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writerkitSo I ordered a bunch of laptop chargers from eBay. They're "ships from California", which I take to mean they're probably not as snarled up in the current supply chain mess. Normally I try to have one spare one on hand, and then order a new one as soon as I've needed to start using the spare one.
I would like to not break a laptop charger every few months, but I have not yet figured out what I'm doing that causes this-- although I did figure out that I need the straight ones which are slightly more likely to break because they are much less likely, in the process of breaking, to break the laptop's pin. Chargers are replaceable; it's a lot harder to keep spare pins around. And thenbenign_cremator has to open up my laptop and it's completely out of commission until he has time and the part gets here. Having done it once, we'd both like to avoid having to do it again. So I'm using slightly more fragile chargers.
But why I am ordering a bunch now? Well, if supply chains are going to keep getting worse that's going to make it harder to get them; I want to have more on hand. (Which is to say, once they all arrive, I'm going to keep ordering a new one as the old one breaks-- it's just I'm going to have more than one spare one in the house at any given time in case that ends up taking months.)
I'm also making some effort to build a pantry, although that keeps getting foiled by things like not being able to go grocery shopping because of COVID exposure. (I suppose that would have been worse if I didn't have the half-built pantry to draw from.)
Other prepping: I am going to order a ruggedized cell phone now rather than in several months, which would be fine except that means I have to sit down and try to puzzle out which ones have the ability to run a GPS app-- they tend to focus more on the kinds of sensors you'd want on a job site and less on processing power. It's just I want one that's built to last, which is kind of the major selling point of a ruggedized phone. (And I have a strong desire for a Titan Unihertz-- not the Pocket, which doesn't exist yet, but the original-- because PHYSICAL KEYBOARD but I honestly can't tell if it can run a GPS app or not. The long Reddit analysis of it I found was more focused on whether it had the correct kind of tactile feedback as opposed to various models of Blackberry and apparently the camera is terrible. Which I care much less about.)
I would like to not break a laptop charger every few months, but I have not yet figured out what I'm doing that causes this-- although I did figure out that I need the straight ones which are slightly more likely to break because they are much less likely, in the process of breaking, to break the laptop's pin. Chargers are replaceable; it's a lot harder to keep spare pins around. And then
benign_cremator has to open up my laptop and it's completely out of commission until he has time and the part gets here. Having done it once, we'd both like to avoid having to do it again. So I'm using slightly more fragile chargers.But why I am ordering a bunch now? Well, if supply chains are going to keep getting worse that's going to make it harder to get them; I want to have more on hand. (Which is to say, once they all arrive, I'm going to keep ordering a new one as the old one breaks-- it's just I'm going to have more than one spare one in the house at any given time in case that ends up taking months.)
I'm also making some effort to build a pantry, although that keeps getting foiled by things like not being able to go grocery shopping because of COVID exposure. (I suppose that would have been worse if I didn't have the half-built pantry to draw from.)
Other prepping: I am going to order a ruggedized cell phone now rather than in several months, which would be fine except that means I have to sit down and try to puzzle out which ones have the ability to run a GPS app-- they tend to focus more on the kinds of sensors you'd want on a job site and less on processing power. It's just I want one that's built to last, which is kind of the major selling point of a ruggedized phone. (And I have a strong desire for a Titan Unihertz-- not the Pocket, which doesn't exist yet, but the original-- because PHYSICAL KEYBOARD but I honestly can't tell if it can run a GPS app or not. The long Reddit analysis of it I found was more focused on whether it had the correct kind of tactile feedback as opposed to various models of Blackberry and apparently the camera is terrible. Which I care much less about.)
