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Strong recommendation for a single large sink.
Just made a Breton cake, aka butter cake. The springform leaked butter into the baking shelf below. Would've been a nightmare to clean except the entire baking shelf just fits in the sink and could be quickly cleaned.
Also pyro, but fitting it in the sink is ace
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Mine's a silly price, but I've had it for years and it replaced one I had for 15 years that just proved to be too small to be useful in the end (it was for an individual rather than a household). Because I already knew the value of them I knew I'd use it 2-3 times per week for a decade or more... that amortisation makes the cost per use about 20p... 20p for effortless perfect rice. It's a no-brainer for me. I save the money even quicker the few times I order curry or thai on Deliveroo... I do the rice myself here and save £3-4 a portion.
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And there's me still using a saucepan like some sort of stone age idiot :'(
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What's your bin? Looks nice.
Buy the bin just so you can buy their bags. Their bags are good... really good.
I opted for this one as it is the most mechanically simple of their bins... it bugs me when bins break, there's nothing on this to break that I couldn't fix... it's just two springs.
Out of interest how come you chose to box in the fridge like that?
Recommended by kitchen designer and then mock up. Basically alignment of the top of the cabinets and the counter top to the right of the fridge... it looked awful without a box around the fridge.
Once you opt for a box around the fridge, it looks odd without the cupboard at the top to even out the height and keep that line good... hence the very odd small cabinet up there (good for trays, nothing else).
It does also hide the side and back, guarantee airflow, and from the side the fridge isn't visible. So I'm happy with it.
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and house plants, copious amounts thereof!
This is the plan for those shelves.
Not just house plants though... growing herbs in little pots on the shelves and window sills (depending on which ones need how much direct sunlight or shade).
I've already bought the soil! Just in search of the pots now. I'm thinking large glass jars so it's really easy to see soil moisture level without inspecting each pot.
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And for the record... the money was worth every penny.
Whilst the project was triggered by the poor state of things, I loaded the project with a goal... could I make this room that I liked the least, that was too brightly lit and had harsh cold surfaces and a rotting wood worktop, into the room that was most pleasurable in the house? Could I make it such that even on a bright sunny day the light is natural and soothing, the materials interesting, the tactility of everything a delight? Could I make this the room I want to sit in every evening, to cook in, to delight in building my skill at cooking and baking? Could this be "the room"?
Answer: Yes.
It's a wild success from my perspective, I love being in the room now, and it's a real joy to cook and bake in there, and to eat and drink, to listen to music and just be.
PS: On that count the photos do not do it justice... the colours are slightly different and softer, the reflected light from the walnut and brass warm and welcoming, the sound is nicely dampened and soft... it's a real pleasure being in there.
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How were your stress levels out of 10? Sounds like it's been pretty calm in your posts.
Pretty calm.
The only frustration I experienced was with Harvey Jones. Their communication was poor and at one point I did write a terse email to kick them into action. I was already double my first idea of budget by this point and I wanted to get an idea of remaining costs as I knew I would come close to emptying the bank fully and if I needed credit then I wanted to know. But for several months Harvey Jones would not give an indication of what was happening, who was going to be working on the worktop, the price range, anything I needed to consider... nothing, full radio silence, and at best my emails would be acknowledged but then yield no actual response. I snapped, but not in an angry way... in a very calm way, a "I am becoming stressed due to the costs, and this is fully from your behaviour as I only need you to set my expectations"... after that things were smoother (ignoring their failure to order knobs and handles which I solved by throwing money at the problem).
So yeah... pretty copacetic throughout I'd say.
Pot noodles and eating meals made from a kettle... meh... I was homeless and rough sleeping for over 2 years in my youth, frankly being in a warm, comfortable house, and with a Deliveroo Plus account means this stuff was a breeze, it was kinda fun to go back to basic stripped down existence for a while and now I get to appreciate what I have even more.
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Finally moved the table back in there after the last of the paint was dry. Took advantage of the painter popping back to do a quality inspection of the job and to determine whether any last bits of touching up were needed - the answer to that was no, they did a great job.
Adding the painter to recommended trades: http://hallisseybarnet.com/ would give 9/10... no real reason not to give a 10, but I do like to imagine everything can be improved upon. The key to the paint job... meticulous prep, they took on the kitchen walls, woodwork, hallway, bathroom, ceilings in all of those rooms... and spend a good 3 days just working on the surface first, masking, filling, sanding, etc. I've had bad painters in the past, it's good to see what good painters look like.
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Heavy stuff on plasterboard walls is a piece of piss now I’ve found Geefix. Night and day compared to expanding or anchor bolts.
Give it a go. It’s harder to install but a million times better.
Tried this today... super fun using a 1" auger drillbit. The Geefix was really easy to install and feels rock solid.
However... I'd advise a 6mm exploratory hole first. One of the locations I was drilling was actually a joist. No Geefix needed as it was already good. Kinda patched up by inserting the Geefix circle into the new hole and screwing all three holes into the joist, but would've been cleaner just to have the centre screw considering it was anchored by the joist.
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I normally assume HDMI audio is wrapped up in HDCP and cannot be fully converted accurately. But perhaps the Chromecast isn't actually wrapping the signal it has in HDCP.
Not that I've investigated this much.
What I do know is that the SACD player I used to have with an HDMI output could only be paired with a A/V amplifier, and if I tried to jump to a coax or tape output it would prevent that... basically enforcing copy protection somewhere, presumably because the HDMI signal had HDCP.
I kinda avoid HDMI for audio now as it feels a bit opaque, I'm not quite sure what it will let me do.
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Chromecast 3 outputs HDMI, that DAC doesn't have HDMI input.. what else is in the equation?
I'm always looking for a replacement to the Chromecast Audio, not because mine has issues but because it will eventually suffer bitrot from no longer being supported.
There's this: https://www.essenceelectrostatic.com/product/hdacc-ii-4k/ but it seems a bit excessive.
And this: https://www.kanexpro.com/item/?id=HAECOAX but who knows whether this is good or not.
And this: https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=590187330024 which looks great, but would prefer spdif. But apparently this is the only way to get a coax output from a SACD.
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Climate change papers predicted 10-15 years ago that what average temp rises meant is changes in existing weather patterns, and that those changes would lead movements in weather streams that protected some areas from polar conditions... i.e. that rising temps weren't just hotter weather, but more variable and extreme weather... that 100 year events would start to occur every 5-10 years.
The Texas conditions are that.
But they're compounded by local policy on utilities seeking cheapest price for decades, and not investing in capacity or protection from extreme weather. So no regulation existed to force utility companies to ensure they could withstand extreme (relative to their norms) weather.
The Texas weather, similar to the UK "Beast from the East" recurrences, are predicted to now occur more frequently. So whilst from a historical perspective it is rare, it is now going to be more common.
Texas being so unprepared typically warm their homes on cool days with space heaters... electric heaters with fans... being just about the most power consuming heating available with no residual heat (i.e. stop running them and they don't stay hot)... so people run them constantly and that's overloaded a grid that doesn't have the capacity for it.
Oh, and they lead on wind power, more in Texas than in the UK (and our seas)... but they never opted for the few % more cost to keep that stuff working in cold weather, so it's all iced up and they've lost all of that power generation from the system.
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Blinds that rise from the bottom. By far the best blind solution. We usually have ours halfway up, privacy but let’s light in.
Only have to hide the top half of you as you walk around naked?
Oh... you mean the inverse... blinds that are on the floor when fully open and are lifted from the bottom to close.
That would be nice.
😂
That used to be the justification my local fish shop used for not changing the oil.