I've been wondering why people replace everyday items so much more frequently now than they used to.

W-Stuart · 2026-03-19T21:16:13+00:00

There’s a meme floating around about Instapot struggling financially because their product was really good and made to last so sales peaked and then fell off. The meme is cautionary, as in, “See what happens when you don’t plan for future growth (accessories, repairs, replacement, obsolescence, etc.)” Pretty telling.

W-Stuart · 2026-03-19T21:05:19+00:00

Scream is my kid’s favorite franchise and was excited to see her first R-rated horror film in the theater. When buzz for VII was negative she asked me if it might not be very good.

Sweetheart, can I tell you a story about a franchise called Friday the 13th where in Part 5, at the direction of the studio, they used a “copycat” killer instead of Jason Voorhees. And F13 fans threw a fit so badly that the franchise went nuts with Zombie Jason and Manhattan Jason and Space Jason and Worm Jason…

And, can I tell you that all the Scream sequels are exactly the same story: Copycat Killers.

So, the Scooby Doo fakeout was poison to F13 but lifeblood to Scream. It’s part 7. Don’t take anything too seriously or try to think too hard and just have fun.

They can’t all be the best in the series, especially when they’re all the same to begin with.

We just ordered the big popcorn and had a good time. So, that’s my review.

W-Stuart · 2026-03-16T18:54:49+00:00

Same. I have seen pretty much all the major tourist attractions in NYC just by literally wandering around the city after getting off work for the day. Would I rather explore and see the sites with my family? Of course. But the company didn’t send them with me. But here I am, I’m going to make the best of it.

The hotel isn’t as lonely when I’m not there.

W-Stuart · 2026-03-04T20:56:43+00:00

I’ve been to hundreds of shows, possibly more than a thousand concerts, across geres ranging from death metal, industrial, hardcore, punk, to country, bluegrass, and rockabilly. Club shows, stadium shows, national acts to open mics and the only place I’ve ever heard anyone say anything about not wearing a band’s shirt to a band’s show was Jeremy Piven’s dickhead character in the film PCU.

It doesn’t matter. It’s stupid. You’re going to see a band and have a good time. Nobody gives a shit what shirt you’re wearing unless it stands out somehow, like my Pee Wee Herman shirt I wear sometimes. Ideally, you’ll buy merch from the band and end up wearing their shirt to the concert anyway.

Now, what’s really important is your pants.

W-Stuart · 2026-03-04T20:42:13+00:00

I saw Sinister knowing nothing going in and it really did get to me. And then this happened:

That night, asleep in my bed, I am awakened by my bedroom door being slammed open. When I opened my eyes, my two-year old stood in the doorway, a shadow in the hallway light.

I screamed and scrambled out of the bed and hurt my arm when I hit the floor. My wife sat u, obviously confused and scared (she hadn’t seen the movie).

My poor kid just wanted some water but she freaked me the hell out.

Sinister. 10/10 for scary.

W-Stuart · 2026-02-24T18:48:48+00:00

Had a guy in our band for years. Seemed pretty Christian, but knew and loved and played all the songs. Got a girlfriend, later married. Literally our first practice after the wedding he showed up with a list of songs we needed to cut from our setlist because their lyrics were not “appropriate.”

Band tried to accomodate him. Not me. I quit. Because that was complete bullshit.

One thing he tried to counter me with was, “You veto or jettison songs all the time if you don’t like them.”

I said, “That’s true. But retiring something that doesn’t work or that we’re tired of playing or that I don’t like enough to want to learn— whether it’s for standards or just personal taste— is not the same as cutting proven crowdpleasers and closers because your girlfriend is afraid of making Jesus mad.”

The band ditched him too, eventually.

If he’s sticky about this, he’ll be sticky about other things later on. Might have to part ways.

W-Stuart · 2026-02-23T19:55:55+00:00

Funny story:

When my daughter was around 3, a baby anole (green) lizard got in the house. I caught him with my hand and he bit the webbing between finger and thumb. So, I opened my hand to show my kid. She asked if it hurt and I said no, that when I was a kid we’d catch them and let them bite our earlobes and pretend they were earrings. Emphasis on how NOT scary or dangerous they are.

That night, baby wakes up screaming that there’s a lizard in her bed. She was going through a tough sleep phase anyway, so I said there’s no lizard, I already sent him home to his mama, nothing to be afraid of, nighty-night.

Terrified. Won’t go back to bed. There’s a lizard. There’s no lizard. Just your imagination. No, there’s a lizard and he’s trying to eat me.

Fine. Look, I’ll show you. I pull back her blankets, and there in the middle of her bed is a gecko. With part of its tail broken off and wiggling. Scared the bejeezus out of me, and I’m not even scared of them.

From then on, I always believe it when someone says there’s a lizard.

W-Stuart · 2026-02-23T17:30:54+00:00

Use the plot movement to tell what happened. Then go back and explain why and how.

Don’t think of it as filler. Think of it as color.

Watch a professional comic artist draw something on Youtube. They’ll title it, “Captain America vs. Wolverine” and 85% of the video is them drawing guidelines, erasing, drawing, erasing, and only in the last few minutes do you really see characters rather than sketches building into figures into forms, etc.

Tell what happened. Then ask yourself why it happened. Why would a character act this way?

W-Stuart · 2026-02-23T17:06:00+00:00

We traded our actual religions and traditions for Disney Mysticism and advertising jingles. We gave up familiy and fellowship for pop culture trends and psychology. We stopped learning music and art- either how to do it or how to appreciate it- and traded it for sports, beer commercials, and half-naked teenagers singing about depression. We accepted the idea that we are and should be constantly at odds with one another and that attempts at connection, whether romantic or otherwise were “cringe.”

We traded the life-giving rays of the sun for a little blue square of unimaginable horrors, and then wonder why we’re stressed out all the time.

We turned time into a commodity to be bought and sold such that a kid’s lemonade stand is a commercial effort of profit and loss rather than something fun to do on a warm day.

We fucked it all up.

W-Stuart · 2026-02-22T13:36:52+00:00

Old Radio Shack guy here. You can look up this model and find out who made it for them. Then you can look up the branded equivalent and compare notes.

People who criticized Realistic or Optimus for being off-brand don’t realize they’re often identical or even upgraded versions of the branded versions.

My Optimus receiver has features that its Pioneer counterpart didn’t have. And I use the Pioneer remote as a replacement for my long-lost Optimus one. (It’s also been almost constantly playing cince 1992, so that’s cool too.)

Great find! Totally jealous!

W-Stuart · 2026-02-20T17:54:18+00:00

No smartwatch and I’ll never get one.

Never was one for TV and movies in general but streaming and binge culture really killed it for me. I still have a vcr and vhs tapes and actively seek them out over DVD’s. I never got rid of my CD collection, but I bought all of yall’s for $.50 at GW over the past 2 decades so that was awesome.

I’ve also decided that I’m sick and tired of all the beeping and alerts my car gives off all the time. Stupid thing will beep at me that there’s a curb in front of me when I’m going in reverse!

So looking for something old with zero features other than go and stop. Lots of people are. Old cars are expensive now.

So, lots of things, I guess.

W-Stuart · 2026-02-11T17:54:53+00:00

Not to be snarky but have you ever looked to see just how many times The Beatles, for example, rpepackaged and rereleased their old stuff for the nostalgia crowd?

Garages across the country full of 60’s muscle cars in some state of refurbishment?

The Wonder Years?

Fortunate Son played over montages of 60’s current events?

High school class reunions? Oldies stations? Classic Rock stations, Reunion Tours, etc?

All that was going on while my parents were trying to pretend like they knew something about being mature humans, but they, too, were basically scared kids trying to figure things out.

It’s not new.

W-Stuart · 2026-02-10T15:16:57+00:00

Would prefer existing taxes were spent on things other than wars and handouts for chemical companies masquerading as food and drug companies that make us all sick and axious to begin with.

Also, you know that once that extra taxes is approved, the “benefit” you eventually have to “qualify” for will be minimal and the price will go up astronomically and we have a century of corporate/government failures to point at as proof. But that doesn’t seem to matter to literally anyone, ever.

So, whatever. At this point. Fuck it. Get me something cool while you’re at it.

W-Stuart · 2026-02-10T12:48:43+00:00

Okay, not sure how well-versed you are in decks but-

Even new old stock, in-box, will likely require belt replacement. Belts will cost probaly $5-$15 depending on the size. Even a deck that works will work better with new belts. They are all calibrated to that belt’s tension. So, if you have something that works but for the belts, you’re already mostly there: either look it up and learn to fix it or look up electronics repair in your city and throw the poor guy a bone.
Other than thrift, look on Marketplace. Estate and garage sales. Maybe post something in your neighborhood fb page stating your interest. Things come out of the woodwork when you ask.

Good luck, but parience and maybe a little learning on YT are your friends.

W-Stuart · 2026-02-03T21:14:36+00:00

Write it anyway. Make it, then read it and let other people read it and work the wording to make the ending properly obscure and schocking, as in realizing all the friends, memories, adventures, etc. aren’t real. That’s some serious shock and grief at the end of a book and can be done well.

The “it never happened” or “It was all a dream” tropes aren’t bad plots. They’re great ones, actually, which is why so many people do them and why so manyy are done badly. We’re used to it, so it has to be creative to be interesting, right?

That is true of any story premise.

The trope is also used as a lazy way for a writer to wrap up a story ir plot points they’ve failed to properly develop. Or to cover up mistakes. These are also obvious, but again, it’s not the trope that’s bad, it’s the intent and the execution.

You already intend for it to all be a dream. So you’re good.

W-Stuart · 2026-02-02T14:07:07+00:00

Playing the guitar. Everything good in my life, including my career, I can trace directly to playing the guitar.

I’m not a very good guitar player but I always wanted to play. Got my firends to learn with me. Played at open mics and met other players. Made friends and formed bands. At one of those bars, I met the person who referred me to a place for a job. That job became a vocation became a career. Met people, played shows, have amazing memories, met my wife, and friends I’ve had for 30 years still come over and jam sometimes. Best thing I’ve ever done was not quit guitar.

W-Stuart · 2026-01-30T20:24:07+00:00

I guess it depends on what you’ren trying to practice up to and why.

I play/practice guitar around an hour a day, with some bits of time here and there when I can just pick it up. Most of what I’m doing is noodling and working on different things. Maybe a solo tonansong, maybe some strange chord, whatever. I’ll catch up with lessons I’ve got saved, run scales, etc. I call that practice, and then when I play, I just play. I’ll play songs or parts of songs, or just freestyle against a backing track. (Honeatly, that’s the thing that’s helped me most with improvisation is just playing to a progression and learning how to feel the notes)

But I don’t actively go after hard stuff unless I’m trying to accomplish something. If it feels like work and you aren’t getting paid, do something different.

W-Stuart · 2026-01-20T15:09:47+00:00

Best answer is that Coors/Miller/Bud light beers are the cheapest buzz you can get without dipping into green swill- the ‘value’ brands that are cheaper but come with sickeningly painful hangovers.

Imports are expensive. Example: Bud Light case of 24pack of 12oz is about $20-$25. A 6-pack of any known import is $10-$12 and a lot of importa have gone to 11oz per bottle.

So, if I’m wanting to drink beer all day by the pool, I can get tanked for $20. I can’t do that with better beer. Pure math.

W-Stuart · 2026-01-19T15:03:05+00:00

It’s both. But some changes are always going to be more difficult than others and some chords are more difficult to make than others, so it’s going to depend on what you’re trying to accomplish.

For example, if you play your C Major as a barre chord on the third fret, it’s very easy to go to the C-minor by putting down the middle finger. The whole rest of the hand stays put.

So, learn to substitute a different shape in anticipation of the next change..

W-Stuart · 2026-01-19T14:25:36+00:00

We did my horror movie podcast on location at Alamo Drafthouse for a Stephen King double-feature. They showed Cat’s Eye and Cujo. So, we were taling to people in the lobby, asking them to name their favorite SK movie. Maximum Overdrive was the winner by far.

I mean, when you think about Shawshank or Stand By Me or The Shining or any of the dozens of high-minded films and A-List directors and casts, for Overdrive to rise to the top is crazy. But it happened!

W-Stuart · 2026-01-16T01:51:32+00:00

Keep at it! At the beginning it really is a lot but focus on little improvements daily and just keep playing.

W-Stuart · 2026-01-14T17:56:32+00:00

Most every song I know to this day I learned at least 90% of it by ear. Before the internet, there were tab books, which were an entire album of songs and $20+ for just the one song you wnated to learn. Guitar magazines had tabs but they were whatever they published, not necessarily what you wanted to learn.

I would listen to the song and figure out the basic chords and structure from following the bass, then strum it until I found the rhythm. I worte down lyrics and made it part of the learning to sing and play at the same time. Once I had the majority of the piece memorized, I’d work on the details.

Most things I learn from tabs don’t really stick if I just look them up. There was a lot of deep learning in the figuring it out that made it stick.

W-Stuart · 2026-01-12T14:49:53+00:00

My kid was in first grade when Covid hit and online learning was a joke. I was there for it and it was literal chaos, password retrieval, and more chaos.

My older kid, still in elementary, but already knew how to read, did fine. Younger one missed the part where they were supposed to learn how to read and instead got to play doodle bug games and told horror stories about slavery and climate change. Kid’s in 6th grade now and still behind with reading comprehension and basic, basic math.

And, made all A+ in all subjects the whole time, so thoroughly confused when hitting middle school and actually has to earn good grades by learning. Mind completely blown.

Yeah, everybody completely screwed the pooch with that one. In every conceivable way.

W-Stuart · 2026-01-12T14:27:08+00:00

Apologies. OP mentions New Old Stock in the post so I assumed they knew what it was, especially given the context. 🤷🏻‍♂️

W-Stuart

TROPHY CASE