RPG books I know I won’t ever play. I ran D&D for two years during the pandemic and now I’m here reading Pathfinder, The One Ring, Legend of the Five Rings, Fate, Savage Worlds, and so, so many Mausritter crowdfundings.
I bought an old boat in Amsterdam (3000€), did some reparations (500€), replaced the engine (1500€), paid the local tax (600€ x 3years). I had fun with it. No regrets. Then I was moving back to my country, I couldn’t find a buyer… so I lowered the price to 1500€.
You were great, old boat. But not a great investment.
I once asked my dad if he’d ever buy a boat. He asked me why he would want to buy “a hole in the water to throw money into.”
Just bought a Brothers B&W laser printer. I need to print something maybe twice a year.
I bought healthy food that rotted away, and took a significan’t amount of my income. I now only eat slop again.
Most of it I just didn’t know how to prepare proper, was stored badly in the shop itself, and I could not find all the ingredients for. It was expensive as fuck too.
The Tofu tasted like fish, and made me feel nauseous.
So, don’t try to min-max your diet if you live in a shithole I guess.
At least the slop is cheap, and caloric. And I still have peanut butter left over.
I have a few more: A solar battery called blue wave that does not charge from the sun. The panels must be fake!
A solar lamp with the same problem, a working portable solar panel that is only useful for battery packs/mobile devices and I never have the time to actually use (although it will be good in emergencies).
A plastic bike helmet that would probably increase injuries due to awful design.
Bought a small fridge with no freezer compartment when there was one of the same size, with a freezer compartment that was just objectively better for the samepeice.
Gmod, years after it was no longer popular, just because I finally could.
So now, all my money is devoted to basically pleasing my brother, and bailing out my mother. After that, I will hoard like a dragon, after he has his PC (not buying alat after), and her debt is settled (plus a few small things to make life easier).
This subject is dear to my heart, because I realized that part of my conservative upbringing taught me money is the important thing and that emotions are worthless and dumb. If you spend money on something that makes you happy but does not provide commensurate utility or return on investment, it is by definition a dumb purchase. Treating yourself is a waste of resources and therefore makes you a bad person. Maybe unless you are debt free and fully funding every retirement and college account you got. (note the unspoken implication that it’s cool for the rich to do whatever they want)
As I have spent decades reverse engineering the instructions for my brain, I have recently concluded that not only do I thrive when building and creating things, but having the perfect high-quality tool that is great at what it does right down to the sensory feedback can really enhance the experience for me.
I’ve spent a bunch of money expanding and upgrading my collection this year, and I haven’t regretted it once. But I’ve spent even more on the materials just in the months since!
That’s not a conservative upbringing/mentality… That’s a capitalist mentality.
The only thing I can really say about capitalists is that they’re some of the worst people I’ve ever known, and I’ve known a few of them.
Very religious people (usually conservatives) are generally quite kind and generous. If they follow their religious book, that tracks. Since most religions teach about tolerance, acceptance, and understanding. Like the legend Fred Rogers; May he rest in peace.
Usually very liberal people are about basic social services for everyone, and programmes that support DEI. They want everyone to be on an equal playing field and they want that playing field to be, at a minimum, allowing all people to independently be able to live, have reasonably good health, food to eat, and somewhere to live.
Meanwhile capitalists always focus on the money. Who is paying for all of this? They don’t want their money (via taxes) to go to people that are less than them. Anyone who makes less or has less is “losing”, and they’re “winning”. All capitalists want to be on top, and they don’t care who they have to trample to achieve that.
There are exceptions of course, on every one of these groups. For example, Bill Gates who donates a lot of money for good causes. He still has plenty of money, but honestly, he gives away a lot. By no means do I mean to imply that any billionaire is good; in this case Bill is just using the wealth he has to do good. He’s clearly someone that made a lot of money doing capitalism things, and yet he believes in helping others.
The capitalists I have met are some of the most argumentative, vocal, and toxic people I’ve ever met.
Good on you for getting away from that mentality and finding enjoyment.
A collection of Commodore and compatible disk drives. Useless, expensive, heavy, fragile, mostly non-functional, unrepairable in some cases. But they look good piled up at the back of my closet.
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I bought a pallet of computers at an auction at a local college for $250 a year or two ago. HP Elitedesk GenIIs specifically (4th Gen i5, 8GB of RAM, 256gb SSDs, and space for add in cards and more drives if needed) I did not expect my throwaway bid to win but it did. So now I have a bunch of computers. I have some projects in mind, but honestly I’ve mostly been tossing them to friends and family when they need a computer for something. Eventually they’ll all be allocated, sold and given away but it’s certainly taking a bit
You can’t like connect them together and make an AI server with them?
Some music gear that I haven’t really used at all, and don’t feel particularly inclined to lean in and really figure out how to use. like a drum machine (arturia drumbrute impact) and a sequencer thingy (arturia beatstep pro). I could sell both of those and not feel like I’ll ever miss them.
Watch collection is pretty dumb and I really only ever wear one of them anyways. But damnit, they’re neat, and I enjoy rebelling against smartwatches.
Arguably, purchasing a custom ordered Taycan wagon with nearly all the options. BUT, car depreciation only matters when selling, and no other cars out there tick all the boxes for me like the Taycan does, so I’m okay with it
$19K in watches. Now I have a kid, and I am straight salary. In hindsight, I would be perfectly happy with the least expensive one. I’m a mechanical engineer, and they really interest me. But they were not smart purchases.
That’s a rabbit hole I managed to avoid. I lived in Shanghai in the 00’s when you could still get nice counterfeit mechanical watches there. Then I got a nice Seiko mechanical watch but no matter what I did, I just didn’t love the auto-winding function. Then came the solar watches from Seiko and Citizen which were relatively cheap. Now I’m here with a smart watch and never looking back.
Edit: also an engineer.
My co-worker has something similar. I wonder when he will figure it out?
me sitting here with five Casios, a Ball, a spring drive Seiko, a Bulova Precisionist, a Brew, and probably one or two I’m forgetting about: yepppppppppp
Hell yeah! Nice collection.
I never liked Breitling too much. If you want a good cheap mechanical watch, just go with Seiko, you get a good amount of quality for your money. Everything more expensive is an asset just like buying gold.
Oh, let’s not add the Seikos to the list. I have plenty of those. SKX007, SRP775, and like 5 or 6 I’ve built with Seiko NH-35 movements. I have a watch with a Seagull ST19 movement. I have some vintage ones, like a Timex Viscount and an Elgin Sportsman. But all of those are $500 and under (mostly under 200) and I don’t look at them as dumb purchases.
As a watch and mechanical enthusiast and fellow engineer myself, I read your comment and well you are certainty right, you gotta live a little haha
You sure do! And I love them all. I love modding them, I love wearing them. Love learning about them. I’d say my Seagull chrono gets equal wrist time to the Breitling. I try to keep everything in rotation. Except the George Stockwell trench watch… I’m afraid it might be a touch radioactive due to the radium.
Oh yeah that one I probably wouldn’t wear haha. Would you care to share some of your mods?
Sure!
Here is my SKX and an Invicta Pro Diver.
SKX has new hands, dial, chapter ring, crystal, date wheel, bezel insert, and crown. And I ended up doing an NH-35 swap on the 7S26. So basically, just the case is original now.
The Pro Diver has new hands, dial, bezel, bezel insert, high domed acrylic crystal, and I ground the crown guards off.
Thank you very much. Its a shame that you are the only person posting into MechanicalWatches lol
I nice steal-able asset you flaunt on your wrist, to boot!
TIL about watch insurance. What a wacky world we live in.
True, but they are all insured and you can always report the serial number to a database so it gets flagged if it pops up somewhere.
Yes what I meant by saying it’s an asset is that you should not wear it. The Seiko is already expensive enough to get stolen. Either way when you have watches in the price category shown above, you also have insurance for your watch. Especially when you wear it.
Dumb? I just bought an IDE PCI card and a 3.5” floppy USB adapter. I have a bunch of old 52x dvd/Bluray drives, some are IDE. Thought about buying a new SATA writer, but the internal 5.25 are well over $100!? Shocking, they used to be $35. Nobody needs them anymore. I only bought the 2.5” adapter to avoid throwing away the drive, I don’t know where my 1.44mb floppies are. So now I have an old PC with IDE optical drives and a 3.5” floppy.
What’s a 2.5" floppy?
One number away from the correct one.
Does a Hello Kitty bandsaw count?
No. That’s the coolest shit I’ve ever seen
I actually did the paint job myself. Bought an old saw that needed some new paint, so I decided to have some fun with it.
Are you actually a wood scientist, and, if so; can I pick your brain?
Nice saw, BTW!
I’m actually working on a PhD in the field. Whether that officially makes me a “scientist” I cannot say. But I have actually studied and done research in the field. Ask away!
Rock and Roll!
What cheap woods are the most impact resistant for splintering and splitting?
What is the best way to cure wood to prevent splitting without a kiln? Slap a heavy coat of latex paint on a log/burl/root and let it sit 6mo/year?
What are the most machinable hardwoods? (In particular as regards tearout, warping, and tolerance of thin sections)
In your opinion, what is an available underappreciated or interesting wood to work?
I’ve had a burl with the ends coated in truck box liner spray for almost a year. I’m cracking into it this winter to make a bathroom sink for my house. It hasn’t seemed to crack at all. It’s in a storage shed. Protected from the elements. It will be interesting to see what’s inside.
I bought a used rusty school bus. Six years later, at least I know how to weld now. Sort of. I also learned how to survive hitting my head on a large steel C-clamp nine times without suffering any brain damage. Additionally, I learned how to survive hitting my head on a large steel C-clamp nine times without suffering any brain damage.
Six years later, at least I know how to weld now. Sort of.
The most important part of the Dunning Kruger curve! And welding is a fantastic example. You go from “this hot melty thing is scary” to “dang, I can make metal stick to itself!” to “that weld looks kinda professional” to “holy crap there’s a whole science and art to this I will never have the time to fully learn”.
Is your school bus now something usable? Would love to hear about a successful impulse buy!
My skoolie is semi-usable, basically just needs the utilities (electric, propane and water) hooked up. I bought a house two years ago and that has suspended work on the bus completely. Someday …
A 10 inch 300W powered amp/subwoofer… I already have a soul-destroying stereo with 8 inch sub and studio monitor speakers… and live in a 1 BR… I do NOT need a sub so powerful it will rattle the gypsum out of the walls, and yet…
My Revel F208 speakers don’t really need a subwoofer for music but having a 12 inch 500 watt subwoofer to support them for movies does add to the dramatic impact. My apartment neighbors haven’t complained so I assume they are enjoying the music and movies too.
I feel like subs are way overrated for music. A good 10 or 12 in a quality speaker kicks. I mostly use mine to round out the sound, because I listen to a shitload of 50’s-70’s jazz where the recordings are shite.
I would disagree since getting a speaker with a “good” 10 or 12 inch driver is difficult or very expensive and impractical since those large drivers don’t do well with mids and upper mids. The Tannoy, Klipsch heritage line, and similar old school designs with large drivers all measure like crap.
Difficulty obtaining a good speaker doesn’t detract from my point though.
Also yes every Klipsch I’ve heard is shitty.
e And I said “overrated” not purposeless
My pregnant wife asked me to get her a fountain Coke Zero from Costco the other day… I paid for the thing and waited patiently for my empty cup. When I approached the dispenser, I found that all three Coke Zeros were out of order. I had no choice but to fill it with Diet Coke. It was the lowest Costco experience of our lives.
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I realise that it’s probably a highly technical question, but is there a difference?
Coke Zero is a newer diet option formulated to taste similar to original Coke, with the presence of a mild artificial sweetener flavor that is more recognizable to those who are sensitive to the taste. Diet Coke, on the other hand, was created decades before they had decent sweeteners. While it still has a sizable following of people who like it, Diet Coke tastes nothing like original Coke, and has a flavor more akin to the smell of hot plastic.
This is pretty consistent across all brands now, at least from those that I’ve tried so far. The new Zero versions are much, much closer to the original formulas.
Coke Zero is the formula marketed to males who do not want to be on a “diet”.
It’s got some extra flavor extracts as far as I can tell; a more robust and “spicy” taste v Diet Coke
