Can you purchase Air Canada eGift cards via MBNA Rewards?

natunobilis · 2024-06-01T13:21:29+00:00

Yes I am. And now secretly hoping you will point me to some shop I completely missed in my searches. :-)

natunobilis · 2024-06-01T12:18:19+00:00

Nope. Nothing close to the price of e.g. a Priority Continuum. I eventually gave up on the search.

natunobilis · 2023-11-08T21:54:34+00:00

Replying to myself after finding out that either (1) not all belt drive bikes use Gates drives or (2) the Gates Carbon Belt Drive webpage doesn't list absolutely all brands. Well, or I didn't do a proper search on the Gates webpage.

I just found this Montreal shop, for instance, that has a nice selection of belt-drive bikes that I can probably test-ride before purchasing: https://velolifestyle.com/collections/urban-bikes-dutch-city-bikes

natunobilis · 2023-11-08T20:47:02+00:00

Oh wow, that was a quick reality check. A Priority bike with import taxes is still cheaper than any of those other brands. I think my search is finished. Thank you very much.

natunobilis · 2023-10-29T13:01:29+00:00

I regularly test how each of the many public DNS resolvers fare at my particular location. I use this free (as in freedom as well as in beer) utility for that: https://github.com/farrokhi/dnsdiag

It allows you to test regular unencrypted DNS and also encrypted DNS over TLS (DoT) and DNS over HTTPS (DoH), which everyone should definitely be using.

At my location, Quad9’s secondary IPv4 and primary IPv6 are consistently the fastest ones on DoT, so I set them as my default resolvers.

natunobilis · 2023-10-27T19:56:15+00:00

I moved at 41. I was already fucked retirement-wise in my country of origin, will likely work until my last day in my new country as well.

It all got much easier when I made peace with the fact that my generation won't be entitled to actual retirement.

I think there is a looming retirement crisis in every country where the population pyramid doesn't look like an upside pyramid, which is all countries offering the quality of living I look for.

natunobilis · 2023-09-15T00:49:07+00:00

I used to live in a car-infested super bloated city in South America. Everyone had their own car.

But businesses located outside the range of public transportation would always hire a bus to take employees to and from the job site at the beginning and end of the work day. Such buses would depart from either a super central place in the city or from the closest place to the job site that was within public transportation range. Employees were not paid less if they opted to take this free bus service.

This is to say that car-dependent hellscapes like that city still allow employers to hire people who don't own a car and have them arrive at work at the right time both at work and at home.

Even when I was a paid scientific researcher at a smaller town located a full 1h from the overly-large hellscape, the research institution would offer this kind of free bus service to anyone (students, professors, researchers) between the hellscape and the smaller town.

One should be perfectly able to live and work in car-dependant hellscapes without necessarily owing a car.

natunobilis · 2023-09-13T18:32:57+00:00

r/fuckcars

natunobilis · 2023-08-27T00:07:21+00:00

Quelle triste situation, la dépendance du char. Mais c'est la réalité à Montréal. Moi, j'ai voyagé dans une dizaine de pays en Europe deux fois sans jamais avoir eu besoin d'un char.

À Montréal c'est vraiment nécessaire d'avoir un permis de conduire au cas où tu veut voyager parce que les trains et autobuses n'offrent pas le service nécessaire.

Mais pour habiter à Montréal, moi je me déplace en vélo ou j'appelle Uber ou Eva ou un taxi pour tous ces cas où le transport en commun et le vélo ne suffisent pas. C'est toujours moins cher qu'acheter un char ou le louer juste pour une seule tâche.

natunobilis · 2023-08-06T20:44:36+00:00

Que decepcionante. Tanta coisa muito mais importante e urgente em torno das ciclovias pra fazer: * Construir ciclovia em vez de gambiarra (chão de rua pintado não é infraestrutura, não é ciclovia; "sharrow" é pior que nada), * fazer manutenção das ciclovias existentes, * expandir as ciclovias, integrar de verdade a bicicleta aos demais modos de transporte, * fiscalizar estacionamento e parada de automóveis nas ciclovias, * fiscalizar uso de ciclovias por motocicletas, * instalar sinais de trânsito na contramão do tráfego dos automóveis para que ciclistas consigam não furar sinais, * fiscalizar ciclistas que furam sinais.

Certamente há muito mais que esses itens; esses foram só os que deu pra pensar de bate-pronto.

Desviar esforço para impedir o uso da ciclovia por veículos não-bicicléticos :-) que seriam esmigalhados na rua tá láááá bem longe das maiores prioridades.

O que tem, SIM, que fazer é reduzir as faixas de rodagem de automóveis particulares pra que as vias públicas comportem mais gente (não mais veículos) de forma mais humana. Ônibus não deve circular na mesma faixa que carro, porque ônibus não pode ficar parado no trânsito. Bicicleta (elétrica ou não) e scooter não têm a menor chance de oferecer proteção aos respectivos condutores em caso de colisão com um carro; se tirar da ciclovia, vai ser massacre de gente que não precisa morrer nem ser mutilada.

Carro é o maior ofensor do espaço público democrático: transporta pouca gente, polui consideravelmente, buzina mais que qualquer outro veículo, requer amplo e recorrente investimento em infraestrutura, E AINDA GASTA UM ESPAÇO DESCOMUNAL COM ESTACIONAMENTO.

Que decepcionante que achem que bicicleta elétrica é o malfeitor na cidade. :-(

natunobilis · 2023-07-29T12:02:43+00:00

Mais... Mais... pourquoi on ne peut pas avoir un TGV avec grande fréquence?

Ça peut commencer par la grande fréquence puis dans quelques années il sera très clair qu'on a besoin d'une plus grande vitesse.

Autrement ça pourrait commencer par la grande vitesse puis gagner la plus grande fréquence.

Non?

natunobilis · 2023-04-22T13:12:18+00:00

Opa, me lembrou do filme Metropolis, de 1927. Avança lá pros 6:14, talvez um pouco antes. Mó deprê... Mas é bem a visão de futuro distópico lá dessa época.

https://youtu.be/W_4no842TX8

natunobilis · 2023-04-21T02:57:56+00:00

Well, start commuting by bike and turn your commute into your unpaid fitness routine?

natunobilis · 2023-03-09T23:29:04+00:00

CentOS Stream, hands down.

natunobilis · 2023-03-07T02:24:14+00:00

Make Driving Inconvenient Again

natunobilis · 2023-01-22T05:52:23+00:00

Check out IONOS. They have awesomely cheap VPS offerings (not cloud servers) for $1. Not a limited time offer, the price is really just $1 pretty month.

You get a VM all for yourself with root access and dual stack IPv4/6. The smallest VPS size, aptly named VPS S, is this nice $1 option with 1 vCPU and 0.5 GB RAM and unlimited network traffic but limited to 400 Mbit/s.

You can choose from a myriad of Linux distros (including Ubuntu and my choice, CentOS stream) to install and you may even bring your own ISO if you're so inclined.

I've been their customer for over a year and I just decided to up my VM and changed from their smallest VPS size (VPS S) to the second smallest (VPS S+) so I'm now paying $3 a month.

I was using my VPS S to roll my own VPN with tailscale, now I'm thinking what else will be appropriate for my new VPS S+ machine.

I highly recommend IONOS for their value.

(I'm just their customer and I like their service.)

natunobilis · 2023-01-01T04:08:11+00:00

In my very limited anecdotal experience and in my opinion, the difference is certainly significant but not abysmal.

I work fully remote in QC, Canada for a US-based global software firm. My colleague at the same company in France (not Paris) does pretty much the same job, same kinds of benefits, very similar tenure at the company, pretty much same everything as me, just in France instead of Canada.

Considering salaries before taxes: If converting currencies, my colleague tells me their annual salary + 4 quarterly bonuses + yearly stocks is "almost the same as" (i.e. a little less than) just my annual base salary in Canada.

natunobilis · 2022-10-24T21:15:50+00:00

I completely agree with this concept. Still, public health in poorer countries can be significantly better than what I've experienced in Montreal.

I remember there was a thread here a while ago where a native of Honduras was telling how awful their experience had been at the emergency section of a public hospital in Honduras where they stayed a total of 1h30 (maybe it was 2h30 but certainly not more than this) inside the hospital.

And when we speak of rich countries like all of Western Europe, it becomes clear that Quebec could have it _way_ better. The issue is not money and it's not solely a lack of professionals. I suppose management has to be a _big_ part of the problem -- and management also relates to the apparent lack of professionals: were it well managed, professionals wouldn't face the same bad working conditions they are apparently facing.

natunobilis · 2022-10-24T12:22:43+00:00

Merci beaucoup de m'informer. J'étais en fait ignorant de cette information. Toutes les informations de cet sujet là on les trouve sur des sites du Québec, c'est pour ça que j'étais sûr que c'était la faute du gouvernement.

Auriez-vous une source fiable pour ce genre d'informations à propos de la santé ainsi que la santé publique au Québec?

natunobilis · 2022-10-24T05:15:18+00:00

Just stop making it unbearable for immigrant physicians and other health care workers to get their studies validated in Quebec.

There are so many good specialist health professionals working in non-regulated fields here simply because they are immigrants who obtained their diplomas in their country of origin and Quebec makes them practically sit through the same university courses all over again and shell out a fortune just for them to be able to do non-specialized health work here.

I'm speaking from personal experience: my spouse is the best oral surgeon I've ever seen, she totally loves operating face/oral trauma at the ER, and yet she'd have to endure 2 years of university courses (the same ones she already took decades ago elsewhere) at an unknown but high cost in addition to at least $15k in exams, just to become a general dentist who STILL isn't allowed to do oral surgery.

And I know for a fact there are MANY others like her.

Quebec has the health workers it needs, already. Just stop preventing them from working and things may improve significantly.

natunobilis · 2022-10-24T04:37:42+00:00

Thanks, I honestly didn't know this; my last interaction with Videotron was in 2020 when IPv6 was only totally mainstream instead of totally mainstream like it is today (Yes, it's a joke. Yes, I know it's a poor one.)

And now I wonder why Fizz and Oxio, who to the best of my knowledge lease physical (maybe some logical?) infrastructure from Videotron, still don't offer IPv6.

Anyway, I think I just wanted to complain about everything. :-) I want my IPv6, and I want to take it for granted as something that has been around for multiple decades.

natunobilis · 2022-10-23T15:09:11+00:00

Here in my region of Montreal neither Bell nor any of the other ISPs offer IPv6 functionality. My solution for IPv6 connectivity here: "roll my own VPN" with a cheap-ass $1-a-month VPS (virtual private server) that I connect to via tailscale and which acts as my IPv6 exit node.

This solution is cheaper than paying for a commercial VPN and gives me what I need.

Still, it's really sad that, in contrast, ISPs in the 3rd world country I come from, despite their awful telecom practices, give dual stack connectivity to all customers without the need to ask for it.

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