid of. You need a massive heat sink and great airflow, or liquid cooling.

The market won't support solar panels with a life of only 5 to 7 years. Half the cost of solar is the installation. If you have to put in new panels every 5 to 7 years the economics don't work out. While the problems mentioned exist, they can be mitigated designing panels with longer life. We...

We only have one bathroom and it doesn't have a fan. I always thought fans were a thing if you had a windowless bathroom. We have a bathroom window, and if it gets :poop: , we can open it and turn on the whole house attic fan.

That all may be true, but look where they're testing it. It's probably miles from anybody but the people testing it. I also don't think it would fall a whole lot faster even not autorotating. It's light with a fairly large surface area. I'd be surprised if its terminal velocity at lower...

I've read it's possible to get waivers but that's probably beyond the means of hobbyists. Companies like Blue Origin have to get waivers to launch their rockets, for example. It looks like there are no rules regarding height in Mexico, so that's one possibility...

Those are my thoughts exactly, Doug. I would love to try something like this but it's obviously not happening in NYC, or probably anywhere in the NY Metro area, for obvious reasons. My parents bought a plot of land in New Mexico. It's pretty much in the middle of nowhere. The area was supposedly...

You can see the ascent/descent rate in the info screen (middle right just under the altitude). It looks like it maxed at around 37 m/s (83 mph) for the 33,000 foot flight and about 48 m/s (107 mph) for the 40,000+ foot flight. That slows a lot as you descend into thicker air. The propellers...

Express elevator going up, way up: Record drone flight to over 33,000 feet Later record to 40,000+ feet As far as I know, it's completely legal to go this high with drones in the area where these flights were made (Western Siberia).

The Earth will be devoid of life something like 7 billion years before that happens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_of_Earth Hopefully sometime in the next few thousand years, we'll start looking for other worlds to settle.

Add about 50°F to 100°F to those numbers once global warming runs its course. If I live long enough I might actually see 200°F broken somewhere on the Earth's surface.

Honestly, when I was researching solar panels it was kind of a shock to me that by default you won't have power if the grid was down. One of the reasons, albeit a minor one, for getting solar panels is exactly so you have power during blackouts. The fix is relatively simple, namely to have a...

I don't have any machine that I can put one in or I would jump at it for that price.

Or just get a Ryzen 2400G APU for about $136. If you don't want a gaming PC, you likely won't notice the difference between 4 cores/8 threads and 6 cores/12 threads. The IGP on the Ryzen is superior to anything from Intel. In fact, nowadays if you don't want a gaming PC I'm not seeing much...

The price sounds in line with what other places charge. One thing everyone should do before installing solar is see where usage can be reduced. We went from an average of around 1000 kW-hr/month to 670 and dropping (I'll know the exact figure as soon as the cooling season is over). How did we do...

I'll need to check if ConEd does something similar, although the way I'm sizing my system it probably wouldn't generate a net surplus beyond my annual average usage. That makes sense from the perspective you mentioned, plus micro-inverters already have all the other advantages I mentioned. The...

A 6 or 7 kW system should probably cover that in your part of the country. Covering your needs is ideal but anyone know about the situation where you generate more power than you use? Does the power company buy that power from you at the going rate they charge you, or can the best you do with...

Also, a lot of master/slave support was flaky at best. Some devices worked fine alone but didn't work once you added a slave. Others worked fine as masters, whether alone or with a slave, but didn't work at all as slaves. It's only safe to say the drive doesn't work at all if it's set as a...

A lot of employers explicitly prohibit moonlighting because of its effect on job performance. In some places it's even illegal to moonlight. Even if not, there's a lot of legal stuff to worry about: https://www.nurse.com/blog/2018/01/22/dont-land-in-legal-hot-water-when-moonlighting/...

Obviously if you need that much storage SSDs will cost many thousands more. I couldn't imagine filling up 8TB, never mind the amount of storage you have. For the masses who can probably get by with 1 TB or less, SSDs are the best solution. I'm pretty sure he's still alive even though he stopped...

Don't know anything about quality but 5400 or 5900 RPM 8 TB seems to be the sweet spot in terms of cost per TB. I don't see much point spending more for 7200 RPM when the decrease in access times is marginal, and 8 TB will most likely be used for bulk storage. In my opinion, given the high bit...

This is one of those times I really miss Merc. I'd love to read whatever witty comments he might write regarding WD.

All the more amazing because it looks like that e-bike is electronically limited to ~100 mph. Despite that, it handily beat the Mustang.

Technically speaking, "throttle" more accurately describes the function as it's something which varies the power output of the engine or electric motor. "Accelerator" is really a slang term. If the term were strictly accurate, you would only hit the accelerator to accelerate. When you let off...

No, it just humiliated the Ferrari off the line.

I personally think of retirement as a time when I can just do only work which I find interesting and which pays enough, rather than taking anything which comes my way. I really have no set age when I'll just never take any work. So long as the mind/body are able, and the work is enjoyable, why...

Earnings potential doesn't necessarily mean much at this point. Yes, I was making about $100K annually on my last consulting gig but they no longer need me. I doubt I can get anything that lucrative, especially something where I'm still able to take care on my mother. Outside of 3 trips on site...

I've been doing asset planning for a long time. Basically, I'll have way too much assets to qualify for Medicaid when I'm over 65. I can technically get Medicaid right now since there is no asset limit if you're under 65 but then that means if any lucrative consulting work comes if I'll have to...

Well, if I had coverage I would have had it treated. For what it's worth, for a lot of relatively minor stuff, the Internet is a great source of information. Back in early 2006 I was having terrible foot and joint pain, to the point I was walking like I was 90 years old. I read up about it, and...

Here's the thing. Nobody knows what the healthcare landscape in this country will look like in even 5 years. If Trump doesn't get reelected and we have a Democratic-majority Congress we'll likely get some form of universal health care. If not, some states, including New York, are talking about...