Reviews on jneidel

Documentary Notes: 20 Days in Mariupol

web@jneidel.com (Jonathan Neidel) — Wed, 11 Sep 2024 00:00:00 +0000

What is the film about? #

Shown are early days of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, from a civilian perspective, in one of the first cities that was hit. The footage is a raw, only lightly editorialized Ukrainian perspective on the ground. We see what the early stage of the war did to regular people.

Main themes #

Good people; bad people

War is like an x-ray, all human insides become visible. Good people become better, bad people worse.

Your real character is revealed and enhanced in extraordinary circumstances. The good people work tirelessly in the hospital and go out of their way to help strangers, those in need.

The bad go around, loot and pillage their own neighborhood: The toy store and hair saloon. They take selfishly for themselves, without reason or regard for others.

Phones without cell towers

A few days into the war, the Russians cut the electricity and the cell towers. Smartphones, so overused in normal life, turned almost useless.

People charge cellphones from a generator. Just to use them as flashlights.

This was a huge problem for our journalists as well. In the first days of the war, they could easily send their pictures and video from anywhere. Suddenly, no signal. Based on a tip, they found the last spot in the city, which still had reception. That place became an inconvenient, regular, dangerous destination.

The information war

Without any information, people don’t know who to blame.

In one scene, the journalists spoke to a group of people, about what happened around the city.

Person 1: Who is bombing us? Tell us.
Journalist: The Russian Federation planes are bombing you.
[…]
Person 2: Yeah, yeah, keep filming us. [The] Ukrainian army is fucking bombing us.

Russian propaganda

Obviously there would be blatant lies in the Russian, state-controlled media. But this scene stuck out for it’s unexpected audacity. The female reporter can’t believe it!

Female reporter: We’ve seen mass graves. Narrow trenches with babies bodies in them. AP Journalists have been there.
Russian ambassador to the UN: I’ve seen so many fakes. [He] who wins the information war, [will be] the one who wins the war.
Female reporter: Do you really, truely believe that? Do you truely believe what you are saying?
Russian ambassador to the UN:

The body language and lack of response says it all.

And Russia is intent on winning the war! No matter the means.

War crimes and an urban wasteland

While watching I asked myself: What is the point of laying waste to the whole city? The Russians targeted civilian residential areas, specifically. They primarily used artillery fire and shelling from afar. One could argue that these are not so precise and could have been aimed at something else. But there were also tanks on the ground, shooting multiple rounds through tall apartment buildings, something that could serve no military objective.

What could be the point for Russia to bomb out residential areas, hospitals and fire stations? Maybe to:

Get the civilians out of the city. Some high percentage left while they had the chance. This would mean less people who are aiding or abetting the enemy fighters.
Demonstrate strength. Strike fear into the enemy and it’s population. Make them want to surrender. That kind of behavior can have the opposite effect though. It can inspire resistance, feelings of revenge. It can serve as ammunition for the other side. Ukraine can (and did) use these atrocities to recruit international help.
Force the displacement of the local population and, after annexing the area, integrate it into Russia and bring in Russian citizens to take over this strategic city.

But there are so many more questions with this behavior:

Why are they intentionally committing war crimes?¹
“They can’t persecute us anyway and we already got all of these sanctions, fuck it.”???
Why are they spending all of that money on arms, just to flatten buildings with no tactical value?
Are they not interested in using the city after they it over for themselves? That’s a lot of infrastructure and private property damage to repair before normalcy can return.

Conclusions #

Well worth watching. You get a civilian perspective on war. This being a documentary makes what you see more impactful, than the many fictional movies about war I’ve watched.

See the Geneva Convention. ↩︎

Open Ear Headphones Review: Oladance

web@jneidel.com (Jonathan Neidel) — Sun, 25 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

What are open ear headphones? #

As the name suggests: your ears are not covered by putting something over them (over-ear) or into them (in-ear). The result is: you can clearly hear the outside world at all times.

Why Oladance? #

In late 2022, when I was looking for a pair of open ear headphones, the selection was very small. I got one of the available styles each and tried them out:

Oladance open ear

Aftershokz bone-conduction headphones

I felt right at home with the Oladance. My wife preferred the bone-conduction headphones and kept them :smile:

Why open ear? #

Open ear headphones have some advantages over in-ear and over-ear headphones:

You can hear what’s going on around you. Can be convenient, pleasant or a safety feature¹ (depending on use.)
You can hear your own voice, which is not being blocked out.
Comfort. They are more comfortable over an extended period of time (nothing in or pressing on your ear.)
Stable. They will not fall off your head (no problem on the trampoline.)

Downsides #

I’ve only found one downside: You can hear what’s going on around you! That can be distracting!

They’re not great on public transport or around construction, crowds of people, big roads, etc. But I’m not in those environments much anymore (if I am I’ll use my noise canceling over-ear headphones.)

My experience #

Open ear headphones shine in quiet environments!

How I make use of them is best described in use cases:

Use case 1: person talks to you

I’m in the kitchen and listening to something. My wife can just walk up and start talking to me. There is not this moment of stopping the audio, taking your headphones off and asking “Huh? What did you say?” and the other person repeating themselves.

Because of the open ear design I understood her the first time. I still might turn off what I was listening to, but I don’t need to (unless it’s very loud.)

Use case 2: listen to something in the background

I’m at home, working or doing something. There are a few different things I might listen to on low volume, passively in the background. That might be a Neurostream, silent subliminal, my philosophy or a language learning piece on a loop. Either way, I can have it conveniently running in the background, while hearing everything else normally.

Use case 3: hearing nature

I live at the edge of a forest, which I visit regularly. With my open ear headphones, I can listen to audiobooks and have calls, while still hearing the calming and satisfying sounds of nature: the birds chirping, my footsteps through the high grass, branches breaking under my feet, the wind blowing past me, etc. It would be the same without the soundscape.

Use case 4: for language learning

To train your speaking ability you will want to: hear a word and then say that word. You need the practice to get your pronunciation right.

Open ear headphones allow me to hear my own voice naturally. I can have my headphones on and listen to an audio course or my vocabulary on the go, repeat what I heard and while hearing my own voice unimpaired.

Sound quality #

Sound quality is good and music will be enjoyable if you don’t have any overwhelming environment noise. Calls are enjoyable for both sides :slightly_smiling_face:

Price #

I paid 120€ back in 2022 and that is still the price today. For me it was well worth what I paid.

What model to get today? #

Nowadays there are many more models to choose from. After the first generation, Oladance released a second generation and a pro version. JBL and soundcore also created some more affordable alternatives.

I haven’t looked at what’s available today in detail, but I would probably go with Oladance again, if mine were to break now.

Conclusions #

I’m really happy with my Oladance. They are the pair I use the most out of all my headphones and speakers. They nicely address the described use cases and present a uniquely comfortable and convenient solution.

Open ear headphones are often advertised as safe, because you can hear traffic around you while you are jogging for example. It’s not listed in my use cases, because I don’t have traffic where I live. ↩︎

AWS Review: Low-cost vs high-cost providers

web@jneidel.com (Jonathan Neidel) — Wed, 10 Jul 2024 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve tried to keep this review non-technical. The discussion is relevant not just to AWS, but to other low-cost providers like it. The hidden costs need to be considered. Especially compared to a more pricey option.

What is AWS? #

Amazon Web Services provides computing resources. They want to differentiate themselves on price. You only pay for what you use. They are the cheapest available option in some categories.

My usage #

I only intended to use AWS on a small scale. A few things here and there. Hosting parts of a project.

I didn’t do any training. I just logged into the platform and clicked around.

If you don’t care about the technical details of what I tried to do with AWS, skip straight to the problems.

Storage #

An app I was demoing needed some storage. Looking up S3 and clicking my way through was simple enough.

It stopped being simple at the bucket policy. They wouldn’t generate it, so I had to paste in some everything-is-allowed configuration from the internet to get it to work.

I had no interest in understanding or securing the policy. Authentication and the like. That seems really painful.

Host a dockerized app #

I had a docker compose app I wanted to be available 24/7.

I thought “how complicated could it be” and grabbed a guide. After clicking my way through a bunch of modules, setting up a RDS, EC2, Firewall, Internet Gateway, etc. I concluded that I would not be able to make it work. The app was constantly crashing and not reachable from the outside. Debugging experience was horrible.

Send Email #

I wanted to send an email newsletter for this website. At 1$ per 10.000 emails SES is the undefeated price leader¹.

I had configured Sendgrid some weeks before for a different project. That was super easy. SES was not.

I could not just send a test email to my own email, I could only trigger an internal test case. You can’t do anything without production access, for which you need to apply. My experience with that and some other little issues are described below in little annoyances.

Problems #

I found there to be a lot of things wrong with AWS. I cannot say, that the same is true of all low-cost providers. But, I would expect higher-cost providers to do better than this.

User experience #

I know computers. I can work navigate around a new website fine.

I could not complete any task without getting help from the internet. Sure I could go in and delete something. But I wouldn’t know if that deleted everything (the answer is No.) I could create something, but it wouldn’t work. Least of all could I understand how things worked.

There is technical mumbo-jumbo everywhere. Everything has arcane names and tons of options. You have to select the right region to see anything. Important points are hidden away in a menu somewhere.

At no point was navigating the site ever easy, enjoyable or even just bearable. Every login I knew “this is gonna suck.”

Cost management #

At no point did I know what costs I would incur as the consequence of my actions. You won’t know what is or is not covered by the free tier. You won’t know if it cost you anything until you get the invoice.

Not that you can understand the invoice. Nothing is clickable. Good luck figuring out by yourself which component and what inside of it is creating these charges.

It took me three months to figure out what I was even being charged for. Each time removing the things that I thought to be causing the costs. Only with multiple searches and ChatGPT debugging did I finally get it. Well, I don’t know if I got it, I’ll have to wait until for the next invoice to be sure :weary:

Just let me click on it and disable what is causing the charge.

Dishonesty #

The cost management design described above is clearly flawed from a user perspective. Generally flaws can either be attributed to incompetence or malice.

As far as people are concerned, it is generally a good idea to assume incompetence rather than malice. Makes it easier to work with them.

AWS can not claim incompetence. The cost management is a critical part of a huge operation. AWS cross-finances Amazons money-loosing ventures. It’s Amazons golden goose.

They would remedy this if they wanted to. They don’t want to. The flaws serve them. That make the intention behind it malice.

For their own benefit, they are screwing over the user intentionally. AWS knows that people are paying for stuff they don’t want, for resources they are having a hard time getting rid off. AWS knows what they are doing. They are bad faith actors.

Complexity #

KISS is a foreign concept to the AWS people. Everything. Is. So. Complicated. The site is just not understandable without training.

I get it. You’re trying to sell to enterprise customers. They demand full customizability on everything. And they can pay their employees for hours and hours of training and performing BS tasks.

Little annoyances #

AWS Email: “We have received your support ticket.”
I close the tab because I assume they will now process it.
AWS Email: “Actually you’re not done. Answer all of these questions. If you don’t we’ll just close this ticket.”
I have to go back to copy-paste my answers.

You already asked me to fill out a bunch of stuff. Why do you ask for more details right after? You haven’t even looked at my responses.

Your DNS records for the DKIM setup are no longer present.²

Ok, but I didn’t change anything. I checked and far as I can see my DNS records are still correct. Must be their mistake. 5 days pass. “We are now disabling DKIM.”

It is their mistake, but it is my problem to clean up :weary:

Pareto & ROIs #

After what I have seen from AWS, I would categorize them in the 20% of services that create 80% of the headaches for me. I know, that if I stay with them, there is gonna be one issue after the other. Random things break, “you need a dedicated IP,” undecipherable costs, etc. Headaches I don’t want to deal with.

ROI comparison #

For my emails I’ve decided to go with Postmark over AWS. Here are the return on investment (ROI) calculations underlying that decision:

AWS investment #

1$/10.000 emails
effort to setup in their complex system
waiting times to be unlocked for production access
effort to solve problems by myself (support will treat me like a tiny fish, since I’m not an enterprise customer)
effort to deal with the little annoyances
effort to double check to see how AWS will screw me over (cf. bad faith actor)
uncertainty about invoicing and hidden costs
uncertainty about deliverability and associated costs
I feel miserable when using the website

AWS returns #

emails are delivered

Postmark investment #

15$/10.000 emails
effort to setup (minimal)

Postmark returns #

emails are delivered
certainty that I’m getting the best deliverability out of the box
certainty that there are no hidden or future costs
certainty that the support will be there if I need it
the website is a joy to use

The way that I see it, is that Postmark beats out AWS here. I see AWS with a huge list of investments and risks, most of which are non-monetary, and delivering simply what is required.

Postmark I see as user-focused, concious of the costs they are creating for me and delivering a much superior experience.

The way that you feel while using the service is not to be understated. That can be a big part of the returns/costs.

Conclusions #

AWS and similar low-cost providers cost us in non-material ways. If you take into account the immaterial costs and benefits, a competitor charging a higher dollar amount might not look so bad.

If you value your own time, use services that also value your time. AWS is not one of them.

Personally I will pay somebody else more money to get a website that makes things easy for me and is a joy to use.

At Postmark it’s 15$ per 10k emails. At scale this get cheaper, but AWS is just unbeatable. With Postmark it’s still 6.95$ per 10k, even if you send 1 Million emails. ↩︎
Technical mumbo-jumbo. I did know what DKIM was before this message either. I would have been fine not knowing. ↩︎

Neurostreams: Review & Explaination of the brainwave tool

web@jneidel.com (Jonathan Neidel) — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0000

What are Neurostreams? #

Neurostreams are a powerful tool for putting you into a desired mental state. The product itself is a collection of sounds.

These sounds can make you more focused, calm you down, put you into deep meditation, give you energy and motivation and more.

If you want to get an idea of what a Neurostream sounds like:

A caveat up-front: There is not an official English version of this product. For the sounds that does not make a difference. For your convenience I wrote an English quick reference guide, which works as an overview for all the available tracks. It also links to the translated catalogue pages where you can find more details about each sound. With that, you should have everything you need, to get the most out of this great tool.

How do they work? #

Your brainwaves oscillate (swing backward and forth) around a given frequency. Frequencies are associated with a mental state and are commonly grouped into¹:

Delta: Deep sleep
Theta: Light sleep, meditation
Alpha: Relaxed wakefulness, idle, unfocused
Beta: Active concentration, analytical thinking, problem-solving
Gamma: Use of higher cognitive functions, highly motivated, peak performance

When listening to a Neurostream, your brainwaves synchronize with the frequency of the included beat. The beat then modifies that frequency (and your brainwaves along with it) to take you to a wave length associated with the desired mental state.

Commonly a track will include an intro section, which “picks you up” at an Alpha frequency and then slowly moves the frequency up or down to the desired level.

At the end you might have an outro section that returns you to a normal level. This is, so you don’t remain in e.g. light sleep, but are put back into Beta, ready to get back to work.

Applications #

Neurostreams exist for various different applications, to which they are specifically tailored. I will introduce them in groups based what they can do for you. I will only mention my favorite tracks. Just know, that there are plenty more out there. You can discover what works best for you.

The purpose of this review is to give you an idea of what is possible and what Neurostreams are doing for me. If you are interested in more options & details afterwards, you can find a concise overview of all available tracks in my quick reference guide.

Calm me down #

Sometimes you just need to take a break. With these tracks you can put yourself into a near sleep state, from which you are woken up again. You can deeply regenerate for a time and effectively recover, ready to tackle the next thing afterwards.

How I use it #

I had always taken a little siesta (lying down some time after lunch.) But whatever I did, I never felt truly relaxed after. Mediation takes a lot of practice to get good at. Napping was ineffective for me, since I can’t fall asleep. It was always better than nothing, but not what I had hoped for.

Neurostreams dramatically increased the effectiveness of my siesta. They get me into deep meditation without effort or consistently put me into a near sleep state much deeper than my nap ever were. And with less effort. Much less.

It also gave me a tool to calm myself in urgent cases of anxiety, where my thoughts are racing or I was stressed. I can just do one of these session to be more at ease.

It just works. Reliably. A tool I never want to miss.

The tracks #

DNA Talk :person_in_lotus_position:

The standard meditation track.

In the past (after a lot of training) I was able to meditate deeply for a good amount of time. But now, after losing that routine, it is hard to just sit down for 5 mins.

This track makes it easy though. It meditates you. You just sit there. 30 mins of meditation are easily doable.

Skip the practice and get right to the results.

Gaia Club Radio :radio:

My new favorite. It’s deeper than DNA Talk and it’s not meditation. I just lie down and relax deeply. Afterwards I’m more aware, refreshed and ready to tackle a new task. My perfect Siesta track.

I put calming down as the first category for a reason. Having the ability to calm down a frantic mind or recharge my batteries in the middle of the day is just invaluable.

Improve my work #

Most of my personal and professional work requires a lot of focus. Writing, studying, researching, reading, coding. Any kind of knowledge work.

There are some Neurostreams that put your mind into “focus mode”. Making it easier for you to focus and do your best work.

How I use them #

The tracks are an easy thing to add. I just have them running on my headphones while I work. That’s it.

I’ve had tremendous success with these. Especially in combination with blocking out distractions (notifications, interruptions and the like) and forgoing (doing without) consumption of things that would be detrimental to my attention span (short-form video, social media, the news, YouTube, etc.)

The tracks #

IQ 7000 :brain:

My main concentration track. It gets me deeply into focus mode. Deep work made easy, just tune in.

Flow meets genius :handshake: Flow triff Genie

My all-round favorite Neurostream. It also works well for getting me into flow and focus mode, but I can also used more generally for lifting my my mood and decreasing anxiety or stress.

This track can be played via speakers. Because of that I will switch between IQ 7000 and this one, so I don’t have to wear headphones all day.

Brainstorms :lightning:

As the name suggests: for more effective brainstorming sessions. The beat is unpredictable and will trigger your brain to make new connections. Worked really well when I used it.

Energize myself #

Sometimes you are unmotivated and can’t seem do what you set out for yourself. But, you want or need to perform.

These tracks are perfect for generating that energy and motivation. They can speed up your brainwaves to a point where you are highly motivated and where you will want to do stuff.

The tracks #

Sturm und Drang :thunder_cloud_and_rain:

It functions like coffee, giving me a boost of energy. I never drank coffee regularly and the same applies to this track. I don’t use it on a regular basis. It’s a tool I have with me, for the times when I need a little push, when I otherwise wouldn’t want to move.

Falling asleep #

Sometimes you just can’t fall asleep. For whatever reason. Because you’re excited about a trip, you slept during the day or your thoughts are keeping you up.

Not being able to sleep hurts your recovery and your performance the next day. These tracks can help you to fall asleep or even force you to.

The tracks #

Sleep forcing :sleeping: Schlaferzwingung

Personally I have a hard time falling asleep. My wife can sleep anywhere and any time. The speed with which she falls asleep is really astonishing. But, that’s not me.

It happens from time to time that I’m lying in bed and am excited about something, my thoughts racing or I had a little too much bluelight/activity before going to bed. And I can’t fall asleep.

I tried falling sleep naturally and using some hacks (writing down your thoughts, sleep drink, cooling down the bed, get up and doing something else and then returning, etc.), which kinda work, but not as consistently or as quickly as I would like. At some point, I just need a hammer to knock myself out.

This Neurostream is that hammer. And I am the nail:slightly_smiling_face:. I can just force myself to fall asleep. It’s the most effective way I’ve found to addressing this problem.

Why this product? #

I prefer Neurostreams over random YouTube videos, which promise similar effects. These tracks were carefully built, tested and refined. They were designed with specific applications in mind and come with clear usage instructions. You don’t need to figure them by yourself, you get a working toolbox.

I discovered this brainwave manipulation through Neurostreams and never bothered to explore what else is out there, since I am very happy with what I got.

Costs #

I started with the Panorama, which is a diverse set of tracks covering the whole range of what Neurostreams can do for you. At only 9€ getting that was a no-brainer for me. I recommend you start with it as well.

The Panorama itself will already get you quite far. If you want some of the missing track or some variety (other versions) of the Panorama tracks, then you can think about an upgrade.

Don’t think about upgrading until you have intensely tested the Panorama.

In my overview you can find what track are included in what bundles. I bought the now retired Kompendium bundle (today: Panorama + Speicals + Klassiker.) It provides all tracks I mentioned in this post. For me it was ca. 110€, because I bought it through the Grand Slam (a bundle with some other products.) Otherwise it will cost you 225€. But, you can also buy tracks individually and get them accredited if you decide you want a bundle later on.

The laboratory (Labor) includes more niche, experimental tracks, which weren’t of interest to me.

Try for free

On the homepage Tim has a radio station that cycles through some tracks. These are missing the intro and outro sections. I never bothered with them.
Signing up for the newsletter gets you the title Planet Relax.

Conclusions #

A great toolbox I use regularly and wouldn’t want to live without.

To me, it’s part of the 20% of optimizations that deliver 80% of the results.

Neurostreams have something to offer for everybody and I would recommend everybody to try them.

Start with Panorama and use the quick reference guide to understand how to use the tracks.

Read more ↩︎

Does Jim Rohn know what he's talking about? - Person Review

web@jneidel.com (Jonathan Neidel) — Sat, 01 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Who is Jim Rohn #

An author and motivational speaker. He is known for his various self-help books (7 Strategies for Wealth & Happiness, My Philosophy For Successful Living), motivational tapes and speeches.

Was he really a millionaire? #

His claim to fame and what he proclaims each time he introduces himself is that he became a millionaire at 30. He is also open about going broke soon after. I think going broke that quickly ought to raise some questions.

Rohn made his million in a MLM company, which soon after went bust. If the company you work for goes bankrupt and you go bankrupt, it is probably because all of your assets, all of your wealth is tied up in that company. That would mean that “his million” was in company shares.

A harsh way to look at this would be to say: Profits in company shares are unrealized profits and fluctuate with the value of the company. And only when you cash out and realize those profits can you actually claim to be a millionaire. On the stock market it would be certainly seen like that. Holding a stock during it’s all-time-high doesn’t mean anything if you didn’t sell.

An extreme example of claiming millionaire status based on unrealized profits

Company shares are illiquid (unless you work at a publicly traded company, you can’t just sell them whenever you want), so he probably couldn’t have sold, even if he wanted to.

Also don’t forget that about taxes. If you cash out your shares the government will take a (big) cut.

It’s hard to value privately held companies, so shares were likely overvalued (it was a failing business after all.)

Maybe officers at the company above him knew that the ship was going down and pushed their company shares onto him in place of compensation, effectively trading value-losing shares against hard cash that they would have otherwise paid out to him.

All of this is to say: These theories cast serious doubt on Rohn ever having been a millionaire like he claims. And even if, it would have only been on paper.

Alternative scenario #

Let’s say his money didn’t only exist on paper (i.e. in company shares), but was in his bank account.

The company he works for goes bankrupt, but his money is save because it is under his control. The only way he goes personally bankrupt now, is by having terrible money habits, which would be even worse for his credibility.

Rich from public speaking #

After the bust he got rich by holding seminars and where he (among other things) taught others how to get rich. All from a guy who wasn’t rich himself and had only been rich on paper before.

It’s the paradox of practice:

to teach wisdom that the teacher himself hasn’t successfully used in his life
– Mj DeMarco in The Millionaire Fastlane

Wouldn’t you rather take advice from somebody who has achieved, what you want to achieve? Instead of just proclaiming it?

His Mentor #

Rohn talks about all the lessons he learned from his mentor Mr. Shoaff after he started working at his company. Shoaff started multiple MLM schemes, to which Rohn contributed.

MLM is a terrible business model for all, but the people at the top. You are basically profiting from the losses and labor of the people at the bottom.

I wouldn’t want to do business like that, and I would be careful with what the people, who do do business like that, have to say.

The Positive #

I wouldn’t be writing this if Jim Rohn didn’t have something to offer. He was a great public speaker and story-teller and is fun to listen to.

What he really drilled home for me was taking control of my life’s philosophy. The Slight Edge (the author of which had the idea from Rohn) had already implanted the idea in me, but with Jim Rohn I understood it more clearly.

Conclusion #

Fun to listen to. Flexible morals. Tread with care, especially when it comes to the topic of money.

What is the use of an Air Purifier? Benefits explained.

web@jneidel.com (Jonathan Neidel) — Sat, 18 May 2024 00:00:00 +0000

A review of the Levoit Core 300S.

What’s an air purifier? #

A white cylinder that captiously draws in air through a filter system. The filters trap particles like dust, mould spores, pollen and smoke. Resulting in cleaner air.

How do we use it? #

It sits in the middle of the apartment. That is, between the kitchen and the rest of the place. We have the machine running in automatic mode, which means that when the air is clean, the machine is quiet and just sits there. But when my wife starts cooking without oil again and creates a bunch of smoke in the kitchen, then the air purifier will kick into overdrive and start whirling loudly, doing it’s best to get that burnt smell out of the air ASAP.

And that is really our main use of the thing. To get unpleasant smells out of the air (mostly from cooking, but also smells coming in from the hallway.) Previously we had used incense to cover up the smells or opened two windows to get the air flowing. That worked OK, but the purifier does it faster, better and automatically.

Costs #

This particular machine does a fine job at cleaning the air in a 75m² place. Don’t let them upsell you into a bigger machine.

The costs come out to three factors:

Initial cost of the machine: 125€ new, but we got it used for 30€. I would not have paid full price for a new one.
Regular costs of replacing the filter: 17€ every 6-8 months.
Regular energy costs: Not measured¹.

Maintenance #

With time dust will collect around the air intake holes and on the filter. Just vacuum the outer shell and the filter. Don’t vacuum the sensor though. No dust will collect on it and vacuuming it created this weird sound for me².

Conclusion #

Do you need one: No. But some people would benefit from having an air purifier. E.g. if you have a sensitive nose or cook a lot.

I don’t care about the marginal health benefits. For me the utility lies in removing unwanted smells from the air. That, to me, along with the convenient experience makes the machine worth it.

The machine draws 15W at peak operation. What that averages out to and if there is a draw on standby would have to be measured. ↩︎
I could fix that by blowing into the sensor hard. ↩︎

Intermittent Fasting: An easy addition to a working diet

web@jneidel.com (Jonathan Neidel) — Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

What is intermittent fasting? #

Restrict your eating to a certain time window. The notation for describing eating and fasting times is this: 16-8. Which means: 16 hours of fasting and 8 hours of eating.

Why do it? #

Digestion is an energy intense process for your body. If you give your body a window of fasting, it is able to actually finishing the digestion process and trigger repair mechanisms.

Only after 10-12h of fasting will your body start to repurpose aged cells and reduce inflammation. This positively impacts the immune system.

How I applied it in my life #

When I first heard of intermittent fasting and especial 16-8, it sounded crazy to me. How is that gonna work? I’m just gonna be hungry. Why would I do that to myself? I tried it a bit and it was a lot of effort and not worth it at all.

Time passed. I worked on my diet and found something that fills me and gives me energy for a long time. And then I stumbled over intermittent fasting again.

I was already not eating 2:30h before going to bed (as this negatively impacts sleep quality, digestions diverts energy away from recovery.) I counted the hours and as it turns out, I was basically already doing an intermittent fasting schedule of 12-12.

So, I decided to just try 14-10, (it’s just a small change after all), by eating the last meal 2h earlier. During the day I never felt hungry. Only in the morning, but that was already the case before :smile:

At this point I was only eating breakfast and lunch. It felt natural to just eat breakfast earlier. So, 16-8 happened automatically.

Eating schedule	Eating window example
12-12	6:00 - 18:00
14-10	6:00 - 16:00
16-8	6:00 - 14:00

Skip breakfast or dinner? #

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.
– A cereal commercial

The industry is trying to sell you something with that quote, but there is some truth to it.

In the morning your body is the most efficient at processing food¹. Eating soon after waking also signals to your inner clock that the day is starting.

Both eating savory in the morning and eating soon after waking up (ideal is the slot 30 mins to 1.5h after waking) took some getting used to. But, I do feel better with this schedule than without it.

What about the benefits? #

For me and the way I have integrated intermittent fasting in my life, there a few to no costs. The only one that comes to mind, is not being able to eat dinner. But, I do make exceptions for some dinner (happens rarely.) That means, that any upside, any positive effect that intermittent fasting has on me, I basically get for free.

For me, there is not much of an effect that I have observed. I have always had a good immune system and no problems with inflammation. Just knowing that it’s good for my body is enough for me.

Most of the benefits that people report after starting intermittent fasting I would attribute to be the result of eating better. Because you can’t do IF and eat like crap. That is gonna be torture. And for a lot of people, who try IF, it is torture.

Alarms & Tracking #

As you can imagine I don’t need to set alarms or anything. My body is hungry in the morning and then knows when it’s time for lunch. Easy.

I do have IF in my habit tracker, just so I don’t forget about it. Because actions that are easy and automated can easily slip my mind with the passage of time.

Exceptions to the schedule #

I do break the intermittent fasting rule occasionally.

There was no earlier opportunity for me to eat.
There is a dinner, which doubles as a social occasion, that I want to participate attend.

The results is always the same: I feel worse. But, I can’t solely attribute that to breaking my intermittent fasting rule, because it usually coincides with other rule breaks, such as: eating sugar, eating less than 2.5h before bed or eating in a way that spikes my blood sugar.

I am aware of these costs and if the dinner is important to me, I will bear them.

Conclusion #

Intermittent fasting is very easy to do, if your diet already gives you energy for at least 6-8h. And that’s a big if.

Intermittent fasting itself you set up once and then don’t think about it much. Benefits for me only exist on paper, but that’s fine, since it’s such an easy fix.

In the morning your body is best at producing Insulin. Insulin stimulates the processing and absorption of (blood) sugar. This means, that your body can more easily convert food into energy and instead of storing it as fat. ↩︎