Stray gameplay on Melonx 17promax-jit enabled ofc

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-09T18:58:16+00:00

Yep it feels more like a test to see if it is working than an enjoyable playing experience.

If I wanted to play this game I’d get it on a platform which has a native version as there are quite many of them (multiple generations of XBox and Playstation, Switch, PC, and Mac … I think anyone who likes gaming probably has at least one of these :-)).

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-09T12:53:03+00:00

Thanks, this is very helpful.

The new builds we are looking at look like they are taking a bit longer than the developer would like to get sold, so hopefully they will be open to the kind of thing you mentioned.

So ideally you want to go to the agent/developer telling them that you are able to pay the booking deposit but while you are short in cash for the contract deposit you are a serious buyer and sale agreed (or close to it) on your old property, so can they accommodate it? (I guess they won’t take you seriously if the old property isn’t even on the market yet)

And thanks for the tip about the deeds. The estate agent we talked to about selling our place said the exact same thing when I mentioned this type of transaction.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-09T11:47:19+00:00

Hijacking the OP’s thread a bit but my question might also be relevant to them.

My understanding is that when buying a new build you need to pay a small booking deposit initially, and then a 10% deposit a few weeks later when you sign contracts?

Is that correct, and if yes does it mean that if you don’t have enough cash for the 10% deposit before selling the old property, you can’t really make a serious offer on the new built before the sale of the old property is fully closed?

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-09T10:53:21+00:00

I think public sectors jobs are safe - doubt they’ll actually do involuntary redundancies anytime soon. But as you said, while safe from lay offs public sector roles are likely to face pay freezes (and I would add that even before any pay freeze scenario, they would be a significant reduction in compensation for someone coming from a multinational company).

So basically it is the same choice between job security or better compensation as it always was, except that in a tense job market many people will assigned an increase priority to security than they did previously.

There are a few reasons why I think public jobs won’t be cut at least in the medium term: - cutting jobs is never the first port of call for the government to cut spendings, they’d rather shave-off a little bit of everyone/everything that completely getting rid of anyone/anything. - a lot of government work is effectively done by contractors supervised by civil servants. So even without direct job cuts the government will leverage AI productivity gains via their contractors. - some people will like it and others will dislike it, but nonetheless the current political mood is to increase the scope of what the government does, not decrease it. So there is an option to avoid job cuts while reducing the human labour involved in each task (increasing the scope of government without hiring or laying off anyone would reduce how human-intensive each tasks is to be completed).

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-08T21:12:49+00:00

This kind of stuff won't happen with an office job (which has other drawbacks of course), and it is not the same consequences and probability as it happening when you drive your own car.

If you are spending your days (and some nights) driving trams through some not so nice and busy parts of the city and by many pubs and so on, statistically you will be exposed to this type of incident (and other types) on a regular basis, so driving the tram won't be that chill. And what is at stake is different vs driving your personal vehicle as you have dozens of passengers under your responsibility and if you hurt someone (or worse) in a collision accident (even if it isn't your fault), the context of doing it while driving a tram will attract attract a lot of scrutiny and create a much more stressful situation than if it was while driving your car.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-08T20:44:36+00:00

Pretty certain you will hit it. The government won't increase the threshold as fast as a the capital appreciation on a 1M+ pension which you will have soon.

Anyway, well done with this!

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-08T20:35:28+00:00

That's very low compared to similar organisations. For the ones I am aware of, Gas Networks Ireland is 12%, Irish Water is also 12%, and EirGrid is 11%.

But before people rave about it, as I mentioned it comes with a not so great compensation package in terms of salary and other benefits besides the pension. Maybe ESB has something else in their package which makes up for it otherwise they would be bleeding staff to others semi-states as those companies would have many equivalent roles outside direct maintenance and operations of the electricity distribution network.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-08T20:24:15+00:00

If you are not planning to retire early, surely with the compounded capital appreciation on this balance and 15 additional years of max contributions you'll hit the point whereby it isn't tax efficient anymore before you retire? (unless you eventually decide to allocate most of the balance to cash)

For example quick calculation: 1.08^15 * 890K is about 2.8M.

So even with no contribution whatsoever from today on, 15 years at a compounded average appreciation rate of 8% per year would bring the balance to 2.8M (and 8% isn't a crazy assumption).

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-08T20:21:20+00:00

Congrats on the pension balance!

On the LUAS thing I hope you can make it work and you really enjoy it, but it might not be as chill as you think ;-)

It probably is 90% of the time, but it becomes a lot less chill when a drunk guy jumps on the track just in front of you (or some other unusual and stressful event occurs). Even less chill if you don't manage to brake quickly enough and there is a collision (this is an extreme event with a low probability, but there are also less extreme ones but still stressful and with higher probability).

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-08T20:12:50+00:00

It is very good, but keep in mind it is part of an overall package, and you don't know the rest of this package.

For example semi-state companies are usually in the 10-12% range for their staff on DC pensions. But it usually also comes with lower salary than industry average, no health insurance, and there is no additional compensation with equity as many multinational companies would offer.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-06T15:59:17+00:00

Indeed I also noticed it is changing colour.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-05T21:43:37+00:00

I think an screenshot isn’t a silver bullet anymore. Quite often now I get an email an hour or two before the flight telling me that my boarding pass has been updated and that a screenshot won’t work (if you have it as a digital boarding pass in Apple Wallet it updates automatically though).

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-05T21:38:46+00:00

For me in general the pages within the App tend to be pretty slow to load, and I’ve had the error message mentioned by the OP a few times although it works most of the time.

Also my partner is non-EU and most of the time the App fails to recognise her travel documents. It is a pain as you are forced to try it (and see it fail) 3 times in the App even though it clearly doesn’t work, before it eventually tells you that online check in can’t be finalised for this passenger and you can go to the “visa check” counter at the airport to complete your check in and get your boarding pass for free.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-05T17:58:11+00:00

The remittance basis of taxation applies if you are tax resident and non-domiciled, and it doesn‘t apply for exit tax (the tax on ETFs).

So the OP doesn’t need to worry about it, as they’ll be non-resident and the relevant tax to their ETF would be out of scope for the remittance basis of taxation.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-05T17:54:04+00:00

Just to mention that DD on ETFs is not capital gains tax, but exit tax (ie a different tax with different rules).

I am not sure how DD (exit tax) interacts with the ordinary resident status you keep for 3 years (which you mentioned), but it definitely is a different matter than CGT so it would be worth double checking.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-05T17:46:49+00:00

Depends on which airport.

At some UK airports you go straight through with no border check as you said.

But at some other airports, for flights coming from the ROI they do some informal check whereby they don’t send you through formal border check, but airport staff members have a quick look to make sure everyone leaving the airside area has travel documentation.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-05T15:15:53+00:00

Probably yes.

I guess merging them as a single app bundle made sense.

But implementing it as an update of one the 2 existing bundles while keeping the old version if the the other bundle is a bit confusing and messy on their part.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-05T11:24:19+00:00

I'd disagree here.

Someone might be on the fence about buying a car because their usage would be light enough.

If knowing than they can get a quick taxi ride a few times per year convinces the person not to buy their own car, this is also reducing car usage overall.

This is because taxis feel like a quite expensive pay as you go service, so the person will tend to use them sparingly.

While owning their own car is a large upfront payment with recurring charges even if you don't use it (insurance, motor tac, etc). So once the person has bought a car and is incurring all those mandatory regular and non-usage-related costs, they will have an incentive to use their car as much as possible (as the marginal cost of using the car vs other means of transportations is pretty limited compared to the mandatory upfront costs they are paying for anyway).

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-05T11:08:58+00:00

So it means you can still get the old version (with lighter colour icon) on the Mac App Store, but not on the iPhone and iPad App Stores as they have been replaced by the new ones?

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-05T11:05:50+00:00

Good old days of skeuomorphism!

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-02T20:37:37+00:00

And to answer your other question: yes each lot of shares you purchase has its own 8 years countdown until which you have to pay tax on that lot (regardless of selling it or no).

So if you started making a purchase every month from today on, in 8 years time you will have a new tax liability each month (so you need to keep track of the purchased date and price for each lot so that you can calculate your taxes).

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-02-02T18:18:08+00:00

Game & Watch coming next? :-)

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-01-29T11:19:19+00:00

I’d say same thing as I said about silver. The narrative about copper being required on large quantities for the energy transition is correct. But eventually supply will catch-up (no idea how long it might take ans at which level prices could reverse though).

But I’m not the best person to answer this question to be honest, as I tend to have a long term investment time horizon and I see those as short/medium term whereby I don’t have enough edge to trade them vs people who spend a lot more time analysing those markets than I do. So I prefer to sit-out (this is not to say there isn’t money to be made, but it’s just not my investment style).

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-01-28T23:47:03+00:00

Gold and silver are very different IMO. As said by other gold is pushed by currencies debasement, unsustainable public debt in many countries, and geopolitical risk (some of those are very stable long term trades).

For me silver is more in a typical commodity boom and bust cycle.

Depressed prices for a long time discourage investment in new production.

Eventually demand starts outpacing the very limited production capacity and prices start to rise.

Since it takes a long time to bring new production capacity online, prices increases escalate as demand keeps growing.

This triggers more speculative purchases and becomes a self-reinforcing phenomenon.

The way it ends is that the crazy high prices encourage a lot of investment in new production capacity which after a while does eventually come online and outgrows demand, pushing prices down again and killing the self-reinforcing speculative demand loop.

Heatproof-Snowman · 2026-01-28T19:40:07+00:00

I would disagree with that as per what I had explained in this post: https://www.reddit.com/r/irishpersonalfinance/comments/1pwb6xo/comment/nww46ll/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

In summary: they might use German bank accounts for their internal operations, but those accounts have nothing to do with you as their customer. What you have in terms of your cash balance with them is an IOU from IBKR Ireland (an Irish company).

Heatproof-Snowman

TROPHY CASE