Jorn

Medical bills account for 40% of bankruptcies in the US.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1127305/

Rez and Fez. Similar names, very different games.

Yes. In Germany it’s called Soja sauce. Same thing.

I didn’t see this mentioned but it’s a great couch co-op indie game. Has a 93% rating on steam. https://store.steampowered.com/app/252110/Lovers_in_a_Dangerous_Spacetime/

You could check on the new requirements. There are some massive changes this year to the work visa programs. One such change is that you don’t have to work in your field of education anymore.

Wife and I are moving to Frankfurt am Main next month from the USA. Hopefully it goes well for us.

I’ve been using my Shokz OpenRun headset almost everyday for the past 6 months and I love them for lots of things but they dont replace earbuds/headphones completely.

I work in a machine shop and it’s important to be able to hear machines and things happening around you. Most shops don’t allow earbuds or headphones for that reason. Our machines aren’t too loud so it doesn’t drown out the sound but these definitely won’t work in a loud environment unless you wear earplugs but then that defeats the purpose.

Great for audiobooks, podcasts, and music that doesn’t have a lot of bass. I mostly listen to punk and metal and it’s fine for that. I can even listen to hip-hop and not expect some kicking bass.

I tried to use them for PC gaming and they just crackled during explosions and could not handle that. So I don’t use it for gaming.

Having hands free conversations with people is definitely a plus. I did some testing with my wife and she could not tell a difference in volume or on quality between using the headset and talking regularly on the phone.

Battery life and comfort are great. Sometimes I forget I’m wearing them if they are just idling on my head. With mixed use on and off all day, the charge lasts several days for me. If I was to listen to something constantly, I think I’d get more life out of a charge than I have waking hours in the day.

One thing that bothered me at first is at the highest volume, I can feel a tickle on the skin where it rests. I usually only have them up when that much when ambient noise is a bit high and then I dont notice it as much. But I’m also used to it now so it’s not as bad.

Be careful with cheap sets. My wife got a cheap pair on Amazon with “good ratings” and it was awful. It was basically earbud style speaker/drivers that were up against your skin and it was terrible.

I used to be an Operations Manager at a machine shop with 150 employees and a Program Manager at another places with 250 employees. Both had 5am starts. In my experience, the biggest factor was support for the billable staff. You have direct labor employees; these are the people who run machines and fabricate products. Then there are indirect employees that support the direct employees; like purchasing, planning/scheduling, management, customer service, quality, etc. Most manufacturers with a 5am start time are running multiple shifts of direct labor. The indirect employees usually don’t start until 7-8am and overlap both shifts to have some support for both day and night shift.

Manufacturers that run one shift(like my current job) usually start later. We start at 7am but allow people to flex their start time for kids, etc.

If you look at other countries like Germany you can get high speed 400mbps for around $30-35 a month. Fiber isn’t as available in a lot of areas but it is expanding and you can get 1000mbps for $45 a month.

US cable companies are price gouging customers so bad. And that’s all while getting money from the government to fund their infrastructure expansions.

I think it’s important to point out that this disqualification under section 3 of the 14th amendment does not require conviction of a crime. Anyone who has previously taken oath as a member of the US government can be disqualified from holding office if they “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.” There is enough of an argument that just providing comfort to insurrectionists is enough to disqualify.

https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/amendment-14/section-3/