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Cake day: September 23rd, 2023

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  • Yes, Massachusetts. I have a dual fuel heat pump with natural gas backup installed in 2020, so it’s a newer system. And I have one heat pump mini split in the least energy efficient, but most used room in my house (large, high ceilings, exterior walls on three sides, and a skylight).

    The first couple of years I noticed when it got just below freezing, the central heat pump seemed to struggle to keep up. Then this year I replaced my windows and got new wall insulation in both of the main bedrooms and bathrooms (previous insulation was original from the 1960s and shredded to bits with huge gaps.)

    After those improvements, I’ve been running my heat pump down to 20⁰F/-7⁰C so far without any issues at all. I’m excited to see how cold we can get and this system still keep up. I am still supplementing my one large room with the mini split, but that’s mostly because all my plants are in here, so I keep this room warmer than 68⁰F/20⁰C.




  • Not true really. Wayfair is just a drop shipping company, in a similar vein as Amazon. Except with actual customer service. You can search specifically for solid wood furniture, so you don’t end up with cheap MDF toy furniture, their reviews are accurate and not gamed, and their search has robust filtering so you can drill down and find exactly what you want. I buy a lot of shit from Wayfair that is definitely better quality than Ikea.

    That doesn’t mean their CEO isn’t a labor abusing bag of dicks. I still think they should unionize.










  • Hmm, “current went missing” isn’t a phrase I’m used to hearing. I wonder if the cardiogram was indicating some level of heart block (often not a dangerous condition, just something to monitor).

    With the high fibrinogen, they’re probably concerned about clotting. I wonder, did they check a blood test called d-dimer by chance?

    I’m glad you’ll be seeing a doctor soon. We have a lot of good treatments for cardiac conditions these days.


  • May I ask you about the nature of your heart problems exactly?

    Because a “heart attack” is not actually a medical thing. What people usually mean when they say “heart attack” is what we call a myocardial infarction (lack of blood flow to the heart muscle caused by a blockage or constriction in a coronary artery.) And less commonly people use the term “heart attack” to refer to cardiac arrest where the heart just stops beating for some reason. (Myocardial infarction can turn into cardiac arrest, but cardiac arrest can happen because of any number of other things as well.)

    So do you have a confirmed occlusion of a coronary artery? Or do you have a diagnosed cardiac arrhythmia of some kind? What are they planning to do to treat you? Because “don’t get excited” isn’t a long term management strategy. It’s usually just to get you through until you find a successful treatment.

    (I’m a cardiac critical care nurse. AMA)


  • Fresh episodes of X-Files and Star Trek: TNG every week.

    Just that whole experience of something on television being a cultural zeitgeist because everyone had to watch it at the exact same time because that was the only time it existed. Sure, you could record it on VHS and watch later, but it wasn’t the same. Even being at home watching alone felt like participating in a social event.




  • Dark healthcare provider humor incoming: When considering these kinds of questions regarding CPR, we actually say, “Well, they ain’t getting any deader.”

    CPR actually reverses death. That’s why it only works sometimes and only if provided in a very short window of time after you’ve died. Nothing that is done during CPR is going to make that worse. So yeah, the reality is that it’s a little bit of a controlled free-for-all. It’s called “heroic measures” for a reason.