I'm just so exhausted with everything getting worse all the time. (Companies sabotaging their own products, mainly, because they serve the investors & not the users.)
Tell me about some stuff that is improving in a way that actually helps people.
I note that a lot of these are indie creators/businesses, or those that charge a reasonable price for their services. It's not pump-and-dump growth. It's products with a story.
I never understood how it could be interesting. My mother and both her parents were avid gardeners, I couldn't have cared less.
Now I realise it has to do with having your own space in which to garden. It's a privilege. Allotments are so important to those who otherwise have no land around their homes in which to potter and plant.
It's a joy isn't it? Pruning, planting, tending and weeding. Not a chore. A slow, gentle, growing joy.
Back from holiday! Yay! So what was the story with the hire car?
Well. We had some credit with a hire car company from a booking we cancelled years ago. We needed something bigger than our EV for this trip as we were taking an extra passenger. So we used our credit to hire a Peugeot 3008 “crossover”-style car. Petrol. Automatic.
What did I hate about it, apart from being really noisy at low speed and the jolts of gear changes that we weren’t used to?
Well… it was really (adjusted for my own expextations) big on the outside but surprisingly small on the inside. It must have had very thick walls. But in the front it also had the MASSIVE central console thing that meant that I felt really cramped as a driver.
The console also had a ridge on it at about the height of my knee, so resting my left leg against it was actually painful.
The steering wheel was small as well. Which meant that… you could not see any of the controls on the stalks! Which is fine if it’s your car and you’ve memorised everything. But I only had a week and no instruction manual.
Finally, while I liked the real buttons, there was shiny edging in the interior that, at times, reflected bright sunlight at me from several directions at once.
Oh, and the display brightness setting was buried in an obscure menu in the touchscreen. Which totally threw me when I first turned the lights on and could barely see the display.
Just SO badly designed. Was glad to hand it back.
Yes. First world problems or whatever. Thanks for enduring my rant.