Subj : Back from vacay
To   : All
From : poindexter FORTRAN
Date : Mon Jul 08 2024 06:48 am

10 days and the BBS didn't crash...

I spent 3 days in London, did the tourist thing. Saw Mamma Mia on the
west end, amazing show. Took a train to Bath, walked around the Roman
baths, then explored some small villages looking for inspirations for
retirement locations.

Then, went to Portsmouth and caught up with in-laws I haven't seen in 10
years.

The rest of my family is jetlagged out, I'm doing OK. Stayed up until
9pm last night doing laundry, woke up at 5. Shockingly, everything is
washed and the suitcase put away less than 24 hours after landing.

My favorite town was Tisbury, in Wiltshire. We found a 2 bedroom, 2 bath
flat with a garden, 2 car garage and a commercial space on the high
street for around a third of what our current house in California is
worth. Train and bussable to Salisbury, the next big town, lots of
activity, 2 old churches and friendly people.

Staying in contact was a pain. My wife and kids have iPhones, I have an
Android. I tried buying a SIM card for her, then realized her phone does
eSIMs. Tried buying one online, they worked for phone calls and SMS but
no MMS. Wife had podcasts set to update over cellular, so we burned
through all of her data in one go.

Later went into a Vodafone store and got an eSim set up. That worked
well, but couldn't send pictures via iMessage.

I set up a VOIP.ms account last week, that worked well. Picked up a
F/OSS SIP client and was able to make and receive phone calls on a
local number.

I brought a Lenovo Duet tablet for cheap a year ago and brought it
along. After a week on its cramped keyboard, I'm missing keys on my home
desktop keyboard!




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