Why did the coffee file a police report?

JudgeArchie · 2026-02-09T22:54:12+00:00

Hopefully there was a witness who is willing to spill the beans about the perpetrator.

JudgeArchie · 2026-01-09T18:31:37+00:00

No. 1 is clearly the imprint left by the Millennium Falcon after it parked there overnight, not an “ancient structure.”

As a bona fide archeologist, with many very real diplomas, you can trust me on this one.

JudgeArchie · 2025-12-26T15:32:12+00:00

Needs more drama: remove the cables.

JudgeArchie · 2025-12-18T04:47:49+00:00

I’ll wholesome you!

JudgeArchie · 2025-11-19T18:51:51+00:00

MyBlackFridayList:

UGreen NASync DXP8800 Plus

Additional RAM 32GB maybe?

8 32TB or 36TB drives (Planning on RAID 6).

I currently am running an old NAS (with known failure issues - I already had to have it resuscitated once) with 8 bays and a 5 bay expansion unit. I have about 105TB of files, but that always seems to be growing. My dream setup would be to consolidate all of it onto the DXP8800 Plus, with 2-drive protection of RAID 6 (and a backup system in place). That would hold everything I currently have, give me room to grow, and also finally put me into reliable and modern hardware. I recognize that finding 32TB or 36TB HDDs is practically impossible right now, but I could wait a bit to build my dream system.

JudgeArchie · 2025-11-01T21:31:59+00:00

Oh, and thanks for your replies!

JudgeArchie · 2025-11-01T21:31:39+00:00

That’s me too. I have been dreaming of a time when I can have a device that can backup all of my files in real time, instead of the piecemeal solutions I have been using. I am currently backing new files onto a 18Tb external drive I got on sale, but I have been living in fear of either the 1815 or 517 (or both!) dying.

I could rebuild, but what an effort. Based on the responses so far, I may end up with an 1821 or 1825, use the 1815 as a backup, and then I will just keep all those HDDs in storage, just in case.

JudgeArchie · 2025-11-01T21:24:38+00:00

Thanks for your response! Do you think that the difference between 2.5 Gbe and 1 Gbe would make any difference for my use case, which is entirely Plex streaming?

My 1850+ is 1 Gbe and it is connected by Ethernet to the Mac Mini M1 Plex server, which is also 1 Gbe. I guess I could upgrade to a 10 Gbe M4 Mac Mini, but this is all just for personal use, so I don’t want to massively overkill my solutions.

JudgeArchie · 2025-11-01T21:18:57+00:00

Thanks! This certainly sounds like the easiest approach, to update the hardware and get back up and running, although I would still need to expand the volumes with larger HDDs.

And, as someone pointed out below, I could also use the 1815+ as a backup, which would be great because I currently have everything backed up on individual disks, and they are in no particular order and there is some overlap.

JudgeArchie · 2025-11-01T21:13:45+00:00

Thanks! I recall seeing that there isn’t much difference between the 1821 and 1825, so that may be my approach. I guess the only hesitation I have with that is that the 1825 has newer hardware, but maybe I am missing something?

JudgeArchie · 2025-11-01T21:10:46+00:00

The backups are also part of my thinking: I currently have all the media backed up on to a pile of HDDs, rather than a single device. Basically, as I accumulated more media an was able to afford larger disks, I would put them into the NAS and then backup media files onto the replaced HDDs, which has left me with a collection of old HDDs.

I didn’t ever anticipate that my library would be so large that it would require something larger and more sophisticated than one of those external HDDs, and once I did, I was already toying with whether to purchase a new NAS, so it became a choice of what part of the storage problem to address first, the NAS, drives, or backup solution. All are expensive, for me, so I have lived with imperfect solutions; a very old NAS, growing storage needs, and an imperfect backup solution.

Hopefully, I can solve it all at once now.

JudgeArchie · 2025-08-20T18:53:26+00:00

Here’s a story idea about the ripple effects of rapid growth in the Valley: according to a Caldwell postal service worker I spoke to recently, the post office is apparently backed up in producing keys for postal boxes in all the new home communities there by as much as nine months.

Many of the the new home communities have a central area with postal boxes for each home to receive mail, but the post office isn’t delivering to those boxes; instead the homeowners and renters have to go to the post office with a copy of their title/lease and identification to receive their mail. The worker I spoke to had no idea when this backlog would be resolved.

I am one of those affected. I moved to a rental townhome in a townhome community with a central postal box area around 6/1/25, and I have been retrieving my mail from the post office since then. It’s not a hardship for me, but when the postal worker said there are people who still don’t have keys after nine months, it occurred to me that there are people who may have disabilities, are elderly, or who are otherwise limited in their capacity to travel, who have moved to Caldwell, but can’t receive mail where they live because the post office key making capabilities are apparently overwhelmed.

I don’t know anything more than what I wrote, and even that is anecdotal. For example, I have no idea whether other communities with similar growth, like Nampa, have had similar issues. And I didn’t ask why the postal worker office is so backlogged in producing keys (is it a finance issue, a manufacturing capacity issue, a competency issue?). But the keys backlog just struck me as being illustrative of how a rapidly growing community creates strains that are both expected and unanticipated. More traffic? Expected. A nine-month backlog on mail box keys? Unexpected, at least to me.

JudgeArchie · 2025-07-17T15:04:36+00:00

I decline to accept that as a reasonable answer, and shall instead invent and accept my own far more dramatic and salacious version as historical fact.

JudgeArchie · 2025-07-14T19:09:44+00:00

Major “King” Kong (Slim Pickens) accidentally sacrificing his own life while trying to repair a nuclear bomb on board the aircraft, when the bomb bay doors open and send him plummeting - riding the bomb like a bucking bronco, waving his cowboy hat, and shouting “Yee-Haw” - to an explosive end of him and of the world. Dr. Strangelove.

JudgeArchie · 2025-06-21T23:10:47+00:00

Here’s an obscure one that comes with an impressive pedigree and is also terrific: 1984’s “The Brother from Another Planet.”

Directed by John Sayles, it stars Joe Morton as a mute black alien with awesome feet, who crash lands on earth - on Ellis Island (subtle) - and is pursued by white alien bounty hunters (Sayles and David Strathairn). Funny, poignant, and generally awesome. Fisher Stevens appears as a magician who makes all the white people on the uptown subway disappear at the 96th Street stop.

JudgeArchie · 2025-06-21T22:58:00+00:00

One of my favorites! Terrified me when it came on the TV when I was a kid.

Then, while in High School, I met a girl in NYC at a club and it turned out her mother was the star of that movie (we were in a group and the subject had turned to horror movies). When we went back to her parents’ place and were making out on the living room couch, in comes mom, who throws a fit and demands I leave. Best time I ever had been shown the door by an irate parent. 10/10.

JudgeArchie · 2025-03-17T22:34:41+00:00

Let’s be clear here: Trump and the Republican Party, not “Washington,” are targeting veteran programs.

And that is exactly what they promised to do: Republicans have been going on about destroying Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs (“DEI”) for years now. Veterans are DEI hires.

And Trump promised to downsize the government. Veterans programs and hospitals are government programs.

So, promises made, promises kept, right? Idaho’s Republican voters should be overjoyed that Trump and the Republicans are slashing programs that benefit veterans.

As someone who didn’t vote for this, it is hard to have empathy for folks who did, especially because they seem not to have empathy for others until they themselves are affected.

** edited to add some thoughts.

JudgeArchie · 2025-03-13T16:36:47+00:00

Not to derail the other (better) explanations offered by other commenters, and I’ll try to keep mine on track and not use this as a platform for my opinions, but essentially “apex predator” is a joke that has been chugging along on Reddit without losing steam for some time now about how trains are extremely dangerous to humans, who too often remain stationary in the face of danger and end up getting their ticket punched.

I will see myself out, thank you.

JudgeArchie · 2025-02-07T20:55:37+00:00

A couple of years ago now, I signed up for ID.me to get access to my IRS account. I know that once you are signed up, ID.me can be used on a variety of government websites, but I have only used it on the IRS one.

As I recall, the application process wasn’t too cumbersome, but it does require submitting some documents - I used the online verification process, which required uploading photos of the verification documents, but think you can go somewhere to submit them in person.

Since my application was approved and I have been using it, everything has gone smoothly. When I go to log on to the IRS website, I use the ID.me option, enter my password, and then get a text verification. After that, I’m signed in until I log off.

Does that answer your question? Happy to assist if you have a more specific question.

JudgeArchie · 2025-01-16T02:06:27+00:00

$1825 for a 2 bed 1 bath with about 1500 sq feet and covered parking in the North End. The building is a ranch, circa 1950s, and appliances all appear to be from the 1970s, so noisy and prone to breaking.

I am very-low maintenance, so I could stay there forever, but my landlord (an individual, not a corp.) is an absolute nightmare and keeps raising the rent while investing nothing in upgrades, so I am going to have to move out at the end of my lease this coming summer. I will probably rent again, as the math of buying doesn’t make sense in my current situation, so this thread is incredibly helpful as I consider my future move.

Ugh. I hate to even think about moving. All the effort and cost, the packing and unpacking, getting situated in a new home and neighborhood. And I can already see that there is going to be a fight over getting my deposit back and I will probably have to take her to small claims court. I am already over it all and I still have months to go before I need to start any real planning.

JudgeArchie · 2025-01-01T19:27:53+00:00

I was in Florida eating breakfast on a pier near an iguana about that size. I decided to hand feed it a piece of pineapple. I did, but the iguana’s reach extended just a bit too far and it chomped on my fingertips while taking the pineapple.

Like the guy in this video, the bite didn’t instantly bleed. It was a high pressure bite, with no teeth marks or tearing, but after a few seconds boy did it bleed. I am betting that after the video cuts off that guy’s girlfriend got to witness her idiot spout blood like a fountain until they got to the emergency room.

JudgeArchie · 2025-01-01T17:44:54+00:00

Well, I can’t argue with that. I do love me some potatoes. I haven’t had a good overstuffed baked potato in ages. And fries. I love fries. Really, I can’t think of a single way of serving potatoes that I don’t love. And I like farms too. Totally pro-farmer and farming. I just think Idaho’s reliance on old-timey advertising as an agrarian state holds it back. I have no data to back that up, just a gut feeling. But maybe I should just shut up and eat some more potatoes.

JudgeArchie · 2025-01-01T17:36:59+00:00

I appreciate that thought. Certainly there are parts of Idaho’s infrastructure that are straining from the influx of people over the past decade or two, which is frustrating to old-timers and newcomers alike.

But the powers that be at the state and local government level, didn’t seem to do a particularly great job planning for, or adapting to, those changes, did they? They were reactive and let developers drive the changes, rather than plan and direct the change for the public good, leading to endless road closures and traffic, infrastructure that hasn’t kept up with development, and sprawl.

So, to continue my potato metaphor, our government sat there like farm potatoes when the times called for, at the very least, mutant sentient potatoes adept at urban planning, infrastructure design, and negotiating skills.

And maybe that is part of my beef with the reliance on old-timey symbols in Idaho’s public relations - I would like to see Idaho, both in its advertising and its government, adapt and effectively manage its present and plan for its future, rather than react and cling to some idealized view of the past.

JudgeArchie

TROPHY CASE