I LOVE these. Funnier the longer I think about them. Almost serious or useful then just completely out of left field.

What is everyone else using for VPN solutions and what are the trade offs?

I want a VPN to access all my personal devices and use services like Syncthing. I use it on my phone so it can't use ungodly amounts of idle data.

I looked at Netbird but found the idle data usage almost 1GB per few days using JetBird with Lazy connections. I tried the default app but it makes me SSO login every day or two, it wouldn't stay connected, and it still used a reasonable amount of idle data.

I looked at Tailscale but I'm not going to lock access to all my devices behind a Google account login or some other third party service login for no reason. It seems like hosting my own auth server is too much additional risk as well. I tried self hosting headscale which worked well except that I have no decent front end to easily add devices. I have to log into a terminal, then execute docker commands which was a huge pain in the ass. I didn't even touch on any of the firewalling or routing that can be done because it was so much more complex in headscale then in a web interface. I tried hosting two or three headscale front ends but couldn't get one working that supported most of the available feature set. Usually I was given generic connection errors with no clear way to diagnose or clear troubleshooting steps so after a few hours I moved on.

Edit 2026-05-10:
Thank you for all the feedback.

Will try disabling expiry on SSO login for my phone via Netbird official app.
Will look into Pangolin.
May try Headplane UI for Headscale again though lower priority than Netbird because it's fully open source.

Yesterday afternoon. Seemed as though the driver had ample time to pull over and get out,

Common Sense Calgary figures the report states the city has been warned that the bearspaw feeder line was going to be a problem for a decade.

I have no idea how reliable a source they are; they tend to be conservative leaning. But here is the report so people can read it themselves.

https://www.calgary.ca/content/dam/www/emergencies/files/feedermain-review-final-report.pdf

TLDR: Zoo took bear to DQ to make safety video. Was later charged $500 for not notifying the gov't body about moving the bear.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/58220106

Life Expectancy Around the World in 2025

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/mapped-life-expectancy-around-the-world-in-2025/

cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/52880319

Calgary officials provide update on repairs after 'catastrophic' water main break

Calgary Mayor Jeromy Farkas says there's a "ticking time bomb" under the city's streets, and that means a new reality for residents moving forward.

"This Bearspaw feeder main served Calgarians for many years, but right now, it is at end-of-life," Farkas told CBC Radio's Calgary Eyeopener on Monday.

"No amount of short-term fixes, no amount of patchwork will be able to get this back into a reliable condition."

Last Tuesday, Calgary saw its second "catastrophic" water main break in the northwest in less than two years. That led to water restrictions and a boil-water advisory for several northwest communities, which were lifted late on Sunday.

Evidence suggests that exposure to certain animals early in life (even before birth) decreases allergies later in life. Other animals seem to make allergies worse.

Sorry, couldn't find a non-paywall link. Browse to the archive.org link, then stop loading once you can see the text and the pay wall should never come up.

I suspect this is the referenced study for evidence: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36989214/

Another water main break in Bowness.

Other links: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DS6boeAkTgz/