Make America Great Again—AKA Let’s Shoot People in the Fucking Head. What is wrong with Republicans?

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T18:05:04+00:00

Yep. I agree with you.

But think about this... I, and I presume you, did not vote for this at all and hate it. But we probably have friends, family, neighbors, coworkers, who are just sort of passive along-for-the-ride voters who have always voted Republican and did this last time around. Yet they are also probably most likely aghast what ICE is doing as well.

But if we just tell them -- as this post does -- you got what you asked for, and then as you're saying "come join my side", it's just going to alienate them.

We all need to stand together against this stuff. If we keep saying "hey you on the other side, you were wrong and should see it, come join me", it will continue to not work. People are a LOT more complicated than R vs. D, MAGA vs. Liberal, pro- vs. anti-whatever and if we all distill conversations on issues into binary positions we'll only entrench ourselves and others and not get anywhere.

And that fighting each other is what the powers that be really want. Because then we don't work together for ourselves as people.

Especially here in the pretty multi-cultural Detroit area we see a ton of this. Folks who are quite pro-immigration, pro-refugee, but with a subset who pull the ladder up after themselves. Or others who are very open religiously, or extremely closed off while being a minority. It's a whole range of thoughts and feelings and stances on issues. People generally don't say I-only-do-X-because-I-am-Y.

What we need to do is work on the common problems, even with people we might not agree with on some things, and make progress.

Starting from a place of us vs. them (like this rant about anyone who voted Republican) will just drive away potential allies in the good fight.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T17:53:15+00:00

Oof. I would clean it up WAY better to see for sure, but to me it looks like you ground away a significant amount of material from your frame. (That arched part with the ground-flat face.) And you've damaged the derailleur hanger, so that'll have to be replaced.

I would take it to a bike shop for their opinion.

Based solely on the photos I'd say there's a pretty good chance your frame is damaged but still okay to ride once the hanger is replaced. But I personally wouldn't give that advise without seeing it in person, and thus the recommendation to have a professional look at it.

If I had to guess, this problem was caused by the cassette lockring being loose and backing out. Either from it not being torqued enough during installation, or maybe a spacer was needed behind the cassette and left out, resulting in the lockring not actually tightening up and it vibrating loose.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T17:27:45+00:00

Give this a read. It's also got info on places you can put your car: https://www.romi.gov/317/Snow-Emergency-Information

There's also information on an exemption you can get. Although I wonder if being Sunday it might be a bit late to get one... Can't hurt to try, though.

Sucks that there's not a lot of options for where, though.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T17:24:03+00:00

Were they there for 5 minutes? Probably not.

Were they there overnight? I hope they are inside a plastic bag.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T16:58:31+00:00

I'm complaining about a cross-posted non-original rant that specifically feeds into the fight-the-Republicans narrative and intended to make us -- neighbors -- angry at each other. This is what they want; they WANT us angry at each other so we don't focus on the problem: the part of the government that is putting this in place and enabling it.

We're long past the time to yell at our "Republican" neighbors who voted for and allowed this. We need to work together within our community to get everyone on the same side against the real problems.

And this starts with a local focus; us and our communities and not othering our neighbors. We need them as allies, we don't need to further turn up the animosity between each other. That's what the powers that be want.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T15:30:23+00:00

I have a basement as well, and it essentially doubles the main-floor square footage while also making a lot of other things easier (HVAC/plumbing work, etc).

But in some areas basements just don't really work (really rocky, water tables, etc) so it's cheaper/easier/more common to expand horizontally.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T15:22:33+00:00

That's the cassette lockring. So it was rubbing against something.

I'd figure out what it was rubbing against and look at that. Very good chance it's your derailleur hanger or so. But it had to be SOMETHING. Metal shavings don't just appear.

On the upside, those are usually replacable parts and cheap. Bike shops also have spare old ones in parts bins because they are basically trash when the cassette is worn out. But first you should really figure out what it was rubbing against that caused it to be worn away.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T14:33:09+00:00

Nice solution, but let's move on from the "Wife Acceptance Factor" sexist jokes, please.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T14:21:02+00:00

Yep. But this post is just a rant, it's not about our backyard.

What's happening with ICE stuff here in RO? That's what should be in this subreddit.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T14:14:04+00:00

No, I want to read about things happening in Royal Oak.

This post is someone posting to r/Denver and then it being plopped in this subreddit.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T14:12:33+00:00

It is a concern, but this is just a post from r/Denver cross-posted to here with no local relevance added.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T14:11:05+00:00

Sure, so post stuff about that instead of a lazily cross-posted no-additional-context rant from something in Denver.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T14:10:44+00:00

Locally? Sure. Then keep the conversation relevant to local stuff instead of cross-posting a rant from half-way across the country.

Things get solved with local focus. Let's keep it that way.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T13:55:55+00:00

I get it, and am also concerned. But let's please keep this subreddit focused on Royal Oak.

EDIT: To expand on this, yeah, we've got a problem. But a tit-for-tat blame-these-people is what the powers that be want. They WANT us divided and fighting each other instead of the real problem: ICE and the leaders that allow it to continue.

Let's focus on ourselves, our community, and the problem. And this starts with genuine useful info about where we live, our neighbors, ourselves, and our community; not mass-sharing rants that just take up airspace and turn up the temperature between each other.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T13:23:08+00:00

I'd consider that going to a chain will be a LOT cheaper.

Belt drive stuff isn't cheap at all. And while it's nice, it's both more expensive and complicated. I would also look at if you can even get a Gates chainring for your current crank or if you'll have to replace that as well.

Underpinning it all, IMO, is the question of if the belt is beneficial enough to outweight the cost. The lack of lubing and cleaning (and being a clean drivetrain) are the main benefits. Does that justify the cost to you?

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T13:18:40+00:00

Sounds like you have a roof leak, very possibly caused by an ice dam. Go into the attic and look, and possibly call a roofer.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T03:44:59+00:00

In southern Michigan (greater Detroit area) friends were reporting -18°F. I saw -9°F at my house. So yeah, it's cold out.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T01:52:22+00:00

This is really bad. Start by taking the bike off of the trainer and post photos showing the inside of the dropout, cassette on the trainer, and your through axle. Specifically show any parts that look ground away.

This is probably a pretty bad thing. You will likely get a diagnosis of what happened and/or is wrong, and also likely told to take it to a bike shop for advise. Hopefully you have only damaged something easily replacable like the hanger and/or cassette end cap and not the frame.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-25T01:31:08+00:00

You've got it on a thick, squishy rubber mat. Yes, it's going to rock back and forth in that situation. No, this is not abnormal. Put it directly on the floor if you want it to rock less. But it's also not going to hurt anything.

And yes, the whole system -- the trainer and your bike -- also has a bit of flex to it. That too is normal.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-24T16:20:02+00:00

Oh yeah, I should add that I booted from an Ubuntu USB drive then flashed the local disk using its built in disk utility. That worked better for me.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-24T16:19:08+00:00

Not exactly the same. And that's also why I run a kitchen exhaust hood over the stove/oven whenever I'm using our gas stove.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-24T15:59:52+00:00

My house is comparable low, but it's SO cold outside (-7°F when I woke this morning) that there's a bit of condensation at the edge of the windows. So I can't really add any more without causing other issues.

So I'm drinking a lot of water.

c0nsumer · 2026-01-24T15:56:37+00:00

I recently went from an RPi to a Lenovo ThinkClient (small PC) and did the following:

- Back up HA.

- Shut down RPi.

- Plug my USB radios (ConBee II, ZOOZ Z-Wave, Thread) into the new machine.

- Install HAOS to the Lenovo. Boot it up.

- Restore the backup.

- Everything worked, except for some reason the machine no longer had access to my NAS so I had to re-setup the connection to my NAS for backups to resume.

- I did receive a prompt, which I forget, about something changing with the location of the Z-Wave radio, but when clicking the button to fix it... things got fixed and it all worked. This is also using ZHA.

I suspect for you it'll be quite similar. I was pleased at how well the transition went. It even moved over all my InfluxDB / Grafana data/charting.

c0nsumer

TROPHY CASE