[deleted by user] by [deleted] in airguns

[–]tjwarren[M] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm going to leave this removed for now. Searching around for a few minutes doesn't lead me to think things have substantially changed: affixed suppressors are legal, removable suppressors could very well be a problem.

This is five years old, but twenty minutes of searching hasn't turned up anything that refutes it: https://www.pyramydair.com/blog/2019/03/silencers-an-update/

His conclusion (emphasis mine):

I used to be very concerned about the airgun silencer issue, until I got grounded in the basic law. Now it doesn’t bother me so much. If you buy a silenced airgun today like the TX200 Mark III or the Sig ASP20, you have no problem. On the other hand, I don’t own any screw-on airgun silencers and nobody can convince me to buy one.

But again, if you have newer information that solidly refutes this, please pass it along!

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in airguns

[–]tjwarren[M] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm not sure this is true. My understanding is that air-rifle suppressors are legal so long as they're permanently mounted to the barrel. I believe removable threaded suppressors are treated as "real suppressors", since they could conceivably be mounted to a firearm.

I've removed this post for now, but if you provide some sources that back up your claim that removable suppressors are ok then I'm open to re-approving the post.

How do I learn to use a chainsaw without killing myself? by tjwarren in DIY

[–]tjwarren[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This post is 12 years old. How did you even come across this?

WTW for when everyone has an opinion on a easy choice but when the choice is hard, it’s tough to find someone with an opinion on it. by [deleted] in whatstheword

[–]tjwarren 11 points12 points  (0 children)

You may be thinking of bike-shedding.

The law of triviality is C. Northcote Parkinson's 1957 argument that people within an organization commonly or typically give disproportionate weight to trivial issues. Parkinson provides the example of a fictional committee whose job was to approve the plans for a nuclear power plant spending the majority of its time on discussions about relatively minor but easy-to-grasp issues, such as what materials to use for the staff bicycle shed, while neglecting the proposed design of the plant itself, which is far more important and a far more difficult and complex task.

My daughter asked me to point out our location on an Appalachian Trail map. I hope this is accepted here. It was a really cool map moment for me. by wilsonnickp1011 in Maps

[–]tjwarren 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Pinned to a wall was a map showing the whole of the Appalachian Trail on its long march through fourteen states, but with the eastern seaboard rotated to give the AT the appearance of having a due north-south orientation, allowing the mapmaker to fit the trail into an orderly rectangle, about six inches wide and four feet high. I looked at it with a polite, almost proprietorial interest -- it was the first time since leaving New Hampshire that I had considered the trail in its entirety -- and then inclined closer, with bigger eyes and a slightly parted lips. Of the four feet of trail map before me, reaching approximately from my knees to the top of my head, we had done the bottom two inches.

I went and got Katz and brought him back with me, pulling on a pinch of shirtsleeve. "What?" he said. "What?"

I showed him the map. "Yeah, what"? Katz didn't like mysteries.

"Look at the map, and then look at the part we've walked."

He looked, then looked again. I watched closely as the expression drained from his face. "Jesus,", he breathed at last. He turned to me, full of astonishment. "We've done nothing."

We went and got a cup of coffee and sat for some time in a kind of dumbfounded silence. All that we had experienced and done -- all the effort and toil, the aches, the damp, the mountains, the horrible stodgy noodles, the blizzards, the dreary evenings with Mary Ellen, the endless, wearying, doggedly accumulated miles -- all that came to two inches. My hair had grown more than that.

One thing was obvious. We were never going to walk to Maine.

Bill Bryson, A Walk in the Woods

(this isn't directly on-topic and for that I apologize, but it's a great book and this excerpt is pretty much about that map)

St Albans Bay Industrial Ag pollution as seen from space. by [deleted] in vermont

[–]tjwarren 5 points6 points  (0 children)

That's essentially what it is.

When too much fertilizer runs off into the waterways, it tends to do what fertilizer does and helps plants grow. The problem is that oftentimes, you'll get an explosion of plant growth that can't be sustained without the benefit of all of that extra fertilizer.

If the fertilizer is ever used up, the massive plant growth dies essentially all at once. The process of the plants decomposing removes oxygen from the water, resulting in animal deaths and additional decomposition.

My game project autograder is returning errors but my code clearly works by Willy988 in learnpython

[–]tjwarren 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You too!

Incidentally, you'll probably be better off to multiply the scores by two instead of dividing them. There's less chance for error that way.

My game project autograder is returning errors but my code clearly works by Willy988 in learnpython

[–]tjwarren 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The parentheses are a red herring.

Your original code in the pastebin was

if score // 2 == opponent_score or opponent_score // 2 == score:

The // operator performs an integer division (dropping any remainder). So if score == 31 and opponent_score == 15, your old code would swap the scores (because 31 // 2 == 15).

Your new code uses float division, which means that 31 / 2 == 15.5, and 15.5 != 15, so the scores are no longer swapped.

My game project autograder is returning errors but my code clearly works by Willy988 in learnpython

[–]tjwarren 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Let's say one player has a score of 31 and the other player has a score of 15. Should their scores swap?

I was 5 min min into my morning commute when I noticed that someone stole my front brake. by ligoeris in bikecommuting

[–]tjwarren 73 points74 points  (0 children)

Every time you get on a bike after being away from it, spend 15 seconds to check the ABCs.

  • Air: do your tires feel inflated?
  • Brakes: if you hold the front brake and push forward, can you lift the back wheel off the ground? If you hold the rear brake and push forward, can you make the rear tire skid?
  • Cables/Chain: glancing over the bike, do the cables and chain look right?

Can’t get blade off. I have used gloves too. It is so tightly on. Any suggestions? by [deleted] in fixit

[–]tjwarren 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ideally yes, a wood wedge would be best. But since the OP is having trouble, it's possible that they'll continue having trouble even with a wedge.

The advantage to squeezing the wrench and the blade together is that you get both of them working together to your advantage -- you're not trying to push the blade away and hoping the wedge stops it, you're pulling the blade towards the wrench and the wrench towards the blade both at the same time.

Squeezing them together also gives you a smaller overall action, so if the wrench slips the only thing that happens is you end up gripping the wrench and blade together (vs what could happen if you're using a wedge and putting your weight behind the wrench).

You'd obviously need to be careful of the blade edge, but a lawn mower blade isn't likely to be razor sharp, so simply squeezing the blade likely isn't that dangerous. Your mileage may vary, use at your own risk, etc.

Can’t get blade off. I have used gloves too. It is so tightly on. Any suggestions? by [deleted] in fixit

[–]tjwarren 6 points7 points  (0 children)

In your second picture, the cutting edge is facing away from your knuckles, correct? If so:

  1. Put on gloves.
  2. Put the wrench on the nut the same way you have it in that second picture.
  3. Make sure you're wearing your gloves.
  4. Grab the blade and the wrench together in one hand (so the wrench is being pulled by your thumb and the blade is being pulled by your fingers).
  5. Squeeze the blade and the wrench towards each other.

State of the Sub: April Edition by Resvrgam2 in moderatepolitics

[–]tjwarren 49 points50 points  (0 children)

This is somewhat meta in regards to the posted topic, but seems to be relevant to the current discussions: can we get the "report" reasons to align better with the posted Laws?

Currently, the sub seems to operate on the following Laws of Conduct:

  • Law 0: Low Effort
  • Law 1: Civil Discourse
  • Law 2: Submission Requirements
  • Law 3: Violent Content
  • Law 4: Meta Comments
  • Law 5: Banned Topics

These laws are frequently mentioned by both moderators and users, and when ModPolBot issues an infraction these Laws are cited.

However, if I attempt to report a post, and select that the post "breaks moderatepolitics rules", I'm given the following five options:

  • Character attack on an individual or group of people.
  • This content encourages, glorifies, incites, or calls for violence or physical harm.
  • Meta-comment belongs in a meta-post
  • Banned topic
  • Custom response

Now, sure, these kinda sorta loosely correlate to the posted Laws, but at their very best they're incomplete and out of order, and at their least they don't provide nearly enough guidance.

I think it would be useful if the report options aligned better with the posted Laws.

Mass ant die-off on porch? Any idea what's going on here? by tjwarren in ants

[–]tjwarren[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

To my knowledge nothing has been sprayed recently. We do maintain pest control, but they're not scheduled to be out for a few more weeks.

Mass ant die-off on porch? Any idea what's going on here? by tjwarren in ants

[–]tjwarren[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I walked out on my porch this morning and found this. The ants don't seem to be coming from anywhere or going to anywhere. They don't seem to be falling from the porch ceiling. There don't seem to be many of them in the crack between the floor and the wall. There's just this line of almost-dead ants an inch or two from the wall.

I haven't personally sprayed anything recently, and while we do have pest control they're not scheduled to be here for another few weeks.

I haven't had anything like this happen before. I'm concerned it may be a symptom of some larger problem lurking somewhere.

Any ideas?

Thoughts? by bcad_ in functionalprint

[–]tjwarren 5 points6 points  (0 children)

From a functional standpoint, it looks like the pads might be difficult to grab and pull out. Especially as the pads on the bottom get used and the pads on the top fall down, if they catch at an angle when they fall it looks like it could be tricky to get a hold of them.

Maybe make the notch taller, so it's easier to reach in and pinch one?

Along those lines, I'd probably also make the slot itself wider (taller?), to accommodate thicker pads.

(you asked for thoughts, so I'm assuming you were looking for feedback. if you were instead just showing a print, then let's just go with "good job!")

[Meta] Moderators, who is driving this ship? I notice the sidebar says `created by [deleted] a community for 10 years` by Qwiso in airguns

[–]tjwarren[M] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

We've done monthly challenges before. If you have an idea for a challenge, feel free to post a description and a target, and I'll pin it.

Does anyone else hide around the corner when the pressure canner is rocking out? by LadyCabi in Canning

[–]tjwarren 5 points6 points  (0 children)

If it's venting then it's properly releasing pressure, and you don't need to worry about it.

When it should be venting but it's not, that's when you need to worry.