Farcebook

Author: james

  • Please read the top line for me…

    Please read the top line for me…

    Went for an eye test last weekend, mostly because we were sent a £10 voucher through the mail and I’ve never had one. Everyone else in the family has glasses and they seem mystified that I don’t. “We all wear them, bet you need a pair, get your eyes tested and find out”.

    So I did, they’re fine. Well, the right one is a bit oval, but only a bit. The only thing the optician said was that my eyes are very dry and that I should use eye drops. Squirting those in my eyes is a new form of torture I’ve discovered. They don’t hurt, I don’t dislike it, but the reflex to shut my eye when they see objects moving towards them takes a lot to override. This is a reflex that can detect pieces of Dremel cutoff wheel flying at my face and deal with it before I’ve even noticed the blade has snapped. A droplet of water must be comically slow by comparison.

    The eye test itself was kind of interesting, I had a 3D scan of my eyes done too which involved looking into a machine that scanned a red line up and down each eye. Then there was the other machine with the balloon in it that did some focus testing and then blew fucking air at my eyeball from a point blank range. “Oh this might make you jump a bit but it doesn’t hurt” the nice lady said as something started extending towards my eyeball. “We use air to test the pressure of your eye”. Aha, well after having it done multiple times I think my eyes are fine, they’ve not popped.

    The actual optician (optometrist? which one is it?) also had a good peer around inside my eyes using the brightest light I’ve ever seen. You think the sun is bright? Go get an eye test. “Put your chin on here, look at my left ear, this is going to be a bit bright”. No shit. At one point he was fiddling round with a microscope having a really good look at the back of my eyeball and everything lined up perfectly so that I could see a perfect image of my own retina. I’m sure nature never intended on the light sensing part of an eye to see itself.

    We also had the traditional reading of the letters game, and some fun with different lenses being stuck in front of my eyes. “Tell me which number looks clearest… number one… number two?”. After a while I just got confused as successive lenses looked identical… “Number four… or number two?” … “err? I can’t tell? Same? is that a valid answer?”. “Ok, when I do this does your vision get worse or better?” “Nope, worse, it’s all blurry”… “Hmm, and this way is clearer” “Yep”.

    I guess I must have been consistently confused to get a reading of zero for both eyes. I am quite sure the way this is done removes any bias I might have towards glasses or not. Like when immigration asks you the same question six different ways just to check you’re not lying.

    For all the science behind distance sight testing, close up testing seems to involve being given a sheet of paper with writing on and being asked to read the tiniest text on it. “Can you read the smallest text on this page OK?” … “Yep, looks fine”.

    So yeah, eye drops and “come back in two years, you might need some then” was the verdict.

  • Forgot to tax my car…

    Forgot to tax my car…

    Vehicle tax is a thing here, every vehicle must be taxed. If it isn’t your insurance is invalid and all the ANPR equipped police cars driving the streets will find you.

    Except they’re supposed to send you a letter reminding you it’s about to expire. Not an angry red letter telling you it has expired. Also this letter was dated 15th August and I received it today a mere week later. In the same batch of mail was some tat from China posted on the 16th of August. I’m fairly sure mail from China isn’t supposed to arrive quicker than mail from Wales…

    So I logged in and “paid” my £0 for the coming year.

    With my old car I used to have a yearly direct debit set up and the money would just leave my account automatically. I guess they can’t do that with this one…

  • Modern Society Illustrated

    Modern Society Illustrated

    Here’s a photo that perfectly sums up modern society…

    Chairs need instructions explicitly telling the user it is for sitting on, and that it isn’t a step ladder.

    Of course the warning label is not attached to a chair because of course it isn’t, even though it tells us not to remove it. That person probably used it as a step ladder while riding it down a corridor.

  • Using a non-Tesla EV on a Super Charger

    Using a non-Tesla EV on a Super Charger

    No, there’s no drama, no weird thing. It just works, just like any other CCS charger. Elon doesn’t come out and give a free hand-job while you wait or anything. About the only piece of excitement is the mildly confused looks from actual Tesla owners when you roll up.

    Also the charging leads are really really short, if your charging port isn’t on a side it’s unlikely to reach. And if your port is on the “other” side to a Tesla it might be hard to park up if they’re nearly full as you might need to go into the wrong bay for the unit that’s free.

  • More Artificial Idiocy

    More Artificial Idiocy

    Gmail has a cool feature where it can understand important emails and put things in your calendar.

    Except it also does it with spam too…

    Although I think this is a mistyped email address, or it’s a very elaborate scam… It’s hard to tell, I’ve had this email address for so long now I can no longer tell the scams, spam and other Internet Herpes from the idiots who can’t spell. I keep getting mail from some church in Australia, I’ve been getting that mail for the past 10 years. I could have said “sorry but you have the wrong person” but it’s a bit late now.

    This airline one though, seems legitimate somehow.

    There was a “manage booking” button on the email too, but it needs a login.

    The Internet is a fucking weird place, isn’t it!