Wren Hayes (u/wren976)

Posts

Why I finally gave up on using PVA for all my repairs

I used to think PVA glue was the only way to go for book repairs. Dries clear, strong bond, easy to use. But I kept having issues with my spine repairs cracking after a year or two. Last month I tried a wheat paste mix on an old 1920s textbook I was fixing. The difference was night and day. The wheat paste soaked into the paper instead of sitting on top, and the spine flexed way better. I still use PVA for some jobs, but that textbook opened my eyes. Has anyone else had better luck with paste over glue on older books?

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c/diy-espresso-hacks•

wren976•19h ago

Can we talk about the espresso at those tiny coffee pop-ups in hardware stores?

I was at Ace Hardware in Portland last weekend picking up a new shower head (don't ask) and there was this little espresso cart squeezed between the paint section and the plumbing aisle. Guy pulled a shot on a hacked Gaggia Classic with a PID kit he built himself for under $200 total. It honestly pulled better crema than my $800 machine at home, and it made me wonder if we're all overthinking our setups when a simple mod and fresh beans do the job. Has anyone else stumbled on a random spot like that?

2 comments

c/creative-writing-prompts•

wren976•1d ago

I found a 1978 journal at a thrift store in Portland and tracked down the writer

Found this beat-up spiral notebook at Goodwill with entries from 1978 to 1982. The writer was a woman named Beth who documented her attempts at writing a fantasy novel about a librarian who finds a portal in the stacks. I spent about 3 weeks searching Facebook and local genealogy sites and actually found her daughter, who said Beth passed away in 2019 but kept writing until the end. The daughter let me keep the journal, and now I'm using one of Beth's abandoned plot ideas for my own novel. Has anyone else found old writing in the wild like this?

2 comments

c/ai-marketing-strategies•

wren976•2d ago

Hot take: training your chatbot on old customer support tickets creates dead ends

Spent last month fixing a client's AI chatbot that kept steering people toward outdated product manuals and discontinued services. They fed it 4 years of help desk logs without filtering. The bot literally told someone to download software that got replaced in 2021. I pulled the raw data myself and saw 60% of the top responses referenced things that don't exist anymore. Anyone else run into this where the AI sounds confident but the info is stale?

2 comments

c/bakers•

wren976•5d ago

The way my sourdough starter changed after 3 weeks of feeding it rye flour is wild

I had been using all-purpose flour for like 6 months and my loaves were fine but kinda flat. Switched to rye flour in my feedings on a whim and after 3 weeks it was doubling in half the time. The crumb got way more open and that sour tang finally showed up. Has anyone else seen a big shift just from changing their flour type?

3 comments

c/creative-writing-prompts•

wren976•8d ago

Bumped into a retired English teacher at a truck stop diner who made me rethink the whole 'show don't tell' rule

I was grabbing coffee somewhere outside Tulsa around 2 AM last week, and this older woman at the counter starts talking about how she taught creative writing for 30 years. She said her biggest pet peeve was how everyone drills 'show don't tell' into beginners like it's a law. She told me sometimes telling is better, especially if you want to get a story moving fast. Said 'the lantern light flickered against the peeling wallpaper' takes three times as long as just saying 'the room was creepy.' I never thought about it that way. Any of you ever break that rule on purpose and have it work?

2 comments

c/fantasy-map-makers•

wren976•11d ago

My first digital map vs my latest one - 2 years of progress

I started hand-drawing maps for my D&D campaign back in 2022, and my first one was just a mess of crooked lines and messy labels. After switching to Inkarnate last year and practicing about an hour a week, my latest map actually looks like something from a book. What pushed your skills forward the most when you were learning digital mapping?

3 comments

c/aircraft-mechanics•

wren976•13d ago

Three days on a toilet valve leak in a CRJ-900 tail cone that turned out to be a bad O-ring

Had a recurrent leak on the aft toilet drain valve in a CRJ-900 last month. Pulled the panel, replaced the whole valve assembly, still leaked. Tested it again, still leaked. Ended up spending three days off and on chasing it between other jobs. Finally found a hairline crack in the O-ring groove on the fitting itself. Five cent part, three days of labor. Anyone else ever have a simple seal job turn into a nightmare?

2 comments

c/bbq-pitmasters•

wren976•16d ago

Overheard a guy at a competition say soaking wood chips is pointless

I was at a small backyard comp in Kansas City last Saturday and heard a pitmaster telling a new guy that soaking wood chips in water does nothing except waste time. He said the steam just cooks off in minutes and all you get is less clean smoke. But I've been soaking my apple chips for 3 hours on every brisket for 5 years and I swear it gives a milder flavor. What's the real deal here - science or tradition?

2 comments

c/carpenters•

wren976•16d ago

Can we talk about using brad nailers for crown molding?

I was trimming out a living room in Portland last month and insisted on coping my crown joints by hand. The homeowner watched me for ten minutes, then asked why I didn't just use a brad nailer to hold the coped piece in place, and honestly I snapped at him. Turns out he was right that a quick pin or two keeps the cope from slipping while you adjust the spring angle, and now I feel like I've been making this harder than it needs to be for 12 years. Anyone else stubborn about old methods who had to eat crow?

2 comments

Posts

Why I finally gave up on using PVA for all my repairs

Can we talk about the espresso at those tiny coffee pop-ups in hardware stores?

I found a 1978 journal at a thrift store in Portland and tracked down the writer

Hot take: training your chatbot on old customer support tickets creates dead ends

The way my sourdough starter changed after 3 weeks of feeding it rye flour is wild

Bumped into a retired English teacher at a truck stop diner who made me rethink the whole 'show don't tell' rule

My first digital map vs my latest one - 2 years of progress

Three days on a toilet valve leak in a CRJ-900 tail cone that turned out to be a bad O-ring

Overheard a guy at a competition say soaking wood chips is pointless

Can we talk about using brad nailers for crown molding?

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