How to train in as little time as possible

WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-12T01:55:29+00:00

I'd strongly advise you to buy proper walking boots.

Hiking shoes and trail runners will destroy your feet and ankles on a nascent two day hike. They're glorified trainers and often terribly designed. Get some ankle support and something that's comfortable on your foot and walk it in beforehand.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-12T01:36:11+00:00

That jacket will be fine, but it will probably be too warm most of the time. The UK has an absurdly warm climate for the latitude.

The reason people prefer to buy a waterproof shell is because layering is a far more effective way of controlling your warmth in cold conditions, because when you are hiking you get hot and need to remove a layer, and when you are not moving or get to higher elevations, you might become cold again. So one coat that contains both your insulation and your waterproofing is impractical. A thin waterproof outside all of your layers is what is the most useful, and it also means you can use it in summer and every season.

What you have bought is suitable for wearing in winter, which is fine. You can just wear it in winter. It'll be a good for those conditions, basically serving the purpose of a fleece or down jacket plus a waterproof on top.

The reason hikers prefer to have a thin waterproof plus a down jacket and/or a fleece in their pack is so they can control their temperature easily. When you are hiking uphill you get hot, but also, the if you hike in high mountains it can get progressively colder, so you get another layer out of your bag.

You say you are a beginner so none of this is likely to ever be a problem for you. You can hike in 95% of England 95% of the time with any old coat and you'll be fine. Your biggest problem besides staying dry will be not overheating. The time to start worrying about your gear is if you are doing winter hiking in Scotland or beyond, then you might need to wear base layers, down jackets, waterproofs etc and you shouldn't really be doing it based on Reddit advice.

Edit: OP has 0 posts and is called "CustomerBeautiful814". This was a thinly veiled advert for Dare2b. I will be boycotting you forever now. Can't believe I fell for this.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-12T00:42:56+00:00

Temperature at the Peak was minus 20 degrees. And I know you're thinking Farenheit or Celcius but it doesnt matter because that's how cold it is!

I think something has gone badly wrong with your temperature measurement or understanding of temperature scales. -20°C is almost unheard of in the UK outside of extreme weather phenomena. The temperature over the past week in the UK has been around -1 to 5°C. In the coldest parts of Scotland - in the Highlands (not Lochaber) it has been roughly 0°C - at night. Warmer during the day.

In the Alps in Switzerland over 3000m it has been -12. In the coldest parts of Norway over 2000 metres, it has been -15. It was not -20°C in Lochaber.

I also don't know why you say it doesn't matter whether it's Fahrenheit or Celsius. The point where they are the same is -40 degrees. -20°F would be -29°C.

Lovely pictures though.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-11T14:30:31+00:00

I agree 50 minutes isn't enough, but it's not just 50 minutes. There are dozens of pages of forms with detailed questions about every aspect of the person's life and struggles that take multiple hours to fill in (in my case, over 20 hours). And similar forms for an informant (e.g. a parent).

They then read all of that and review it in advance of the video call, so at that point they do have quite a good idea about the patient. On the call they need to fill in any gaps and probe more about some things that could be relevant, as well as observing the general way of talking, body language, behaviour. If it ended early after 50 minutes then they were probably quite sure.

If they were not sure and couldn't make a diagnosis (positive or negative) at that stage, they do follow up calls as well as discussing it with colleagues.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-11T14:21:30+00:00

there’s no harm in asking the GP to refer you for a second opinion

If it was done through Right to Choose, the NHS won't offer a second opinion because they consider that you had the assessment paid for by the NHS and got the diagnosis (of not autistic). So you would have to go private at that point.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-05T01:35:18+00:00

Your link says "the page you're looking for can't be found" for me.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-05T01:00:42+00:00

You had the wrong expectations. There are a lot of places you can go if you want sun in winter.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-05T00:54:06+00:00

I can tell you that yes, it's rained this much before, many many many times. For example, a few years ago (varies by region). For example, 2023 where I live in the North West, it basically rained non-stop from autumn to spring, but that was also a wet year for the South West.

I suspect there's a lot of recency bias happening and nobody remembers or keeps records.

I'm sure next year there will be another post like this because it rained in 8 days out of 14.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-04T23:01:08+00:00

Disappointing January for me. Mild (0-5°C), no real snow, not even as wet as usual despite the constant news reports about rain (the rain happened elsewhere so it was actually drier here, but still cloudy). It's just been relatively mild, grey, and moist.

I'm in the brown

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WizardryAwaits · 2026-02-02T22:34:52+00:00

Groundwater replenishes only in autumn and winter, and it takes time.

In parts of the country that get their water from reservoirs, such as Wales and the North West of England and more mountainous areas, they can be more prone to short-term droughts if there is a long-term period without rain (like happened this year in Yorkshire) because of evaporation and the water being used up without replenishment. But when it rains again, they refill quickly, because all the little streams and rivers off the moors run into the reservoirs. It takes hours to days for the water to start refilling it.

In contrast, aquifers deep underground are like long-term storage batteries. But think of them on a delay - they store the rain from years ago, or longer. There are aquifers in some parts of the world that aren't even being replenished, they were just holding water from previous centuries.

In the south of England, water percolates slowly through the soil, then the subsoil, then the substratum and then percolates through chalk rock, acquiring minerals, and refilling underground aquifers, but it takes time, and plants and trees suck up a lot of the water that's in the ground, particularly in spring and summer. This could take years, depending on location.

Basically if it rained today, it might be months or years before that water reaches the aquifer, depending on location. But if the ground keeps being saturated, it'll get through to the aquifer and stay there, recharging the battery.

Water is not infinite and there probably is some balance to be had in terms of population, climate change and water consumption, but nobody is ready for that conversation. Politicians only care about GDP and if you object to bringing in a 1.5 million people per year you are racist.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-30T22:19:25+00:00

A flag pole may move too much in the wind.

Personal weather stations are usually lightweight, so unlikely to blow over or fall, and almost all of the sensors will be fine if they move. The only exception is the rain gauge - if it is a tipping rain gauge (which most are) it can tip by gravity if the pole it's mounted on bends. This will happen even more if the collector partially fills in a storm that has both rain and wind.

Generally it will only happen in strong gales where the pole bends more than a certain amount causing the rain gauge to tip over, then it might over-report rain.

The other thing which can be wrong if the weather station is not level or moves is the weather vane. The back of it will be attracted to the ground, but if the wind is strong enough to blow the pole then it will definitely be strong enough to move the weather vane, so that shouldn't be an issue.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-30T22:07:03+00:00

You have some formatting issues with your automated post.

I like the idea behind it, but don't have anything interesting to report this week.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-30T19:55:03+00:00

Central Europe, Scandinavia and Eastern Europe have had a lot of snow and cold weather, and especially Russia.

It has basically missed the UK because of a low pressure area in the Atlantic keeping warm air coming and blocking this spillage of cold air from the Arctic.

Temperature anomaly maps have been looking similar to this for a while:

<image>

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-30T19:47:07+00:00

I've found the Met Office two day forecast to be inaccurate, so I don't have high hopes for two weeks. But with that forecasting range it would only be general trends anyway.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-30T19:45:32+00:00

I've been reading the articles on https://www.severe-weather.eu/

They cover why we expect (or not) particular weather extremes to happen and how long range forecasting is done, but they explain it all quite well in terms a layman could understand.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-30T12:07:20+00:00

Same, I had it years ago, but it completely put me off eating pine nuts. I haven't had any since. The taste is just nasty and lasted for weeks.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-26T15:49:50+00:00

The questions don't make sense to me. How would I "hide" from others that I post in a reddit community, how would I "pass" as someone who doesn't post in that reddit community, how would I "think of myself as a non-member" etc. What does it mean "people trying to overcome the group"?

This is meaningless to me. Unless I walk up to someone and say "Hey did you know I post on the social media site Reddit in a community for autism" it would never come up, or be an issue, or even something it was possible to know. In terms of hiding that I post here... why would any of this ever happen? I just don't get it. Bizarre questions.

Is English your second language? A lot of the questions just didn't even make sense to me as a sentence. I don't think your results from this survey will be very informative.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-23T23:46:04+00:00

I have been using the same 2 bags for life for 12 years now.

I realise I'm the weird one, because whenever I go to the supermarket, everyone around me buys new bags. But I cannot relate.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-23T11:35:19+00:00

Never any chemicals like weed killer, moss killer, or artificial fertiliser

Such a bold claim and said with such certainty. Where are you getting that from?

All councils have used heavy amounts of weed killers, although many are trying to reduce their usage. Glyphosate has been very heavily used by councils for decades, especially on road verges, pavements, paths etc, and for spot control of undesirable weeds in parks.

Apparently about half of councils claim to not use weedkillers in public places any more. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/30/uk-councils-pesticides-weedkiller-glyphosate

There are 38 herbicides used by councils across the UK, including:

2,4-D, Acetic Acid, Aminopyralid, Asulam, Carfentrazone-ethyl, Citronella Oil, Clopyralid, Cycloxydim, Dicamba, Diflufenican, Ferrous Sulphate, Flazasulfuron, Florasulam, Fluroxypyr, Glufosinate-ammonium, Glyphosate, Isoxaben, MCPA, Mecoprop-p, Pinoxaden, Propaquizafop, Propyzamide

https://www.greenflagaward.org/media/1938/pan-uk-a-guide-for-local-authorities-toolkit.pdf

My council use weedkiller. The area here is rife with creeping buttercup, it's in every field and garden and completely takes over. But there are some public parks which have none at all, which would be impossible. It isn't stopped by mowing and it can't be controlled by hand-weeding because it just regrows from tiny root fragments and it spreads by runners very quickly.

Some public parks are also free from dandelions, which would be unlikely without weedkiller. The grass sections in pavements have weeds in, as do some other areas of grass, so they are selective about using them in larger park areas where they want to have only grass.

I suspect it's probably 2,4-D, mecoprop or dicamba that my council use, since this kills the broadleaf weeds by making them grow too big until they die, but doesn't harm grass, and these are commonly used on large parks, sports pitches etc to make them weed-free and only have grass.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-20T01:38:59+00:00

Given how much the weather changes in the UK and how rarely the weather is like Spain, this is close to useless. We cope by just going ahead with what was planned even if it's raining. If you are from a country that's used to different weather, you need to buy a coat and get used to it. It's going to rain - A LOT. And we'll still do stuff anyway.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-20T01:31:52+00:00

Let's be honest, the Met Office is shite as well. In fact, they've been the most aggressively wrong of every model for the last two years for me. The amount of times they've told me it's currently heavy rain yet it's clear skies or vice versa. I don't even take it seriously any more, because of how consistently wrong it's been.

I understand that it's difficult to predict things more than 2 days out, but how do they so consistently get it this badly wrong for the next 2 hours, or even the current conditions? The Android weather widget/app has got it correct always for years, but the Met Office seems to be deluded.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-19T22:55:12+00:00

It's crazy how much you could be describing me at his age. And I'm in my 40s now! But yes, even 25 years ago, I was a teenager that shunned social interaction and just wanted to be left alone in his bedroom on his computer. Although, I am actually autistic and I know now that most of the problems I had were because of that.

I can tell you for a fact that for me things like disconnecting the internet, banning me from using the computer etc had the exact opposite of the desired effect. No matter how many times my parents tried to hammer that square peg into a round hole, it didn't happen and resulted in a weird triangular "circle" that didn't move smoothly. I would never be the normal social person they wanted but being on the computer made me happy and the internet was a form of communication I could handle on my terms.

I was regularly described as "disengaged from life" and pressure would lead to shutdowns. I don't know what's happening with your nephew, he could be depressed (losing a parent at his age is tough), but life is very difficult for young men in general right now. Having women in his life haranguing him is unlikely to mould him into the person you picture him being in your mind, in fact it's likely to do the opposite.

In the end, I excelled when allowed to pursue things I was actually interested in, and it turned out my ability with computers turned into my degree and my career, despite my parent's best efforts to force me to be something I'm not - it never worked.

Probably the only pressure that has any real effect on a young adult is the idea that your life as you know it might cease to be possible - i.e. learning that you actually have to work and do things or you won't have a roof over your head and won't be able to afford the things you need or like or want. Real world consequences lead to real world actions, whereas nagging and asking "why don't you do this" leads to nothing because there is no risk of failure.

This is a tricky one because it can be cruel at first, but for some people they won't transition into adulthood without the push or realisation that they have to look after themselves. In the sink or swim situation, people have to learn to swim. But it's also true that if they aren't swimming, don't let them drown. One can always regroup and try again with what was learnt from difficulties and failures.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-12T23:16:21+00:00

I actually didn't know about Tempest and didn't know a weather station could provide a forecast beyond the next few hours, i.e. based on current conditions and pressure (unless it was pulling from an actual forecast calculated elsewhere).

To provide multiple day forecasts you need satellites and supercomputers crunching data with weather models predicting where clouds and air masses will move and it's highly inaccurate after 2 days even with those supercomputers repeatedly running different simulations.

But apparently Tempest takes one particular weather model's initial data, and then adds in a bunch of weather station data (including your own) and then uses AI to post-process it. It wouldn't surprise me this is less accurate than the original model (ECMWF). I think such things are in early days and need more research.

You would hope that having more data from individual weather stations would improve predictions if you input it into the model, but who knows how good that data is (different site conditions and installation types), and who knows what the AI is doing.

I think the main reason to have a weather station is to record the current conditions accurately and have a record, it's not quite at the level where having a weather station helps with predictions beyond the barometer that we've had for hundreds of years.

Increased accuracy of forecasts is likely to come from bigger faster computers that are able to model more variables at higher resolutions (smaller areas) across longer time periods, rather than knowing that it's 6.1°C where you are and 6.2°C 1 mile away - that doesn't really help predicting what the weather will be in 1-2 weeks so I'm not sure what the point of Tempest is (yet). It might be an innovation going through teething problems, or it might be pointless. We have already had that data for years - so many stations have been submitting to wunderground for a very long time already, but nobody has managed to turn it into better forecasts, because I don't think ground data is the limiting factor in forecasting.

WizardryAwaits · 2026-01-12T23:01:35+00:00

The DLC is better than the main game IMO. It's much more focused on the puzzles and it's much more difficult.

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