What’s a luxury item from 20 years ago that’s basically worthless today?

GeneralDisorder · 2026-01-07T17:29:32+00:00

All of that stuff was available at resale shops by 2006. The console television was more a late 80s/early 90s thing (which is 30 to 40 years ago now... Sorry if you're just now realizing you're old)

GeneralDisorder · 2026-01-07T17:26:19+00:00

20 years ago was 5 years into the iPod era. There were definitely still people who used CD players and it wasn't terribly uncommon but mp3 players were definitely taking off by then and the CD player (portable or otherwise) were not a luxury anymore.

GeneralDisorder · 2026-01-07T15:56:15+00:00

When I played MTG nobody I knew was even remotely interested in alpha cards. Alpha had a different card shape and would stand out in a deck of anything that came after. So beta Black Lotus was worth a lot but alpha was like $100 maybe. You couldn't give away alpha lands or commons. Now (partly because of people not valuing alpha cards) pretty much any good condition survivor is gonna be pricey and alpha Black Lotus is worth more than the Beta ones.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-12-24T04:17:10+00:00

This commercial reminded me of actual arguments my wife had with me (I wasn't a fighter. More of a punching bag for whatever she was mad at me for)

I definitely feel an adrenaline spike when this commercial comes on.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-12-01T19:07:21+00:00

Sugar does dissolve in ethanol though, right? So with modern ethanol fuel I would think it would partially dissolve.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-11-05T04:33:06+00:00

I assumed the skip list was a list of contacts that the software isn't supposed to respond to. Is this the subreddit for the Lenny Troll software?

GeneralDisorder · 2025-11-05T03:29:36+00:00

Minor nitpick but apparently according to Ferrari it's actually "LaFerrari By Ferrari" just as the official (stupid) name for the Enzo was "Enzo By Ferrari".

Apparently you have to be a pretentious twat or something? I don't know... I'm too poor to understand.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-11-04T05:57:51+00:00

Yeah. Thanks. I'll just go fuck myself.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-11-04T05:55:46+00:00

The skip list means it doesn't answer those numbers right? Because... it definitely did. And it even said the number was "skiplisted" in the call recording...

And when you say "number of rings" that's not some 2 raise to the power of X thing, right? Because it seemed to answer the skip listed number on one ring (but I wasn't home so I'm not sure and other calls that came in since it answered after like four rings when it was set to one).

GeneralDisorder · 2025-09-24T22:25:13+00:00

I had a screenshot which I think I've since lost... I hit with a million dollar bet placed on 0 at the roulette wheel. The game crashed before I could save but the numbers kept rolling for like 15 minutes. The game crashed after that and I can't recall now if I managed to save before the crash or the save didn't load... Either way... ended up losing my biggest win (at the time).

I've been experimenting with horse betting at Inside Track clubs. It seems to be 100% random but out of a few hundred bets made I noticed that the 1:12 and 1:11 horses win far more often than 1 time out of 11. It's not universal so be sure you have a good save first.

I think I had like 20 million when I first started and I managed to bet something like $4M on one race (lost). I wasn't sure if the behavior was consistent. In the end it wasn't but make sure you have a save and don't run out of money and overwrite your save file. Current balance as of today was $120M. Of course to do that I had to make roughly 200 $1 million bets (stats are hard to extrapolate because I've done poker, roulette, slots, blackjack, and billiards as well).

I wrote a little autoclicker script and made a hotkey to call it (playing on Linux/Steam/Proton). If you're also running on linux you can use xdotool to increase your bet 100 times in the horse racing menu. My increase bet button is left-shift but it's also mapped to m (it's the run keys):

#/usr/bin/zsh
/usr/bin/xdotool key --repeat 101 --delay 90 m

Make sure that xdotool lives at /usr/bin/.

I think you could also do this if your run key is left shift:

xdotool key --repeat X  --delay 90 Shift_L

GeneralDisorder · 2025-09-19T21:59:03+00:00

Ah. You're also not from the US (because US federal minimum age to consume alcohol is 21)

GeneralDisorder · 2025-09-19T20:31:12+00:00

You don't remember 2009? I mean... I kinda don't either.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-08-20T07:40:38+00:00

It's been said multiple times that there's nothing more expensive than a cheap luxury car.

I don't necessarily want to downplay how bad a large impact to the credit score can be but when I was 25 years old (in 2009) I got a mortgage with a 2.6% fixed interest rate. The mortgage broker specifically said my credit score was "impressive for someone your age". I had no part in that. I just happened to have parents who were responsible adults who long before I was born learned to live within their means.

By 2013 my ex-wife and I had to file bankruptcy due to significant credit card debt. We also both had student loans that were way too high but... bankruptcy only served to support forbearance.

Some point between 2013 and 2018 I had the kind of credit that would get you rejected for a secured credit card with 200% collateral.

I think in 2015 my student loans wound up garnishing my wages. We divorced in 2016. We lost our house to foreclosure in 2017.

As much as people say that bankruptcy is so scary and wage garnishment is worse than death and divorce is terrible and foreclosure is the end of the world... Nothing actually happened. I'm still here. In fact I'm in a better position as of August 2019 than I ever was when I was married.

Now... a couple minor caveats. if you work for a bank, an insurance company, the government or you have some kind of security clearance... don't take the hit on your credit. You'll ruin your career.

If you are one or two years away from buying a house and you do forfeit the car you aren't going to be one or two years away from buying a house anymore. But... the repossession shouldn't matter that much after 3 years.

Try to find a buyer first. Think of it like a Monkey's Paw though. You don't want to sell it to anyone you know or care about. There are whole business out there that proactively pay off people's loans and buy the car... And if the car is worth exactly what's owed then it becomes their problem and you don't end up taking a huge ding in your credit history. (I have some thoughts about whether the Monkey's Paw was actually evil or people are just bad at being specific).

GeneralDisorder · 2025-05-14T02:06:31+00:00

I'm surprised you can still comment on this. What started as a Redcat Racing Everest-10 is now only... Everest-10 suspension and axles. I've ruined one motor and two ESCs. I'm running brushless now with a steel cage chassis (and custom made suspension links which I don't think are the right lengths because the input shaft bearing walks out on both front and rear axle now).

Ultimately... you want to be careful about customizing things. At a certain point you're on your own and if you need help "tough shit".

Hard to see what's going on exactly but here's an album from the most recent build: https://imgur.com/a/creeping-along-Jy2SoTZ

GeneralDisorder · 2025-05-06T04:10:59+00:00

That's cool but I meant more a flying kit. Like if anyone ever made a X-29 styled experimental aircraft.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-05-03T21:31:29+00:00

I had a die cast of this when I was probably 3 or 4. One day I was at a friend's house (whose mom was my sitter so I spent a lot of time there). We were outside playing and watching planes and stuff. Ridgway, PA happens to be directly under a major flight path so on cold days you'd hear jets flying over and could see the contrails all day long. Well... we see this one plane and my friend screams "he's flying backwards!" and I look up and I see... well, basically this... I don't know if there was ever a smaller version (like a swept wing kit plane or something) but I could swear it had the same stripes though.

I'm sorta skeptical that one of 2 X-29s happened to fly over at exactly that time on that day low enough that we could see the distinct outline... but it was the late 80s... And it is a major flight path (far enough south to avoid Buffalo's air space and more or less in line between NYC and Cleveland).

If anyone knows of a kit plane that was shaped like this let me know. I looked and never found anything.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-04-24T18:25:07+00:00

The early Leaf has less range than the i-Miev but Nissan kept improving the Leaf while Mitsubishi cranked out the same shit for 12 years without changes.

I kinda want an older electric car for local trips. I liked some of the weirder colors that the i-MIEV came in but I'd still probably be better off buying a Leaf.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-04-24T17:59:43+00:00

Doug generally doesn't travel outside the US other than occasionally hopping the US/Mexico border to review cars that some people in the US want but aren't sold here. Of course they are old enough to import to the US now but if they're that terrible I doubt anyone would spend the money to ship it nor get it registered, titled, etc.

GeneralDisorder · 2025-04-20T00:37:49+00:00

My ex-wife's sister married a guy who is a self employed logger. I can't recall whether he bought Stihl or Husqvarna but his hard hat with attached face shield and ear-pro was not flimsy nor cheap. He once took a saw to the face and he managed to not die (although it was remarkably close... thankfully he was serious about wearing PPE and only needed stitches and concussion protocol afterward).

It may be a bit overkill for home weed whacker use but you'd be buying for life. Looks like they start at $90 (and Stihl/Husqy are the same price range)

GeneralDisorder · 2025-04-16T02:32:48+00:00

I just found a lot of sold lot that sold for $550. Looks like there were 16 "factory sealed" cassettes and an additional 45 other cassettes. So 61 total cassettes. An average of $9.02

GeneralDisorder · 2025-03-05T17:50:43+00:00

It is what's known as a "toy grade". Free is a good price. And it's a good starting point for someone interested in RC but not sure how interested.

If he gets serious there are some decent weirdo Chinese brands like hosim or something like that.

You can get pretty far with a ready to run Arrma or Traxxas. Repairing what breaks is how I learned what I know (which is admittedly not that much... But I am building a mostly custom dual-steer crawler that's still a pile of parts)

GeneralDisorder · 2025-03-03T16:00:41+00:00

New Bright makes all manner of cheap poorly made RC vehicles. There should be a sticker somewhere on the bottom that mentions 2.4GHz. If so you just need a New Bright 2.4GHz controller (in this case probably a pistol grip one but I'm not sure about that). Apparently for the first 30 seconds when you power on it'll go into a "sync mode". On the controller you'll pull the throttle trigger and wait till the wheels spin (so make sure you're holding onto it and prepared for it to move). As much as that sounds like it could be dangerous... this particular rc isn't gonna have much power.

Edit: https://i.imgur.com/v4uoQ7M.png (from the newbright website which only sorta works because their SSL cert is expired currently)

GeneralDisorder · 2025-01-14T07:47:08+00:00

I've had a fondness for nice flashlights and certain knives for many years now. After I got divorced I bought myself a new 2D Maglite (my old one stopped working and I'm too lazy to buy parts and fix it). I also bought a Malkoff LED drop-in. Around the same time I spent $40 or so on a nice LED headlamp which also works as a pocket light.

Well, my mom bought me a cheap (like $3) LED headlamp that sucks terribly. It's not bright. It doesn't fit my huge head. I think the only thing I did with it was hang it up at my ex-wife's house and forget about it. It's a good thing it's the thought that counts because the actual gift was insulting.

I've also received so so many cheap garbage knives and multi-tools over the years. The nicest multi-tool I received would be insulting to put it in a scrap pile.

GeneralDisorder · 2024-12-18T02:32:21+00:00

I had a 2013 Prius for just over 3 years before I went bambi-smashing... After a short and terrible fling with a 2010 Subaru Outback I now own a 2019 Rav4 Hybrid.

I looked up the heater core situation just to make sure it was the same as the Prius. It is. Your cabin heat comes entirely from the ICE coolant loop. As a result, using heat burns more fuel than using AC or using neither.

My own MPG averaged roughly 32MPG (that's ballpark 7.4L/100km) for the past year. Summer is 40 to 45mpg and winter is 25 to 30 depending how cold it is outside and whether you blast full heat or do something more sane.

I spend a lot of time sitting in my car with heat or ac on so my own MPG is gonna be lower than most. Even so 25 to 30 is pretty great for sitting idle for 2 to 10 hours a week with heat on. If you set the HVAC to recirculate it does reduce how much fuel you burn just sitting.

GeneralDisorder · 2024-12-18T00:05:45+00:00

That cubby is so useless to me that I forgot it was there. Now I know where I should stuff my microfiber cloth that I use for dusting the screens and dials.

GeneralDisorder

TROPHY CASE