OwOarchist

Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.

Trying to find a phone plan that's paid by the minute, not by the month. I want a phone that only charges me when and if I use it -- no recurring monthly fee whatsoever, and no 'inactivity' fees either.

I don't use my phone much at all. Even if it costs $5 per minute, that would still be cheaper for me than even the cheapest monthly plans. And I don't need any data connection at all, ever. Just voice calls and texts.

Such a thing used to be possible, but after searching and searching, I can't find any such thing now. Do they no longer exist?

Still need to finish wrapping the lines and tidy up the cables a bit, though.

I'm planning to cut my grid connection and go full off-grid. Which raises the question of how much capacity I really need. And what you see here is me trying to answer that question based on ~51,000 5-minute data points of usage data my power company provided to me, complete with custom-made python script to parse all that data and pretty charts! (Yes, I have 6 monitors. And this kind of shows why.)

And what I'm really torn about now is how much battery capacity I need. Should I get enough to cover the absolute worst case scenario (~66kwh) or is something closer to my average overnight usage (~20kwh) acceptable?

Not the absolute end of the world if the batteries run dry and I need to temporarily supplement with generator backup, I suppose. Nobody is life-or-death depending on any electrical appliances here, and even on the coldest days, waiting a few minutes to go start a generator isn't a huge deal.

But definitely would like a word from the wise about how much battery capacity I really need. And also how much solar panel wattage I need, I suppose.

Okay, I know it sounds weird, but hear me out:

We know space is expanding, sure. That's been established science for a while now. All three spatial dimensions at the same (increasing) rate.

So ... why should we assume that the 4th dimension -- time -- is static and unchanging like we used to think space was? Could time also be expanding or contracting? (Expanding seems more likely, as it would match what the other dimensions are doing.) After all, spacetime is all one thing, really. Space and time are inextricably linked. When you think of it that way, it seems nearly impossible that space would be expanding while time is not. Spacetime is expanding, so wouldn't that include time as well?

My question here is: what would it look like, subjectively, from our perspective inside it, if time was expanding just like space? Would we be able to measure it at all? Would there be any difference? Could the acceleration of space expansion ('dark energy') actually be explained by time expansion instead?

For a moment, imagine a universe where time definitely is expanding. Even if you don't think time could really be expanding, let's think about that hypothetical universe where it definitely is. What would that universe be like? How would it be different -- if at all -- from our universe?

Does it even matter? If time is expanding, but we still experience it passing at a constant rate, why would we even care whether it's expanding or not? An observer somehow watching it happen from 'outside of time' might, say, see things happening slower and slower ... but for beings living inside of spacetime, with their subjective perceptions also dependent upon the flow of time, would it actually change anything at all?

Power saving mode sounds good. Of course I want to conserve battery.

But what does power saving mode actually do? What features is it slowing or disabling in order to save power?

(If you know where I stole this from, I love you.)