MrEff @ MrEff @lemmy.world

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2 yr. ago

The Kirkland brand of hearing aids is the same as phonak. It is the same company. Sonova. The biggest two things are oing to be getting them fit by a good audiologist, and picking out a set that fits the needs of the person.

Totally agree. In the US- Real ear verification is actually required by law in several states. Unfortunately the laws about it are a little gray on details, but they at least require it.

Trial periods are also required by law in every state, but the time period varies. When I was in Texas it was 30 days, which is the minimum several states have. A few state offer longer periods.

Close, but definitely not 30% volume. When we fit hearing aids a good audiologist would have asked you if you already wear hearing aids and other questions to know if we need to enable a very specific feature. Each brand calls it something different, but it is generally called "first time user adaptation." It let's us set an initial decrease percentage (normally 60-70% of the prescription volume) and we can then set a 'target time' of normally about 2 or 3 weeks, maybe 4 or 5 if they are extra old. Then the hearing aids will slowely turn up on their own over the time set. In the end, the person is as 100% volume and they shouldn't have noticed. You can still do your own personal temp volume changes in the app and it doesn't interfere with the progressive steps.

A good audiologist will then typically have you come back in 2 weeks, then a month, then at 6 months, then annually or as needed. Each appointment they should be checking several things and asking about the sound and volume levels and such, but specifically we can see where you are adjusting the volume to on average. Most manufacturers let us then just take your average adjustments and apply them to the prescription. So if you are turning it down 3 db on average every day, or if you just cut a little bass or push a little more treble, we can see that and just apply it to be permanent. This is why we encourage people to use the app as much as possible.

Now, all of this is also dependent on the person wearing the hearing aids all day. We get a lot of old people that insist they only need to wear them in very specific situations and then wonder why they never get used to them. It is always fun the first time the person finds out we can see how long the hearing aids are on every day. So they are like "yeah I totally wear them for a few hours every day. 4 or 5 hours, easy" then we tell them they are actually averaging about an hour.

It's worse than you think. Last week we got an email that looked like strait up fishing spam demanding that we were to email back "yes" confirming that we got the email. So many people even reported it as spam that we had supervisors have to directly tell us that it was legit. Then they sent out a second email with a warning that is was in fact legit and to respond to that email with "yes" if we got that one.

On the back end at OPM: Musk forced his way in and demanded to redo the email servers. The IT told him it wasn't possible for what he was asking. So he brought in his own goons to install a non government server with unknown software and unknown security configurations and they plugged it into the OPM network to spoof it as an official OPM server, then sent out those emails.

And sure enough, the idiot didn't didn't configure the security correctly or let official government IT people touch it, it ended up backdooring into the entire government HR system, and it had every active government email that responded "yes" to his stupid email that we were required to. And now we know it was compromised. There is no telling what foreign governments now have all of that info as well as what other backdoors they have installed.

This is a double edged sword. You are protecting homeowners from predatory behavior, sure. But also delaying those who simply want to cash out and say fuck this.

This is also LA's chance to go into these areas and build high density, high efficiency housing with fire resistant materials and prevent future issues like this while also providing some relief to the housing issues in the area and showing how energy efficiency is the future of construction. Unfortunately these homes are going to be rebuilt as fast as possible for the families to move back in as fast as possible and they will use whatever is the cheapest and most accessible materials to make it happen. And this protection does nothing to stop that, and if anything encourages it by blocking the sales and pushing for individual rebuilds.

With climate change pushing these fire to happen more often, this disaster that could be at least mitigated. Policy like this will only push for a future cycle of rebuild the same way followed by burning down the same way. And it is the poor and middle class footing the bill to the insurance companies charging whatever they want, knowing it is going to keep happening.

Fun experiment: take your turntable out, place in a large plate with pieces of the shittiest American cheese slices. We are talking kraft single serves. Splay them out, no deeper than one layer thick is needed, but make a full cover of the microwave bed (on top of the plate though. You will make a mess if not). Then you simply cook the shit out of it. You will see the cheese bubble and burn in the microwave wave peaks and you will see cold cheese in the wave troughs.

Yes, it was supposed to have a sequel. It was the start of a franchise that never became one. The OP of the OP is not wrong in saying it was a setup and wanted a sequel. The difference of this movie versus the slop of other sequels is this one was made to be one. It wasn't based on some one-off movie that did well, so the studio demanded a followup to milk it for more money. From its inception this movie was supposed to have one.

I do audiology research and can tell you right now, short of a cochlear implant -no we can't. And we are easily about two decades away from anything close. And even then, a CI can't make music sound as good as your ears. There is no 'one' place in the brain you can imput music into. The most dense and easiest place to input the music is in the cochlea, like a cochlear implant does. Every place up the chain then branches out to thousands of connections and makes it harder and harder. And every step higher up that you try to interface into means you are skipping the initial signal generator and lose out on all the needed fidelity. The next step above a CI is an ABI, auditory brainstem inplant. And they sound so bad, just going one stop up from the cochlea, that those users barely can understand speech and only in the best settings. And normally after about a year of auditory therapy with it. Realistically we tell people (the handfull a year who will end up with one) that they should expect to get sound awareness, and that's it, from their ABI. And now Elon talks about wanting to go another half dozen steps up from that and magically have the fidelity to make it sound like music?? GTFO. This guy is a moron and doesn't know what he is talking about.

Too soon for Obi Wan? 1977? Nah.

But I will tell you what was too soon. I was at a firefly/serenity trivia night back in about 2008 or 2009 and everyone had various firefly related cute names. Kaylee's commandos, the 'Washbucklers, team 'leaf on the wind', and such. Then you had the one team that chose fire. Their team name was "Reaver cleaning company: putting spears in the wash since 2005"

That was too soon...

For as much as everyone is saying to buy now out of economic fear, I wouldn't say they are wrong, but there are several steps that will have to happen first. Tarrifs must be congressional approved first. That means the bill must be presented, debated on, voted on, then signed. I would start to worry a little when we see the bill presented, but even then if he presents some insane ranting that everyone knows will kneecap the economy for the rich, then it won't go through and I wouldn't worry. But if he lets his economic hit men write it and it is airtight, targeted, and specifically- then I would be buying my computer parts before the effective date hits for the reasons people are saying.

I recently looped back to rimworld.

I was playing a bunch of frostpunk 2, then a little frostpunk 1, and then bounced between the two of them. But in the end all gaming comes back to rimworld...

Also up vote because obviously the only correct answer. It was based on golden source material. Therefore could not fail.

When it is easy bull markets, I go heavy on growth stocks. When the market is bear, I go heavy on dividends. Right now though there is a high beta turmoil, so I have a mix of both. My IRA is also set up as more od a "leave this alone" investment. My etrade account has my "fuck around and find out" money. I mention this because it is hard to directly compare the two. So far my dividends have strongly out performed the growth stocks, but only in the last 3 months or so has the gap widened. I credit it to 2 specific ones that are getting me 30%-ish yields with stable prices. They are also new etf's, so the hedge money is still strong before the stripping gets to its prices. I mentioned in a post lower that that my little under 30k is netting me 800/month. Honestly it is paying a higher yield than renting out my condo is getting me.

It is also called 'dividend stripping'.

Also yes. The more professional name is 'dividend capture strategy'. More work, worth the pay off, do all you can to avoid commissions and fees.

Little under 30k in higher risk dividend. Bring in about 800 a month.

I have a mix of large cap, small cap growth stocks, then dividend high risk and low risk. Stock like this (I do not own PETS, I was just using it as an example) would be a high risk due to its price instability. But you mitigate that with stop loss orders.

I have a vanguard/roth for my longs (large cap growths and stable dividends with DRIP) and then use etrade for the small cap or high risk ones. I like their tax documents and easy interface.

People make arguments against dividend stocks, I simply call it a different strategy. Some years it beats out my growths, some years it is about on par. Depends on where I have it at the time and slightly more market dependant.

I have recently gotten into ex-date chasing. While it has increased the returns, it is more work.

Sure. It is still a lower rate than going into dividend stocks.

PETS, sorry, don't know why my phone cut off the 'S'.

PETMED EXPRESS INC COM

$10,000 at 4% gives you $400 interest in one year.

Just about any decent dividend stock will outperform that. Look at PET for example. It is sitting at $3.65/share right now and offers a quarterly dividend of $0.30. That puts you at $1.20/share per year. 10k = 2739 shares = $3,286.80 dividend payout in one year.

Banks are the worst place to put investments. Money in bank accounts are only supposed to be there if you need it liquid, like an emergency fund or your checking account.

*PETS

PETMED EXPRESS INC COM

For all the nay sayers downvoting me as if it is impossible to find dividend stocks that outperform their precious SPY or high yield savings rates, here is a great list I found with shit loads. I count 60 different stocks that offer 10% yields or more. 100 in total all offering over 8% -double what some bullshit 'high yield' savings offers.

https://www.tradingview.com/markets/stocks-usa/market-movers-high-dividend/

I am a fan of all good sci-fi, regardless of the time it was made or the limits of the budget. This one is on the list. I will warn others as it has been pointed out- very rape centric plot and story beats. Be sure to watch it with a good level of suspension of disbelief and understanding of the setting. Beyond that, it is one of the best post apocalyptic stories out there and I wish it was redone with more plot, tighter story, and less rape related with the exception of the Topeka plot line. Highly recommend for anyone who enjoys old sci fi or post apoc.