E15's Unexpected Surprise

 It is almost ironic that in this day and age, where our society is supposedly moving away from internal combustion engines and toward battery electric vehicles, there is now a baffling array of gasoline grades available. Since the late 1980s, when leaded gasoline was completely phased out, most stations have offered three grades: regular (87 octane), mid-grade (89 octane) and premium (93 octane), but several new options have appeared in recent years like E85 (up to 85 percent ethanol) and E15 (15 percent ethanol), as well as non-ethanol formulations on the other end of the spectrum. This all begs the question of which is best for your car. The answer, of course, is 'that depends'. Different formulations are optimized for different types of vehicles.

To fully understand the differences among these fuel grades, not including diesel, we first need to understand what octane is and what it measures. Many people mistakenly believe octane is a measure of the fuel's potential power and that higher octane fuel will deliver higher performance, but it's a little more nuanced than that. Octane is a measure of gasoline's ability not to detonate under pressure. Higher performance engines often require higher octane fuel because they have a higher compression ratio, which delivers a bigger bang, if you will, when the fuel is detonated. For this reason, higher compression engines, including those that use superchargers or turbochargers, will not run properly on regular fuel, but the opposite is not true for more conventional engines. While higher octane fuel is not an issue for them, there is no real benefit, either. 

With that bit of knowledge in hand, let's look at the various gasoline grades and what vehicles they're best for:

Regular (87 octane)—More often than not, this is the fuel you need. It works in most cars, unless they have a high-performance, high-compression engine. If your car specifies "Unleaded Fuel Only", regular gas will work just fine. It will also work in flex fuel vehicles, but more on that later.

Mid-Grade/Plus (89 octane)—This is often the forgotten 'middle child' at the gas pump. This is the same octane rating as leaded regular gas, which has not been available in the U.S. since about 1988, and is best suited for older cars that ran on leaded regular. It will deliver slightly improved performance and fuel economy in some other cars, but the ever-widening price spread between it and regular often makes it somewhat of a false economy.

Premium (93 octane)—As mentioned earlier, this is the specified fuel for higher compression and forced induction engines. In most cases, a car requiring premium fuel will spark knock on regular, a result of premature detonation, although there are some exceptions, such as Cadillac's NorthStar V8, which would automatically adjust itself to run on regular, albeit with a modest loss of performance and fuel economy.

Non-Ethanol (90 octane)—Up until about a decade ago, most gasoline did not contain ethanol (corn alcohol), but today's gasoline is typically an E10 (ten percent ethanol) blend. Most cars run fine on E10, but some do not. If you have a car with carburetor, especially an old muscle car from the '60s, this might be a viable option, but for most applications the benefits are marginal at best, especially at a premium of around a dollar a gallon over regular.

E85—As the acronym suggests, this as an up to 85 percent ethanol blend, or more accurately, 51-85 percent. Regardless of the exact ratio of gasoline to alcohol, this fuel should only be used in flex fuel vehicles that are designed for it. The best way to tell if you have such a vehicle is to look for 'Flex Fuel' badging on it and a yellow factory supplied gas cap. I owned a flex fuel vehicle, a 2011 Chevy Impala, for a few years, but I never put E85 in it because the owner's manual stated due to the lower energy contained in ethanol. it would yield reduced fuel economy and performance. The few times I saw it at a gas station, the price was so close to that of regular gas, that running it seemed to present a false economy; that is, the lower fuel economy negated the cost savings. That said, ethanol does burn cleaner than gasoline and it is American made, so those might be significant feel good points for some people.

E15 (88 octane)—This fuel is designed to run in any 2001 model or newer passenger car or light duty truck, flex fuel or not. It has a slightly higher ethanol level than conventional gasoline, which gives it a slightly higher octane rating. Still, many drivers are skeptical of E15 because of the conventional wisdom that non-flex fuel vehicles can only tolerate up to 10 percent ethanol, and this was why I always ignored it, despite it being a bit cheaper than regular.  

That price spread suddenly opened into a chasm last week, when a local station ran a promo, knocking the price of E15 down to $1.35 below that of regular 87 octane. After some online research to assure myself that it was safe to run in my car, I topped up my tank ahead of a 200-mile road trip. The results were, to say the least, unexpected. I figured that if fuel economy were off even by as much as 5 mpg, I would still be coming out ahead, but instead, I actually got better gas mileage than on regular 87 octane fuel. While I usually average 32-34 mpg on that trip, my round trip average was 36.3 mpg. I was astonished enough that I refilled the next day with more E15 (still at the bargain price of $1.91 a gallon) to test it out on regular, in-town driving. So far, in-town mileage is comparable, so I'm declaring this experiment a success, in that E15 fuel has proven itself an economical alternative, at least in my car. While I may not use it exclusively, I will consider it a cost-effective alternative and will use it when appropriate. Late fall and early winter are when I see the best fuel economy, but it will be interesting to see how it holds up in the warmer months, when I am using the air conditioning and the summer's heat is putting an additional strain on the engine.

Check back for periodic updates...

SPEAKING OF UPDATES--It's been about eight months since I discovered E15 and I have continued to use it at least as often as I use regular gas. Although no longer as deeply discounted as it was, it's still a good 30 cents cheaper, and these days, every little bit helps. My long-term observations are that there is no noticeable difference in performance, but a slight dip in fuel economy, about 2-3 mpg on average, especially in hot weather. The difference during cooler weather, where the air conditioning is not needed, is almost nonexistent. 

All that said, I convinced a friend to try a tank of E15 in her 2001 Pontiac minivan, and the results were less than stellar, with a check engine light and hesitation occurring shortly after the fill-up. The problem went away once there was enough room in the tank to add a few gallons of regular gas.

Have I Developed a Love/Hate Relationship with Apple Products?

 I've owned and used Apple products for more than 30 years, beginning with an Apple Mac Classic and monochrome StyleWriter ink jet printer I acquired shortly after I started graduate school in 1991. I've been through a string of Macs since then, and use a rather aged MacBook Pro as my daily driver at home. Along the way, I've had about three iPads and am on my second iPhone (never looked back at Android after getting the first one in 2016). I also had some fun a few years ago, refurbishing and upgrading old iPods, but my more recent technology acquisitions have been decidedly non-Apple. I wonder why that is.

I am no fan of Microsoft, so I do my best to stay away from Windows (I wish my employer felt the same way), but that's not to say I'm not open to new things. My latest laptop is a Chromebook, and for a tablet these days, I'm using an Amazon Fire 10 HD. For home automation, I also seem to be all in on Google Assistant instead of Apple Home.

The common denominator in those choices seems to be price. While iPads start at around $400, I got the Amazon Fire tablet on sale for well under $100. I got the Chromebook for a couple hundred dollars when I needed something to get me through until I could find what I really wanted, but the Chromebook ended up being something I could live with for the price. It's a fine secondary laptop, but will never achieve daily driver status.

The choice of Google Assistant happened more because of a freebie than anything else. I had not even considered home automation beyond a couple of KASA smart plugs when I got an offer for a free Google Nest Home Mini smart speaker from Sirius-XM. In addition to being able to listen to music, I could now control certain lamps, connected to the aforementioned smart plugs, with my voice. 

All of this might lead a casual observer to conclude that, over time, I've been gradually turning my back on Apple and its products, but that simply isn't true. It's more a matter of matching functionality to cost. Some Apple products, such as iPhones, are totally worth the price, while iPads, given the limited uses I have for a tablet are less so, especially considering that much less expensive alternatives are available that do everything I need a tablet to do. The same holds true of my Google Nest devices. My needs were essentially non-existent and were thus easily filled by a free device. 

Where the equation gets more complicated is with laptops. My Chromebook was amazingly inexpensive, but that low price came with its own costs. It does what it does reasonably well, but there's simply a lot it can't do. Realistically, a Chromebook can satisfy about 65 percent of my computing needs, and that's pretty good for the price, but it doesn't make that remaining 35 percent go away. I've also tried inexpensive Windows laptops, but those aren't exactly satisfactory, either. That's why I have an almost decade-old MacBook Pro for daily use. Surprisingly, other than degraded battery life, and the fact that it's no longer receiving operating system updates, it's pretty sprightly for its age. One thing's for certain; factoring longevity into the equation makes a Mac more affordable than it would first appear. The trick, I've found, is not to cheap out, but to buy absolutely the most Mac you can afford, as upgrading later is going to be more expensive and perhaps even impossible.

Two other parts of the Apple ecosystem I haven't explored are Apple TV and the Apple watch. As with Apple Home, streaming with Apple TV never made it to my radar. My first foray into streaming was with an Internet-enabled Panasonic Blu-Ray player, capable of streaming Netflix and Hulu. Within a couple of years, I had transitioned to Roku boxes, which are cheap and adequately serve my needs. 

I have, at times, been intrigued by Apple Watches, but not enough to lay down a few hundred dollars for one. If they were to incorporate a glucometer function into the health monitoring functions, I might consider it. For now, I will continue to check my sugar levels on my iPhone, using Freestyle Libre sensors.

The bottom line is that while I don't lock myself into the Apple ecosystem, neither am I abandoning it. I use it where it makes sense and look for alternatives where it doesn't. 

UPDATE: In the fall of 2023, I made an impulse purchase of a seller-refurbished Dell Latitude 7490 notebook computer, running Linux Mint in lieu of Windows, ostensibly as a replacement for my Chromebook, with which I had become increasingly dissatisfied, as covered in other posts on this site. What I wasn't expecting was that this computer would prove so satisfactory that it also replaced my now twelve-year-old MacBook Pro. I kept both machines running side-by-side for a few months, while actively using the Dell. Eventually, I shut the MacBook Pro down and have only fired it back up a couple of times since, mainly to transfer files to the Dell via a Web app called Snapdrop. I keep telling myself that I may someday get another MacBook, but to date "someday" has yet to arrive.

Putting it All Down on Paper

With the ubiquity of smart phones, a paper datebook may seem to many a bit of an anachronism, a reminder of how things were done way back when, yet many people, myself included, still use them. Despite my affinity for most things digital, I still like them. A few years ago, at the suggestion of a life coach, I acquired a portable sized Day-Timer and liked it fairly well; however, the Day-Timer page refills were very expensive and the binder could hold only about three months' worth of pages at any given time, so I always kept the previous month, the present month, and the next month to come in my binder. It wasn't ideal, but it worked. As it was explained to me by my life coach, I could write dates further in the future on the monthly planner pages and then transfer them to the daily planner pages whenever a new month was inserted. The process of transferring them would also help cement them in my mind.

The expense and complexity of the Day-Timer system eventually sent me searching for a better solution. For several years, I settled for employer-supplied date books, but they continued arriving later and later, so I decided the time had come to return my Day-Timer to service. I just had to find a more affordable alternative to the Day-Timer brand refill pages.

What I found, for a small fraction of the price of genuine Day-Timer inserts, was the At-A-Glance 'My Week' insert packs from ACCO Brands. They are the same page size, but unlike the Day-Timer pages, which show two days on facing pages, the At-A-Glance pages show a whole week on two facing pages, albeit in a little more cramped view, with hourly appointment slots instead of 15-minute slots on the Day-Timer pages. After using them for three or four years, I have found that the At-A-Glance page format has not, in any way, cramped my style, in fact, I prefer the At-A-Glance format to the Day-Timer format because I only have to change out the pages once a year, instead of once a month. 

A datebook is intended to be a productivity tool, but recording too much detail can have the opposite effect. The Day-Timer approach is simply too granular for my needs. Honestly, I feel that if I were to document my life in the way the Day-Timer's layout suggests—filling in as many spaces as possible on as many pages as possible, I would never get anything else accomplished. In addition, my sometimes random though processes occasionally require a certain amount of free text area on which to jot down thoughts and document additional details that wouldn't fit on a line in the weekly calendar. Having the freedom to write a page of notes and put them in the datebook adjacent to the relevant date is often far more useful than some of the pre-printed Day-Timer pages I have had. Of course, sticky notes—2 x 2 inches of smaller—are a viable option as well.

The Day-Timer starter pack that came with my binder provided a small pad of about twenty sheets of lined note paper, but refills for those are so frightfully expensive that I find myself excessively husbanding those pages as a scarce resource, to the point of avoiding using the few sheets I have, and even writing on them in pencil so I can erase and reuse them later. The At-A-Glance refill packs do not include lined paper at all, although ACCO does sell small packages of those sheets as a separate—and absurdly expensive—product. Fortunately, I found a generous supply of lined paper in the proper 6.75-inch-by-3.75-inch, six-hole punched size on eBay that was cheap enough that I won't have to worry about 'wasting' a sheet again for the foreseeable future. 

One of the great advantages of a refillable, binder style date book is its flexibility—put what you need in and leave the rest out. These days, I find myself systematically removing pages that do not serve my needs to make room for more lined note paper. I find a paper datebook, properly configured with what I need and will actually use, provides an excellent overview of one's working life, and that writing things down by hand seems to better cement them into my consciousness. Besides, a paper datebook requires no batteries. It's just a simple, efficient, and practical solution for keeping my life straight. Looking at the pages in my Day-Timer, there are sections that I use and those that I do not. If I am realistic about my usage patterns, I could remove the unnecessary ones to make it more useful. Here's what I use and what I don't:

• Month-at a glance calendar—I use it to plan ahead, but I primarily use the Week-at-a-glance pages instead.
• Week-at-a-glance calendar—This is the primary feature I use. I consider it to be indispensable and the very reason I by a new set of refills each year.
• Contact list—I prefer the contact list on my iPhone and never use the one in my Day-Timer. These pages could easily be eliminated. 
• Vehicle mileage/expense log—Another set of pages I never use and could eliminate without missing them.
• Ruled note pages—Perhaps the most flexible section that I have not been using for fear of running out. Now that I have plenty of these pages, I intend to use them much more liberally.
• Reference pages—The starter pack came with a few pages of reference material, such as a list of telephone area codes, a map of U.S. time zones, metric conversion chart, etc. I seldom use, but handy when needed and they take up little space, so they're worth keeping.
  

My Tech Stable

 Like many people, I use multiple digital devices in a typical day, including laptops, tablets and my smart phone. I don't know how unique I am in this, but the devices I use represent an eclectic assortment of platforms, this is despite the fact that I primarily identify as an Apple user. The list below will outline the devices I use regularly; that is, at least several times a week, why I chose them and why I keep them around.

 iPhone SE (2020)—In the spring of 2020, I upgraded from the iPhone 6s I had been using since late 2016 because of one app it wouldn't run. I monitor my blood glucose levels with Freestyle Libre 14-day sensors and wanted to use those with the smart phone app instead of a separate monitoring device. The phone has been paid off for several months now, but I am in no hurry to upgrade. I am definitely a fan of the enhanced value proposition brought by Apple products' comparative longevity and will definitely opt for an iPhone when the time comes to replace it.

Amazon Fire 10 Tablet—This is a bit of an anomaly in that I 'downgraded' from an iPad to an Amazon tablet, but when I found myself in need of a new tablet two years ago, I couldn't justify the expense of another iPad, considering the limited uses I have for a tablet. I only ever use a tablet for reading eBooks on the Kindle app, checking emails and light Web surfing, all of which the Fire tablet does quite well. I caught this one on a Black Friday sale for half price and I had a $25 Amazon gift card to put toward it, so I was able to pick it up for less than $50, which was a steal, considering it's really all the tablet I need. I had owned a couple of Fire tablets before it, and this is the first one that really felt ready for prime time. Fire tablets aren't the greatest tablets out there, but for the money, their value proposition is undeniable.

Chromebooks—I have two of them, a 14-inch HP and an 11.6-inch Lenovo. I bought both of these devices for the simple reason that they are lightweight, wildly inexpensive, and thus well suited as grab-and-go devices that I don't have to worry about, should they become lost or damaged. Chromebooks have limited functionality, compared to Windows or Mac OS computers, and thus will never have first-string, go-to status for me, but for Web, e-mail, and light productivity tasks, they are at least adequate. I use the HP Chromebook primarily to provide Zoom connectivity allow virtual attendees log onto certain meetings I regularly attend. Because of its smaller size, the Lenovo is the computer I most often use on the go. In many ways I use the Chromebooks in much the same way as I use a tablet, but I much prefer the notebook computer form factor. Looking ahead, I could possibly see a Chromebook tablet as a viable alternative to both a Chromebook and a Fire tablet, but not necessarily anytime soon.

HP Windows Laptop—This was never a great laptop and at about five years old, it has not aged gracefully at all. I keep it around because my employer is a Microsoft shop and I occasionally need a level of compatibility not offered by my other non-Windows machines. It stays on my dining table, where I mainly use it to read emails while I eat breakfast. This computer could barely run Windows 10 out of the box and does not meet the requirements for a Windows 11 upgrade, so the next likely step for it is a Linux installation. It may be my Apple snobbery coming through, but I could never see myself using a Windows computer as my primary personal machine.

MacBook Pro—This decade-old Apple laptop is my go-to home computer. It has aged out of all but security updates from Apple but it still performs circles around my Windows laptop. It is a testament to the value proposition of Apple products. Yes, they cost more but they last longer and have fewer issues along the way. I occasionally consider upgrading to a newer MacBook, but cost is usually a deterrent. As long as this one continues to function properly, and it can run recent versions of the software I need, it will continue to serve as my main computer. I've been an Apple user for more than 30 years and I don't see that changing any time soon. When this machine needs replacing, it will be with another MacBook*.

The one device not mentioned on the list above is my employer-issued Lenovo ThinkPad X1 laptop. I did not include it because I did not select it and I have no say in how long I will keep it. As a general rule, my employer replaces computers every four to five years, sooner if they develop a significant malfunction. I will say that it is a pretty nice setup as it came to me with a large Dell monitor with built-in docking station. All peripherals and network connections are made via the monitor, which connects to the laptop with a single USB-C cable. This provides the best aspects of both a desktop and a laptop computer. 

*UPDATE: Well, things didn't exactly turn out that way. The MacBook Pro is now mostly retired in favor of a Dell Latitude 7490 notebook computer, running Linux Mint, which I had gotten to replace the increasingly unsatisfactory Chromebooks. For what it's worth, I do not see myself acquiring a Chromebook laptop/tablet combo. The Dell has proved to be so satisfactory that I installed Linux Mint on my Windows laptop to create a dual-boot system, but I quickly ended up retiring it in favor of yet another Dell 7490 with Linux Mint. While I have not completely ruled out another MacBook at some point in the future, These days, I'm just loving Linux.

Getting to the Point(er)

 One of my minor pet peeves with graphical interfaces on computers, regardless of operating system, has long been the mouse pointer/cursor. By default, it's usually very small and unobtrusive, and either black or white, which makes it somewhat hard to see and easy to lose track of. This is not a new problem. I have been losing track of my mouse pointer for about as long as I've been using a mouse. Of course, now that I am approaching the upper reaches of middle age and my eyesight isn't what it once was, the issue has become increasingly acute. Fortunately, I have found that I can easily address this problem on all three platforms I use regularly—Mac OS, Chrome OS and Windows—without installing any additional software. As a result, my mouse pointer is larger and more visible on all of my screens. Not only are they larger, but at least on my Windows and Chrome OS computers, they're also an obnoxious shade of purple for added visibility. Colored pointers are also now an available option under Mac OS Monterey, but I'm running a slightly older version that doesn't include this feature, so mine remains black.

The process for each platform is a little different, but not difficult. On Mac OS and Chrome OS, the settings are found under the accessibility settings, while on Windows, they're under the Mouse settings. We'll take each in turn.

Mac OS—Open System Preferences and click the Accessibility icon. In the dialog box that appears, select 'Display' on the menu at the left and then click the 'Cursor' tab at the top of the box and you will get a slider to adjust the size of your pointer. As mentioned earlier, Mac OS Monterey also includes an option to select the colors of the fill and outline of your pointer. Even without the option to change the pointer color from black, it is still quite helpful for it to be a bit larger. My only question is why these settings are located under 'Display' instead of under 'Pointer Control'. 

Chrome OS—For all their simplicity, configuring Chromebooks can be more than a little complicated when it comes to accessing advanced settings. At least this one didn't involve activating any experimental feature flags, as is so often the case, such as turning on the ability to disable and enable the touch pad. 

To access these advanced Chrome OS mouse settings, you need to go through several layers of menus. Begin by clicking the clock in the lower right corner of the screen and then clicking the gear icon at the top of the menu that pops up. For simplicity's sake, I keep that gear icon pinned to the 'shelf' at the bottom of the screen. Once you're in the Settings screen, scroll to the bottom and click 'Advanced' to see more settings. Click 'Accessibility Features' and scroll down until you see a group called 'Mouse and Touchpad'. You will see a switch on the right side labeled 'Show large mouse cursor'. Click this to turn it on and you will see a slider, with which you can adjust the size of the pointer. Just below this is a 'Cursor color' menu to select a color. 

Windows 10—Windows takes a slightly more logical approach, actually grouping these controls under the mouse settings. To access them, click the 'Start' icon in the lower left corner of the screen and select the gear icon to open the System Settings. Select 'Devices' and then 'Mouse' on the following screen. Scroll down and you will see a heading called 'Related Settings'. Under that, you will see 'Adjust mouse and cursor size'. Click that and you are presented with controls for both the size and color of the mouse pointer. 

 Somehow, I had stumbled onto this setting on my Windows laptop long before I searched for them on my MacBook Pro and Chromebooks, but I am now glad to have a larger pointer on all of those machines, plus my office computer. A bigger cursor is a small thing, but it does make a real difference. Even though this setting is buried under a few layers of menus in all three operating systems, it's definitely worth seeking out.

Keurig 2.0—Big Upgrade for Little Money

 I freely admit that I am often a late adopter of new technologies, tending to wait until I can get what I want on the cheap--like thrift store cheap. This has certainly been the case with Keurig coffeemakers. It seemed like everyone was getting them when they first came out back in the early and mid-2010s, but I held out as I watched the wave of castoff drip coffeemakers on thrift shop shelves crest. Then, in about 2017, I spied a one-cup Mr. Coffee, built around the Keurig system for about the cost of a fast food meal and I decided that was cheap enough to give it a try. 

Not surprisingly, I was immediately hooked on the convenience and variety, and every year or two, I'd find an irresistible deal on a newer, fancier machine at a dirt cheap price and decide an upgrade was warranted, and move my previous favorite to my office to make room for the new one at home. The previous office machine might get donated back, passed on to a friend or family member, or simply put on a shelf as an extra, in case one of my daily use machines went bad.

Seeing a Keurig at a a thrift shop at all used to be a novel experience and it would never stay on the shelf long, but in the last couple of years, first generation Keurigs have started proliferating the shelves and the occasional 2.0 machine began to catch my eye. Inevitably, it seemed, they were missing parts, usually the drip tray, and they always wanted a premium price, even in rough condition, so I decided to content myself with what I had.

That all changed a few weeks ago, when I spotted a Keurig 2.0, complete for $15. I initially resisted it, but eventually gave in to temptation a week later and went back to have a second look at it. The machine was still there, but there was another one next to it on the shelf, in slightly better condition for $10. Such are the vagaries of thrift store pricing. Then, as icing on the proverbial cake, I found the stainless steel carafe to go with it on the next aisle over, priced separately for $4, so I bought both.

Even though I have been using Keurig machines for five or six years, I've always kept a drip coffeemaker next to it for those occasions when I wanted to make a pot of coffee. It's not every day, but sometimes, that's just what's needed. This new acquisition offered the potential to streamline things down to only one machine.

Making a pot of coffee with the Keurig requires one of two things: extra large--and extra expensive--K-cups or a large capacity, reusable coffee pod. Either of these options unlock extra menu options for the carafe and large commuter mugs. Since I have a good amount of loose ground coffee on hand for the drip coffeemaker, I opted to go that route and ordered a two-pack of reusable pods online. To be honest, I rarely see the larger K-cups in the store and they're usually over-priced when I do.

As I suspected would happen, my first attempt, using the same two scoops of coffee grounds that I would put in the drip coffeemaker, resulted in somewhat weak tasting coffee, albeit a little better than I had experienced with single-cup reusable pods. On my second attempt, I employed a trick I had successfully tried with single-cup pods on other machines, which is to add a tiny amount of instant coffee, which yields stronger flavor without inflicting instant coffee's often bitter edge onto it. 

With that little adjustment, I have decided the flexibility of the Keurig 2.0 is sufficient to justify not only the cost of acquisition but is justification to finally retire the drip coffeemaker. I know that I will not use the carafe every day, but on the occasions when I want or need to do so, it combines the convenience of the Keurig with the larger capacity of the drip coffeemaker into an excellent single solution. 

UPDATE—Now that I've had this machine for about a month, I've found it to be a worthwhile investment. The drip coffeemaker is retired and off the kitchen counter, and the few times I have wanted a pot of coffee, the carafe setup has been more than adequate. My only minor gripe about the machine is I can't manually shut it off. The virtual power button on the touch screen will turn it on, but then touching it after making a cup o coffee will not turn it off. I do not know whether this is a design feature or a malfunction, but the easy workaround is to set the automatic shutoff for 15 minutes. All in all, it's a quirk I can live with.

UPDATE: January 2025--A few months ago, I found a better solution for the weak coffee problem when using ground coffee in the reusable pods. I got hold of a coffee grinder and grind things up a little finer. It yields richer tasting coffee without resorting to adding instant. 

Let There Be (More) Light

A few years ago, I decided my front walk area was too dark at night, so I replaced a non-functional gas post light with a solar LED fixture that fit on the gas light's post. Equipped with a simple photocell, it turned itself on at dusk and usually remained on until the battery ran down, putting out enough light to be ornamental but not enough to make a functional difference. The fixture was fairly expensive and the internal battery, which was charged by the solar panel on top, only lasted a short time before it would no longer take a charge. Replacements were expensive and hard to find.

In time, I decided I needed something more practical, so I got a couple of motion activated, solar powered LED floodlights, which helped greatly; however, because of their placement between the two front windows, the ends of the walkway were still in relative shadow. 

For whatever reason, most likely laziness, that remained the status quo for several years, but as one light has grown noticeably dimmer over they years, I finally decided more light was needed, so I ordered two more solar lights of a similar design. 

The new lights arrived yesterday and I promptly installed them. Even with a proper masonry bit, drilling holes in bricks is no easy task, but now that they're up, the walkway is without shadow from end to end. The new fixtures are not identical to the old ones; they actually offer more illumination with their 144 smaller LED's versus the old ones' 20 larger LED's. While the older ones have their LED's only on the front, the newer ones have them on the front and sides, offering a wider spread of illumination. 

Perhaps the biggest difference is the presence of a push-button switch on the front of the new ones, which toggles between four operational modes--constantly on (dim), dim/bright (contstantly on dim, automatically going to full brightness when motion is detected), (off/bright) (off until motion is detected, then to full brightness), and completely off. I'm using the off/bright mode to mirror the operation of the older ones, which have no switch and are simply motion activated. 

The beauty of these motion activated lights is that they are only on for less than a minute at a time, providing light only when it is truly needed. This means the internal storage batteries are never fully depleted. Also, each one costs about the same as a conventional floodlight bulb and they require no wiring. They are completely self-contained and are ready for service almost as soon as they are mounted. A simple, practical and cost-effective solution, these lights are an excellent value, well suited for the needs of renters and home owners alike.