I was thinking about buying a phone to play games on lately. I’d been using a Xiaomi Mi Pad 4, and it’s not like it can’t run games, but that screen aspect ratio cuts off part of my view. When I play a turret-type mid-lane mage I just can’t keep track of everything, so I figured maybe I should just get a phone.

At first I had my sights set on the Xiaomi Mi Max (first gen), since its specs are good enough, the screen is big enough, and the battery is ridiculous—it’s basically a handheld console. The second and third generations don’t even bear mentioning; the performance actually went backwards, even with bigger batteries and better build quality.

But the Mi Max is obviously not something you can buy new. I found only eBay had them, so I went looking, and after digging around I couldn’t find a single one I was happy with. Ones in good condition were priced absurdly, and the reasonably priced ones were all crippled units. Then I thought I’d check out LeEco phones or Gree phones—hah, Gree phones are even more expensive, and LeEco phones are complete garbage…

While I was hesitating, my good buddy, the Guo Degang of the medical world, a.k.a. Duan Ye, answered my prayers:

“Master Li, there’s a Smartisan Nut Pro here that Luo Yonghao sold to idiots. Wanna take a look?” “If it’s sold to idiots, then how do you have one, Duan Ye? Don’t tell me…” “Cut the crap. Do you want it or not?” “Yes yes yes…”

So I took the Nut Pro off Duan Ye’s hands and began my testing journey.

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I’ve been cooking every day lately, breakfast especially.

Breakfast has to taste good, and it has to be fast and convenient. Best of all if nothing goes to waste — this time the house was sitting on way too much mantou, so I stir-fried it.

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A supremely unglamorous dish. As the name says, you chop up a flatbread or scallion pancake and stir-fry it.

First, chop the pancake into bits, then chop some lettuce too. If you don’t have lettuce, skip it… or swap in cabbage.

Beat two eggs, heat the wok, add a tiny bit of oil, toss in a little chili to bloom the aroma, then pour in the beaten egg and the chopped pancake bits and just start stir-frying.

Finally add the chopped lettuce, give it a quick toss, and you’re ready to season.

Add black pepper, add a bowl of warm water with salt stirred in, keep stir-frying — this makes sure the pancake softens up and improves the texture.

Then add a splash of light soy sauce, and it’s ready to come out of the wok.

![DqjODaoXcAEQ9Ej.jpg:large.jpeg][1]

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ThinkPad batteries are lithium-ion, so capacity loss over time is normal.

But my brand-new replacement battery dropped to 97% in a month, and it won’t charge past 99%. That’s definitely fucked up.

I remember there used to be a ThinkPad Windows tool for recalibrating the battery — drain it completely, charge it back up, let it re-estimate capacity. Except I’m on Linux. And after I dug up a Windows To Go drive and booted into Windows, that ThinkPad tool was gone anyway, so I had no idea how to calibrate.

Good thing TLP exists on Linux and can recalibrate the battery. One command, that’s it.

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VNR: Visual Novel Reader, a hooking tool that grabs text from visual novels and immediately translates and displays it.

Granted, I haven’t touched it in ages, but VNR is still my go-to recommendation for anyone who wants to learn Japanese and play visual novels in the original language.

Recently someone told me the thing doesn’t work anymore.

VNR hasn’t been updated in years, but it always kept working. And the only translation engine in it that actually works is Baidu Translate — its Japanese output is the most reliable; the rest of the features don’t matter. Problem is, the Baidu Translate engine is dead now.

Looked around online, and apparently the reason is:

Baidu Translate’s API switched from an http URL to https!

Holy shit, Baidu actually uses https now.

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Egg fried rice made from leftover rice, with diced beef tossed in.

The method is a total ripoff of Kuan You Wang’s video. The key is frying the egg whites and yolks separately.

Except I didn’t have fresh shiitake mushrooms, and no cured meat either. I used beef paste, the kind with lots of diced beef in it. For the mushrooms I subbed in diced carrot.

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I had a PSP 3000 lying around, and I did play some visual novels on it back in the day. A few days ago I dug it out and found the battery swollen, the paint flaking off, and the thing generally dead.

Still, I’m attached to it, so let’s save it. I bought some parts on Taobao — pretty cheap, too — and figured I’d just refurbish it.

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The LG Watch Sport officially doesn’t support swapping straps, since the antenna lives in the strap.

But anything that comes apart can be replaced, as long as you can find the parts.

There are two ways to buy a strap for the LG Watch Sport. One is to order from a Korean site, which comes to $58.

https://www.tntkstore.com/product-page/lg-watch-sports-w281-band-international-edition-band-gray-color

The other is to pick up a dead unit on Taobao.

I went with the latter, because it’s cheap!

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The Walkman ZX300A is probably one of the more honest players Sony has put out recently.

First off, the chip. It uses Sony’s newly developed S-Master chip, which is a higher hardware revision than what’s in the Black Brick and Gold Brick, and it supports more features too. In theory the sound should be on par with those high-end models, and the price is still low — the Chinese domestic version seems to be under 3000, which is downright reasonable compared to the Black Brick, the Gold Brick, and the “Sony Sixty Thousand.”

So anyway, I’m broke, I can’t afford a Black Brick, and this is all I can manage. It has every feature I need, and I’m pretty happy listening to it.

Then comes the even better part: this thing keeps getting firmware updates, and the latest one is a bombshell.

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You’re not a cute anime girl, and you can’t hug one like a bottle of cola, but you can still make yourself the same baked sweet potato she’d eat.

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