Using a mouse for work all day doesn't have to be a recipe for carpal tunnel syndrome. If pain comes with the territory, you're probably using your mouse incorrectly. A slight twist of your wrist can cause a serious problem, but Vivienne Fliescher (writing for Performance Based Ergonomics) suggests a fix.
    
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If you love having your pets with you all the time—even when you're sleeping—you're going to wind up with some hair/fur in the bed. Presuming you don't want to wash your sheets daily, you can fix the problem with less work using a squeegee.
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We don't always use scissors for just cutting. When held open, they can do all sorts of things from open packages to curl ribbon on gifts. The problem? You have to grab the blade in order to use them that way. Sheath scissors hides the blade in the handle so you don't accidentally cut yourself.
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If you can relate to the proverbial hamster on a wheel in your quest to have a bigger house, or nicer clothes, science can explain why. The "hedonic treadmill" is what psychologists call our innate desire for bigger, better pleasures—like a bigger house or splashier car—each time we get a raise or bonus.
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If you need a way to charge your gadgets on the go and you're not particularly fond of also having to charge a battery, let the sun do half of the work for you. Instructables user andrea biffi demonstrates how it's not that hard to make your own solar USB battery with four ports.
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Ever need to track down an old newspaper clipping? In olden times, you'd need to head into the library's microfiche section and dig through boxes of film. Now, it's as easy as heading over to Google's recently relaunched and easier to search through news archive.
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Nobody likes cleaning out that gross, crusty, burnt-on foodstuff in the microwave. To make that process a bit easier, The Kitchn suggests using a lemon.
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Home remedies are awesome ways to fix common little problems like hangovers, headaches, acne, and just about everything else. But how much research goes into them? Let's take a look at which ones have studies behind them.
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Nearly everyone's had that one (or more) first job that was awful. Not just a job you didn't enjoy, but one that was underpaid, overworked, and probably disgusting. The conventional wisdom, though, is that you build skills with those jobs. So, what did you learn?
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Some couples are just made of money. (mikemilton)
Dealing with finances is one of the least fun aspects of being an adult. Dealing with finances when you’re in a committed relationship is even less enjoyable. Of course you love your spouse, boyfriend/girlfriend, fiancé, or whatever, but you don’t have to love the way they handle money. Seamlessly transitioning to a ‘we’ financial situation doesn’t have to be full of mistakes or a completely painful situation.
There are several ways to ensure that your financial future with your sweetheart isn’t going to be full of doom and gloom. Kiplinger recently released a list of 9 mistakes couples make with money. Here are the ones we thought would be of interest to Consumerist readers…
1. Have the ‘money talk’ before marriage. No, you don’t need to browse each other’s credit reports on the first date, but earlier you talk about it the better. As we recently wrote in this guide on merging your money when you marry, communication truly is key.
2. Remember to amend your single-filer tax returns. Now that you’ve spent thousands of dollars on a wedding, how about a little gift from the federal government? To do so, make sure you change your single-filer tax returns. If you somehow forgot you were married, you can go back as far as 2010 to amend previous filings and watch those tax bills drop.
3. Keep a separate bank account. What’s your is mine, unless it’s a personal bank account. Each person should have their own account for their splurges and a joint account can be used for boring things like paying the mortgage.
4. Share in the fun (or burden) of managing household expenses. Both members of the relationship should take active roles, unless of course you like doing a thankless job alone. Of course knowing the ins and outs of your household finances is always a plus if/when your partner dies or you break-up.
5. Plan for your future, your kids can deal with their own. Ask yourself are those children going to provide for you when you’re retired and all the money you had planned to put in your 401(k) actually went to their college education? Forego the college account and save for retirement instead. After all, your kid can just get a student loan and deal with their own crippling debt, right?
Isn’t money fun when you’re in a couple? Remember, you love your significant other, not their money.
9 Money Mistakes Couples Make — And How to Avoid Them [Kiplinger]
The November incident occurred when the council member’s daughter attempted to pay for her late-night ride with two different credit cards, but both were declined. According to a police report, she offered to pay the fare with cash, but said she would report the driver to the Taxi Cab Commission for having an improperly working credit card machine, the Washington Post reports.
Apparently unsatisfied with the offer, the passenger claims the taxi driver locked the doors and drove several blocks before calling 911 to report he had a passenger refusing to pay her fare.
The council member says the incident constitutes kidnapping, but officers declined to arrest the driver. The council member says she tried to make a case for the arrest but didn’t “pull rank” by identifying herself as a council member. A follow-up investigation by the taxi cab commission could result in a suspension for the driver.
The anecdote was used during a Taxi Cab Commission oversight hearing Wednesday to illustrate how several drivers are failing to comply with a new law requiring taxi cabs be equipped with working credit card machines.
Taxi Cab Commission Chair Ron M. Linton says he believes most drivers are complying with the new rule, but the commission had heard several instances of drivers locking the doors and demanding cash.
The commission recommends asking a driver if the credit card machine works when a rider first enters the taxi. If a dispute does arise, Linton suggests paying with cash if you have it and take down the cab number to report it to the commission.
D.C. Council member says was briefly ‘kidnapped’ in dispute over taxi fare [The Washington Times]
The sign outside this Montreal restaurant translates into English as, “Pick-up line of the day: does this tissue smell like chloroform?”
Since it’s Montreal, the sign was written in French, but it translates to “Pick-up line of the day: does this tissue smell like chloroform?”
Guess what? Not everyone sees the humor in a restaurant cracking jokes about rendering a woman unconscious, presumably for the purpose of non-consensual sex. And even some people who admit that such a joke might have a proper time and place contend that maybe a restaurant sandwich board is neither the time nor the place.
In response to the people who find rape less than amusing, the restaurant’s owner took to the eatery’s Facebook page [via Eater Montreal] to defend the gag:
We thought it was harmless. The joke is from the movie Hall Pass and Family Guy. It wasn’t intended to offend anyone or to condone rape or violence. We kind of find it mind-boggling. We’re not promoting rape here. We’re not saying that rape is normal and that people should be getting raped. It’s dark humour, not for kids, but apparently some people choose to interpret it differently.
The Montreal mess is already the second rape-themed restaurant story of 2014, coming on the heels of the Spokane bar that made headlines with its “Date Grape Kool-Aid,” which drew not just the ire of those who have no sense of humor about dates that degrade into sexual assault, but also that of Kraft, which sought to distance its Kool-Aid brand from the drink.
Not the actual burglary suspect, but this is how we imagine him. (scenemissingmagazine)
Police in Haddon Township, NJ, say that a local criminal mastermind’s brilliantly plotted heist was undone when he returned to the scene of his crime because he still had some unfinished business. More precisely, he had forgotten to take the remote to the sound system he’d stolen 30 minutes earlier.
NJ.com reports that the burglar (we’re going to assume he wore a bandit mask and knit cap) first entered the private home early in the morning on Feb. 4, walking out a short time later with the aforementioned sound system and other valuables, but not the remote control that is so key to operating the boosted audio equipment.
Another hairline flaw in his otherwise peerless plan — not realizing that the entire thing would be caught on nearby surveillance cameras. And so he was not only filmed during the initial breaking-and-entering, but was also when he returned for the remote a half-hour later.
So let this be a lesson to anyone out there planning to rob some random person’s home — just don’t. It’s not only mean; but you’ll probably get caught.
It all started last fall when the man put a dollar in his company’s vending machine to procure a Twix bar, The Des Moines Register reports.
Unfortunately, the candy bar was snagged by a spiral hook on its journey through the machine.
Not one to be deterred, the man pounded the machine and then shook it back and forth in an attempt to dislodge his snack.
When those methods didn’t work, the man took a more sure-fire approach. He used an 8,000-pound forklift to lift the machine 2 feet from the floor before letting it drop. According to unemployment compensation records he repeated the move six times and eventually dislodged three candy bars.
When confronted by a supervisor, the man allegedly said he was trying to get the candy bar he paid for.
He was fired five days later.
A claim for unemployment benefits was denied when a judge found the man had demonstrated a willful disregard for his employer’s interests. The former employee contends he used the forklift to simply place the machine back in its original spot after shaking it with his hands.
The man told The Des Moines Register that he heard the company now has new vending machines.
The Twix bar, the forklift, and the fired Iowan [The Des Moines Register]
Where there’s smoke, there just has to be fire. Which is why we’ve all been stymied by the mysterious rash of overly generous tips that have been popping up in restaurants, coffee shops and bars across the nation. On a lot of those receipts, there’s a unifying addition scrawled after tips of $1,000 or $3,000: “Tips for Jesus.” So who is this big tipper — or tippers — making the fires?
San Francisco Magazine sat down for a one-on-one interview with The Tipper, as we’ll call him, the supposed ringleader and instigator for the Tips for Jesus movement (let’s call it TFJ from now on). While it seems that the tippers have now spread out to be more than just this guy and his pals, many people have been wondering about this guy.
He’s not identifying himself, so for now this is all we’ve learned about him from the interview.
10 Things We Learned About The Tips For Jesus Ringleader
1. He likes “utilitarian, non-name brand coffee spots” that are “acceptable but not with outstanding Yelp reviews.” So hey, maybe get a job at that kind of place if you want a big tip.
2. He wears nice clothes because duh, he can afford to hand out big tips, but he’s still a nice guy: He’s “uncommonly well dressed” but also “forthright, funny and warm.”
3. So far TFJ campaigns have left more than $130,000 nationally in big tips.
4. The first one was at a bar in Ann Arbor, Michigan, after he was feeling generous with friends for a reason he doesn’t remember, and gave a $3,000 tip on an $87.98 check. And of course, posted a photo of the receipt to Instagram.
5. The TFJ Instagram account has 71,069 followers (as of this morning).
6. It’s not actually about Christianity, despite that popular opinion (because when you mention Jesus, it does seem, you know, Christian) — “The movement we have started is intended to be agnostic.”
7. It’s unclear how many people are tipping — “Here you have a clearly affluent person (or people) anonymously giving money to individuals (servers, bussers, cooks) who presumably could use it.”
8. The whole thing is supposed to be a guerrilla effort to help people, and create copycats to do the same. And it’s fun.
“It’s just about helping people out,” The Tipper says. “It’s not hard to give back”—to tip a little extra, pay for someone else’s drink, engage in small acts of kindness, even if it’s at a level somewhere below tens of thousands of dollars. “When justified by great service, magnanimous gratuities are achievable by everyone—no excuses.”
9. It provides a philanthropy outlet for people who might never have thought to do something like this otherwise. Especially if they’re young and have money, maybe for the first time.
Like, “Dude, did you hear about that TFJ thing? I bet we could get together a pretty ridiculous tip…” “Oh man that is a great effing idea — I bet we can get the biggest one YET because we just got crazy big bonuses in our various financial jobs!” And, scene.
Where in the World Is Tips for Jesus? [San Francisco Magazine]
Applicant screening software may be all that's standing in the way between you and a job interview. To get past it, you need to make sure your resume has all the relevant keywords matching the job description. That's where Jobscan comes in.
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Conventional wisdom says that houses are a lifelong investment. While it might not be true, that's also a source of some controversy. When compared with other investments, though, houses don't seem to stack up very well.
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Here's the deal. Networking sucks and you're probably bad at it. I say that because I believe it too: I hate networking, and I'm bad at it. So I don't do it.
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Winter can throw some pretty nasty driving conditions your way: icy roads, reduced vision, and darker evenings. If you live in an area where ice and snow are a big part of winter, make sure you understand how to recover from common types of skids.
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Massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs, mercifully) get a bad rap for being life-sucking parallel universes. However, games like World of Warcraft are a microcosm of many real-life experiences. No, really.
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This is not an uncommon sight in Philadelphia during the winter. (Twitter: @NoSavesies)
There are two issues surrounding this traditional spot-saving ritual: First, is it legal? Second, regardless of legality, do you have some sort of tacit right to that spot?
“Just because a practice has been going on for so long that [it] has been ignored, doesn’t mean that we need to continue to do so,” explains Philadelphia police sergeant Eric Gripp, who also created the @NoSavesies Twitter account and hashtag, to the Philadelphia Daily News.
Gripp says that there aren’t laws on the books in Philly that specifically forbid the practice of saving a spot with a lawnchair or whatever other piece of furniture you’re wiling to risk losing by putting it in the vacated spot. However, there are laws against littering and obstructing the roadway.
That said, cops — not just in Philly, but in other cities where this is a common practice — tend to not issue citations to spot-savers, presumably because it’s hard to locate the owner of some random, busted folding chair left sitting in the gutter.
Instead, says Gripp, he and his fellow officers are more frequently called to handle the fights that erupt over saved spots, or from people like visiting nurse services who can’t find a parking spot because entire blocks are littered with bits of furniture.
Since I haven’t had a car in more than 15 years and my street in Philly is so narrow you can’t actually park on it, this issue doesn’t impact me. And so I took the question to my colleagues who own cars and/or have lived in snowy cities.
Ms. Kate Cox is now working in Consumerist’s D.C. office, but she’d previously lived in Boston where she says spot-saving has “always been considered a total [expletive redacted] move,” but “everyone does it anyway.”
Mary Beth Quirk sees her fair share of snow in Brooklyn, but not as much as she did growing up in Wisconsin. She feels that spot-saving might be accept under two conditions:
“If you (A) did the shoveling, and (B) are sitting in the chair, the spot is yours,” MBQ explains. “But the traffic cone thing? That’s bad. I’ll just drive over it.”
Meanwhile, Meg Marco, who has come across spot-saving during her time in both Chicago and NYC, worries about those who might unwittingly find themselves in a saved-spot dispute because of some other jerk’s actions:
“Say the first guy shovels his car out in the morning and leaves a cruddy chair there, hoping his spot will still be free when he returns. Then an hour later, a second guy comes, scoffs at the chair and tosses it out of the way. So after that guy leaves and a third driver pulls up to find an empty, shoveled-out, unclaimed spot, she might be the one getting yelled at when the first driver returns home to find her car in the spot he shoveled out that morning.”
And D.C.’s Ashlee Keiser, formerly of Iowa, apparently adopts the same double standard held by most spot-savers: “If the spot was being saved for me: acceptable. If it was being saved for someone else: illegal,” she jokes (I hope). “Honestly, if there’s not a person there guarding the spot, then I’d consider it fair game.”
Albany’s own Laura Northrup sums it up by saying, “In an ideal world, it would be illegal to save the spot for any longer than it takes to go get your car from wherever it is. In a real world where law enforcement has to make real rules, if no one is actually standing in the spot then it should be fair game.”
This is a very complicated matter… You know, a lot of ins, a lot of outs, a lot of what-have-you’s. Which is why we’re putting it to y’all to make the call:
Take Our Poll
Officials told the airlines to perk up and stay alert on flights heading from overseas into the U.S., with several sources telling NBC News that “very recent intelligence” showed credible warnings of possible attempts to attack planes using explosives concealed in shoes.
There’s no specific threat to any certain airline, country or time, or any confirmed plot, officials say. But Homeland Security thought it was best to let airlines in on the possible danger anyway. One official told NBC that the concern that comes with this news is “moderate.”
“It’s a reminder that we are under constant threat and an advisory to airlines be on their A game,” said another official familiar with the threat intelligence.
This also has nothing to do with the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, officials say.
“Out of an abundance of caution, DHS regularly shares relevant information with domestic and international partners about relevant threat information as we work to meet our mission of keeping the traveling public safe,” the Department said. “These types of regular communications are part of that important priority.
“Our security apparatus includes a number of measures, both seen and unseen, informed by the latest intelligence and as always DHS continue to adjust security measures to fit an ever evolving threat environment.”
You’ll recall The Shoe Bomber, Richard Reid, whose attempt to blow up explosives in his shoes on a flight from Paris to Miami in 2002 is the reason why we all take our shoes off in airport security screenings now. And it sounds like the shadow he cast on our footwear is going to last for a very long time yet.
Homeland Security Alerts Airlines to Possible Shoe-Bomb Threat [NBC News]
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Vandals shoot out at least 100 car windows in Centreville WJLA CENTREVILLE, Va. (WJLA) - Someone is shooting out car windows in Fairfax County. Police say they've hit at least 100 cars this month. Continue reading. Photo: Kendis Gibson/WJLA. The glass has been blown out by what appears to be a BB gun. Several ... 100 cars hit by BBs in Fairfax CountyW*USA 9 all 6 news articles » |
