Remember that any advice from your parents (or anyone over 30, apparently) is, at best, 20 years past its best by date. Doesn’t mean it’s not still good, but give it a sniff test.

Under the Red Hot Moon by Rancid

I get about 7. Turns out I need closer to 9. When I do get enough sleep, the difference is pretty wild - my mood is better, WAY better. And my appetite is under control too, which is a nice bonus. But the only way to actually get those 9 hours is literally “eat-sleep-work”. Just ain’t enough time in the day.

So, I’m a novice Linux user and have been on Ubuntu for maybe 2 years now. And I’m just starting to hit the SNAPS wall - IE, just a bit too much of what I want doesn’t install through snaps. Is there a good progression for my “next distro after Ubuntu?”. Still need some training wheels, but ready to take the next step.

Ah, I see it now! I was an idiot and only looking at the menu above it for interface language. Got it. Thanks for the help!

On mine, there’s a dropdown to select your language. There is no option to add an additional one.

Oh wow, so if I want to see English AND Spanish content, I would need to add both languages? Neat. TIL!

Oh, looks like that’s not an option for me (lemmy.zip). Are you able to add multiple languages on other instances?

I realize OP probably doesn’t care, but I find the differences interesting. Not too long ago, I just happened to park my truck (with grandpa cap) right next to the identical SUV. From the outside, the two looked like twins - same paint color even. And yet, when you peer through the back window, it’s immediately obvious how much less cargo space the SUV has. Even if you took the back seats out, there’s all this plastic trim that devours what should be cargo space. You’d never fit a sheet of plywood back there. And I don’t see why. Airbags & cupholders I guess?

I haven’t been able to even look at new vehicle prices in a while, but back when I bought the truck, it was literally half the price of the SUV. That’s an awful lot to pay for 2 rear seats and less cargo space. And yet, SUVs are everywhere here in America. Go fig.

I guess what I’m saying is that if you want more cargo space for less money - yes, the extra step of buying a tonneau cover or camper shell is totally worth it. Or was, anyway.

For me, what has sort of worked it pointing out that both sides of the news are getting basic facts wrong - things where there shouldn’t even be a debate. If the news was true, you could watch any channel - it would all be the same. Instead, we get things like one side claiming murders are up and the other claiming murders are down. Our current journalism is a failure of a system designed to drive engagement/viewership/clicks rather than convey knowledge.

I also find it helps to remind them that we’re Americans first, party second. The other side isn’t stupid, they’re just getting a completely different set of ‘news’.

As others have said, search YouTube for brake pad changes on your make/model of car. If that still leaves you with questions, you can also find a self help book specific to your car (Chilton or Haynes).

Good news, based on how you’re describing your own technical level, I think you’re going to find this is pretty easy actually. Only concern is if you live where they salt the roads, then some of these things will be rusted together. So, good to watch the video again & see how it’s supposed to come apart.

Once the calipers are off, you need to support them somehow so they don’t hang on the brake lines. I usually just slide a cinder block underneath them, but others like using bungie cords / zip ties & tying them to spring/strut. (Depending on the car, you may not even need to fully remove the caliper - many of them pivot upwards).

Probably worth mentioning, the pads themselves are cheap, but you should also resurface or replace the rotors. One of the important steps to making sure they last is having a clean & smooth surface when they’re new, so that they will mate together smoothly. There’s a lot of neat stuff going on with the transfer of pad material to the rotor itself, I can’t pretend to cover it all, but “bedding” the pad material to the rotor properly ensures long life. And the short-short answer is that to accomplish that, you need new rotors or you need to have the rotors machined smooth when you replace the pads. I find it’s usually more cost effective to just buy cheap rotors from Rock Auto online.

Lastly, you may want to watch a video on brake bleeding (getting the air out of the brake lines). In theory you might not need to even open the brake lines, but often you need to do so in order to get the caliper pistons to retract far enough for the new brake pads. (I like to bleed the brakes on every pad change just to have fresh fluid in there). I mention this because brake bleeding is usually a 2 person job. There are special tools to work around that, but you need to know in advance if you’re going to need them.

I own a model electric train that was built in 1937. So, 88 years young?

Runs well, it’s kinda weird to think that this was a toy and this level of build quality was normal. To be fair, it wasn’t exactly. This was a high end toy aimed at affluent teens and young adults. It would have been equivalent to buying a new PlayStation. But still, I have trouble imagining any toy you could buy today that would hold up like this.

Capitalism.

Also, if I work hard I will be rewarded.

I have an unhealthy relationship with food. Oddly, the thing that really finally made it click was playing the Sims, and I noticed my Sim would get up & grab a snack from the fridge every single time they were bored.

We never really back up and say ‘did you REALLY get that part, because you’re going to NEED it for the next 14 years?’. I can remember I was sick for multiple weeks when we were learning division. I came back, and we were already onto the next topic, and it was just assumed I knew it. Now, I was super-lucky, in that I understood multiplication well enough to puzzle it out. Not every student cares, especially when they are like 8 years old. Just want to learn it enough to pass and be done with Math. ‘What do you mean I have more Math next year too???’

As soon as you miss a single step in the mathematics education train, well, you’re going to be hating math for the rest of your schooling. It’s a series of incremental building blocks, but we never double check that each student really has each piece.

Perma-banned, and the worst part is I’m not even sure why. I logged in while away on vacation, got hit with the ‘you’re logging in from an usual location, please confirm with an e-mail code’, and when I did that, boom, locked with no option to appeal.

I find some humor in that a robot decided I was a robot. Perhaps that will save me when the great robot uprising occurs?

A replacement PCV valve for my car.

Car was around 100,000 miles, figured it was a good time to do a big refresh & replace a bunch of stuff. Spark plugs, belts & hoses, fuel & air filters, fluids, etc etc… While I was at the parts store, guy suggested I also replace the PCV valve. But, it turned out the only one he had in stock was the store brand. $4, sure whatever. Got it home, took the factory one off the car, and sure enough it was gummed up kinda bad. But went to put the new one on, and it just about collapsed in my hands. It was so flimsy, kinda like a drinking straw. Ended up cleaning the factory one & putting it back on, threw the new one away.

Here are the Lyrics to Dead Kennedy’s “Kinky sex makes the world go round”. 1987. More relevant than ever.

https://www.elyrics.net/read/d/dead-kennedys-lyrics/kinky-sex-makes-the-world-go-_Round-lyrics.html

I was blown away when my die-hard Republican boomer dad said he thinks climate change is real. There’s a pond behind our house, and he can remember how big it used to get in the rainy season and how small it used to get in the dry season. Now, during the rainy season it comes up to the backdoor, and during the dry season it’s not there at all. If he can still trust his own eyes over what the TV tells him to think, maybe there’s still some hope for the world.

Came here to mention mincemeat. Good stuff.

For those of you who have never tried it - it’s mostly dark brown sugar, cinnamon, & raisins. But it has that fatty aftertaste you normally associate with bacon as well.

“The United States is also a one-party state but, with typical American extravagance, they have two of them.”

I attribute the quote wrong all the time, but today the internet says it’s from Julius Nyerere, who was a prime minister in Africa back in the 1960s.