Tong Family (richtong.org sync)

Man I’m sure sad Yakima is discontinuing the whispbar. More expensive and not as strong but they really are totally silent and have essentially no impact on gas mileage.  We have whispbar on a 2013 Honda Fit and it is terrific. We have the new jetstream on a 2016 fit…

A zillion years ago, the old Campy computer told you what gear you were in. How much work is it to get back to that. Also Shimano is introducing synchronized shifting. That is, one shift and the bike computer decides when to move the front derailleur. Pretty handy. But getting…

Well, I think that keeping a drone investment safe is pretty important, so for about 30% of the cost of a drone, here is what you can do: Insurance $99 DJI Refresh. This is like Applecare, you buy at the DJI Store and then within 48 hours of activation type…

OK more strange accessories: Be careful when you plug a modular connector into a power supply. There isn’t a standard. So if you lose the bag of connectors, don’t just find a random one. It is expensive to buy replacement cables ($50 for cables when the power supply is $120…

Well the gig or outsource economy is in full swing and since it is impossible not to interact with it, I thought I’d note the last three and make some observations: Buying with e-certificates at Lowe’s. This shows why competing with Amazon is so hard. They offer huge discounts vs…

Ok for the truly nerdy, did you know that if you sign up for earny.co it will track your purchases and if you have a chase or Citibank card, it will take a 25% commission, but will automatically handle the refund process. A pretty good deal. If you want to…

OK, for a long time this was one of my favorite brands, but then they bulked out and got less athletic, so I don’t normally buy their stuff anymore, but if you are lucky enough to have a discount on them, here are the best things in their line: Mens’…

Well it is nice to have an actual working controller. First a hat tip to B&H Photo Video, they have a 30 day return policy and it is really just a phone call and you get an RMA. As I said before for things like this, you really want to…

OK, feel free to skip past this post, but it took an evening, but right now I feel like the worlds expert on toilets and all things modern (and no there will be no yucky talk here). But here’s the scoop: TL;dr We’ve been using the Toto Drake II 1.28GPF which is…

Man, I can’t count how many $$$s I’ve lost with expiring rewards points, but with a disciplined use of 1Password, so at least I know what accounts I have, plus a subscription to Awardwallet, hopefully this will be a thing of the past. Some notes, (by the way I was…