Henry Bell (u/the_henry)

Posts

Found a wild stat about banned books in my town's library

I was looking through our local library's records online last night and noticed they had a whole section of books that were challenged but not banned. The number surprised me: 47 different books were formally challenged in our county over the last 3 years, but only 3 got removed. I dug into the reasons and most were about language or LGBTQ topics. The biggest shock was that a kids' picture book about penguins was challenged because someone thought it was about same-sex parenting. Have any of you checked your library's challenge list or seen similar weird complaints?

2 comments

c/bricklayers•

the_henry•2d ago

Went to a jobsite in Austin yesterday and saw a brick wall that made me cringe

Some crew laid a whole facade with the frogs facing out. Eight courses of brick and every single one had the indentation showing. How do you miss that for an entire shift without anyone saying something?

2 comments

c/detroit-business-networking•

the_henry•4d ago

LinkedIn networking event at the Roostertail last month was a total waste of $40

Paid for a ticket expecting actual conversations. Walked around for 90 minutes and everyone was just handing out business cards and staring at their phones. Three people literally pulled out their laptops mid-conversation. I left before the second drink ticket. Has anyone found a Detroit networking group that actually talks to each other instead of just collecting contacts?

2 comments

c/camping-gear-reviews•

the_henry•6d ago

My old tent hit 100 nights in the field and it's still dry as a bone

I just logged my gear spreadsheet and saw my 8-year-old Mountain Hardwear tent crossed the 100-night mark, all in the Pacific Northwest. Part of me thinks it's a fluke and I should replace it before it fails on a rainy trip. The other part says if it's not leaking after that many wet weekends, why fix what isn't broken? Has anyone else pushed a piece of gear way past its expected life?

2 comments

c/ai-innovations•

the_henry•8d ago

A random meetup in Austin made me rethink my whole data cleaning process

I was at a small tech meetup there last month, mostly just to kill time. This guy from a local startup was showing how they used a new AI tool to find bad data in their customer lists. He said they cut their cleaning time from about 20 hours a week down to 3. I've been doing it all by hand for my own client records, so I tried a similar method. It's not perfect, but it flagged a bunch of duplicate addresses I would have missed. Has anyone else found a good trick for this that doesn't cost a ton?

2 comments

c/coding-for-beginners•

the_henry•9d ago

Hit 100 lines of code that actually worked on my first try

I was following a Python tutorial from a site called freeCodeCamp and built a simple number guessing game. When I ran it and it worked without any errors, I was shocked lol. It felt like a real win after weeks of fixing tiny mistakes. Has anyone else had a moment like that with a small project?

3 comments

c/ask-anything•

the_henry•10d ago

Why does nobody talk about the cost of asking a lawyer a simple question?

I needed to know if a verbal agreement was binding in my state. Called a local lawyer for a quick chat, thinking it would be free. Got a bill for $175 for a 15 minute call. It was a clear answer, but that hurt. Anyone know a better way to get basic legal info without the shock bill?

2 comments

c/cable-installers•

the_henry•11d ago

I finally got a coax line through a packed wall cavity in a Denver apartment

The old plaster and lathe was blocking everything, so I tried a trick with a shop vac and a plastic bag. I taped the bag over the hole upstairs and ran the vac hose on the lower floor, which pulled the fish tape right through. Has anyone else used a vacuum to help with a tough pull?

2 comments

-1

c/computer-technicians•

the_henry•14d ago

My uncle told me to always check the RAM first, and he was totally wrong this time.

He's been fixing computers since the 90s, so I listened when a machine wouldn't boot. Spent an hour reseating and testing the memory. The real issue was a tiny bit of thermal paste that had oozed onto the motherboard pins from a bad CPU install. Cleaned it off with some isopropyl and a toothbrush, and it fired right up. Has anyone else had a go-to piece of advice that just completely failed them?

2 comments

c/digital-art-showcase•

the_henry•22d ago

Just realized my old backup plan for finished art was a ticking time bomb

For years, I'd just save the final .psd file and maybe a .jpg to my computer's hard drive and a single external drive I kept in a drawer. That was it. Then last month, my main drive failed and I found the backup drive was corrupted too, losing three months of client work. I switched to a 3-2-1 system: three total copies, on two different types of media, with one off-site. Now I use a local SSD, a NAS, and cloud storage. Has anyone else had a close call that made them totally change their file management?

2 comments

Recent Comments

2d ago

Saw a new condo building downtown and their entry panel setup is a bad idea

Bet someone could install a privacy shield over it in ten minutes.

2d ago

TIL wholesale flower markets in Philly sell to the public after 10am on Saturdays

Right, because paying $6 for a single flower that dies in three days feels like a real winning investment. Love that the flower market's business model is basically "panic sale before everything turns into compost." $25 for peonies sounds like the biggest rip-off of the grocery store's entire existence, honestly. Guess I'll just show up Saturday with a wad of cash and zero shame about not owning a commercial greenhouse.

2d ago

Spent $150 on a bore scope for a stuck lifter job and it paid for itself in an hour.

I've had a $30 endoscope from Amazon for three years and it's worked every time I needed it. Not every cheap tool is a headache, some of them are fine for occasional use.

3d ago

Almost ruined a whole batch of lentils with a cheap spice blend

@kareng27 you're totally right about that Italian seasoning scam. It happened to me with chili powder once. Bought a big jar from the regular grocery aisle and got home and realized it was like 40% corn flour and salt. The actual chili flavor was barely there. Now I just make my own blends when I can, even if it means buying a few extra jars of individual spices. The cost adds up faster that way but at least you know what you're getting. I found this out the hard way after trying to season a big batch of chili and it came out tasting like salty cardboard. My wife still gives me crap about that dinner.

3d ago

Spent 45 minutes trying to figure out why my fries were soggy

Yeah but oscarb71, you still gotta shake the basket halfway through even if you preheat.