Yes the water heater was replaced. Just for my unit.
Printable View
Here is a rant about yet more financial consequences to the capital gains event for us that took place last year. I bitched and moaned about the enormous tax bill we paid last April, around $50,000. This was made necessary when one of our stocks cashed out without warning and out of our control.
So now, we got a letter from Nanny Government telling us we have to pay double for Medicare due to that one time increase of “income.”: Bite me Federal government.
Iris, we are facing that with our RMDs. So agree with your rant.
Is that for one year only, the increase in premium for Part B, or is that forever?
IL That happened to us when we sold my father in law's house that we inherited...a jolt to pay more for medicare! But at least it is only one year!
It is just such an unexpected thing.
Taxes, I get. The tax man will extract his tax. But I never expected Medicare to be impacted.
Well, live and learn. And as I ponder Required Minimum Distributions that will kick in at a future point, I need to look at the Medicare income chart and see if those will impact Medicare payments. Qualified Charitable Distributions will likely mitigate that, making QCD an attractive choice.
IL, I do the charity distribution of RMD and it is easy. Well, the stock guy does it. My husband chose not to do that. I'm not sure if it impacted our taxes, but it didn't mess with Medicare.
The keyboard on my MacBook stopped working yesterday. Well, not completely stopped, the e, o, m and q keys seem to work just fine but the rest not so much. I followed the first rule of computer glitches and rebooted but then found that since my login is not qome, I'm locked out of the machine.
Not a huge deal, it's a 2018 model and nothing lasts forever but we're currently on the road on our annual winter wander with no access to backup machines at home for the next couple of months, nor is there an electronics store within 50 miles of our current campground. Slowly tapping this post out with my thumb on my phone and not being one of those swift thumb typers its taking forever.
We're scheduled to move to the next campground on our itinerary tomorrow and Google Maps assures me there's a Best Buy within 20 miles of that location. I think we'll be out shopping next week.
Good luck in getting your Mac fixed soon. How annoying!
Nope
I'm planning on trying that once I get closer to civilization. However, I texted my youngest grandson yesterday for advice and he got excited about the idea of opening it up and poking around inside. I, being a typical grandparent told him if he could fix it, he could have it. So, I'm spending this afternoon reading reviews of the latest MacBook Pro vs MacBook Air models. They're expensive little buggers!Quote:
USB keyboard is how I am getting around someone spilling soda on my work laptop (2,w,s,x don't work).
I will confess that in the year 2017 I bought a MacBook Pro, way too much computer for my needs. It never really took to me. I didn’t take to it. Mainly there were never ending email problems (likely caused by me) and then the machine started failing in 2022 but Mac peeps could not identify problem.
So, I traded it in and got a regular MacBook Air and this little machine has been perfectly fine. We get along splendidly.
I am not a fan of researching for a new item. Good luck and hope you find what you like, Alan.
I had to read to see what you would be ranting about, happystuff--ranting is so unlike you! I am relieved to see you are supporting Alan and not ranting about anything, just being your general pleasant and supportive self! Thanks for being you!
Thank you happystuff! I'm just the opposite, I enjoy reading reviews and narrowing the scope of acceptable products before committing. I started the process for this purchase by reviewing current versions of the old machine with similar specs, namely a MacBook Pro with 32GB of ram and minimum 512GB solid state drive. But boy howdy that things over $3000!
A couple hours of reading reviews convinced me I would be perfectly satisfied with a MacBook Air with similar specs for about half that amount. Guess which one I'm picking up tomorrow?
My 2015 MacBook which essentially died earlier this year was an Air. It was great. I replaced it with a mid-level Windows Lenovo laptop as I didn’t want to spend the cash on what a MacBook costs now. I wanted to have the capability to work from home and the $800 Windows laptop gave me that. Two monitors were $90 each on Amazon. Personal stuff is only done on the laptop when websites don’t play well with mobile devices, such as certain gov’t websites. I use iPad and iPhone for everything else.
I went with Lenovo after a friend’s IT guy hubby suggested Lenovo and walked me through options. I was really proud of myself for realizing I needed two HDMI ports, but laptop I wanted only had one. I did some digging on Amazon and found an adapter that expanded one HDMI port into two, allowing you to use them both at the same time. That adapter was only $50 and has worked well. I got it all set up myself, too! There was a bit of fumbling but it wasn’t too bad.
For a lot of people, a laptop isn’t really a need anymore. A decent tablet takes care of the need for a PC, aside from the rate website (usually government related) that doesn’t play well with mobile browsers. The state of IL is like that. I had to use the laptop to renew my concealed carry permit.
I hate the research. When my local Ford dealership suggested I “ go online and research the features I want in a car and then place the order with us “ I thought nope.
So I called our friend from whom we have purchased 3 cars and said “ Ed, I want a Bronco Sport in the weird blue color and I don’t want a lot of junk on it.” I placed the order over the phone, easy and done.
The “feature” I wanted was a car that drives.
I tried to buy from our local guy but am not doing any research.
My iPad debacle yesterday:
I use my iPad 10 for everything, including my music for church choir (director does a pdf for herself and more of us are doing it now). At coffee hour yesterday, I put my purse and iPad in the middle of the big round table we were at. A senior lady who is a friend is choir was fumbling around and sent my coffee flying. iPad got soaked, including the charging port. I got home and it wouldn’t charge. I went to Best Buy, certified Apple repair place, and I was told that if it wouldn’t charge, it was shot. $400 for the repair and Apple wouldn’t fix it. New one is $100 more. So I got a new one. Told the lady who sent coffee flying that I was taking it to be fixed and she said she’d cover it. She got very quiet when I told her later I had to buy a new one ($500) she got very quiet. I told her we’d talk about it later. Thinking of asking her to cover half the cost and give me $25-$50 a month, as she’s on a fixed income.
Then when I got home and was trying to update it, the backup from iCloud would not work. It backups were for iOS 17 something and the iPad was still at 16. The Apple update servers didn’t respond so it took me trying occasionally all evening to finally be able to do the update. Everything finally downloaded and stuff and so I’m good. What a mess though.
Tradd, I’m sorry to hear that. That’s really too bad about your IPAD.
I am seldom without my IPAD minis. I have two that function well, both several years old. Probably this year one will go kaput.
Here’s my rant for the day, kinda a funny one:
On New Year’s Eve a local winery is holding a Leisure Suit party. A meetup of Leisure Suits a mere 3 miles from our house!
So DH pulled out his pristine Leisure Suit that he’s had for 50 years and….surprise! It does not fit.
I am currently watching You Tube videos to figure how I can cobble an expansion in the pants of this suit.
It would be a shame to miss this opportunity to wear this suit, so easy to attend, so close to home.
IL, You made me laugh!! Pristine but did not fit!
Well, I have decided not to tear apart these pants to expand them because I just don’t want that to become my sewing project. So we decided he will wear the original slick polyester shirt and jacket, both kinda/sorta fit. He also has the groovy shoes with heels that go with it, it’s a complete outfit.
Checking eBay, I see that pants and jacket just like it sold for $127. There was no smooth shirt or groovy shoes in that sale.
I wish I still had a sales account at eBay because I think we could get $150+ for the entire thing.
I had skipped doing FL this year as I missed being at church/singing in choir and being with goddaughter’s family. Well, the latter is something I won’t miss much when I’m in FL next year. Dinner is at 6pm. Do none of these people have to work tomorrow? At least they’re only 30 min from me. I was told to get there at 6. I really hope dinner is served shortly after I arrive.
Tradd, 6 pm seems like a reasonable time to have dinner, do you think it should be something like 4 PM? That’s just seems early.
My rant for the day is The nonstandard way people describe measurements of objects they are selling.
I do a lot of online shopping. A LOT! There is a standard way to measure furniture and most objects. You stand in front of it, and measure width height, depth. Too many people confuse depths and width. Sometimes height and depth is confused. It all leads to my confusion about the item and I’ll move onto another item if I don’t understand its measurements. They lose a sale.
I suspect the turkey did not get done. I am with you. In the US, 8 seems to be only fine for fancy restaurants here. Or maybe it is my age. In Europe, the restaurants we visited did not even open until 7 at the earliest.
I don’t know what the reason was. Never had this issue with them and I’ve spent many holidays with them. If it was New Year’s Eve, 8pm wouldn’t have been an issue. But I have to work tomorrow and I bet I’m not the only one out of the people that cancelled.
Today’s peeve - websites that will NOT work with mobile browsers.
Work’s 401K administrator has a website that you can’t access on phone/tablet browser. It directs you to their app, which didn’t work well until recently. You can do anything excel or change your contribution amount. I went to HR and asked where in the app I could so it. I was told I’d have to do it on their full website, which means I have to haul out the laptop. I do everything on iPhone or iPad. It’s absolutely ridiculous to have an app that’s not fully functional and forces you to the website.
I’m sick. Sore throat yesterday, chills last night. I got flu and Covid shots. I’m not going in today. Have a ton of stuff to do but coworker can do the urgent stuff. I’ve not been sick like this in years, since pre covid at least.