If the artist is constantly in the news reminding me what a POS they are IRL, then no, I can’t enjoy their works because that’s always in my mind. Otherwise, if they just fuck off into obscurity, then I can enjoy the works independently for what they are.

Last fall I bought a 1 KWh Anker power station, and I’m loving it. It charges from 800 watts of solar and powers all kinds of random stuff around the house each day. Useful for power outages, too.

That’s what I’ve done for years. Makes managing things much easier, and I run multiple APs (all with the same SSID/PSK) and you can just roam to the best one. One upstairs, one downstairs, one in the weird dead zone in my office, and one on the back patio (it’s not hardwired and uses the mesh connection for uplink).

These are all old Aruba APs running OpenWRT but that’s the plan for this Cudy Model. I may pick up a few more and just replace all of my trusty but very old Arubas.

I bought this one last month when it was on sale for $39: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BRK3CYY3

Haven’t deployed it yet, but it’s fully supported by OpenWRT. I would only be using it as an access point, though. My router is a USFF Optiplex with an extra NIC and runs OpenWRT.

I downloaded one and I still want to support the author so I have no issue with buying it on sale.

Same. Not with A Stitch in Time but two of the PIC tie-in novels weren’t available without DRM. So I bought them full price and “Rules of Acquisition’d” DRM-free versions from elsewhere. My conscience is clean.

Yeah, A Stitch in Time was what started the search. Just over $100 seems like a bargain when I was seeing the used paperbacks listed over $200 on Amazon lol. So I went with the ebook copy.

https://www.ebooks.com/en-us/book/136175/a-stitch-in-time/andrew-j-robinson/

I think I paid $10.99 for it last year, and it’s $8.99 now. If you are interested in more, create an account and add them to your wish list. They will randomly go on sale with no notice. I got several that were normally like $12.99 for $1.99 just by catching them on sale when I checked back on my lists.

I’ve been getting all of mine from there. If the title is available without DRM, it’s noted in the listing, and you can straight-up just download a clean epub file once you’ve bought it. That’s everything I’ve always wanted from an ebook store.

It’s like reading an extended episode of ST.

Very much that. Mine are all ebooks but I’m starting to build a nice collection. Thankfully I can get most of them DRM-free so they’re actually mine. Best I can tell, the publisher will release them DRM-free approx. 5 years after they’re published.

USS Equinox

Nova Class :)

The Bajoran Solar Sailor anyone

For a pleasure cruise? Yes, please. I forgot about those, but they are gorgeous. Practical, though? Probably not unless you plan to sail through a tachyon field lol.

Good thing there’s still a large backlog of Trek novels I haven’t read yet. Not really a consolation prize or silver lining, but it’s at least something.

I did a post a while back asking for recommendations, so I’ll link that since there’s some good ones: https://startrek.website/post/28030285

My favorites of what I’ve read so far:

• A Stitch in Time
• Deep Space Nine: Millennium (trilogy)
• Star Trek: Destiny (Trilogy)
• Cold Equations (Trilogy)

I’ve read 4 out of the 5 Star Trek: Picard tie-in novels, and they’re all excellent (though the Riker one is the weakest but not bad).

• The Last Best Hope: Prequel to Picard S1 and fills in so many blanks that were missing in the show. Picard and Raffi are the main focus.
• Second Self: Set between PIC S1 and S2, features Raffi as the main character.
• Firewall: Set before PIC S1 with flashbacks to shortly after Voyager returned from the Delta Quadrant. Seven of Nine is the main character.
• The Dark Veil: Set After before PIC S1, features Riker and the Titan.

Honorable Mentions:

• Q-Squared: If you like Q and Trelane antics
• Q-in-Law: I’m struggling to get through the first few chapters of this one, but it was recommended so I’m going to power through lol. (Update: Got through to chapter 6 last night and it’s finally picking up speed.)

I bought it (ebook) and read it last year. It was my gateway drug into the TrekLit universe :)

And 4 and 5 for that matter

Honestly, for me, it’s when someone knows when to keep their mouth shut or opinions to themselves. I could, in theory, consider the dumbest person in the world “intelligent” so long as they don’t open their dumb mouth and make situations worse.

Basically, any idiot can speak, but it takes intelligence and/or wisdom to know when not to.

I’d get a new weather app that only shows the weather. If you’re on Android, try BreezyWeather (F-Droid link).

The F-Droid (“freenet”) one only mainly uses OpenMeteo as the source (which is pretty good) but the releases on Github offer additional sources. Not sure why there’s a discrepancy, but I use the Github release and Accuweather as the source. YMMV which gives the best results for your area, but I often wasn’t getting severe weather alerts with OpenMeteo.

The world is just as fucked up as it ever was. The only difference now is that every fucked-up thing that ever happens anywhere is getting pushed to your always-on doomscroll device in real time with people attaching their mostly ignorant opinions to it.

This is where the “touch grass” advice comes into play. In broad terms, the real world is not nearly the hellhole social media portrays it to be.

A Ferengi ship? Interesting choice!

TIL that I’ve always been looking at them backwards. I always thought the curved section was the front.

Had to look that one up and recognized the USS Aventine from ST: Destiny. Definitely looks like a cool ship. Assuming the models of it are from ST: online?

maybe they don’t use plasma at all?

Never even thought of that. There was a lot of dialog and plot points about finding alternatives to warp after the Burn, and we know they still use dilithium as a regulator, so I assumed they’re still using the same M/A reaction as before. But it’s very possible they extract the energy from the reaction in completely novel ways now.

Was just assuming the same way as we’ve always known because (checks notes) the nacelles still light up blue lol.

I could but probably won’t. I’ve already settled on DS9 mixed with a nap or 3 as my reward for surviving a really crappy and stressful week at work.

Glad I’m not the only one mortgaging their Saturday and hoping to pay it in full on Sunday 😆