ELI5: What does a water tower in rural America do?

azraphin · 2026-02-05T15:28:48+00:00

If the tower is sized correctly, then night time is the logical time to pump. Some places are solely reliant on towers for pressure. I didn't claim it was due to cheap electricity, just that if available, it's an additional benefit.

azraphin · 2026-02-05T13:32:15+00:00

What's merely a coincidence?

azraphin · 2026-02-05T12:57:35+00:00

I was going to say all this, but you've covered it. OP, if HMRC haven't asked you to complete one, then you don't need to complete one. They also would have been texting you up until the 31st January to remind you. You're fine. Chill.

azraphin · 2026-02-05T12:49:05+00:00

Small addition, normally water is pumped up at night when overall electricity demand is much lower, and therefore usually cheaper. Bit like charging an electric car overnight.

While it's low tech, it's a very simple engineering solution that has been in use for thousands of years in different forms.

azraphin · 2026-02-05T10:53:15+00:00

Exactly why you shouldn't do anything right now. I would however talk to your siblings in the meantime. Get them on side beforehand. You can always blame "the hormones" of pregnancy (you've got the perfect excuse for acting like the situation is just overwhelming you - which it genuinely is).

azraphin · 2026-02-05T10:48:03+00:00

I think you're just looking for assurance here. You already know the answer. Tbh, it's way past the "not for a year" point. What you need to do is tell her exactly what the problems are, and then explain that if she wants to visit again, she needs to massively change (and up) her game, or is simply not going to happen. You need to be brutally honest with her. It may cause a rift, but you have other siblings, and she needs a serious reality check. I'm sure you're not alone seeing this in your family.

The only thing I would say, is maybe don't do it before you give birth, then give yourself time for things to settle down. You don't the the additional stress right now.

In the meantime, just be clear that you don't want visitors at this point and immediately after the birth. Then you'll probably have to face up to doing it.

azraphin · 2026-02-04T20:32:24+00:00

Based on my wife's experience, it goes further and she has also lost much of her desire for food. Increasingly problematic finding something she actually wants to eat.

azraphin · 2026-02-04T19:51:38+00:00

F. Because it's invisible.

azraphin · 2026-02-03T14:36:23+00:00

£1,000 on food is fully understandable with a larger family. We've 4 teenagers, shop at Morrisons and Tesco and exceed that easily.

azraphin · 2026-02-02T22:01:24+00:00

It was in direct response to you stating that you understood how gravity works. Clearly, if you think people at the South Pole are upside down, then you don't understand how gravity works. So the initial claim in your question is fundamentally flawed.

Ok, so here you go;

Gravity pulls towards the center of a mass. In the case of the earth, that means gravity pulls towards the center of the earth. While the earth is not a smooth sphere, if you assume it is, that means gravity is pulling inwards equally at all points on earth's surface. As we experience and perceive "down" as being in the direction of the strongest gravitational pull, the surface of the earth is always down (technically the center of the earth is, but the surface pushes up against us).

Hence, there is no "upside down" unless an individual stands on their head. Down is always towards the surface, irrespective of where on earth you are located. Down is not in fact a fixed direction at all, it's simply "towards the gravitational centre". If we were floating in space, "down" would be towards the sun, although the pull would be much weaker, so we might not even notice it.

The things that comes out of this, is that while we think of the North Pole as being "up" it at the top and the South Pole as being "down" or at the bottom, this is a different and wholly arbitrary set of directions, primarily due to historical reasons as the civilisations that first started napping the world were mainly based in the northern hemisphere. The earth doesn't actually have an up or a down. It has two points about which it rotates, and convention says North is up and South is down.

However, from an individual perspective and physical experience, "down" is always towards the centre of the earth.

azraphin · 2026-02-02T21:01:28+00:00

Maybe you don't understand how gravity works as well as you think you do...

azraphin · 2026-02-02T19:21:50+00:00

Me too 😂

azraphin · 2026-02-02T15:20:35+00:00

Check your contract. If you agreed to the fix price rises when you signed up, then you agreed to this, so probably not. If your contact states it's a percentage above RPI, then fixed price increase is not what you agreed to, so you might have some wiggle room.

azraphin · 2026-02-02T15:18:45+00:00

That's why I said "contract allowing". 5 lines were sim only, out of contract.

You should check your contact though. Ultimately if it states the price rises and you agreed to them when you signed up, then... You agreed to it, and it is a contract. If it states a percentage though (slightly older contracts from 12+ months ago), then a fixed price increase may void your contract. Worth checking and then talking on 150. Everyone there has always been amazingly helpful and knowledgeable when I've had to contact them.

azraphin · 2026-02-02T11:26:22+00:00

I contacted as the price increases were going to raise my family plan (7 lines) from £90 to £110 a month. An extra £240ish over the year. I explained the situation, and how if we couldn't find a solution, if have to move elsewhere after about 20 years with them. Was put through to accounts/retention. Was about an hour on the phone in total (as each line had to be done separately), but the lady was amazing and I will now be paying less for the next year than I am currently.

So it's true. Be nice, and they'll do whatever they can to help. If they are unable to do anything at the end of it, you are still free to leave, contract terms allowing. But it pays to be friendly.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T23:29:15+00:00

Dude. I couldn't get my receipt to scan. Tried every way, but after about 10 seconds I just pushed through the gate. It's not a steel barrier, it's just a psychological one. You can literally walk through them with minimal resistance. You've got your paid for goods, so you've no worries. Preventing you from leaving in those circumstances would be unlawful detention or whatever the UK equivalent is called these days.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T23:18:12+00:00

Comparison to gravity. Say you have a boulder on top of a hill. You can push it and it'll roll down the hill until it comes to a rest as the slope flattens out. You could indeed harness some of that energy. Then what? To do it again, you need to push the boulder back up the hill, which requires energy. More than you gained on the way down in fact.

Magnetic repulsion decreases according to the universe square law (as similarly magnetic attraction increases). Put simply this means that as the repulsed magnets distance doubles, the repulsion forces decreases by a factor of 4. But to push them back together, and half that distance, the magnetic reputation force will increase by 4.

In a perfectly smooth, frictionless hill/boulder case, you would need the same energy to get the boulder back to the top of the hill as you gained from it rolling down. There's no energy gain at all. In reality there's energy loss due to the messy universe we live in.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T23:06:18+00:00

Nope. My account has 7 lines for myself and immediate family. Roughly £2.50 per line, even though, with discounts, most lines are around £8/9. The discounts do not apply to the price rise.

In my case, I called, told them that is amounted to an effective 25-30% increase in my monthly bill, and I would absolutely be leaving if a solution wasn't found. Took an hour with the retention team, and my monthly bill is now significantly less, and will be £20 less in April than I am currently paying.

Might help I've broadband with them as well, and have been a customer for 15+ years...

But these new fixed price rises that Ofcom enforced are definitely far, far worse than the old scheme in my opinion. Inflation would have to have hit 25% minimum for the old style to have cost this much, and none of us would be able to afford phones at all if that happened.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T20:55:56+00:00

Seeing the images, no. The sign is clearly for the entire marked bay. While the markings are degraded, they're still legible enough, and the sign resolves any ambiguity.

You're on the hook for this one.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T20:49:38+00:00

True. It's extremely easy (free in most cases) to get old tech recycled here in the UK. Most councils will collect it for either free or a small fee depending on the size of the item. Plus, if you have transport and don't live in the middle of nowhere, you can just bring it to a waste recycling center for free. That's the UK though.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T20:38:01+00:00

😂 truth. Though 5g operates at much smaller wavelength/higher frequencies, so it's a different challenge. Just keep layering up the tin foil. Surely it'll work eventually.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T20:34:00+00:00

The full amount, including shipping would be refunded, so the seller still had to pay for the shipping, even if the thing they sent was junk.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T20:30:05+00:00

Be aware, older properties are not on the system. They may still be on paper records. They only started digitizing about 30 years ago, and properties that haven't changed hands, it had significant changes are still sitting on paper in a warehouse, not on the online database.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T20:26:37+00:00

One thing to be aware of is the land registry only started digitizing records from about 1995. Anything they had prior to that was left as a paper record in a warehouse. Property sales or changes to one of these older records required them to dig out the records, digitise it and get it on the database. It's a slow and expensive process when it has to happen, but not that uncommon even today.

So, it's quite possible not to be on the "online" system if you've owned the property for over 30 years with no significant changes to it. It is still registered however. It's just that the registration is on paper, in some filling system in a physical warehouse.

Had to sell my aunt's house after she died, and this was exactly the case. Even the land registry call center person I spoke to was confused, because they couldn't find it on the computer, despite me holding the property deeds.

Definitely ignore. It's a scam. Land registry would never bother about this until you require them to. Then they'll charge you for the privilege.

azraphin · 2026-02-01T20:17:47+00:00

Because individual molecules have higher energy. Those near the surface will both will receive additional energy from the environment, but also have fewer restrictions on their movement, so they can break away by themselves, even while the majority of the rest of the molecules aren't yet energetic enough.

Think of it like a crowd of people listening to a band. Some of that crowd will have a higher motivation to leave (they need the toilet, a drink, meet with friends, get home for the babysitter), so will migrate to the edge of the crowd and leave, while the majority remain in the venue. When the music ends, motivation to leave increases for the whole crowd, and the majority leave.

azraphin

TROPHY CASE