u/tectactoe

Most of my reading has been either non-fiction (biographies and such) or technical reading (lots of engineering manuals and things of that nature). I have read a few fiction books, mostly ones that were made into movies (because I was very into movies and wanted to read the books). Those would include… High Fidelity, 2001: A Space Odyssey, No Country for Old Men, The Godfather. Loved them all.

I’m interesting in getting into reading and discovering a lot of the classics…But I don’t even know where to start. What, say, five (or even 10) books would you recommend to someone to get them started into the world of fictional literature?

Thanks

Funny enough, I am a mechanical engineer and have used commercial 3D printing throughout the years for various projects, but I really don't know much about "at home" 3D printers at all. My son will be turning 8 soon, he is autistic and has very specialized/unique interests for someone his age, and he is currently obsessed with 3D printed objects. I think he has seen some YouTubers creating cool 3D printed fidgets and toys and things and is very interested in doing some himself. I feel like this would be a cool opportunity to get him even more interested in computers/design/etc. things like that. His brain is remarkable and this feels like a great outlet for him. Plus our daughter (5 years old) would love all the little tiny toys and things we could make haha.

My initial research led me to the Bambu Lab A1 printer as the best option for "I want to start 3d printing, I don't want to overspend, and I want something that simply works and won't give me hours and hours of headaches trying to fix and tinker just to get it to work." The A1 seems like the consensus best option there, so I have some questions:

>1. Should I go for the "Combo" A1 or the regular? The Combo seems very convenient that it can load multiple colors at once. I am thinking it might just be worth it to have that feature but wanted to get some opinions here.

>2. As far as creating models goes - I know you can find a lot of things online to simply download and print. But I also have licensed CATIA software through my work. Am I able to create models in CATIA that can be used for printing on the A1? Is it as simple as saving them as .stl files and... "uploading" them to the printer?

>3. Is it recommended to purchase the printer from Bambu directly, or a retailer like Best Buy? I was thinking of the latter, since I don't love the idea of shipping a $370+ device across the country in 90°+ degree weather. Plus returns would be easier if something goes wrong, and also no shipping costs. But again, wanted to see if there was any benefit to buying directly from Bambu?

>4. Might be a dumb question, but when you buy a new printer...does it come with any starter filaments? Or will I need to buy some filament right out of the gate?

>5. Can the printer just sit on any table? If we do get this, it will probably go in our basement on one of those Lifetime foldable tables. I don't see why this would be an issue but want to ask just to be safe.

>6. I see that the A1 doesn't have an enclosure... Is this fine? I mean, I assume so, since that's how it is sold. But are there any precautions I'll need to consider getting a printer with no enclosure (other than the obvious: Don't touch the moving pieces while it's printing!).

Thank you all for the help in advance.

My email is a university email (@umich.edu) which uses Google/Gmail as its client. I have never had an @outlook.com email…ever. My work uses Microsoft Outlook the application but our domain is not @outlook, it’s @companyname.

Anyway. An email showed up in my block list. Maybe it was an email that sent me a strange text a long time ago and I blocked it. But I don’t recognize the email at all. It’s a rather nonsensical string of letters @outlook.com. Either way, I have zero association with it and have no idea who or what it is.

Here’s the weird thing. I go to Microsoft’s website and try to login with this strange email. Click “forgot password” and it asks me to enter another, different email to which they can send the login recovery code. I enter my real email, the @umich.edu one. Lo and behold, Microsoft…actually sent me a six-digit recovery code???

So I enter it. And it takes me to another screen that wants me to put in more information about the account - name, birthday, etc., and at this point I just back out.

But now I’m curious and creeped out. WHY did this work? Why did Microsoft send me a recovery code for this email that I have absolutely zero knowledge of, have never seen before (that I can recall), and most certainly isn’t mine. Obviously if I wasn’t denoted as the recovery email for this account, Microsoft wouldn’t have sent me a code. But they did…which means I AM somehow the recovery email address for this weird, spam-looking outlook email?

Does anyone know what the heck is going on or how this could happen?

Thanks in advance.

My son is about to turn 8. He has autism and is extremely intelligent for his age - I say this to emphasize that his interests and hobbies are not those of a neurotypical child his age. (He has gone through many phases of hobbies including interests in rocks/minerals/geodes, foreign currency/coins, modding things in Minecraft, exploring and reading about space/galaxies/distant planets, etc.)

Recently he has become obsessed with an app he found that lets you see things through the eyes of other animals. Like, you select "dog" and it shows you via filter what the world would look like to a dog. Or bird, ant, spider, cow, etc. And he has an attachment that is basically a big set of goggles that holds the phone in front of your eyes, like a makeshift VR headset.

Considering his large appetite for sensory input, I think getting a real/actual VR headset would be awesome for him, and would hopefully be stimulating, engaging, and/or educational. But I don't know the first thing about VR headsets. How do they work? Are they similar to video game "systems" where you have to buy "games"? Or apps? Like, if we got him a VR headset, the first thing he would ask for is if he could do the "animal vision" thing he's been obsessed with on the phone. I don't even know if this is something that a real VR headset would have. And if so, would it be an app/game you have to buy/download? Or do VR headsets just have their own preloaded games/activities/things?

I tried googling but it seems like the "world" of VR headsets is so large at this point, and ranging from cheap to insanely expensive that I don't even know where to begin looking or reading up.

If anybody has any good suggestions, advice, or just general information to get me started, that would be much appreciated.

Thanks.

36 y/o male, 6' 0", 200 lb athletic build, exercise 4x/week, never smoker, occasional/social (weekend) drinker (just beer, rarely enough to get drunk). No other drug or substance use. On 50 mg of both losartan and sertraline daily for about 6 years (for hypertension and anxiety, respectively). Have had no issues with those meds.

Here is the timeline of events:

• ~First week of March, there was a day where I yelled really loud. Kids & I were at a park and I had to get the attention of one of them that was very far away. My throat hurt a little after that due to how loud I yelled, but I figured that was normal.
• Over next couple days, noticed a very VERY faint soreness in my throat, still thought it was just carry over soreness from yelling.
• Several more days pass, suddenly I notice the sore throat getting worse. It seems localized on the right(ish) side of my throat, feels "deep" if that makes sense. Now I figure at this point I might be getting sick, unrelated to the yelling.
• Another week or so passes. Throat is still sore, getting slightly worse, but no other symptoms of sickness. No cough, fever, lethargy, headache, nothing. Just sore throat. It is not painful enough to prevent eating (in fact eating makes it feel better), but it is noticeable and sore enough to be bothersome.
• Another ~week, throat still sore, decide to visit ENT. They put a scope through my nose and look down my throat. I get diagnosed with a "classic case of thrush" (doc's words). I confirm with him there appear to be no strange lesions or anything like that. Lymph nodes not swollen. Prescribed two weeks of fluconazole.
• After two weeks of fluconazole, throat still hurts. Feels the same, not better, not worse. Go back to see ENT. He scopes again, says the thrush is gone (no more white patches) and he doesn't see anything that would appear to be causing pain. No inflammation, no lesions, nothing he would note as abnormal. Prescribes me 1 week of amoxicillin and 1 month of famotidine. The former in case of an underlying infection causing this, the latter in case it's due to silent reflux.
• I am now ~two weeks past that (so the amoxicillin dose is done and has been done for about a week now), still taking the famotidine nightly. Throat...still sore.

Weirdly enough, the "soreness level" fluctuates. About 3 or 4 days into the amoxicillin, there was a day or two where the pain was almost gone. I thought for sure it was going away. But then, very next day, I wake up and bam, the soreness is back to its "normal" level and persists...all day.

Again, talking or eating doesn't hurt it worse. In fact, eating/drinking seems to soothe it (or at least not affect it at all). It doesn't even hurt (or isn't noticeable) when I'm just still, even. The only thing(s) that trigger the soreness are 1. swallowing my saliva, and 2. I've noticed that yawning/opening my lower jaw at a certain angle can trigger the soreness.

The soreness seems to originate from the exact same "spot" in my throat. To me it feels like the back-right side is where it is coming from, and has been coming from this entire time.

During all this, I also had my yearly labs/physical. I get a metabolic and lipid panel done every year, and everything on those panels were normal. Normal cholesterol, normal A1C, other levels normal. I also got an HIV test done - I had no real reason to believe I contracted it, but it was an off-the-wall suggestion after getting thrush, and my anxiety forced me to ask my doc for the test (it came back negative).

At this point I don't know what to do. Nothing seems to be helping. IDK if the yelling at the start of this even has anything to do with it, but I thought it might be worth of noting.

What could be causing this pain/soreness lasting for this long that an ENT wouldn't be able to see with a nose/throat scope? What would be the next things to look for?

If this doesn't clear up by the time my famotidine dose is over (and it likely won't), I will go back to the ENT to discuss next steps. But in the meantime, I wanted to reach out here to see if anyone else has any ideas. Or has encountered a similar situation before. Or even just prepare me for what the next steps might be.

Thank you.

Been in the home for ~8 years (SE Michigan). Occasionally get mice in the yard. Also have an attached garage. Have traps set up all around the garage and catch a mouse here or there.

Noticed a few mouse tunnels/holes the other day near the back of my house - right in the grass alongside where it meets the brick. Set up a few snap traps back there along the house and caught one overnight.

My wife and daughter went outside this morning to play and take the dog out (we just got a new Dachshund) and my daughter saw the trap with the dead mouse hanging halfway out (it's one of those "igloo" kinds that hides the snap but sometimes the mouse doesn't always fit totally inside, so you can see a dead half-a-mouse hanging out.

Anyway, daughter was traumatized and crying (she's 5) and my wife is also not happy considering we now have a small puppy who could probably fit his tiny paw in there and is also probably attracted to peanut butter. So, agreed there.

Is there anything I can do that's relatively safe for humans and dogs to the outside of the perimeter of my house to hopefully deter or keep the mice from even wanting to be there?

Thanks