Overall I think this is well written. I agree with @poVoq@slrpnk.net that the section on picking an instance could be improved, since which instance one picks can be rather important, since federation/defederation is dictated by individual instances.
And a minor typo I noticed:
leaving Mastodon out to try
I assume that should be "out to dry".
and connect to it with an iPad that has a Jellyfin client installed?
In my experience, you don't even need the dedicated Jellyfin client. Just opening it up in a web browser works out of the box, so that's potentially one less thing to download/install/manage for the clients.
That said, I've never tried to access Jellyfin from an iPad/iPhone/Mac so it might not be as seamless as my experiences on Android/Linux based devices. But I imagine they'd be fine; just test it out before you hit the road.
I don't watch a lot of creepy/spooky stuff, so my recommendations come from a fairly limited breadth. That said, I recommend a few things that many might lump under "kid movies" (I prefer the more accurate label "family entertainment") since they tend to be perilous and unsettling without being outright violent, gory, or generally miserable.
Coraline (2009) - A young girl, dissatisfied with her home life after moving to a new town, stumbles upon a dark, parallel world. Therein, she finds solace in a parallel version of her mother who is not what she seems.
Paranorman (2012) - A young boy who can speak with the dead learns that a witch who was executed by the townspeople hundreds of years ago will soon return to seek vengeance upon them.
Over the Garden Wall (2014) - A mini-series focusing on two brothers who find themselves inexplicably lost in a forest teeming with fell beasts, witches, undead, and unlikely allies. I watch this one every year around this time. Cozy yet spooky at the same time.
Ah, thanks for the tip. I've got a dinky little pair of binoculars lying around, so I'll give 'em a try
Noice. There isn't too much light pollution around where I live, so I'm hoping to get to see it some time over the next few days if the conditions are right
Hell yeah. Did you have to do a long exposure for this, or could you also see it with the naked eye?
I've tried catching a glimpse over the last few days, but it's just too close to the sun, even after sundown.
Thumbing through my copy of "On Food and Cooking" by Harold McGee, I didn't find anything specifically comparing fresh vs canned tomatoes for pasta sauces, but it does mention:
Fresh tomatoes readily cook down to a smooth puree, but many canned tomatoes don’t. Canners frequently add calcium salts to firm the cell walls and keep the pieces intact, and this can interfere with their disintegration during cooking. If you want to make a fine-textured dish from canned tomatoes, check the labels and buy a brand that doesn’t list calcium among its ingredients.
I bought an N64 with 4 controllers and 5 games for $5.00 about 10 years ago…the same setup is like $200 minimum now.
Sounds like you got an absolutely incredible deal; I don't think $5 was a normal price point for that kind of hardware even 10 years ago. I sold my N64 with 2 controllers and maybe 4 game cartridges for ~$100 around 17 years ago and the guy I sold it to didn't even haggle.
Gotcha. You mentioned you put the PC into Recovery Mode and tried to reinstall Windows, but it didn't work. What happened that prevented the re-installation of Windows? Did the PC just shutdown during installation, or were you wholly unable to get the Windows installer to run?
If you're still able to boot into Recovery Mode/Safe Mode, try opening up a Command Prompt and running the SFC Scan and DISM commands outlined here: https://www.howtogeek.com/222532/how-to-repair-corrupted-windows-system-files-with-the-sfc-and-dism-commands/
Could Linux save my laptop?
Depends on the root cause of the BSoD. If it's a hardware issue, then no, installing Linux won't fix an underlying hardware issue. What does the BSoD screen actually say? Any specific error code?
My understanding is that Linux is a kind of system that you download the components to a USB or what not and then install it on your machine. Is that something I could do in this case?
Yep, you could do that, but you'll need a functioning PC to create a USB installer for the Linux OS of your choice. You'll need a blank USB drive and some software to "flash" the Linux OS installer to the USB drive. e.g.: https://linuxmint-installation-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/burn.html
I always thought the messages left by other players in Dark Souls was such a cool mechanic.
They could be helpful, letting the player know to be wary of danger, or they could be completely disingenuous and trick the player into jumping off a cliff and dying.
I always labored over whether or not to take a leap of faith based on other players' messages cause it was a toss-up whether they were being helpful or trolling, lol.
As others have pointed out, there's a lot to hate about ads since the industry is routinely dishonest, insulting, obnoxious, deceptive, intrusive, and all manner of unpleasant. I've been adblocking religiously for most of my life for these reasons.
So I think a more interesting question might be the other way around: "What do you like about commercials?"
The only commercials I've ever liked are the ones for local small businesses. The ones with a nonexistent production budget that aren't beating the viewer over the head with blatant lies or dishonest sales tactics.
Adult Swim used to have faux-ad bumpers for the fictional business "Strickland Propane" from King of the Hill, featuring the honest-to-a-fault character Hank Hill as the spokesman, which I felt captured that vibe well.
Rhett and Link also made a funny homage to these kinds of commercials in this classic skit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnOyMSEWNTs