Benny Ling

For best results, do everything right.

New year vibes

Picked up a new backpack this week and good golly the straps, while generously padded, are quite stiff and somewhat uncomfortable. Gonna need a couple of weeks to break them in, I think.

I rarely buy things from the US these days thanks to exchange rates being awful, but when I do I’m reminded how good shipping can be, four days from there to here is impressive. But then it better be given how much I’m paying for it…

It seems wild to me that people would put up their Christmas trees in the first week of November, but colleagues talking about it in the lift first thing this morning and my own apartment building suggest otherwise.

I enjoy eating crumpets occasionally, but the worst thing about crumpets is they go mouldy *so fast*. You can refrigerate them for days if you like ‘em stale. The best day to eat crumpets is the day you buy them. After that, no matter what you do, they’re not nearly as good.

Caught the last third of the Matildas’ game while I was at the gym. Whaddya knw, Perth IS good for something!

PSA for Australians thinking of getting up early tomorrow for the Apple event: cancel your 3AM/4AM alarms, it’s at 11AM AEDT for some unknown reason. I don’t know if that’s actually better, how am I supposed to watch it at work?

Turns out going to work half an hour earlier than normal isn’t quite enough to beat the heat. No significant difference in terms of how sweaty I am arriving at work. 😓 Maybe an hour will?

Figured out why my Polaroid stopped ejecting photos but would eject the dark slide fine. Pick arm is fine, but it doesn’t retract automatically. Now to take it apart and see if I can fix it…

With passkeys gaining more and more traction, I get the feeling I’m going to be forced to sign up for Yet Another Subscription so I can sync them across devices soon. Unless I just don’t care about non-Apple devices…

Absolutely screamed THANKS to my bus driver this morning as a way of offsetting his apparent anger at his fellow colleagues and their poor parking practices at the platform

Is the referendum democracy? Because I have done the thing but there was no democracy sausage 🥲

Jacarandas are all fun and games until the flowers fall on the ground and then it rains, turning the pretty purple carpet into a slippery surface of death.

@Lauren_lolly_ Maybe I’m thinking of something else. Maybe like a Turkish pida? But yeah, they’re good, just… strange.

@bdyling It’s nothing like a pita!!

Bagels have always seemed like a very strange food to me. It’s as if someone said “what if we could have a sandwich, that’s like a pita, but with a hole in it, like a donut?” Like, why not just have a sandwich, you know? Just seems unnecessarily complicated.

Just got invited to my gym’s Christmas party, which I did not know was a thing. Unlimited beer and cider, but $65… yeah, nah.

Happy new iPhone and Apple Watch day to all those that celebrate! Picking up my Series 9 later today at the Apple Store, which will be my first time doing in-store pickup for a pre-order.

A few hours on iOS 17 and I can already tell autocorrect feels better than it did previously. Could just be placebo from the text underlining thing it does now, but the predictive thing is good too.

In unrelated news, Logi announced the Superlight 2 this week, and while I don’t think it’s that big of an upgrade, it does have USB-C. But my soldering skills aren’t quite that good. Yet!

Worth it? It feels better; clicks are now much crisper, and it glides better now. But desoldering stuff on a tiny PCB is annoying, and I probably spent $40-50 on soldering accessories that I can reuse. I’d do it again, but only because I have another one I was going to do anyway

Picked up a 2nd hand Logitech Superlight recently. Took it apart today, de-soldered the switches it came with and put in some new ones. Also reduced amount of pre-travel on the buttons, re-lubed the scroll wheel, and gave it a good clean. New skates, too.