Yeah, I use Lineage on a Pixel 5 since I switched back from an iPhone a few months ago. My intention was to run Graphene or Calyx, but I can’t get wifi calling working without gapps installed, even with Graphene’s sandboxed play services and the dialer. I think ATT Prepaid is using the new wifi calling negotiation that Google implemented in Android 12. I have zero coverage from any carrier for miles around me, so wifi calling is pretty critical. So I installed mindthegapps, enabled wifi calling, and then disabled all the Google stuff again. I didn’t want root, so I’m not too thrilled with this situation.

I’ll be switching to T-Mobile/Mint or Verizon/US Mobile in the next few months, so I’ll try again then. But I’m seriously considering getting a Light Phone. Then I’ll use a Pixel Tablet with Graphene/Calyx and a Garmin Fenix for handling music, calendar/email, hike mapping, browsing/media while lounging, maybe a work account, etc. I’m also considering just limiting the software footprint on the Pixel, but… that’s too easy to override on a whim.

Another option is a Unihertz Jelly Star, so the screen is too small to do much. I’d really like Spotify in the car, and mostly just my downloaded daily/weekly playlists since I have such limited cell coverage. I’m not entirely sure if the Fenix can play to the head unit over Bluetooth.

I suspect the decades of infinite scroll is destroying my attention span and already limited emotional response, which is combining with my autism to put me in a place of pretty much near constant burnout. That leaves me on the cusp of meltdown at all times, it’s not a good place to be. Luckily reddit gave me an excuse to do what I’d been leaning towards for over a year, and there isn’t such an overload of content over here yet.