Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
Burnt out, over the hill autistic IT nerd and longtime SSC lurker
User ID: 3219
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
8hr ago
Finishing up Twelve Months: Dresden Files Book 18 by Jim Butcher. I expected to be finished with it by now but, fuck, some of its themes just hit too close to home right now for me to be able to devour it in my usual fashion. I'm finding myself having to take breaks and deal with my own feelings frequently, which is probably a good thing, but it also reminds me that despite having more good days than bad, it's going to be A While before I find whatever my latest new Normal is.
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
1d ago
All right, it's been a few days since I finished the book and I gotta agree that Mote wouldn't have ever made it past the editors in modern publishing. That said, I have to say that the book is quite well-written and I can easily see why it's such a classic. Yes, there's zeerust, as there is with all aged works, but the CoDominium being the obvious big one is actually pretty impressive to me. Gotta give Niven and Pournelle props for not getting too into the weeds with the science part of their science fiction there.
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
1d ago
I can't even count the number of times I've fallen into the trap of reading some post or another that happens to push one of my buttons (which tends to be when the ghosts of old culture wars are invoked via their commonly-accepted memes) and next thing I know I'm hip deep in a, "well, ackshully," reply before I catch myself and hit cancel.
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
1d ago
Aaaaaaand, now /u/ThomasdelVasto is Algernop Krieger in my mind's eye. Thanks for that!
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
4d ago
Twelve Months: The Dresden Files Book 18 by Jim Butcher, now that it's dropped.
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
6d ago
Yeah, that makes sense, Breville just wasn't a Thing back when I was chugging along with a Rancilio Silvia and daydreaming about the one-armed bandit. NGL, said one-armed bandit was hands down one of the best scores that I ever made on an Amazon Warehouse deal back when they were actually deals and it was more common to get stuff that was better than advertised, if not NIB, instead of worse. That said, I did find the imperfection they had talked about by accident one day when I was cleaning it. Still, I regret nothing on that particular purchase!
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
6d ago
Ha! As much as some folks in /r/sysadmin would love for IT work to be unionized, that's not happening in my corner of the Earth anytime soon!
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
6d ago
Right?! I was ready to pay up to $2k for personal service but 5 seems nutty to me.
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
6d ago
Alas, we really need to set up a trust as well as a will, though this would be a decent stopgap for sure!
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
6d ago
They definitely live up (and down) to their reputation, I'll say that. The Europiccola is well night unusable IME, it barely had time to pull a shot before its thermal fuse kicked out. The Professional, OTOH, has been a dream in terms of maintaining steam/pressure, but finding the sweet spot in terms of tamp has always been tricksy for me in the sense that there's little wiggle room between a nice shot that requires some, but not too much, force to pull, and a shot that's a little too tightly packed and can't really be pulled at all! As you can imagine, that kind of workout hasn't been kind to the grouphead gaskets...
I can do TIA 586B in my sleep (orange-white orange, green-white blue, blue-white green, brown-white brown), and only get TIA 586A right without looking it up 50% of the time. That's not a good combination.
Okay, funnily enough, while I do have both schemes straight in my head (we had one building that for whatever reason seemed to have constant network issues that we largely solved by going from 586B to 586A, so I got used to the difference pretty quickly as we reworked the wiring) I swear I had 586B as 586A in my head and vice versa until seeing this post and reminding myself that no, we were using A in that clinic and not B. Doh! facepalm
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
7d ago
So, anyone here have any experience with either using an online service like Legal Zoom or Trust and Will the like to create a trust, will, medical directives/POA, etc, or alternately going it alone with DIY? We had an unexpected death in our family several months ago, and as a result it's kinda lit a fire under my ass to actually get something on the books instead of just a vague, soon-ish thought in my head. I decided to check with a local legal group that specializes in this, but their price tag is >$5k, when the online guys are <20% of that. I know most of what goes into these things is boilerplate, but I also know that it's not unheard of for there to be additional trouble with online shops and DIY kits, too, so I'd be interested to hear others' experience with things like this.
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
7d ago
Yeah, that analogy checks out. IMAO what they are more than anything is convenient, but said convenience definitely comes with a price tag attached. I think these days that K-cups are over a dollar a pop when coming from a local grocery store, though the warehouse places like Costco, Sam's, BJ's, etc. will get you closer to .50 to .75 per cup, depending on brand, and below that for the house brands. So while the coffee might not be so fresh on the fourth or fifth cup from the good old automatic drip coffee maker, it'll be significantly less expensive.
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
7d ago
I've been using a La Pavoni Professional for the last several years, it's not terrible to take apart but I might be a little excessively concerned that I'm going to mess it up trying to pry the gaskets out of the grouphead, even though my rational brain knows it'll be fine. Never tried the Breville but I've heard really good things about them, and especially that dual boiler system.
I don't know a damn thing about hacking a Breville, but I'm curious as to what you'd hack on one. PID would be the obvious first stop, but doesn't the dual boiler have one in both the broiler and the grouphead?
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
7d ago
You're absolutely right, of course, my choices have been inexcusable. I denounce myself!
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
7d ago
Cool, the Flair Go is a fascinating little machine, part of me wants to buy one for portable espresso but the other part of me is reminding me that the decision to just go with the flow and take the opportunity to check out the local scene was already made. Thing about an espresso machine in particular is that the pressure required for espresso is going to blow out the gaskets sooner or later, and next thing you know, your espresso is coming out the sides of the portafilter as well as from the portafilter and, well, you're ready to replace the gasket!
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
8d ago
I am in awe of your coffee game, fellow Mottizen. I can practically taste the bitter mochaltine flavor from here!
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
8d ago
You're not wrong, Walter, but I'm doing a bit here, work with me!
You say that, and I hear you, but believe it or not Starbucks is a significant gateway drug when it comes to the wider realm of craft coffee. And when I'm travelling and there's no good-looking craft coffee in the vicinity of my stay, it's nice when there's a nearby Starbucks and I can get a shot or four of their blonde espresso roast.
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
8d ago
I've been drinking too much coffee lately - turning it into some sort of crutch during the day, relying on it to boost my energy after working hard. Three strong cups a day is too much and my sleep has suffered as a result. I also haven't been able to pick out many subtle notes - and on that note!, I've wondered why the ground beans always smell much more intensely and complex right after grinding, compared to the finished liquid in the cup, which is much more muted and simple. Because of this I've included a stirring pin in my latest order. I will try to arrange the grounds properly before pouring, and then stirring while it infuses.
Yeah, that can definitely do it. At my own personal height of madness, I would have a shot of espresso in the morning, then head down to my local craft coffee shop to talk coffee and grab something from them, which could be a nitro cold brew, a pour-over, a "dialed in" (y'know, that fancypants mixture of steamed cold brew, coconut oil, and grass-fed butter), or even just another shot of espresso from them. This actually improved my palate overall, but it could give me sleep issues as well, which isn't saying much these days but still. COVID plus inflation killed them, alas, but I'm better off without all of that extra caffeine, even though I miss nerding out on coffee with the staff there.
On the ground beans part, brewing just doesn't extract all of that wonderful flavor and aroma that the act of grinding has just released from the bean. The idea behind espresso is actually to extract the maximum flavor from the bean while leaving the bitterness behind in the puck, and while it definitely produces the most intensely flavorful brew of all methods of making coffee, it can definitely blunt the more refined and delicate notes of a particular coffee, which is where pour-overs come in. Just about all of us who get way too into coffee end up preferring either espresso for flavor or pour-overs for the subtlety.
When the order arrives I'll be trying out what will be, by far, the most expensive home made coffee I've ever tried: Honduras Geisha. At almost 4.50 USD (eqv.) per 16g cup! In the meantime I'll try to reduce my tolerance a bit and improve my sleep by drinking a minimal amount of coffee.
Ooh, please share your experience with that once you've tried it a couple of times! I actually have three pounds of Guatemalan Gesha that I'll roast as soon as I'm confident in my roasting again, which will probably be a few weeks from now, but in the meantime I'd love to hear your opinion on it. Speaking of which, I'd be interested in hearing about whether or not the stirring pin makes a difference for you, if you wouldn't mind. Cheers!
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
8d ago
Thanks for the kind words and for sharing your experience, pour-overs with fresh coffee are on a whole different level than regular automatic drip coffee! May I ask what kind of lever machine you're using? Espresso is actually my favorite way to enjoy coffee but my machine is ready for a full tear-down and a fresh set of gaskets, so I need to get going on that project now that I've done the deep cleaning on my roaster.
Growing one's own coffee would be amazing, though probably work intensive to get good coffee out of it. If you ever do so, please post about it here!
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
8d ago
Oh, you're just getting started on the fun, sonny. You've got so much to look forward to! Before you know it, your nose will run for no reason when you're eating, your grip will fail you every once in a while, you'll get sore so much more quickly when exerting yourself physically, your muscles and bones will creak and pop in new and freaky ways... it just keeps getting more interesting! Yes, you'll keep mixing things up, probably ever-more frequently, but it's when you stop noticing the mix-up that shit's getting real...
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
8d ago
I thought the coffee haters would be for people that actually hate coffee, not people that like coffee enough to be picky about it.
Me too, but what do I know? I'm not a fan of the bitterness either, which is why, when left to my own devices, I prefer espresso and pour-overs.
It definitely delivers the goods, though that'd pretty much be a given after the last book. I was lucky enough to be finishing my last book the day that it came out so I'm fortunate in that particular department!
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