womp womp

I live in a townhouse complex with a strata that contracts with a gardening company, whose costs make up a not insignificant part of the monthly "rent" we have to pay for the house we own.

Every week they bring in gasoline powered tools and make the entire complex sound like a biker gang HQ for literally the entire day. Not just a constant engine sound either, CONSTANT revving up and down because otherwise people would be able to get used to it and block it out and we can't have that. That was great back when I worked night shift and it's still great now that I work remotely and no one in online meetings can hear me properly that day. And then the exhaust fumes waft into your windows which is great in the summer in a house that doesn't have built in air conditioners (because they weren't necessary where I live until literally a few years ago, can't imagine why with all the fossil fuel powered tools we use constantly) and where the strata bans installing proper high efficiency split air conditioners. So we're forced to use only portable air conditioners that don't seal against the swing-out style windows properly and create a constant low pressure that draws the air from outside in. Even better when you can't afford an air conditioner in every room and get to choose between the room smelling like an oil refinery with the windows open or risk heat stroke with them closed.

Also, they used to not just maintain the common areas, but would go into each unit's private yard (again, which we own) and pull up any non-compliant plants (read: food). Though to be fair they haven't done that in quite a while so maybe the strata changed its policy. There are also quite a few bushes around here that are just sticks and branches because every time it tries to sprout new leaves they get trimmed back, and the strata wonders why they keep dying and keeps forcing us to pay for replacements that will die in a year from not being allowed to grow properly. Who needs green on your plants when you can make them unnatural geometric shapes instead?

And this isn't even "oh you demand neatly trimmed hedges but get mad when it inconveniences you" I don't want neatly trimmed hedges. Just let them grow naturally like plants are supposed to, the ends truly don't justify the means. Save that money and use it to maintain the aging buildings themselves instead of hiking up the strata payments every time something goes wrong while refusing to budge on any existing spending. Also, these are plants in the interior courtyard past the gate, who the hell are you impressing when the only people who see them are the ones living here?

I live in a townhouse complex with a strata that contracts with a gardening company, whose costs make up a not insignificant part of the monthly "rent" we have to pay for the house we own.

Every week they bring in gasoline powered tools and make the entire complex sound like a biker gang HQ for literally the entire day. Not just a constant engine sound either, CONSTANT revving up and down because otherwise people would be able to get used to it and block it out and we can't have that. That was great back when I worked night shift and it's still great now that I work remotely and no one in online meetings can hear me properly that day. And then the exhaust fumes waft into your windows which is great in the summer in a house that doesn't have built in air conditioners (because they weren't necessary where I live until literally a few years ago, can't imagine why with all the fossil fuel powered tools we use constantly) and where the strata bans installing proper high efficiency split air conditioners. So we're forced to use only portable air conditioners that don't seal against the swing-out style windows properly and create a constant low pressure that draws the air from outside in. Even better when you can't afford an air conditioner in every room and get to choose between the room smelling like an oil refinery with the windows open or risk heat stroke with them closed.

Also, they used to not just maintain the common areas, but would go into each unit's private yard (again, which we own) and pull up any non-compliant plants (read: food). Though to be fair they haven't done that in quite a while so maybe the strata changed its policy. There are also quite a few bushes around here that are just sticks and branches because every time it tries to sprout new leaves they get trimmed back, and the strata wonders why they keep dying and keeps forcing us to pay for replacements that will die in a year from not being allowed to grow properly. Who needs green on your plants when you can make them unnatural geometric shapes instead?

And this isn't even "oh you demand neatly trimmed hedges but get mad when it inconveniences you" I don't want neatly trimmed hedges. Just let them grow naturally like plants are supposed to, the ends truly don't justify the means. Save that money and use it to maintain the aging buildings themselves instead of hiking up the strata payments every time something goes wrong while refusing to budge on any existing spending. Also, these are plants in the interior courtyard past the gate, who the hell are you impressing when the only people who see them are the ones living here?

I currently use "The Transit App" for navigating by transit. How bad is that privacy wise? I know it tracks your location at least while you're in the en route mode because it advertises that as part of its real time tracking system, and I'm torn on whether I'm okay with that given that I directly benefit from the improved real time data whenever someone else taking the same line is end route (you can see transit vehicles being tracked by another user's app session vs data from the transit agency itself). Is there anything more shady going on with that app? Is there any way to tell whether it's recording my motion sensors? Is the generic sounding name intentionally hiding that it's made by the CIA or something?

I don't know if it's because of me growing up and my tastes changing, but I could swear fruits from the grocery store when I was a kid were nowhere near as sweet as they are now. Some of the fruits I've eaten recently are genuinely sweeter than soda because the soda tastes bitter after eating the fruit.

Are they selectively breeding/GMOing fruits to produce more sugar? Is that bad? I feel like that's a bad thing but don't actually know.

Is there any way hijacked tasks can read your other files? I assume BOINC uses some kind of sandbox but how secure is it? All my stuff run Linux if that makes a difference.

I really want my primary mobile computer to be a tablet mainly because I genuinely like the form factor. My current Linux laptop is dying and I thought I'd just buy the newest Lenovo Thinkpad Surface clone but Lenovo seems to have discontinued it because I couldn't find a 2025 version anywhere, same with HP and Dell's Surface clones. And most of the Windows tablets I could find online have dinky Intel N processors instead of Core.

Can anyone recommend a high end tablet that runs Linux well? Failing that, how bad is the Surface really with Linux as the only OS?

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/35078393

AI has made the experience of language learners way shittier because now people will just call them AI on the internet.

Also, imagine trying to learn a language and not being able to tell whether it's your own lack of knowledge or if what you're reading is actually AI slop and doesn't make sense.

AI has made the experience of language learners way shittier because now people will just call them AI on the internet.

Also, imagine trying to learn a language and not being able to tell whether it's your own lack of knowledge or if what you're reading is actually AI slop and doesn't make sense.

I currently use btrfs on almost all my server and offline backup drives mainly because of the ability to transparently compress files to save space. But apparently btrfs can get corrupted if it unexpectedly loses power? Is there a more robust and corruption resistant filesystem that you'd recommend that also has the ability to compress files?

I have one of those pitchers that I mainly use to get rid of the chlorine taste in the tap water, but are the actual health claims about drinking filtered water actually true? There are claims that these dinky little passive filters can get rid of things like lead and PFAS which I honestly don't believe. Especially if you're using it with tap water which I'd assume would always have some kind of active filtration before it gets to your home, so the idea that whatever got past the industrial grade filter at the water treatment plant can be caught by a little plastic one sounds more than a little fishy to me. Anyone have knowledge about this.

Dude was getting lonely not being able to micromanage the lives of government employees.

Text of the article at the time of posting:

Ontario ordering public servants back into office full time

Current mandate of 3 days a week has been provincial government policy since April 2022

Mike Crawley · CBC News · Posted: Aug 14, 2025 7:17 AM PDT | Last Updated: 1 hour ago

Premier Doug Ford's government is ordering Ontario public servants to work from the office four days a week starting this fall and then full-time in January.

It's a change from a policy that has been in place since April 2022, when provincial government employees were mandated to be in their offices at least three days per week.

Employees of the Ontario Public Service, provincial agencies, boards and commissions must "increase their attendance to four days per week" starting Oct. 20 and transition to full-time hours in-office effective Jan. 5, 2026, said Treasury Board President Caroline Mulroney in an announcement Thursday. 

Ford says he believes government employees are more productive when they are in the office. 

"How do you mentor someone over a phone? You can't. You've got to look at them eye to eye," Ford said during an unrelated news conference Thursday in Pickering.

Ford also suggested having provincial workers return to the office is better for the economy, pointing out that many small businesses that rely on foot traffic from office workers have suffered due to remote work policies. 

"There's hard-working entrepreneurs that their business has basically just died when they weren't seeing the flow of traffic."

The news follows on the heels of announcements by four of Canada's big banks — RBC, Scotiabank, BMO and TD — that staff at their Toronto headquarters must spend at least four days a week in the office, effective this fall. 

'Everyone needs to go back to work,' says Ford

Ford said his government wasn't influenced by the bank mandates, but said business leaders he'd spoken with agree "everyone needs to go back to work." 

"We look forward to having everyone back; we're very grateful for the work they do. We have the best public service in Canada and I appreciate the work they do every day," he said.

Ontario's top bureaucrat, Secretary of Cabinet Michelle DiEmanuele, said in a memo obtained by CBC News that the decision "is in line with an increasing number of organizations across the public and private sectors."

The province's move comes just two weeks after it reached a new collective agreement with AMAPCEO, which represents some 14,000 professional, administrative and supervisory employees in the Ontario Public Service. 

The province was "hellbent on removing" employees' options for remote work during those negotiations, says AMAPCEO president Dave Bulmer. 

"I am incensed by this morning's announcement," said Bulmer in a message to union members. "We have shown that we can, and should, be treated as the capable, trustworthy professionals we are — professionals capable of working for Ontario from anywhere." 

Bulmer says there should be no changes for provincial employees who have a formal, signed agreement allowing them to work remotely, and says AMAPCEO members who want to work remotely should make an official request now.

Officials from OPSEU, the union that represents roughly half of the Ontario Public Service workforce, said they will issue a statement in response to the changes later on Thursday. 

The provincial government's single-largest office space in Toronto, the Macdonald Block complex, is undergoing a $1.5 billion renovation and has been shut down for six years. 

Staff of several provincial ministries have since been working from rented office space scattered around the city's downtown. 

Federal government employees are currently subject to a three-days-per-week minimum in the workplace, imposed last September. There's been some evidence since that the policy is not being strictly enforced. 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mike Crawley

Senior reporter

Mike Crawley has covered Ontario politics for CBC News since 2009. He began his career as a newspaper reporter in B.C., spent six years as a freelance journalist in various parts of Africa, then joined the CBC in 2005. Mike was born and raised in Saint John, N.B.

With files from Sarah Petz