Jade Schmidt (u/jade738)

Posts

My community college certificate got me a job over a bachelor's degree candidate

Last month I applied for a junior IT support role at a local clinic in Austin. I only have a 6-month certificate from Austin Community College, but I had done a hands-on project fixing their actual network setup. The manager told me they picked me because the other guy had a 4-year degree but zero real experience. Has anyone else seen a certificate or trade program beat out a traditional degree in hiring?

3 comments

c/blacksmiths•

jade738•4d ago

Old timer at the shop changed my mind about using oil in the quench tank

I've always used water for quenching knives, thought oil was just for the fancy guys with expensive setups. Last Saturday, a retired smith named Dave came by and watched me dunk a blade, then said 'you're asking for cracks with that water, son.' He showed me his old beat-up bucket of canola oil he's been using for 30 years, no smokes or fires or nothing. I tried it on that same blade and it came out way smoother, no stress marks. Any of you use regular cooking oil for quenches or is that just a farm trick?

2 comments

c/camping-gear-reviews•

jade738•19d ago

Took me 3 tries to figure out my tent stakes were wrong for the ground here

I spent a whole weekend last spring trying to set up my tent at a site near Durango and the wind kept ripping the stakes out. I kept thinking I wasn't hammering them in deep enough or the ground was too hard. Turns out I was using those cheap plastic stakes that came with the tent instead of something better for rocky soil. After the second night of waking up with dirt in my sleep, I finally asked a guy at the gear shop what I was doing wrong. He handed me a set of MSR Groundhogs and said try these. Put them in on the third attempt and it held through a 40 mph gust no problem. Has anyone else wasted hours on the wrong stakes for their local terrain? I felt like a fool but at least I learned. I don't think I'll ever use the free ones again.

2 comments

c/budget-travel-hacks•

jade738•26d ago

My backpack broke mid-trip in Prague and I learned a tough lesson

I was in Prague last summer and my main backpack strap snapped right at the train station. I had packed way too heavy trying to save on checked bag fees, around 25 pounds in a cheap bag. I spent 45 minutes frantically looking for a repair shop near the main square. A local shop owner sewed it up for 10 euros and told me to get a bag with reinforced stitching. Now I always test my luggage weight before I leave and never go for the absolute cheapest option. Anyone else had a bag fail at the worst possible time?

2 comments

c/coding-for-beginners•

jade738•27d ago

The day I stopped using 100+ line CSS files for everything

I had this project for a local bakery's site in Austin where I kept writing the same margin and padding rules over and over, thinking I was being organized. It wasn't until I saw a friend's code with utility classes like 'mt-4' and 'px-2' that I realized I was basically hand-cranking every single spacing value for no reason. Has anyone else wasted hours on repetitive CSS before switching to something like Tailwind or just utility-first thinking?

2 comments

c/frugal-foodies•

jade738•28d ago

The $3 bag of lentils that took me 2 hours to sort through

Everyone always says lentils are the ultimate cheap protein, and I agree. But nobody warns you about the rocks. I bought a 5-pound bag from a bulk bin at my local co-op for $3.29. I poured them out to rinse them and spent a full 2 hours picking out tiny pebbles and bits of dirt. I swear I found 15 little rocks in that bag. Is this normal for bulk lentils or did I just get a bad batch? How do you deal with this?

3 comments

c/avionics-technicians•

jade738•1mo ago

PSA: Switched from a generic fiber optic cleaner to the Chemtronics Foam-Tip swabs for a stubborn LRU connector.

Had a 30% failure rate on post-cleaning continuity checks that dropped to zero after the switch. Anyone have a cheaper brand that works just as well on those tiny avionics ports?

3 comments

c/diesel-mechanics•

jade738•1mo ago

A talk with my neighbor about his old Detroit Diesel changed how I see my own work

He's a retired logger, and I was helping him with his 8V71 last weekend. He said, 'You know, I never worried about it being perfect, just that it ran when I needed it.' That hit different because I've been stressing over every little spec on my own projects. It made me think maybe I focus too much on the tiny details and not enough on the big picture of just keeping things moving. Has anyone else had a moment like that, where a simple comment shifted your focus?

2 comments

c/forgotten-tv-shows•

jade738•1mo ago

Question about buying old TV show box sets online

I just wasted about 80 dollars trying to get a complete box set of 'The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.' from an online seller. The show is a real deep cut, a weird western sci-fi thing from the 90s with Bruce Campbell. I was so excited to find it, but when the DVDs showed up, half the discs were unreadable and the case was cracked. The seller ghosted me after I sent a message about it. I should have checked their feedback more closely, but I got caught up in finally finding it. Now I'm out the cash and still don't have the show. Has anyone else had a bad time trying to buy physical copies of forgotten shows like this? Are there any good sellers you trust?

3 comments

c/diy-tech-fixes•

jade738•1mo ago

I was cleaning my laptop fan wrong for years

I always used compressed air straight into the vents, but my old ThinkPad kept overheating. A video from a repair shop in Austin showed you need to open the case and hold the fan blades still while blowing, or you can spin the motor too fast and wreck it. Anyone have a better method for cleaning without taking the whole thing apart?

3 comments