Techie Ramblings

Author: Ryan

  • My digital setup during these trying times.

    This follows on nicely from my previous entry, and I feel that detailing my setup is worthy of its own post. By trying times I obviously mean the global effort to ramp up mass surveillance and lock down the internet and the devices we use to access it.

    For years I have gone down privacy rabbit holes with my digital life, generally stemming from a feeling of disgust at the knowledge of the level of data being harvested, simply from using a device I own on the internet. Other than this though it has been without a true cause and clear reason for doing so. Eventually I’d often feel like I was doing it for no reason and revert back to standard usage.

    This time however, things are different. The reason for trying to preserve my privacy and anonymity online is now crystal clear. Even if the motives of the powers pushing these agendas are more murky, it’s abundantly clear that these attempts should be resisted.

    Anyway, I wanted to share my setup with anyone interested. Quite a lot of work went into getting where I am now so I’ll break this down into sections. Any questions or recommendations for me feel free to leave a message:

    Background work

    I made the decision to move away from anything that required an app and had no web based alternative. Apps collect data and increase reliance on having a “compliant” smartphone. This involved changing banks (twice!), changing my mobile phone provider, avoiding certain utility providers and accepting that there are some things that just aren’t going to be accessible for me.

    I bought a domain for myself and host my emails with an independent provider. In my eyes there’s no point doing all this work just for [insert big tech co here] to get all the information I’m trying to protect by scanning my inbox.

    I devised a robust, offline system to back up my valuable data, it’s nothing complicated just a series of hard drives in a couple of different locations. However this allows me to keep backups of my data (photos, documents etc) without relying on a cloud provider.

    I began using an open source, independent password manager. No password is recycled, and I can access this via the web if I ever need to.

    My phone

    Currently I’m using a Moto G55 which is a bit of a unicorn in my opinion. It has an unlockable bootloader, a headphone jack AND a micro SD card slot! I bought it used for around £100. I have the bootloader unlocked, the device rooted and heavily debloated. I run a root firewall (AFwall+, available on F-Droid) and do encrypted app data backups to my SD card (Neo Backup, also on F-Droid) which I periodically copy over to my Hard drives. The phone is not signed into a Google account and I have very minimal apps on my phone aside from Signal, Magic Earth (google maps alternative) and a web browser.

    I don’t use the camera on my phone, I use a digital camera which I backup to my hard drives. I keep a local calendar using Fossify calendar (F-Droid again!) which I backup regularly. I have a local copy of all my music and use a local music player. My contacts are also local only and I keep a backup of those. I don’t have emails on my phone, I don’t feel the need to check them frequently and periodically check them on my desktop.

    I disable radios when not in use; GPS, bluetooth, NFC, Wi-FI. If I’m not using them they’re switched off. Same with microphone access and camera access. I have everything in my quick settings so it’s a minimal inconvenience to re-enable them when needed. If I’m out shopping my phone will be on airplane mode or better yet left in the car. The data collection while in shops is well documented.

    My aim with the phone is to have nothing of value on it. If it was stolen or confiscated there is essentially nothing on that device. They’d have access to my boring schedule through my calendar, the phone numbers of my family members and would be able to check out my music. I would simply cancel my SIM card and restore my small amount of data to a new device. As I have no apps on my device it would be very difficult for a thief to abuse having access to my phone number, there would be no way for them to work out who I held accounts with to try and gain access to them.

    My mobile web browser of choice is Firefox Focus. On exit it wipes itself clean. This serves two purposes. Firstly it stops me relying on it too heavily. It adds friction if I have to sign into something every time (plus I don’t keep my password manager on my phone so I would have to manually type it from my PC). Secondly I leave no trace if someone were to steal or gain access to my phone. No picture could be built from my web history, and accounts that would normally be left logged in on any other browser cannot be exploited in my case.

    I have a Google Pixel 10a stashed away for the future with GrapheneOS installed for if restrictions in the UK really ramp up. Knowing that device will be supported for another 7 years gives me some comfort in knowing that I have at least that long before I have to revisit my strategy. For now, the Motorola is sufficient though.

    My computer

    I have a number of computers, anyone in IT will know you just accumulate them. However I’ll summarise.

    My main gaming PC runs Linux. (There are no PC’s running Windows in my house, the telemetry and unreliability are too much for me to tolerate outside of work.) This is the one device I am completely comfortable using. There is nothing on this machine actively trying to steal my data, it is reliable and it is powerful. Any banking or similar tasks are performed on this machine. I also game through steam and any games I have that are DRM free can be played through Lutris. Any programs that I relied on from my Windows days I’ve found have all run flawlessly through WINE.

    Digital services

    Aside from the annual fee for my domain name, the £0.30 a month it costs me to host this website (didn’t want anything pointing at my home IP) and my annual VPN subscription (Private Internet Access) I have no subscriptions.

    That includes Netflix, Amazon prime, Spotify, game subscriptions, cloud storage. You name it, I don’t subscribe to it.

    Aside from not wanting to waste money, my goal is not to become reliant on anything that I don’t have full control over. I also don’t want my data to be held hostage in the event an account is closed, banned in my country, a payment isn’t made or a service shuts down.

    The VPN subscription may be in question soon though as the UK government are discussing making ID checks mandatory to use a VPN. In which case I’ll just rent a VPS in a country without restrictions and tunnel my traffic through that. To be honest it would probably work out cheaper anyway.

    Physical aspects

    This seems strange to be writing in a post about my digital life but I feel it’s relevant. There are no pictures of me online. If there are they’re from many many years ago and they’ll have no links to my name or any of my online usernames.

    Anyone from the UK will know we have one of the highest density CCTV networks in the world. I make a conscious effort to wear a hat that covers as much of my face as possible and generally wear sunglasses when out in public. Cameras are usually overhead and sunglasses throw AI facial detection cameras off. I also have a beard where I have neither in my drivers license or passport. I shave every time my photos need renewing.

    Conclusion

    I have nothing to hide. If the police came to me with a warrant I would gladly hand over my devices and they would (eventually) hand them back with nothing incriminating discovered. That’s not the point. I believe privacy is a human right. I do not want my data analysed by marketers to analyse my spending patterns. I do not want authoritarian governments monitoring my innocent movements and communications. I do not want to be arrested for being incorrectly identified by an AI camera. I do not want to be wrongly associated with a criminal act because my phone was geofenced in a certain place at a certain time. I do not want my personal data stored on a server that will inevitably be hacked and sold to the highest bidder on the black market.

    All I want is a simple, private and honest life for myself and my family, free from the poison that’s being forced upon us. Of course I do not want my Children being exposed to adult content, however as a tech literate person, when the time comes I will use the widely available tools to control access as a responsible parent should. The state need not interfere.

  • So, I wasn’t that paranoid after all.

    What an absolutely devastating year it’s been for digital sovereignty.

    The worlds governments seem to be hell bent on stripping every bit of freedom and anonymity that’s left when using the internet. Social media bans for teens, mandatory ID checks for everyone. Anything deemed to be adult content locked behind an ID gate. Supposedly the governments are now considering making ID checks mandatory to use a VPN as they’ve clocked that people are using these to bypass the systems. We’ve also had the UK government pressuring big tech (not that they’d take much persuasion) to mandate age verification at the OS level on smartphones.

    The bots, the shills and the naive will get behind the rhetoric of “it’s for the children”. It’s never been about the children. Many of the “elites” pushing these agendas don’t have the best track record with children. Epstein files anyone? They could not care less about the welfare of children. This is just an excuse to demonise anyone trying to push back at their draconian surveillance obsession. The mega rich, and the nations they use as puppets, despise the free speech without consequence that comes from an anonymous internet.

    The peer to peer event coverage of things that main media is forbidden to broadcast, the collaboration of knowledge that exposes agendas, the pressure a collective of individuals can apply to big corporations, it all undermines the absolute control of the average person that they desire so badly.

    Coupled with this we’ve got entire forests in the US being destroyed to make way for water guzzling data centres. Who asked for all these monolithic buildings? Certainly not the layman. In my social and professional circle I’d estimate that 10% use “AI” in some capacity, even then not to the level that would demand anything other than a small local LLM. Aside from artificially inflating (hey, maybe that’s a better meaning for “AI”; Artificial Inflation!)the stock markets I have an inkling that in time these data centres will become a key part in the mass surveillance engine. “AI” facial recognition, raw data collation, pattern recognition, identifying individuals through their writing patterns, possibly even decrypting encrypted communications.

    When businesses finally realise they’re not getting any ROI on their “AI” spend, I wouldn’t be surprised if these “AI” companies turn to governments offering the above services alongside the already concerning military applications the US are exploring.

    It all seems a bit bleak, doesn’t it? What can an individual person possibly do to fight against this? Simple, resist at every opportunity.

    If greeted with an ID checkpoint online, leave the service. If you have no other choice, upload a fake document. Ideally close your account with the company and make your reason known if given the chance.

    Don’t use “AI” for personal applications. Even though you may find it convenient by using it you’re accelerating the progression by training the models, potentially funding with a paid subscription or inflating their user counts. No matter the service you are also completely sacrificing your privacy by interacting with it in any capacity.

    If your employer mandates its usage, maliciously comply. Ensure you run up token usage as high as possible with poor quality prompts. Don’t check the outputs too carefully, “AI” is always right remember… Make sure any hallucinations get submitted as work. Also consider reminding your employer of any data protection and legislation that could be applied to it’s usage. If you’re in the UK or EU the UK GDPR, data protection act and the EU AI Act would be a good place to start.

    Minimise your smartphone dependency on your smartphone. Consolidating all of your digital life onto one device that you carry on your person at all times might seem convenient, but it’s an absolute nightmare for privacy. With as many sensors as a smartphone has, and the priveledged access Google and Apple give themselves you are literally giving them everything. Geofencing, unauthorised Microphone access, contact association, health information, even your sexual preferences. You name it, your smartphone is collecting it. There are ways to minimise this; run a “degoogled” phone (ideally grapheneOS), use a “dumbphone” that doesn’t have the ability to collect said data. The most realistic solution for the average person though is just keep the data off your smartphone in the first place. Turn sensors like GPS, bluetooth, NFC, WiFi/bluetooth scanning off when you’re not using them. Don’t give it your ID, don’t sign into your banking, don’t keep any sensitive data/pictures/videos on there. (I’ll go into how I minimise my smartphone risk in a seperate post)

    This may all sound a little extreme but this could well be a pivotal time in human history. When we’ve all lost access to the free internet, are monitored through every second of our days and have to fight over minimum wage jobs to feed our families, would you rather be on the side that did their best to stop it or at least slow it down, or the side that embraced it with open arms?

    I always like the analogy of the trees voting the axe because the handle was made out of wood. None of this is in our best interests. Shareholders demand profits, governments demand control. Right now those things go hand in hand.

    Obviously what I’m writing here is my individual take on current events without sources. Please don’t take my word for anything, do your own research and form your own opinions. All I am trying to do is make people more aware of the potential dystopia we’re nonchalantly slipping into.

  • Suresmile – Get me off this ride!

    To be honest, I completely forgot I had planned to document my teeth straightening journey here. It’s been 4 months!

    One thing I can say with absolute certainty is that my teeth are a lot straighter than when I started out. My top row are near enough there. Getting the aligners in and out is pretty easy now because they’re basically straight.

    My bottom teeth… Are hell.

    Looking at my teeth going into this I’d have said to anyone it’d be my top teeth that would cause me the most trouble, but how wrong I was.

    Because the top teeth are generally bigger than the bottom incisors they’re a lot more stable. Since about the 6th aligner (I’m on number 10 now) one of my bottom teeth started to develop a bit of a wobble, a day or two after moving onto a new set of aligners.

    I mentioned this at my appointment, and my dentist wasn’t worried, he explained the process and said it’s completely normal and not to worry, this did very little to sooth my anxiety.

    For the longest time I’ve had recurring nightmares about my teeth falling out. The fear of losing teeth was what got me to go back to the dentist in the first place. As much as he says my teeth won’t fall out I can’t help but shake the paranoia.

    With that in mind imagine my mental distress when, the day after moving onto my 10th set I notice all 4 of my lower 4 incisors are loose. Not loose in the sense they feel a bit funny, loose in that if I were to push on them I’d be able to see them move in a mirror. If I use a dental pick my teeth would move out of the way for it.

    Up until the 5th or 6th trays I was comfortable eating as normal. I’d eat apples, pizza, burgers without a thought. I’ve now resorted to cutting everything up into bite sized pieces, I don’t bite anything. The bottom set is also still very difficult to get out and feels like I’m moving my teeth around to do so.

    I’ve resorted to eating a big breakfast/lunch first thing in the morning and then not eating again until my evening meal, so I only have to take them out twice a day. I’m hoping that’ll speed my progress up too as I did have to have an extra week on one of my sets because my teeth hadn’t moved fast enough.

    This coupled with the inconvenience of not being able to eat ad-hoc when I’m out and about without having to go through the whole cleaning ritual (usually in a public toilet), I’m well and truly sick of this process. I am baffled that anyone would consider this a better option than fixed braces.

    With fixed braces you can just carry on with your life. Yes you may have to visit the dentists office more frequently to get them adjusted but I’m still there fairly regularly for check-ups and to pick up more sets of aligners anyway.

    I mentioned my feelings towards all of this at my last appointment and I think I’ll be moving over to fixed braces at my next visit. I’ve got 3 more aligners to get through before then (my interval has been shortened to 10 days) and then fingers crossed I can get back to a more normal life!

    My memory of having braces may be a little hazy (it was 20 years ago) so I’m hoping I’m not downplaying the negative aspects of them, but I really don’t remember them being that bad. I remember the aches after having them tightened, and mild discomfort from the rubbing on my cheeks, but I certainly didn’t struggle with them like I have these plastic aligners.

    The only thing I’ve appreciated with the suresmile aligners is the fact that they act as gum shields. While my bite was uncomfortable these have shielded me from that. If I ever accidentally clenched my jaw these prevented any damage. Fingers crossed that by the time I move over to braces the teeth that were colliding will no longer be doing so.

    As I basically forgot this blog existed I won’t be committing to regular updates, but I will write again once my braces are fitted and do a comparison of the two solutions from my perspective.

    Until then!

  • The Samsung A26 – Revisited

    The Samsung A26 has been out for just over a year now. The anticipated successor, the A27 is currently late, with no release date announced as of yet.

    In that year I’ve purchased at least 8 of them as work phones for my colleagues. I’ve not had a single complaint about them.

    Samsung sell them for £339 which I’d say is overpriced, however I’ve never paid more than £200 for one. At that price, they’re a steal.

    If I listed the specs of 256GB of base storage, 8GB RAM, a 120Hz OLED screen I wouldn’t blame you for expecting me to be detailing a device costing upwards of £500. The only giveaways are the slightly larger bezels, a teardrop camera cutout and the Micro SD slot which is almost always reserved for budget devices these days.

    At 1 year old these phones will still have an additional 5 years of OS and security updates which is more than is currently offered on the Nothing Phone 4a Pro (offering 3 years OS) which costs £499 with no offers in sight.

    The only thing that lets the phone down is its Exynos 1380 chipset. It’s by no means a slouch, but it lags behind its competition.

    You might wonder why I’m spouting about a 1 year old phone? Well I have a theory that it may well be the last of it’s kind. The upcoming Samsung A27 is rumoured to use the Snapdragon 6 Gen 3, which was used last year in the Samsung A36. This in itself isn’t a bad thing, however the fact that the A36 didn’t have a Micro SD slot is. It can semi safely be assumed that they will reuse the board from this phone in the A27, meaning no Micro SD for that either. The leaked benchmarks are also hinting at the device having 6GB RAM, a 25% downgrade on the A26.

    If having expandable storage is important to you (it is to me) this may be your last chance to get a Samsung device with a Micro SD slot and have 8GB RAM. The A1x series are the bestselling devices, but in the UK at least we only ever get offered them with 4GB RAM. I find this to be painfully limiting in day to day use, causing regular slowdowns and background apps closing prematurely.

    I am fortunate enough to have an A26, which I received on a low enough revision of Android 16 (OneUI 8) that I could downgrade it to Android 15 (OneUI 7). This is the update I’ll keep the phone on for now, for one I prefer it over OneUI 8 and secondly I retain the option of unlocking my bootloader should I choose to in the future.

    While you may initially overlook the A26, as it wasn’t a major upgrade on the A25, and lost it’s headphone jack, it is still most likely your cheapest way to get a phone with big storage capabilities in 2026.

  • GrapheneOS – Interesting development

    GrapheneOS is a project that I, in theory, love. It’s open source, it’s very well written, the installation process is excellent and it gives you the choice between going completely Google free or having the play services installed but without the privileged access they would normally have.

    The caveat to this is the only phones that GrapheneOS supports are Google Pixel phones. I do not like Google. I don’t like to support them by purchasing their hardware either directly through a new phone or indirectly through a used purchase (I figure buying a used one enables someone else to go and buy another new Pixel). Let me be clear and say that I have no concerns about GrapheneOS using Google hardware from a security or privacy standpoint, I just don’t like financially supporting Google.

    The recent announcement from GrapheneOS here https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/32656-motorola-partnership-announcement could be what us Google haters were waiting for. GrapheneOS are partnering with Motorola to release devices with first party support for GrapheneOS. This is excellent news for mobile security and privacy. I have long suspected Google have been actively trying to sabotage projects like GrapheneOS, after all data is their product and GrapheneOS actively prevents it falling into their hands. Additionally Google never stated any kind of support or partnership with GrapheneOS, it just so happened that their devices suited the requirements of the project. At any time Google could implement a change (such as removing bootloader unlocking) that would instantly squash any kind of custom ROM on their devices.

    Having a formal agreement with a manufacturer almost guarantees the longevity of GrapheneOS, which is music to my ears. I have owned a few Motorola devices over the years, and whilst I’ve liked their minimal bloatware and clean OS I’ve always been disappointed by their lack of software support. 1-2 years is often the maximum they pledge to support their devices, which simply doesn’t compete with offerings from other brands. I assume that having the Graphene team on board will help them to lengthen their support duration too.

    The official “X” account for GrapheneOS has stated that the first Motorola device with GrapheneOS support will launch in 2027, stating the 2026 models were unable to meet the hardware requirements. They have also stated that initially they will only support one device, presumably a flagship, that will have 5 years software support.

    Unfortunately I had become so disenfranchised with Google and Android that I recently made the switch to iOS with one of their latest offerings, so I won’t be needing another phone for a good few years. However I hope that when the time comes this project and partnership are still going strong so that I have a very secure option to choose from.

  • Suresmile – starting to feel normal

    My previous post on this topic was written from a fairly stressed out and overwhelmed perspective. I’m 5 days into this process now, and while I wouldn’t by any means saying I’m loving it, I am coping better.

    I don’t know if it’s because my technique has improved, or my teeth have moved slightly, or maybe even a combination of both but removing and inserting the aligners has become a lot easier. I can generally get each one out in about 10 seconds now. I start from the molars, and then unhook the canine part from their attachments and then it comes off, top and bottom. Getting them in is even easier. For the bottom I line them up with my jaw and they just click into place. The top ones I have to push the molars on first, which angles the aligner forwards and then it can clear my front attachments on my incisors. Reading back what I’ve just written I’m going to assume it’s my technique that’s improved.

    Being able to get them out and in more comfortably and consistently has in turn given me the confidence to begin eating at work, which has improved the other major problem I was having with these.

    My routine is now as follows: Before work I remove my aligners, have a coffee and a light breakfast, clean my teeth and head to work. At lunch time I remove my aligners at my desk, putting them in the carry case. I eat my lunch and have a cup of tea, then I go and brush and floss in the bathroom and carry on with my work day. In the evening I do the same, but this is the most thorough clean of the day as I won’t take them out again then before I go to sleep.

    It’s still quite a substantial difference to how my routine was, but I find it manageable. At least now I’m not going for ridiculously long periods of time consuming water alone. With a bit of luck I may even lose a bit of weight now that the office treats are completely off limits. Actually no, that’s a lie. They’re not off limits, but the majority of the time it’s just not worth the additional clean up that follows just for a biscuit.

    I’m due to move over to my next tray on the 12th. I was given some advice by a friend to switch to my new tray just before bed. That way the majority of the discomfort that goes along with it will happen while I’m asleep. Needless to say I’ll be following that advice. My next post on this will most likely be on how that went, as it seems like I’m sailing fairly smoothly on this tray now.

  • My journey with SureSmile begins.

    I alluded to having some expensive dental work I’d had to pay for in my previous post. Well I figure I may as well document the process here!

    To begin with a bit of background information I originally had braces at approximately 12-13 years old. I can’t really remember the issues that I had with my teeth that lead me to being recommended braces, but I do remember them being straight afterwards. I think the process lasted about 2 years, and at the end I was given a retainer that initially I had to wear all of the time, and then tapered down to just nighttime use. After having that for a couple of years our pet dog chewed it and we never got it replaced. I’m in my mid 30’s now so it’s probably been around 15 years.

    For the majority of that time my teeth had been okay. There was some movement and shifting, but nothing that was particularly unsightly or annoying to me. Over the past couple of years my crowding has become a lot more apparent. My 2nd incisors had pushed forwards, and my front two teeth had pushed backwards. Compounded by my bottom teeth getting more and more crooked I was starting to experience problems with my teeth colliding uncomfortably when I ate, I was holding my jaw in a way that compensated for this that was causing me issues with snoring in the night too. At one point it was really getting me down, it had been playing on my mind a lot and after realising my teeth were beginning to be damaged by this poor alignment I decided I needed to do something about it.

    At my next dentist appointment I brought up the topic, I was booked back in for an orthodontist appointment a couple of weeks later. At this appointment they did 3d scans of my mouth (impressive technology!). Discrete aligners and fixed braces were discussed, I mentioned I’d prefer the discrete option to have as little as a visible change to myself. My orthodontist mentioned that due to the fact I had some teeth forward and others backwards aligners might not be an option, but he’d let me know. With that I went away to wait for a quote. About a week later I received an email with a proposed treatment plan. I could have the discrete aligners, but I may also require a period in fixed braces too.

    Now I’m not going to post any photos here (plenty of invisalign progress pictures elsewhere) but I will be completely transparent about what it’s costing me. My treatment is costing me £4700. This includes as many sets of aligners as I need, the logistical part of the process, a visit every 6-8 weeks, the period of fixed braces if needed, retainers (either removable or permanent) at the end of the process, and teeth whitening.

    They asked for £2500 up front and the rest is just to be paid throughout the rest of my treatment, my dentist is fairly relaxed about this as I’ve been going there for a while and they know I’m not going to do a runner!

    My fitting appointment was yesterday. I generally book them for later on in the day so I can just stop in on my way home, and if I’m having anything that will need recovery time done at least I don’t have to head into the office straight after it. My appointment was pretty quick, I was in and out in around 40 minutes. My orthodontist explained everything I needed to know:

    The aligners need to be worn for 22 hours a day. I need to wear each set of the initial 3 sets I’ve been given for 2 weeks before moving onto the next one. If I want to eat or drink anything other than water I need to remove the aligners, then brush and floss before putting them back in. Doesn’t seem like too many rules, however they do have a big impact which I’ll get into later.

    After that I got into the chair. I didn’t see the instruments used but they put “attachments” on select teeth. These are blobs of composite filling material which are there to give the aligners something to grip onto and aid them moving the teeth. I currently have 10 in total, 7 on the bottom and 3 on top. Then, and this was my least favourite part, he had to make some space between my teeth. This felt like having my teeth flossed with sandpaper. Fairly unpleasant it taking what I perceived to be a lot of force to get this moving between my teeth, but not painful.

    Finally it was time to learn how to put my aligners in. I moved over to the mirror and was handed my bottom tray. This wasn’t too difficult, fairly similar to putting a phone case on. It required a bit of force but then pops into place. The top set was much harder. It went over my molars quite easily but getting it into place over my front teeth took what initially felt like a dangerous amount of force, eventually it went on. After that I was shown how to use a “chewie” to really get the aligner into place, and given a plastic hook like tool to aid removal. I was handed a box with a carry case, my next 2 sets of trays, some cleaning tablets and a pamphlet and was sent on my way, with the next appointment booked for around 6 weeks time. On my way out my orthodontist mentioned the next week or so would be difficult, and to remember why I decided to do this in the first place. I didn’t think too much about that at the time, but now I can fully understand why he said it.

    When the aligners are in place they really aren’t that intrusive. They’re very smooth feeling, and thin so the worries I had about feeling claustrophobic in my own mouth and obsessing over rough bits were quickly dispelled. I wouldn’t even say they’re that painful. If you’ve ever had fixed braces they are magnitudes worse than this and the aligners are mild in comparison, probably due to the fact the movements are small and gradual opposed to a fixed brace only being tightened every couple of months.

    The real shock to the system comes to the lifestyle changes you have to make for this process to work. What I wasn’t expecting was how difficult these aligners would be to remove. The first time I tried to take them out was later that evening when I was ready to eat my evening meal. Prepared with the hook I was provided with earlier and the carry case I went to the mirror and had a go. At first I couldn’t even find an edge to grip with the hook, they felt permanently attached. Immediately feelings of panic and despair start to set in, however I was warned about this. I used the techniques I’d been taught and eventually managed to release the aligners from my molars. I had less joy with the front top teeth. I started to experience discomfort from the pressure and just couldn’t see how this aligner could possibly come off. Without any exaggeration I struggled with them for about 15 minutes, and eventually with much relief and drool I got them out. By which point my meal had gone cold. The attachments felt very rough whilst I was eating and caused some discomfort against my gums. I carefully ate my meal, cleaned my teeth and struggled for another 10 minutes to get them back in.

    At this point I decided I wasn’t ready to be tackling this at work.

    This is where the lifestyle changes come in. While I am slowly getting better at getting these aligners in and out it is still by no means a quick and stress free process, in fact, I dread it. I decided I would take them out the bare minimum I could get away with, at least until it becomes easier. Today I took them out in the early morning before work, at my lunch at 06:30am (I usually skip breakfast), drank a big coffee and then went through the cleaning regime. I’d done my research before starting and heard plenty of people recommending an ultrasonic cleaner to keep the aligners looking good so I had this ready, I drop them in the ultrasonic cleaner with a cleaning tablet and leave them to do their thing. After that I use the inter-dental brushes, followed by dental floss, then I use a tongue scraper and then finally brush my teeth. Whilst this is my standard nighttime oral hygiene routine, it is quite laborious to have to do it every time I eat. Finally the aligners can go back on.

    Normally I’m an avid drinker of tea and coffee (I’m English, what else would you expect!), and not being able to do that throughout the day was a more daunting concept than not being able to eat or snack. I’ll be honest, that was hard. At one point I even resorted to a cup of hot water just to make it feel like I was having a brew. The office cakes and biscuits looked even more tempting than usual, knowing I couldn’t have them, but the thought of having to wrestle my aligners out and go through that cleaning routine in the work toilets was more than enough of a deterrent.

    My evening meal, while fairly mundane by our standards was like paradise to me. I drank a glass of juice (not normally a huge plain water drinker) and had another big cup of coffee, before heading back to the bathroom to go through the cleaning regime and put the aligners back in.

    You might wonder why I’m going into such detail about this. Well going into this I knew that you can’t eat or drink (except water) with the aligners in, and that really doesn’t hit home of how much that alters daily life until you experience it. What you normally wouldn’t give a second thought to, such as coffee with friends, a piece of fruit as a snack, even temperature checking your toddlers food, these are all near impossible without planning the logistics of having a private bathroom and all of your cleaning equipment to deal with the aftermath. If you plan to stick to the 22 hour a day recommendation (if you’re spending a lot of money, surely you want the best results!) then a relaxed meal at a restaurant, or a night out drinking becomes practically impossible. If I’m out of the house, grabbing a meal on the go is off the cards. Our relationship with food runs much deeper than we realise, and becomes very apparent when restrictions are put in place. Right now I’m feeling quite overwhelmed by it all. My routine has been changed dramatically, and I don’t really know how long it’ll be like this for.

    If this all sounds like too much of a burden, I’d urge you just to consider fixed braces instead. Generally they’re cheaper, they give your orthodontist better control of movement and you can generally just carry on about your day as normal with them fitted. In hindsight I wonder if I’d have been better off with them entirely. Although they’re not without their own set of drawbacks; they effect speech, they’re very visible, they cause more aching pain and they absolutely shred the inside of your cheeks and lips.

    With that said my decision has already been made, I’ve committed to the plan I’m on and whether it’s the easiest or not I will see it through to completion. I will post further updates as my treatment progresses and I settle into things. Wish me luck!

  • Full circle in just over a year

    I must admit, the last 12 months have been a bit of a whirlwind when it comes to me and smartphones. I’ve switched and changed pretty much once a month trying to find the perfect device for me.

    I started the year with a flagship, wanting premium features but then found myself fearing damaging it because of its high value. I then went to the bottom end of the market to counter that, but then was disappointed with the lack of features. I got annoyed with Google threatening to lock down android and switched to iPhone, only to struggle to find workarounds to their closed environment and switch back to Android. From then I justified switching for size issues, storage issues, you name it. If it gave me an excuse to switch I took it. Novelty was what I was subconsciously chasing. In reality, any of these phones would’ve satisfied my requirements of a phone.

    Really 1 year later I’m in exactly the same boat I was in 12 months ago, only the problem was worse than in 2024 where I only owned 3 or 4 phones. Thankfully now I have some motivation to stop, money. Making the best out of a bad situation I’ve found myself in a situation where I need some fairly expensive dental work. To maintain a comfortable financial position I need to cut down on unnecessary spending while this is ongoing.

    I have sold all of my phones that I’ve purchased to offset some of the hit my savings have taken. I’m now in a position where I have 2 phones for personal use, neither of which have cost me anything and technically aren’t mine to sell. I have the Samsung A26 which was a work provided device, and most recently a Samsung A17 5G which was sent to me by mistake from an online retailer. I tried to do the right thing and return it but because there was no order it was linked to they basically didn’t want to know.

    So my long term plan now is to use these 2 devices and not spend any money for as long as possible. Both of these phones have a 6 year update promise, and the A17 is the worse of those two devices so it makes sense to use that one first. In theory after a few years of updates the A26 will still perform better so it’s better to save that one for further down the line.

    Setting up the A17 didn’t fill me full of confidence because it was a laggy, stuttery mess, but after a bit of time to settle down it’s absolutely fine. The camera is decent, the screen is high quality, battery lasts ages and overall it’s just a nice phone. It does make me feel slightly stupid for having thought I needed flagships in the past when in reality I am a light user and only have basic requirements. I wonder how many other people overspend on their phone purchases because they’ve massively overestimated their own requirements?

    Readers; please don’t be like me. Use my experiences to learn from. Smartphones are not a hobby, they’re a tool and if you believe otherwise you’ve fallen for the marketing. Use your phone until it no longer serves you well, don’t buy a new phone just because it’s new and shiny, and don’t spend time lusting after other phones. If your phone still works, chances are it’s still absolutely fine. Save your money and mental energy! The only people that can justify this are reviewers who receive the phones for free and get paid to do it.

  • How did things get so bad that Apple became a better option?

    Bit of a weird title, I know. But I can’t think of a better way of wording it.

    At home I have 2 PC’s in regular use, using a 2 port KVM. One of those is my Linux gaming PC, running Ubuntu. The other is an M1 Mac Mini. I have an old Dell laptop buried away running Windows 10, that’s most definitely got a flat battery because it’s so infrequently turned on. I only use that for a label printer that only has Windows drivers and for my diagnostic tool that again, only supports Windows.

    Aside from that my partner has a Windows 11 laptop, she only uses that when she needs to write a letter or to perform a task that needs it. For the most part she’s one of these that just does everything on her phone. When my son is old enough there is zero chance he’ll be getting a PC running Windows. If he wants to game it’ll most likely be a Linux machine.

    In 2026 I can see absolutely no reason or benefit to someone using a Windows machine in a personal capacity. I understand it for work, a lot of the corporate world still revolves around it. Even in the workplace it’s becoming a hindrance. Forced obsolescence caused us to have to replace at least 50 PC’s when Windows 10 was deprecated, updates are constant, intrusive and generally break something.

    At work I have a desktop running Windows 10 LTSC (I cannot rely on Windows 11, I’ve tried) and a laptop. My requirements for a laptop aren’t demanding. Generally if I’m on my laptop I’m only using it to use a remote session either back to my desktop or a server. At a push I might check emails and do some web related tasks. All I really need from a laptop is decent battery life, reliability and portability. For the past few years I have been in a constant battle to find a Windows laptop that meets those basic requirements. They either drain the battery when turned off, have a horrendous battery life when on, won’t turn on when I need them to due to hardware issues or have just broken.

    My last laptop was a 2025 Lenovo something or other. It’s a far cry from the Thinkpads of old. The RAM, CPU and SSD are soldered to the board. The battery is glued in place. The keyboard is bad. It drains its battery when off, and has a habit of refusing to power on even when charged. As far as a tool goes, it’s terrible.

    So when a Macbook Air M2 2022 was handed back to me, I decided to give it a go. Straight away I could tell it had seen a lot. The keys were worn and sticky, thankfully Apple Self Repair sell replacement sets, so I ordered those. The battery was at 86% health but I decided to wait and see how that goes. I decided I’d use this device as a dual purpose laptop, both personal and work. 

    The Microsoft suite of apps have Mac versions and I feel like I have more control over how deeply they ingrain themselves into my OS. My VPN’s into the offices work fine, as do my RDP sessions. In fact, there hasn’t been a single piece of software that I use that hasn’t had a MacOS version. Most importantly, the battery life. Even with a partially degraded 4 year old battery this Macbook runs rings around every single Dell, HP or Lenovo I’ve ever owned. I don’t even have to power it down, I can just close the lid and come back to it a week later and it’ll still be charged. For the performance this laptop has it is bizarrely frugal with its energy usage.

    10 years ago I would never have even considered this move. Macs were things that arty people used, I had to occasionally navigate them when I had users that needed support but it was rare and it felt completely alien. That has definitely changed. I don’t know if it’s that Macs have got better, or just the fact that Windows and their OEM’s have become so bad and complacent that the alternatives are now more appealing.

    Microsoft needs to realise, and fast, that Windows 10 was exactly what people wanted. No-one likes ads baked into their OS, or a PC that idles at 40% usage, or Copilot being constantly shoved down our throats, or half the settings in “Settings” and the other half in “Control panel”. No-one asked them to reinvent the wheel, their core user base was the enterprises and unnecessary changes do not go down well with them. They tried it with Windows 8, and everyone avoided it like the plague. People just want a functional, minimal operating system that doesn’t get in the way of what they’re trying to do.

    At this point though I think it might already be too late for them. Microsoft has put all their eggs into the “AI” basket. Obviously maintaining a reliable and trustworthy operating system wasn’t impressing shareholders anymore. I think it’s time we all start looking to jump ship elsewhere.

  • Fallout Fans – Give the older titles a chance!

    If you hadn’t already gathered, I’m a bit of a geek. When it comes to games, I absolutely lap up deep lore. I’m the guy that spends ages reading in game books, and then starts binging deep dive long videos.

    Fallout is a series that caters to my desire for lore very well. without dating myself too much, when the first Fallout game released I was too young to play it. Fallout 3 was my first Fallout game, I can’t fully remember but I most likely played it on Xbox 360 (that and PS3 were dreadful ways of playing) and I vaguely remember having the DLC. I also played Fallout New Vegas when it released, but didn’t have the DLC at the time, and remember pretty much breaking my playthrough with some poor ingame decisions.

    Fallout 4 was what really drew me into the fictional universe. Some people don’t speak too highly of Fallout 4, saying it had moved too far away from its RPG roots. However, that exact point is what makes it more accessible to the masses and makes for an excellent entry point. Hell, I played it on a PC but with an Xbox controller because I didn’t even have a desk at the time. The same couldn’t be said for Fallout 1 or 2. Anyone stumbling here from the TV series wondering how to get into the games I’d highly recommend Fallout 4 as your starting point. If you enjoy it, then look to some of the earlier titles.

    There was so much to absorb in the game. From the books, terminals, different factions, multiple story endings and endless characters with their own deep storylines just makes the world seem rich and alive. Fallout 4 is a game I will revisit in time, I’ve yet to play any of the DLC but it will be a while before I get back round to it.

    Fallout New Vegas (which is what the TV series draws a lot from) is easily my favourite game in the series, and one of my favourite games of all time. The second time I played it (with all the DLC, which is all worth every penny) was on an Xbox Series X. I spent over a hundred hours on that play through, soaking everything up I could. The world building and story writing is top notch. The world feels real, and it sucks you in to a point where you’re fully invested in it.

    The beauty of these games though is that even after hundreds of hours played, you could pick one of these games up and have a completely different experience providing you make different choices throughout the story and play in a different style.

    Having played everything (minus Fallout 76 which I won’t play) from Fallout 3 onwards at least once, the original Fallout and Fallout 2 began to pique my interest. For a long time I’ve been put off by their age, rudimentary graphics and isometric style. I watched a couple of videos on Fallout 1 and decided to give it a go. Gaming on Linux brought additional challenges, but thanks to the community edition patch (highly recommended, get it here: https://github.com/alexbatalov/fallout1-ce) I was fully up and running with a comfortable experience.

    Immediately I was thrown out of my comfort zone. This game does not hold your hand. There is no tutorial whatsoever, you get a brief introductory video then you’re thrown into character creation with no explanation and then out into an open world with very little direction. There is logic behind this however. This game was released as physical media, back in a time when paper manuals were a thing. Thankfully if you buy the GoG version of the game, a digital version of this manual is included. I highly recommend you read it, or at least find out what you need to know from it. Once I did this my experience was a lot more comfortable and I could begin to enjoy the game for what it really is.

    Fallout (1) is an incredibly large and deep game for something released in 1997. There are no quest markers, getting stuck is a very real possibility and you need to pay attention to what characters say to you. With only a mild spoiler (warning!) I’ll provide an example: In a settlement called Junktown you will come across a building with a dog (Dogmeat) preventing anyone from entering. The owner of the building will ask you for help moving the dog on. Through conversation you learn the dogs previous owner was a traveller who was killed by a local crime boss. When you enquire more about the traveller he mentions that the owner wore a leather jacket, which he thought ridiculous considering the heat of the area. Approaching the dog it just growls, and there are no further interaction options. Initially I thought maybe I could appease the dog with food, but no luck. The leather jacket comment had stuck in my head for some reason. I had one of my companions (Ian) carrying some of my excess gear, and one of those items was a leather jacket. I took it back and equipped it. Dogmeat took me to be his owner, left his post guarding the door and became my companion. Quest completed. Had I not paid attention to the dialog I would’ve never even thought to try that.

    There is a dark humour to the original game that’s more prevalent than in the later titles too, it’s very witty and subtle but adds to the experience. Often there are dialog options which send conversations down strange, amusing paths, although I’d recommend saving regularly because one poor choice can get you in trouble fast, and combat can easily be initiated by a cheeky comment.

    I’ve also found myself enjoying the isometric style of the game. Yes it’s dated, and can be clunky, especially trying to find doors to buildings that are on the side you can’t see, or trying to differentiate a locker with key items in from the surrounding walls. That aside it’s a charming art style, it’s moody and to a large degree timeless. It was never aiming for realism and for that reason has aged fairly well, in a similar way that The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker will always look good.

    I will also admit that I’m a bit of a wimp when it comes to anything scary in games. The Sierra Madre DLC for New Vegas freaked me out to the point I struggled to get through it. First person adds an uncomfortable layer to the immersion for me, and leaves me very vulnerable to jump scares. The diagonal distance view and turn based combat slows down the pace for me to a point that I can just enjoy the game without freaking out about dark corridors or spooky noises. This won’t be a benefit to people that like fast paced games, but it certainly is to me.

    That draws me nicely to my conclusion. I’m yet to play Fallout 2, but from what I can gather it’s even better than Fallout (1). These older titles won’t be for everyone. However, if you’ve played the Bethesda Fallout titles, watched the TV series and are itching for more of the Fallout universe give it a try. You can usually get Fallout 1 and 2 for around £3 each, so not much of a commitment. Like me you might just find yourself really enjoying it, and the story and characters in these games add a lot of context to the later games and TV show.