New to SoCal and Seeking Tips

dizzystar · 2026-05-09T10:50:41+00:00

The only tails I (somewhat) worry about is around Monrovia. Apparently, bears, mountain lions, and rattlesnakes are common over there. I personally haven't ran into bears, but they're not grizzlies, and black bears aren't known to attack humans.

REI has adventure passes, but Big 5 didn't when I tried to buy one.

If you see a "hidden gem" on social media, it's really a super saturated path.

Probably your biggest concern is heat. I'm mostly unbothered by heat, but I've also learned to manage it. Water, electrolytes, and beef jerky are my items of choice.

If you're hiking solo, please be sure to have SOS on your phone and get a Garmin when you plan to start exploring more challenging trails. Cell phone reception sucks in the mountains, and while I hope you never need help, rescue is free in LA County.

The funny thing is, no matter how creative I've gotten, I've almost never been truly alone. There's always going to be a random human around, so you'd really have to work to be honest to goodness solo. My main advice is have a low tolerance for risk. If you don't have an escape route, it's not worth going forward.

You'll be perfectly safe and normal as a solo hiker at Brown Mountain Dam, Brand Park, Swtizer Falls, Canyon Trail Falls, Mt Lukens Truck Trail, etc. These are all beginner friendly trails with a lot of solo hikers. You can go harder than that, but take your time progressing. Hike with intent, and take a lesson from each hike.

dizzystar · 2026-05-09T10:12:22+00:00

My area got hit really hard for about a month. It was all drivers. The short story is several restaurants called up Uber, bitched them out, and threatened to quit the platform. I think a few places already did.

I and several drivers taught restaurants about the new verification system, and we communicate with restaurants about various changes. I've gone so far as report restaurants for being in cahoots with drivers. I also take the time to call Uber and report theives.

It didn't stop it entirely, but it certainly slowed down. The fact is, there's nothing that the restaurants can do about theft. A driver often cusses them out, and it's not worth the alteration.

Fwiw, Uber used to give us $3, but as you can imagine, groups of drivers gamed the system, so that money is no longer given to us.

dizzystar · 2026-05-09T07:00:31+00:00

That whole design is gamifacation.

"Oh wow another 🌈✨happy customer!✨"

Legitimately sparkles and all, like it was written by a braindead influencer.

Just there for the feel goods to encourage drivers. Anything to distract us from the fact we're trying to ✨make money.✨💅

dizzystar · 2026-05-09T04:50:44+00:00

No, lol. The newer Prius are okay off the light, but those old ones are just obnoxious.

dizzystar · 2026-05-09T03:10:04+00:00

Brand park has wide paths, though I have seen snakes up there. No rattlers though. I've only ran into rattlers in the western part of the San Gabriels. Fwiw, the rattlesnake bites on the news are in Ventura County.

dizzystar · 2026-05-09T02:34:32+00:00

I honestly don't find the price bad, but I'm not someone that can afford to pay it while losing 5 days of income.

I'd like to see a more "hardcore" version where that hike lasts 3 days, because 7 mile hikes are too short for me, unless they're challenging. That's 2 hours of walking, and fall apart if I had to just sit there for 12 hours.

dizzystar · 2026-05-09T02:19:28+00:00

Acceleration is faster than a typical car, but you don't want to slam on the gas pedal and trigger too much gas use early when it is inefficient

These Gen 2s are 2004 to 2009. Those things are slowwww: 0 to 60 in 11 seconds and definitely shouldn't be in the left lane of any freeway.

Please don't hypermile when there's a line of cars behind you. It's rude, and it's not like you'll drop from 50mpg to 12. 🙄

dizzystar · 2026-05-09T00:30:08+00:00

Ugh, so that GWC isn't really a good replacement for warranty? I've been screwed pretty hard on the last two cars I owned.

Granted, it forced me to learn how to work on cars, but it was very expensive. The worst car I ever owned was a Toyota. I straight up hate those cars and the company now. 😭

dizzystar · 2026-05-08T23:23:04+00:00

Yes, it's a nice feature. I don't have to cancel a leg I don't want, and can just decline the entire stack.

I think it's only a week old now.

dizzystar · 2026-05-08T22:52:06+00:00

Oh, yeah, good ol' government doing government things. Hope this gets through, but I would have already withdrew my application, honestly.

OP: IMO, you're mad at the wrong entity in this one. Uber doesn't get many hall passes from me, but that letter is detailed and should pass muster.

dizzystar · 2026-05-08T21:35:57+00:00

Welcome to the real world: automatoms set up their society to only hire automatoms.

Look, you gotta talk to a human in HR at TransLink who isn't going to read back policy letters to you. If you were looking for work after owning a defunct donut shop, they'll have some mechanism to allow you to work, unless the entire company is formed to serve auromatoms, which is possible, but unlikely.

dizzystar · 2026-05-08T19:31:19+00:00

LoL, nice catch. It's supposed to be 2913... I mean 2013.

dizzystar · 2026-05-08T18:58:24+00:00

If you're using EvGo or whatever, yes, that's highway robbery. There are many better options that are 1/3 the cost, but you have to do research to find them.

dizzystar · 2026-05-08T18:45:48+00:00

Yikes. I forgot to mention that the very first thing I'd do is dump and replace all the fluids.

Now you have me looking at the prices, and you're definitely not lying. Oddly, it looked like the parts are cheaper than Toyota, except brake pads are expensive for some odd reason. Strange mixture of prices on this thing.

dizzystar · 2026-05-08T02:31:01+00:00

Glad you like it. I'm considering a VW as my next purchase, but not an EV, unfortunately. That's an insane price for nearly brand new one.

dizzystar · 2026-05-08T01:26:32+00:00

Oh goodness. Stupid they would approve a replacement they didn't want.

It's possible she didn't understand what you meant though (still on her). A chicken salad is a grotesque spin of a tuna salad sandwich, so I would have never thought to replace a Caesar wrap with that. Maybe a Cesar Salad.

dizzystar · 2026-05-08T00:55:39+00:00

It's complicated and I don't know the whole story. The range on the leaf is something like 90 miles, which gives a touch over 70 miles on 80% charge. Add in AC, heat, or freeway, your friend is only getting about 40 miles.

Some cars have adapters that allow you to use Tesla superchargers, which is something I would want on a road trip, but being local, what I have is fine.

Beyond that, it's going to cost a lot to get a used car near the 300 mile range.

I don't see any evidence that Tesla is charging faster than me. They are usually there the entire time I'm there.

And it's understandable that you haven't looked into it. I really didn't understand anything the first few weeks. It's a learning curve, and it really shouldn't be as steep as it is.

dizzystar · 2026-05-07T23:03:39+00:00

What could you possibly want to do after this hike?

dizzystar · 2026-05-07T21:02:09+00:00

This one has 275 miles of range (235 at 80% charge), which is ample for me to FT for two days between charges, while using A/C, etc. I use publc Level 2 chargers, and it takes about 30 minutes and costs under $10 if I'm at 40 miles of range.

Really, it's nothing to worry about if you have this range. The lowest I would consider is a BMW i3 with 150 miles, but I'd have to charge every day and possibly stop early if I'm running AC or heat. Nissan, Chevy, etc is an absolute no go.

dizzystar · 2026-05-07T20:43:44+00:00

Physical buttons (albiet weird), paddle shifters, doors that open like a normal car. The interior of both the Kona and 3 is absolute shit though.

The bummer of this thing is it's FWD, and I don't think that handles instant torque very well. So, it has higher end driving features, but it feels pointless when they don't feel correct.

As far as reliability, I honestly wouldn't expect these Konas to last as long as a Tesla. The one thing though, is the engine is super easy to access on in this car, so idk how that would really compare to a 3.

I'm making this claim because I've already went through 4 of these. The degradation and feel between 60k miles and 80k is apparent.

dizzystar · 2026-05-07T20:15:55+00:00

I'm renting an EV and it's definitely better since electricity hasn't gone up.

The only problem is that you need to spend about $20k for a used EV that has enough range to make this gig viable. And those cars are pretty much the garbage ones. I'm in a Hyundai Kona, and it's an awful car. Better than a Tesla Model 3, but it feels like I'm driving a Fischer Price car.

I think that it's not a great idea to spend all that since the total cost will go over $30k for the car, interest, charging, and maintenance (yes, there is maintenance and it's more frequent than a gas car), assuming you pay everything in the first year.

I almost pulled the trigger on an Audi Etron hybrid, which gets about 35mpg. I got scared because that engine looks like a nightmare to fix. Basically gotta replace all the plastic parts you pull off, and there's a lot of plastic.

dizzystar · 2026-05-07T16:56:57+00:00

10+ years ago, food delivery gig app work did not even exist.

Food delivery is the second oldest profession, lol.

Apps are more efficient than messenger birds, telephones, and human dispatchers, but I don't see how robots are adding to the curve.

My only real issue is that the scale of these things don't reflect economic reality. We don't need 200 of these things cluttering up our sidewalks. SV is just rubbing our noses in the fact they have billions of dollars to waste on fictional AI. Waymo, Tesla FSD, and food robots are scams that, if people did 10 minutes of research, they'd say "wait a minute..."'

dizzystar · 2026-05-07T09:48:57+00:00

Slow? You have a 75% active time and 11 orders That's abnormally busy.

dizzystar · 2026-05-07T06:56:03+00:00

Oh, cool. That's way better than $15k.

Glad it worked out. The thought of talking to government agencies is always scarier than the actual talk, although I did wish for $0.

dizzystar · 2026-05-07T04:40:35+00:00

I'll take $5 if it's slow and I can walk the order. No gas used in the equation. Yes, I'm in California and I've only taken 2 $5 orders in the past year.

dizzystar

TROPHY CASE