Categories
Cars First World Problems Personal

A Chinese-made BMW but with Volvo parts

Part 5 of my ongoing Electric Car series. Fixing my mistake with the Mach E order would cost $5,000 extra, plus taxes (for the extended-range battery) and another trip to the awful dealership, including redoing the price negotiation. No way. Life’s too short for that stress. The Polestar 2 was my second choice for an […]

Categories
Cars First World Problems Personal

I read more

Part four in my Electric Car series. Like many nerds who just made a big purchase, I sat down the next day to read even more about the Mach E. Despite the lousy dealership experience (in part my fault, I don’t know why I had any expectations), I was looking forward to getting the car […]

Categories
Cars First World Problems Personal

Ford

Part 3 of my Electric Car series. I already established that I want an electric car, but not a Tesla. What’s left? The Chevy Bolt. Small, simple, with a small tendency to catch on fire (presumably new ones don’t?). Good price/performance. Excellent for a city car. I seriously considered it, although at my age/with my […]

Categories
Cars Commentary First World Problems Personal

I don’t want a Tesla

This is part 2 of my “Electric Car” series. I knew I wanted an electric car this time. The obvious choice was a Tesla Model 3, almost universally praised for its driving dynamics, range, software, and purchase experience. But you know what? I don’t want a Tesla. And a car, for me, is more than […]

Categories
Cars First World Problems Personal

Electric Car

My children used to love listening to They Might Be Giants’ Here Comes Science in the car. This song stuck with me; it was clear, even in 2009, that electric cars were the future. The reason I’m writing this is, unsurprisingly, because tomorrow I’ll take delivery of my first electric car. It’s kind of a […]

Categories
Commentary First World Problems Tech

I still dislike AT&T, but I use it again

A long time ago, I abandoned AT&T for the crimson-tinted waters of Comcast. They offered faster service, and they didn’t directly try to hoist a fraudulent contract on me. However, AT&T came around about a year ago with an offer a nerd can’t resist. Symmetrical, uncapped, 1 Gbps residential fiber-to-the-home. No strings attached. No requirements […]

Categories
First World Problems Tech

It’s a watch.

Yes, I got an Apple Watch. Sorry, Watch. And people want to know. What is it? How is it? Is it any good? Is it worth the money? All reasonable questions. I’ll answer them as best I can. Once again, there’s already way-too-much written about the Watch all over the internet. I’m not going to rehash […]

Categories
Commentary First World Problems Tech

AT&T doesn’t get it

I’ve been a pretty happy AT&T customer for many years. They’ve never been the cheapest (some MVNO, as of this writing), they’ve never been famous for their network (Verizon, probably), but for me they worked reliably day after day after day. Billing was arcane, but reasonably predictable. As long as I didn’t have to meddle […]

Categories
Commentary First World Problems Tech

Microsoft keeps trying to help me

This is the state of my Lync problem as of today. Yes, I changed the background. The rest looks the same. Bounce, bounce, login, crash. I never stopped to think about this before, but if you’re Microsoft, people obviously blame you for everything wrong with their computer. Dodgy hardware crashes Windows? Microsoft sucks! A pirated […]

Categories
Commentary First World Problems Tech

Microsoft tries to @Helps me

These last few days I’ve had a few unpleasant run-ins with support for different companies. These were not the result of mean people, but of uncaring and somewhat incompetent companies. Today I’ll be mocking the software titan, Microsoft. I use Microsoft Lync a lot at work. It’s a good IM solution, and used to work […]