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https://www.wikihow.com/Grow-Figs
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How to Grow Figs
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To plant a fig tree, start by tilling the soil in a large pot with mulch or compost around mid-spring, and then dig a hole large enough to fit the root ball of the plant. Trim the excess roots around the edges of the root ball, and place it in the hole, carefully spreading the roots away from the trunk. Water the plant heavily for 2-3 days after planting, and reduce watering to 1-2 times per week after that. After 2 years of growing, prune the branches back to encourage fruit growth. Harvest the figs when they're soft to the touch by pulling them gently off the branch.
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Choose a variety of figs. There are many types of figs available on the market, but there are a few common ones that are very popular for their hardiness. Look into the figs that grow best in your region, but consider varieties like brown turkey, Brunswick, or Osborne figs. Keep in mind that figs come in varying colors, in shades from purple to green to brown. Each type of fig typically ripens at a different type of the year as well. Visit a local nursery or call your local agricultural extension to get figs that are suitable for your local climate. Figs grow best in warm, tropical and desert-like areas, so the largest variety of figs will be able to grow in these environments. Only a select few species can grow in places whose temperatures drop below 40 °F (4 °C). Know when to plant. In general, figs should be planted in mid spring. A young fig tree will take up to two years to produce its first fruit, but typically the figs ripen in late summer and early fall. Pruning should also occur in the summer, which is atypical to some other popular fruit trees. Decide where to plant. Because fig trees are so cold-sensitive and also require maintenance of the root ball, it is typically easiest to plant them in a pot if you are growing them in a climate any colder than USDA hardiness zone 7. This way, they can be moved to warmer areas and their roots can be easily maintained. However, you can choose to plant your figs outside with the right conditions; find a location on a southern-facing slope with minimal shade and plenty of drainage. Prepare the soil. Although fig trees aren't particularly picky about soil conditions, they do thrive with a few minor changes. In general, fig trees grow best in soil that is slightly sandy and with a pH near 7 or just below (more alkaline). Add a bit of fertilizer to the soil in a 4-8-12 or 10-20-25 mix or mulch with a layer of compost. Prepare your plot. Use a small shovel or your hands to dig a hole for your fig tree. Make the hole just large enough for the root ball to fit, and plant the tree at the same level it was growing in the container. Plant your tree. Remove the plant from the container and carefully put it on its side. Use a pair of gardening shears to trim off the excess roots around the edges, as these reduce fruit production. Then, place the root ball in the hole and spread the roots carefully away from the trunk. Fill in the areas beneath and around the tree with soil, and pat the soil so it is even and firm. Water the fig tree. To help your newly planted tree to settle, give them a heavy watering for a few days. However, in general figs don't like a ton of water, so give your tree a moderate amount of water 1-2 times a week after planting. Maintain the soil. If you planted your fig tree outside, it is important that you maintain the soil and plot that the plant is growing in. Pull any weeds that you see, and replenish the soil with fertilizer every 4-5 weeks. Additionally, apply between 4 and 6 inches of mulch around the trunk of the tree, covering the soil evenly. Keep in mind that trees planted in containers are more dependent on fertilizer, and they need to be fertilized once per month. Mulching in the summer will preserve moisture. Mulching in the winter will protect the figs from cold and frost. Prune your figs when necessary. Prune your fig tree in the summer of the second year, as it is not necessary to prune them during their first year of growth. Prune the branches down to 4 strong shoots, which will lead in the production of fruit. After the tree matures, prune back every spring before the figs begin to grow. Harvest the fruit. Harvest figs from the tree when they are completely ripe, as they will not continue to ripen after picking (like peaches). A ripe fig will be a little bit soft, and curved at the neck. The color of a ripe fig will vary depending on the variety you have, as figs come in many different colors. Remove the fruit from the tree gently to avoid bruising the fig. Wear gloves when picking your figs, as the sap from the tree (released during harvesting) is a natural skin irritant.
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Choose a variety of figs. Know when to plant. Decide where to plant. Prepare the soil. Prepare your plot. Plant your tree. Water the fig tree. Maintain the soil. Prune your figs when necessary. Harvest the fruit.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Cook-Dry-Aged-Steak
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How to Cook Dry Aged Steak
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To cook a dry aged steak in a cast-iron skillet, first preheat your oven to 400 °F and get your skillet as hot as you can. Season the steak with salt and pepper, then sear it in the skillet for 2 minutes on each side. Transfer the steak to the oven and let it cook for 8 minutes. Take the steak out of the oven and let it rest for 10 minutes before you slice it.
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Preheat your oven to 400 °F (204 °C). You'll start off cooking your steak on the stovetop, but you'll need to transfer it into the oven to finish it, so get your oven preheated before you start. Season your steak with salt and pepper. You'll want to use plenty of salt when you're seasoning your steak, but the amount depends on your taste. You don't want to create a salt crust, but do make sure you season both sides liberally. Add pepper to taste as well. Heat your cast iron skillet to high heat. Turn your stove to high heat and place the cast iron skillet on the burner for about 10 minutes. You'll be searing your steak in the skillet, so get it as hot as you possibly can. To test if your skillet is hot enough, flick a few drops of water onto the bottom of the pan. The droplets of water should sizzle and dance, then evaporate. Remember that the handle of a cast iron skillet often heats along with the rest of the pan, so use pot holders to grab the handle. Place your steak in the skillet and sear it for 2 minutes. Don't move your steak while it's searing or it will stick to the pan. When it's ready to flip, it should release from the pan easily. You should see a golden brown crust on the steak. If it's not ready, allow it to sear a little longer. Flip your steak and sear the other side for 2 minutes. Follow the same guidelines as searing the first side. Searing both sides of the steak will produce more of the flavorful brown crust that characterizes a properly-cooked steak. Use tongs to easily flip your steak. Sear the fatty edge of the steak for 30 seconds. This should be the edge opposite of the bone. Use tongs to hold the steak upright and let the fat sear for about 30 seconds. Place the skillet into the oven for 8 minutes. Turn the steak back to the side you seared first, then carefully transfer the skillet into the oven. This will allow the steak to finish cooking to about medium-rare. Remember, the skillet and oven are both very hot, so use an oven mitt when you're transferring the pan. If you want to check the temperature with a meat thermometer, your steak should be about 130–135 °F (54–57 °C) for a medium-rare when you take it out of the oven. The steak will continue to heat up after you remove it from the oven. Move the skillet back to the stovetop to make your sauce. With the steak still in the skillet, move the pan to the stovetop over low heat. Add 4 tablespoons (59 ml) of butter, 3 sprigs of thyme, 3 diced cloves of garlic, and 1 diced shallot to the pan. Baste the steak with the melted butter for 2 minutes. Once the butter has melted, gently tilt the skillet towards you using a pot holder. Rapidly spoon the butter over the steak for 2 minutes. Remove the steak from the pan and reserve the sauce. Pour the butter sauce into a bowl or other serving dish. You will serve this alongside your steak and sides. Let the steak rest for 10 minutes. You should never cut into a steak as soon as it finishes cooking. Instead, remove it from the pan and allow it to rest on a cutting board or other surface for about 10 minutes. This causes the juices in the steak to redistribute throughout the meat, making your steak more juicy. Slice the steak and serve. This is what you've been waiting for! Slice the steak into even pieces and serve it with the butter sauce and your favorite sides. Having dry aged steak is a special occasion, so accompany the meal with a glass of good wine if you like. Serve the steak with your favorite side dishes. Potatoes are a popular accompaniment to a steak dinner. You can cook potatoes in a number of ways, including roasted, baked, or mashed. Make a Caesar salad to go along with your steak and potatoes. Heat one side of a 2-temperature grill. Since charcoal grills heat unevenly, it's best to use a 2-sided gas grill for this method. Turn one side up as high as you can, and leave the other side turned off or very low. If you're using a charcoal grill, try to group your coals together in one corner of the grill. Season your steak with salt and pepper. You'll want to keep your seasoning simple to enjoy the flavors of your dry aged steak. Season both sides with salt and pepper or your favorite steak seasoning blend. Place your steak on the low-heat side of your grill. The reason this is called the reverse sear method is because you bring the meat up to temperature slowly, then sear it at the end, unlike traditional cooking methods where you sear the meat first and then cook it slowly. A reverse sear cooks the steak more evenly and results in a more tender, juicy steak. Use a meat thermometer to determine how long to cook your steak. Let the steak cook slowly, turning it every 3-4 minutes. Use your meat thermometer to keep track of the temperature. You want to know when the meat is about 15 °F (8.3 °C) below your ideal doneness. The internal temperature for rare steak is 125 °F (52 °C). For medium rare it's 130–135 °F (54–57 °C), for medium 135–140 °F (57–60 °C), medium-well 140–150 °F (60–66 °C), and well 155 °F (68 °C). Well done is not recommended for premium steaks. Move the steak to the hot side of the grill when it reaches your preferred temperature. Cook the steak on the hot side of the grill until you develop that nice crust on both sides. This should only take a few minutes, and you can flip the steak as often as you like. Use the meat thermometer to make sure you don't overcook your steak. Allow the steak to rest for 5 minutes before serving. You want to let the juices redistribute after the steak has cooked, so allow the steak to rest at room temperature for 5 minutes before you cut into it. Serve and enjoy your dry aged steak! Serve your steak with a side of steamed or grilled veggies. Having a healthy side made from fresh veggies will help you create a balanced and delicious meal. Try serving steamed broccoli, grilled zucchini, or whole ears of corn that have been roasted on the grill. Look for the “USDA Prime” label. The USDA grades its beef based on tenderness, juiciness, and fat marbling. The ratings are Prime, Choice, and Select, with Prime being the highest quality. When it comes to dry aging, you want to start out with the best, so if you can afford it, choose a USDA Prime steak. If you can't, a Choice cut will be fine, but a Select cut may not have the marbling to support dry aging. Choose a high-quality cut of steak. Dry aging creates tenderness and flavor, but it won't cover up a poor cut of meat. Look for ribeyes, T-bones, porterhouses, or New York strips when you're shopping for a dry aged steak. Check to make sure your steak has abundant marbling. Marbling is the fat that's located within your steak, rather than along the outside edge. When you cook your steak, this fat will melt and create a rich flavor in the meat. Choose a steak that has been aged 3-6 weeks. When steaks are dry aged, they take on a unique flavor that has a little bit of funk to it, similar to a good bleu cheese. The longer it ages, the more pronounced this flavor will be. Steaks are dry-aged a minimum of 3 weeks, but they can be aged up to several months. If you're trying dry aged steak for the first time, aim for one that's been aged for about 3-6 weeks.
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Preheat your oven to 400 °F (204 °C). Season your steak with salt and pepper. Heat your cast iron skillet to high heat. Place your steak in the skillet and sear it for 2 minutes. Flip your steak and sear the other side for 2 minutes. Sear the fatty edge of the steak for 30 seconds. Place the skillet into the oven for 8 minutes. Move the skillet back to the stovetop to make your sauce. Baste the steak with the melted butter for 2 minutes. Remove the steak from the pan and reserve the sauce. Let the steak rest for 10 minutes. Slice the steak and serve. Heat one side of a 2-temperature grill. Season your steak with salt and pepper. Place your steak on the low-heat side of your grill. Use a meat thermometer to determine how long to cook your steak. Move the steak to the hot side of the grill when it reaches your preferred temperature. Allow the steak to rest for 5 minutes before serving. Serve your steak with a side of steamed or grilled veggies. Look for the “USDA Prime” label. Choose a high-quality cut of steak. Check to make sure your steak has abundant marbling. Choose a steak that has been aged 3-6 weeks.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Become-a-Legal-Resident-of-Texas
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How to Become a Legal Resident of Texas
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To become a legal resident of Texas, start by collecting documents that show a Texas address, like a copy of your lease or mortgage, a W-2 with your address on it, or a credit card statement. Then, bring these documents to the DMV and complete a driver's license or ID application. If you want to vote in Texas, pick up a voter registration application from any polling place or state office and fill it out with your address, ID number, and various other identifying information.
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Move to Texas. To become a Texas resident one must first establish a home in any town in Texas. This entails buying or renting property and subsequently receiving mail at that address. If you do not have a license from another state, you will need to prove that you have been in the state for 30 days before you can get an ID. If you do have a license from another state, you can bring it in and switch it out for a Texas ID less than 30 days after arrival. Collect your residency documents. You will need to show the Department of Motor Vehicles that you do live in Texas. This is done by bringing specific documents to one of their offices, all of which need to have your name and Texas address on them. You will need to bring two of these documents: Deed, mortgage, or rental documents Unexpired Texas voter registration card Texas registration or title for a motor vehicle Texas registration or title for a boat License to carry a concealed handgun Current utility statement: an electric, water, natural gas, satellite TV, cable TV, or home phone bill. It needs to be dated within 90 days of the date you apply. Selective Service card Medical or health card Current homeowner's or renter's insurance policy or homeowner's or renter's insurance statement Current automobile insurance policy or an automobile insurance statement Texas high school, college or university report card or transcript for the current school year W-2 or 1099 tax form from the current tax year Statements from a financial institution: including checking, savings, investment account, or credit card statements dated within 90 days of the date of application Mail from a federal, state, county or city government agency dated within 90 days of the date of application Automobile payment booklet that is current Paycheck or payment stub dated within 90 days of the date of application Documents issued by the U.S. military indicating residence address Document from the Texas Department of Criminal Justice indicating the applicant's recent release or parole Current Form DS2019, I-20, or a document issued by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Complete a driver's license or ID application. All residents must procure a Texas state driver's license or ID card within 90 days of moving to Texas. This can be done at any office of the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). One must complete an application for a Texas driver's license or Texas ID card and pay the required fee. A minor will need a parent or legal guardian to sign their application for a driver's license. That parent or guardian will need to attest that the answers on the minor's application are true. Pass necessary tests to get a driver's license. If you want a driver's license, as opposed to an ID, you will need to prove that you know how to drive. This can be done by showing that you have a valid driver's license in another state or by passing a driving and written test at the DMV. In addition, all new licenses require an eye exam. If moving to Texas with a valid out-of state or out-of country driver's license, you will need to bring this document with you to the DMV. This will be proof of license and thus the written and driving license exam will be waived. However, a vision exam will still be required. When you get your new Texas license, you will need to turn in your existing license from another state. If you do not wish to do that, you can choose to take the written and driving test in Texas, in which case they do not need your old license. If you would like to transfer an endorsement, such as a motorcycle endorsement, you will need to fill out an additional form. You will also need to pass a motorcycle safety course and pay an additional fee for the endorsement. If your license happens to get lost or is stolen, you can simply get your Texas driver's license replaced. Be a United States citizen. Those wishing to become Texas residents in order to vote must first be citizens of the U.S. This can be done through natural birth within U.S. borders, birth abroad to U.S. parents, or naturalization. Naturalization is a process in which a citizen of another country becomes a citizen of the U.S. Whatever your path to citizenship, you will need documentation of your citizenship, whether that be a birth certificate or a certificate of naturalization. Becoming a U.S. citizen can take some time. Naturalization requires 5 years of legal residence in the U.S., followed by an application process and a naturalization test. The test consists of questions on English, U.S. history, and civics. However, there is a strict limit on the number of people who can be permanent residents (those with green cards) and who can become citizens each year, so just because you want to apply and take the test does not mean you will be allowed to. Have identification. While you do not need to show your ID to anyone to register to vote, the registration form asks for an driver's license or ID number and you will be required to show a form of ID when you actually go to vote. The forms of identification that are accepted at voting locations include: Texas driver license Texas election identification certificate Texas identification card Texas license to carry permit United States military identification card United States citizenship certificate US passport Register to vote. Pick up a voter registration application from any polling place or state office. Fill out the form and mail it in 30 days before a scheduled election. On the application you will be asked your name, address, driver's license or ID number, if you are a U.S. Citizen, and various other identifying information, such as your date of birth. While voting is voluntary and not required to be a resident of Texas, it is something that only a resident can do. Be a legal resident for one year. If you are an adult, you must live in Texas for a full year, 12 months consecutively, to be counted as a Texas resident in the eyes of universities. In order to establish the start of this year, get utility bills in your name, just as you would to get your driver's license or ID from the state of Texas. This will prove that you have established a domicile in Texas on that date. If you have lived in Texas for longer than a year then you are already a resident in the eyes of the university system of Texas. Establish residency differently if you are a dependent. Dependents, meaning someone who is still financially supported by their parents or guardians, can prove residency in ways other than a year of living and working in Texas. The ways to prove the residency of a dependent include: Graduate from a Texas high school in the year before you intend to attend a Texas university. You need to have been enrolled in that school for the three years prior to graduation for your graduation to establish residency. Be claimed on your parent's income tax as a dependent, if they themselves are residents of Texas. This means that they need to have been working in Texas for the year before you intend to begin college. Conversely, be sure you are not claimed as a dependent if they live outside the state of Texas and you reside within. Show your proof of residency to the registrar at the university you are applying to. Follow that institutions instructions for proving your residency in a timely manner, in other words before your school year begins. Your residency status has a huge impact on the amount of tuition that you are required to pay to go to college, so you don't want any unforeseen problems arising at the last moment. Move to Texas. Many people may want to move to Texas because the state charges no income tax. There are also other legal reasons to establish residency in Texas, such as to get a divorce. In order to benefit from these tax and legal incentives, you need to be a resident of the state first. Texas is one of the few states in the country that divides assets and debts equally between spouses during a divorce. The is called a "community property" standard. Change your address of record immediately. This means changing the address on your driver's license, car registration, voter registration, and mailing address as soon as you can. Some of these address changes will require documentation, such as mail proving your address, and some should be done before others. Usually, it's best to change your mailing address first, including on bills, so that you get mail at your new address that makes changing the others easier. Changing your address of record quickly will help you to establish when you became a resident. For issues that require you to have been in the state for a set amount of time, this will begin that amount of time. Live in the state for six months, if you are seeking a divorce. In order to get a divorce in Texas, you need to have resided in the state for six months. Additionally, you need to file in a county that you, or your spouse, has lived in for at least ninety days, so don't move from county to county often. If you are in the armed forces, any time serving outside of Texas if you were already a resident is still counted as Texas residency for the six month residency requirement. If the person you are trying to divorce has lived in Texas for the last six months but you have not, you can still file for divorce there. You just need to file for divorce in the county they reside in. Calculate taxes based on when and where you earned income. The date you moved to Texas may have an impact on your taxes, as long as your income is generated in Texas as well. However, if you earned money in another state, you will need to pay taxes on it, whether you are a Texas resident or not. If you live in Texas but work across the border, you will need to pay non-resident taxes in the state you work in. The lack of income taxes in Texas is made up for in high property and sales taxes. So, if you have a lot of income, moving to Texas for tax purposes may be worth it. However, if the amount you would pay in income taxes elsewhere is less than you would pay in property and sales taxes, then lack of income tax might not be a good reason to move to Texas.
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Move to Texas. Collect your residency documents. Complete a driver's license or ID application. Pass necessary tests to get a driver's license. Be a United States citizen. Have identification. Register to vote. Be a legal resident for one year. Establish residency differently if you are a dependent. Show your proof of residency to the registrar at the university you are applying to. Move to Texas. Change your address of record immediately. Live in the state for six months, if you are seeking a divorce. Calculate taxes based on when and where you earned income.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Write-a-Notable-Editorial
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How to Write a Notable Editorial
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To write a notable editorial, start by picking your topic, which should be current and interesting, and your angle, which can be to explain, criticize, persuade, or praise. Next, gather your facts by researching your topic. Then, start your editorial by clearly stating your purpose. As you write, get rid of jargon that could keep the reader from understanding your topic. Additionally, keep the tone user-friendly and the length about 600-800 words so people will read the entire piece.
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Pick your topic and angle. Editorials are meant to influence public opinion, promote critical thinking, and sometimes cause people to take action on an issue. Your topic should be current, interesting, and have a purpose. There are generally four types of editorials: Explaining or interpreting : This format is used to explain how and why a newspaper or magazine took a certain stance on a controversial subject. Criticizing : This format criticizes actions or decisions made on a third party's part in addition to offering a better solution. It's more to get the readers to see that there is a larger problem at hand. Persuading : This type is used to move the reader to action, concentrating on solutions, not the problem. Praising : This format is used to show support for people and organizations in the community that have done something notable. Get your facts straight. An editorial is a mix of fact and opinion; not solely the writer's opinion, but the opinion of the entire staff. Your fact collection should include objective reporting and research. A good op-ed needs to contain at least one "point of enlightenment" which can be described as "an observation that is fresh and original." So, get your facts from a number of different sources, pointing out patterns, impending consequences, or a hole in current analysis. Keep it user-friendly. Typically, editorials are for a fairly quick, captivating read. They are not meant to go on for pages and pages, belaboring the point. Nor are they meant to make the average Joe feel as if he's missed something. Make sure your editorial isn't lengthy or overly esoteric. Keep it to about 600-800 words. Anything longer and you risk losing your reader. A short, snappy, fiery piece is much more captivating than a wordy lecture. Eliminate the jargon. Your audience is reading your article for information on something they seek to understand; using technical terms or specific jargon may be off-putting and make your article difficult to take in. Keep the lowest common denominator in mind. Start your editorial with a thesis-like statement. The introduction--the first one or two paragraphs--should be designed to catch the reader's attention. You can start with a rich question, a quote, or you can summarize what the whole editorial is about. Clearly state your argument. The rest of your editorial will be based on supporting this opinion. Make it as striking as possible. However, in doing so, never use "I"--it diminishes the strength and credibility of the paper and sounds rather informal. Lead with an objective, unbiased explanation of the issue. The body of your work should explain the issue objectively, as a reporter would, and tell why this situation is important to the reader or community as a whole. Include who, what, when, where, why, and how. Cover all your bases and pull in facts or quotations from relevant sources. This ensures that every reader has at least a base knowledge (and an non-skewed one) of the topic at hand. Present the opposing argument first. Make sure to identify the groups who oppose you or else the movers of the debate will become foggy. State their opinions objectively, using accurate facts or quotations. Never use slander. It is fine to state positive things about the opposing side, as long as they're factual. It shows that you are taking the moral high road and giving a balanced overview. If you neglect to air the good side of your opposition, your editorial will come off biased and uninformed. Give the opposition an actual argument, and a strong one at that. You gain nothing from refuting a non-issue. Make it clear their beliefs and what they're advocating. Present your reasons/evidence that directly refute the opposition. Begin this section with a transition, clearly flowing from their argument to yours. Utilize facts and quotations from others who support your opinion. Start with strong reasons that only get stronger. Don't feel limited to existing opinions--add your own, too. Whatever your reasons are, make sure to clearly come down on one side of the argument; there is no room for gray area here. Literary allusions are appropriate. It can lend to your credibility and learnedness. Call to mind images of persons or times in the past that present an imagery to your reader. Make your solution known. This is different than reasons and evidence. If you believe cutting the defense budget is wrong, what would you rather cut instead? Putting your solution out there is imperative to addressing the problem. If you don't have one, any solution is better than yours. Your solution needs to be clear, rational, and doable. It cannot only work in a vacuum. What's more, it should be compelling. Ideally, your readers will be drawn to action with the information and answers you've presented. Conclude your editorial with a punch, a noteworthy statement that would forever engrave the editorial into the reader's mind. Use quotes or a question that would make the readers think hard. (e.g. If we will not take care of the environment, then who will?) End with a hard-hitting summary; you may have a few readers who scanned your piece absentmindedly. All in all, your audience should leave feeling more informed and moved to do something further about the issue. Proofread your work. A great piece is not great if it's riddled with spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors. Have someone on your team look over your work- two minds are always better than one. If you're working as part of an organization, make sure you haven't misrepresented their viewpoints. Allow your group to go over the piece to make sure everyone (at the very least, the majority) is behind the arguments you're about to make public. They can, simultaneously, present questions or ideas that you may have missed or glossed over.
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Pick your topic and angle. Get your facts straight. Keep it user-friendly. Start your editorial with a thesis-like statement. Lead with an objective, unbiased explanation of the issue. Present the opposing argument first. Present your reasons/evidence that directly refute the opposition. Make your solution known. Conclude your editorial with a punch, a noteworthy statement that would forever engrave the editorial into the reader's mind. Proofread your work.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Clean-Pee-Off-a-Couch
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How to Clean Pee Off a Couch
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To clean pee off of a couch, first, blot the stain with paper towels until it's mostly dry. Avoid rubbing the stain, as this will push the pee further into the fabric. Once the pee is soaked up, spray 1 part distilled white vinegar and 4 parts water onto the stain until the fabric is completely soaked. If you have a microfiber couch, use rubbing alcohol instead, since water and vinegar can make the stain worse. After soaking the stain, scrub at it with a sponge before sprinkling the wet spot with a layer of baking soda. Let the baking soda sit overnight and soak up any odors before vacuuming it up.
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Blot the stain with a paper towel. Don't rub the stain, because you'll spread it further into the fabric. Keep patting the wet spot with a paper towel until the spot is mostly dry and use new paper towels as needed. Act quickly! You don't want the pee to settle in the couch for too long, or else it will be more difficult to clean out. Clean the spot with a mixture of vinegar and water. Put 1 part distilled white vinegar and 4 parts water in a spray bottle or basin. Soak the fabric with the solution to remove the stain and the smell. The vinegar and water solution neutralizes ammonia in the urine, which in turn breaks up the smell. It also re-wets the stain to make sure it's being cleaned completely from your couch. Don't use this solution on microfiber as water stains it. Use rubbing alcohol instead since it dries quickly and doesn't leave water stains. Scrub the stain with a sponge. Use a sponge you don't mind tossing out when you're done. Scrub hard from the inside area of the stain toward the outside to get all the pee out of the couch fibers and surface so there's no odor or stain left behind. If your stain smells really bad, using 100% vinegar will neutralize the odor. Sprinkle baking soda on the fabric while it’s still wet. Use enough baking soda to thoroughly cover the wet spot. About 1 cup (520 g) should be sufficient. Feel free to add 10 drops of your favorite essential oil to the baking soda before you apply it if you want to add a pleasant smell to the fabric. Let the baking soda sit overnight. It's best to let the baking soda sit for 12 hours to ensure the fabric underneath it is dry. If you're in a hurry, you can wait 4-6 hours before checking to see if the area is dry. Vacuum up the baking soda. Run a vacuum cleaner over the spot to remove the baking soda once the fabric is completely dry. The stain and the smell should be gone! Pat the stain with a cloth to soak up excess pee. Don't press hard, because you'll spread the urine further into the couch. As you would with any spilled liquid, just press the cloth into the wet spot to absorb extra liquid. If you have a wet/dry vacuum handy, that would also work well on a fresh pee stain. Mix dish soap, baking soda, and hydrogen peroxide together. Put 2-3 drops of dish soap, 3 tablespoons (44.4 ml) (42 grams) of baking soda, and 1.25 c (300 mL) of 3% hydrogen peroxide in a spray bottle. Replace the cap and shake the bottle to mix up the ingredients. Hydrogen peroxide disinfects the fabric and breaks down the acid in the pee, making the stain easier to remove. You can substitute vinegar if you don't have any hydrogen peroxide. Spray the solution on the couch and let it sit for an hour. Be sure to fully saturate all parts of the stain. Don't blot it up right away—give it some time to work! If your couch is made of microfiber, opt for an enzyme cleaner instead. Rinse away the detergent residue with a damp cloth. Gently blot the stain with a damp rag to rinse the soap out, then blot it with a clean, dry cloth. It should only take a few hours for the spot to dry, and your couch will be good as new. Purchase an enzyme cleaner designed for use on upholstery. Visit a big-box store or pet store and peruse the cleaning section for an enzyme cleaner. Make sure the product is formulated for use on whichever fabric your couch is made out of. It's in your best interest to purchase a high-quality enzyme cleaner. While it may be more expensive, it likely works better—meaning you won't have to reapply it. Press an old rag into the fabric to soak up excess urine. Use a rag you don't mind tossing out or one that you plan to wash but not use for dishes anymore. Gently blot the couch to remove the pee. Avoid rubbing the stain, as this can push the urine deeper into the fabric. Saturate the stain with the enzyme cleaner. It's not enough to spritz the spot—you need to soak it thoroughly. Be sure to douse the entire area, including the edges and any drops or dribbles. Let the cleaner sit for 15 minutes. Allow the product to soak into the fabric and padding and break down the uric acid in the urine. Blot the spot to remove moisture. Press a clean, but old, rag into the fabric to soak up as much of the enzyme cleaner and urine as possible. Repeat until no more moisture transfers to the rag. You may need several rags if the spot is large. Allow the fabric to air-dry completely. There's no need to rinse the area. As the cleaner evaporates, so will the uric acid that was broken down into ammonia and carbon dioxide. To prevent your pets or family members from sitting on the wet spot, you can cover it with aluminum foil.
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Blot the stain with a paper towel. Clean the spot with a mixture of vinegar and water. Scrub the stain with a sponge. Sprinkle baking soda on the fabric while it’s still wet. Let the baking soda sit overnight. Vacuum up the baking soda. Pat the stain with a cloth to soak up excess pee. Mix dish soap, baking soda, and hydrogen peroxide together. Spray the solution on the couch and let it sit for an hour. Rinse away the detergent residue with a damp cloth. Purchase an enzyme cleaner designed for use on upholstery. Press an old rag into the fabric to soak up excess urine. Saturate the stain with the enzyme cleaner. Let the cleaner sit for 15 minutes. Blot the spot to remove moisture. Allow the fabric to air-dry completely.
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https://www.wikihow.life/Fold-a-Fitted-Sheet
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How to Fold a Fitted Sheet
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To fold a fitted sheet, hold it lengthwise and inside-out. Put your hands inside the top two corners of the sheet. Next, bring your palms together. Fold the corner in your right hand over the corner in your left hand. Change hands and place your right hand in the corner where your left hand was. Now, straighten the edge of the sheet with your left hand until you reach the opposite corner. Then, put your left hand inside that corner. Bring your hands together again and fold the corner in your right hand over the corner in your left hand. Straighten the edges of the sheet. Now, lay the sheet down with the folded edges up. Fold the top side in so the sheet is rectangular. Fold the sheet into thirds lengthwise, then into thirds horizontally.
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Hold the sheet lengthwise by the corners so it's inside-out. Place your hands inside 2 adjacent corners of the sheet so that the shorter ends of the sheet are hanging down and the longer sides are stretched horizontally. As you're arranging the sheet in your hands, turn it so the top of the sheet is facing your body and the bottom side is facing outward. Fold the corner in your right hand over the corner in the left. Bring the 2 corners you're holding together in front of you so the seams are lined up with each other. Then, turn the right corner right-side-out so it wraps around the corner in your left hand. It may help to think of this as similar to folding one sock over another. At this point, the elastic from both sides should be lined up neatly together. If you're left-handed, fold the corner in your left hand over the corner in your right hand instead. Add the front bottom corner to the top 2. Pinch the corners together with your left hand, then reach down the sheet with your right hand and grasp the corner that's closest to you. Bring it up to the 2 corners you just folded together, and tuck it in so all 3 are folded neatly together. By folding the bottom corners one at a time, you'll end up with neater creases. If you prefer, you can fold the bottom 2 corners together, then bring them both up and fold them into the first 2. Bring the last corner up and straighten the edges of the sheet. At this point, you should have 1 corner left hanging down, with the other 3 corners all in your left hand. Fold the last corner in so it's lined up with the other ones, and use your hand to smooth out the edges that are hanging down. An easy way to smooth the sheet is to slide your fingers into the fold at the bottom of the sheet, then gently pull and shake the fabric until the edges are lined up. Place the sheet on a table with the folded corners up. After you've lined up all 4 corners of the sheet, you'll need to spread folded sheet out on a solid, flat surface, like a table top. The 4 folded corners should be face-up in one corner, but it's okay if the sheet still looks a little messy at this point. Just try not to let the corners unfold as you're laying the sheet down. If the corners do unfold, you may have to shake out the sheet and start over. Fold the sides in so the sheet is rectangular. Arrange the sheet so the seams of the corners create a new corner. Then, fold in the 2 sides on either side of that corner so the sheet has neat, squared-off edges. When you're finished, you'll see an L-shaped fold running along 2 edges of the sheet, with the elastic on the inside of the fold. Smooth out any wrinkles with your hands. Having the sheet on a solid surface will allow you to create nice creases as you're folding the fitted sheet. Once you've folded the elastic edges in to create a rectangle, run your hands over the sheet, including the new creases you made, to get rid of any bumps or wrinkles in the fabric. If you're doing this on a mattress or a carpeted floor, you might not get the same sharp creases you would on a hard surface. Fold the flattened sheet into thirds vertically. Fold the top third of your sheet down so the corners are tucked inside the folded sheet. Smooth out the fabric with your hands, then fold the bottom third up so the sheet makes a long, thin rectangle. All of the folds, corners, and elastic should be completely hidden inside of the sheet. Finish by folding the sheet into horizontal thirds. Once you have a neat rectangle, all that's left is to fold your sheet into a square. Fold one side of the sheet in about a third of the way toward the middle of the rectangle. Then, fold the last side over to finish your neatly-folded fitted sheet! If you have a king-size bed, you may need to fold the long rectangle into quarters rather than thirds. To do that, just fold the sheet in half lengthwise, then in half again.
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Hold the sheet lengthwise by the corners so it's inside-out. Fold the corner in your right hand over the corner in the left. Add the front bottom corner to the top 2. Bring the last corner up and straighten the edges of the sheet. Place the sheet on a table with the folded corners up. Fold the sides in so the sheet is rectangular. Smooth out any wrinkles with your hands. Fold the flattened sheet into thirds vertically. Finish by folding the sheet into horizontal thirds.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Lose-50-Pounds-in-2-Months
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How to Lose 50 Pounds in 2 Months
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If you want to lose 50 pounds in 2 months naturally, try to cook your own food as often as you can so you can control how healthy and how big your meals are. You should also drink 8 glasses of water a day so you aren't as hungry between meals. In addition, do some cardiovascular exercise 4-5 times a week to speed up your metabolism. If you want more accountability, consider joining a weight-loss group like Weight Watchers to keep yourself motivated.
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Set a realistic weight loss goal for yourself. It's great to identify how much weight you want or need to lose over the long term, but short-term goals are important, too. Try to focus on how much you want to lose in 1 month and what you need to do to achieve that. Creating sub-goals to get you to your bigger goals will help to ensure that you stay on track. For example, you might start by setting a 1 month weight loss goal of 8 pounds, which would require losing about 2 lb (0.91 kg) per week. This means that you'll need to burn an extra 1,000 calories per day to achieve this goal, which you can do by cutting calories from your diet and exercising regularly. Identify your caloric needs and count calories to lose weight. Counting calories is an effective way to ensure that you're reducing your food intake enough to lose weight. Your doctor can help you to identify a healthy calorie goal or you can calculate it yourself. Aim to cut between 500 and 1,000 calories from your diet per day with a combination of diet and exercise. Record everything you eat and drink using a food diary or calorie tracking app. For women, a healthy amount is usually between 1,200 and 1,500 calories per day, while it's usually around 1,500 to 1,800 calories per day for men. Fill up on nutrient-rich foods that are lower in calories. Fruits and vegetables will fill you up while adding fewer calories than other foods, such as bread, chips, and candy. Eat 1 to 2 servings of fruits or vegetables with every meal to keep yourself satisfied for fewer calories. Some great options include: Salads made with fresh romaine lettuce, spring mix, or spinach and tomatoes and cucumbers. Steamed veggies like broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, green beans, and summer squash. Fresh cut melon, berries, apples, and pears. Look into intermittent fasting. Intermittent fasting is a way of eating where you consume all of your meals within an 8 or 10 hour window during the most active part of your day. For many people, this is between the hours of 7:00 am and 5:00 pm. However, you can designate a time frame that works for you. Just make sure to keep the same time frame each day so that you'll have 14 to 16 hours between your last meal of one day and your first meal of the next day. For example, you could eat breakfast at 7:00 am, lunch at 11:00 am, and dinner at 3:00 pm if you want to maintain an 8 hour eating window with a 16 hour fast. Or, you could eat breakfast at 9:00 am, lunch at 1:00pm, and dinner at 5:00 pm to maintain a 10 hours window with a 14 hour fast. Try following a low-carb or low-fat diet. Both of these eating strategies may help you to lose weight because they will restrict your calories through your available food choices. Therefore, it's more important to choose a diet that you can stick with over the long term. If you like low-carb foods, such as eggs, bacon, cheese, and non-starchy veggies, then a low-carb diet may work well for you. However, if you can't live without fruit, bread, pasta, and rice, then a low-fat diet may be a better choice. Remember, what's most important is that you cut calories and create a deficit. You won't lose weight if you're not reducing your overall caloric intake. Drink more water than other beverages. Water has zero calories and it provides your body with the hydration it needs to function properly. You don't need to drink anything else. Drink mostly water every day to reduce your overall caloric intake. Avoid sugary soda, alcoholic drinks, and anything else that's high in calories. Try adding a lemon or lime wedge to your water to flavor it. Or, you could toss in a few fresh berries or a cucumber slice for something even more exotic. Practice mindful eating strategies to slow yourself down. Eating mindfully is a way to become more aware of your body and the experience of eating so that you will eat less as a result. Some strategies you might try include: Turning off the TV or computer, or putting away your phone while you eat. Eating with your non-dominant hand or using chopsticks. Focusing on other aspects of your food to help you slow down. Inhale the scent, notice how it looks on your plate, and chew slowly to savor the flavors and texture of the food in your mouth. Exercise for at least 150 minutes per week. This is the minimum recommended amount of exercise for maintaining good health, but the more exercise you get the better. Try to work in at least 30 minutes of exercise on most days of the week. Do something that you enjoy so that it'll be easier for you to stick with it. For example, you could take a walk on your lunch break or after dinner, go to an aerobics or spin class, or simply dance around your living room to your favorite music. Work in more physical activity throughout the day. Doing a little extra whenever you get the chance can help you to burn more calories overall, and this will increase your weight loss results. Some things you can do to work more activity into your day include: Parking further away from the entrances, such as at your place of work or at the grocery store Taking the stairs instead of the elevator Walking or biking to school or work Getting up and walking around or doing squats during a commercial break when you're watching TV Try high-intensity interval training to burn more calories. High-intensity interval training, also known as HIIT, is when you exercise at a moderate pace, do a burst of high-intensity exercise, and then repeat this cycle in regular intervals. You can do HIIT with just about any form of exercise, such as walking, running, biking, swimming, or even dancing. For example, you could walk at a moderate pace for 4 minutes, then walk at a brisk pace for 4 minutes, and then go back to the moderate pace for another 4 minutes. Keep repeating these intervals until you have completed 30 minutes of exercise. If you're biking, try riding on a flat surface and then do a hill, then go back to a flat surface, then do another hill. Continue this for 30 minutes. Incorporate strength training to increase your resting metabolic rate. Building muscle increases your resting metabolic rate, which means you'll burn more calories even when you're asleep. You can use resistance bands, dumbbells, strength-training machines, or bodyweight exercises to build strength. Aim for two 30 to 45 minutes strength training sessions per week. Make sure that you work each of your major muscle groups during the strength training sessions. These include your arms, legs, back, buttocks, abdomen, and chest. Look into therapy to change your eating habits. If you're in the habit of eating whenever you feel stressed, sad, lonely, or tired, working with a therapist might be helpful for changing your behavior. A licensed mental health professional can help you to develop new tools for dealing with negative emotions instead of reaching for food as a distraction. For example, if you often eat candy and other junk foods when you're feeling stressed, a therapist could help you learn to use relaxation techniques, such as deep breathing or progressive muscle relaxation instead. Join a support group to get help from other people. Surrounding yourself with like-minded people can help you to stay motivated and avoid letting setbacks derail your progress. Try joining a weight loss support forum online or look for a weight loss support group in your area. Some paid weight loss programs provide access to support groups, but there are also free support groups you can join, such as Take Off Pounds Sensibly (TOPS) or Overeaters Anonymous (OA). Talk to your doctor about weight loss medications. Several medications have been shown to be effective for improving weight loss results. This might be an option for you if you have a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or higher or if your BMI is over 27 and you have weight-related health problems, such as diabetes or high blood pressure. Discuss your options with your doctor as well as the potential risks of the medications. Some commonly prescribed weight loss medications include: Orlistat Lorcaserin Phentermine and topiramate Buproprion and naltrexone Liraglutide Find out if you’re a good candidate for bariatric surgery. While bariatric surgery is often a last resort for people who have tried for years to lose weight, it is very effective. This surgery involves reducing the size of your stomach so that you are physically incapable of overeating. If you've tried all of your other options and nothing seems to help, talk with your doctor to see if this might be an option for you. Keep in mind that bariatric surgery carries risks just like any other surgery. Discuss these carefully with your doctor before you decide to go through with it.
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Set a realistic weight loss goal for yourself. Identify your caloric needs and count calories to lose weight. Fill up on nutrient-rich foods that are lower in calories. Look into intermittent fasting. Try following a low-carb or low-fat diet. Drink more water than other beverages. Practice mindful eating strategies to slow yourself down. Exercise for at least 150 minutes per week. Work in more physical activity throughout the day. Try high-intensity interval training to burn more calories. Incorporate strength training to increase your resting metabolic rate. Look into therapy to change your eating habits. Join a support group to get help from other people. Talk to your doctor about weight loss medications. Find out if you’re a good candidate for bariatric surgery.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Ask-Someone-to-Be-Your-Child%27s-Godparent
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How to Ask Someone to Be Your Child's Godparent
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If you're unsure who to choose for your child's godparents, look for people you trust and respect and who would make good role models for your child. Godparents often don't need to be from a particular religious background, but it's best to check with your church just in case. Once you've chosen possible godparents, arrange a phone call or invite them over to talk about the possibility of them being godparents. Feel free to ask them questions about the role, like what they'd be comfortable doing for your child and if they intend to stay in the area. If you still think they'd be suitable, ask them to be your child's godparents. If they say yes, you can show your gratitude and welcome them to the family by inviting them to dinner or getting them a personal gift.
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Make a shortlist of people whose values align with your own. You want to pick a godparent who will be a good role model and mentor for your child. First and foremost, it should be someone that you trust and respect. Take time to think through what qualities you most appreciate and what your priorities are. Decide, for example, if you have preference for having a family member like a sibling be a godparent or if you'd rather have a close friend. If political or religious beliefs are of the utmost importance to you, then pick someone with similar views. Similarly, if you would like a person who has a positive attitude or an honest character, narrow down your list accordingly. If it matters to you whether or not your prospective godparent is in a stable relationship or has achieved a degree of professional success, let that steer your choices. Consider what they might offer your child that you do not. While it's important to have a godparent with shared values, you might also want them to bring something different to the table than what your child gets every day at home. They will appreciate the change of pace. For instance, is there someone more adventurous than you who could take your child out exploring or someone who works in an exciting field that she could introduce to your child? Does one of your choices have an exceptional sense of humor or personal passion they could share? Check the policies of your local church. If you intend to baptize your child or belong to a specific religious denomination, your church may have particular criteria when it comes to who can serve as a godparent. Because godparents represent the faith community during baptism ceremonies, some faiths may require one or both godparents to be of the same denomination or in good standing with the church first. Select a person who can build a lasting relationship with your child. You want godparents who will be accessible and take an active interest in your child's life and well-being. Prioritize people who are live near to you so that they can be a routine part in the child's development. Avoid asking people who already have multiple godchildren so that your child's godparents do not feel overcommitted. Take a person's ability to assume responsibility for your child into account. For instance, you may want to shy away from asking an aging family member who may not be up to the task or present for all of your child's upbringing. Decide when you would like to ask. Most people wait until after their child is born, but some prefer to choose godparents during the pregnancy. If you're planning a baptism or other formal ceremony for your new arrival, be sure to ask your godparents at least a few months in advance so that they have plenty of time to make arrangements to be attendance. If there are no logistical concerns, do what feels right to you. Asking someone during the pregnancy can make people feel included in your child's life from the very start and means that they can be involved right away after the birth. If you hold off until after your child is born, it's often less hectic and gives you more time to make the decision. You can also see how prospective godparents interact with your newborn. Schedule a meeting with the prospective godparents. Touching base with each other will prepare prospective godparents for the role while helping you make an informed decision about who to select. Since you're not officially asking the person to be a godparent during this meeting, keep it informal. Arrange a time when you see them in person or through a casual phone call. Choose a location that fits into your normal social interaction with the person. You also want your conversation to be as friendly and open as possible; it shouldn't feel like job interview or interrogation. Give your friend or family member a heads up that you'd like to discuss the possibility of them being a godparent for your child. Telling them you'd like to chat about godparenting will allow them to consider what they think about the prospect in advance. You could say something as simple as: “We're trying to decide who Amy's godparents should be. We thought about you and were wondering if you're interested. If so, would you be up for discussing it when we meet?” The other advantage of mentioning this beforehand is that if they immediately react against the idea, you can cross them off the list without further ado. Ask questions to gauge their interest and suitability. Use your meeting to find out if the person is game, seems like the best choice for the part, and will enjoy the experience and not see it as a burden. You may start by asking them about their godparents, if they had any. Whether or not they had a solid relationship with their godparents, it's a good way to segway into a discussion of what they think a good relationship between godparents and their godchild would look like. Consider asking questions such as, “What does being a godparent mean to you?” or “What would you look forward to about mentoring Amy?” Their answers will give you a sense about how they would approach the role. If they have responses that are enthusiastic and resonate with your ideas about godparenting, you are on the right track. Don't hesitate to ask about their future plans. Some relevant questions may include: “Do you think you'll stay in the area or are you looking to move sometime down the line?” “Is your company likely to ask you to relocate?” “Will your work schedule and family commitments allow you space to occasionally spend time with our child?” Be clear about your expectations. Being a godparent is an honor that comes with responsibility. If you want them to take the role seriously, be up front about what sort of relationship and what kinds of interactions you would like for a godparent to have with your child. Before you have your meeting, think about how and when you would like for them to be in touch with your child and whether you expect them to be present for birthdays, confirmations, graduations, and other milestones. Godparents are often the people designated to take care of their children in the event anything should happen to their parents. If you would like your prospective godparent to assume this responsibility, say so and ask them how they would feel about it. You could ask: “If Oliver and I were to die in an accident, would you be ready and able to take care of Amy and raise her for us?” This is the weightiest of responsibilities for a godparent, so it's important to broach the subject. If they're not willing to step in as a guardian, you will have to find someone else. Extend the invitation in a meaningful way. You've done your homework, now it's time to make the ask for this very special request. There are plenty of thoughtful and creative ways to make new godparents feel welcomed and appreciated. Have a family dinner in their honor. Especially if they're not a blood relative, this is a gesture that shows they're a valued part of your family circle. Send them a card with a sincere message. Many shops and online stores carry notecards that are specifically addressed to godparents. If you're feeling playful, you can write the note from your child's perspective, to let the new godparent know how much it'll mean to your daughter or son. Give them a framed picture of their new goddaughter or godson or include a photo in your card. To add a bit of fun, have your child hold a sign or wear a onesie that asks the question for you. Create a personalized gift to mark the occasion. It could be a mug or a t-shirt with a message, like “Best Godparent,” or a piece of jewelry or a key chain with an inscription that they can carry with them as a reminder.
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Make a shortlist of people whose values align with your own. Consider what they might offer your child that you do not. Check the policies of your local church. Select a person who can build a lasting relationship with your child. Decide when you would like to ask. Schedule a meeting with the prospective godparents. Ask questions to gauge their interest and suitability. Be clear about your expectations. Extend the invitation in a meaningful way.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Shadow-Puppets
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How to Make Shadow Puppets
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Making shadow puppets with your hands is great fun that anyone can try. To make a bird, cross your wrists with your palms facing you and lock your thumbs together. Make the bird flap its wings by curling your fingers toward you. To make a dog, extend your little and ring fingers on one hand while keeping the others in a fist. Raise your thumb slightly to make the dog's ear. You can make it talk by opening and closing your 2 fingers. You can also make a swan by raising one arm at a right angle, touching your fingers and thumb together and pointing your hand down. Then, place the back of your other hand in the crook of your arm and spread your fingers to make the swan's wings.
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Make a two-handed bird. Out of all the hand puppets you can make, this is probably the easiest, making it a great choice for young kids who want to participate in the fun but aren't coordinated enough to try some of the harder puppets. To make the bird, simply turn your hands so that your palms face you, cross your hands over each other, and lock your thumbs together. Stretch your palms open to make the bird's wings. To make the bird "fly", curl your fingers inward, then outward again. Make a one-handed greyhound. This hand puppet is also quite easy, though it requires you to extend your ring finger and little finger without extending the rest of your fingers, which can be tricky for some people. To make the greyhound, start by raising your hand in a fist with your thumb facing you. Raise your little finger and ring finger so that they're parallel to the floor while keeping your index and ring finger curled in. Raise your thumb slightly to make the dog's ear. To make the dog's mouth move, move your little finger up and down. Make a swan. This shadow puppet uses both hands and part of one arm, making it one of the biggest ones out there. To make the swan, begin by raising one arm, bending it at the elbow, and bringing the tips of the fingers together so that they make a point. With your other hand, spread your fingers wide and put the fleshy part of your palm on your bicep to make the swan's tail feathers. Make a one-handed camel. This shadow puppet is a great stepping stone for beginners looking to branch out into more difficult puppets. To make the camel, raise one arm, bending it at the elbow so that your hand points toward the ceiling. Curve your middle and ring fingers forward gently while you arch your index finger back to make the camel's eye — get used to doing this, as it's something that's used in many of the more advanced puppets. Let your little finger droop slightly to form the camel's bottom lip. Tuck your thumb out of the way behind your hand. To make the camel's mouth move, let your little finger bounce up and down limply. Make an old man. This shadow puppet is great for puppet shows because it's easy to make him "talk." To make the old man, raise your palm, then point your index finger forward. Curve your middle, ring, and little fingers in an arc to form the man's eye. Bend your thumb in and raise it up to the index finger to form the man's jaw. Making the man talk is a cinch — just move your thumb back and forth to match the words you say. Make a face. This tricky shadow puppet makes full use of both hands, but is positively lifelike when pulled off well. To start, face your left palm toward yourself and make a ring with your middle finger and thumb. Bring your ring and little fingers together and curl them inward. Let your index finger lay on top of the ring formed by your middle finger ad thumb, sticking out slightly. With your right hand, face your palm toward the floor, curl your little and ring fingers in, and make an arc with your index and middle finger to form the face's eye. Lay this over your other hand palm-down to complete the puppet. To make the face talk, you need to move the ring and little finger on your left hand up and down independently from the rest of your hand. This can be quite tricky, so practice! Make a bulldog. The hardest part of this shadow puppet isn't what you need to do with your fingers, but the way you need to orient your hands. With your left hand, face your palm toward the ground, curl all of your fingers except your thumb inward at the second knuckle, and bend the thumb underneath. With your right hand, curl all of your fingers except your thumb in an arc to make the bulldog's eye and raise your thumb to make its ear. Finally, put your right hand on top of your left so that all of your knuckles are facing the same way and align your hands just right so that the bulldog is visible — harder than it sounds! To make the bulldog bark, move your left thumb up and down. Make an elephant. This puppet's trunk requires a unique arrangement of the middle and ring fingers. To start, face your left hand's palm toward the ground. Point your ring and middle fingers toward the ground while keeping your little and index fingers straight (like a "rock on" gesture). Bend your thumb and tuck it under the hand. Place your right hand palm-down on top of your left hand and bend all of your fingers except your thumb to make the elephant's eye. Try moving the middle and ring fingers on your left hand to make the elephant's trunk move — you can also make it talk with the thumb on your left hand. Make a deer. This puppet can take lots of practice, but it looks amazing when it's perfected. To start, face your left palm toward the ground and bring your index, middle, and ring fingers together in a point. Tuck your thumb under your hand and extend your little finger straight slightly under your other fingers. Place the fleshy part of your right palm on the back of your left hand and extend your thumb, index, and middle fingers upward. Curve your ring and little finger to make the deer's eye. To make the deer talk, move the little finger on your left hand up and down. Be gentle — deer are usually quiet and composed (until they're startled by a friend's elephant puppet, of course). Make a doggy. This hand puppet makes a pretty convincing terrier or dachshund. Start by raising your right arm and bending it at the elbow so that the hand points at the ceiling. Bend your little and ring fingers down so they point forward. Bring your middle finger over your index finger and arch it to make the dog's eye. Tuck your thumb up into the crook of your index finger. Bring the palm of your left hand against the side of your right forearm and extend your index and middle fingers while sticking your thumb behind the forearm to make the dog's tail. Keep your left ring and little fingers tucked out of the way. Unfortunately, there isn't an easy way to make the dog talk, so you'll just have to use your puppet's "body language" to express its emotions! Gather your materials. If you're having a hard time contorting your hands into the bizarre shapes needed to make hand shadow puppets, don't worry! You can make wonderful, detailed miniature shadow puppets with just a few common materials you'll probably have lying around the house. For this project, you'll need: Construction paper A light source (like a lamp or light bulb) A cardboard box (for your "stage") Straws or balsa wood sticks Tape Thin tissue paper or baking parchment (for your “screen”) Build your "stage". To begin, cut the bottom out of the cardboard box, leaving a 5 cm (about 2 inches) border around the edges. Next, fasten a thin sheet of tissue or baking paper onto the frame with tape or glue so that it covers the hole you've just cut. This will be the "screen" for your puppet show — you'll hold your puppets in between your light source and the paper to project their images onto the screen. Design and draw your puppets. Next, grab a sheet of construction paper or cardboard (whatever you use, it should be thick enough that light doesn't shine through it). Draw the outlines of your puppets on this paper or cardboard. Your puppets can be as simple or as detailed as you like, so be creative! One good idea is to draw small details like eyes or smiles on the puppet so that, when it's cut out, these details will appear in its shadow. However, this can require some tricky detail work on your part — you may need to use an X-acto knife to make these small cuts in the middle of the puppet. Cut out your puppets.When you're satisfied with the designs of your puppets, use a pair of scissors to carefully cut along the outlines you drew. As noted above, for minor details like eyes, facial features, hair, and so on, you may need to use a small, sharp X-acto knife. Another good idea is to use the sorts of special children's scissors that are often sold at back-to-school sales. These scissors can sometimes have designs like zigzag lines and curves incorporated into the blades of the scissors, making it easy to make these sorts of designs in your puppets. Attach sticks to your puppets. Grab a thin wooden stick (like a coffee stirrer or popsicle stick) or a drinking straw for each puppet. Put a piece of tape or a drop of glue on one side of each stick or straw. Fasten the sticks or straws to the backs of your paper puppets. If you're using glue, give it time to dry before using your puppets. For especially big puppets (or puppets with moving parts), you may need to use more than one stick. Get ready for your show. Grab an audience, and, if needed, a few friends to act in the show with you. Position the box so that your paper "screen" is facing the audience, then crouch behind the box. Make sure that you can easily fit your hands into the box — if you need to, you may want to cut the sides of the cardboard box down a little to make it easier to put your hands in. As long as your box can still stand up on its own, anything you do to it is fair game. You'll also want to put your light source (lamp, lightbulb, flashlight, etc.) behind the box so that its light shines clearly through the box and out of the screen. This light will make the puppets cast their shadows on the screen during your show. Start your show. If you're not already behind the box, duck behind it, making sure it's positioned with the screen in front of you, and the audience in the front of the screen. Grab all of your puppets and turn on the light behind the box. Finally, turn off the light in the room. Showtime! Move your puppets between your light source and the box so that their shadows project onto the thin paper screen for your audience. Break a leg! If you can't get it dark enough in the room for your puppets to cast clear shadows on the screen, try drawing all of the curtains in the room to keep light from outside from entering.
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Make a two-handed bird. Make a one-handed greyhound. Make a swan. Make a one-handed camel. Make an old man. Make a face. Make a bulldog. Make an elephant. Make a deer. Make a doggy. Gather your materials. Build your "stage". Design and draw your puppets. Cut out your puppets.When you're satisfied with the designs of your puppets, use a pair of scissors to carefully cut along the outlines you drew. Attach sticks to your puppets. Get ready for your show. Start your show.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Adopt-a-Fostered-Dog
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How to Adopt a Fostered Dog
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To adopt a fostered dog, first go to an adoption event where you can meet dogs looking for new homes. Once you've met a pup you want to adopt, you'll need to fill out paperwork to determine that you're qualified to own a dog. You'll also need to meet the foster family, which will give you an opportunity to ask about the dog's behavior and if it has any bad habits. Remember to bring a collar and leash with you, because you might be taking your new dog home with you after filling out some more brief paperwork and paying an adoption fee.
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Look for ads offering dogs for adoption. You might see fliers advertising dogs for adoption on community bulletin boards at your library or town hall, or on the bulletin board of your local pet store. You could also check for fostered dogs in the classifieds of your local newspapers or online (on Craigslist, for instance). Locate and investigate each of these possibilities in turn, inquiring along the way as to whether the dogs available for adoption were fostered. When you contact the person or organization offering the dogs for adoption, ask, “Do you have any fostered dogs?” If they reply that they do, make plans to meet the foster owner and their dog. If they reply that they do not have any fostered dogs, say, “Very well. Do you know where I might find some fostered dogs for adoption?” Follow up on any leads that you receive. Dogs available for adoption might not be advertised as having been fostered, even if they were. Contact your municipal animal shelter. A municipal animal shelter is a place where lost or otherwise unwanted pets are housed until someone adopts them. These shelters are run by local governments, but often connect with private citizens who provide foster homes for the animals. Contact your municipal animal shelter to find out if they have any fostered animals available for adoption. Contact a humane society. A humane society is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to promote animal welfare and find homes for homeless pets. Contact the offices of your local humane societies and find out if you can adopt a fostered dog. Animal welfare agencies and animal rescue organizations are also humane societies. Include them in your quest to adopt a fostered dog. Humane society websites often have lists of the dogs available for adoption along with each dog's picture and a brief biography. Read the biographical information about each dog, looking for evidence that the dog available for adoption has been fostered. Locate a foster to adopt program. Foster to adopt programs are available through many major animal welfare organizations and animal shelters. Contact an animal shelter in your area and inquire as to whether they offer foster to adopt programs. Some organizations that are known to operate foster to adopt programs include: PAWS Chicago Copper's Dream Black Dog, Second Chance Learn the rules. Organizations that offer foster to adopt programs all share certain features in common. At their core, all foster to adopt programs allow individuals to foster a dog for a given length of time, then decide if they want to adopt it. However, the specifics of each foster to adopt program differ slightly. Some programs, for instance, require that the foster owner decide if they want to adopt closer to the beginning of their fostering process. Other programs allow foster owners to wait until the end of the process. Contact the organization that you intend to foster a dog through in order to learn more about their terms and conditions. Alternately, you could consult the organization's website for the details. Fill out the paperwork. With a process like fostering a dog, there are lots forms you'll have to fill out along the way. Contact the organization through which you hope to foster, then adopt, your dog for information about what forms they need. Most organizations have an extensive questionnaire process. You may be required to provide proof of income, personal and professional references, and information about your interest in fostering the dog. You'll need to be at least 18 years old. Some organizations require that you be at least 21. Meet dogs available to foster. Find a dog that is a good fit. The dog should be the right size for your living space. You should feel capable of taking care of the dog you foster. At animal shelters, most of the dogs available to foster are medium or large adolescent dogs. Some foster dogs – especially those that previously had bad owners – might have temperament or behavioral issues. Others – especially puppies – will need to be housebroken and might take a bit of work to train. Visit the shelter or human society to select a dog you wish to foster to adopt. Ask questions about the dog's personality and temperament during your visits to the shelter or humane society. You should be prepared to deal with all these issues, along with the regular responsibilities that any pet owner faces like feeding, playing with, and walking the dog. Foster the dog. Before you can take the dog home, you'll probably have a meet-and-greet. This will allow you and the dog to get to know one another briefly before you take it home. Then, you can take the dog to live with you. Fostering a dog is a big responsibility. You'll be responsible for: taking the dog for walks and providing other opportunities for exercise feeding the dog regularly giving the dog some minimal level of training (especially housebreaking keeping the dog healthy maintain regular contact with the animal shelter Adopt the dog. Most foster owners take dogs for a limited time before passing them on to permanent owners. But foster to adopt programs allow the foster owner to keep the dog after the fostering period concludes. The specific method by which you adopt the dog depends on the organization through which you obtained the foster dog. Talk to a representative of the organization and find out how you can finalize the adoption process once your fostering period is done. Troubleshoot your adopted dog situation. If you feel overwhelmed or unable to take care of the dog you fostered and then adopted, you have several options. You could hire someone to retrain the dog so that it behaves in a way that allows you to handle it more easily. If money is an issue, you could find extra sources of income – a second job, for instance – in order to help you pay for dog-related expenses. As a last resort, you could give the dog to a family that is able to take care of it, or surrender the dog to a humane society. The humane society will do its best to find a new home for your dog. To get your dog retrained, locate dog kindergartens online or in your yellow pages. To give the dog to a family that can care for it, place an ad in your local newspaper or online classifieds. To surrender your dog to the human society, call your local humane society and express your interest in surrendering your dog. Have prior experience as a dog owner. Adopting a dog is a serious responsibility. If you've never owned a dog before, you might not have much of an idea of what you're in for. Foster owners are looking to place their dogs with someone who has a history of caring for dogs. This communicates to the foster owner that you know, in part, what you're in for. While it's not a guarantee that you will be able to adopt a fostered dog, prior dog ownership enhances your credibility as a bona fide dog owner and animal lover. If you haven't owned a dog before, you might want to buy a dog first, then adopt a fostered dog after you have some firsthand experience training, housebreaking, and living with a dog. Be able to own a dog. If you live in a housing situation in which dogs are not allowed, you will not be allowed to adopt a dog. This ensures that dogs are not improperly adopted and set out on the street when, for instance, an individual's landlord finds out that they have a dog. Other situations in which adopting a fostered dog is inadvisable include: having a family member with a dog fur allergy having family members who do not want dogs in the house being too busy to care for the dog Attend adoption events. If you want to meet your potential fostered dog before filling out any paperwork, you can do so at an adoption event. Adoption events are small festivals where adoptable pets – including dogs – get to meet potential owners. Fostered pets are often available through local adoption event. For instance, PetSmart offers four National Adoption Weekend events in the US and Canada. The events are in February, May, September, and November. Once you decide you want to adopt a fostered dog you located at an adoption event, you'll need to fill out the necessary paperwork. There will be an interim period while your paperwork is being processed before the dog is actually placed with you. Complete the paperwork. If you want to adopt a fostered dog, you'll need to complete an extensive questionnaire. This paperwork helps the humane society, animal shelter, or similar agency determine whether you're qualified to adopt a fostered dog. Questions you might see on the adoption paperwork include: Why do you want to adopt a dog? Are you looking for a puppy or an older dog? Do you plan on moving soon? Meet the fostered dog you want to adopt. When you adopt a fostered dog, you'll have to meet them and their foster family. This will give the foster family a chance to learn more about your character and temperament in order to determine if you're a good fit for their fostered dog. It will also give you a chance to see if the fostered dog's temperament and personality are a good match for you. Ask the foster family questions about the fostered dog's habits and behavior when meeting them. For instance, you might ask if the dog is housetrained, if it chews furniture and books, and if it knows any tricks. Schedule a meeting with the foster family and fostered dog you're interested in as soon as possible. Otherwise, other families might adopt the fostered dog before you. You might be able to reach the foster family by email or phone. Be ready to take the dog home with you. When you show up to your meet-and-greet, bring a dog collar and leash with you. Since you've already been approved by the adoption agency, you should be able to head home to your fostered dog that very day. You'll have to fill out some paperwork before taking your dog home if you attended an adoption event. You likely won't be able to take the dog home until your paperwork is processed, even if you're ahead of anyone else on the adoption list. Complete adoption paperwork. Once you've decided to take the dog home, you'll have a fill out a few more documents. These are much briefer and more limited in scope than the application you initially completed in order to adopt the dog. The documents basically constitute a contract that makes you legally responsible for the health of the fostered dog from that point on. Along with the final adoption paperwork, you'll need to pay an adoption fee. The adoption fee for a particular organization will vary. Ask a knowledgeable representative of the organization what the adoption fee for your dog will be.
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Look for ads offering dogs for adoption. Contact your municipal animal shelter. Contact a humane society. Locate a foster to adopt program. Learn the rules. Fill out the paperwork. Meet dogs available to foster. Foster the dog. Adopt the dog. Troubleshoot your adopted dog situation. Have prior experience as a dog owner. Be able to own a dog. Attend adoption events. Complete the paperwork. Meet the fostered dog you want to adopt. Be ready to take the dog home with you. Complete adoption paperwork.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Develop-Positive-Thinking
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How to Develop Positive Thinking
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If you want to develop positive thinking, start by making it a habit to reflect on what you're grateful for at the end of each day or each week. You can also practice showing kindness to yourself by cutting yourself some slack with your imperfections rather than judging yourself. You're only human after all! Along with striving to be more optimistic about your life and yourself, you can take some time out of your day to meditate or exercise, both of which have been shown to improve your mindfulness and outlook for the better.
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Write down what you are grateful for. Gratitude boosts positive emotion and leads to better health, happiness, and relationships. To build a grateful spirit, regularly take time to write down at least three good things each day. Practice this exercise each night as you look back over your day. Note, on a piece of paper, three things that went well or that you are grateful for about the day. Consider why you are grateful for these things. Write that down, too. At the end of each week, look back on what you wrote down. Notice how you feel when reading over these things. Keep this practice up week after week to foster gratitude. Volunteer. Helping others through volunteerism increases self-confidence, gives you a sense of purpose, reduces depression, and improves physical health. Think about what skills or talents you have to offer and how that can translate into helping others. For example, if you enjoy reading, you can offer to read stories to children or elderly people. If you are creative, you can extend your services to helping with a community arts council. Practice self-compassion. Know that you're not perfect - you're human, and everyone else around you is, too. Oftentimes, being self-compassionate is compared to being weak or overly self-indulgent. In truth, practicing self-compassion relates to showing yourself kindness rather than judgment, recognizing your common humanity rather than aloneness, and focusing on mindfulness rather than over-identifying with personal troubles. One particularly useful way to practice self-compassion is to recite a comforting phrase during times of suffering or pain. For example, if you are down on yourself because you went through a terrible break-up, recite the following compassionate phrase "This is a moment of suffering. Suffering is part of life. May I be kind to myself in this moment? May I give myself the compassion I need? Research shows that being self-compassionate can result in greater energy, resilience, courage, and creativity. Laugh. There's much truth to the saying "laughter is the best medicine". A good dose of humor improves cardiovascular functioning, relaxes the body, increases immunity, and releases feel-good endorphins. Get your laugh on by watching a funny movie, hanging out with your hilarious roommate for the day, or sharing a joke or funny story with others. Compliment people. As it turns out, compliments have the ability to boost the self-esteem of the person of the messenger and the receiver. Telling someone else what you like or admire about him simply makes you feel good. But, paying a compliment also knocks down walls in social situations and brings people closer together. Ideas on how to pay compliments include: Keeping it simple - compliments don't have to be over-the-top Be specific - tell the person exactly what it is about them that is so great Be genuine - give compliments that you truly believe Gather a positive support system. Just as negativity can spread, so can positivity. Being around others who have a positive outlook on life can impact your own outlook as well. Develop the relationships in your life that make you feel good about yourself, that challenge you to grow and improve, and that push you towards positive lifestyle choices. Meditate. There is an abundance of evidence that shows the impact of daily meditation on positive thinking. In fact, one study showed that mindfulness meditation coupled with yoga in a group of breast cancer patients led to positive changes in the patients' DNA structure. So, thinking mindfully can heal you from the inside out. Find a quiet place where you can sit undisturbed for several minutes. Sit in a comfortable position. Take several cleansing deep breaths. You can simply focus on your breath or you can listen to a guided audio mediation specifically designed to foster positive thinking. Exercise. Becoming more physically active generates brain chemical called endorphins that leave you feeling relaxed and more content. What's more, regular physical activity builds self-confidence, builds resistance to illness and disease, and controls weight - all factors that can have significant impact on your outlook. Research even shows that optimists are more likely to work out than pessimists. So, grab a pair of sneakers and walk your dog, go for a run or a hike, or turn on the radio and dance with your best friend. Get sleep. Getting an appropriate amount of shut-eye can also drastically influence your optimism. Aim for 7 to 9 hours of sleep per night. Improve your ability to relax by creating a winding-down ritual that includes soothing activities such as listening to soft music, reading, or taking a hot bath. Plus, rising and retiring at the same time each morning and night can improve your sleep habits. When people are sleep-deprived they experience a deficit in optimism, tending to be less hopeful and positive. Even children who get good quality and quantity sleep are more optimistic. Avoid alcohol or drugs. When we experience negative thoughts and feelings, we often turn to alcohol or drugs to numb them. However, alcohol and many drugs are depressants, which may increase negative feeling and increase the likelihood of self-harm. If your tendency to think negatively causes you to turn to alcohol and drugs, call a friend instead. Or, even better, reach out to a mental health professional who can help you overcome these thought patterns. Become aware of your negative thoughts. Having a negative thinking style has various detrimental effects on health. The first step towards overcoming negative thinking is making yourself aware of when you're doing it. Negative thoughts tend to fall in the following categories: being fearful of the future, criticizing yourself, doubting your abilities, putting yourself down, and expecting failure. People who think negatively usually have a certain style of negative self-talk. Do any of these sound familiar? Polarizing. Seeing things in only one of two categories with no middle ground. (i.e. If it is not good, it must be bad.) Filtering. Exaggerating the negatives while minimizing the positives. (i.e. You got a good evaluation at work, but you spend your time dwelling on the areas your boss said need improving.) Catastrophizing. Always expecting the worst to happen. (i.e. One tiny fight with your partner means she hates you and wants to break up.) Personalizing. Blaming yourself for everything bad that happens. (i.e. Everyone leaves the party early. You assume it's because you were there.) Challenge your self-talk. Once you become aware of your tendency to think negatively, you must work to attack these thoughts. Use four methods to challenge negative thinking. Test the reality - Is there evidence for or against my claim (negative self-talk)? Am I jumping to a negative conclusion without assessing the facts? Look for alternate explanations - If I was in a positive mindset, how would I view this situation differently? Is there any other way of looking at this? Put your thoughts into perspective - Will this matter in 6 months (or 1 year)? What's the worst that can really happen? Be goal-oriented - Are these thoughts moving me closer to accomplishing my goals? How can I problem-solve this? Engage in positive self-talk daily. Becoming a more positive thinker won't happen overnight. But, if you actively practice positive self-talk each day, you can develop a healthier, more positive mindset over time. Whenever you catch yourself thinking negatively, put your thoughts to the test. Then, find more realistic and positive ways to transform your self-talk. For example, "My girlfriend thinks I'm a loser" is a negative thought that can be challenged and transformed to "My girlfriend clearly sees something likable and worthwhile about me because she chose to date me". Stop comparing. Measuring yourself up against others is a sure route to always feeling negative and doubting your own abilities. As there will always be someone in the world who is better at any given skill than you, by comparing, you set yourself up for failure every time. Instead focus on your successes and celebrate them. Pay less attention to other people's business and put more energy into your own self-improvement. Look to others who symbolize where or who you want to be without comparing. And, constantly take out time to appreciate your personal growth and the wonderful things happening in your life.
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Write down what you are grateful for. Volunteer. Practice self-compassion. Laugh. Compliment people. Gather a positive support system. Meditate. Exercise. Get sleep. Avoid alcohol or drugs. Become aware of your negative thoughts. Challenge your self-talk. Engage in positive self-talk daily. Stop comparing.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Win-at-Blackjack
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How to Win at Blackjack
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To win at blackjack, bet low whenever the deck is shuffled since no cards have been dealt yet to base your bet off of. Wait to bet high until you know there are a lot of high cards left in the deck since you'll be more likely to win. You can also learn how to count cards while you're playing, which will help you know when to raise your bet or take a hit.
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Memorize the basic terms of the game. The game itself is simple enough to figure out. Every player knows they need to get to 21 to beat the dealer. However, many players don't understand the terms used beyond hitting to get another card or staying to end their term. Before you play, know about asking to double down, split your hand, or surrender your hand so you can incorporate these into your betting strategies and give yourself the best chance of winning. When you choose to double down, you double your bet and receive only one more card. When you have two of the same card, such as a pair of twos, you can split them and play them as two hands with two separate bets. Very few casinos allow you to surrender your hand. When you have a bad hand, you can surrender and save half your bet. Mitigate the house advantage. The dealer gains an advantage because the player must act first without knowing what the hole card, the face-down card, is. Also, once you go over 21, or bust, you lose even if the dealer busts as well. Once you understand this, you'll realize that winning depends upon reacting to the cards you have as well as those other players and the dealer show on the table in order to predict what card the dealer has face-down. Study basic blackjack strategy. Because blackjack is a game of probabilities compared to other casino games, you will be a stronger player by learning how to play certain hands. For example, do you hit on your 16 when the dealer has a ten? Do you split your eights? Study a chart to determine which choice you should make depending on what cards you have and what card the dealer shows. At first you'll find it hard to remember how to act during various in-game scenarios, but the more you play, the more you'll learn how to play your hand by instinct. Find out the table’s game rules before you start playing. Different casinos or blackjack games feature different rules. Many games use multiple decks of cards in order to discourage card counting, throwing off your ability to track your odds of winning. Most games of blackjack require the dealer to stop at 17, even if this means the dealer loses, but the rules may allow for the dealer to hit on a soft 17, which is a 17 made with an ace (the ace can be a one or an 11). A game that makes it harder for you to win in the long term, such as one that allows the dealer to hit on a soft 17, should be avoided. Avoid continuous shuffle machines when playing in person. These machines make keeping track of possible cards you and the dealer can draw an impossibility. Check the table’s blackjack rules. Before you start playing at a table, it's important to find out how you will be paid for a blackjack. If you get a natural blackjack, a 21 on the first two cards dealt to you, a table may pay you 3:2, which is $3 for every $2 wagered. Others will pay you less, such as 6:5, and should be avoided. 6:5 odds are worse for you than 3:2. Consider that if you bet and win twice on the first odds, you'll bet ten units to win 12 units. 12 units on the second odds makes for four bets totalling eight units bet to win 12 units. Formulate your betting strategy. In an average game, it's best to be consistent or, at most, increase your bet by one dollar or other unit of measurement until you win. Remember that there is no such thing as being due for a win or hot and cold decks. Any such pattern you perceive will disappear over time because the game is based on chance and probability. Instead, try betting low after a loss or deck shuffle and increase your bet a little when you perceive the odds are in your favor. Increase your bet when the odds are in your favor. Many high cards in the deck work better for you since they always amount to ten and help you get more blackjacks. The more you play, the more you'll gain a sense of how many helpful cards remain in the deck and how to proceed with the hand you have. Once you have a grasp of your odds of winning, you can more aggressively bet on good hands. Resist buying insurance. The dealer will give you an option to buy protection in case the dealer has a blackjack. This means you in essence make a side bet that the dealer will have blackjack. If the dealer does have blackjack, you will win your side bet but lose your original bet. This may get you back some money in the short-term, but long-term the bet makes the casino money. Beginner players have no way of knowing if the dealer has a card worth ten points face-down under an ace. Card counters however have a better idea and can use their information to make money on this bet. Assign values to cards. Under the Hi-Lo method of card counting, each numbered card has a value. Cards two through six are worth one point. Cards seven through nine are worth zero points. The ten card, face cards, and the aces are worth negative one point each. The idea is that you'll keep a total value of all the cards on display, and as more face cards are left in the deck you'll make more blackjacks while the dealer busts more. The Hi-Lo method is a common counting system, but other systems exist that give different point values to certain cards such as aces and fives. Practice keeping a running count. Use a single deck of cards. Turn over the cards one by one, adding up the values as you go. If you draw a two, a five, and an ace, you'll have a value of one. When you reach the end of the deck, your running total should equal zero. Repeat practice until you're able to keep your total quickly and quietly. Keep a true count. Casinos are wise to card counters, so they play blackjack with multiple decks at the same time. The true count takes the running count and divides it by the number of decks in play. This count gives you more of an idea of how much of an advantage you have in betting. A running count of three is fine in a one-deck game, but this number means less when there are multiple decks since there are more cards to factor that reduce your chances of winning. For example, a seven running count divided by two decks leaves you with a true count of about three. But if there are six decks in play, the true count is only about one. Practice maintaining true counts. Start off by using a few decks. Flip over the cards one by one and grow accustomed to dividing with fractions. At first you can simply round the division into a general true count, but as you go you'll become more able to perform more accurate divisions in your head with less effort. An online card counting simulator can help you practice. Some simulators can correct your counting mistakes and track your winnings. Keep a count with distractions. Once you feel comfortable keeping a true count, try mimicking the feel of a casino. First, start small. Add a little music or radio chatter. As you grow more capable, bring in a friend, roommate, or partner. Later on you can practice during loud events such as parties. Eventually you'll be able to carry on conversations while calculating the true count in your mind. Adjust your betting. When you put your calculations to practice, raise the amount you bet when the count is high in the positives. Remember to remain inconspicuous. Remain natural, talking to other players and the dealer rather than muttering to yourself. Raise your bet by small amounts when you can and lower your bets when you lose. Instead of sitting around at a table for hours, leave when your winning begins to attract suspicion. Card counting is legal but casinos frown upon it because it costs them money.
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Memorize the basic terms of the game. Mitigate the house advantage. Study basic blackjack strategy. Find out the table’s game rules before you start playing. Check the table’s blackjack rules. Formulate your betting strategy. Increase your bet when the odds are in your favor. Resist buying insurance. Assign values to cards. Practice keeping a running count. Keep a true count. Practice maintaining true counts. Keep a count with distractions. Adjust your betting.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Get-Rid-of-Dry-Hair-and-Dry-Scalp
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How to Get Rid of Dry Hair and Dry Scalp
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To get rid of dry hair and dry scalp, avoid shampooing your hair more than a few times a week, since shampooing daily strips oil from your hair and scalp. When you do shampoo your hair, be sure to use a sulfate-free, moisturizing shampoo. You can condition your hair every day to keep it soft, but avoid putting conditioner on the roots of your hair, since it can dry the scalp. Finally, limit your use of heat styling tools and do a deep conditioning treatment once a week to restore your hair's moisture.
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Shampoo your hair no more than 2-3 times a week. Washing your hair too often can dry out both your scalp and hair. You don't need to wash your hair every day, and skipping washes may help improve the look and feel of your hair. For best results, wash your hair just 2-3 times per week using warm or cool water, not hot. If your hair feels very dirty, try using dry shampoo between washes. It's okay to condition your hair between washes, if you like. For your final rinse, always use cool water because it seals your cuticles, which makes your hair smooth and shiny. Use a sulfate-free, moisturizing shampoo and conditioner. Sulfate can dry out both your hair and your scalp, so skip products that contain it. Check the label on your shampoo and conditioner to make sure they are sulfate-free and are moisturizing. This can help you find relief. If your scalp is also itchy and flaky, you may have dandruff. Switch to a dandruff shampoo to see if it relieves your dry scalp. Condition your hair daily, but avoid your scalp. Using a moisturizing conditioner may help treat your dry hair. Apply the conditioner starting at your ends, then stop just before you reach your scalp. Let the conditioner sit on your hair for 3 minutes before rinsing it out with cool water, which seals your cuticle. Don't put the conditioner on your scalp because it may worsen the dryness, especially if you have dandruff. Do a 20-30 minute deep conditioning treatment once a week. Apply a deep conditioning treatment to your hair starting at the ends and working up to your roots. Let it sit for up to 30 minutes, then rinse with cool water to seal your cuticle. This will help restore your hair's moisture. Follow the directions on your product label. Use heat styling tools no more than 1-2 times a week to prevent damage. Unfortunately, styling tools can damage your hair and even cause breakage. Avoid using heat to style your hair if you can. Otherwise, limit your use of heat styling tools to just 1-2 times a week. This includes your hair dryer, straightener, and curling iron. When you do use heat styling tools, apply a heat protectant to your hair first. This will help reduce the damage. Apply coconut oil to your hair and scalp for 20-30 minutes. Divide your hair into 4-6 sections, depending on how thick your hair is. Starting with the first section, use your fingers to apply a thin layer of coconut oil to your hair and scalp. Continue applying the oil to each section until your hair is coated. Then, cover your head with a shower cap and a hot towel. Let the oil sit for up to 30 minutes, then shampoo and condition your hair to remove it. If you don't have much time, leave the oil on your hair for 10 minutes. It won't be quite as effective, but you should see results. If you have very dry hair, it's okay to leave the mask on your hair for longer. In fact, you can even use it as an overnight treatment. Apply the oil before bed, then sleep with the shower cap and towel on your head. Wash your hair in the morning to remove the oil. Do a hot oil treatment to add moisture to your hair. Pour about.5 cups (120 mL) of oil into a bowl. Heat the oil in a pot of boiling water or the microwave until it feels warm. Massage the oil into your hair and scalp, then cover your hair with a shower cap and a warm towel. Let the oil sit for 30-45 minutes. Finally, shampoo and condition your hair to remove the oil. You can use any oil that you have on hand. Avocado oil is a great option for dry hair, and jojoba oil helps with dandruff. You can also use coconut oil, which is great for all hair types. Try a homemade egg yolk mask, which may help with dryness. To make your mask, put 2-3 whole eggs into a clean bowl and add 2-3 drops of lemon juice. Beat the eggs until they get frothy, then apply the mask to your hair using your fingers. Cover your hair with a shower cap and let the mask sit for 20 minutes. Rinse the mask out with cool water, then shampoo and condition your hair. You can use this treatment once or twice a month. Don't rinse the mask out with warm or hot water because the egg will start to cook and will be harder to remove. You can add half a banana, 2 tablespoons (30 mL) of honey, 2 tablespoons (30 mL) of olive oil, or 2 tablespoons (30 mL) of coconut oil to your mask for extra softness and shine. However, keep in mind that these ingredients don't work the same way for everyone and aren't guaranteed to help your hair. Use a homemade gelatin mask for smooth, shiny hair. Stir 1 tbsp (9 g) of gelatin into 1 cup (240 mL) of warm water. Let the gelatin sit for 5 minutes, then add 1 teaspoon (4.9 mL) of apple cider vinegar and 6 drops of rosemary essential oil. Mix the ingredients, then apply the mask to your hair. Let is sit for 10 minutes before shampooing and conditioning your hair. Instead of the rosemary essential oil, you can use clary sage, lavender, or jasmine essential oil. Apply a thick layer of mayonnaise to your hair to restore moisture. Wet your hair with warm water before applying the mask. Use your fingers to apply a thin coat of mayonnaise to your hair, starting at your ends and working up to your roots. Cover your hair with a shower cap and let the mayonnaise sit for 30 minutes to an hour. Finally, rinse out the mayonnaise, shampoo, and condition. Choose a mayonnaise that contains eggs and oil, as these are the ingredients that treat the dryness. Use an avocado mask to add moisture to your hair and scalp. Add a ripe avocado, 2 tablespoons (30 mL) of extra virgin olive oil, and 1 teaspoon (4.9 mL) of honey to a blender, food processor, or clean bowl. Mix the ingredients together until your mask is an even consistency. Apply the mask to dry hair and massage it into your scalp. Cover your hair with a shower cap and let the mask sit for 30 minutes. Finally, rinse your hair out with cool water, then shampoo and condition. Avocados are rich in vitamins, minerals, and natural oils, so they may make your hair soft, glossy, and moisturized. Use honey to make a deep conditioning mask. For an easy option, mix 1 part honey and 2 parts conditioner together. Alternatively, mix 4 tablespoons (59 mL) of extra virgin olive oil, 2 tablespoons (30 mL) of pure vegetable glycerin, and 2 tablespoons (30 mL) of pure honey to make a mask. Apply the conditioner to your hair and let it sit for 10 minutes before rinsing your hair with cool water. Be aware that honey can lighten your hair. Eat a nutritious diet or take a multivitamin to avoid vitamin deficiencies. Consuming nutritious foods will help you get the nutrients you need for healthy hair. If you want to use supplements, check with your doctor first to make sure they're safe for you to take. Here are some ways you can improve your diet to help relieve your dry hair: Eat more fatty fish, like tuna, salmon, sardines, and mackerel. Choose more fresh produce, especially blueberries, broccoli, and tomatoes. Add nutrient-dense foods like walnuts, kidney beans, and oysters. Take supplements for Omega-3s, vitamin A, vitamin C, biotin, and iron. Wear a hat when you’re out in the sun. Sun exposure can dry out your hair and scalp, so spending time outdoors can make your condition worse. Covering your head with a hat helps block the sun's rays, so it may help with your dry hair and scalp. Choose a hat with a brim for the best coverage. If you can, spend less time outdoors during the sunny parts of the day. Wear a swim cap while swimming to protect your hair from chlorine. Exposing your hair and scalp to chlorinated water may dry them out. Fortunately, you don't have to give up swimming! Instead, cover your head with a swim cap before you get in the pool. This will protect both your hair and scalp, which may help with your dryness. You can buy a swim cap online. As another option, keep your hair out of the water while you're spending time in a pool.
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Shampoo your hair no more than 2-3 times a week. Use a sulfate-free, moisturizing shampoo and conditioner. Condition your hair daily, but avoid your scalp. Do a 20-30 minute deep conditioning treatment once a week. Use heat styling tools no more than 1-2 times a week to prevent damage. Apply coconut oil to your hair and scalp for 20-30 minutes. Do a hot oil treatment to add moisture to your hair. Try a homemade egg yolk mask, which may help with dryness. Use a homemade gelatin mask for smooth, shiny hair. Apply a thick layer of mayonnaise to your hair to restore moisture. Use an avocado mask to add moisture to your hair and scalp. Use honey to make a deep conditioning mask. Eat a nutritious diet or take a multivitamin to avoid vitamin deficiencies. Wear a hat when you’re out in the sun. Wear a swim cap while swimming to protect your hair from chlorine.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Dress-Indie
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How to Dress Indie
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If you want to dress indie, avoid wearing mainstream bands, and instead look for unique vintage clothing, independent designers, or handmade clothing that no one else has. Try sporting a faded band tee with a pair of bright yellow skinny jeans, for instance, or a pair of 70s bell bottoms with your favorite slim-cut button-down shirt. If the weather permits, add on layers like scarves, cardigans, or tights to complete your look. Remember, indie style is all about wearing whatever you like!
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Be yourself. Being indie means you're independent —it's where the name comes from. What does independent mean? It means you do your own thing. It doesn't matter what current fashion trends are, were, or will be -- you just do whatever you feel like. So don't even worry about dressing indie -- if you're dressing like you want, that's it. Just make sure you like it because you like it. Society's voice is so obnoxiously loud sometimes it's hard to determine if it's us making the decision or someone else telling us to make the decision. Avoid brand names and mainstream stores. Alright, so if there's one thing that actually is indie, it's avoiding brand names. An indie kid wouldn't be caught toting a Coach purse or a pair of $250 True Religion jeans. They tend to be a bit more logical than that -- if a similar, well-made, quality piece can be found at a vintage shop, where's the contest? But again, do as you please. Just because the mainstream likes something doesn't necessarily mean it's bad. Embrace a trend or two if you honestly like it -- just don't stop embracing it when it falls out of favor! Bring it back. Being indie is about appreciating what is "good." And "good" is timeless -- not temporary like trends always, always are. Because of that, indie people generally appreciate vintage items and timeless pieces (think 40s - 70s). If you find something that's old school that you like, rock it! It was good then and it's good now. Whether it's a vintage band tee or your sister's Kelly Kapowski t-shirt, remember: Do you like it? Not very hard to forget! Who knew being indie was so effortless? Mix a whole bunch of styles if you so choose. Since you're free to be who you are, mix it up! Go a little Jackie Kennedy, go a little John Lennon, go a little Artist Formerly Known as Prince if you damn well please. If you like it, you'll feel confident. And if you feel confident, you'll rock it. Don't worry about certain pieces fitting into a certain label. Do you like that plaid shirt but you know it screams hipster? How about that studded cuff that almost comes prepackaged with eyeliner? Cool. Go for it! When you mix 'em all, the look is quintessentially you. Don't believe the hype. You're probably gonna read a bunch of stuff on the Internet or see a bunch of videos or talk to a bunch of your friends about what indie is. If they say "dude, you gotta wear skinny jeans" or "whoa, what are you doing in those Converses?!" shrug it off. The whole idea of indie is that there isn't a look you have to abide by. Feel free to correct them, too! Go for layers. If you're chilly, do something about it. Throw on that cardigan over a t-shirt or a vest. Wear a scarf in July. Throw on tights under your dress and socks over those. You can clash or not clash. It's all good. If you do clash, you may end up looking a bit Hipster -- but unlike Hipsters, your look isn't screaming I-dont-give-a-damn so hard that it seems like you do. Jazz it up with jewelry and accessories. Again, anything goes. Wooden bangles, a dreamcatcher pendant, an old locket, one of those headband-or-is-it-a-choker necklaces from the 90s, whatever strikes your fancy that day. Hemp bracelets, doorknocker earrings, and long necklaces are cute and add a feminine touch to any outfit, but whatever interests you is great. Vintage pins and necklaces are also cute. Look around at garage sales and thrift shops to spruce up your wardrobe. Scarves, headbands -- they work for both sexes. So does the quintessential messenger bag (denim, leather, you name it), though if you really wanna rock the Lisa Frank backpack, more power to you. If the shoe fits, wear it. Really, anything is kosher. You're not very surprised by that, hopefully. But if you're looking for something specific, here's something to get you started: Vans Authentics are a safe bet. They even come in a wide variety of colors. Mono black (canvas and rubber both black), any shade of green, navy, or off white are great choices, but those aren't your only options. Moccasins are very important to an indie wardrobe. They add the unique and antique look to an everyday outfit. They can vary in design, color, and they go great with just about anything. Some great moccasin online sites are Minnesota moccasin, the moccasin shop, or moccasin house. Nike Dunks have become popular recently because of the nostalgia it can bring, and the limited edition styles they come in. In addition, they look good on just about everyone. Some may want to avoid these, because Nike Dunks could be looked at as mainstream. However, Nike SB dunks or Nike iD Dunks are more individual, if you have the money for them. Sanuks also add great touch! They come in different styles and color/patterns. Check your local boat shop or gb shoe warehouse Girls can also go for some cute flats in whatever color, pattern or style they choose. Funky platforms and gladiator sandals are also great choices if you're tired of boppin' around in sneakers. Make your own clothes. There's nothing more independent and totally you than something you've made yourself. If you can sew , you can start. And if creating something sounds like a task, try tailoring a piece you already have or adding your own touches to an item growing dust in your closet. You can reinvent your wardrobe without making a single trip to the store. And if sewing isn't your bag, try dyeing , knitting , crocheting, or any other project that can turn something boring into something brilliant. Dress for the weather. For girls in cold weather, pea coats in any color are great, whether they're double-breasted or not. When it's chilly, cardigans are your best friend! Striped, patterned and solids are great and look fabulous with any T-shirt or tanks. For guys in cold weather, vintage leather or Members Only jackets are a great option. If you'd like, you can even deck them out with cool pins! In chilly weather, vests or sweater vests look awesome with anything. You can also try a track jacket; they come in lots of colors and are great year-round. Scarves (for men and women) are great year round because you can get them in cotton, linen, silk and wool. They're a classy touch to add no matter what outfit you're wearing. Bright colors and neutrals both look great, as long as they go well with your outfit. Bandanas can also be made into a cool scarf -- singular or with two tied together. You can also wear a scarf in many different ways -- even a simple scarf can make the most basic outfit seem amazingly unique. Be eco-friendly. Indie kids have a pretty good grasp on what's good and what's terrible for the environment. If they can reuse something, they will. Thrift shops are happening places! So donate your clothes, shop second-hand, make your own, and don't let fashion affect your carbon footprint. Generally, you'll wanna stay away from fur and the like, too. Animals are a huge part of the environment! Take the time to know what goes into your pieces and who or what it's affecting. Let your hair do its thing. If your hair is straight, wavy, or curly, let it out in all its glory. No need to spend hours in the bathroom "correcting" it. What's wrong with your hair the way it is? Nothing! And it's way better for your hair not to be exposed to all that heat. So flaunt what your mamma gave you, even if it is a nappy pile of coarse straw. That's not to say you can't do things with it. If you wanna throw it up, shave it off, rock the mullet, go for it. Just don't get too involved with dyes and thermal treatments. That's not you, you know? Rock a set of headphones. If there's going to be one generalization, it's that indie kids are up on the music scene. So get yourself a nice pair of retro or designer headphones that'll add a touch of mystery for when you're walking about. The best pair of headphones that suit the purpose that come to mind are the Grado SR60's. Once you get your headphones, try to find killer underground bands and songs to listen to. Most indie kids don't prescribe to the top 40 and like to pave their own path when it comes to their musical tastes.
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Be yourself. Avoid brand names and mainstream stores. Bring it back. Mix a whole bunch of styles if you so choose. Don't believe the hype. Go for layers. Jazz it up with jewelry and accessories. If the shoe fits, wear it. Make your own clothes. Dress for the weather. Be eco-friendly. Let your hair do its thing. Rock a set of headphones.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Bat-Against-Fast-Bowlers
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How to Bat Against Fast Bowlers
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To bat against fast bowlers, position yourself in a comfortable batting stance and hold the bat with both hands using a light grip. Next, keep your head still and your eyes on the ball so you can anticipate the ball's trajectory. Then, after the bowler pitches the ball, trigger by stepping back slightly so you can quickly position yourself for the right shot. Be sure to keep 75% of your weight on your front foot so you can quickly move forward or back, depending on the shot you need to make!
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Show the bowler that you’re not afraid of speed. Before you approach, maintain a positive mindset and tell yourself that you can handle high speeds. Walk up with confidence and look toward the bowler to give the impression that you're in charge. A strong mental game is the first step of batting. Set yourself up for success by getting rest and having a good meal before the match. Keep your stance comfortable and relaxed. Stand in front of the wickets with your knees slightly bent, your feet shoulder-width apart, and your non-dominant shoulder facing the bowler. Turn your head toward the bowler, bend slightly forward from your hips, and keep your torso straight. Put your weight on the balls of your feet so you can quickly react to the ball. Keep your shoulders straight, and don't let them drop as you swing. For a fast bowler, you might want to open your stance a bit by turning your body slightly toward the bowler. This can give you a clearer view of the ball. Hold the bat with a soft grip. Grip the bat with your non-dominant hand positioned near the top of the handle. Your dominant hand should be closer to the paddle, and your hands should be fairly close together. Don't keep your grip strong or rigid, as if you wanted to launch the ball with power. Keep your hands soft and be ready to open them up to make a quick defensive swing. When facing a tough, fast bowler, hitting the boundary is less of a priority than making defensive contact and hitting the gaps. Keep your head still and watch the ball at all times. Don't be afraid of the ball. If you keep your eyes on the ball, anticipate its trajectory, and stay ready to react, you're less likely to get hit. Watch the line and length of the bowler's delivery, and your instincts will help you decide which shot to play. It takes practice but, with experience, you'll learn which deliveries you can make strong contact with, which require a defensive swing, and which aren't playable. Work on triggering to stay in motion before the pitch. If you stay stationary in the crease, you won't have as much time to react against a fast bowler. Upon their delivery, trigger by stepping back slightly so you can quickly position yourself for the right shot. As you step back, be sure to keep 75% of your weight on your front foot so your back foot doesn't get stuck. If your transfer too much weight to your back foot, it'll take longer to make a shot with a forward step. With more weight on your front foot, you'll be able to quickly forward or back, depending on the shot you need to make. Remember to keep your weight on the balls of your feet to quicken your footwork. Defend the stumps if the bowler is aiming low and fast. If you're facing a fast bowler, odds they're aiming to put down the wicket. Step forward with your front leg, and make a straight shot by swinging the bat upward with the full face of the bat facing the ball. Remember to focus on making contact instead of trying to drive the ball. Swing the bat to the side if the ball bounces short. If the ball bounces early, step backward with your back foot and prepare to make a high defensive shot. Instead of swinging straight, swing the bat to the side to drive the ball toward a gap. This swing is called a pull shot, and it's used to drive the ball to the leg side. With a fast bowler, you're more likely to score runs by making strategic shots toward gaps instead of driving it to the boundary. Look for opportunities for back foot drives. While you'll likely need to make lots of defensive shots against a fast bowler, stay ready to react to a shot that bounces at a favorable length at middle or off stump. When the opportunity for a back-foot drive arises, keep most of your weight forward, draw your front foot back, and align the bat with the ball's trajectory. Guide the shot with your top hand, and power it by punching with your bottom hand. Follow through with the bat and your hands in a high position in line with the shot. Have a partner hit tennis balls to you as you bat. Instead of pitching like an ordinary bowler, your partner can hit tennis balls with a racket toward you to simulate high-speed pitches. Work on keeping your eye on the ball, tracing its trajectory from the racket, and making contact with the target. Tennis balls are softer than cricket balls. Practicing with them can help you adapt to high-speed pitches if you're afraid to get hurt by a fast, hard cricket ball. Work on judging the ball’s line of delivery. Set up the stumps and have a partner bowl pitches at a specific stump. Stand in your crease and call out which stump the ball will target. With each pitch, check with your partner to make sure you're correctly judging the ball's trajectory. Instead of their ordinary labels “off,” “middle,” and “leg,” you can call out “1,” “2,” or “3.” To improve your judgment of pitches outside the wicket, place another set of stumps next to the standard posts on the opposite side that you stand to bat. Label this set “4,” “5,” and “6.” If you're consistently getting stumped or bowled, work on honing your ability to predict the ball's trajectory. This drill can help you decide whether you need to attack, lay off, or defend the stumps. Watch your partner’s grip as they bowl. Practice anticipating the ball's spin and trajectory by calling out the grip after your partner bowls. For instance, if you see 1 finger, say “1,” then check your accuracy with your partner. If you see 2 fingers and anticipate a tricky spin, you'll know to lay off or get out of the way. Set up target cones to practice making your shots. Set up pairs of cones ahead and to the left and right. Have your partner throw to you, and practice opening and closing your hands to adjust the bat's face. Adjust your swing and the angle of the bat to aim the ball toward the gaps between the cones. Step back, turn up your front shoulder, swing inside-out to square your swing and send the ball away from you. Close up and swing from outside-in to pull your swing. Practice batting with golf or squash balls. Have your partner bowl smaller balls, such as golf or squash balls, to improve your hand-eye coordination. Focus on watching the ball leave the bowler's hand and making contact with the smaller target. The smaller ball can simulate the difficulty of batting against a fast bowler. If possible, find a skinnier cricket bat to increase the level of difficulty.
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Show the bowler that you’re not afraid of speed. Keep your stance comfortable and relaxed. Hold the bat with a soft grip. Keep your head still and watch the ball at all times. Work on triggering to stay in motion before the pitch. Defend the stumps if the bowler is aiming low and fast. Swing the bat to the side if the ball bounces short. Look for opportunities for back foot drives. Have a partner hit tennis balls to you as you bat. Work on judging the ball’s line of delivery. Watch your partner’s grip as they bowl. Set up target cones to practice making your shots. Practice batting with golf or squash balls.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Espresso-Beverages-With-a-French-Press
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How to Make Espresso Beverages With a French Press
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To make espresso beverages with a French press, start by boiling 2 cups of water in a kettle. Then, while that's boiling, add 1.3 ounces of ground espresso beans to your French press. Once the water boils, pour it over the grounds and give the brew a stir to remove any lumps. Next, brew the coffee for 3-5 minutes, and heat milk in a pan before whisking it until it's frothy. Then, shake the milk in a jar until it's bubbly. Finish by pouring your coffee and adding the milk on top.
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Assemble your ingredients and tools: French press Freshly ground coffee beans ground to espresso setting. Measuring spoon Stirring stick Hot water Lift the lid/filter assembly out of the pot. This is the top of your French press that is comprised of the lid and a rod that screws into the mesh filter. The mesh filter and the plunger is what you will press down on the coffee grounds and water. The filter separates the grounds from your beverage for drinking. Make sure it is pulled up when you remove it. Heat your water. Using a stovetop safe kettle, heat your water. As your kettle begins to heat the water, warm the glass container of your French press by swirling some hot water in it. Adding a bit of warm water ensures the glass won't crack from the sudden temperature change when you add boiling water later. Grind your beans. The grind of your beans is going to be a large factor in how close you get to having a drink that resembles an espresso. If you are buying ground beans, then look for an espresso grind. If you are grinding your own beans, still look for coffee that says "espresso beans" or "espresso". While there is no actual espresso type of bean, often commercial roasters will have an espresso bean. This will give you a taste and consistency to which you are used to because it is roasted to bring out the espresso flavor. If you grind your own beans, you will want a grinder that can offer you an espresso grind. Burr grinders are grinders which actually grind the beans between two burrs. These grinders crunch up a few beans at a time and grind the bean into a nice even powder. Blade grinders can be effective as well. However, with a blade grinder, you're using a sharp propeller to chop the beans. This method can be less consistent. The espresso ground is very fine. It is finer than what you would have if you were grinding beans for a regular French press or a drip coffee maker. The fine ground contributes to the flavor and ability to mix with the hot pressure of water. You don't want an espresso grind to be so fine that it goes through your filter. The problem with this fine of a grind in a French press is that the filter has a larger mesh. It should be like sand. You may then want to make your grind slightly more coarse, but not much. Unless you don't mind a bit of grounds in the bottom of your cup. Add your grounds to your press. Pour roughly 36 grams (1.3 oz) of grounds into your press. This part is a bit tricky because you are trying to make espresso. Which when prepared in an espresso machine uses about 16-21 grams of grounds per 1 cup of water. Since your French press is larger, try doubling your proportions. You'll have some espresso left over but that's ok. Pour a splash of near boiling water over the grounds. Then after a few seconds add the remainder of your two cups of water. Your water should not exceed 200° F, around 195° F is ideal. Before pouring in your full two cups of water, just add a splash to let the grounds flour and bloom. This will open the grounds up and let the flavors really come out. Stir your brew. Give the brew a quick stir with a long-handled spoon to prevent clumps and add a nice frothy consistency. Then push the lid/filter assembly down until it just rests on the water. Don't plunge your filter down yet. You need to let the coffee steep. Steep your brew. Let it steep until the coffee is very dark (about 3-4 minutes). The longer you steep, the stronger your coffee will be. However, this does not mean that you should steep your espresso too long just to get a stronger, more espresso-like flavor. Steeping is another area for experimentation. Just be aware of one rule: The length of steep time controls extraction. Too short and the coffee will be under-extracted and sour; too long and the coffee will be over-extracted and bitter. Press your brew. Hold the lid to steady and press the plunger down slowly in a steady, even manner until it stops. You may want to experiment with plunging halfway, bringing it up, and then plunging it down all the way to create a thin layer of foam. Let your brew set briefly before pouring. Pour your coffee through a clean cloth or a coffee filter if you want to catch any of the very fine sediment. Note that pouring through a paper filter will alter the consistency and flavor of your drink slightly. The paper will catch some of the texture of your drink, and possibly transfer an oily essence as your coffee steeps through. Heat the milk. Pour at least 1/2 cup of milk in a medium saucepan and heat on low or medium. Heat the milk until it is warmed through. You don't want your milk to boil. Heat just until it starts to bubble then turn the stove off. The thicker the milk or cream you use, the thicker your foam will be. However, using 2% or low-fat milk may be easier if you are frothing by hand. Lower-fat milks usually include whey proteins that are critical stabilizers for milk foam. Prepare your espresso in your French Press. While the milk is being heated, make your espresso using the first method. You can also heat the milk while the beverage is steeping. Remove the milk from heat. Do this while the coffee is steeping. Place the pan on a towel or surface that isn't hot but that won't get damaged by the heat from the pan. Blend the milk. Angle your pot and set an immersion blender in the shallow end of the pot. Froth the milk on high speed until the foam holds, about 2 to 3 minutes blending on high. If you don't have an immersion blender, you can use a whisk and stir the milk in a smaller container. Stir by rotating the whisk back and forth between the palms of your hands. Stir until your milk is bubbly and frothy. Pour the frothy milk into a jar with a lid. Once you've poured your milk, tighten the lid and give the jar a good shake. Don't fill the jar more than halfway. This won't leave enough room for the milk to foam. Shake until the milk is bubbly and nice and foamy. You should be shaking for about 30 to 60 seconds. Then microwave the jar (making sure you have a microwave safe jar) for about 30 seconds. This allows the foam to rise to the top. Pour your espresso coffee. Divide the coffee out amongst the cups and spoon the frothed milk on top of each. Serve immediately. You can also pour the leftover milk into your drink if you like milk in your drink. Chill about 1/2 cup of milk in a small glass or stainless steel bowl. Place the bowl in the freezer for 15 to 30 minutes, or until the temperature reaches just above freezing. The thicker the milk or cream you use, the thicker your foam will be. However, using 2% or low-fat milk may be easier if you are frothing by hand. Lower-fat milks usually include whey proteins that are critical stabilizers for milk foam. Check on your bowl to make sure the milk hasn't frozen. There should not be any ice crystals. Prepare your espresso in your French Press. While the milk is being cooled, make your espresso using the first method. You can then make the foam while your coffee is steeping. Remove the bowl from the freezer. Once you remove the cold milk from your freezer set it on a towel on your counter top. You can now go about frothing your milk in a couple of ways. One way is to proceed as you would with milk heated on the stove. Blend the milk, then shake and microwave. Another way is to blend and shake. But not microwave. Tip the bowl and insert your immersion blender. You can also pour your milk into a smaller container for easier blending or whisking. Blend until there is a good, stiff froth. If you don't have an immersion blender, you can use a whisk and stir the milk in a smaller container. Stir by rotating the whisk back and forth between the palms of your hands. Stir until your milk is bubbly and frothy. Pour the frothy milk into a jar with a lid. Once you've poured your milk, tighten the lid and give the jar a good shake. Don't fill the jar more than halfway. This won't leave enough room for the milk to foam. Shake until the milk is bubbly and nice and foamy. You should be shaking for about 30 to 60 seconds. You can leave the cold froth as is, or microwave if you want extra foam. Leaving the froth cold will mean that you have to scoop it right away onto your drink before it settles back in. Spoon out the froth onto your coffee and enjoy. Take a spoon and place a dollop of froth onto the top of your drink. Sprinkle with cinnamon for added flavor. You can also pour the milk mixture into your drink if you like. Prepare your ingredients for whipped cream. For those who would like to use whipped cream, this is a basic recipe: 1/2 pint heavy cream, chilled 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract 1 tablespoons powdered sugar Whip the cream. Using a stick blender or whisk, whip the cream in a large bowl until soft peaks form. It sometimes help to whip the cream and get a fluffier consistency if you use a metal bowl and whisk. Place the cream in the bowl with the whisk and let it sit in the freezer for 10 to 15 minutes. You may also want to add some sugar before you start whisking. the sugar will help the cream to clump and form. Add the vanilla and the sugar. Continue to beat the mixture until it reaches the consistency of whipped cream. You can place your bowl back in the fridge to cool if you are still brewing your beverage. Prepare your espresso in your French Press. While the cream is cooling in the bowl, make your espresso using the first method. You can then finish making your whipped cream while your beverage steeps, if you haven't yet. Make sure that you've whipped your mixture so it's fluffy and not runny. Add a dollop of whip cream to your beverage. Once you have your desired consistency, add a dollop to your beverage. You can also stir the whipped cream into your beverage if you want more of a Frappuccino® drink. Finished.
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Assemble your ingredients and tools: Lift the lid/filter assembly out of the pot. Heat your water. Grind your beans. Add your grounds to your press. Pour a splash of near boiling water over the grounds. Stir your brew. Steep your brew. Press your brew. Let your brew set briefly before pouring. Heat the milk. Prepare your espresso in your French Press. Remove the milk from heat. Blend the milk. Pour the frothy milk into a jar with a lid. Pour your espresso coffee. Chill about 1/2 cup of milk in a small glass or stainless steel bowl. Prepare your espresso in your French Press. Remove the bowl from the freezer. Tip the bowl and insert your immersion blender. Pour the frothy milk into a jar with a lid. Spoon out the froth onto your coffee and enjoy. Prepare your ingredients for whipped cream. Whip the cream. Add the vanilla and the sugar. Prepare your espresso in your French Press. Add a dollop of whip cream to your beverage. Finished.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Stop-a-Wedding
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How to Stop a Wedding
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To stop a wedding, meet directly with the couple and calmly tell them why you believe they shouldn't be married. If you can't convince them to call it off completely, try persuading them to hold it off for a year by pointing out how expensive and time-consuming it is to plan a wedding. You should avoid crashing a wedding, which will damage your own reputation and may not even work. If you have an urgent reason for preventing the wedding, consider reaching out to other family or friends to get help convincing the couple to hold off.
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Consider your motivations. Before attempting to stop a wedding you need to think about why you have decided to take this on. Ask yourself if you believe you have the best intentions for both individuals by stopping their wedding. Try to understand why the couple has decided to get married and if you may be the only person feeling otherwise. Talk with family members or other people involved in the wedding to find out if someone else feels similarly. If you want to stop a wedding it's best to find legal reasons why it shouldn't happen. Do not base halting a wedding purely on emotions like jealousy or hatred. Those can be worked through with communication and therapy. Meet with the bride and groom privately to talk. Go directly to the couple-to-be and calmly discuss why you believe their wedding should be stopped. If there are legal reasons they should not be married bring these up and show the facts. Imagine how you would feel if someone tried to stop you from having your wedding. Go into your discussion with the couple thinking carefully about the words you use and your reasoning. Make sure to stay calm and collected to get your point across in the best way. Voice your concerns and why you feel so strongly opposed to the wedding, but also listen to them and hear their side. Offer solutions if you bring up legal problems and it's more likely the couple will listen and cooperate. Address your concerns one-on-one. If you need to, ask to speak individually with the couple-to-be. This is beneficial if you don't think you can keep a cool head talking with them both at the same time. Discuss your concerns with them separately. This may be a good time to ask questions about how they are feeling about the wedding, and what their future looks like in their eyes; why they believe their significant other is the one for them etc. That kind of discussion could bring up uncertainty they may have about getting married and you can use it to enable them to think a little more, and possibly call off the wedding. Convince the couple to wait a year. If you can't convince one or both of the lovebirds to call off the wedding, you can try getting them to hold off for a year. The expense of a wedding is a great excuse to need to wait to save up more money. Planning a wedding is a lot of time and effort. For some, schooling, athletics, or current hobbies may take up much of their time and you can use this as another excuse to wait. Another excuse to hold off until another year would be family events coming up such as grandpa's 80th or the birth of a new baby. You could use these by saying how much nicer it may be to have a wedding when the celebration will be all about them. If none of these are true, and you feel the couple actually isn't a good match, you can also tell them the truth if you think they will listen; you believe they should wait a year to see what comes of their relationship, and if they're still together and happy its testament of their bond and they can decide to get married then. Suggest a “fake” wedding. Discuss holding a wedding celebration, but without the minister and paperwork. No one else has to know it's not legally binding and everyone can still enjoy themselves. This may satisfy a couple looking forward to the event and festivity but avoid any trouble later with divorce lawyers if it doesn't end well. Call out the lies. If you know the wedding is a fraud, or there are legal reasons the wedding should not go through as planned, you have at least 28 days to take legal action. Couples must let a registrar know of their decision to get married and the registrar is required to make that information public for at least 28 days. Laws vary by jurisdiction, and each case is situation. Call or visit your local courthouse to discuss the steps you need to take once you have legal reasons the couple cannot get married. Involve others. If you have a good reason to believe the wedding should be stopped it will help if you get others to feel the same way. If you feel it may be your only way to stop the wedding, share your research you've done with the family and friends of the couple to obtain a greater opposition. Use this pressure to divide the couple. This should be done as a last resort as it could be very traumatic, or it could actually bring the couple closer together in their possible attempt to escape and elope. Crashing a wedding is not advised. It is a dramatic and reputation-damaging route which may not even work since some couples are legally married by signing the marriage license before the wedding ceremony. The recommended plan would be to talk way ahead of time with the couple to avoid expenses and chaos and to have a rational discussion where you all share your sides. Follow the money. If the couple are relying on both or one set of their parents to support the wedding, you may want to try to stop the money source so the wedding will be called off. If you have legal reasons, again, share this with the parents and let them know they may be financially supporting a harmful situation. If there aren't legal reasons you can still voice other concerns and attempt to stop the money flow. Void the marriage after the wedding. You can use an annulment to legally cancel-out the marriage as if it never happened. After the wedding one of the two newly weds can call for an annulment for several different reasons. The marriage was with a minor and required approval from the court and/or parental consent. The marriage was not consummated and neither spouse were able to have sexual relations. Either spouse were mentally ill or mentally incapacitated; involved with drugs or drunk. If the marriage was illegal based on incest If the marriage was fraudulent; one spouse marrying the other based on lies. If a spouse was forced or blackmailed into the marriage. If either of the two were still married to someone else at the time of the wedding. If you know the wedding is going to happen on any of those pretenses then you may still be able to null out the marriage after the wedding. Talk with the person whom you believe should initiate the annulment and show them how they can escape the marriage. Wait for the marriage to fail down the road. If the couple are fairly young and it's their first marriage there's a 40% chance the marriage will end in divorce. Waiting is not a fantastic solution since there may not actually be an end in sight. This should be your very last resort. This could be a good plan if you believe the relationship is already particularly unstable. Move on. If you feel you've done all you can rationally do to stop the wedding without success, it's time to accept the inevitable. It may take time, but since you have no control over the couples' decisions, the best way to get over your opposition is to move forward with your life.
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Consider your motivations. Meet with the bride and groom privately to talk. Address your concerns one-on-one. Convince the couple to wait a year. Suggest a “fake” wedding. Call out the lies. Involve others. Follow the money. Void the marriage after the wedding. Wait for the marriage to fail down the road. Move on.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Leave-School-Early
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How to Leave School Early
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While it isn't a good idea to skip school, it can be helpful to know how to leave school early in case you need to. One of the best ways to do so is to fake an illness. You could pretend to have a headache or migraine by rubbing your temples and complaining to your teacher and classmates that your neck is feeling stiff. You can then tell your teacher that your head hurts and you need to go home. Another illness you can easily fake is an upset stomach. Ask your teacher to go to the restroom and then come back to class after a few minutes complaining that you feel very ill and may throw up. If your teacher sends you to the nurse for your headache or upset stomach, describe the symptoms to the nurse and ask them for permission to go home.
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Tell a few friends that your neck is feeling very stiff. This is a common sign that a headache is coming on. Particularly if you don't want your friends to know that you're faking sick in order to leave early, you'll want to start early to make it believable. Rub your temples. Let your teachers and friends see that your head is starting to bother you. You might want to include an accompanying squint. Sensitivity to light is a very common symptom of an oncoming migraine or headache. Tone it down. Even if you feel excited about something, keep your voice and actions subdued. You don't want to make it clear that you're faking a headache by acting like you feel fine. Tell your teacher your head hurts, and ask to go to the nurse. Be sure to look pathetic while you tell them this. If you don't look pitiful enough, they may be inclined to tell you to stay. Continue rubbing your temples, and speak quietly and respectfully. You could say “I have this weird pain on only one side of my head, and I feel dizzy when I see bright light” or “My head hurts all over, and I have this weird ringing in my ears.” Explain your symptoms to the nurse. Tell her that you have a headache that has been getting worse throughout the day. You can tell her that it involves sensitivity to light and sound. You can tell her that you feel nauseous as well, as this is often a side effect of a migraine. Tell your friends you aren’t feeling well. Suggest the possible cause of your illness casually. You could say, “I think I've got this stomach bug that's going around” or “I don't think my breakfast agreed with me today.” Ask your teacher to go to the restroom. Make it clear that it's urgent, but be very respectful. It's a good idea to go in the middle of class instead of during a bell change. That way there will be fewer people in the bathroom, and there won't be any need to fake throwing up for. Come back to class, and tell your teacher that you still don’t feel well. Tell them you think it would be a good idea to go to the nurse. Make it clear that it's in their best interest to send you to the nurse, because you might throw up in class if you don't go. There's no need to be especially graphic. Don't say, “I'm going to hurl all over my books if I don't leave now.” Say, “I was sick in the bathroom just now, and I'm afraid that I'll be sick again soon.” Tell the nurse your stomach hurts. Be sure to tell her that you've already been sick in the bathroom once. Try to look as pathetic as possible. You may want to to suggest to her that you have a stomach virus or mention some food that didn't agree with you. Be sure to stick to a consistent story. If you told your friends you think you have a virus, don't change to food poison when you see the nurse. Throw in a few other symptoms as well. If you have a stomach virus, odds are you also have some other aches and pains. Be careful not to describe any symptoms that the nurse could easily disprove. You might say you have pain in your muscles and joints. You could claim that you've been very tired and lethargic all day. You might also say you have a headache. Write a note. If you are under 18, this method will require that you fake a note from your parents or guardians saying you have to go to the doctor. If you're not comfortable forging a note and a signature, consider a different method. Be sure that the note includes the date begins with the phrase “Please excuse ___(your name)___...” says exactly when you need to leave explains specifically where you are going (to the orthodontist, the optometrist, etc.) says you're not coming back that day has your parent or guardian's signature at the bottom is free of spelling and grammatical errors (so that it's clear an adult wrote it) is a tiny bit crumpled as if it's been in your backpack Note that this method doesn't really work unless you can drive yourself home. If you have to have someone come pick you up, the jig will be up! Depending on your school, the consequences for turning in a forged note may be pretty severe. Some schools will give you detention, suspend you, or in extreme cases, even expel you. Think hard about whether it's worth the risk! Depending on why you need to leave school early, it's possible that your parents or guardians might write the note for you, so consider asking them before you go to the trouble of faking the note. Turn in the note as early as possible. It will seem more believable if you hand in the note right away. Follow your school's policies for doing so. You may need to give the note to your homeroom teacher or turn it in in the principal's office. Keep your story straight. If your note said that you were leaving early to go to the orthodontist, be careful not to slip up and say you have an eye appointment this afternoon! Stick with minimal details, and you are less likely to get caught. Leave. When it reaches the time your note said you had to leave, raise your hand and remind your teacher that you have to go. Pack your bags and leave without causing a ruckus. The more you can fly under the radar, the better! Act as casual as possible. People will suspect that you're lying if you make a big fuss out of leaving. Decide who you’re going to ask for help. A parent or guardian is a good option if they're not too strict about missing school or if they are already sympathetic to your problem. Otherwise, you may need to enlist the help of an older sibling or friend. Think through the reason you need to leave early. Be sure that you have a very convincing case that anyone would feel sympathetic towards. Think carefully about who you have chosen to help you, and be sure that you can convince them that your problem is severe enough that you need to leave school. Ask the person for help. Explain why you need to leave early. Once they agree that it's a good idea for you to skip school, tell them how you need them to help. If it's a parent or guardian, all they'll need to do is write a note and be prepared to answer the phone if anyone calls. If it's an older sibling or friend, they may have to be prepared to lie for you. Anyone helping you with the plan can also make your story more believable by arriving at school to pick you up at the scheduled time. If possible, tell them what they have to gain by helping you. If it's your older sister, and you're skipping school to help her pick out a wedding dress, remind her how excited she'll be to have you there. If it's your dad, and you're skipping school because of a bad breakup, remind him that he never liked your girlfriend anyway, and tell him how much happier and healthier you'll feel after a “personal day.” State your case assertively. If you're wishy-washy or don't make a clear case for why you don't feel well, your teacher, the nurse, or a school administrator might not believe you. Particularly if you're faking sick, the key is to tell them exactly what you need -- to go home as soon as possible. Don't confuse assertiveness with aggression. Be clear about what you need, but don't be hostile or angry. When talking to your teacher, you might want to say something like, “I'm feeling really bad and think I may need to leave. Can I please go to the nurse to talk to her about that?” When you see the nurse, remember to make your case with specific symptoms. For example, “I'm feeling nauseous and have vomited once already. I've also had a headache and chills all day. Could I please go home?” Stop them in their tracks. If there's an obvious reason why you might want to skip school that day, and your teacher, the nurse, or an administrator knows that, you'll want to get ahead of the game by mentioning that yourself. If you're talking to your teacher, try saying something like, “I feel awful about missing my group presentation this afternoon. As soon as I'm feeling better and back in school, could we please talk about the best way to make that up?” If you're trying to convince the nurse to let you go home, try saying, “I know what my teacher's make up test policy is, so I'm planning to come in and take it during study hall on Friday, assuming I'm feeling better by then.” Be prepared to expand the lie. Particularly if you've turned in a fake note, there's a chance that an administrator will want to call home to verify that you really do need to leave early. If your parent or guardian really did write the note, just be sure they're prepared to keep the lie going for you when they answer the phone. If you faked the note yourself, some possible solutions include Give a number you know no one will answer. If your parents are at work, you could give them your home number. Be prepared to delete the message before they can hear it. Have an accomplice ready to answer the phone at whatever number you give them. An older sibling or friend who isn't in school are good options. Accept the consequences gracefully. If you get caught, the best thing you can do is stop lying immediately and accept the blame. Adults are more likely to be lenient on you if you fess up right away, and admit that you were wrong. Explain politely why you did what you did, and say that you know it was wrong.
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Tell a few friends that your neck is feeling very stiff. Rub your temples. Tone it down. Tell your teacher your head hurts, and ask to go to the nurse. Explain your symptoms to the nurse. Tell your friends you aren’t feeling well. Ask your teacher to go to the restroom. Come back to class, and tell your teacher that you still don’t feel well. Tell the nurse your stomach hurts. Throw in a few other symptoms as well. Write a note. Turn in the note as early as possible. Keep your story straight. Leave. Decide who you’re going to ask for help. Think through the reason you need to leave early. Ask the person for help. State your case assertively. Stop them in their tracks. Be prepared to expand the lie. Accept the consequences gracefully.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Apply-Advantix-for-Dogs
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How to Apply Advantix for Dogs
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To apply Advantix to your dog, take the cap off the tube and use the tip of the cap to pierce the seal. Once the seal is broken, part your dog's fur at the base of its neck. Depending on the dosing instructions for your dog's size, apply 1/4 to 1/3 of the medication at that spot, then space the rest of the medicine in 2 or 3 more equal doses along the dog's back. Don't pet the dog for several hours after you apply the medicine to avoid wiping it off.
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Select the appropriate Advantix dosage for your dog. Advantix is not a 'one size fits all' treatment, so you will need to make sure that you choose the correct dosage. Advantix comes in four dosage levels according to a dog's weight. If you do not know your dog's weight, contact your veterinarian or refer to the paperwork from your dog's most recent veterinary visit. Advantix comes in packs of four or six. Small dogs (4 to 10 pounds) – 0.4 milliliters (mL) Medium dogs (11 to 20 pounds) – 1.0 mL Large dogs (21 to 55 pounds) – 2.5 mL Extra-large dogs (over 55 pounds) – 5.0 mL Remove the tube of Advantix from its packaging. You can either separate and peel the foil down with your fingers or use scissors to open the foil packaging. Using scissors may be easier and quicker. Remove the cap from the tube. There is a specific way to remove the cap so that you can dispense the Advantix from the tube; it is not as simple as just twisting off the cap and squeezing out the product. First, make sure that you are holding the tube in the upright position. Next, remove the cap, turn it upside down, and put it back on the tube. Placing the upside-down cap back on the tube will break the seal on the top of the tube, allowing you to squeeze out the Advantix. When you see that the seal has broken, remove the cap from the tube and lace it to the side. Have your dog stand up. You will apply Advantix to various locations along your dog's back. Having your dog in the standing position will help you apply Advantix more easily and accurately on his skin. If your dog tends to be a bit squirmy, you can have someone gently restrain your dog while you apply the Advantix. Part your dog’s fur. Use your fingers to part the fur until you can see the skin. Advantix needs to be applied to the skin for maximum effectiveness. The first location where you will apply the Advantix is at the start of your dog's back, right near the base of his neck. Small and medium dogs will need three Advantix applications along their backs. Large and extra-large dogs will need four Advantix applications along their backs. If your dog is extremely furry, it may be helpful to clip away a little bit of hair to make it easier to apply the Advantix. Apply the Advantix. Gently place the tip of the tube on your dog's skin. Squeeze about 1/3 or 1/4 of the Advantix onto the skin, depending on how many applications your dog will need. You want to be careful not to apply too much Advantix to the skin; this could cause the product to get on your dog's hair and drip down his side. Not only will this waste the product, but it increases the likelihood that your dog may ingest the Advantix. Advantix should not be applied if the skin is wet or broken. Dry your dog's skin if it is wet. If the skin is broken, do not apply the Advantix and contact your veterinarian. It is not necessary to massage the product into the skin after applying it. Another reason not to massage the product into your dog's skin is that Advantix can be harmful to human skin. The remaining applications should be spaced at least a few inches apart down your dog's back. For large and extra-large dogs, the last dose should be near the top of the tail. For small and medium dogs, the last dose should be near the middle of the back. Avoid petting the dog for several hours after application, as you may wipe the product off the skin. It might be best to apply Advantix shortly before the dog goes to bed to minimize the chances of accidentally wiping it off. Throw away the tube. If you used the entire tube, you can dispense of it by putting it in the regular trash. If you did not use the entire tube, you should still throw it away. However, do not throw the partially-filled tube in the trash or pour it down the drain. Contact your local waste department to learn how to dispose of the partially-filled tube. The remaining tubes that were not used should be stored at room temperature in a cool, dry place. Wash your hands. Advantix can be harmful to human skin. Even if you are sure that Advantix did not get on your skin, washing your hands thoroughly is still a good idea after applying a product on your dog's skin. If you notice that Advantix has gotten on your skin by accident, immediately rinse your skin with water for 15 to 20 minutes. Call a poison hotline or your doctor for further treatment recommendations. Do not bathe your dog for two days. The Advantix will need time to be absorbed into your dog's skin. Bathing your dog would remove the product from your dog's skin. Even though Advantix is waterproof, it will take at least two days before it has absorbed enough in the skin so that it will not come off with bathing or swimming. Do not let your dog eat the Advantix. Given that you applied Advantix to your dog's back, his mouth should not be able to get to the areas where you applied the product. However, if some of the product happened to drip down his sides and land on the floor, he may be able to ingest the product that way. Advantix can be harmful to dogs if ingested, so contact your veterinarian or local pet poison hotline immediately for guidance on treatment. If you have other pets, keep your dog separated them so that they do not have a chance to ingest the Advantix or get it on their skin. Monitor your dog for side effects. It is rare that Advantix causes side effects in dogs. Potential side effects include lethargy, vomiting and drooling. You may notice that the skin is red where you applied the Advantix, which indicates irritation. Your dog may scratch at the application site if the skin is irritated, or he might just look uncomfortable in general. If your dog has any of these side effects, take your dog to your veterinarian.
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Select the appropriate Advantix dosage for your dog. Remove the tube of Advantix from its packaging. Remove the cap from the tube. Have your dog stand up. Part your dog’s fur. Apply the Advantix. Throw away the tube. Wash your hands. Do not bathe your dog for two days. Do not let your dog eat the Advantix. Monitor your dog for side effects.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Clean-Brass%E2%80%90Plated-Items
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How to Clean Brass‐Plated Items
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You'll want to be careful when cleaning brass-plated items so you don't damage the surface. All you need to do is wipe your item with soapy water and a soft cloth. Just be gentle so you don't rub off the brass or lacquer coating. For tougher stains, add a little ammonia to your cloth and wipe it gently. However, avoid ammonia if your brass-plated items have a lacquer coating. Remember to rinse and dry it once you're done.
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Check to see if the brass is solid. You'll want to clean brass-plated and solid brass items differently, so it's important to check first. The easiest way to check is to try to stick a magnet to it. Magnets won't stick to solid brass, but they will stick to brass-plated steel and other metals. If the brass is solid, you can follow some of the same general steps. However, solid brass can take slightly harsher chemicals, such as a strong brass cleaner, rather than just a mild one. Look for lacquer. Brass-plated objects often have a thin coating of lacquer to help protect the brass. If the brass-plated item is lacquer-coated, you should stick to soap and water when cleaning it. Anything else will remove the lacquer. Unlacquered (not comparable) items will tarnish over time, while lacquered items won't. However, lacquered items may show tiny black spots, as the lacquer cracks. You can also test an inconspicuous place with a bit of brass cleaner. If it leaves a black spot on your rag, that means it's not lacquered. If it doesn't, it's likely lacquered, and you shouldn't clean it with anything harsh. Wipe the object gently with soap and water. Using a soft rag, wipe the brass-plated item down gently with dishwashing soap and water. A microfiber cloth is ideal. You don't want to scrub too hard, as you can rub off the brass or lacquer. Try ammonia. Ammonia is gentle enough that it won't remove the brass-plating, but strong enough that it will remove much of the grime. Use a soft cloth to apply the ammonia to the brass. Rinse it off thoroughly. Use a mild brass cleaner meant for brass-plate. Another option for heavier tarnish (once you've cleaned the item with soap and water, plus dried it) is a brass cleaner that is designed to be used on brass-plated items. Rub it in with a soft cloth, and wash it off with warm water. Test the cleaner first in a hidden area. Always dry the item thoroughly. Once you've cleaned the item and rinsed off any excess cleaner, always take the time to dry it thoroughly. You don't want to leave it wet, so use a soft cloth to dry it off. Take off lacquer by boiling. If your brass-plate is lacquer-coated, you may have reason to want to remove it. Cracking in the lacquer can lead to tarnishing on the surface beneath the coating. The best way to remove lacquer is through boiling. Place the item in a pot filled with the water. The pot should not be aluminum. Add a couple of spoonfuls of both washing soda and baking soda. Boil the item. You can either boil the item until the lacquer comes off, or you can heat it up enough that the brass expands, then let it cool. Once it cools, the lacquer should be easy to peel off, since it won't shrink back like the brass does while cooling. Remove lacquer with a lacquer thinner. Lacquer thinner will also remove the coating if you'd like to take it off your brass-plated item. Rub the thinner in. Keep rubbing until you see the lacquer coming off the brass. Use oil to prevent tarnishing. If your brass-plated piece tarnishes easily, you can use oils to help prevent that. On a clean, dry item, rub in a little linseed oil or mineral oil. Use a soft cloth to prevent scratching, and only apply a thin coating.
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Check to see if the brass is solid. Look for lacquer. Wipe the object gently with soap and water. Try ammonia. Use a mild brass cleaner meant for brass-plate. Always dry the item thoroughly. Take off lacquer by boiling. Remove lacquer with a lacquer thinner. Use oil to prevent tarnishing.
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https://www.wikihow.mom/Know-the-Signs-of-Miscarriage
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How to Know the Signs of Miscarriage
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Signs of miscarriage can include tissue, fluid, or clumps of blood coming out of your vagina, spotting, strong cramping, fever, chills, and back pain. If you have any of these symptoms, go to the emergency room right away for treatment. Once you're at the doctor, they will likely do an ultrasound to see if the fetus is developing properly. They may also run a blood test to measure your hormone levels. Once the tests come back, the doctor can tell you whether or not you are miscarrying, and what kind of miscarriage you're experiencing. If you're diagnosed with a threatened miscarriage, you'll need to rest and abstain from sex and exercise for as long as your doctor recommends.
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Call your physician or go to the emergency room if tissue, fluid, or what appears to be clumps of blood come out of your vagina. This could mean that you are miscarrying. Depending on how far along you are, and how heavy you are bleeding, your doctor may recommend you go to the emergency room, or that you wait to be seen during office hours. If you do pass tissue that you think might be fetal tissue, put it in a clean, sealed container and take it with you to the doctor. Taking the tissue with you may seem strange, but the doctor will be able to test it to confirm whether it was fetal tissue. Recognize that you may be at risk of miscarrying if you have spotting or vaginal bleeding. Many women have bleeding, but do not miscarry. However, it is safest to call your doctor immediately to see if you need to visit the ER. You may also experience cramping. Sometimes it may feel like a strong tugging-like sensation inside, as if something is being pulled. If you have strong cramping, it is another sign that you should see a doctor quickly. Take note if you experience lower back pain. Back pain, abdominal discomfort, or cramping may be signs that you are miscarrying, even if you have no bleeding. Contact your doctor before taking any pain medication. Recognize the symptoms of a septic miscarriage. This occurs when a woman has an infection in her uterus and miscarries. It is dangerous for the woman's health and requires immediate medical care. Symptoms include: Fluid coming from your vagina that smells bad. Vaginal bleeding. Fever and chills. Cramping and pain in your abdomen. Get a medical check-up. There are several tests and exams that your doctor will probably do to determine whether you have lost the pregnancy. The doctor will likely do an ultrasound to see if the fetus is visible in your womb. If so, the ultrasound will also let the doctor see if it is developing properly. If the fetus is old enough, it may be possible to check the heartbeat. Your doctor may do a pelvic exam to see if your cervix is opening. Blood tests will allow the doctor to measure your hormones. If you have passed tissue and brought it with you, your doctor can test it to confirm whether it is fetal tissue. Understand the diagnoses you may be given. There several possibilities: A threatened miscarriage is when you are showing signs that you may be about to miscarry. Not all threatened miscarriages actually miscarry. If you have cramps, or you are bleeding, but your cervix is not opening, then you may be diagnosed with a threatened miscarriage. If there is nothing the doctor can do to prevent a miscarriage, you will be diagnosed with an inevitable miscarriage. This diagnosis is likely if your cervix has opened, and your uterus is contracting to expel the fetus. A complete miscarriage occurs when all of the fetal and pregnancy tissues are expelled. An incomplete miscarriage is when you miscarry but some of the fetus or placenta is not passed out through your vagina. Missed miscarriage occurs when you do not pass the fetus or placenta even though the fetus has died. Follow your doctor’s advice if you have been diagnosed with a threatened miscarriage. Not all threatened miscarriages actually miscarry. However, depending on your situation, it may not be possible to prevent a miscarriage. Your doctor may recommend: Resting until the symptoms stop. Not exercising. Abstaining from sex. Not traveling to areas where you will not be able to get quick, high quality medical care if you need it. Know what to expect if you have miscarried, but not passed all of the tissues. What your doctor recommends may depend on your preferences. You can wait to see if your body passes the remaining tissue on its own. This could take up to a month. You can take medication to induce your body to expel the tissue. This usually works quickly, sometimes within a day. The medication can be taken by mouth or by putting it directly into your vagina. If you are showing signs of infection, the doctor will dilate you and remove the tissue. Give yourself time to recover physically if you have miscarried. Chances are the recovery will be quick and you will be physically healthy within a few days afterwards. Know that your period may resume the following month. This means that you are physically capable of getting pregnant again immediately. If you do not wish to do so, use contraception. Allow your vaginal tissues 2 weeks to recover. During this time, don't have sex or use tampons. Take the time to heal psychologically. Studies show that women who miscarry can grieve the same as those who lose a baby to stillbirth close to their due date. It is extremely important you give yourself time to grieve and surround yourself with supportive people to talk to. Get support from friends and family members that you trust. Seek out a support group. Most women who miscarry go on to have healthy pregnancies afterwards. A miscarriage probably does not mean that you won't be able to have a baby. Understand the common causes of miscarriage. Many miscarriages occur because the baby wasn't developing properly. This can occur for several reasons either arising from the genetic makeup of the fetus or from the mother's health. Genetic disorders in the fetus. These can be either inherited problems or problems occurring in that particular egg and sperm. Diabetes in the mother. An infection. Maternal hormonal imbalance. Thyroid problems. Disorders of the uterus or cervix. Lower your risk for future miscarriages as much as possible. While not all miscarriages can be prevented, there are some things that may make you more at risk. Smoking. Drinking alcohol. Alcohol may cause irreversible harm to your baby even if you do not miscarry. Taking drugs. Avoid all street drugs if you are pregnant or attempting to become pregnant. Do not take any medications, even over-the-counter medications or herbal remedies, without first consulting your doctor. Diabetes. Being overweight or underweight. Problems with your reproductive organs, particularly the uterus or cervix. Environmental toxins. Infections. Immune disorders. Hormonal imbalances. Invasive prenatal tests such as amniocentesis or chorionic villus sampling The risk of miscarriage increases for women over the age of 35. Know what does not cause miscarriage. The following activities should not cause miscarriages under normal conditions. If your doctor advises you differently, follow your doctor's advice. Moderate exercise. Having safe sex. Avoid infections. Working in jobs that do not raise your risk of being exposed to environmental toxins, infectious agents, chemicals, or radiation.
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Call your physician or go to the emergency room if tissue, fluid, or what appears to be clumps of blood come out of your vagina. Recognize that you may be at risk of miscarrying if you have spotting or vaginal bleeding. Take note if you experience lower back pain. Recognize the symptoms of a septic miscarriage. Get a medical check-up. Understand the diagnoses you may be given. Follow your doctor’s advice if you have been diagnosed with a threatened miscarriage. Know what to expect if you have miscarried, but not passed all of the tissues. Give yourself time to recover physically if you have miscarried. Take the time to heal psychologically. Understand the common causes of miscarriage. Lower your risk for future miscarriages as much as possible. Know what does not cause miscarriage.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Stop-on-a-Longboard
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How to Stop on a Longboard
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To stop on a longboard using a power slide, start by steering your board out to the side of the road in the direction your toes are pointing. Then, shift your body weight onto your heels and swivel your hips in the direction you're sliding in. As your front foot pivots, kick out your back foot in the direction of the slide so that your board swings out sideways. Finally, lean forward as you slow down so you don't fall backwards, then use your foot to stop yourself completely.
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Know when to foot brake. The foot brake should only be used at slow speeds. If you're flying down a steep hill and about to carve into a turn, the last thing you want to do is hang your foot off your board. Reserve the technique for casual riding at the level ground and slower speeds. Make sure you're sporting proper footwear when using the foot brake. While using the foot brake is technically possible in thin-soled shoes and flip-flops, it's not recommended. Using the foot brake involves sliding your shoe along the ground to come to a stop. Don't use it as an opportunity to ruin shoes and gain friction burns! Shift your weight to your front foot. To begin utilizing the foot brake, shift the majority of your weight (60 to 70 percent) to your front foot. It doesn't matter whether you have your left or right foot forward. Use whichever foot you normally have out front. While it is possible to foot brake by leaning onto your back foot, it's not recommended. Since longboarding involves going down hills, leaning back can unevenly distribute the weight in regards to the angle you're traveling at. This means your back foot is much more likely to be unstable than your front. Lift up your back foot and drag it along the ground next to the board. Begin dragging your back foot along the ground. Do not lean onto your back foot, as that would be stepping off the board (potentially at high speeds). Use a minimal amount of weight to merely drag the foot across the top of the ground. Make sure the shoes you're wearing have large enough soles to drag along the ground. You want to avoid any and all sort of foot injuries or wardrobe malfunctions. This technique could easily result in burned or scraped skin or ruined footwear. Apply pressure on the ground until you come to a stop. As you drag your foot, slowly apply pressure toward the ground and begin shifting your weight slowly from the front to the back. Remember, the more pressure you apply, the faster you'll come to a stop. Use your own judgment, taking into account factors like speed, distance and the angle at which you're traveling. Be mindful of the type of ground you're skating on. Friction changes depending on the type of ground you're traveling on, be it asphalt or concrete. For example, asphalt has a higher skid resistance than concrete, but concrete roads are more durable. Set up the slide. You're going to begin a powerslide by turning or “carving” out to one side of the road. The turn is an integral part of the powerslide, as it involves drastically turning the board until it's perpendicular to the road, causing you to skid or “slide” to a stop. The side you carve out to depends completely on how you situate yourself on your longboard. Carve out to the side your toes are pointing ("toeside") to complete one of the most basic standing powerslides. Be mindful of traffic coming from both behind and ahead of you. You will not want to attempt to slide and stop with cars coming in either direction, as the powerslide is a tricky maneuver to perform until fully mastered. Shift your weight to your heels and the front of the board. After carving out and setting up your powerslide, shift your weight to your heels. This will mean you're leaning more backward than forward, allowing your bodyweight to dictate the board's slide. In addition, put the majority of your weight (60 to 70 percent) on your front foot. This will help when fully turning and fully sliding. The more weight on your back foot, the harder it will be to slide. While it's a perfectly normal tendency to have some weight on the back of your board for stability, it'll actually prevent you from completing a slide in the proper fashion. Turn your hips and shoulders in the direction you’re sliding. After you've shifted your weight appropriately, swivel your hips and shoulders in the direction of the slide. If you've leaned back on your heels and toward the front of your board, use your front foot as a pivot. This will begin your perpendicular slide. Exercise caution in regards to anything that may be on the ground before performing this step. The tiniest piece of gravel, stone, wood, or glass can easily sabotage your slide and make for some gnarly road rash. Determine the speed in which you want to turn based on your speed. If you turn too fast, you're just gong to turn 180 degrees without detracting any sort of speed. Ease into the turn slowly to attain a fuller stop. Kick out with your back foot. As you pivot with your front foot, kick out in the direction of your slide with your back foot. This will turn you 180 degrees and complete the slide. If performed correctly, you will have slid your board “sideways” along the road or path. Be prepared to skid and slide a short distance. It's important to remember to continue leaning back throughout the slide. If you lean forward, you run the risk of bringing your board to a complete stop. At higher speeds, this can be very problematic and runs you the risk of injury. Continue rotating throughout the entire slide. If you slide completely sideways (perpendicular to the road) for too long, you'll warp the shape of your wheels to the point of having flat spots. Continuing your rotation will help your wheels evenly wear when power sliding. Lean forward as you complete your slide. After you've turned 180 degrees and continue moving, lean forward and even out your weight. This will prevent you from falling backward after the slide and allow for a smooth transition and a significantly shorter speed. If performed correctly, the powerslide will slow you down to the point you can utilize a foot brake. Perform a toeside pendulum slide. A "pendulum" slide involves sliding a gloved hand along the ground as you perform a powerslide. This involves becoming lower to the ground. Carve out to the side, crouch down, and put all your weight on the front foot. Put a gloved hand on the side you're sliding away from and perform a powerslide. Use your back foot to kick out and slide and reduce speed. Bring your foot back to continue rolling on your board while also retracting your gloved hand. Do not put your gloved hand either too far away from your body or too close to your body, as you'll run the risk of not being able to perform the pendulum or completely falling off your board by being bucked forward. Performing this maneuver will require a lot of practice and messing up, so don't worry if you don't immediately catch on. Keep at it until you perform the maneuver with ease, adding your own style and flare in the process. Try not to become overly reliant on your hand. Your hand his there to help maintain balance and ensure you can maneuver your legs properly to get the best slide you can. Perform a heelside pendulum slide. Begin by setting your feet up square on the board. Carve out to one side of the road. With a gloved hand, crouch down and begin running your hand along the ground. Kick your feet out in a powerslide maneuver while leaning back on your heels. Weight should be evenly distributed from the front to back. Slide 180 degrees and continue on your way. If performed correctly, you'll lose a lot of speed but continue forward. Your free hand can grab your board to help maintain balance. Do not, however, grab the board in between your legs. Grab the board near your back foot instead to avoid interference with the maneuver. Perform a 360 slide. You can slow your speed drastically by performing two slides at once. This involves performing two successive powerslides. To begin, carve out to one side of the road. Lean back while also placing your weight on your front foot as a pivot before turning your hips and shoulders. Kick out your back foot to perform a power slide before transferring your weight back by leaning forward. Perform the same maneuver again by switching your weight back to the front and rotating your hips the same way as before. It's not necessary to use your hands in this maneuver along the ground, as you'll be typically using them for balance in the air.
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Know when to foot brake. Shift your weight to your front foot. Lift up your back foot and drag it along the ground next to the board. Apply pressure on the ground until you come to a stop. Set up the slide. Shift your weight to your heels and the front of the board. Turn your hips and shoulders in the direction you’re sliding. Kick out with your back foot. Lean forward as you complete your slide. Perform a toeside pendulum slide. Perform a heelside pendulum slide. Perform a 360 slide.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Write-Your-Own-Last-Will-and-Testament
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How to Write Your Own Last Will and Testament
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If you need to write your own last will and testament, make sure to identify yourself using your name, Social Security number, and address so it isn't confused with someone else's. At the beginning of the document, declare that it's your will and last testament and that you're of sound mental health to express your final wishes. Before you give away your assets, authorize someone as your executor so they can distribute your assets and carry out your last wishes. While the executor is usually a lawyer, you can pick anyone you think will be able to do the job. Once you have an executor, divide your assets using percentages or specify particular assets you want to be given away. You can also describe any other requests you want to be fulfilled after your death.
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Decide how you will write your will. You have a few options here: Write your own will. Once you know your state's requirements, decide how you plan to fulfill them. You can write your own will and be responsible for making sure it fulfills your state's requirements. Be aware that state laws can change from year to year, so the process may be more complicated than you think. Hire an attorney. An attorney can review the will you write, provide you with witnesses and ensure that you have met your state's requirements. This can be a costly option depending on your attorney's fees and how complicated your will is. Wills that “unnaturally dispose” of the testator's assets should always be overseen by an attorney. Unnatural disposition includes cutting your family out of the will, giving all of your assets to someone that is not in your family if you have living family members and giving your assets to someone that you have not known for very long. Use an online will writing service. This type of service will automatically ensure that your will is written according to your state's requirements. Online will writing services generally cost between $60 and $100, depending on how complicated your will is. Identify yourself on the will. Include identifying factors in your will to ensure that your will isn't confused with that of someone else with the same name. Identify yourself by name, Social Security number, and address. If you don't have a Social Security number, provide a different form of ID, such as a driver's license or state issued ID number. You may also include your date of birth to further identify yourself. Make a declaration. Introduce the document as your last will and testament as the first sentence of your will. In the full declaration that follows, you need to state clearly that you are of sound mental health and of contractual capacity, and that this will expresses your last wishes. Without this important step, it could be argued that your will is not legally viable. Use this statement: “I declare that this is my last will and testament.” Include a provision nullifying all previous wills. This type of provision will ensure that any previous wills that you may have written are no longer valid. Use this statement: “I hereby revoke, annul and cancel all wills and codicils previously made by me, either jointly or severally.” Include information attesting to your soundness of mind. Because wills can be challenged if the testator of the will was not of sound mind (that is, the testator was suffering from dementia or another ailment that prevented him/her from understanding the effects of a will), the testator should include information in the will that proves the testator's soundness of mind. Include this statement: “I declare that I am of legal age to make this will, and that I am sound of mind.” In addition to including the above text in the will, you may want to videotape the execution of the will to put to rest any future allegations of incapacity. Attest that your wishes do not result from undue influence. The disposition of assets in your will must be according to your wishes, and can't be the result of any type of outside influence. If you think that your will could be subject to a challenge of undue influence, contact an attorney who can help you protect the will from the challenge. Include this statement: “This last will expresses my wishes without undue influence or duress.” Include family details. If you're leaving part of your estate to a spouse, children or other family members, they should be named as such in your will. Include the following lines, if appropriate: ”I am married to [spouse's first and last name], hereafter referred to as my spouse.” ”I have the following children: [list children's first and last names as well as their dates of birth].” State your appointment of an executor. This person will ensure that your will is followed. The Executor is known in some states as a “personal representative.” You may also want to name a secondary executor if the first is unable to perform the duties at the time of your death. The executor is the person who distributes assets and property according to your will. Because executors are so frequently asked to handle assets in a professional manner, you should ideally select an individual with a background in business or law. Increasingly, individuals are selecting professionals -- usually lawyers -- to deal with these matters rather than leaving them for a member of an already grieving family. For example: “I hereby nominate, constitute and appoint [executor's first and last name] as Executor. If this Executor is unable or unwilling to serve, then I appoint [backup executor's first and last name] as alternate Executor.” Determine if your executor should post bond. If the executor must post a bond, this will protect against fraudulent use of your estate. However, requiring the executor to post a bond can be expensive for the executor, depending on the size of your estate, and could prevent your chosen executor from serving. Empower the executor. Authorize the executor to act in your interest regarding your estate, debts, funeral expenses and other items. Write clauses empowering the executor to do the following: Sell any real estate in which you may own an interest at the time of your death and to pledge it, lease it mortgage it or otherwise deal with your real estate as you yourself would do. Pay all of your just debts, funeral expenses, taxes and estate administration expenses. This allows your heirs to take their shares without later deductions or complications. State if your executor should post bond or serve without bond. If your executor must post a bond, the beneficiaries to the will are protected and insured if the executor fails to carry out the distribution as the will stipulates. However, requiring the executor to post a bond can be expensive for the executor, depending on the size of your estate, and could prevent your chosen executor from serving. Determine the assets you can legally bequeath. You may not actually be able to distribute all of your assets as you see fit, based on certain state laws and prior legal arrangements. You should consider previous legal contracts you have entered, and whether you live in a common law or community property state. In common law states, anything with only your name on the deed, registration papers or other title documentation is yours to bequeath. In community property states, 50 percent of all accumulations during a marriage legally belong to a spouse, and a will can't supersede that. There are nine community property states: Arizona, California, Idaho, Louisiana, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, Washington and Wisconsin. Alaska also allows couple to opt into a community property system if the couple so chooses. Other legal documents, such as pre-nuptial or ante-nuptial agreements and living trusts, can also affect what you can legally bequeath in your will. Examine any previous legal documents and the laws in your state to determine if they affect how you can distribute your assets. State the division of your assets. State the way in which your assets will be divided among people using percentages, which should add up to 100 percent. For example, one line might read: To my mother, Barbara Smith, I bequeath five (5) percent. Wills that “unnaturally dispose” of the testator's assets should always be overseen by an attorney. Unnatural disposition includes cutting your family out of the will, giving all of your assets to someone that is not in your family if you have living family members and giving your assets to someone that you have not known for very long. Specify distribution of particular assets. If you want a beneficiary to receive a specific asset, you may state that as well. Then that particular asset will not be included in the percentages of your estate (the remainder) that is divided among other beneficiaries. For example, one line may read: “To Barbara Smith, I give my house at 123 Cherry Lane, and to Chauncey Gardner, I give 50 percent of the remainder.” Make sure that you are as specific as possible with your disposition. Include any addresses of real estate, descriptions of any personal property and full names of beneficiaries. Include provisions for beneficiaries dying before you. Include statements that clearly explain who gets a beneficiary's gift if that person dies before you. For example: “To my mother, Barbara Smith, I bequeath five (5) percent should she survive me; otherwise the share of Barbara Smith shall pass instead to Chauncey Gardner should he survive Barbara Smith and myself.” If you want a deceased beneficiary's gift to just go back into the pot and be divided among your living beneficiaries in shares proportionate to what you provided for them, you can use conditional language such as: “To my mother, Barbara Smith, I bequeath five (5) percent should she survive me.” If you do not name an alternate to specifically receive Barbara's gift, her gift will "lapse" and go back into the pot. Designate a guardian to minor children. Your will should designate who will serve as the guardian to any minor children, if applicable, in the event of your death. Allocate conditional gifts. You can also include conditional gifts in your will that are contingent upon something. For example: you can condition a gift on the beneficiary graduating from college, but you can't condition a gift on the beneficiary marrying a certain person that you want him/her to marry. If the conditions specified as a prerequisite to receiving the gift are against any other laws, the court will not enforce them. Make special requests. You may choose to stipulate how your remains should be handled, where you will be buried, and how your funeral will be paid for. For example: “I direct that on my death my remains shall … ” Sign the will. Conclude the document with your signature, name, date and location. Follow your state's requirements on signing. How you sign the will is a matter of state law and can affect its validity. Initial or sign each page of your will, per your state's requirements. Do not add any text after your signature. In many states, anything added below the signature will not be included as a part of the will. Sign your will in the presence of one or more witnesses. In many cases, the will must be signed in the presence of two witnesses, who then sign a statement asserting that you are of legal age and sound mind and that you signed your will in their presence. Each state has different requirements for what constitutes a legal last will and testament. The differences in requirements primarily pertain to relatively small issues in execution, such as how many witnesses are required and when those witnesses are required to swear to or sign the will or matters of notarization. Here are a few examples: In Illinois, a will must be signed by the testator and two witnesses. The witnesses should not be beneficiaries of the will. No notarization is required. In Kentucky, wills require only the signature of witnesses if the will itself has not been "wholly" handwritten by the testator. In these cases, the witnesses and testator must all be present together and bear witness to all signatures. , In Colorado, there is more than one way to make a valid will. You can have two witnesses sign, but they can do so at any time up to the execution of the will, as long as they attest to witnessing the testator sign the will or they claim to have received acknowledgement of the will from the testator before his/her death. Alternatively, the will can be signed and authorized in front of a notary, in which case no further witnesses are required. Or, as a third alternative, handwritten wills can be acknowledged by a court without need for witnesses or notarization. Find out whether your state adopted the Uniform Probate Code (UPC). The UPC is an act drafted by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws to standardize state laws governing wills and other matters related to estates. It has been adopted in full by 17 states and in part by many other states. To find out whether your state adopted the UPC, check with the American Bar Association. If your will does not meet the legal requirements, it will be found invalid and any property will pass under state laws governing the distribution of assets when someone does not have a will. Figure out how your state handles property allocation. States differ in terms of what to do if a person mentioned in your will dies before you. Check with the American Bar Association to find out specifics for your state. link. In some states, if you do not change your will to account for the death of a beneficiary, the property that was supposed to go to the beneficiary automatically passes to the beneficiary's heirs. In other states the beneficiary's heirs do not recover the property, which is combined with the rest of the estate and distributed among the living beneficiaries. For example, if you leave your house to your sister and she dies before you, the house could go to her children. Another scenario would be that, when you die, the value of the course could be split among the still living beneficiaries. Do not alter the will after it has been signed. The witnesses to your will testified to your capacity and acknowledged your decisions, but their signatures are invalid if the document is altered after the fact. Revisit your will if your assets change. If your assets change after you write the will, you should edit the will to include these changes, or execute a new will. Make modest changes with a codicil. If you need to make minor changes, use a "codicil." This is a separate document that explicitly refers to the original will and serves as a minor amendment rather than a replacement to the original will. Make substantial changes with a new will. Substantial changes should be made via a new will. It is not uncommon to replace a will if the first will is made at in early age. Your children will grow; you may divorce and remarry; or your financial situation could change drastically -- any of which would require such substantial changes that only a new will is appropriate. Store the will safely. Your will is not filed with the courts until after your death. If the will is destroyed, it can't be filed. Make sure that you store the will somewhere that can be found after your death. Consider storing your will in a safe at your home or in a safety deposit box at your bank. Many people give their wills to an attorney for safekeeping, or tell their named executor where the will is located. Give a copy to your executor. Consider handing over a copy of your will to your executor in case something happens to the original. Make a note to yourself. It's a good idea to make a note to yourself to say where your will is stored. In the event that you forget where your will is stored, you will be able to tell your executor, spouse or other party.
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Decide how you will write your will. Identify yourself on the will. Make a declaration. Include a provision nullifying all previous wills. Include information attesting to your soundness of mind. Attest that your wishes do not result from undue influence. Include family details. State your appointment of an executor. Empower the executor. Determine the assets you can legally bequeath. State the division of your assets. Specify distribution of particular assets. Include provisions for beneficiaries dying before you. Designate a guardian to minor children. Allocate conditional gifts. Make special requests. Sign the will. Sign your will in the presence of one or more witnesses. Find out whether your state adopted the Uniform Probate Code (UPC). Figure out how your state handles property allocation. Do not alter the will after it has been signed. Revisit your will if your assets change. Make modest changes with a codicil. Make substantial changes with a new will. Store the will safely. Give a copy to your executor. Make a note to yourself.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Style-Short-Hair-(Women)
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How to Style Short Hair (Women)
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To style short hair as a woman, try French braiding a section of hair along your front hairline and then pinning it to the side with a bobby pin. Or, you can curl your hair in small sections using a thin curling iron to give it some texture. Alternatively, you can spray your hair with dry shampoo to give it volume and then flip the ends out with a flat iron for a messy-chic hairstyle.
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Create a mini French braid headband across your forehead. Use the handle of a rat-tail comb to create a 1 in (2.5 cm) thick section of hair along your front hairline. French braid that section of hair, starting on one side and ending on the other. Secure the end of the braid with a bobby pin. The section of hair should span the width of your forehead. If your hair isn't long enough to finish with a regular braid, simply secure the braid with a bobby pin. Camouflage bobby pins by choosing ones the same color as your hair and tucking them in fully. Blow dry your hair straight, then slick it back to create a pompadour. Dampen your hair first, then apply a volumizing mousse to the roots. Blow dry your hair straight by combing it upwards and back. Smooth your hair back, then use pomade or styling wax to keep it in place. If the pomp is too tall for you, you can lightly press down on it. Spray your hair with a heat-protectant product, and then curl the front part of your hair backwards using a large-barreled curling iron. Make sure that your hair is dry, however. Use a round brush to blow dry sections of hair vertically for a little additional height to your style. Give your hair some texture by curling it. Apply a heat protectant to your hair first. If it is very thin, add some volumizing mousse as well. Curl your hair in small sections using a thin curling iron. Let your hair cool to the touch, then style it as desired with pomade. Use dry shampoo, a straightener, and wax for a messy-chic pixie. Add some dry shampoo to your roots to create texture and volume. Create more volume by backcombing your hair. Flip the ends of your hair out using a flat iron to create the look you want. Finish off with some styling wax on the ends of your hair and a misting of hairspray. Accessorize with bobby pins, scarves, and headbands. Pin your bangs back with colorful bobby pins or hairclips, or keep them off your forehead with a headband. For a retro look, wrap a fabric scarf around your head and tie it into a knot. If your bangs are long enough, consider straightening them first, then putting on a headband. Leave the bangs out of the headband for a chic look. Create a braided headband using rope braids. Create a deep side part, then gather 2 thin strands of hair from the thicker side of the part. Twist the bottom strand over the top strand. Add a thin strand of hair to the new bottom strand, then twist the strands together again. Keep going until you reach your ear, then secure the braid with a bobby pin. The thin strands should be between the thickness of a pencil and your finger. You can also do this style using a French or Dutch braid. Curl your hair into waves and pin back a few strands for a boho look. Create loose waves using a medium-sized curling iron. Gather some hair from each temple, and pull it towards the back of your head. Secure the sections of hair with bobby pins. You can create this style using a center part or a side part. If you are doing a side part, consider pinning back the hair from just the thinner side of the part. Coil your hair into a French twist for an elegant look. Create a deep side part, then pin the hair from the thinner side of the part back behind your head, close to the nape. Gather all of your hair behind your head; spread it vertically between both hands rather than holding it in a fist like a ponytail. Coil the ends of your hair inwards to form a French twist. Secure the French twist with bobby pins. If your hair is straight, fine, or smooth, add some texturizing spray to it first to make it easier to work with. You will need at least 1 bobby pin on the top and bottom of the French twist. Use more bobby pins wherever you feel a strand coming loose. Use a boar bristle hairbrush to smooth down any stray strands on the sides of your head. Pull your hair back into a messy ponytail. Messy buns and ponies are all the rage, and are easiest to create with bob-length hair. Simply pull your hair up into a high ponytail, then secure it with a hair tie. The shorter strands of your hair will naturally slip out of the hair tie and frame your face, creating a chic, messy look. If you prefer a bun, wrap the hair tie 2 to 3 times around your ponytail. Pull your ponytail only halfway through the hair tie on the last wrap. Wrap your hair around an elastic headband to create a chignon. Tuck your hair behind your ears, then slide an elastic headband over your head and hair like a crown. Take a wide section of hair from just behind your ear, and wrap it over-and-under the elastic, creating a roll. Continue in this fashion around the back of your head to your other ear. A thin, elastic headband will work the best, but you can use a thicker one too if you want it to show. The elastic headband should sit just above your nape and ears, and 1 to 2 inches (2.5 to 5.1 cm) behind your front hairline. French or Dutch Braid your hair. You can create 1 or 2 French or Dutch braids. If you wish to create 2 braids , you will have to part your hair down the center first. Secure the braids with mini hair elastics. Standard hair ties will be too bulky. You can end the braids at the nape of your neck, or continue with regular braids. Change up the style by creating an interesting part on either side of your head. Use your part as a guide, and braid at an angle, continuing the line as you braid down the hair. Create a knotted low ponytail. Pull your hair back into a low ponytail. Split it into 3 sections, like doing a braid, then secure the middle section with a hair tie. Cross the 2 side sections over the top of your ponytail, like tying a shoe. Hold the sections against the sides of your ponytail, and secure them with bobby pins. Use bobby pins that match your hair color. Be sure to tuck them inside your hair so that they are not visible. Keep things simple with a half-up, half-down ponytail. Part your hair at about eyebrow-level, then gather everything above your eyebrows into a ponytail. You can make the style fancier by doing a French braid or by twisting the ponytail into a bun. Twist 2 thin sections of hair into ropes and pin them back. Create a center or side part, then gather a 1 in (2.5 cm) section from each side of the part, right at your forehead. Twist each section into a thin rope. Pull the ropes towards the back of your head, then cross the left one over the right one to make an X. Secure the ropes by crossing 2 bobby pins over the middle of the X. Switch up your daily look by changing your hair texture or part. If your hair is straight, try curling it for a more voluminous look. If your hair is curly, straighten it for something sleeker. Use the handle of a rat-tail comb to change your part from how you normally wear it: center, left, or right. When creating a side part, begin the part above your left or right eyebrow, then angle it towards the back-center of your crown.
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Create a mini French braid headband across your forehead. Blow dry your hair straight, then slick it back to create a pompadour. Give your hair some texture by curling it. Use dry shampoo, a straightener, and wax for a messy-chic pixie. Accessorize with bobby pins, scarves, and headbands. Create a braided headband using rope braids. Curl your hair into waves and pin back a few strands for a boho look. Coil your hair into a French twist for an elegant look. Pull your hair back into a messy ponytail. Wrap your hair around an elastic headband to create a chignon. French or Dutch Braid your hair. Create a knotted low ponytail. Keep things simple with a half-up, half-down ponytail. Twist 2 thin sections of hair into ropes and pin them back. Switch up your daily look by changing your hair texture or part.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Do-Your-Own-Highlights
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How to Do Your Own Highlights
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To do your own highlights, start by buying a highlighter kit that's a few shades lighter than your natural hair color. Next, separate the sections of your hair that you want to highlight and use small clips to isolate them from the rest of your hair. Then, place a strip of foil under a section, brush dye onto the hair, and close up the foil. After applying the dye to all sections, let it sit for the amount of time the highlighting kit specifies. Finally, remove the foils and rinse your hair with cool water.
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Choose a highlighter kit with a cap if you have short hair. Shop at a beauty supply store for your highlighter kit; some kits come with a cap with holes, hook, and brush, which are nice if you have shorter hair and would like evenly spread highlights. If you only want a few highlights in very specific places, you won't need a kit with a cap. Regular highlighting or bleach kits will work fine. Buy a highlighting or bleach kit and applicator brush if you have longer hair. For medium to longer hair, choose a kit that comes with the bleach you need and a brush or other applicator that allows you to place your highlights exactly where you want them. If you choose a kit that doesn't contain an applicator or brush, or are using separate bleach powder and developer, just buy a dye brush at the same beauty supply store where you bought your kit. When buying your bleach powder and developer separately, make sure that you choose either a 10 or 20 volume developer, which are safest for use at home. For small, subtly blended highlights that don't look extremely obvious, ask an employee to help you find a spool brush, the kind typically used for applying mascara or eyebrow gel. Select a highlighting kit that will complement your hair color. If you want your highlights to look natural, choose a blonde highlighting kit that will give you highlights a few shades lighter than your natural color. Auburn highlights are also a great choice, especially if you have dark brown or black hair. For more dramatically colored highlights like pink, purple, or any other color, you'll need to get your highlights pretty light with bleach before applying the color. There are kits made specifically for those colors, or you can buy a light blonde highlight kit and then the colored dye separately. Don’t wash your hair 2-3 days before highlighting it. Using bleach and dye on clean hair can damage it, so the natural oils your scalp provide protection for the hair shaft. Your hair should also be dry when you begin highlighting it. You should avoid highlighting hair that has been chemically relaxed or permed. If your hair has been chemically treated in the past with dyes, you may want to consult a professional before doing your own highlights. Set up your highlighting station. Get out your supplies such as your cap and hook, foil, brush, bleach, and developer at your bathroom sink. Put away items nearby that might get damaged by the bleach. Put on an old T-shirt and have old towels handy to protect yourself from the bleach. It's a good idea to purchase a hairdresser's cape to protect your skin and clothes from the bleach. You can find one at your local beauty supply store or online. If you're highlighting long hair, you'll also need strips of aluminum foil to separate your highlighted strands from the rest of your hair. Mix your powder and developer. If your kit calls for you to mix bleach powder and developer together, mix it together according to the instructions while wearing rubber or latex gloves. Try not to get any of the mixtures onto your skin. If you do get highlighting solution onto your skin, wipe it off immediately with a damp cloth. Do a strand test. Choose a small strand of hair underneath your top layer of hair that will not be easily seen. Clip the rest of your hair away from the strand and brush bleach onto the strand, then rinse it off after 20 minutes. If your hair starts to break or become damaged, rinse the bleach off right away and do not apply this highlighting solution to any other parts of your hair. Pull strands of hair through the holes of your cap if you’re using one. If you're using a cap, brush your hair first and then put it on. Take a look at where the holes are; this is where your highlights will go. Use the hook that came with your kit to pull small sections of hair through the holes in the cap. You don't have to use every hole provided; just pull through as much hair as you want. Use the long end of a comb to separate sections of longer hair. If you're not using a cap, first style your hair how you normally wear it. Determine which sections of hair you want to highlight; most people choose to highlight areas in the front and strands on the top layer of their hair since that is where sunlight would naturally lighten hair the most. Separate these sections using the end of a rat-tail comb and use small clips to section off these strands. Make sure that you don't use tools or clips that are made of metal, as the metal could react with the bleach. If you want your highlights to appear in a ponytail, consider doing some underneath strands in addition to the top layer strands that you do. Brush bleach onto your designated sections. Use your applicator brush to apply bleach to the strands you have either pulled through the cap holes or clipped aside. Apply it from the middle of your strands to the ends first, since the ends of hair would naturally be lighter than the tops. Use your regular dye painting brush for thicker highlights. To create thinner highlights, use your small spool brush only. Alternatively, you can get thinner highlights by dividing your hair into smaller sections, which would allow you to still use your regular dye brush. Make sure each strand gets an even coating of bleach for the best results. Use strips of aluminum foil to keep longer strands of hair separate. For long hair, place a strip of foil under the part of your hair you are highlighting while you paint bleach onto the strand of hair. Fold up the aluminum foil to keep that strand separate from your non-highlighted hair while the bleach works on your hair. Place the aluminum foil around each section of hair with highlighter on it as you go. Check your color every 5 minutes, leaving it in for 20 minutes at most. Most kits will call for 20 minutes as the maximum time to leave the bleach on your hair. You can check your hair every 5 minutes and rinse it sooner if you feel that it is as light as you want it. Be sure to follow the instructions on your kit for the time limits of leaving solution in your hair. Leaving it in too long can cause your hair to become damaged and break. Rinse your hair with cool water. Remove the aluminum foil strips, if you used them. Then, rinse your head under cool running water until all the bleach is rinsed out. If you used the cap with holes, you can rinse the strands with cool running water first and then remove the cap. Apply colored dye over the dry highlighted strands, if desired. If you want green, purple, pink, or another color highlights instead of blonde, dry your hair completely first. Then, section out the highlighted strands and paint the colored dye over each. Wrap the colored strands in aluminum foil to prevent the color from transferring to the rest of your hair. Leave the dye on for as long as the package suggests, or until you are pleased with the color. Then, rinse out the dye one strand at a time with cool water. Shampoo and condition your hair using products for color-treated hair. Shampoo and conditioner made for color-treated hair helps prevent your hair from drying out. If your highlighting kit came with a conditioner or rinsing cream, use that instead of your own conditioner. Be sure that all the bleach is rinsed from your hair before you shampoo and condition, so that leftover bleach doesn't get into the rest of your hair and lighten it. Buy a touch-up kit to maintain highlights that grow out. When your highlights start to grow out, use a touch-up kit of the same color to brighten your roots. Touch-up kits often come with rubber fingertip applicators that make it easy to apply a little highlighter solution directly to your roots. Follow the instructions, and apply the touch-up solution only to your roots and sections where you'd like to add highlights. You can also simply allow your highlights to grow out if you don't want to continue touching them up. Or, if you'd like to cover them up, consult a professional about color treating your highlighted hair. Use sulfate-free hair products. Now that you have color-treated hair, you want to be sure to avoid sulfates, which are known to dry out and damage hair, particularly if it is color treated. Check the labels on your shampoo, conditioner, hairspray, gel, or styling creams to make sure they do not contain sulfates. If you have any products containing sulfates, replace them with ones that do not until your highlights grow out.
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Choose a highlighter kit with a cap if you have short hair. Buy a highlighting or bleach kit and applicator brush if you have longer hair. Select a highlighting kit that will complement your hair color. Don’t wash your hair 2-3 days before highlighting it. Set up your highlighting station. Mix your powder and developer. Do a strand test. Pull strands of hair through the holes of your cap if you’re using one. Use the long end of a comb to separate sections of longer hair. Brush bleach onto your designated sections. Use strips of aluminum foil to keep longer strands of hair separate. Check your color every 5 minutes, leaving it in for 20 minutes at most. Rinse your hair with cool water. Apply colored dye over the dry highlighted strands, if desired. Shampoo and condition your hair using products for color-treated hair. Buy a touch-up kit to maintain highlights that grow out. Use sulfate-free hair products.
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https://www.wikihow.health/Treat-Lead-Poisoning
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How to Treat Lead Poisoning
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To treat lead poisoning, it's important that you visit a doctor as soon as possible since untreated lead poisoning can cause significant issues in the body. Your doctor will run tests to determine whether you have lead poisoning and how severe it is. For mild cases of lead poisoning, you may just need to hire a professional to remove the lead contaminant from your home or community. However, for more serious cases of lead poisoning, your doctor may recommend chelation therapy, which uses medication to help your body excrete lead. Alternatively, for severe cases, your doctor might suggest ethylene diaminete traacetic acid therapy.
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Acknowledge risk factors. Certain persons are at an increased risk of developing lead poisoning. Knowing the following risk factors may help you identify symptoms and get treatment in a timely manner. Risk factors include: Age. Infants and young children are more likely to develop lead poisoning from chewing paint chips or inhaling lead dust. Children absorb lead into their bloodstreams more easily than adults. Residence. Living in older homes can expose you to lead paints, which were banned in the 1970s. Hobbies. Making stained glass, which requires the use of lead solder, and refinishing old furniture can expose you to lead. Country of origin. Persons living in developing countries are at a higher risk because these places often have less stringent laws on lead exposure. Recognize the symptoms of lead poisoning in children. There are a variety of symptoms of lead poisoning, which present differently in children and adults. If you notice these signs or symptoms in your child, lead poisoning may be a possibility: Developmental delays Learning difficulties Slowed growth Irritability Weight loss Sluggishness or fatigue Abdominal pain Vomiting Constipation Hearing loss Recognize the symptoms of lead poisoning in adults. While children are more at risk, adults are also susceptible to lead poisoning In adults, the symptoms of lead poisoning include: High blood pressure Abdominal pain Aches, and pains Declined mental function Numbness or tingling in the extremities Headache Memory loss Mood disorders Reduced sperm count Miscarriage or premature birth Schedule an appointment your doctor. If you develop any signs or symptoms of lead poisoning, or even suspect it, visit your doctor as soon as possible. Not treating lead poisoning can affect brain development in children, and cause issues with the kidneys and nervous system in both children and adults. It can also lead to death. Your doctor may order tests, such as a blood test, to definitively diagnose lead poisoning. She will likely look for signs of iron deficiency (anemia), which is associated with lead toxicity, and may also conduct a physical examination. From here, she can formulate a treatment plan. Some doctors may test children for lead poisoning as a part of regular check ups. Remove the lead contaminant from your environment. The first and most important part of treatment for lead poisoning is to remove the source of the contamination. For persons with lower levels of lead in the body, removing the contaminant may be enough to reduce blood lead levels. Contact your local health department, which can recommend ways to identify the source of the contamination in your home or community. You may want to hire a professional who can locate and abate lead contamination. The Environmental Protection Agency offers a service to help you locate Certified Renovation and Lead Dust Sampling Technician Firms, which can help you remove your problem. The service is available at http://www2.epa.gov/lead. Undergo chelation therapy. If you have higher levels of lead in your body, your doctor may prescribe that you undergo chelation therapy. This treatment can help your body excrete lead in your urine with medication. Chelation therapy uses mineral ions or cations that bond with lead in your body. Once this bond is formed, the mineral ions or cations help your body excrete the lead in your urine. Chelation therapy in children may be at lower levels than in adults. Chelation therapy is often given for either a 19 day course or two separate five day courses. Children with severe lead intoxication may receive combined chelation therapy with dimercaprol and edetate calcium disodium. Severe lead intoxication is a medical emergency — chelation therapy can be a life-saving treatment. Get EDTA therapy. In some adults, your doctor may suggest treatment with three different drugs, which are commonly called ethylene diaminete traacetic acid, or EDTA. Undergo these treatments if you have a severe case of lead poisoning, but be aware that it may not be possible to reverse damage. This is particularly true if the lead has entered your bone. You may require more than one treatment of EDTA to remove lead from your body. EDTA is administered intravenously. There is some evidence that intravenous administration of the medication may be more effective at removing lead than oral preparations. Wash hands and toys often and thoroughly. Children often develop lead poisoning as a result of hand to mouth ingestion. Washing their hands and toys often and thoroughly can help minimize the risk of contamination. Wash your child's hands in warm water with a mild soap for at least 20 seconds after outdoor play, before eating, and at bedtime. Use a hand sanitizer if you cannot access soap and water. Dust surfaces regularly. Clean dust off of surfaces in your home on a regular basis. This can remove and cut down on lead dust and small particles and minimize your risk for developing lead poisoning. Wipe furniture, windowsills, and other surfaces containing dust with a wet cloth. Mop your floors on a regular basis, too. Keeping windows closed and using an air conditioner may cut down on the amount of dust in your home. Steer children away from exposed soil. Soil, which children may put in their mouths, can expose them to lead. Keeping them away from bare soil and making them wash their hands frequently may help prevent lead exposure and poisoning. If you have exposed soil, cover it with grass or mulch. If you are able, provide your children with a sandbox that you cover between uses. Dine on healthy foods. A healthy diet can help your body lower lead absorption. Children in particular need sufficient calcium and iron in their diets to help lower possible lead exposure. Adults should get between 1,800 – 2,200 calories per day, depending on activity level, age, weight, and sex. Infants to three year olds should get between 900 and 100 calories per day, while children between the ages of 4 and 13 need a range of 1200 – 1600 calories daily. Eat vitamin- and nutrient-dense foods such as whole grains, fruits and vegetables, dairy, and lean proteins. Children need about two to three cups of dairy per day, which will provide them with their recommended dose of calcium. Children can get calcium from milk, cheese, yogurt, dark, leafy greens and oranges. Children require between.27 mg and 8 mg of iron every day. They can get iron from lean meats and seafood, nuts, and fortified grain products. It's also important to drink enough water for hydration, which may help excrete lead from your urine. Adults need between nine and 16 cups of water a day. Children need between five and eight glasses depending on age. Renovate with care. If you are doing renovations on your home, it's important to take care during the process, especially if your home is older. This can minimize your risk of exposure to lead and may prevent lead poisoning. Don't sand surfaces with lead paint. This can create large amounts of lead dust that you could inhale. Don't remove paint with an open flame torch because this can also create small lead particles that you could ingest. Cover old paint that isn't particularly chipped and thickly adhering to the wall. You can do this with another coat of paint, drywall, paneling, or encapsulation. Wear protective equipment and clothing such as masks, suits, or articles that you can throw away. Don't shake out your work clothes or wash them with other clothing. Shower and wash your hair before leaving the site. If you are renovating in or near your kitchen, watch for surfaces that may have lead dust accumulation. Either clean it off or eat someplace with a lower risk of lead exposure.
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Acknowledge risk factors. Recognize the symptoms of lead poisoning in children. Recognize the symptoms of lead poisoning in adults. Schedule an appointment your doctor. Remove the lead contaminant from your environment. Undergo chelation therapy. Children with severe lead intoxication may receive combined chelation therapy with dimercaprol and edetate calcium disodium. Get EDTA therapy. Wash hands and toys often and thoroughly. Dust surfaces regularly. Steer children away from exposed soil. Dine on healthy foods. Renovate with care.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Apologize-After-a-Heated-Argument
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How to Apologize After a Heated Argument
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Having a heated argument never feels good, but if you're sincere and apologize, you can make it right again. Avoid using words like “if” or “but” in your apology, since these can make it sound like you're making excuses. Instead, just say that you're sorry for what you said and you want to fix the situation. You could say, "I'm sorry I said those hurtful things. I really want to work to make things better." After you apologize, listen to whatever the other person has to say, to show you're willing to fix things. If you're both still angry, wait a while to apologize until you've both had the chance to cool off. Or, if you know you won't see them for a while, write them a letter of apology. This is a good way to show you're sorry while giving the other person time to think things over and respond.
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Avoid excuses. However you choose to apologize, there are a few things you should avoid. Don't automatically try to justify your statements or behavior, or try to reiterate why you were right about whatever you were arguing about. Pay attention to word choice and approach to prevent giving an apology that isn't actually an apology. Avoid “ifs” and “buts”. Never start an apology with “I'm sorry if _____.” This makes your apology dependent on something else (and may even imply you think your apology is only necessary because of their feelings). This is simply not a sincere way to be apologetic. Don't say “I'm sorry but_____” either. An apology like this is making an excuse before an apology is even made. Don't try to explain yourself during an apology. Focused on owning up for what you did or said, the fact that you're sorry about it, and that you intend to remedy the situation. Do not attempt to rationalize what had occurred during a heated argument. Know that if there was a valid reason for the argument and for your role in it, that you should talk about it, but that that conversation ought to be independent of your apology. Listen! Though it may seem counter-intuitive, listening may be the most important part of apologizing. Once you've made it clear that you are sorry, allow your loved one to speak and give them your full attention. Don't allow the potential discomfort of giving an apology to turn into a monologue that you may have to apologize for all over again. Whenever you're unsure or whether you should continue speaking, pause. If your loved one begins to speak, just listen. Don't try to anticipate anything the other person is going to say. They may still be too angry or hurt to receive your apology. Even if they're still upset, let them make their point. If you're feeling badly after a fight, recognize that the other person is too. Give them the time and space to articulate their feelings. Don’t discount the other person’s feelings. Avoid attempting to downplay someone else's negative feelings. Similarly, don't act as though nothing happened. Acknowledge the feelings that they convey by responding specifically to each feeling they articulate. Use “I”-statements when responding, such as “I understand you're upset”, “I know I disappointed you”, I realize that I said some hurtful things”. These statements can stand alone, or be accompanied with another clear “I'm sorry.” Do not attempt to explain yourself when they still have more to say. Avoid being falsely cheerful, as this may seem insincere or even malicious. Say something along the lines of “I know you're upset. So am I. When we calm down, let's talk about it and get through this.” Practice your apology beforehand. Apologize for both specific things you said during the argument, and for allowing yourself to get heated in the first place. Convey they sincerity of your apology by knowing what you're going to say – and why – ahead of time. Tell yourself, and the person to whom you are apologizing, that you have no agenda that motivates your apology other than healing the damage to your relationship that the argument may have caused. Choose words and statements that are honest and heart-felt. Don't try to be overly-eloquent or too analytical. Be direct; you might not need to say much. Ensure that none of your sentiments are framed in an effort to deceive or manipulate your loved one. Never be duplicitous in conversations that are important to your own or others' feelings. Time your apology thoughtfully. Timing is especially important if you want your apology to come across as genuine. You certainly can't give a heartfelt apology while you're still worked up from the argument. Take a moment. You and your loved one will likely need a while to regroup your thoughts and gain composure. Avoid rushing into an apology for both your sake and the sake of the person you fought with. Go somewhere private. A walk may be your best option; fresh air can help clear the mind and calm you down. Allow yourself to address your heightened emotions privately. Write a letter of apology. A letter is a great way to calmly and courteously convey an apology. Even if you decide to apologize in person, writing a letter before doing so can help you organize your thoughts, express your feelings, and plan exactly what you want to share with your loved one. If you're not going to see the person with whom you argued for a while, a letter is great way to convey your apology without putting them on the spot, which you risk doing with a phone call. After you've written your letter, reconsider what you've written. Do so either immediately or over the course of a few days, depending on how quickly you want to give an apology. Right before delivering an apology letter, reread it one last time. Consider allowing someone you trust to read over the letter to help ensure you haven't included anything that might be interpreted differently than you intend. Do not apologize via text or email. A text is not an appropriate medium with which to have a meaningful conversation. Emailed apologies may be appropriate for professional apologies, but not for personal apologies to people you know well. For more specific tips on apologizing, see the wikiHow on How to Apologize. Acknowledge the reason that you had a fight. The bad news is, there's probably a reason that you fought, and it needs to be addressed. Don't allow potential points of irritability or distance between the two of your to turn into deeper animosities by recognizing tensions before they lead to another fight. Self-reflection will lead to realizations that you can address after you've apologized. Specific questions you might ask yourself include: What are the specific things I said or did that likely hurt the other person? Was I intending to hurt the other person, or get back at them for something? If so, why did I do so? Do interactions such as this often occur between you? Include specific realizations about your behavior in conversations following an apology. The answers you provide for yourself to these questions can help inform the specific things you need to apologize for. Be clear, by saying things like, “I'm really sorry about saying ______, I can see how hurtful that likely was.” If fights are recurring, bring it up, especially if you're at fault. Say something like. “I'm sorry for fighting with you again. I recognize that my behavior needs to change. Are you willing to talk about this with me?” Let it go! Alternatively, you may realize that there wasn't a good reason for a fight – it was just an especially bad moment for one or both of you. If you're sure there's not an underlying issue that needs to be talked about, letting it go (after apologizing) might be the best route to take. More than likely there is something that needs to be addressed. Articulate not only the things you recognize that you did wrong, but also the things the other person said or did that hurt you, though do so after you've apologized. Address potential causes of continued tension with your loved one. If you or your loved one feels as though one of your “gave in” during the fight, or didn't get something off of their chest that they need to, there are likely unresolved issues between you. For instance, Ask each other, “Are you angry about how the argument ended?” Did you try to convince your loved one to do something they didn't want to do? Be sure to apologize and rescind any coercive agreements by saying things like, “I know I insisted on _______, and that I didn't hear you out on why you disagreed. Let's talk about it together, and I'll be more open to your considerations.” Articulate the things specific things that hurt of offended you that your loved one has said or done. Do so calmly, and avoid being accusatory, but you need to be clear about behavior that cannot continue. Say things likes, “It really hurt me when you said/did _______.” Be ready to forgive your loved one, and expect the same, if you're able to apologize to one another, have the constructive conversations to grow closer, and move on. Don’t hold grudges. Even if you are extremely upset or disgusted about what was said or done, recognize that holding onto the emotion of anger will not improve the situation for anyone. Ensure that there aren't any grudges that may drive a wedge between the two of you. Don't persist in giving others the cold shoulder or the silent treatment. Similarly, if you find yourself being especially critical of one another, there are likely unresolved feelings that need to be discussed. Monitor yourself and reflect on the observations you make about how you're acting. Take responsibility for your own actions by working to adjust your own behavior and being willing to speak openly and listen fully to your loved ones. Commit to acting more appropriately. You need to make it clear that you intend not to repeat any hurtful behavior. Your apology is only as good as your willingness to ensure you don't have to make the same apology again. Clearly and specifically articulate a commitment not to repeat any hurtful things you said or did. Emphasize the fact that you do not want to hurt the other person, and are sorry for having done so. Following egregious or repeated behavior during arguments with your loved ones, you may need to do more than apologize. Commit to a plan or process to help you deal with whatever might be leading to your hurtful behavior, and seek professional guidance or join a support group to help you follow through on these commitments. Give a token of apology. Don't ever think that simply giving a gift is a sufficient apology. If you go the gift route, it needs to be something well-thought out that will be meaningful to the recipient. If you apologized in person, following it up with a letter about how much your relationship with the person means to you may be the best gift you can give someone. Think of something the other person likes to do, and get them something accordingly. Tickets or passes to a show or other activity you know your loved one will enjoy are a great option, as you can go together. Spending time together is another great gift, as it indicates you're hoping to maintain your connection. Consummate the apology. If you fought with your romantic partner, tangibly re-establishing your commitment to one another is vital, not to mention (especially) enjoyable. Make-up sex has a reputation for solidifying a particularly gratifying reunion after a fight. Remind one another, both verbally and tangibly (with kissing, hand-holding, hugging), that even though you are capable of hurting one another, that you're still there for one another as well. When emotionally excited by the stimulus of an intense fight, the pleasures of sex may be amplified by a psychological (and biological) phenomenon called the arousal transfer. Allow the relief you're both feeling on account of your reconciliation to spill over into a session of romantic reunion that reaffirms the bonds between you.
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Avoid excuses. Listen! Don’t discount the other person’s feelings. Practice your apology beforehand. Time your apology thoughtfully. Write a letter of apology. Acknowledge the reason that you had a fight. Include specific realizations about your behavior in conversations following an apology. Address potential causes of continued tension with your loved one. Don’t hold grudges. Commit to acting more appropriately. Give a token of apology. Consummate the apology.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Brown-Food-Coloring
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How to Make Brown Food Coloring
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To make brown food coloring, start by finding 2 bottles of food coloring that are opposites on the color wheel. You can use red and green, orange and blue, or yellow and purple. Then, mix equal parts of the colors in a bowl to make brown! If you're not satisfied with the brown you end up with, try adding more of one color until you find the perfect shade.
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Find two colored dyes that are opposites on the color wheel. Red and green, orange and blue, or yellow and purple can all be combined to make brown. You can use liquid or gel food dye. Gel food dye is usually preferred because you don't need very much to get vivid colors. Mix the color in a 1:1 ratio. So for every 1 drop of red, add 1 drop of green. Mix your colors in a glass or stainless steel bowl. The dye can stain plastic bowls. Play with the addition of colors until you reach the desired shade of brown. Mix red and yellow in a 1:10 ratio (1 drop red to 10 drops yellow) for tan. Add 1 drop blue for a darker brown. Add red or yellow if the dye looks gray or black. Add orange and green to lighten a red and green mix and make tan. Add 1 drop of black dye for a very dark brown. Remember that brown dye will darken as it dries. You may think you have the perfect shade of espresso brown and then find the next day that is has deepened to almost black. Mix your dye lighter than you think you want so it has room to develop. If you are dying frosting, consider making it 1-2 days ahead of time so you know the true shade you are working with. If your frosting still isn't dark enough, add a drop of black dye or more of your brown. If your frosting is too dark, add a little of the white frosting to dilute the color. Add your dye a little at a time. It often takes a lot of brown dye to make a rich color, but you risk ruining your frosting, playdough, etc. by drowning it in liquid. Choose your colorant. The colorant is what will provide the brown coloring for the dye. You can use ground espresso, instant coffee, cocoa powder, cinnamon, or black tea achieve brown. Remember that you may need a lot of dye to get a very dark brown, which means you will also get a stronger taste of the colorant. Cinnamon is great for light brown, but the taste might be overwhelming if you make a dark brown. Used in small amounts, you should not taste the colorant. It's ok to use a dill seed-based colorant for your buttercream if you use it very sparingly. You may not be able to get the same vivid colors with natural dye as you would with store-bought colors. Petroleum-based colors need only a few drops to add color, whereas you might need a lot of natural dye to add color. Most recipes will be ruined by the addition of too much coloring--they will taste weird or become too watery to use. Steep colorants in water to make liquid dye. For every 1 cup of water, add 1 cup coffee, 1/2 cup cocoa, 10 tea bags, or 4 tablespoons of spice. Bring the water and colorant mixture to a boil. Boil gently or simmer between 15-30 minutes. Allow mixture to cool to room temperature. Pour mixture through a fine mesh strainer to catch any unabsorbed granules. Store in a glass or stainless steel bowl, as the dye will not stain these materials. Grind colorants in a coffee or spice grinder to make a powder dye. The key to a powder dye is that it must be extremely fine. If any of your colorants are coarse (like crystals of instant coffee), grind them further until they are a powdery consistency. Powder dyes are more concentrated, so you may be able to get a darker color using less of the powder dye. Keep in mind that too much can change the flavor of whatever you are dyeing. Add your dye a little at a time. Remember that too much liquid dye can ruin the texture and structure of whatever you are dyeing, especially frosting. Too much liquid or powder dye can affect the flavor, so be sure to taste as you go. Make peace with the idea that you may not get the dark, vivid color you want from natural dye. Flavor and consistency is ultimately more important than getting that perfect shade.
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Find two colored dyes that are opposites on the color wheel. Mix the color in a 1:1 ratio. Play with the addition of colors until you reach the desired shade of brown. Remember that brown dye will darken as it dries. Add your dye a little at a time. Choose your colorant. Steep colorants in water to make liquid dye. Grind colorants in a coffee or spice grinder to make a powder dye. Add your dye a little at a time.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Play-Dungeons-and-Dragons-for-Free
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How to Play Dungeons and Dragons for Free
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To play Dungeons and Dragons for free, play the Wizards of the Coast demo online and read up on the core materials so you don't need to pay for the books. You can also print off free character sheets to help you create your hero. Once everyone has created their characters, make up your own storyline to make your game unique. If you're the Dungeon Master, download the Basic Rules and Spells Section of the System Reference Document so you can refer to them while you play. Unless someone in your party already owns a set of dice, use a free online dice roller to save you money.
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Learn about the game. Play the demo on the Wizards of the Coast (WOTC) website. This will familiarize you with the game and give you a basic idea of the flow and systems at work.Dungeons and Dragons is traditionally played on a tabletop, with paper and dice.The books can get expensive, but the basics are available online for free. The average player does not actually have to purchase anything, as the DM is in charge of creating the game. Find a dice substitute. Dice are the only material that is required from all players. There is a dice roller at WOTC's site , or you can find a printable paper template and make your own. A pencil with dots on each side makes an inexpensive replacement for six-sided dice. Make up a character sheet, or use a pre-made one. If you want the traditional DnD-style game, go with dwarves, elves, humans and even half-lings. If you want sci-fi, you can use any sort of aliens you want. The System Reference Document (SRD) contains the rules of D&D, which are important to consult as you learn to play. Follow the link and scroll to the bottom of the page. Download the Basic Rules and Spells sections. If you're planning to be the Dungeon Master (DM), get the Monsters and Magic Items as well. Don't worry about any of the other sections for now, they're for advanced players. Be advised: The SRD is not comprehensive, and lacks vital information on subjects like character generation and gaining levels. Printable character sheets are available here. For most beginners, the 4th Edition Character Sheets will do. Make up your own story line. This is what makes your game interesting, making your own story line could be the hardest, but most fun part of the process. You can choose to have whatever characters you want, whatever mythology you want or you can even make up your own mythology. Get together in a group and play! Dungeons and Dragons is a complex game that will take some time getting used to, so encourage everyone playing to read the core materials and go over the WOTC tutorial. Stay persistent and your game sessions will become much more rewarding. Download the Dungeons and Dragons Online program here. Dungeons and Dragons Online is free-to-play, and does not require a monthly subscription.Online play is a natural fit for a game like Dungeons and Dragons, and now you can play it for free. Create a free account. You will need to create an account in order to download the game. All it requires is a working email address. Install the program. Be sure that your computer meets the minimum requirements to play. Online games can take a lot of time to get ahead. Take a look at our guide for casual players to get the most enjoyment out of your game.
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Learn about the game. Find a dice substitute. Make up a character sheet, or use a pre-made one. Make up your own story line. Get together in a group and play! Download the Dungeons and Dragons Online program here. Create a free account. Install the program. Online games can take a lot of time to get ahead.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Boil-Lobsters
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How to Boil Lobsters
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To boil a lobster, first set the live lobster on a cutting board and place the tip of a chef's knife 1 inch (2.5 cm) above the first striation. Hold the lobster down with your free hand and quickly insert the knife straight down through the lobster. Bring the blade down so it's parallel to the cutting board to humanely kill the lobster. Then, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Drop the lobster into the boiling water, wait for the water to start boiling again, and put the lid on. Boil a 1-pound (½-kg) lobster for 10 minutes, adding 3 minutes for each additional pound (½ kg). Finally, drain the lobster and serve with melted butter.
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Purchase 4 live lobsters from your local grocery store. Ask employees where the lobster is sourced from—if the store is extremely close to the source, the lobster likely be a bit fresher. Otherwise, location isn't a huge deal. Wrap them in a damp (but not wet) newspaper. Store them in a container or bag with 1 frozen gel pack. Place them on the bottom shelf of your fridge to avoid cross contamination for a maximum of 36 to 48 hours. Claws should be clean and free from scratches. Leave the rubber bands on their claws until you submerge them in water—their claws are strong and can cause injury. Remember: the farther the sources from their market, the less effect distance has on quality. Fill a 6 gallons (23 L) stockpot with 4 to 5 gallons (15 to 19 L) of water. This should hold about 6 to 8 pounds (2.7 to 3.6 kg) of lobster. As a rule of thumb, it's better to have too much water than to overcrowd the pot with too much lobster. Add 12 tablespoons of salt per 1 gallon (3.8 L) of water. Salt increases the boiling point of water. This means your water will come to a more steady boil than it would without salt, which is ideal for rolling boils. For best results, use sea salt. Add 1 sprig of thyme, 2 bay leaves, and the juice of 1 lemon into the water. Cut the lemon in half and squeeze the juice into a bowl. You can also purchase lemon juice from the store—a medium-sized lemon is about ⁄ 4 cup (59 ml) of lemon juice. Afterward, pour the juice into the stockpot along with the other ingredients. This step is ideal if you prefer a broth (meat cooked with vegetable chunks and water) to a brine (meat cooked in high-concentration salt water). If you plan to eat your lobster with melted butter, you can skip this step. Bring the water to a full rolling boil. A rolling boil is when the water does not stop boiling when you stir the water. Place the pot on an element and set it to the highest heat possible. Once you notice consistent bubbling, you can begin adding your lobsters. Always keep a rolling boil—it will ensure the water will boil even after the lobster is put into the pot, reducing the temperature of the water momentarily. Hold the lobsters by the tail with your tongs and put them in the water. Gently dip them into the water one at a time, always placing them headfirst. Submerge them as fast as possible, but take care not to splash any water. Afterward, clamp the lid onto the pot and turn on your timer. Remove the rubber bands prior to submerging your lobster in the boiling water. Grab the lobster by the back of the carapace (the upper hard shell) while doing this. Submerge the lobsters in quick succession to ensure they all receive equal cooking time. Boil 8 minutes for each 1 pound (0.45 kg) of lobster. For example, for 4 live 1.5 pounds (0.68 kg) lobsters, leave the lobsters in the pot for 43 to 48 minutes. Follow the boiling guide above for different weights. Keep the lid clamped tightly to the pot with no openings in the seal. Gently stir the lobsters with your tongs halfway through the allotted cooking time. Check whether the lobsters are cooked after the allotted cooking time. You should notice the shells turning bright red (uncooked lobster is charcoal in color). To check if they're properly cooked inside, crack open the region where the carapace reaches the tail using scissors. If it's properly cooked, the meat will be opaque and firm. Tug on an antenna—if the lobster is fully cooked, it will come off easily If you notice loose and translucent meat, the lobster isn't cooked. Boil it for another 3 to 5 minutes and then check again. Continue this process until the lobster is completely cooked through. Drain your lobsters in a colander. Remove your lobsters from the water using tongs and place them in a colander sitting underside up on a clean work surface. Gently shake it to the left and right to get rid of initial water. Place paper towel underneath your colander to catch drainage. Remove the tips of each lobster claw. Use scissors or a kitchen knife and take care not to cut yourself by aiming the pointed edge of your tool away from you. Cutting the tips prevents your lobsters from becoming waterlogged and improves the draining process. Grasp the lobster firmly and split the tail along the length using a knife. This also improves drainage. Melt 2⁄3 cup (160 ml) melted butter in a heavy saucepan on your stovetop. Keep an eye on the butter and wait for it to begin melting. Once it is approximately ¾ melted, stir it with a wooden spoon until it finishes melted. Most sticks of butter are around ⁄ 2 cup (120 ml). You can also cut your butter into small 1 inch (2.5 cm) pieces and melt them in a microwave on medium-low power or defrost. Check on it every 10 to 15 second until it's nearly melted. Now, remove it and stir it to complete the melting process. Serve your lobster with your choice of sides. Pour your melted butter over the lobster and enjoy it with your choice of sides. Common choices include lemon wedges, corn on the cob , fresh green beans, and asparagus. Use a lobster cracker to get through your lobster shells and reach the meat. You can also use your hands in combination with a lobster fork to dig into the smaller crevices. Store your lobster in the refrigerator for 3 to 4 days at most. In the freezer, lobster lasts for 2 to 3 months. After de-thawing frozen lobster, you can store it in the refrigerator for another 3 to 4 days prior to cooking. Lobster should be thrown away if it's left at room temperature for more than 2 hours. Signs of bad lobster include a slimy texture and a sour smell. Don't taste lobster before looking for these signs.
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Purchase 4 live lobsters from your local grocery store. Fill a 6 gallons (23 L) stockpot with 4 to 5 gallons (15 to 19 L) of water. Add 12 tablespoons of salt per 1 gallon (3.8 L) of water. Add 1 sprig of thyme, 2 bay leaves, and the juice of 1 lemon into the water. Bring the water to a full rolling boil. Hold the lobsters by the tail with your tongs and put them in the water. Boil 8 minutes for each 1 pound (0.45 kg) of lobster. Check whether the lobsters are cooked after the allotted cooking time. Drain your lobsters in a colander. Remove the tips of each lobster claw. Melt 2⁄3 cup (160 ml) melted butter in a heavy saucepan on your stovetop. Serve your lobster with your choice of sides.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Blu-Tack-Slime
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How to Make Blu Tack Slime
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To make blu tack slime, start by stretching 1 stick of blue tack in your hands for 5 minutes to warm it up and make it stretchier. Once the tack is pliable, pump 2 squirts of liquid hand soap into it. Mix the liquid soap into the blu tack by hand until they're completely combined. If the slime isn't stretchy enough, add another pump of liquid hand soap. Store your slime in an airtight container to keep it stretchy for 2 to 3 days.
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Stretch one stick of blu tack in your hands for 5 minutes. Kneading the blu tack helps to warm it up and makes it stretchier! Stretch the blu tack until it breaks and then squish it together into a ball. Continue to repeat this process until the blu tack feels warm and stretchy. If you don't have any blu tack, use a non-name brand of sticky tack instead. This recipe makes about one handful of slime. To make more slime, simply just double the recipe. Pump two squirts of liquid soap or shaving foam into the blu tack. Pump the soap into the centre of the stretched blu tack. If your liquid soap isn't in a pump bottle, measure about 1 teaspoon (4.9 mL) instead. Any type of liquid soap that bubbles up can be used for this recipe. If you don't have any liquid hand soap, use a runny hand lotion instead. Mix the liquid soap into the blu tack. Knead the blu tack and liquid soap together with your hands until they are completely combined. If you don't want to use your hands, use a silicone spatula instead. Add another pump of liquid hand soap if the slime isn’t stretchy enough. If the slime feels a bit dry, add a little extra liquid soap to make it squishier. Squeeze the soap onto the top of the slime and then use your hands to knead it into the existing slime. Skip this step if you don't like sticky slime. Store your slime in an airtight container. The slime normally remains stretchy for about 2-3 days. Add a drop of food colouring to your slime to change its colour. Place one drop of food colouring into the middle of the slime and then mix it in until the slime is an even colour. If you want the slime a darker colour, simply add another drop of food colouring. If you don't have any food colouring, use a drop of dye instead. If you are using traditional blu tack, the food colouring will mix with the existing blue colour. Add yellow to blu tack slime to make it green or red food colouring to make purple slime. Knead a drop of essential oil into the slime to make it smell nice. This is a great way to make your slime unique! Choose your favourite essential oil, add one drop into the middle of your slime, and then mix it in to disperse the scent through the slime. Purchase essential oils from a pharmacy or health store. Essential oils are really strong, so you don't need to use very much. Sprinkle a little glitter over the slime to make it sparkly. Choose fine glitter to make your slime look metallic or use chunkier glitter to give it a confetti look. Sprinkle 1 pinch of glitter over your slime and then mix it until the glitter is evenly dispersed in your slime. Sprinkle the glitter onto your slime outside or over newspaper to stop the glitter from making a mess. Mix in foam beads or sequins to give your slime an interesting texture. Different textures in your slime help to make it look and feel unique. Add foam beads to make it feel nice and squishy or add sequins for a glittery look. Mix in a few foam beads or sequins and add more until you get the desired texture. Experiment with other small craft items, such as confetti or wobbly eyes. Keep slime that has small items in it away from children, as these can act as choking hazards.
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Stretch one stick of blu tack in your hands for 5 minutes. Pump two squirts of liquid soap or shaving foam into the blu tack. Mix the liquid soap into the blu tack. Add another pump of liquid hand soap if the slime isn’t stretchy enough. Add a drop of food colouring to your slime to change its colour. Knead a drop of essential oil into the slime to make it smell nice. Sprinkle a little glitter over the slime to make it sparkly. Mix in foam beads or sequins to give your slime an interesting texture.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Easy-Peanut-Butter-Cookies
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How to Make Easy Peanut Butter Cookies
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To make easy peanut butter cookies, start by combining peanut butter, white sugar, and an egg in a bowl with an electric mixer until smooth and creamy. Next, roll the dough into small balls and place them about 1 inch apart on a baking sheet. Press the back of a fork into the dough to create the traditional criss-cross design on top of the cookies before placing in the oven to cook for 10 minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Then, remove them from the oven and let the cookies cool on a wire rack.
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Preheat your oven to 350 °F (177 °C). Prior to baking, preheat the oven. This way, when you're ready to toss your cookies in the oven, it will already be heated. Make sure you know how to recognize when your oven is done heating. Some ovens will make a noise. If your oven does not indicate when it's done preheating, use an oven thermometer to check. Mix your ingredients using an electric mixer. Add the peanut butter, sugar, and egg to a large mixing bowl. Using an electronic mixer, beat the ingredients until your dough has a smooth, creamy texture. If you don't have an electric mixer, you can use a wooden spoon to stir the ingredients until smooth and creamy. Keep in mind, however, this may take slightly longer. Roll the dough into small balls and place them on a cookie sheet. Place the balls about an inch apart so the cookies do not run into each other. If desired, press the back of a fork into the dough, making the traditional criss-cross peanut butter cookie design. Make sure to grease the cookie sheet prior to baking. Wash your hands before and after handling cookie dough. Bake for 10 minutes. The cookies should take about 10 minutes bake in the preheated oven. However, check them on occasion just in case, especially if you don't have an oven thermometer. If your oven's heat is off slightly, the cookies may take slightly longer to bake. Cool your cookies and enjoy. Use a spatula to remove the cookies from the cookie sheet. Set them on a wire cooling rack. Allow the cookies to cool for about two minutes before eating them. Preheat the oven to 375 °F (191 °C). Make sure you know when your oven is done preheating. Some ovens make a noise, while others do not indicate when they're ready for use. In this case, use an oven thermometer. {"smallUrl":"https:\/\/www.wikihow.com\/images\/7\/71\/Make-Easy-Peanut-Butter-Cookies-Step-6-Version-3.jpg","bigUrl":"\/images\/thumb\/7\/71\/Make-Easy-Peanut-Butter-Cookies-Step-6-Version-3.jpg\/v4-190px-Make-Easy-Peanut-Butter-Cookies-Step-6-Version-3.jpg","smallWidth":460,"smallHeight":307,"bigWidth":"190","bigHeight":"127","licensing":"<div class=\"mw-parser-output\"><p>License: <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer noopener\" class=\"external text\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc-sa\/3.0\/\">Creative Commons<\/a><br>\n<\/p><p><br \/>\n<\/p><\/div>"} Spray non-stick cooking spray on a baking sheet. This will prevent the cookies from sticking to the cookie sheet. Alternatively, you can also line the cookie tray with parchment paper. Cream the sugar and butter. Place the butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl. Using a wooden spoon, mash the butter and sugar together. Keep working the butter and sugar until the mixture is smooth and creamy. Add the egg, peanut butter, and vanilla. You can use an electronic mixer or a wooden spoon. Beat the egg until the mixture is once again smooth and creamy. This will take longer if you're not using a mixer. Stir in the dry ingredients. The dry ingredients include the flour, baking soda, and salt. Add them in gradually, stirring as you go. Stir until the mixture is even throughout and has a smooth texture. Be patient. Dry ingredients can take a longer time to mix into a recipe. Place the cookies on your baking sheet. Roll the dough into small balls and then place the balls on the cookie sheet. The distance is important as the cookies will spread during cooking. Keep them half an inch apart. If you want, you can use a fork to flatten the cookies. Traditionally, peanut butter cookies are flattened with a fork. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes. To begin, bake the cookies for about 12 minutes. Check them regularly, especially if you don't have an oven thermometer. If the cookies are not done after 12 minutes, bake them for another minute at a time until they're cooked. Cool and enjoy. Remove the cookies from the cookie sheet and set them on a wire cooling rack. Allow them to cool for a few minutes before eating them. Use room temperature ingredients. For the best results, all ingredients should be at room temperature. This includes things like butter and eggs. Set your ingredients out an hour before baking. Room temperature ingredients are much easier to mix. Take your time with each step. Do not rush through steps when baking. You want to make sure you spend enough time on each step to thoroughly blend the ingredients. Rushing through a step will result in an uneven dough, which can give your cookies an odd taste and texture. Use an oven thermometer. The settings on an oven can only give a rough estimate of its heat. You should use an oven thermometer to make sure your oven is set to the right temperature. This way, you will avoid burning or undercooking your cookies.
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Preheat your oven to 350 °F (177 °C). Mix your ingredients using an electric mixer. Roll the dough into small balls and place them on a cookie sheet. Bake for 10 minutes. Cool your cookies and enjoy. Preheat the oven to 375 °F (191 °C). Spray non-stick cooking spray on a baking sheet. Cream the sugar and butter. Add the egg, peanut butter, and vanilla. Stir in the dry ingredients. Place the cookies on your baking sheet. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes. Cool and enjoy. Use room temperature ingredients. Take your time with each step. Use an oven thermometer.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Recognize-Dwarf-Tapeworm-Infection
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How to Recognize Dwarf Tapeworm Infection
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To identify a dwarf tapeworm infection, look for upset stomach symptoms including nausea, diarrhea, and abdominal pain, as well as loss of appetite without weight loss. Watch out for other signs of tapeworm infection, including anal itching, headache, and trouble sleeping. In addition to symptoms, identify possible sources of infection, such as exposure to soil contaminated by tapeworm eggs or potentially contaminated water supplies. If you have these symptoms, make an appointment with your doctor to have a fecal examination.
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Make a note of increased upset stomach. These could be signs of the infection or other problems, but they are a potential warning. Increased occurrences of nausea and/or diarrhea could be symptoms of dwarf tapeworm infection. You may also experience abdominal pain along with the upset stomach. The severity of your symptoms could vary greatly. Duration of these symptoms could be from a few days to intermittently over years. Check if you have a loss of appetite. This too can be a sign of the tapeworm infection or other problems. As this is not as an immediate symptom as nausea or diarrhea, you may want to take a few days to make sure this is occurring. Weight loss is rarely an occurrence with dwarf tapeworm infection. See if you are turning away even your favorite foods. There is a risk of vitamin deficiency and body chemistry imbalance with this, so consult your doctor if it persists. Feel if you have any abdominal pain. While you cannot feel the worm inside you, the subsequent infection can induce pain. If the pain is intense, see a doctor immediately in case it is a symptom of something else. This pain could vary in intensity from and duration from immediately of a few days to on and off for years depending on the persistence of infection. If you can identify the pain as acute (sharp and intense) and/or chronic (frequent occurrence)--this may help your doctor's diagnosis. The pain's location may not situate itself in any one location in the abdominal area. Similar to the other conditions, it could be a symptom of the tapeworm infection, or other problems. Be aware of any itches around the anal region. This could be a sign of localized infection and irritation and it is most common in young children. The irritation could also vary in intensity and duration depending on the timeline of the infection. A rash or physical blemish is not typically associated with this irritation, though you may risk inflicting such harm if you scratch too much. Determine if you have intense headaches. This could be a sign of a more severe infection and this symptom is also seen in young children more often. If you feel the headache in conjunction with the other symptoms, this too could be signs of other illness--but the tapeworm infection remains a possibility. The headache's intensity and duration may vary greatly depending on the persistence of the infection. There are ways to classify your pain level, if it's sharp and severe (acute) or frequent (chronic). This can be useful to your doctor for diagnosis. Pay attention to loss of sleep. Problems sleeping can be signs of a more severe infection. Similar to loss of appetite, you should see if this pattern holds up over a few days to determine if it's an actual symptom of your problem. Sleep loss caused by an associated problem is called "secondary insomnia" (as opposed to ordinary sleep loss or "primary insomnia"). As with pain problems, this can be acute (brief intense bouts) and/or chronic (frequently occurring). Let your doctor know how you are being affected. Besides waking up at night, you might experience sleepiness during the day, fatigue (tiredness), irritability (bad mood), and problems concentrating/memory. Any repeated disruption to your normal sleeping period can be a symptom of insomnia, but determining the cause may be up to your doctor and you. Identify locations the dwarf tapeworms may have placed eggs. Finding places where exposure could have happened can help with diagnosis, and prevent further contamination. These eggs are frequently passed through accidental ingestion. Fecal contamination is a possibility especially in poor sanitary/hygiene areas. You may not be able to visibly spot the eggs. While the worms can grow up to a couple of inches in length, the eggs will need medical instrumentation to detect. Ask if others have been infected around you. You may have come in contact with the same substances they have. See what they ate, drank, or touched of an organic nature that may have been a carrier for the eggs. Examine the possibility of secondary hosts. See if another animal or insect have been exposed and carried the infection into local consumables. Sometimes these other animals and insects will eat the eggs and then contaminate the food, water, and/or soil supply indirectly. The infection can spread by one consuming the intermediate host. The intermediate host may not show any obvious signs of infection. Contact an entomologist (expert on insects) either locally or if one can be reached at a nearby university for assistance on identifying infected insects in the area. Consult local environmental reports to see if any infections are reported. Ask your local forestry, or game and wildlife service to see if any animals in the area have been infected with tapeworms. Determine if local soil has been exposed. If you do any yard or farm work, this is especially important. Accidentally ingesting some contaminated soil by putting your fingers to your mouth can lead to infection. Fecal contamination is a risk as the reproducing worm and eggs can pass through the bowels. Ask government agencies for reports on potential contamination. Get independent verification if possible. See if there are any environmental groups that work in the area and have contaminant information. Also independently verify their data if possible. Examine potentially exposed water supplies. This is of even greater concern in poor sanitation/hygiene areas. As with the food supply and soil, this is an at risk area for exposure to the eggs and fecal contamination from intermediate hosts. Ask to see if others have been infected from a particular water supply. File requests with the local government to get reports on the environmental health of the water supply. Independently verify the data with other sources if possible. Check with local environmental groups to see if they have been monitoring contamination of water supplies. But independently verify the data. Go to a doctor to confirm if you have a dwarf tapeworm infection. A fecal examination is the usual way this diagnosis is made. Diagnosis is made by identifying the eggs in the fecal stool. Your doctor will ask you to submit specimens collected over several days confirm if you are infected or not. Take the prescribed treatment. Usually the drug praziquantel is given for dwarf tapeworm infections. Praziquantel dissolves the dwarf tapeworm within the intestine. Praziquantel is usually well tolerated. Sometimes more than one treatment is necessary--up to ten days. Follow your doctor's instructions when taking praziquantel. But usually it is taken by mouth, with food, three or four times a day (four to six hours apart). You should take the medicine with a full glass of water. Do NOT chew or suck the medicine tablets. You should avoid consuming grapefruits or grapefruit products while taking praziquantel. Contact your doctor immediately if your condition persists or worsens. Sometimes Niclosamide or nitazoxanide are given as alternative medicines. Follow your doctor's instructions when taking any of these medicines. Know the prognosis of dwarf tapeworm infections. This disease is relatively minor if treated on time. Most patients fully recover with treatment. More severe symptoms can result from prolonged infections, so treatment should be sought immediately. Learn how to prevent infection while you are infected. You do not want to spread the infectious eggs while you are receiving treatment. If you have multiple bathrooms at home, consider using one while your family/guests use the other. Disinfect any bathroom equipment you use thoroughly after every use. Standard antibacterial sprays and soaps should be sufficient, but ask your doctor if they recommend something else. Consider leaving food preparation to others until your doctor certifies you as clear of the infection. Have an independent/portable food and water supply if you are traveling. Maintain prevention of infection. Improving hygiene and sanitation not only can help prevent spreading the infection from a contaminated person, but prevent infection in the first place in the future. Wash your hands with soap and warm water. Do this after any task involving potential contaminants--especially after using the toilet, diaper changes, and during food preparation. Be particularly mindful of educating children in your area about cleanliness around potential contaminants--especially with their higher risk for dwarf tapeworm infection. If you are in a situation where food may be contaminated, you should wash, peel and/or cook all raw vegetables and fruits with safe/tested water before eating.
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Make a note of increased upset stomach. Check if you have a loss of appetite. Feel if you have any abdominal pain. Be aware of any itches around the anal region. Determine if you have intense headaches. Pay attention to loss of sleep. Identify locations the dwarf tapeworms may have placed eggs. Ask if others have been infected around you. Examine the possibility of secondary hosts. Determine if local soil has been exposed. Examine potentially exposed water supplies. Go to a doctor to confirm if you have a dwarf tapeworm infection. Take the prescribed treatment. Know the prognosis of dwarf tapeworm infections. Learn how to prevent infection while you are infected. Maintain prevention of infection.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Use-Cruise-Control-on-a-Car
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How to Use Cruise Control on a Car
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If you want to use cruise control on your car, make sure you're on the open road, such as a freeway or highway. Additionally, avoid using cruise control in rainy or snowy conditions, or if you're driving through a city, since you'll need to change speed and turn regularly. When you're ready to switch to cruise control, press the "Set" switch, which is usually found on the steering column or on the wheel, when your car reaches the desired speed. To stop cruise control, press on the brake or push the clutch if you're driving a manual car.
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Locate your car's cruise control switches. Usually, these are found either on the steering column (the part connecting the steering wheel to the dashboard area), or on the steering wheel itself. Controls found on the steering wheel usually consist of a few buttons. If car's controls are located on the steering column, look for a lever that sticks out, often near a windshield wiper lever. Check your car's operating manual if you are unable to find the cruise control switches. Study the layout of the switches. Each car model's controls look slightly different. Generally, however, the controls are labeled clearly. You should see one or two buttons to turn cruise control "ON" and "OFF," another labeled “SET,” and one labeled “RES” (meaning “resume”). Your car may also have a switch labeled “CANCEL.” Familiarize yourself with the location of these buttons. Many cars have additional buttons to increase or decrease speed (marked by a +/-) when using cruise control. Drive your car until you reach your desired speed and hit “SET. ” Cruise control will set the car to hold steady at a particular speed. Once you reach the speed you want (keep an eye on your car's speedometer), push the “SET” button. You can now take your foot off of the gas pedal, and your car will maintain the speed for you. For some car models, cruise control will not operate below a certain speed, such as 40 miles (64 km) per hour. Stop cruise control whenever you need to. If you need to slow down, stop, turn, or make another change in your driving, it's time to turn cruise control off, or at least pause it. This is easy to do, but there are a few different methods: To stop cruise control briefly (such as when a car in front of you brakes), just press the brake as you normally would. If you are driving a manual, you can also disengage cruise control by pressing the clutch. If you are completely done using cruise control, you can press the “OFF” or "ON/OFF" switch. If your car has a cruise control “CANCEL” switch, you can also press that to stop it. Resume cruise control, if you want. Sometimes you only need to turn cruise control off momentarily, such as while braking for a car ahead of you. When you're ready to get back into cruise control, just get back up to (or near) your desired speed and hit the “RES” button. This will put your car back into cruise control, at the speed you set previously. Change the cruise control speed when necessary. For instance, perhaps you have been driving using cruise control on a road where the speed limit is 55 miles (89 km) per hour, and then you enter a zone where the speed limit increases to 70 miles (110 km) per hour. Just press the gas pedal to bring your car up to the new speed, and hit the “SET” button again. This will set cruise control at the new speed. If your car has a +/- button for cruise control, press this when you want to raise or lower your car's speed. Reserve cruise control for the open road. Cruise control is really meant to be used in situations where you can drive mostly without needing to stop or slow down. It's ideal for driving on freeways and highways. Using cruise control while driving on busy city streets doesn't make any sense, because of all the stopping and starting you will have to do. Using cruise control on busy streets can also be dangerous. Since you yourself are not in complete control of your car, you may be paying less attention. You might brake or react to other cars more slowly than normal, increasing the chance of an accident. Avoid using cruise control in hazardous conditions. Cruise control can slightly slow your reaction time and keeps you from having total control over acceleration. This means it's best not to use it in situations where road conditions require more careful and nuanced driving. These include: Wet or snowy roads Hilly, steep, or mountainous areas Winding roads Stay focused on the road. Cruise control is not auto-pilot. You will still need to stay focused on the road. Scan the road constantly for any upcoming hazards or other vehicles. Keep your feet near the brake pedal at all times (not folded under you on the seat or propped up on the dash) in case you need to slow or stop quickly. Most of all, keep your mind on driving: don't zone out! Use cruise control to maximize fuel economy and ensure you maintain a safe speed. Your car's engine runs more efficiently in conditions where cruise control is engaged safely. Since you can set it at a specific speed, it's also a way to avoid getting a speeding ticket if you have a lead foot. Just set it at or below the speed limit! Finally, cruise control lets you relax a little as you drive, which can reduce fatigue on long trips.
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Locate your car's cruise control switches. Study the layout of the switches. Drive your car until you reach your desired speed and hit “SET. Stop cruise control whenever you need to. Resume cruise control, if you want. Change the cruise control speed when necessary. Reserve cruise control for the open road. Avoid using cruise control in hazardous conditions. Stay focused on the road. Use cruise control to maximize fuel economy and ensure you maintain a safe speed.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Keep-Capuchin-Monkeys-As-Pets
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How to Keep Capuchin Monkeys As Pets
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To keep a capuchin monkey as a pet, you should provide an entire bedroom or the biggest enclosure you can get as well as an outdoor section, since monkeys need lots of space to explore. However, make sure to keep it out of the kitchen, where it can burn or cut itself by accident. For a healthy diet, you should provide commercial monkey food, which includes many nutrients it needs. Also, provide a variety of nuts, fruits, and vegetables, like mangos, carrots, and sweet potatoes. Capuchin monkeys also need fresh water to stay hydrated, so try to refill its supply a few times a day. In addition to the their everyday needs, bear in mind that owning a capuchin monkey is a big commitment, since they can live to 45 years old.
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Note their natural environment. Capuchin monkeys originate from the jungles of Central and South America, where the climate tends to be warm. They live the majority of their lives in treetops, descending to the ground only for water. Think about the environment you can provide, and how closely it mimics their natural environment. Understand the lifespan of a Capuchin. Capuchins exhibit a 35-45 year lifespan in captivity. If you are adopting a Capuchin as a baby, be sure you can commit to caring for the monkey for the entirety of his lifespan. Your Capuchin can outlive you, so enact a care plan if that should occur. Be clear on social behavior. Capuchin monkeys live in social groups of 10-30 other Capuchins. Within each social group is one dominant male, who acts as the leader. Social class exists within Capuchin monkeys and affects everyday functioning of how the monkeys interact together. Class structure influences if monkeys will race to defend another or leave him be. Your Capuchin may become aggressive toward you or begin throwing feces. This may be a way he is testing social boundaries with you. Observe sexual maturity. Capuchin monkeys reach sexual maturity by age 4 or 5. Full grown Capuchin monkeys weigh between 4-15 pounds, with larger males than females. Female menstrual cycles occur every 14 to 20 days. With sexual maturity, behavior or personality changes may occur. Adolescents that were docile and cuddly may become aggressive. Observe infant behavior. Mothers give birth to one baby, with a gestation of 160 days. The baby will cling to the mother for about three months, at which point he may start to explore the environment on his own. After about 3 months, babies will start to take solid food, and are typically weaned by about 1 year of age. If receiving a baby Capuchin, do as much as you can to imitate the mothering. Capuchin babies rely heavily on their mothers for the beginning of their lives, never leaving their side. Let them cling to you and observe their surroundings while close to you. If the monkey seems scared or apprehensive, cuddle it. Introduce objects (and people) slowly and show that you are ok with them. Prepare to spend a lot of time with your Capuchin. Especially if you have an infant, you will need to spend much time with your monkey, serving as her caretaker. Nothing can replace time and attention for your monkey, as Capuchins are highly social. Interact with your Capuchin, provide cuddles, and play with toys. Make all interactions highly enjoyable for your monkey. Stop immediately and redirect to another activity if your monkey is unhappy. Provide indoor and outdoor housing. The bigger the enclosure, the better. It is best to provide an entire bedroom plus an outdoor section. The indoor section should be heated. You want your monkey to stay interested in the environment and not get bored. Be sure to include some shade when building an outdoor section. Be cautious with habitat openings. Monkeys are inherently curious. Don't let monkey boredom lead to a missing monkey. Be extra cautious to secure doors or any openings which your Capuchin can use to escape. It is not overkill to create a double door structure. Create a stimulating environment. Fill the habitat with items your monkey finds interesting. Include items such as branches, trees and bushes, platforms, swings, ponds, tires, ladders, unbreakable mirrors, baby toys and dog toys. Use non-toxic plants and trees such as bamboo, rubber tree, willow, palm or hibiscus. Avoid American oak, cedar, mistletoe, and pencil trees as these can poison your monkey. Change the environment. To avoid boredom, change the layout of the enclosure. Add new items or move items around. Buy new toys or rotate toys as to keep your monkey always interested and playing. Choose an indoor floor. The floor should clean easily, such as a drop tray, peat, straw, or wood chips in smaller cages. Larger cages can have cement or linoleum floors. Clean your monkey enclosure. Monkeys are known to throw their food, rip things up, and even fling their feces. They are not clean animals. Clean the monkey enclosure at least once each week. Consider using diapers. While they may look goofy, many monkey parents use diapers to eliminate large messes with bodily fluids. Some monkeys will throw feces if they are annoyed, bored, or upset, so using diapers can reduce these messes. Some monkey parents choose to use baby diapers (with a hole cut for the tail), while others use rags or other at-home methods. Be aware that older monkeys may start refusing to wear diapers or take them off and smear feces. There is no sure-fire way to eliminate messes. Secure acceptable areas. Many monkey parents allow the monkeys to run around their house, but make sure the house is completely secure first. Cover outlets and remove appliance cords. If your monkey contacts an electric current, it could kill your monkey. Look around and determine whether your monkey can damage any of your belongings. If so, remove them. Lock all doors that the monkey is not allowed to enter. While monkeys are often fascinated with lamps, they can be dangerous. Remove any standing lamps that can fall over. Monkeys like to place items on top of the bulbs, which can start a fire. Your monkey is capable of unscrewing lightbulbs. Ensure the kitchen is completely off limits. Your monkey can burn herself on the stove or injure herself with the knives. Lots of accidents can occur in the kitchen, and it's best to keep it off limits. Remove all other pets. You don't want a confrontation, so move any dogs, cats, birds, or other pets while your monkey plays. Place them in a secured, locked room. Provide a commercial food. Specialized monkey food exists, which you can purchase from a specialty store or on-line. These foods provide proper nutrition to your monkey. Both wet and dry food is available for purchase. Use as directed. Supplement feed with fruits and vegetables. Monkeys need to eat additional food outside of feed, such as fruits, nuts, and vegetables. Add mangos, carrots, and sweet potatoes every day at night. All foods should be cut up so that it can fit into your monkey's hands. Do not overfeed. Monkeys will tend to throw food or create a mess when provided too much food. Avoid feeding dairy, sweets, candies, or cereals as these are bad for Capuchins. Provide occasional treats. Treats do not have to be given every day. Consider a treat like raisins. Do not feed in excess of 1 teaspoon. Give fresh water every day. Monkeys will need fresh water throughout the day. Especially if your monkey splashes or creates a mess, you will need to refill the water several times each day.
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Note their natural environment. Understand the lifespan of a Capuchin. Be clear on social behavior. Observe sexual maturity. Observe infant behavior. Prepare to spend a lot of time with your Capuchin. Provide indoor and outdoor housing. Be cautious with habitat openings. Create a stimulating environment. Change the environment. Choose an indoor floor. Clean your monkey enclosure. Consider using diapers. Secure acceptable areas. Ensure the kitchen is completely off limits. Remove all other pets. Provide a commercial food. Supplement feed with fruits and vegetables. Provide occasional treats. Give fresh water every day.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Keep-Discus
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How to Keep Discus
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To keep discus, keep them in a tank that holds at least 10 gallons of water per fish. Install a heater and thermometer in the tank so you can keep the temperature between 84 and 90 degrees Fahrenheit. Also, set up a high-quality filter in the tank to keep the water clean. To feed your discus fish, give them live or frozen protein, like bloodworms and brine shrimp, 2-3 times a day. You should also supplement their diet with high-quality fish flakes so they get all of the nutrients they need.
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Provide 7–10 US gal (26–38 L) of tank space per fish. A group of 4-6 discus fish makes for a good starting point, so your aquarium should be at least 40 US gal (150 L) total. If you think you might add more discus fish in the future, go bigger—this fish thrives in roomy conditions. Larger tanks take more time, effort, and money to maintain, but consider that you may be helping to protect a rather pricey investment in discus fish. Invest in a high-quality filter. Discus fish must have clean water to thrive, so don't skimp on the filter! Make comparisons and read reviews to choose the best filter for your needs, and make sure it is capable of filtering the amount of water that's in your tank. If you have friends with discus fish, or know of any discus breeders in your area, ask them what type of filter they use. There are 3 main types of filters—chemical, mechanical, and biological—and some discus experts believe that biological filters are the best systems for discus fish. They have very porous biological filter media material with good nitrifying bacteria that remove toxins and impurities. Keep the water temperature between 84 and 90 °F (29 and 32 °C). Discus are a tropical fish, so they thrive in warmer water temperatures. Install a tank thermometer so you can keep a close eye on the temperature, and add a high-quality aquarium heater in order to maintain the ideal temperature range at all times. Check the temperature several times per day. If the water temperature goes above or (especially) below the ideal range for even a few hours, the discus fish may begin to suffer negative health impacts. Maintain the water pH between 5.5 and 6.5. Discus fish are sensitive to water acidity as well as temperature, so regularly check the water pH to make sure it's within the ideal range. Use a digital, chemical, or litmus strip tester to check the pH at least twice per week. Add pH-raising or lowering solutions as needed. You can buy pH-raising (baking soda based) and pH-lowering (muriatic acid based) solutions at pet supply retailers. Add an overhead light to the tank. Discus fish can be quite skittish, and even shadows cast by external light sources can bother them. Install an overhead aquarium light to limit shadows—and to showcase your beautiful fish! Ideally, the aquarium should be kept away from windows, TVs, and other sources of strong and/or intermittent sources of exterior lighting. Include lots of foliage and hiding spots (option 1). Discus fish are adapted to swim through foliage, and like hiding under logs, rocks, and plants. As they are originally from the Amazon, adding long stem plants and lower foreground plants will make them feel more comfortable. It'll also soften the water and lower the pH level. You can add natural or artificial hiding spots as well. Natural aquarium pebbles can make a good substrate for a discus fish tank. Provide an undecorated tank to keep the water cleaner (option 2). Despite the breed's natural inclination toward ample foliage and hiding spots, some discus fish keepers believe the tank should be kept bare in order to maintain cleanliness. And, true enough, if you only have fish and water in the tank, it is easier to maintain optimal aquarium conditions. Unadorned tanks also further highlight the beautiful shapes and colors of discus fish. You'll have to decide whether it's worth more cleaning and maintenance to provide an aquarium that more closely resembles their natural habitat. Change 20-30% of the water weekly. No matter how well your filter works, it's important to change out a portion of the tank water on a regular basis. This is the only way to ensure the pristine water conditions that discus fish require. Changing the tank water properly can be a bit time-consuming, but it's time well-spent if you value the health of your discus fish. Don't change more than 30% of the total volume of the tank water at a time—a greater change can be too much of a shock for sensitive discus fish. Use live or frozen proteins for 50%-plus of the discus’ diet. At least half of a discus fish diet should be comprised of live or frozen proteins, such as bloodworms, brine shrimp, and fine pieces of beef heart. Beef heart can be purchased frozen from fish supply retailers. You can also purchase bloodworms and brine shrimp either live or frozen. Discus fish often prefer live bloodworms and brine shrimp, but these are more likely to carry parasites or bacteria. To reduce this possibility, buy high-quality worms and shrimp from a reputable vendor. Otherwise, use frozen worms and shrimp. Rotate among the proteins you use in order to maintain some variety in the diet. Supplement live or frozen proteins with high-quality flake fish food. While the live or frozen proteins should make up the majority of the discus' diet, flakes offer some variety as well as supplemental nutritional value. You can add some flakes with each feeding, or use them as a more occasional change-of-pace. Choose high-quality fish flakes, since these typically have a better nutritional profile. Ask your vet or other fish owners for recommendations. Feed discus 2-3 times daily, in a calm setting and on a regular schedule. Discus fish prefer consistent timing and limited distractions during feeding times. Feed the fish around the same times each day, and prevent distractions such as a loud TV or rowdy kids playing in the room. Juvenile discus fish should eat 3 times per day, while adults should be feed 2 times daily. Remove uneaten food right away to keep the water clean. When it comes to the amount of food to offer, aim to give enough for the fish to finish in 10-15 minutes. If there is any food left after 15 minutes, use a net to remove it from the tank. This will help keep the water cleaner for longer. If all the food is eaten in 5-10 minutes, offer more per feeding. If there is quite a bit left over after 15 minutes, reduce the amount offered. Note any changes in their eating or defecation habits. Because discus fish thrive under a consistent routine, any changes should be carefully noted. If a fish is eating substantially less than usual, for example, this could be a sign of illness. Likewise, if the amount or appearance of the feces they produce changes, don't ignore it. Contact a vet with experience dealing with tropical fish if you have concerns about the health of your discus fish. Quarantine new fish in a separate tank for 2-4 weeks. New fish should always be quarantined before you add them to your main aquarium, and this is particularly important for the sensitive discus fish. Observe the new fish in the quarantine tank for at least 2 weeks, and ideally 4 weeks, before moving them to the main tank. If the new fish show any signs of illness, do not move them into the main tank. The quarantine tank can be a bit smaller than the main tank, but it should be set up in the same manner. The more similar the tanks are, the easier the transition will be. Watch for signs of “discus plague” or other illnesses. Discuss fish are very susceptible to this somewhat mysterious illness, which is hard to eradicate and often fatal. To identify “discus plague,” look for a darkening of body color, clamping fins, lethargy, a refusal to eat, or other unexplained physical or behavioral changes. You can try quarantining a fish that displays potential symptoms, but it's hard to prevent the spread of illnesses like “discus plague.” If you suspect a problem, contact a vet quickly. Keep at least 4-6 discus in your main tank whenever possible. As a shoaling species that naturally congregates in groups, discus are not suited to solitary living. You should keep a minimum group of 4-6 discus in your main tank, and add more discus in groups of 4-6 as well. So, instead of adding 1 or 2 new discus to your aquarium at a time (after quarantine), try adding them in groups of 4-6. Make sure you have sufficient tank space, however—you'll need at least a 70 US gal (260 L) tank for 10 discus fish. Discus usually get along well, but you may run into instances of aggression and territoriality. In this case, you may need to separate the fish into different aquariums. Consider adding tetras as aquarium companions. If you'd like to add some fish variety to your discus aquarium, consider adding 6 or more cardinal or bleeding heart tetras. Both of these tetra varieties tend to get along well with discus fish. You won't need a larger tank to add 6-12 tetras. You may want to increase the tank size by 10 US gal (38 L) for larger numbers of tetras, though. As with any other fish, quarantine tetras before adding them to the main tank. Try your hand at breeding discus fish. If you keep both males and females in a clean, well-maintained tank, there's a good chance you'll eventually see tiny discus eggs in the aquarium. If you want to increase your number of discus, you can choose to keep the hatchlings with their parents or isolate them in a separate tank. If you keep the hatchlings in the main tank, there isn't much you need to change from your typical routine. You'll likely lose a greater number of hatchlings through cannibalism this way, however. To isolate the hatchlings, you'll either have to move the eggs to a separate tank, or temporarily relocate the adult discus. In either case, the secondary tank should be prepared to the same standards as the main tank.
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Provide 7–10 US gal (26–38 L) of tank space per fish. Invest in a high-quality filter. Keep the water temperature between 84 and 90 °F (29 and 32 °C). Maintain the water pH between 5.5 and 6.5. Add an overhead light to the tank. Include lots of foliage and hiding spots (option 1). Provide an undecorated tank to keep the water cleaner (option 2). Change 20-30% of the water weekly. Use live or frozen proteins for 50%-plus of the discus’ diet. Supplement live or frozen proteins with high-quality flake fish food. Feed discus 2-3 times daily, in a calm setting and on a regular schedule. Remove uneaten food right away to keep the water clean. Note any changes in their eating or defecation habits. Quarantine new fish in a separate tank for 2-4 weeks. Watch for signs of “discus plague” or other illnesses. Keep at least 4-6 discus in your main tank whenever possible. Consider adding tetras as aquarium companions. Try your hand at breeding discus fish.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Wear-a-Hat
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How to Wear a Hat
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To wear a hat, try to choose one that matches your proportions. For example, if you're petite, an over-sized or wide-brimmed hat may take over your entire look. Similarly, pick a hat style that flatters the shape of your face and skin tone. Also, evaluate what you're wearing and select a hat that unifies the outfit and complements the overall style you're going for.
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Wear a cloche hat. Cloche hats, or "flapper hats," are made either with or without brims. Try out a newsboy hat. Also called "paperboy hats," these hipster hats look great with both casual and professional wear. Put on a giant sun hat. These hats have floppy brims are are great to wear during the daylight hours. If you're wearing this type of hat in winter, choose a sun hat made of felt. Wear a Victorian top hat. These hats are great with any outfit and are a great touch for a steampunk ensemble. Just keep the outfit simple since these hats are pretty elaborate. Don a pork pie hat. Pork pie hats were invented in the Victorian period. Although they were traditionally worn by men, they look great on women as well. Deck yourself out in a beret. Knit and wool berets are great for the cooler seasons. Flaunt a fedora. These hats were also originally designed for men, but they look great with a woman's suit or even with girly dresses. Wear a flat cap. These hats look great with a suit or when you're wearing a large overcoat or trench coat. Put on a fedora. Humphrey Bogart and Frank Sinatra will have nothing on you when you put on your own fedora with either formal wear or business suits. However, fedoras are so versatile that you can also wear them with a polo shirt or T-shirt. Try out a homburg. You've seen this hat in the Godfather movies, and lately you've seen it resurrected by Tupac and Snoop Dogg. Whether you're going for gangster or don, you'll look great in your homburg hat. Put on a pork pie hat. These hats were invented in the Victorian era for men and were named for their resemblance to a pork pie dish. Think Gene Hackman in The French Connection. Go with a bowler hat. Think of Charlie Chaplin or an old 19th century New York City gangster. This hat looks great with a suit or with a nice shirt and a vest. Pick a hat that matches your proportions. If you're petite, a huge wide-brimmed hat could totally overwhelm you. Instead of using size to make a visual statement, choose a hat with bold colors or vibrant trim instead. Select a hat that flatters your hairstyle. You can wear a small hat to one side and twist a chignon on the opposite side. This effect also makes your neck appear longer. Wear a hat that complements the shape of your face. If your face is round, choose a hat that has a broad brim to balance out the fullness of your face. If your face is long, choose a softer design or something with movement, like feathers. For a square-shaped face, choose an asymmetrical hat to balance the angle of your jawline. People with heart-shaped faces are the luckiest. They can carry off almost any type of hat. Choose colors that flatter your skin tone. If you have a bold hat, tone down your makeup so that you don't look clownish. Connect your hat to your outfit. If you're wearing a dress with a peacock pattern, then try a hat with a jaunty peacock feather to unify the outfit. However, if your hat is bold, tone down accessories like jewelry so that you don't look garish. Secure your hat to your head. This advice may sound obvious, but the last thing you want to do is to spend your entire day clutching your hat against your head. Use thin elastic bands, ribbons or combs to make sure that your hat stays in place.
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Wear a cloche hat. Try out a newsboy hat. Put on a giant sun hat. Wear a Victorian top hat. Don a pork pie hat. Deck yourself out in a beret. Flaunt a fedora. Wear a flat cap. Put on a fedora. Try out a homburg. Put on a pork pie hat. Go with a bowler hat. Pick a hat that matches your proportions. Select a hat that flatters your hairstyle. Wear a hat that complements the shape of your face. Choose colors that flatter your skin tone. Connect your hat to your outfit. Secure your hat to your head.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Foaming-Hand-Soap
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How to Make Foaming Hand Soap
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To make foaming hand soap, buy or recycle an empty bottle with a dispenser pump and fill it a third of the way up with tap water. Next, add an equal amount of gel hand soap to the water, hold your hand over the open mouth of the bottle, and shake the ingredients thoroughly until they're fully incorporated. Then, tighten the pump back onto the bottle before using your foaming hand soap.
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Buy or recycle an empty bottle with a dispenser pump. Plastic and glass bottles can be acquired cheaply in most supermarket and online. If you want to make a good gesture for the environment or save money, you can clean and recycle an old bottle with dispenser instead of buying a new one. Choose a sturdy and aesthetically pleasing bottle. Remember that you want to use it for a long period of time. If possible, test a few bottles. Make sure that the pump works well and look for a sturdy bottle which can survive a fall on the floor. Buy the right bottle of gel soap refill. Washing your hands can damage the skin. If you suffer from hand dryness, irritation, itching or cracks, look for hypoallergenic or scent-free soap. Examine the label. The most common allergic reactions are caused by the following ingredients: QAC, iodine, iodophors, chlorhexidine, triclosan, chloroxylenol and alcohols. Look for a soap with moisturizer to protect the skin of your hands. Mix the ingredients. Pour tap water into your empty hand soap bottle until it is one third of the way full and then add the gel soap refill until another third of the space is filled. Shake well to mix the gel and the water until they form a liquid. Tighten the pump back onto the hand soap bottle. Add the water first. If you don't, the water will make the soap foam up. Do not fill the bottle beyond two thirds of the way. If you do, the bottle will overflow when you screw the cap back on. If the dispenser pump is not springing back to the up position, rub a bit of petroleum jelly on the dispenser stem to get it freely moving again. The mixture must be diluted enough to flow through the pump. If the dispenser is clogged, clean it and add more water to the mixture. Buy the right ingredients. In addition to an empty bottle with a dispenser pump, you will need liquid scent-free soap and perfumed essential oils. Essential oils will determine the color and the scent of your foaming hand soap and are believed to have various health properties. Make sure to use a scent-free soap. Otherwise, the soap will overpower the subtle smell of the essential oils. Essential oils can be found in most supermarkets and health shops. There is a large range of colors and scent, such as orange, rosemary, violet, and many more. Aromatherapy claims that essential oils have many health benefits. While some are true, many others are largely exaggerated. Prepare the room in which you will make your soap. Cover the surface on which you will work with a plastic tablecloth and be sure to have a tap in the room. Wear an apron to avoid staining your clothes and use gloves if you have sensitive hands. Keep a kitchen roll handy in case water spills on the table or on the floor. Be particularly careful with essential oils. They stain easily and are very hard to remove. Mix the ingredients. Pour the tap water into your empty hand soap bottle until it is one third of the way full and then add the gel soap refill until another third of the space is filled. Add a teaspoon of essential oil and mix until the ingredients form a homogeneous liquid. Tighten the pump back onto the hand soap bottle. If the scent is not strong enough, add another teaspoon of essential oils. Don't add too much at once as essential oils are both powerful and expensive. You can also modify the color by adding food coloring. Always use natural coloring to avoid chemicals.
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Buy or recycle an empty bottle with a dispenser pump. Buy the right bottle of gel soap refill. Mix the ingredients. Buy the right ingredients. Prepare the room in which you will make your soap. Mix the ingredients.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Eye-Contact-With-a-Girl
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How to Make Eye Contact With a Girl
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To make eye contact with girls easier, practice by making eye contact with your friends, and even with strangers. Start out by looking at the top of someone's nose, right between their eyes, and maintaining “eye contact” for 2-3 seconds. Once you've gotten the hang of it, try direct eye contact. Then, when you see a girl you're interested in talking to, glance casually in her direction a couple of times to see if you catch her looking back. If she looks your way, smile gently, and hold the eye contact until she looks away.
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Find someone you may be interested in meeting. This can be anywhere... a book store, bar, restaurant, shopping center, etc. If you find someone at a place you visit frequently, chances are you may have something in common. Something to talk about, perhaps. Relax. Narrow and tense eye's tend to convey a negative or angry disposition, so do your best to maintain your calm. A calm demeanor will put people at ease and make them feel more comfortable speaking with you. Glance casually in her direction. Every so often, gaze over at her. Does she seem to be trying to make eye contact with you? Don't stare. Staring at people is not only rude, but it also makes people feel very uncomfortable. If you don't catch her eye, she may be uninterested or preoccupied. Even worse, you may be offended that you are staring. If someone is unwilling to make eye contact with you, or seems to be avoiding it, this may be an indicator that she is not interested in speaking or meeting you. Meet her gaze with a smile. If the two of you make eye-contact, be sure to relax and smile. Again, an easy smile will make people feel more comfortable. Avoid examining her. Looking intensely at a person--even when eye contact has been established--can be rude and intimidating, even demeaning. Try to read her facial expression. Although this is highly subjective and is in now way a perfect science, do your best to interpret any expression she may have made. Did she return the smile? Or, did she politely nod? A smile may be an indicator of interest, while a nod just the opposite. Blinking or batting of the eyes can also be an indicator of interest. Did she raise her eyebrows? This can be a way of saying hello or communicating further interest. Were her eyes wide open? This can be a way of communicating happiness or joy, even a feeling of ease. Did she seem to be lowering her chin, appearing to be looking up at you? This too can be a sign that she may be interested in meeting you. Let her be the first to break eye contact. Don't look away until she does. This will communicate that you are interested in speaking to her. The longer she maintains eye contact, the more likely it is that she may be interested in meeting you. Continue to look. After she breaks eye contact with you, continue looking in her general direction for another second or two. If she looks back, make eye contact with her once again and smile. If she looks back, it may be an indicator that she is interested in meeting and/or speaking to you. Relax. Although it can be very intimidating to make eye contact with someone you don't know, you need to do your best to maintain a calm demeanor. Nobody likes being looked-at with nervous, intense, or over-anxious eyes. The person you may wish to make eye contact with may be nervous as well. If you maintain a calm demeanor, you might be able to make them feel more at ease. Intense or anxious stares may suggest hostility or anger--the opposite of what you are trying to convey. Practice your smile in the mirror. This may sound silly, but if you aren't in the practice of making eye contact with people, then you might not be in the practice of producing a gentle gaze or smile. You may not actually be "staring" at someone, but the look on your face may suggest otherwise. This can make people feel very uneasy. Being stared at makes people feel uncomfortable and will make them want to avoid eye contact. Be sure to avoid making facial expressions that would suggest you are examining or critiquing a person. Practicing your smile in the mirror will also help you get over any feeling of intimidation of shyness that you may experience when making direct eye contact. Look at portraits of people. Get used to making direct eye contact by practicing on a few portraits. This may feel awkward at first, but that is the point. You want to continue to work through any feeling of awkwardness that you may experience while looking people in the eye. You can even do this while flipping through magazines or while browsing the internet. Practice making eye contact with the television. As you watch your favorite television show, practice making direct eye contact with the characters as if they are real people speaking directly to you. Follow their eyes as they move around the screen. Go see a public speaker. It is a lot easier to make and maintain eye contact with an individual when you are listening instead of speaking. Furthermore, being part of a group may help alleviate any anxiety. Practice making eye contact with someone delivering a speech or public address. Even when the speaker is not looking at you directly, practice looking at their eyes. Engage in short conversations with people you don't know. Maintaining eye contact for a long period of time can be uncomfortable or difficult, so start with short conversations with the grocery clerk, your neighbor, even a co-worker. The point is not to engage in a deep or meaningful conversation, but to practice making eye contact with a real person for short periods of time. As you feel more-and-more comfortable, try increasing the length of the discussions. Look your friends in the eye when conversing. Practice looking your friends or people that you feel comfortable with in the eyes. Make this a priority when you are speaking to your friends and family. In some cases, it may be easier for you to look at another spot on the person's face. If you pick a spot close enough to the eye they will not be able to notice that you are not looking at them directly. Take a test or survey. If making eye contact with a person continues to be a difficult task, you may want to consider taking a preliminary test to see if you may have social anxiety disorder. Social anxiety disorders can be identified as an extreme and constant fear of being judged, scrutinized, or critiqued. This could be the cause of your fear of making eye contact.
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Find someone you may be interested in meeting. Relax. Glance casually in her direction. Don't stare. Meet her gaze with a smile. Avoid examining her. Try to read her facial expression. Let her be the first to break eye contact. Continue to look. Relax. Practice your smile in the mirror. Look at portraits of people. Practice making eye contact with the television. Go see a public speaker. Engage in short conversations with people you don't know. Look your friends in the eye when conversing. Take a test or survey.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Choose-the-Right-Lipstick-for-You
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How to Choose the Right Lipstick for You
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To choose the right lipstick for you, start by finding a color that is 1 or 2 shades deeper than your natural lip color. You can test this by applying the lipstick to your lower lip and comparing the shade to your upper lip. If you have light skin, choose pinks, corals, or beige colors, and if you have medium skin, try rose or berry shades. For deep complexions, select browns or purples like caramel or plum. Additionally, choose darker, matte lipsticks to make your lips appear small, or lighter, shimmery shades if you want fuller lips.
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Examine your skin in natural lighting to determine your complexion: fair, light, medium, tan, deep. Concentrate on the skin around your jaw line. Fair skin: your skin is very pale or translucent and you burn very easily. You may have freckles and some redness. Light skin: your skin is pale. When you are in the sun, you burn and then may possibly tan. Medium: you tan easily and generally don't burn or have sensitive skin. Tan: your skin is tan or olive. You rarely burn and look tanned even in the winter. Deep: your skin is dark and you never get sunburned. Your hair is possibly black or dark brown. Look at the color of the veins on the inside of your wrist. This is a quick way to figure out if you have a warm, neutral, or cool skin tone. Blue or purple veins indicate you have a cool skin tone. Green veins mean you have a warm skin tone. If you have difficulty deciding if your veins are blue or green, you likely have a neutral skin tone and can choose colors from both the cool and warm spectrum. People with olive skin usually have neutral undertones. Notice how your skin reacts to the sun: do you tan or burn easily? Skin that tans easily has more melanin indicates a warm skin tone. Most women of African, Caribbean, and Indian descent fall into this category. If you burn before you tan (and maybe can't tan at all), then your skin has less melanin and you have a blue skin tone. If you have deep ebony skin, you may actually fall into this category. Try on gold and silver jewelry. Which looks better? Gold jewelry looks best with warm skin tones. Silver jewelry looks best on cool skin tones. Both look good on a more neutral skin tone. This can be a good "tie breaker" if you don't clearly meet the criteria listed already. Find a color that is one to two shades deeper than your natural lip color. To test how close the shade is to your natural color, apply the lipstick only to your lower lip. Compare that shade to the your upper lip. If the shades are drastically different, you need to keep looking. Decide if you want your lips to look smaller or larger. Dark shades will actually make your lips look smaller, while lighter shades can add plumpness. Lipstick with a matte finish can also cause lips to look thinner, while glosses and shimmery shades can make them look fuller. Determine your undertone and complexion. Remember that your undertone and complexion will help guide you, but they aren't the be-all-end-all of choosing a lipstick color. It is important to try on different shades and, ultimately, choose what you feel looks best. Experiment with shades that experts recommend for your complexion and skin tone. If you have fair or light skin, try light pink, coral, peach, nudes, or beige. If you have cool undertones, try a soft mocha and nude. Warm undertones, try pale pinks or a nude with a little peach. If you have medium skin, try rose, mauve, or berry shades. Cool undertones: try shades of pink or cranberry. Warm undertones: experiment with copper or bronze. If you have tan skin, try to avoid browns and purples and go for colors with an orange undertone. Most other colors will look great. Try coral, or deep pink. If you have a deep complexion, try browns or purples like walnut, caramel, plum, or wine. Cool undertones should look for ruby and wine-colored reds. Warm undertones: try copper or bronze. Keep it subtle. Unless you're feeling like making a statement with bold lips (which is totally fine!), apply strong shades to your lower lip only. Press your lips together, then use your finger to even out the color. Find the right color for your skin tone. Again, use your skin tone and complexion as a guide--if you find a color you love that breaks the "rules"--go for it! Fair or light skin should look for dusty, pinkish red or coral. Cool undertones: raspberry. Warm tones: try reds with a blue undertone or coral. Tan or medium skin should look for bright red cherry red, or true red with no undertone (if you have a neutral undertone). Warm undertones: orangey-red or tangerine. Cool undertones: wine. Deep skin with warm undertones should try blue-based red. Cool: Metallic ruby red or deep wine. Wear red with pride. This is a classic look that any woman can pull off, regardless of age, skin, hair, eye, or lip color. Own it! Try the lipstick on before you buy it. Clean the tester with a little alcohol (the store should provide this in a spray bottle) and use a test brush or a cotton swab to apply the color to your lips. If you don't want to apply the tester lipstick to your mouth, test it on the pads of your fingertips. Your fingertips are closer to your lip color than your wrist or the side of your hand. Remove one lip color completely before trying on the next. Otherwise, you will be mixing multiple colors together. Ask a sales rep for makeup remover or lotion. Make sure you are in a well-lit area. Try on lipstick with little or no other makeup on your face. Look for a shade that, worn with no other make up, brightens your face and makes other makeup unnecessary. Ask for help at the makeup counter. Sometimes it's hard to objectively judge what looks best on ourselves. A professional at the makeup counter can match you with the right color. Don’t match a lip color too closely with your clothing. For example, if you are wearing a fire-engine red dress, wearing the same exact color on your lips will look overwhelming. Have fun and experiment, but consider these guidelines if you're not sure: Nude lips look great with just about anything. It's a great casual look and can help play up dramatic eyes. Red can add drama to a fairly plain outfit. Try not to overwhelm by wearing red with very bright clothing or clothes with crazy patterns. Pink is versatile because there are so many shades. Pinks that are just a few shades brighter than your natural lip color work for a subtle, everyday look. Berries can make a dark ensemble seem sombre and can weigh down an airy, summery look. Try matching berries with mixed neutrals. Go for dramatic lips or eyes; not both. Stick to just mascara on the eyes, or just a bit of dark brown eyeliner in between your lashes.
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Examine your skin in natural lighting to determine your complexion: Look at the color of the veins on the inside of your wrist. Notice how your skin reacts to the sun: Try on gold and silver jewelry. Find a color that is one to two shades deeper than your natural lip color. Decide if you want your lips to look smaller or larger. Determine your undertone and complexion. Experiment with shades that experts recommend for your complexion and skin tone. Keep it subtle. Find the right color for your skin tone. Wear red with pride. Try the lipstick on before you buy it. Remove one lip color completely before trying on the next. Make sure you are in a well-lit area. Try on lipstick with little or no other makeup on your face. Ask for help at the makeup counter. Don’t match a lip color too closely with your clothing. Have fun and experiment, but consider these guidelines if you're not sure: Go for dramatic lips or eyes; not both.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Shave-a-Cat
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How to Shave a Cat
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To shave your cat, first find someone to help you, which will make the process a lot easier. Have your partner gently hold your cat down so you don't have to worry about it running off. Then, pull your cat's skin taut and gently shave off the fur in that area with clippers. Shave in the direction the fur grows in and don't push down on the clippers or you could hurt your cat. Avoid shaving sensitive areas like the face and legs, which are more prone to nicks and cuts.
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Decide whether you should shave your cat. When your cat's hair is matted, shaving him is an option. Severe matting can cause discoloration and scarring on your cat's skin. Afterwards, put your cat on a regular grooming schedule. Other reasons for shaving your cat include cat allergies, hairballs, dirty bottoms, and excessive shedding. In these cases, you can reduce the fur's thickness by thinning it. Generally, it is best to avoid unneeded shaving. Your cat's coat is designed to keep him cool in the summer and warm during the winter. If you shave too much of your cat's hair, you will interfere with your cat's temperature regulation. If you have a long-haired cat, consider brushing her to keep her cool instead. Not all cats should be shaved. Highly aggressive, elderly, or ill cats can become stressed or nicked during shaving. Consider visiting a pet groomer. Check local prices and locations. Pet groomers are trained to treat your pet's hair. Although it is more expensive than shaving your cat at home, it might be worth it. Groomers are less likely to accidentally nick your cat. They also know how to keep pets calm during the grooming process. Prices vary depending on what service you need. If you want basic grooming (rather than a full shave), the cost will be lower. Cats have thin and delicate skin that you can easily cut with clippers, so it's best for professionals to shave them. Check with your veterinarian. To be safe, check with your vet before shaving your cat. If your cat's fur has a tangle, your vet might prefer to remove it herself. Additionally, your vet might advise you not to shave your cat or to only do it during certain seasons. She also might have recommendations for groomers or tools. Gather needed supplies. If you decide to shave your cat at home, being prepared will make the process easier. Collect rubber gloves (to prevent scratching), towels, a brush, treats, appropriate clippers, and a #10 blade.You can purchase a pet hair clipper from your local pet store or online. Be sure to purchase a tool designed for small animals rather than for humans. Do not use a razor blade. Find a partner. Shaving your cat on your own would be very difficult. It is best to find someone who can hold the cat while you shave your pet. Try to find someone who already knows your cat, like your partner, child, or close neighbor. Your cat will trust these people more than a stranger. Train your cat to associate grooming with positive things like petting and rewards. Show her the tools you will use and then give her a treat, praise or pet her. When starting a grooming session, have your helper pet the cat first on the grooming table so that your cat becomes calm. After your cat is purring, have your helper gently hold the cat in place with two hands. There might be moments, like when you are working in the tail area, when your helper will need to hold the cat in her arms. Pick a location. Decide where you want to shave your cat. There likely will be hair all over, so keep that in mind. Aim for a site with tile or wood flooring rather than carpet. A kitchen or bathroom would work well. Shaving your cat in a familiar environment can help keep your cat calm. Find a table that you can use where you can place your cat. Pick a table that you don't mind accidentally being scratched or made dirty. Brush your cat. It is a good idea to clean your cat's hair before shaving her. Brushing your cat's hair will remove dirt, spread natural oils throughout her coat, prevent tangles, and keep her skin clean and irritant-free. If your cat has short hair, you only need to brush her once a week. If she has long hair, you should brush her every week. To brush your cat, follow these steps: Use a metal comb. Comb her fur from head to tail. Start with her belly and legs. Be gentle near her chest and belly areas. Untangle any knots. Use a bristle or rubber brush to remove dead and loose hair. Brush her in an upward motion. Brush her tail by parting it down the middle and brushing the fur to either side. Choose a grooming style. There are multiple ways to shave your cat. It is best to have a plan in mind before beginning to shave your cat. Consider the reasons (e.g. hygiene, age, hair length, etc.) for shaving your cat before choosing a style. The sanitary or hygiene cut frees the anus area for easier cleaning. The belly shave removes hair on the belly where matting often occurs. The comb cut removes some but not all hair and essentially thins the hair. It is effective for reducing shedding. A popular grooming style that reduces shedding is the lion cut. With the lion cut, your cat retains hair on her face but loses the rest of her hair. Keep your clippers cool. Make sure you do not shave your cat for too long with electric clippers. They will get hot. Take frequent breaks to let them cool. Your cat's skin is very sensitive, which is another reason to watch the heat of the clippers. Consider using lubricant to aid shaving. Pull the skin taut. When shaving your cat, be sure to stretch the skin enough so you do not nick your cat. Be sure you have calmed your cat sufficiently before trying this step. Having another person to help with this step is also a good idea. Move your clippers properly. Have your clippers proceed in the direction of the lie of the fur. Aim to skim the clippers over the surface. Avoid applying downward pressure to the clippers as this is more likely to abrade the skin and cause clipper-rash --- a painful condition which causes the cat to lick to try and settle the inflammation and usually causes infection. Shaving against the lie of the fur increases the risk that you will snag your cat's skin. Do not shave too close. To give your cat's coat enough protection from the sun and cold nights, leave one inch (2.54 cm) of hair. Too close of shaves can result in guard hair being embedded under the skin. This can lead to irregular hair growth and skin problems. Avoid high risk areas. Do not shave further down the legs and paws where skin, ligaments, and tendons are sensitive to nicking. Do not shave any whiskers (including by the muzzle, above the eyes, and the backside of front paws). If your cat appears particularly agitated while you are shaving near a sensitive area, stop immediately. Perform the sanitary or hygiene cut. This cut is appropriate for long hair and overweight cats. The sanitary or hygiene cut is purely functional. It helps keep your cat's fur clear of waste that sticks to him after litter box use. Complete this cut every six weeks. Use a cat clipper with a #10 blade. Hold your cat still. Trim the hair around the anus. Be careful not to nick your cat. Give your cat a belly shave. Appropriate for long haired cats, the belly shave removes most of the hair underneath your cat. This cut is an extension of the sanitary cut. It makes it easier for your cat to clean himself. A belly shave prevents matting and excessive shedding. You cannot see a belly shave when your cat is walking. Use an appropriate cat fur clipper. Pull the skin taut. Shave under the tail and around the rectum. Shave between the rear legs. Shave up the belly area to the armpits of the front legs. Try the comb cut. This trim leaves approximately 1/2″ to 1″ (approximately 1 to 2.5 cm) of hair on the cat's body. You trim the hair short but do not shave it completely. Cats may not have matting for this cut. The comb cut reduces shedding and hairballs. It also makes it easier for you to inspect your cat's body for skin-related issues. Attach a snap-on comb to your clippers. Start clipping behind the ears. Clip your cat's back to the base of its tail. Clip down the shoulders and the sides of your cat. Turn the cat on its side. Clip the cat's belly. Clip the cat's legs. Shave the back. Start near the base of the tail on your cat's back. Use a #10 blade clipper and shave against the growth of the hair. Shave up the back toward your cat's head. Shave the chest. Work down to your cat's belly. First, shave with the hair growth so you can remove most of the hair and see better. Then, reverse the clipper's direction and shave upward to get a smooth finish. Decide which tail cut you would like. For the lion cut, there are two primary tail cuts: the full tail or the pom-pom tail. The pom-pom tail looks like it has a fluffy ball on the end. The style you choose depends on your personal preferences. Here are steps on how to complete each cut: For a full tail, move the clippers down to the tail's base to create a line. Reverse the clippers to shave upward and provide a clean finish that will blend into your cat's back. Shave to the underside of the tail. Keep the line even all the way around. For a pom-pom tail, hold two to three inches (approximately 5 to 7.5 cm) of your cat's tail in one hand. With the other hand, shave down the tail toward the pom. Use the clipper blade to create a pom line similar to the line created for a full tail. Then reverse the clippers. Shave upwards toward the body. Shave all sides of the tail until the finish is smooth and even. Shave the front legs and armpits. Fully extend the legs. Pull the loose skin of the armpit taut to prevent nicks or cuts. Shave up and over the elbow approximately one inch. Using the bare line underneath the arm, work toward the front and even up all sides. Again, use the clippers to shave with the growth to create a line. Reverse the clippers then and shave against the growth to smoothen the finish and define the line. Shave the rear legs. First, extend the rear legs. Shave downward to remove the bulk of hair and gain visibility. Next, shave upwards against the growth. Shave until just above your cat's ankle joint. Groom the neckline. Pull the ruff forward and start shaving at the back of the neck. Pull the skin taut and back. Work forward with the clippers against the growth. Imagine your cat is wearing a collar. Use the natural collar line as the guide. Once the lines become even at the back of the neck, move to the front of the cat's chin. Shave upward to her natural collar line. Then work around both sides of the neck to blend the front and back lines together, keeping with the natural collar line. Bathe your cat. After you finish these steps, give your cat a degreasing bath. Use a shampoo appropriate for cats. You can purchase these shampoos online or at your local pet store. If your cat has sensitive skin, your vet might have a shampoo recommendation. Follow these steps: Place a rubber bath mat in a sink or tub to provide secure footing for your cat. Fill the tub with three to four inches of lukewarm water. Place your cat in the tub. Use a spray hose to thoroughly wet your cat. Do not spray her directly in her ears, eyes, or nose. A large plastic pitcher or unbreakable cup will work in lieu of a spray hose. Gently massage your cat with shampoo. Work from head to tail. Thoroughly rinse your cat with the spray hose. Avoid the ears, eyes, and nose again. Dry your cat with a large towel. Blow dry. After you have bathed your cat, blow dry her. Use the "cool" setting so that you do not harm her skin. Smooth any rough spots on her hair. Make sure the hair is well-blended and very smooth. Apply sunscreen. Your cat's fur helps prevent skin cancer by blocking harmful UV rays. When you shave your cat, he loses some of that protection. Be sure to apply pet-specific sunscreen to prevent sunburn and skin cancer. You can purchase sunscreen online at retailers like Amazon or in your local pet shops.
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Decide whether you should shave your cat. Consider visiting a pet groomer. Check with your veterinarian. Gather needed supplies. Find a partner. Pick a location. Brush your cat. Choose a grooming style. Keep your clippers cool. Pull the skin taut. Move your clippers properly. Do not shave too close. Avoid high risk areas. Perform the sanitary or hygiene cut. Give your cat a belly shave. Try the comb cut. Shave the back. Shave the chest. Decide which tail cut you would like. Shave the front legs and armpits. Shave the rear legs. Groom the neckline. Bathe your cat. Blow dry. Apply sunscreen.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Defend-Yourself-from-Bullies
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How to Defend Yourself from Bullies
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The best way to defend yourself from bullies is to just ignore them and walk away, even if it seems hard to do at first. If you can't avoid them, use your words to respond to them kindly, calmly, and confidently. For example, if a bully says something mean to you, you can smile and say, "Hey, see you later!" If the bullying doesn't stop or gets worse, let an adult like your parent or teacher know what's going on so they can help. You're not being a tattletale if you tell an adult —you're doing the right thing!
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Ignore the bully if you’re able to. Bullies mainly say or do things to make the other person upset, so make it seem like their comments don't bother you. Rather than engaging with your bully, try looking in a different direction or continuing with your day as normal. Pretend that the bully isn't there and act like you can't hear them so it seems like you don't care what they say about you. For example, if you're near your locker at school and a bully comes up to you, grab your things as quickly as you can and walk the other direction. Sometimes, bullies may try to step in your way or cut you off if you keep ignoring them. If they start getting angry, you may need to confront them. Tell the bully to stop in a loud voice to appear more confident. If the bully keeps making comments and won't leave you alone when you ignore them, turn toward them and make eye contact with them. Loudly say “Stop!” or “Please don't!” to quiet them down. Not only will you sound more confident, but other people around you may notice and your bully may want stop due to the unwanted attention. Avoid yelling or raising your voice too loudly since your bully may notice that you're still getting angered by them. If your bully is still being persistent, you can try saying something like, “I asked you to stop, so please stop.” Walk away afterward so your bully doesn't have time to respond. Keep a straight face so the bully doesn’t see you get emotional. Bullies will usually keep picking on you if you notice that you're getting upset or afraid of them. Do your best to hide your emotions while you're interacting with your bully, or else they may start picking on you more. If you feel like you're getting upset, take deep breaths while they're talking to you so you can stay calm. Once you're away from your bully, it's okay to get emotional and react to what they said. Don't try to suppress how you feel for a long time or else it could lower your self-esteem and confidence. Talk to the bully without anger or fear. If you need to interact with your bully, try to talk in a firm, assertive voice to show that you don't care about what comments they're making. Maintain eye contact with them and stand with good posture to boost your confidence while talking to them. After a few interactions, they won't want to bully you since you aren't reacting to them. For example you may say, “I don't like what you're saying about me, and I would like you to stop.” Agree with the bully to take power away from them. Sometimes, agreeing with a comment a bully says takes away their power over you. When your bully says a minor comment or tries to belittle you, “own” the comment and tell them that they're right. Mention how the comment doesn't bother you because it's true before asking them to stop or go away. For example, if your bully calls you a nerd, you can say, “That's right, I am a nerd and I'm proud of it. Now please leave me alone.” You don't actually need to agree with what the bully says, but saying that you agree can help deter them from bullying you more. Joke around in response to the bully to deflect their comments. Saying something humorous in reference to the bully's comments can make it seem like you don't care what they have to say about you. Rather than get upset by what they're saying, smile and laugh it off. Make a joke about what they told you and ask the bully if they think it's funny. Chances are that the bully will stop picking on you once you realize you aren't offended or angry. For example, you could say, “Didn't you say the same thing to me last week?” or “I'm in a bit of a hurry. Can we reschedule this for some other time?” Don't make jokes that insult the bully since that can make them angrier and they may get more aggressive around you. Reach out to an adult after a bully confronts you. While you may not be able to reach out to an adult right away, talk to a parent or teacher soon after you've been bullied to let them know of the situation. Let them know who's bullying you and what they've done to you so the adult is aware of what's happening. The adult may be able to deescalate the situation before the next time a bully would confront you. Adults may not notice bullying right away, so always be sure to tell them as soon as you feel like it's happening to you. Telling an adult is not tattling on your bully. The bully wants you to feel like you're alone and can't reach out to anyone to make them feel like they're more powerful than you. Try to walk away from the bully to avoid conflict. If you sense that your bully is going to get physical, try to get out of the situation as best as you can. Don't say anything to them and walk in the opposite direction so you can get away from them. Go somewhere that has a lot of people or where they can't follow you so they aren't able to catch up. Avoid going to secluded places or somewhere where you're alone since you could be more at risk of a bully fighting you there. Surround yourself with friends so you don’t feel isolated. A bully will usually only pick on you if you're alone or isolated from other people. Stay in a group of good friends when you're walking around the halls so you're surrounded by people who will stand up for you if the bully comes around. If the bully comes by, tell them that you're with your friends and you don't have time to talk to them. Stand your ground so you don’t fall down. If a bully pushes you down on the ground, it will be easier for them to beat you up or hit you more. Rather than moving away from your bully when they push or hit you, lean forward into the hits so you can maintain your balance. Try to stay upright as much as possible without fighting the bully back so you don't get in trouble. Don't let the bully push you against a wall or into the corner, or else you won't be able to get away. Keep your hands up near your face to block hits from the bully. If your bully tries to hit your face, keep your forearms straight up near the sides of your head and your palms facing out. When the bully throws a punch, push their arms out of the way so they aren't able to hit your face. Always bring your hands back up to guard your head so they can't hit you. Stay in an active stance while you're defending against the bully so you aren't taken off guard. Always keep your palms open so you don't accidentally punch or hit the bully. Fight back as a last resort only. If you aren't able to reach out for help or you feel like you're in physical danger, there may not be any other option except fighting back. Aim to hit the bully in a vulnerable area, like their stomach or groin, before getting away from the fight as fast you can. Never fight for longer than you need to or else you may get in trouble. Many schools have zero-tolerance policies for bullying or violence, so you may still get in trouble even if you're just defending yourself. Only fight back to defend yourself. Never start the fight if you don't need to.
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Ignore the bully if you’re able to. Tell the bully to stop in a loud voice to appear more confident. Keep a straight face so the bully doesn’t see you get emotional. Talk to the bully without anger or fear. Agree with the bully to take power away from them. Joke around in response to the bully to deflect their comments. Reach out to an adult after a bully confronts you. Try to walk away from the bully to avoid conflict. Surround yourself with friends so you don’t feel isolated. Stand your ground so you don’t fall down. Keep your hands up near your face to block hits from the bully. Fight back as a last resort only.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Look-Slimmer-in-a-Dress
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How to Look Slimmer in a Dress
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To look slimmer in a dress, pick undergarments that fit properly to avoid any bulging or sagging lines. Additionally, use shapewear to smooth out your figure and give you a more hourglass silhouette. When picking the dress, look for a structured cut, like an empire waist or a pencil skirt, to streamline your figure. You should also choose V-neckline dresses to create a high focal point and a longer body or maxi dresses to look long and lean.
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Select properly-fitting undergarments. Too-tight panties and bras cause unflattering bulges. Get a professional bra fitting at a lingerie shop to ensure you're wearing the right size. Ask a salesperson to help you choose a bra that lifts and shapes your breasts. Also, ensure the edges of your underwear don't squeeze your skin. Add shapewear to smooth bulges. Choose shapewear that lifts your breasts and butt while simultaneously smoothing bulges. Shapewear with tummy control help create a more slender silhouette, especially under garments with high waists, like pencil skirts. Choose from bodysuits, boy shorts, briefs, camis, and more. Wear opaque black nylons to lengthen your legs. Opaque black tights are guaranteed to make your legs look longer and slimmer. They're the perfect pairing with your favorite dress during the fall and winter. Add a long cardigan or a tapered jacket to complete your look. Ensure your undergarments don’t show. If you're wearing a tight dress, it's imperative that the lines of your undergarments are not visible through the fabric. Opt for a thong or g-string, or go with seamless underwear, nylons, or shapewear if you prefer more coverage. Select structured dresses to minimize your midsection. Flowy and A-line dresses add volume to your bottom half which can make you look unbalanced. Structured dresses, like those with an empire waist or pencil skirt, streamline your silhouette. For example, opt for a fitted dress with bright colors on top and dark colors from the waist to the hemline to bring focus to the top of your body while slimming down the bottom. Choose V-neckline dresses to create a high focal point. A V-neckline dress draws the eye up toward the face and away from the midsection. It also creates the illusion of a slimmer, longer body and equalizes your proportions. Choose a wide V-neck to balance out broad thighs and hips. Opt for maxi dresses to look long and lean. You don't have to stick with shorter hemlines to look sleek and slim. Go for solid maxi dresses that don't add bulk with pleats or pockets. Ensure the bottom of the dress just brushes the floor, rather than showing your shoes or ankles. For instance, opt for a royal blue maxi dress that skims the length of your body and pair it with wedges and a long necklace. Select wrap dresses to highlight your natural waist. Dresses that cinch in at your natural waist draw the eye to your thinnest point, while taking the focus away from problem areas. Go for dresses with bows or other details at your natural waist to create the illusion of an hourglass figure. For example, pick a long-sleeved ballet wrap dress in a bright color that flares away from your natural waist and pair it with nude pumps. Pick small prints to make yourself look smaller. You don't have to shy away from prints and wear all black to look slim. Print dresses actually have camouflaging features that help you hide areas you may feel insecure about. However, you should opt for small prints to make your frame look smaller, rather than large prints which give the impression of a bigger surface area. For instance, choose a shift dress with a tiny flower pattern instead of one with large blooms. Select dresses with color-blocking to slim your waist. Dresses with strategically-placed inserts on the sides instantly create an hourglass shape. Look for dresses that are one color along the front and back with contrasting side panels. Opt for flat fabrics that don’t add volume. Cotton, silk, denim, and wool gabardine are “flat” fabrics that won't add bulk to your body. You can also choose fabrics that help slim and shape, including fine cotton, jersey, cashmere, and spandex blends. Avoid dresses made from bulky fabrics. Velvet, corduroy, leather, taffeta, and brocade should be avoided, as they add volume to your silhouette. Stay away from other heavy fabrics, like satin, flannel, suede and mohair. Layer on a tapered jacket to camouflage curves. An open jacket or blazer streamlines your silhouette. The narrow lapels and crisp lines make your body look slimmer, too. For instance, if you're wearing a dress for business or to the office, add a tapered blazer in a complementary color to your outfit. Add a long cardigan to lengthen your torso. Avoid shorter, hip-grazing sweaters, which shorten the look of your body. Opt for long cardigans that flow to your thighs, instead. A long cardigan is the perfect fall accessory to a dress that hits just below the knee. Opt for a wide belt. A wide belt cinched at your natural waist draws the eye to the thinnest part of your body. Skinny belts can get swallowed by the fabric, whereas a wider belt stands out and makes you look smaller. Select stilettos with pointed toes. Thin heels and slender toes lengthen your calves' narrow silhouette. Opt for a 2 in (5.1 cm) heel or higher to make your legs look slimmer. Square toes and thick heels make your legs seem shorter and bulkier, so avoid those styles. Wear shoes that match your skin tone to lengthen your legs. Opt for heels that are close to your skin tone rather than those that contrast. Nude shoes lengthen the look of your legs, rather than cutting them off at the ankle. Keep your legs bare and go for a dress that hits at mid-thigh or just below the knee. However, if you want to wear black pumps, for instance, pair them with sheer black tights. Add length to your neck with a long necklace. Necklaces also draw attention to the top of the body and away from the tummy and hips. Opt for a necklace that reaches to your breasts or lower, rather than choosing a choker or necklace that rests at mid-chest. Layer on bracelets to draw focus to your wrists. Many women feel self-conscious about their upper arms. Stack several bangles or opt for a sparkly wrist cuff paired with cocktail rings to draw focus from your upper arms to your wrists and hands.
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Select properly-fitting undergarments. Add shapewear to smooth bulges. Wear opaque black nylons to lengthen your legs. Ensure your undergarments don’t show. Select structured dresses to minimize your midsection. Choose V-neckline dresses to create a high focal point. Opt for maxi dresses to look long and lean. Select wrap dresses to highlight your natural waist. Pick small prints to make yourself look smaller. Select dresses with color-blocking to slim your waist. Opt for flat fabrics that don’t add volume. Avoid dresses made from bulky fabrics. Layer on a tapered jacket to camouflage curves. Add a long cardigan to lengthen your torso. Opt for a wide belt. Select stilettos with pointed toes. Wear shoes that match your skin tone to lengthen your legs. Add length to your neck with a long necklace. Layer on bracelets to draw focus to your wrists.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Wax-Your-Face
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How to Wax Your Face
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Before you wax your face, wash your face with a cleanser and trim any hairs that are longer than 2 cm long. You may also want to put baby powder on sensitive parts of your face to reduce irritation. Then, get a facial wax that contains aloe vera for sensitive skin and warm it up on the stove or in a microwave. Apply that wax with a popsicle stick, and use fabric strips to pull the hairs out in the direction they are growing.
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Get wax that's made for your face. Only use wax that is made for use on your face, known as facial wax. It will often come in a kit with an applicator or strips that are made for certain areas of your face. Facial wax will be more gentle on your skin than body wax, as the skin on your face is more sensitive. You can find facial wax at your local beauty supply store or online. Cold wax kits are ideal for the face. These kits use wax strips. They are less painful and messy, and they may cause less damage to your face than using hot wax. Go for wax with aloe vera for sensitive skin. If you have sensitive skin or acne prone skin, look for facial wax with aloe vera. The aloe vera will help to soothe your skin and make the wax less harsh on your skin. Get facial wax that is marked “for sensitive skin.” If you use acne medication, use facial wax made for sensitive skin. Acne medication can make your skin extra sensitive to wax. Consider sugaring your face instead of waxing. Instead of wax, you can always use body sugar. Body sugar is gentler than wax and is easier to clean from your skin. The sugar paste is applied to your skin the same way that wax is and removed using the same techniques. Get an applicator stick and fabric strips if you’re using loose wax. If you are using loose facial wax, you will need an applicator stick. You can use an applicator stick made for waxing or popsicle sticks. Get popsicle sticks in a wide and small size, as you can use the small size for applying wax on your eyebrows. You will also need fabric strips to help remove the hair. You can buy pre-made fabric strips for waxing or make your own by buying white, cotton fabric and cutting it into small strips. Use prepared wax strips to make application easier. If you are new to waxing your body, particularly your face, look for wax that comes in prepared strips. The strips will often come in a kit for facial waxing. They will be cut to fit certain areas of your face, such as your upper lip, your eyebrows, or your jawline. It is usually easier to apply wax in strips, rather than have to deal with loose wax and an application stick. If you are a seasoned waxer, you may feel more comfortable with loose wax. Wash your face. Start by washing your face your normal facial cleanser. Use lukewarm water to clean your face well. Having a clean face will make waxing easier and reduce your chances of a breakout after waxing. Gently exfoliate your skin as you clean it by pressing the cleanser to your skin in small circles. Exfoliating your skin will help to remove dead skin. Don't scrub too hard, however, or the waxing might be more painful. Trim any long hairs on your face. If you have a long beard or hairs that are longer than 2 cm, trim them with small scissors or a hair trimmer. Only trim your hairs so they are no shorter than ⁄ 8 inch (0.32 cm). Avoid shaving, tweezing, or any other hair removal before you wax. Otherwise, the hair might be too short for the wax to grab. Do not try to wax any hairs on your face that are shorter than ⁄ 8 inch (0.32 cm), as this can lead to ingrown hairs and damage to your skin. Wait until your hair grows out and is long enough to wax off. Apply baby powder to sensitive areas. Put baby powder on your upper lip and your eyebrows to make it easier for the wax to grab your hairs. The baby powder will also absorb any excess oil and reduce irritation due to the wax. If your face is very dry, apply a small amount of moisturizer to your skin so the wax can grab the hairs properly and won't irritate your skin too much. Wash your hands. Clean your hands well with soap and water. Having clean hands will ensure no bacteria or germs end up on your face during the waxing. You may also position yourself in front of a mirror to make it easier for you to see what you are doing as you wax your face. Determine the direction of your hair growth. Notice if your hair grows downward in a straight line or diagonally towards the center of your face. You will then apply the wax in the direction of your hair growth. Your eyebrow hair and upper lip hair will usually grow at a diagonal. Hair on your cheeks and jawline may grow straight downward or at a diagonal. Warm up the wax. If you are using wax strips, warm the strip up by rubbing them between your hands for 30-40 seconds. If you are using loose wax, warm up the wax over the stove or in the microwave. Test the wax by applying a small amount to the inside of your wrist. It should be warm enough that the wax is wet and easy to spread, but not boiling hot. Apply the wax to your skin. If you are using loose wax, use an applicator stick or a popsicle stick to apply a thin layer of wax in the direction of your hair growth. Then, take a strip of fabric and press it down on the wax. Massage the fabric onto the wax using your fingers. Move in the direction of the hair growth. If you are using prepared wax strips, peel off the non sticky side and apply it to your skin in the direction of your hair growth. Press down on the strip, massaging it into your skin so it picks up your hairs. Be sure to massage it in the direction of the hair growth. Let the wax sit for 30 seconds. This will give the wax time to set onto your hairs and onto the strip. Do not let the wax sit for longer than 30 seconds, as it can be difficult to remove and more painful to remove. The wax should not feel like it is burning your skin when you let it sit. It should feel hot, but not burning. Pull the wax off in the opposite direction of your hair growth. After 30 seconds, put one hand underneath the strip and press down on your skin, holding it taut. Grip the bottom edge of the strip with your other hand. In one quick motion, pull off the strip in the opposite direction of your hair growth. You do not have to remove the strip quickly as long as you remove it in one continuous go. Do not tug at the strip too hard. Next, put two fingers gently on the waxed area for 10-15 seconds to relieve the extra blood flow that will cause redness and pain. Use a cool cloth or pad to soothe your skin. Your skin may tingle after the wax has been removed. Use a wet, cool cloth or pad to press your skin and soothe it. Try to do this right after the wax has been removed so the area does not feel too painful. Do not use soothing oils on your skin right after the wax has been removed as this can clog your pores. A wet clean cloth is fine. Some wax kits will come with a cooling gel that you can use. If they don't, try applying some aloe gel. Wax with care around your eyebrows. Put small dabs of wax under and above your eyebrows to remove excess hairs. If you want to shape your eyebrows, remove a small amount of hair at a time. This way, you are not at risk of waxing off too much of your brows in one go. You may want to avoid waxing off too much of your eyebrows or shaping them using the wax. When in doubt, consult a professional. Do your upper lip one side at a time. If you want to wax your upper lip hairs, use two strips of wax. This will ensure you follow the direction of your hair growth and do not irritate your skin. Apply wax on one side of your upper lip and remove the hair. Then, apply wax to the other side of your lip and remove the hair. Moisturize your skin. Once you are done waxing your skin, apply a facial moisturizer to the area to ensure it does not get dry or irritated. Use a moisturizer with soothing ingredients like aloe vera and shea butter. Do not use moisturizer that is heavy with oils or fragrance, as they can clog your pores. Wax your face every four weeks. To maintain your facial hair, get in the habit of waxing your face every four to six weeks. This will give your hair enough time to grow back. Your facial hair will also be easier to remove if you wax it more regularly. Avoid waxing acne prone areas or areas with breakouts. If you develop acne or a break out on your face, do not wax these areas. Waxing these areas can make them worse and lead to scarring. If you notice your skin breaking out due to waxing, you may want to consult a professional.
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Get wax that's made for your face. Go for wax with aloe vera for sensitive skin. Consider sugaring your face instead of waxing. Get an applicator stick and fabric strips if you’re using loose wax. Use prepared wax strips to make application easier. Wash your face. Trim any long hairs on your face. Apply baby powder to sensitive areas. Wash your hands. Determine the direction of your hair growth. Warm up the wax. Apply the wax to your skin. Let the wax sit for 30 seconds. Pull the wax off in the opposite direction of your hair growth. Use a cool cloth or pad to soothe your skin. Wax with care around your eyebrows. Do your upper lip one side at a time. Moisturize your skin. Wax your face every four weeks. Avoid waxing acne prone areas or areas with breakouts.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Become-a-Green-Beret
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How to Become a Green Beret
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To be a Green Beret, start by joining the U.S. Army after you graduate from high school. Once you're in the Army, work towards becoming an officer with a good record so you can qualify to train for the special forces. After you've qualified, be prepared to take a special course that involves rigorous physical activity and navigation skills. You'll also need to spend a year doing a qualification course, where you'll be trained on survival skills, language and culture, and many other topics relevant to being on a mission as a Green Beret.
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Be the right age and gender. To qualify for the Green Berets, you must be a man. You also must be between the ages of 20 and 30 years old. Have good vision. Like other specialized professions within the military, you must have good eyesight to qualify. You need 20/20 vision or very close to it. Get a high school diploma. This requirement is a basic one for the special forces. You must pass and graduate high school. You don't necessarily need a high GPA; however, you need intelligence to pass the Army's tests for special forces. In fact, the Army prefers that you have at least a year of college, but that is not strictly necessary. Take and do well on the Army's aptitude test. You take this test upon entering the army, and it measures where your strengths lie and where you would do best in the Army. To enter special forces, you need 110 or better in the general technical section and 100 or better on combat operation. Join the Army. You can apply online first, if you prefer, though a recruiter will talk to you after you submit your application. You can also just go talk to a local recruiter in person. You must be over 18 to enter. You'll go to the Military Entrance Processing Station to actually join. That's where your initial physical will happen. You'll also choose a specialty before you actually join. Do the pre-basic training task list. This list is a catch-all of things you need to get done before entering the Army. It includes items such as setting up direct deposit and creating an Army account. You're also responsible for completing some training, from suicide prevention to anti-terrorism. You may also be responsible for completing some physical training. The full list is provided in the link. Pass the Army's basic physical test. This test is given to everyone who enters the Army. Basically, you must do a certain number of sit-ups in 2 minutes and a certain number of push-ups in 2 minutes. The more you do in those 4 minutes, the better. After that, you run 2 miles (3.2 km), which is timed. What you need to pass is based on your age. For instance, if you're 18, you need to do 64 push-ups and 72 sit-ups and run the mile in 13 minutes and 42 seconds just to pass. At age 27, you need to do 67 push-ups and 72 sit-ups and run the mile in 14 minutes and 12 seconds to pass. Nonetheless, you need to do better than just passing to enter the special forces, as they are an elite squad. Take Advanced Individual Training. This training is basically your vocational training in the Army. It covers everything from engineering to artillery. Your commanding officer can help you decide which one is the right one for you to join the special forces. Apply for and receive secret security clearance. You don't simply apply for this clearance on your own; once you've begun the process for entering special forces, you will apply through the Army. The U.S. Department of State will do a thorough background check on you, after you have provided information on your background up front. You can be denied this clearance for any number of reasons, from having lied on your application or problems with your personal conduct in the past to bad credit and being influenced by other nations. Apply and enter airborne training. You also need to complete airborne training to qualify for special forces. Basically, in airborne training, you learn how to jump out of airplanes using parachutes. Meet the requirements for enlisted applications. If you are enlisted, you must be in the E-4 to E-7 pay grade, though there are some qualifiers for E-7: you must not have more than 12 years Time in Service or more than 9 months Time in Grade. You also must have 3 years left on your Time in Service once you complete all of the special forces training. If you are on assignment, you must get permission from your branch before attending the training. The terms "E-4" and up refer to what rank you are. That means that you need to be at least a corporeal or specialist (E-4) to be in the special forces, but you can also be a sergeant or staff sergeant. "Time in Service" refers to how long you've been in the Army, while "Time in Grade" refers to how long you've been at your current rank or pay grade. Promotions are based on both Time in Service and Time in Grade, with automatic promotions coming after certain time periods. Therefore, these requirements force you to be in the Army a certain amount of time before you enter special forces, though part of that time can be waived with approval. Meet the requirements for officers. If you are an officer, your pay grade must be O-1 or O-2, and you must have done well as an officer so far. You are also required to be in the targeted year group for the Captains' Board. You must have 3 years left on your Time in Service once you complete all the special forces training. Finally, you need either an 85 or better on the Defense Language Aptitude Battery or 1/1 reading and listening score on the Defense Language Proficiency Test. O-1 and O-2 refer to ranks, second lieutenant and first lieutenant, respectively. Take the Special Operations Preparation Course (SOPC). This course is 2 weeks long. You need to have already qualified for special forces training before taking this course, by completing the previous steps. This course will basically train you for the rigorous physical requirements of the Green Berets. You also need to be adept at land navigation. This course is given at Fort Bragg. Go through Special Forces Assessment and Selection (SFAS). The SFAS course is both a training session and an assessment to see if you're able to move forward. It will test if you are physically and mentally able to deal with what special forces will require of you. In fact, this assessment is the first official part of Green Beret training. Take the Special Forces Qualification Course (SFQC). This course lasts almost a year. It trains you in everything from small unit tactics and survival skills to language and culture. One of the primary phases of this course is the Collective Training or Robin Sage training. During this phase, you will be divided into units as you would be in a combat zone and deployed in a the made-up country Pineland, an area in North Carolina. The phase will simulate what it's like to be on an actual mission and can separate out those are not able to cope. Graduate from the program. If you make it through all the training, you will graduate from the program after SFQC. You will have about a week at the end to phase out of training.
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Be the right age and gender. Have good vision. Get a high school diploma. Take and do well on the Army's aptitude test. Join the Army. Do the pre-basic training task list. Pass the Army's basic physical test. Take Advanced Individual Training. Apply for and receive secret security clearance. Apply and enter airborne training. Meet the requirements for enlisted applications. Meet the requirements for officers. Take the Special Operations Preparation Course (SOPC). Go through Special Forces Assessment and Selection (SFAS). Take the Special Forces Qualification Course (SFQC). Graduate from the program.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Stop-Smoking-Weed
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How to Stop Smoking Weed
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While it can be difficult to stop smoking weed, with a little effort and support from your friends and family, you can do it! To go cold turkey, throw out all of your pot and paraphernalia so you aren't tempted to start smoking again. This includes any lighters, matches, roach clips, and bongs that you own. Once you've cleared out your stash, tell trustworthy friends and family members about your plan to quit so they can hold you accountable. If they smoke themselves, you might ask them to not smoke in front of you, since you may be tempted to join in. After you quit, try finding a replacement activity to keep your mind off weed. For example, you could go for long walks, talk to friends on the phone, or start cooking.
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Throw out all your pot and your smoking paraphernalia. If you remove the things that make it easy for you to start smoking again, you might be less likely to give in to your cravings. Here's what you should do: Get rid of any lighters, matches, roach clips, bongs, or containers. Empty out all of your pockets to make sure you didn't miss anything. Flush any remaining weed down the toilet, so you can't simply dig it out of the trash later. Destroy all of your supplies. Or, if you can't render them useless, throw them into a disgusting dumpster so you're not tempted to climb in and get them. (You might want to wrap them in a discreet trash bag first, though.) Get rid of anything that even makes you want to smoke pot, whether it's your favorite video game or a poster in your room. This may sound extreme, but removing your triggers can help you beat your habit. If you have a dealer, take his number and other contact information out of your phone. Make your decision clear to your support system. Tell trustworthy friends and family members what you're doing, and ask for their support in quitting. You'll probably find that they're thrilled to see you quit and support you however they can. This is especially important if you want to remain close to people who are active smokers. Tell them that you're not trying to get them to quit, but you'd appreciate it if they don't pressure you into using. If you get no support from anyone or if they try to get you to "join in", consider whether that person really belongs in your life if he/she can't respect your choices and requests. You may even have to avoid the friends that you smoke with for a while. If your entire social life with your friends consisted of getting high together, then you'll have to find a new social network. This may sound harsh, but that's the way it goes. Prepare for withdrawal. The good news is it's temporary: marijuana withdrawal begins 1 day after you quit cold turkey, hits a peak after 2 or 3 days, and eventually levels off after 1 or 2 weeks. You might not experience any or all of them, but it's important to have a plan in place for what you'll do about them instead of going back to pot. The bad news is, there are symptoms. Here are some of the symptoms you may experience: Sleeplessness: Try to avoid caffeine for the first few days, and hit the hay as soon as you're tired in the evening. Decreased appetite: You might feel nauseated at first. Try to eat bland foods that are easy on the stomach, such as bananas, rice, toast, oatmeal and apples. Irritability : As you experience the mood swings that accompany withdrawal, you might find yourself quick to anger or prone to crying. Plan for these ahead of time, and when they happen try to take a step back and acknowledge what's happening. Tell yourself, "This isn't me, and this isn't the situation. It's the withdrawal." Repeat it as often as you need to. Anxiety : Feeling on-edge or generally out of sorts is a common symptom of withdrawal that can come with quitting any drug. When you have a spare minute, close your eyes, breathe deeply, and remember that withdrawal is only temporary. Increased body temperature: you may feel hotter than normal and may start sweating from time to time. Find a replacement activity. Instead of using, devote your new free time to a hobby or sport. Try to make it something you can do as quickly and easily as lighting up — such as playing guitar or going for a run — and turn to it whenever you're tempted. If you're feeling too bored or depressed to do this, watch a movie that makes you smile or spend some time with a good friend who is not a user. Here are some other things to try: Taking long walks Talking to an old friend on the phone Swimming Cooking Reading. For example, newspapers, light novels, comic books, adventure stories, juicy biographies. Change your routine. In addition to finding a new hobby, you should switch up your routine so that you don't start missing pot so badly during the time that you usually spent getting high. Here are some things you can do: Change your morning routine. Try getting up a little earlier or later, having something different for breakfast, or showering at a different time. Change your work or school routine. Go to work or school by a different route, sit in a different seat if you can, and eat something different for lunch. Change your study routine. If you normally study in your bedroom (which leads to smoking pot), mix it up and study at a coffee shop or a library. Don't start eating less just to change up your routine, though. You may find that you're less hungry, but you should try to eat the same amount to stay healthy. Manage your urges. You will have an urge, or a craving to smoke, pretty often, and it's important to know how to react to these if you really want to quit. Here are some things you can do to avoid giving in to the craving for pot: Avoid your trigger locations. Don't go to the places that make you want to smoke, whether its your friend's basement or the sop under your high school bleachers. Flee the scene. Wherever you find yourself when you get an urge, get out as soon as you can. Changing your environment as quickly as you can is your best bet. Breathe deeply. Take a deep breath through your mouth and hold the air in your lungs for 5-7 seconds until you feel more calm. Breathe it out through puckered lips, and repeat these steps until the feeling passes. Put something else in your mouth. Finding a substitute for your craving -- as long as it's not alcohol or another drug -- can help curb it. Try sugarless gum, sugarless candy, a diet drink, toothpicks, a pen or pencil, or even a straw. Drink water. Staying hydrated will keep you healthy and will help you battle your urges. Stick with it. The worst of the withdrawal should be over in a week or two, and we've all heard that saying about how it takes three weeks to make or break a habit. By the time a month's passed, urges should be much less frequent. It might seem like an eternity while you're dealing with it, but try to remember that it's not that long. Plan a small celebration a month from your quit date. Having a milestone to look forward to can help you stay on-track, and you can use it as an excuse for a small reward like a night out or a present to yourself. Visit a psychiatrist for pharmacological help. A medical doctor (MD) or doctor of osteopathy (DO) can prescribe medications designed to help you ease off of marijuana. If you've tried to quit cold turkey or to quit gradually, or even if you just know that there's no way you can do it on your own, seeing a doctor may be your best bet. Even if you are unsure about quitting smoking weed, just make an appointment. One good start would be to find outpatient addiction services. Never let the cost of psychological care stop you from seeking treatment. There are outpatient rehabilitation groups that are less expensive than seeing an individual addiction counselor. Relapse is common. If you try outpatient services and you are still getting high, talk to your counselor about in patient addiction treatment. See a therapist. If there are underlying issues that are driving your marijuana use — such as depression or anxiety — talking them through with a professional could help you quit. If possible, try to find someone who specializes in addiction issues. Look at different modalities. There are several modalities, or types of therapy, that might be appropriate for pot addiction. Talk therapy is the most common kind, but you might also investigate cognitive-behavioral therapy. Join a support group. If you're having a hard time quitting on your own because of peer pressure or a lack of confidence, a support group might be the answer for you. Marijuana Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous is in several countries, and provides free membership and meetings. Search online for groups in your area. Check into inpatient rehab. If nothing else has worked and your marijuana addiction is seriously endangering your health and happiness, you might need the help that inpatient rehab offers. Its like a vacation with the purpose of rebuilding, re-imagining, and redefining your life. Some people only go to inpatient treatment one time and never return to smoking. Other people need a little more love and go to inpatient multiple times. Never deny yourself treatment. Always seek help and work out costs later. Exhaust all your other options first. Rehab is difficult and expensive, and not something you should enter lightly. If you are truly out of choices, though, it might be the best thing. Find out how many inpatient days your insurance company will cover. Set a date for when you want to be completely pot-free. Scheduling it somewhere between two weeks and a month out should make it close enough that you don't lose sight of it, but not so close that tapering off feels impossible. If you think this is really unrealistic, you can give yourself a few months to really quit. If pot has really become a major fixture in your life, it will be hard to just give it up after a few weeks. Establish a tapering plan. Plot out how much you'll use between now and your quit date. Try to make it a linear process — for example, at the halfway point between today and the quit date, you should be using half as much as you are now. Put your plan on a calendar, marking how much you'll use for every day, and stick to it. Put the calendar in a place where you have to look at it every day, like next to the bathroom mirror or on the refrigerator. Portion out your pot ahead of time. Instead of relying on yourself in the moment to only take what's in your tapering plan, set up your portions ahead of time. That way you don't have to think about it — you just take what you've promised yourself you will. Just like taking your medication. Stay busy. As your pot use tapers down and you're spending less time using, find activities to do immediately after you smoke. Transition straight from that to doing another hobby or sport you enjoy, so that you don't have time to notice the difference. Though you should still make time to be alone and relax, try to keep your day filled with hobbies, social activities, schoolwork, or anything else that can keep you focused on something other than smoking pot. Take a look at your schedule and try to fill it with as many social engagements and activities as you can without feeling overwhelmed. Stay motivated. If you really want to quit, then you have to keep your eyes on the prize. Remind yourself why you want to quit, whether it's to improve your health, your thinking, your social life, or your overall perspective on life, and stay focused on that goal like a laser. Write it down and tape it above your desk, keep an index card with your motives in your pocket, or just keep your goals in an accessible place that you can easily reach whenever you're losing steam. Whenever you're having a moment of weakness, consider all of the things you can do once you stop smoking for good. You'll feel more active, more energetic, and more motivated to do all of the things you want to do.
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Throw out all your pot and your smoking paraphernalia. Make your decision clear to your support system. Prepare for withdrawal. Find a replacement activity. Change your routine. Manage your urges. Stick with it. Visit a psychiatrist for pharmacological help. See a therapist. Join a support group. Check into inpatient rehab. Set a date for when you want to be completely pot-free. Establish a tapering plan. Portion out your pot ahead of time. Stay busy. Stay motivated.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Get-a-Pisces-Man
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How to Get a Pisces Man
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To get a Pisces man, try to match their romantic and emotional nature by being affectionate. Be vulnerable around them and be sincere when you're affectionate. For example, if you say that you love them, mean it. Be yourself and genuine, but be open-minded to new experiences. For example, try new activities with him but be honest if you didn't enjoy them. Never cheat on or lie to a Pisces man and try to spend as much time with him as you can to win his trust. If you're a Cancer, Scorpio, Virgo, or Capricorn, you're naturally compatible with a Pisces. Regardless of your sign, you can get a Pisces man if you care about him the way he cares about you.
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Be sensitive and gentle around him. If Aries men are the crash and burn, fly by the seat of your pants type, Pisces men are more gentle, nurturing, and romantic. The more you can turn on your gentle side, exploring your natural sensitivity and vulnerability, the better your chances will be. Be yourself. The Pisces man doesn't care how much money you have, what kind of car you drive, or where you live. While it's a plus to him, he doesn't base his opinion of you on superficial factors like job status. Pisces men are looking for more of a soulmate, not a status symbol. Get in touch with your creative side. Pisces men are very in touch with their creative side; they tend to look for the same thing in their romantic interests. If you've got a creative bone in your body, get in touch with it, explore it, and nurture it. A Pisces man who sees you develop a relationship with your art will want to explore that relationship with you. That's your in. Art, spirituality, music — these are all expressions of your creativity that you can show to the Pisces man. Philosophy, sculpture, writing are also good hobbies to cultivate in order to put your best foot forward. Get along with his friends, family, and respect what they do. A Pisces man may not be the life of the social party, but he treats the friends he does have like family, and he treats the family he has like friends. Invest in his family in order to invest in him. Pisces also like to feel that they are welcomed by your family. Therefore, try to prepare your family for someone who has a rich inner life, but whose outer shell may not immediately suggest it. Be charitable by giving back. Because Pisces internalize a lot about the world, perhaps noticing injustice and cruelty in ways that other signs don't, it helps to be generous around a Pisces you're trying to woo. Don't fake it, because he'll be able to see right through your shenanigans; tap into your most charitable self and let that person come out. Mean it when you deliver gestures of affection. Whenever you say "I love you," mean it. Don't be afraid when he says it back because a Pisces's words are the most meaningful and carefully chosen of any sign. Be open-minded. Pisces men tend to be sensitive and questioning, lending them an unusually open mind. If you're obstinate, learn to tone down your stubbornness when you're around him. The inability to budge or compromise will be a downfall in your relationship if you let it. Choose to be with them as much as possible. Pisces men are not secure in love. They would rather have you around more than their friends if they truly care for you. Plus, this will give them ample opportunities to be the romantic sign that they know they can be. Most people like being showered with affection. Try to tone down your gossip. Loose lips sink - in this case, they sink Pisces. Gossip is superficial, and Pisces are, as a rule, opposed to the superficial. As much more deep thinkers, Pisces men tend to engage better in meaningful conversation. Skip the latest celebrity banter and move straight to a conversation about art for a satisfying response. If you're not great at small talk, take it little by little. Find out what areas of conversation interest him and don't be afraid to bring it up. Asking questions is good. Once you get a Pisces talking about a subject he loves, you won't have to do much of the talking anyway. You'll probably have to pry him away from the conversation. Never cheat on, lie to, or deceive a Pisces man. A Pisces can tell right from the start when you begin acting strangely towards him. There's a good chance he'll intuit what's going on and bring it up with you after wrestling with it himself. That's not good for your relationship. Stoke the fires of your passion. Pisces like to be emotionally mothered, but that doesn't mean he doesn't want to see the passion you're capable of. When you kiss, put your all into it (kissing passionately is not the same thing as kissing violently). When you compete, put your heart into it. Whenever there's a chance to bare your soul, do so passionately. Passion is what will attract a Pisces man to you. Care for him more than you care for yourself. You know why? The reason is he cares more about you than you care about him. Know that Cancer works well with Pisces. Cancer and Pisces work well together, as both are water signs. Cancer is mystified (in a good way) with Pisces's quiet vulnerability, while Pisces appreciates Cancer's sympathetic nature. Know that Scorpio works well with Pisces. Another water sign, Scorpio also lives in a more — let's say — rarefied realm. Scorpio and Pisces appreciate each other's depth and reasonableness. Both signs, however, can begin to show signs of frustration when the real world butts its nasty little head in and requires either sign to make compromises, be practical, and get things done. Understand that Virgo works well with Pisces. Virgo and Pisces share a fascination with and fondness of communication. Although Virgo can be a little bit exacting from time to time, Pisces's loyalty makes these signs quite compatible. Know that Pisces and Pisces make an occasionally wonderful, occasionally not, couple. A Pisces/Pisces love match could either go one of two ways: unburdened and complete love for one another, or consummate distaste. They'll either love each other because of similarities or hate each other because of similarities. Know that Taurus and Pisces may be compatible. One likes to change (Pisces) while the other likes to stay the same (Taurus). Although the stability that Taurus offers may be reassuring to Pisces, her desire to always stay the same may eventually be stifling for a Pisces that can embrace changes readily and quickly. Know that Capricorns and Pisces make ideal partners owing to their gentle nature. This relationship will enjoy a perfect balance of comfort and compassion, and will endure a long stay together.
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Be sensitive and gentle around him. Be yourself. Get in touch with your creative side. Get along with his friends, family, and respect what they do. Be charitable by giving back. Mean it when you deliver gestures of affection. Be open-minded. Choose to be with them as much as possible. Try to tone down your gossip. Never cheat on, lie to, or deceive a Pisces man. Stoke the fires of your passion. Care for him more than you care for yourself. Know that Cancer works well with Pisces. Know that Scorpio works well with Pisces. Understand that Virgo works well with Pisces. Know that Pisces and Pisces make an occasionally wonderful, occasionally not, couple. Know that Taurus and Pisces may be compatible. Know that Capricorns and Pisces make ideal partners owing to their gentle nature.
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https://www.wikihow.pet/Pick-Up-a-Small-Adult-Dog
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How to Pick Up a Small Adult Dog
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To pick up your small adult dog, start by crouching behind it with your legs hip-width apart so you don't strain your back. Then, slide your non-dominant hand between your dog's front legs to its chest. At the same time, put your other hand under its hindquarters to support its back. Once you've got a good grip under your dog, lift it straight up, holding it to your chest for added support. When you put your dog down again, make sure to gently lower it onto a solid surface.
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Crouch behind the dog with your legs hip width apart. To ensure your back is supported, take a stance behind the small adult dog with equal weight in both feet. Make sure your feet are hip width apart. This will ensure you can lift the small dog without putting your lower back at risk. Then, crouch down until you are at the dog's level. You can crouch down so you are at the level of the dog's body, with your arms relaxed at your sides. You may need to keep your heels off the ground when you crouch for comfort. Slide one hand under the dog’s chest. Use your non-dominant hand to support the dog's upper body by sliding your arm through the dog's front legs until your hand is under their chest. You may put your hand under their chest and cup it to support the dog or wrap your hand lightly around one of the dog's legs. The dog's head and neck should be free to move around when the dog is in your grip. You want to support their upper body with your hand without constraining them too much. Put your other hand under the dog’s hind quarters. Place your dominant hand underneath the dog's hind quarters, or butt. Have your hand pointing forward with your fingers between the dog's back legs. This will create a good support under their body and make it easier for you to lift them up. Make sure you have a good grip on your dog's hind quarters with your arm and your hands. Having a solid hold of the dog will ensure they do not slip out of your grip when you pick them up. Pick the dog up. Once you have your arms in position, lift the dog straight up from a crouching position. Use your legs to raise yourself and the dog up. Hold the dog close to your chest as you lift them up. They should feel sturdy and secure in your arms. Once you have lifted up the dog, you may then carry them a short distance and place them back down on a solid surface. Crouch down behind the dog. If you are trying to lift up a small adult dog that is injured, you should move carefully around the dog. Make sure you are standing behind the dog with your legs hip width apart. Then, crouch down so you are at the dog's level. When you are crouching behind the dog, you should observe any sensitive areas on the dog and avoid touching these spots when you lift them up. If you notice bandages around the dog's ear, for example, you should make sure you avoid touching that spot when you lift the dog up. Put one hand under the dog’s head. Place your non-dominant hand under the dog's head, cupping their chin in the crook of your arm. You may then place your fingers on top of the dog's head or around the side of their face. Be careful not to put your hand too close to the dog's mouth, especially if they appear agitated or upset when you touch them. Hold your fingers in a fist if you want to keep your fingers out of the way. Place the other hand around the dog’s hind quarters. Use your dominant hand to support the dog's hind quarters. Cup your hand under the dog's butt, using your open palm as a support. Make sure you have a good hold of your dog's hind quarters with your hand. If you are not comfortable lifting the dog with your hand, you may slide your arm under the dog's hind quarters and use your arm to support this area. Lift the dog straight up. Once you have a good hold of the dog with both hands, raise the dog up from the crouching position. Lift with your legs so your lower back is protected. Keep the dog close to your chest as you raise them up. You should be able to carry the injured dog a short distance using this hold. If the dog has an injury on one or more of its limbs, you should try to put the dog down on a safe, solid surface as soon as possible, as carrying the dog for a prolonged period of time can make the injury worse. Crouch to one side of the dog. Start by standing to one side of the dog. Make sure the stray dog is not displaying any signs of aggression, such as growling, baring its teeth, or barking. If the stray dog seems docile, you can crouch down beside the dog and position your legs hip width apart. Do not touch or pick up a stray dog that appears aggressive towards you or others. You may be putting yourself at risk of injury if you get too close to an aggressive stray dog. Keep the dog calm using the leash. To keep the dog calm and make sure you are not at risk of injury, you can use the dog's leash as a makeshift muzzle. Make sure the leash is clipped onto the dog. Then, bend down at the waist and wrap the leash one to two times around the dog's mouth. Keep the leash firm but not too tight around the dog's mouth. Throw the rest of the leash over the dog so it is out of the way. If you do not want to muzzle the dog but need to keep the dog calm, use your non-dominant hand to grab onto the leash right at the dog's collar. Hold the leash firmly at the dog's collar with your hand so the dog cannot move around. Place one hand under the dog’s head. Once you have calmed down the dog using the leash, place your non-dominant hand under the dog's head. Support the dog's neck and head in the crook of your arm. Make sure you keep the leash in your hand as you do this so the dog cannot move around. Wrap your hand around the dog's head or keep your hand away from the dog if you are worried about the dog nipping at you. Put the other hand around the dog’s abdomen. Wrap your dominant hand around the dog's abdomen, supporting the dog with your arm and hand. Your arm should be between the dog's back legs to ensure they are supported. You should have a good grip on the dog's abdomen, enough that you could support the dog's weight with your arm and hand. Pick up the dog and bring it to a safe place. Once your hands are in position, rise from the crouching position using your legs to lift yourself up, keeping the dog close to your chest area. You can then hold the dog comfortably in your arms and bring them to a safe place nearby. You may keep the dog in the makeshift muzzle or hold the dog at the collar as you hold them until you find a safe place to put down the dog.
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Crouch behind the dog with your legs hip width apart. Slide one hand under the dog’s chest. Put your other hand under the dog’s hind quarters. Pick the dog up. Crouch down behind the dog. Put one hand under the dog’s head. Place the other hand around the dog’s hind quarters. Lift the dog straight up. Crouch to one side of the dog. Keep the dog calm using the leash. Place one hand under the dog’s head. Put the other hand around the dog’s abdomen. Pick up the dog and bring it to a safe place.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Dance-Bachata
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How to Dance Bachata
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To teach yourself the basic Bachata step, move your feet from the left to the right in 4-beat increments. Start by taking your first step to the left on beat 1, bringing your right foot to meet it on beat 2. Then, step to the left again on beat 3, lifting your right foot slightly on beat 4. Without stopping, repeat the same steps in the opposite direction, stepping to the right on beat 1. Move your hips and arms in a rolling motion to match the movement of your feet.
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Feel the beat. Bachata is an 8-beat dance (like the Salsa). Bachata music has four beats per measure. At its most basic, bachata has dancers move left for one four-beat measure, then right for the next. Listen to the music and try to find the pulsing beat. Modern electronic bachata music usually has some form of synth percussion hitting every beat, which makes the beat easy to find. Traditional bachata music can have slightly more complex percussion, but usually still have beats that are easy to "feel". Here's an example of how you'll count your steps during a basic bachata: (Stepping to the left) 1, 2, 3, (4), (stepping to the right) 5, 6, 7, (8), (stepping to the left) 1, 2, 3, (4), etc.. The 4th and 8th beats are marked in parentheses because these beats are often counted silently. In terms of modern "pop" bachata, you might want to check out the work of modern Latino artists like Prince Royce, Anthony Santos, Aventura, Don Omar, and Maite Perroni. These artists are influenced by bachata and many record songs in modernized bachata style. Try starting with "Creiste" by Anthony Santos. Older, more traditional bachata artists may be slightly more obscure today, owing to the popularity of their "pop" counterparts. Try checking out artists like Yoskar Sarante, Frank Reyes, and Joe Veras. The song "Intentalo Tu" by Joe Veras is a great bachata tune with a semi-traditional flavor. Step to the left. Begin with both your feet together. Count the beat of the music: 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4. When you're ready, start by stepping to the left with your left foot on beat 1. Then, bring your right foot to your left foot on beat 2. Step left with your left foot again on beat 3, then finally, raise your right foot off the ground slightly on beat 4. Notice the motion in your hips. You may have noticed that by raising your right foot off the ground slightly, you were forced to jut your hips out to the right. This is perfect - eventually, the effect you want to create is that of a continuous, rolling motion in your hips. As you continue to dance, be conscious of the motion of your hips. Repeat your steps in the opposite direction. Don't stop! Plant your right foot on the ground on the next beat 1, stepping to the right. Then, just mirror the motions you've already made in the opposite direction: bring your left foot to your right on beat 2, step right on beat 3, and raise your left foot slightly on 4. Your hips should jut to the left now. Keep time and repeat. Practice these basic steps until you think you have a sense for the basic pulse of bachata. As you dance, keep your knees slightly bent (obviously bending your knee more when you raise your foot) and try to keep a slight rhythmic swaying motion in your hips. In bachata, as with many forms of Latin dance, the swaying motion in the hips is typically more pronounced in the female partner than in the male partner. If you think this is too simple, don't worry - the bachata is about to get much more interesting. Ask your partner to dance. Knowing how to graciously accept either a "yes" or a "no" is essential for avoiding awkwardness at clubs, parties, Quinceañeras, and other places where you may want to do the bachata. In traditional bachata, men ask women to dance. The instructions below assume a traditional situation, however, today, it's perfectly acceptable for women to do the asking. Gentlemen - when you want to dance with someone, be direct, yet courteous. Approach your potential partner directly, offer her your hand (palm up) and say something short and to-the-point along the lines of "Hey, would you like to dance?" If she accepts, great! Take her hand and move to the dance floor. If, for any reason, she doesn't want to, politely acquiesce with a short acknowledgement like "oh, OK. No problem," then move on. Ladies - when you're asked to dance, reply graciously but honestly. If you do want to dance, simply say "I'd love to", then take your partner's hand and proceed to the dance floor. If you don't , decline politely, briefly and honestly explaining why you'd rather not. For instance, you might say something like, "Oh, I wish I could, but my heels are killing me." Hold your partner. In Bachata, there are two basic positions for holding your partner - open position and closed position. Open position puts more space between the two partners, as they make contact only through their hands. Open position allows more space and flexibility when it comes to advanced moves like turns. Closed position, on the other hand, is somewhat more intimate, as it involves an arm draped across the lady's back and slight-to-strong contact between the two partners' bodies. Closed position is more common in modern clubs and dance halls owing to cramped floor space. See below for instructions on both positions: Gentlemen: For open position, keep your arms loose and relaxed. Offer your lady partner both palms, facing up. She'll gently place her hands in yours - allow them to rest there. Don't grab with your thumbs. Both your and your partners' elbows should be bent at your sides, which will put your bodies about a foot or two apart. For closed position, wrap your arm around your lady's body so that your palm is resting roughly in the middle of her back. She will drape her arm over yours, resting her hand near your shoulder. Using your unoccupied arm (which is called your "leading arm"), hold her other hand out to the side at about shoulder or chest height, keeping both of your elbows bent. Don't interlock fingers - your hands should be held palm-on-palm, with the back of your hand facing out. As you dance, use your outstretched hand to lead your partner, gently guiding her upper body in the direction you're moving. Ladies: For open position, keep your arms loose and relaxed. Lay your hands palms-down in your partner's. Remember to keep your elbows bent to allow flexibility and ensure you're somewhat close to your partner. For closed position, when your partner wraps his arm around your back, lay your arm over his and rest it near his shoulder. Allow your partner to hold your other hand - the back of your hand should be facing towards you, while the back of his should be facing out. Keep your elbows bent and remember to keep a palm-palm hand hold (don't interlock fingers). Step with your partner. Practice simply moving in time to the music with your partner. You may find that coordinating your movements so that you both step on the beat is harder than you first thought! Regardless of whether you're in open or closed position, both partners perform basically the same "left four beats, right four beats" motion described above. However, realize that, since both partners are facing each other, one partner will be stepping in the opposite direction as described. Traditionally, in bachata, the man leads, so, if you're a lady, you can just follow in the direction of his motion, whether that means stepping to the right or to the left first. Incorporate back-and-forth motion. As your bachata skill improves and you begin dancing with partners, you'll want to move away from the basic left-and-right bachata steps and towards a more advanced, versatile step pattern that uses back-and-forth movements as well. These back and forth movements are done almost identically to the left-and-right movements - in other words, you'll step forward three beats and pop your hips on beat four, then step backward 3 beats and pop your hips on beat four, lather, rinse, and repeat. As the leading partner steps forward, the following partner steps back with the corresponding foot. For beginners, try moving through the basic left-and-right bachata steps twice, then doing a back-and-forth motion twice, then switching back to the left-and-right motion and repeating. Your steps should be as follows: (To the left) 1, 2, 3, (4) (To the right) 1, 2, 3, (4), (To the left) 1, 2, 3, (4) (To the right) 1, 2, 3, (4) (To the front) 1, 2, 3, (4), (To the back) 1, 2, 3, (4), (To the front) 1, 2, 3, (4), (To the back) 1, 2, 3, (4) (To the left) 1, 2, 3, (4), (To the right)... and so on. Note - because, in traditional bachata, the male partner leads, the (to the front) direction refers to his point of view. The female (or following) partner will step back as the leading partner steps forward, and vice versa. Add turns. One of the most essential partner moves done in bachata is the turn. In the most basic variation of this move, the male partner raises his arm, allowing the woman to complete a full turn in time to the music, then both partners return to normal dancing without missing a beat. Follow the instructions below to do a basic turn: Gentlemen - As you dance, mentally count out the beat (1, 2, 3, 4). On beat 4, begin to raise your leading arm over your partner's head and begin to release your other arm's grip (as a reminder, in closed position, the leading arm is the outstretched one, rather than the one wrapped around your partner's back). On beat 1 of the next measure, your partner will begin to turn in a circle under your arm, gently holding on to your leading arm as she does so. She will finish turning on beat 3 so that on beat 4 you'll both be dancing in sync again and you'll be able to move together in the opposite direction on the next beat 1. Ladies - feel your partner's leading arm begin to rise on beat 4. Keep holding onto your partner's leading arm, but release your grip on your partner's shoulder with your other arm and move under the curve of his leading arm. On beat 1, start to turn in a circle under his leading arm. Try to finish turning on beat 3 so that you can hit beat 4 in the "normal" dancing position and step together in the opposite direction on beat 1. Pay attention to your partner. Above all else, bachata is supposed to be a way for two people to have fun. Both men and women should try to give their partner their full attention. At the simplest level, this means looking at your partner while you dance, not at the floor (and especially not at other people you'd like to dance with). However, this also applies to the way you dance: Pay attention to your partner's movements. if you're leading, make sure your partner is keeping up with you. If you're following, try to match your partner's directions and predict which way he'll go next. When your partner does a glamorous move like a spin or a turn, give your partner the attention s/he deserves. Generally, unless you're doing a special synchronized two-person move, you shouldn't do your own moves while your partner is doing his or hers. Get your whole body in motion. Bachata shouldn't be a dreary shuffle - it should be an upbeat, energetic dance. As your bachata skill grows, try to incorporate more of your body into your basic step patterns. For instance, rather that keeping your upper body mostly straight, try moving your arms in a pumping motion and twisting slightly as you move. Try bending your knees and popping your hips more than you normally would for a low, sensual swaying motion. Eventually, when you're comfortable, the bachata should naturally become a whole-body activity. Add bachata urbana flavor. At most modern dance clubs, you'll encounter a casual, modernized version of bachata, rather than the formal, traditional version. This version of the dance, called "bachata urbana", incorporates a wide variety of added moves and minor variations to give bachata an updated, modern feel. Below are instructions for two bachata urbana moves that can give your dance routine some modern flair. The slide - This move is usually performed when you would normally be stepping in the opposite direction as the leading arm (typically, this arm is the leading partner's left arm, so this means you'll do this move when you'd normally step to his right). To do this move, mentally count the beat of the music (1, 2, 3, 4). On beat 4 of the "to the left" measure, the leading partner raises his leading arm so that his hand and his partner's are above their heads. On beat 1 of the "to the right measure," he drops his leading hand to below the waist, takes a big step back with his rear leg, and slides backward until beat 4. The following partner mirrors his movements. The male turn - This move allows the leading male partner to enjoy a flashy turn for a change. The male turn works especially well right after a traditional female turn, so we'll assume you've just "caught" your turning partner on beat 4. On beat 1, start to turn in front of your partner - she doesn't need to raise her hand over you like you would while she's turning. As you turn, she should keep her elbows bent and her hands out in front of her. This way, as you turn, you can grab her non-leading arm with your leading arm so that, for a brief moment, you're both holding hands and facing the same way with your back to her front. Continue turning and "catch" her hands as you normally would on beat 3 so that on beat 4 you're dancing in sync again. Add complex footwork. When two experienced bachata dancers dance with each other, they're unlikely to be content with the basic "left, right, front, back" steps for long. As you grow as a bachata dancer, for added challenge and entertainment, you'll probably want to start throwing new, more complex footwork patterns into your repertoire. Here are just a few ideas you may want to practice: Heel steps. Typically, on the fourth beat of each measure, you'll raise your foot slightly and roll your hips to the side. Instead, try kicking your foot out slightly so that its heel touches the ground and its toes are raised. You may need to bend your knees slightly to do this comfortably. The end result should be somewhat subtle - not an exaggerated "Cossack dance" kick, but slight variation on your normal step. Twisting. Instead of stepping back and forth, spend a measure twisting with your partner. Bend your knees slightly more than usual, then twist your hips and legs side to side to the beat of the music. Try varying between twisting twice per measure (once every two beats) and twisting four times per measure (once every beat). Leg-crosses. This move incorporates several kicks followed by a quick turn for a dazzling effect. Step to the side as you normally would for three beats. On beat 4, raise your leg slightly more than normal in preparation for a kick. On beat 1, keeping your upper body upright, gently kick out in front of you. Your leg should swing back on beat 2. Kick out again on beat 3, then, on beat four, cross your kicking leg across your stationary leg and plant it on the ground. Use your momentum to complete a full turn on beats 1, 2, and 3 of the next measure so that you're back in your "normal" position on beat 4.
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Feel the beat. Step to the left. Notice the motion in your hips. Repeat your steps in the opposite direction. Keep time and repeat. Ask your partner to dance. Hold your partner. Step with your partner. Incorporate back-and-forth motion. Add turns. Pay attention to your partner. Get your whole body in motion. Add bachata urbana flavor. Add complex footwork.
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https://www.wikihow-fun.com/Act-Tsundere
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How to Act Tsundere
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In Japanese anime or manga, a tsundere is a character that seems cold and aloof, but they're actually loving and protective around people they care about. To act tsundere, hide your emotions when you're out in public, but don't be afraid to show your softer side around your friends. As you get to know someone better, show them more and more of your gentle side. Although tsunderes act like they don't care around most people, you should still apologize if you actually hurt someone's feelings, since tsunderes are nice people beneath the surface!
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Dress in expensive-looking clothing. Many tsunderes are spoiled and/or rich, and some of them just want a "prim-and-proper", clean-cut look to them. While there's no tsundere "dress code", so to speak, the best look would be something that looks expensive and classy, such as a neat sweater and jeans without holes, or a cute dress. Check out what kinds of clothes you can find that you think would match the tsundere archetype. Some tsunderes dress typically, or for the girls, in a more tomboyish style. You don't have to wear super-expensive clothing just to look like a tsundere. Many of them actually look fairly normal. Care for your hair. Think about it - do you see a lot of tsunderes with less-than-stellar hair? Learning how to care for your hair is important for being a tsundere. Greasy, knotted hair just makes you look less like a tsundere, and more like a rabid otaku. It's common for tsundere girls to have long hair, sometimes pinned up into "twintails" (ponytails on both sides of the head). It's not necessary to be a tsundere, but it's a nice touch. Consider dressing like a certain tsundere. If there's a tsundere in particular that you have a liking for, check out their clothing and hairstyles, and consider mimicking them. You don't want to completely copy off of them - you're not a clone of them, after all - but many tsunderes have a very distinctive style that you could loosely follow. Maybe you could make your own tsundere style! Check out zettai ryouiki if you wear skirts or short shorts. A common trait of tsundere girls is to wear thigh-high stockings while wearing a short skirt or shorts; in Japan, this is referred to as zettai ryouiki. There are many "grades" of zettai ryouiki, tsundere girls wearing Grade A or Grade B most of the time (socks that extend up to the thigh, with short shorts or a short skirt). If you want to up the tsundere image, check out zettai ryouiki. Zettai ryouiki is fairly sexualized, so if you're not comfortable with it, you don't have to wear it. It's a personal choice. You do not have to wear something you're not comfortable with in order to be a tsundere. . Make your school uniform look good on you A general anime staple is focusing on high-school-age protagonists, so it's common to see tsunderes that wear school uniforms. If your school has a uniform, do everything in your power to make sure that it looks the best it can. Do any pinning, rolling, tucking, or searching for similar clothes to make yourself look as good as possible. If your school doesn't have a uniform, consider dressing in a uniform-style fashion. Not only does it help you look more tsundere, but it's also bound to look more clean-cut than just a basic outfit of a shirt and jeans. Consider carrying a signature item. Some tsunderes (though not all of them) carry around their own signature item. This could be something small, like a book, a phone charm or a piece of jewelry, or something huge and impossible to overlook, usually cute looking. If you want to carry around a signature item, figure out what you like and consider carrying something like that. Get creative! Don't carry a weapon! Though you might want to carry around a wooden katana like Taiga Aisaka from Toradora! does, carrying a weapon can get you in serious legal trouble, especially at school. Stick with the stuff that won't be perceived as dangerous. Develop an edge out in public. Obviously, don't be snarky to authority figures - that's just asking to get in trouble! However, being slightly aggressive and displaying a "don't mess with me" attitude will get the message across. Don't be arrogant, but act as though most people in general are below you, and as though your friends are the exception to that. Don't be rude to people who don't know you. You shouldn't call someone an idiot just because they approached you and asked for directions. If the person is a stranger or barely an acquaintance, aim for being polite, but distant. Common ways of showing an edge are to be sarcastic and being rude in a backhanded way. Be harsher towards your crush. A common trait among many tsunderes is that in an attempt to hide their feelings towards their love interest, they act even harsher towards them. They may play hard-to-get, which is a very common trait of tsunderes, and have a constant back-and-forth love-hate relationship. Imitate this! Give your crush some attitude (but not so much that they dislike you), and swap back and forth between love and hate. It's a classic trait of tsunderes. If your crush likes someone else or has a partner, be especially harsh towards that person. Insulting them subtly is a great way of getting across your feelings without really revealing it. However, keep in mind that this can backfire if your crush finds out you were being cruel to the person they like. If your friends ask you if you like that person, give them a harsh reprimand (e.g. "Idiot! As if I'd like [your crush's name]!"). Show a softer side in private. Whether you're with your crush or your friends, when there aren't others around, drop the attitude a bit and show your kinder, softer side. Don't totally drop the attitude, of course, but definitely tone it down a notch (or two, or three). Show them your sweet side - that's a side of you that they'll be wanting to see. Be nice in these moments, and they'll be wanting even more. If your friends or your crush are sensitive and don't like your cold side, take these private moments to apologize to them. Be sure to let them know that while you do actually care about them, you have a different approach to getting that across. Let them know that they have merit in your eyes, but be subtle (if not a bit backhanded). Take a passive-aggressive stance towards anything. Tsunderes are well-known for managing to take on a snarky attitude towards anything at all, whether it's something small or big. Being passive-aggressive and seeming like everything is merely a minor annoyance is a good way to act tsundere. Backhanded compliments and snarky remarks are the way to go. Classic passive-aggressive lines dropped by tsunderes are "It's not like I [care about/like/think about] you or anything...", "I didn't do this for you! I did this because I wanted to!", "Idiot!", and "It's not like that !". If you give someone a gift, a good comment to make is, "I suppose I should give you something... But I guess you deserve it". Dismiss your emotions in the presence of those you don't know well. If you're upset about anything, play it off as anger or frustration, or take an aloof, I-don't-care kind of attitude. Outwardly, blame it on someone else (e.g. "That teacher is so stupid."), and don't talk about how you feel to strangers. Remember, tsunderes are usually very barricaded by their rough, harsh exterior; you don't want to be an open book of emotions to people. Of course, it's okay to have emotions; you're allowed to feel what you feel. Tsunderes just don't often show their vulnerable, more emotional side to strangers. If you need to cry, go to a close friend that you trust. For your own emotional health, don't actually blame someone else for something or refuse to ever talk about your emotions. If you know you're in the wrong, own up to it, and find someone you can vent to. Take the edge off your act over time. Remember, if tsunderes don't show a kind side over time, they're no better than jerks. Tsunderes also really do value the people they feel deserve their time, so be nicer to people who spend a lot of time around you, such as your friendly acquaintances and your crush. It'll show them that you really do care about them, and that your attitude is nothing more than a façade or defense mechanism. React when someone pushes your buttons. When tsunderes are provoked, they really take the bait, and react with a vengeance. If somebody bumps into you, a "Hey, watch where you're going , you idiot!" and fuming can have a great effect. And if somebody is rude to you or bullies you, react to it strongly - you're a tsundere, after all. Take it up a notch further than you already have! Never physically attack someone. The constant hitting and attacking that you'd see in anime and manga would land you in police custody. A light slap on the upper arm might work with some people, though, as long as they don't mind play-punching. Don't take the tsundere attitude too far. You're trying to be a tsundere, not verbally abusive towards anyone who says a word to you. Remember, tsunderes don't want to actually hurt people - they just want to take on an "I can do this without you, better than you" attitude. Don't bully or verbally attack people, especially if there's no justification for it. If you do, you'll just end up driving people away from you. Never intentionally target someone's weak spots. If you know your friend or crush is sensitive about the fact that they're bad at socializing, don't attack their social skills. This can cause a serious hit to their self-esteem and will most likely drive them away from you. After all, who wants to be friends with a bully? Back off if you accidentally cross a boundary. An often-overlooked fact is that tsunderes do cause emotional pain at times, or overstep boundaries and attack things that others are sensitive about. In the real world, people will be much more vocal about you hurting their feelings than they will in anime or manga. If you do end up hurting someone, apologize immediately and back off. It's likely that all eyes will be on you, and you don't want to end up friendless. Tsunderes are capable of admitting they're in the wrong and being kind. After all, being a tsundere is all about revealing your kinder side to people.
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Dress in expensive-looking clothing. Care for your hair. Consider dressing like a certain tsundere. Check out zettai ryouiki if you wear skirts or short shorts. . Consider carrying a signature item. Develop an edge out in public. Be harsher towards your crush. Show a softer side in private. Take a passive-aggressive stance towards anything. Dismiss your emotions in the presence of those you don't know well. Take the edge off your act over time. React Don't take the tsundere attitude too far. Back off if you accidentally cross a boundary.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Cook-Chorizo
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How to Cook Chorizo
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To cook chorizo on the stove, start by putting it in a non-stick skillet on medium-high heat. Cook the chorizo for 5 minutes, turning it frequently so it browns on all sides. Then, reduce the heat to medium-low and add ½ a cup of water. Finally, cover the skillet and simmer the chorizo for 12 minutes. For oven-cooked chorizo, set your broiler on high and give it 5-10 minutes to heat up. When the broiler is ready, you can put the chorizo on a broiler pan and broil it for 11-12 minutes, turning it every 4 minutes so it cooks evenly.
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Purchase Spanish or Mexican chorizo from the deli or meat department. Spanish chorizo is sold in firm, sausage link form and it's already smoked so there's no need to cook it. To cook fresh Mexican chorizo, buy it ground up in a tube or in fresh sausage links from the butcher. Remove the casing from fresh chorizo if you want to crumble and fry it. If you bought Mexican chorizo links and you want to cook the chorizo so it crumbles, cut a thin slit across the length of each link. Then, squeeze the chorizo out. To grill or roast the chorizo links, leave the casing on. It's edible so there's no need to remove it. If you bought a package of Mexican chorizo in a tube, cut open the end of the package and squeeze the chorizo out. Slice links of fresh chorizo if you'd like to sauté them. To get pieces of chorizo that are crisp on the sides, place Mexican chorizo links on your cutting board and slice them into ⁄ 2 inch (1.3 cm) rounds. Then, heat them in a skillet over medium for 8 to 10 minutes or until they're firm. Use a serrated knife so the chorizo doesn't squirt out of the casing as you try to cut the links. Avoid boiling chorizo before cooking it. Although you might boil fresh sausages before grilling them, boiling chorizo will ruin its flavor. As the chorizo boils, fat melts out of it and you'll be left with dry chorizo that isn't as tasty. As long as you turn chorizo links frequently as they grill, the chorizo will be perfectly cooked. Chop the onion, tomatoes, and 1 clove of garlic if you want to add vegetables. Finely chop 1 white onion and push it to the side of your cutting board. Then, cut 2 plum tomatoes into ⁄ 2 inch (1.3 cm) pieces and mince 1 clove of garlic. If you don't want to add vegetables, skip this step. Sauté the onion for 1 minute over medium heat. Pour 1 tablespoon (15 ml) of vegetable oil into a skillet and turn the burner to medium. Once the oil shimmers, add the chopped onion and stir it as it cooks. Cook the onion so it just softens a little. Stir in the tomato and garlic and sauté the mixture for 1 more minute. Add the chopped tomatoes and garlic to the skillet and stir the vegetables so they don't stick to the bottom of the pan. Cook the vegetables until the garlic becomes fragrant and the tomatoes soften. Cut a thin slit along the casing of your fresh Mexican chorizo. If you purchased fresh chorizo from the meat case or a butcher, it's probably contained in a casing. To remove the casing before you cook the chorizo, slice a thin slit down the length of the chorizo. Then, you can squeeze the chorizo out of the casing. Some brands of Mexican chorizo don't have this casing, so all you have to do is open the package! If you'd rather use cured Spanish chorizo, chop it into fine pieces and use it instead of the fresh chorizo. Keep in mind that since it's fully cured, you just need to reheat it for a few minutes in the skillet before adding the eggs. Add the chorizo to the skillet and cook the mixture for 5 to 7 minutes. Squeeze the 12 ounces (340 g) of Mexican chorizo into the skillet with the vegetables and stir the meat to break it up. Keep stirring it occasionally to help the chorizo cook evenly. Chorizo releases a lot of grease once it's cooked. If you don't want to leave this in the skillet, carefully hold a lid over the skillet and drain the grease into a heat-proof container. Then, discard the grease. Crack 8 eggs into a bowl and beat them with a fork. Keep beating the eggs until they're a uniform yellow color and you don't see separate yolks or whites. If you prefer, use 2 cups (470 ml) of liquid eggs instead of whole eggs. Pour the eggs into the skillet and cook them for 1 minute without stirring. Slowly pour the beaten eggs in so the grease doesn't splash out of the skillet. Leave the eggs to cook for 1 full minute before you stir them. Cook the chorizo and eggs for 3 to 4 minutes or until the eggs are done. Stir the mixture occasionally to break up the eggs and prevent them from sticking. Cook the chorizo and eggs until the eggs are as firm as you like. Cook the chorizo until it's crumbly and firm. If you have an instant-read meat thermometer, push it into a piece of chorizo to see if it's reached 160 °F (71 °C). Serve the chorizo and eggs while they're hot. Turn off the burner and spoon the chorizo and eggs onto serving plates. If you like, set out warm tortillas and salsa with the chorizo and eggs. Refrigerate leftover chorizo and eggs in an airtight container for up to 1 week. Preheat the oven to 400 °F (204 °C). Ensure that you have an oven rack in the center of the oven before you turn the oven on. Leave the oven to preheat while you slice the onions. Cut 1 onion into 1⁄2 inch (1.3 cm) thick slices and lay them in a cast-iron skillet. Use a yellow onion if you'd like a sweeter flavor or slice a red onion for a sharper taste. Arrange the sliced onion in a single layer in the skillet. For a more delicate flavor, use 5 shallots instead. Peel the shallots and slice each in 1/2. Then, spread them in the skillet. Scatter 4 garlic cloves and the fresh herbs over the sliced onions. Peel the garlic cloves and toss them into the skillet. Then, lay 2 sprigs of fresh rosemary and 2 sprigs of fresh oregano over the onions. Lay 2 pounds (0.91 kg) of chorizo sausage in the skillet and brush it with vegetable oil. Arrange the links so there's at least ⁄ 2 inch (1.3 cm) of space in between each chorizo. Dip a pastry brush into 1 tablespoon (15 ml) of vegetable oil and brush the top and sides of each chorizo link with the oil. Brushing the chorizo will help them brown as they roast. Roast the chorizo with onions until they reach 160 °F (71 °C). Put the skillet into the preheated oven and cook the links for 20 to 30 minutes. Use tongs to carefully turn each link halfway through the cooking time. When you think they're done roasting, insert an instant-read meat thermometer into a link to see if it's reached 160 °F (71 °C). The time it takes to roast the chorizo will depend on the brand and size of the links. Begin checking them after they've cooked for 20 minutes. Serve the chorizo with crusty bread or roasted vegetables. Turn off the oven and wear oven mitts to remove the hot skillet. Transfer the chorizo links to plates and serve them with soft cheese, crusty bread, and roasted vegetables. Put leftover links in an airtight container and refrigerate them for up to 4 days. Heat a charcoal or gas grill to high. If you're using a gas grill, turn the burners to high. To heat a charcoal grill , fill a chimney with briquettes and light them. Dump the briquettes in the bottom grill grate once they become hot and lightly covered with ash. Then, set the top grill grate on the grill. If you use a charcoal grill, the chorizo links will get an extra-smoky flavor. Dip a paper towel in vegetable oil and use tongs to brush it over the grill grate. To prevent the chorizo links from sticking to the grill, pour about 1 tablespoon (15 ml) of vegetable oil into a small dish. Bunch a paper towel into a ball and use tongs to pick up the balled paper towel. Dip it into the oil and brush the oiled paper towel over the top grill grate. Lay 4 chorizo links on the hot grill and close it. Arrange the chorizo links so they're at least 1 inch (2.5 cm) apart. This will allow air to circulate between them and they'll cook evenly. Put the lid on the grill to keep your grill hot. If you'd like to serve more people, double or triple the recipe. Cook the chorizo for 30 to 35 minutes or until the links reach 160 °F (71 °C). Use tongs to turn the chorizo about every 5 minutes so they brown on all sides. Once you've grilled them for 30 minutes, insert an instant-read meat thermometer into a link. Remove the chorizo links once they reach 160 °F (71 °C). If the links aren't fully cooked, check them again after 5 minutes. Transfer the chorizo to a cutting board and rest the links for 5 minutes before serving. Use the tongs to take the links off of the grill and set them on a cutting board or serving plate. Cover them loosely with aluminum foil and leave them for 5 minutes so the juices redistribute within the meat. Then, serve the chorizo in a bun as a sandwich or slice the links to serve them with grilled vegetables. Refrigerate leftover chorizo links for up to 4 days in an airtight container.
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Purchase Spanish or Mexican chorizo from the deli or meat department. Remove the casing from fresh chorizo if you want to crumble and fry it. Slice links of fresh chorizo if you'd like to sauté them. Avoid boiling chorizo before cooking it. Chop the onion, tomatoes, and 1 clove of garlic if you want to add vegetables. Sauté the onion for 1 minute over medium heat. Stir in the tomato and garlic and sauté the mixture for 1 more minute. Cut a thin slit along the casing of your fresh Mexican chorizo. Add the chorizo to the skillet and cook the mixture for 5 to 7 minutes. Crack 8 eggs into a bowl and beat them with a fork. Pour the eggs into the skillet and cook them for 1 minute without stirring. Cook the chorizo and eggs for 3 to 4 minutes or until the eggs are done. Serve the chorizo and eggs while they're hot. Preheat the oven to 400 °F (204 °C). Cut 1 onion into 1⁄2 inch (1.3 cm) thick slices and lay them in a cast-iron skillet. Scatter 4 garlic cloves and the fresh herbs over the sliced onions. Lay 2 pounds (0.91 kg) of chorizo sausage in the skillet and brush it with vegetable oil. Roast the chorizo with onions until they reach 160 °F (71 °C). Serve the chorizo with crusty bread or roasted vegetables. Heat a charcoal or gas grill to high. Dip a paper towel in vegetable oil and use tongs to brush it over the grill grate. Lay 4 chorizo links on the hot grill and close it. Cook the chorizo for 30 to 35 minutes or until the links reach 160 °F (71 °C). Transfer the chorizo to a cutting board and rest the links for 5 minutes before serving.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Be-the-Perfect-Woman
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How to Be the Perfect Woman
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Although everyone's idea of the perfect woman is different, there are a few ways you can work towards being the best version of yourself. Life can be stressful sometimes, but try to remain calm and be positive so you don't lose your perspective. Your physical health is important too, so try to eat healthy and exercise regularly to stay in shape. Another important part of being a perfect woman is being there for your friends and family. Always follow through on the things you say you'll do, and support those around you as well as you can. To keep yourself moving forward, set goals for your career and personal life and work towards them every day.
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Analyze your role models. Think of women you consider to be 'perfect.' Make a list of the qualities you admire about them. Consider the things they've done in life, their approach to life, their philosophy of living, their achievements, their personality, their physical appearance, and their sense of style. What is it that all of them have in common? Think of women you know in real life, celebrities or historical figures. Acknowledge your strengths. Think about the state of your life now: the things you do, education you're pursuing, jobs you're in, your relationships with others, your physical health. Consider your personal qualities, too. Make a list of the things you're most proud of. Try to think about examples that prove that you are this way. For example, 'I am a good daughter: I call my parents daily/once a week and speak to them patiently even when I'm pressed for time.' 'I am diligent: I consistently perform to the best of my ability, I don't procrastinate and I thoroughly check the standard of my work.' 'I have amazing hair: it's soft, shiny and long.' Your list of strengths and proofs will be subjective -- they are unique to you. Write an operating definition of perfect. Of your strengths, which do you consider to be perfect? Think of your perfections and those of your role models, and write a few sentences or a list of what you consider will make you a perfect woman. What does that look like? What goals will you achieve that will mean you're perfect? What behaviors, attitudes and values will you adopt? Avoid the words 'always,' 'never,' 'should,' and 'must' (e.g. 'I must always speak in a polite tone of voice.') Such words create unrealistic expectations and disappointment, guilt and frustration when they're not met. Your definition of the perfect woman applies to you: the point of the exercise is not to be exactly like another woman. Rather it is to help you define your ideal version of you. Acknowledge your growth points. Make a list of aspects of your current self that you think keep you from being perfect. Every human, even a 'perfect' one has some point that can be viewed as negative. Remember that it's a blend of positives and negatives that create 'perfection' in a person. Take extra caution if any of the women you consider perfect are current celebrities or people you only interact with through social media. Personal social media accounts are tailored to reflect only what she chooses to reveal. Pictures can be edited and people choose to publicize the best parts of their lives. Social media profiles are snippets of people's lives and this presents a skewed version of reality. Expand your interests. Pursue knowledge of different topics or crafts. You never know if you have an unfounded talent. Check your local area or school for different clubs or societies where you can interact with others who can encourage you and teach you. Perhaps you'll find you're really good at cooking or woodwork. If you like, start with things that you have always wanted to know better but never really had an opportunity to follow. Perhaps you've always wanted to develop your photography skills or read classic English Literature. Devote part of your day to engaging in these activities. Remember that this is meant to be enjoyable. You will have something to look forward to that is stress-free. Not every new interest will necessarily require you to leave your house and spend money. Look for online documentaries or videos to watch. Display a positive outlook. Actively look for the positive aspects of every situation and person. Remember that 'positive' does not necessarily mean 'good.' A learning outcome from a negative situation is a 'positive' aspect but that does not make your situation a 'good one': you are allowed to consider things as being negative and bad. However, people gravitate towards those who display a positive attitude. Your sunny disposition will encourage others to be cheerful. Ask yourself, 'What can I learn from this situation? What can I do differently next time to prevent such an outcome? What have I gained from this?' Once you form a negative opinion of someone, you start to notice things about her that will confirm your opinion and ignore any evidence to the contrary. If you find yourself thinking mean things about another person, deliberately think of examples that dispel your negative opinion. Or think of reasons that may have made her behave in a way you disliked. Perhaps she was tired or hungry? Maybe she misunderstood the situation? Make a special effort to cheer other women on. It's very easy to feel competitive around another woman as you seek to be the 'perfect woman'. Rise above such pettiness and be supportive of other women as opposed to trying to sabotage them. A simple example, is if a co-worker you dislike asks you if you know the deadline for a certain project, don't sabotage her by giving her the incorrect date. Or if another woman asks you for the recipe of a dish you brought to the potluck, don't leave out ingredients from the recipe or give different proportions to the ones you used. Be supportive of other women. Develop social skills. Stop and think whenever you're interacting with others about what you're going to say and do. Make a quick assessment of the different consequences of potential actions. You will have to practice by putting yourself in situations where social skills are required. Read up on body language so that you are better able to assess others. Read up on emotions to better understand how they are conveyed. Identify your growth points by analysing your own behavior. Do you have trouble maintaining eye contact? Is your speech too fast or your voice too loud when you're nervous? Do you stand too closely to others when you're talking to them? Do you interrupt when others are talking? Do you have difficulty saying no? Ask friends/family you can trust to be honest without hurting your feelings about any of your social skills that you need to work on. Friends can often notice things about your behavior that you can't. Make sure the person you ask is socially skilled. Pick one or two social skills at a time to focus on. When you've made significant progress in them, then advance to other skills. Consider asking a friend to role play with you or practice in front of a mirror. Control your emotions. Learn to recognize what emotions feel like in your body. Actively notice how you're feeling throughout the day. If you're feeling irritable, angry or any other negative emotion, try to identify the source of the emotion. Look to your thoughts. What are you thinking about that is making you feel this way? Know that just because you think something, that does not mean that thought it true. Avoid taking any negative feelings out on others. If you feel that you are about to snap, take deep, calming breaths. Inhale slowly through your nose, exhale slowly through your mouth. If you can, distance yourself from the situation: leave the room and find a quiet place. If you can't leave, try to drink a glass of cool water or to sit down. This will help you calm down. Emotions are not inherently negative, wrong or bad. Regularly process your emotions through daily journaling or by talking to someone you trust about the events in your life. Keeping emotions bottled up increases stress levels and doesn't help you resolve problems. Follow through on promises. Remember that even if you say you'll do something without adding the words, 'I promise,' you've still made a promise. If you say you'll do something, try your utmost to do it. If you find that you'll be unable to do it, inform the person in advance and apologize, giving your reason for being unable to do it. These behaviors will show that you're trustworthy and honest. Set up reminders with alarms on your phone or in your organizer so that you can keep track of your commitments. Estimate how long it will take to do your promised task. Set your reminders in advance of when your promise is due so that you have ample time to collect any resources you need to carry out your task. Be proactive. Make an effort to reach out to others first and to stay in touch. Remember any upcoming events they mention to you. Ask them about it later. In this day and age of busyness, people appreciate it even more when others reach out first. Use whichever method of staying in touch you like but remember that hearing a voice or seeing a person in real life is always different from interacting through the internet. Surprise a friend or a family member with a phone call. Keep track of people's anniversaries and birthdays. Go out of your way to show gratitude to someone who has done something good for you. Say thank you, send gifts, or try to return the favour. Set up a schedule to call family and friends who are far away. It may not be possible to do so every day or every week. Set aside an hour on the weekend that you can devote to reaching out to others who aren't in your daily life but who are important to you. Avoid gossip. Speak well of others behind their back. Don't complain about them, spread rumors or lies. If anyone else in your company starts to gossip, either ask them directly to stop or steer the conversation to another topic. 'Hey, let's not talk about her like that.' 'Let's talk about something else.' 'How's your project coming along?' This doesn't mean you're not allowed to discuss negative events. Do so only if it's your business, out of concern for someone or if you're trying to understand what happened. Be reliable and available. Make time for your family and friends. Make sure you keep a balance between your work/school life and social life. Set boundaries for yourself: mark the times of day where you'll do work-related things and the times where you'll be with family and friends. Keep any secrets that are entrusted to you; if anyone else brings up the subject, pretend that you don't know anything about it. Take time to be up to date with what is happening in close friends and family's life. Just as you need other people to rely on, you should be there for your loved ones in turn. Develop an active lifestyle. Being active throughout the day and week will give you huge benefits physically and mentally. An active lifestyle is the best way to keep your body in the best possible shape (as opposed to one big burst of activity every now and then). Try to get 30 minutes of aerobic exercise in a day. Your heart rate should be up and it shouldn't be so vigorous that you find it difficult to speak as you exercise. You don't need to spend a lot of money to be physically fit. Joining a gym is not the only way to stay healthy; though it's certainly an option. Consider joining a sports team, or asking a friend or family member to join you for a daily jog. Look up different videos or blogs of fitness experts you can follow. Be sure to check the credentials of any 'expert' that you follow. Check for training, certifications and qualifications on their website. You don't want to follow someone posing as an expert as you might end up injuring yourself. If you're not used to being physically active, it will take you time to build up your stamina. Keep going! Develop your own sense of style. Experiment with different hair, makeup and sartorial styles. Look to your role models as a starting place for a sense of fashion. If any of them are stylists or celebrities, look to see what kind of style she's wearing these days. Look up tutorials online for different makeup styles. Makeup not only enhances your natural beauty but it can also be used to create looks that highlight facial features you admire such as big eyes or slim noses. Stay within your budget. Don't go overboard and don't try to buy a replica of every outfit your role model has. Consider buying drugstore 'dupes' of high-end brand makeup. You are only looking to your role models for inspiration. Fashion changes constantly but your style will be yours always. Follow a hair and skin care routine. Experiment with different natural skin and hair masks to see which are suitable for you. These can often be made with ingredients that are already available in your kitchen. Research online for ingredients that will suit your skin type and condition. Do a skin test even with a homemade mask. In the long-run, store-bought masks may be more economical: homemade masks may not last as long. Only buy skincare products that have been tested on human skin and are made by reputable companies. Go to a certified dermatologist if you have problematic skin. A dermatologist can give you advice on which creams and products will suit you best and can outline a routine for you to follow. Improve your posture. Make sure you sit with your back straight. When you stand, keep your chin straight, shoulders down and back, back straight and keep your toes and heels aligned. Your spine should form a natural S-shaped curve. If this is painful, you may be straining yourself too much or you may have a problem with your back. Visit your general practitioner if this is the case. If you have to lift anything off the floor, bend your knees, rather than reaching down to pick it up. This will prevent back injury. Do regular stretching exercises if you find that any muscles are tight and preventing you from correcting your posture. Look in the mirror to help you adopt proper posture. Once you see that you're in the correct position, try to analyse what it feels like in your body so that when you're not around a mirror, you'll know how to adjust your posture. The way you carry yourself is indicative of the way you feel about yourself and others around you. Proper posture will also help you improve and maintain your health and reduce chances for tiredness. Identify your goals. Think about what you want to achieve in the long-run. Think in terms of your education, your career, and your family. Break your goals into logical steps by thinking of which goals you will have to achieve first in order to keep going. Apply this principle to all your goals: break them down into more manageable steps. Make sure your goals are specific, measurable, time-based and achievable. This will help you measure your progress and keep you from feeling disappointed if you don't achieve goals that were unrealistic in the first place. If you are particularly inspired by your role models and want to achieve something similar to them, read their biography. Look at their milestones and how they achieved them. Some of this information may not be readily available and you will have to do your own research. For example, if you are looking to break into the cosmetics industry, you will have to research different methods of doing so. Consider contacting local makeup artists or contacting persons who design makeup for further guidance. Sometimes plans don't turn out exactly as we want them to because of circumstances beyond our control or because something else inspires you along the way. That's okay: find another way to achieve your goal. Make allowances in your plan for setbacks. If you read up on your role model's history, you'll find that they didn't always have smooth sailing either. Consider setting aside an afternoon to draft your long-term plan. Gather resources. Make a list of what you need to achieve your goals. Calculate how much your resources will cost you. The amount of money you spend will depend on the scale of your goal. Take a look at your budget and see if there are ways of reducing your costs. Consider purchasing items second hand or renting them instead of purchasing them. For example, if you have a low budget and you're pursuing an education, considering getting second-hand textbooks. If your goal is a large scale project that is out of your budget such as setting up a bespoke bakery, consider taking a loan or asking family for financial help. Explore your options online or by asking others who are striving to achieve similar goals for tips on how they financed themselves or obtained their resources. Try not to let lack of resources hold you back. Ask for help. There may be some things you need to achieve that are out of your experience. Ask others to help you where you might be struggling to achieve your goals or if you know that they have knowledge that you can benefit from. Such people can show you new ways of doing things and pass on these skills to you. For example, if you're attempting to take a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) exam but you're not sure about how to approach the study material, ask someone who scored highly on the exam for study management tips. Consider asking close friends and family or outsourcing. Look for people who are knowledgeable about the field you're looking into. Remember to thank them and show your gratitude through favours either by doing something kind for them or by returning the favour if they ever need help. Implement your plan. Start your plan now. Measure your progress. As your goal(s) are time based, you have a schedule to follow: this will help you know if you're on track. Sometimes, things happen that you didn't account for and your plans may get delayed. Don't take this as an excuse to give up. This doesn't mean that you aren't making progress. Find solutions to your problems and factor them into your plans. Remind yourself of how your goal will make you and your life perfect. Tell people you trust about your plans. Ask them for their moral support and encouragement. Track how you use your time by writing down what you complete every half hour. Log your activities for a week to see where you can be more efficient. Accept that you will always have flaws. Even the women on your list of 'perfect women' will have flaws. A flaw is not something that makes you unlovable or worthless. Rather, you will always have some way to develop personally. When you see a flaw, find ways to better yourself. Repeat positive affirmations to yourself daily, before you leave the house: 'I accept myself, I improve by learning and self-educating myself – I accept myself.' 'I approve of myself, I work hard every day to achieve my goals – I approve of myself.' Forgive yourself. Remind yourself that the past is the past. If there are any mistakes you've made, allow yourself to move on. Your past performance does not define your future. If there is anything you're currently doing that's causing you grief, start replacing that behavior with an alternative one that will give you peace of mind. This may be difficult as it takes time to replace habits. Talk to someone about how you feel about things that you're finding hard to let go. Other people can help give you different perspectives and encourage you to move on. Create a good support system. Surround yourself with people who give you positive affirmations and encourage you to be the best version of yourself. Distance yourself from those who put you down and constantly berate you. It's not possible to avoid negative people completely but try your hardest to stop socializing with them and limiting your daily interactions with them at school or work. If someone you interact with on a daily basis is constantly bullying you, either confront her about the issue or discuss the matter with your supervisor or a trusted colleague for advice on how best to approach the matter. Know that it's okay to say no from time to time. If someone asks to spend time with you but they bring you down, you can tell them you don't want to hang out with them. Celebrate your strengths. At the end of every day, remind yourself of the things you achieved today. Remind yourself of both big and small things. Small achievements can include things like, 'I made my bed before leaving for school this morning.' Some achievements may seem small but may have required a lot of effort, e.g. 'I didn't snap back at my sister when she was being rude to me.' Periodically reward yourself for doing things well. Go out for dinner at your favorite restaurant if you've performed particularly well this week. Or buy a new book to read if you've successfully managed to maintain an exercise routine for a couple of weeks. Put your life into perspective. As you try to achieve perfection, take a look at the things you do on a daily basis and how much you change over the course of a month, six months or a year. Reflect on how you grow. Remind yourself that your personality, your goals, your appearance, and your relationships are not static: all of them will develop and flourish as you seek to make your life better. Remember that your definition of perfect applies to you and you alone. Along the way you might be inspired by someone else to change an aspect of your life. That doesn't mean that you're aiming to become exactly like another woman.
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Analyze your role models. Acknowledge your strengths. Write an operating definition of perfect. Acknowledge your growth points. Expand your interests. Display a positive outlook. Develop social skills. Control your emotions. Follow through on promises. Be proactive. Avoid gossip. Be reliable and available. Develop an active lifestyle. Develop your own sense of style. Follow a hair and skin care routine. Improve your posture. Identify your goals. Gather resources. Ask for help. Implement your plan. Accept that you will always have flaws. Forgive yourself. Create a good support system. Celebrate your strengths. Put your life into perspective.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Play-Candy-Land
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How to Play Candy Land
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Candy Land is a fun 2-4 player board game where players try to make their way around the board and reach the Candy Castle first. To play Candy Land, start by having each player choose a gingerbread pawn to play with. The youngest player goes first. On your turn, draw a card off the top of the deck. If the card has a single colored square, move your gingerbread pawn to the next square in that color. If the card has 2 colored squares on it, move your pawn to the second next square in that color. If the card has a picture on it, move your pawn forward or backward to the nearest space with that same picture on it. After you move, the player to your left goes next. If you land on either the Rainbow Trail or Gumdrop Pass spaces, move your space all the way to the other end of the trail shortcut. If you land on one of the Licorice spaces, skip your next turn. The first player to get all the way to the end of the board and land on the rainbow space in Candy Castle is the winner!
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Set up the board. To set up the Candy Land board, unfold it and place it on your playing surface. Make sure that you place the board somewhere that everyone can reach it. A large table or a carpeted floor make good playing surfaces. Shuffle the cards and stack them together in a pile. Make sure that all of the cards are facing down so no player can see what they will pick up off the top of the deck. Place the cards somewhere central so that all players will be able to reach them. Place gingerbread pawns on the start square. The game comes with four gingerbread character pawns. Each player should choose one of these gingerbread pawns and place it on the start square of the Candy Land board. Let the youngest player go first. Have all of the players announce their birthdays to determine who is the youngest player. That player gets to go first and then play passes to the left. Keep the turns moving in a clockwise fashion throughout the entire game. Draw a card and move to the closest corresponding color. At the start of your turn, draw a card and check to see what is on it. Each card will either have one color square, two color squares, or a picture. Each of these cards allows you to do something different on your turn. One color square: Move your pawn to the first color space on the board that matches the color square on the card you have drawn. Two color squares: Move your pawn to the second color space on the board that matches the color square on the card you have drawn. Picture: Move your pawn forward OR backward to the picture square that matches the picture card you have drawn. Take shortcuts when possible. There are two shortcuts on the board that will allow you to move ahead faster if you land on one of these special spaces. The two shortcuts are located on Rainbow Trail and Gumdrop Pass. The shortcut space on Rainbow Trail is orange and the one on Gumdrop Pass is yellow. If you land on one of these spaces, follow the shortcut path upwards to the space above it. You must land on the exact space to use a shortcut. You may not use a shortcut if you are just passing by it. Lose a turn if you land on a licorice space. There are three licorice spaces on the board. If you land on one of these spaces, then you lose a turn. Keep in mind that you do not lose a turn if you are just passing by a licorice space. You must land on the exact space to lose a turn. Continue until you reach the end. The first player who reaches the multi-colored rainbow space at the end of the board has made it to the candy castle. The player who makes it to the candy castle first wins the game! Make the game easier for younger players. If you are playing with very young children, then you can use a rule variation that allows players to discard any cards that would send them backwards on the board. If a child draws a card that would send his or her gingerbread pawn backwards instead of forwards, then that child may simply discard the card and draw a new one. Add complexity for older players. If you are playing with older children or adults, then you can use a rule variation that allows players to draw two card per turn and choose which one to use. This variation adds an element of strategy to the game play. Players draw two cards per turn, select one to use and then discard the other card.
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Set up the board. Shuffle the cards and stack them together in a pile. Place gingerbread pawns on the start square. Let the youngest player go first. Draw a card and move to the closest corresponding color. Take shortcuts when possible. Lose a turn if you land on a licorice space. Continue until you reach the end. Make the game easier for younger players. Add complexity for older players.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Connect-a-PS3-to-Computer-Speakers
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How to Connect a PS3 to Computer Speakers
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There are a few different ways to connect a PS3 to computer speakers. If you have speakers with a digital optical input, connect one end of an optical output jack to the back of the PS3 and the other end to the audio jack on your computer. Or, if your speakers use a ⅛ input jack, plug one end of a headphone jack into your computer speakers and the other end into the ⅛ socket on the back of the TV. Alternatively, if you're playing your PS3 on a computer, you can use the AV multi-out audio cable to connect audio directly from the PlayStation to your computer.
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Know that computer speakers with digital optical inputs are the best method. Find computer speakers with digital optical inputs for the best results with your PS3. Since this method creates a direct connection to the system's digital signals with no adapters or converters, it will deliver the highest quality sound with little or no latency. Connect your PS3 to the video monitor of your choice. Connect the PS3 to the computer using an optical digital cable. Attach one end of the cable to the digital optical output jack on the back of your PS3. Connect the other end of the cable to the corresponding input jack on your computer speakers for the optimal PlayStation 3 audio experience. Look around your house and you will probably find some computer speakers with a 1/8th inch input jack. This is the most common type of input for computer speakers. You cannot plug these directly into your Playstation 3, but you can certainly connect them to the system by other means. Check the back of your HDTV to see what kinds of sockets are built into your input panel. You will find a 1/8th inch socket if you are lucky. In this case, getting PS3 audio through your computer speakers is simple. Connect your PS3 to the HDTV using the method of your choice. Locate the 1/8th inch socket. Plug the 1/8th inch headphone jack from your computer speakers into this socket. Hear all the audio signals from your television through the computer speakers, including those of your properly connected Playstation 3. Locate the analog AV multi out to component cable which should have come with your PS3. If it did not, you can use the one from your PS2 or obtain one from a trusted retailer. The cables plug into sockets that match them in color. Notice the three to five RCA connectors on the business end of this cable. The audio connectors are marked with red and white for the right and left speaker channels respectively. They are usually found right next to each other. This one is from a PS2. All the other connectors are associated with video functions and have nothing to do with carrying audio signals to the speakers. This is where the arcane cable and adapter combos come into play. Connect the video jacks from the AV multi out cable to the RCA inputs on your television set. Attach a male to female RCA adapter to each audio jack on the AV multi out cable. The connections should look like the illustration above. Connect a male RCA to female 1/8th inch adapter. Make sure red is attached to red and white to white/black all the way down the line before proceeding. Plug the 1/8th inch cable from your computer speakers into the female 1/8th inch jack. Confirm that the final rig looks like this before enjoying your PS3 audio experience. Use an HDMI cable or an HDMI to VGA converter to play PS3 video through your computer monitor. Connect audio from the Playstation directly to your computer speakers. Use the AV multi out audio cables and the same configuration of adapters described in the 1/8th inch input to RCA method.
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Know that computer speakers with digital optical inputs are the best method. Connect your PS3 to the video monitor of your choice. Connect the PS3 to the computer using an optical digital cable. Look around your house and you will probably find some computer speakers with a 1/8th inch input jack. Check the back of your HDTV to see what kinds of sockets are built into your input panel. Connect your PS3 to the HDTV using the method of your choice. Locate the 1/8th inch socket. Plug the 1/8th inch headphone jack from your computer speakers into this socket. Hear all the audio signals from your television through the computer speakers, including those of your properly connected Playstation 3. Locate the analog AV multi out to component cable which should have come with your PS3. Notice the three to five RCA connectors on the business end of this cable. Connect the video jacks from the AV multi out cable to the RCA inputs on your television set. Attach a male to female RCA adapter to each audio jack on the AV multi out cable. Connect a male RCA to female 1/8th inch adapter. Make sure red is attached to red and white to white/black all the way down the line before proceeding. Plug the 1/8th inch cable from your computer speakers into the female 1/8th inch jack. Confirm that the final rig looks like this before enjoying your PS3 audio experience. Use an HDMI cable or an HDMI to VGA converter to play PS3 video through your computer monitor. Connect audio from the Playstation directly to your computer speakers.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Replace-Swear-Words-with-Less-Offensive-Words
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How to Replace Swear Words with Less Offensive Words
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If you want to watch your language, you can replace common swear words with less offensive versions so you don't offend anyone. You might even make the person laugh instead. Think about all the words you usually say, then find replacements for them. For example, you can say funk or fudge instead of the F word, darn instead of damn, and messed up instead of F'd up. You can also say what the heck instead of what the F and crud or rats instead of crap. If someone's being an idiot, call them a goofball or doofus instead of a more offensive word.
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Make notes on how you swear. Brainstorm all of the swear words you use, and make notes on when you use them (when joking with friends, when you are angry, when you stub your toe, etc.). Knowing how and when you swear is the first step in figuring out inoffensive replacements. For instance, you might be able to identify your number one swear word, and start by replacing just that one. Think about both when and why you swear. Do you swear to impress friends? Out of habit? Because other people around you do? Think about where you can and cannot swear. You might be interested in limiting or eliminating your swearing in certain contexts, such as when you are at school or work. However, you might be fine with swearing in other contexts, such as when you are at home or hanging out with friends. When trying to replace swear words with inoffensive alternatives, you might first try to replace them in only one context, before moving on to others. Consider using a reward system to motivate yourself. You can help yourself consistently replace swear words with inoffensive alternatives if you reward yourself when you are successful. You can try a positive reward system. For instance, you can buy yourself a new pair of shoes if you make it through a week of replacing swear words. You could also try a negative motivator. For instance, you can make yourself put a dollar in a jar each time you use a swear word. Think about what you are trying to say when you swear. Sometimes, swear words are used in ways that are far different that their actual meaning. Start thinking about what you are really trying to say when you swear, so that you can develop a list of good alternatives. For instance, the “B” word technically means “female dog,” while the “A” word means donkey, and the "D" word means wishing one person to an evil place, yet all of these words convey very different meanings when used as swear words. Sometimes, swear words are used when a more precise word or phrase could be used to express a thought or feeling. For instance "This exam really f***ed me over" doesn't really say much, while "I didn't do well on this exam because I hadn't studied enough for the section on thermal dynamics" is much more specific. Use euphemisms. Euphemisms are relatively harmless words or phrases that are used in place of more offensive ones. Using a euphemism instead of a swear word is a quick an easy way to clean up your vocabulary. Many existing swear words also have common euphemisms. For instance, try saying: “Funk!” instead of “f***!” “Darn!” instead of “damn!” “What the eff?”, "What the heck?", or "What the barnacles?" instead of “What the f***?”. Also "What the hell?" (acceptable with limitations). “SOB” instead of “Son of a b****” “BS” instead of “bull s***!” “Screwed up," "stinks," or "sucks" instead of “f***ed up” “Goofball” instead of “dumba**” "Rats!" instead of "crap!" or "s***!" Invent new, inoffensive expletives You can invent nonsense words to use instead of swear words. Since these words are newly invented, they won't offend some people like swear words will. Use your imagination to invent replacement words and phrases like: "Boccalocca" "Egumwalasha!" “Dinglebuff” “I literally buhdangled my pants” “He was so glogged up” “I got my weewuu beat at bowling last night” “I can't find my nogwrangling keys!” Use outdated swear terms. Some words that were once used as offensive swear words have either become more acceptable, or have generally been forgotten. You can have fun researching some of these words and phrases, and practice using them to replace contemporary swear words. Some examples include: “Consarn it!” instead of “damn it!” “Zooterkins” (a seventeenth-century term for “God's wounds!” or “Zounds”!) “Sard” (an Old English term for f***) “Waesucks” (means “woe's sakes,” but can be used in place of "s***!") “Gadzbudlikins!” (unknown derivation) “Fopdoodle” for “dumba**” Borrow fictional swear words. Science fiction books, films, and television shows often invent alternative languages, including swear words. You can use some of these as less offensive replacements for swear words. For instance: “Ying-takh!” or “puh-takh,” from Klingon, to replace the “S” or “F” words. “Frack” or “frak” from Battlestar Galactica, to replace the “F” word “Goram,” from the Firefly series, to replace “G** d***!” Swear in a foreign language. You can use swear words from foreign languages as replacements. Since others around you may not know the foreign language, the replacement word will be less offensive. Avoid using swear words from a foreign language around others that speak that language, however. Some examples of foreign swear words include: “Scheisse” (pronounced “shy-seh”), German for “s***” “Aborder,” Cajun for “f***” “Culo,” Spanish for “a**” “Perfututum,” Latin for “totally f***ed” Bleep yourself. Television, radio, and other media sources often use a “bleep” or “beep” sound to censor swear words and other undesirable or offensive phrases. You can adopt the same approach. Any time you feel the urge to swear, just say “bleep!” For example: “This bleeping movie is stupid!” “I lost my bleeping phone!” “I'm so bleeped.” Speak eloquently. Circumlocutions, or ways of getting around saying something that you don't want to or shouldn't, can be used as another way of replacing swear words. They can also be an opportunity for you to practice speaking creatively and eloquently, and to have fun while doing it. For instance, try saying: “By the beard of Zeus, I declare: I have lost my keys and this has thrown me into a woefully anguished state of mind” instead of “I can't find my keys. I'm so f***ed.” “That motorist displayed neither noble character nor common decency when our paths crossed” instead of “I can't believe that f***ing jacka** cut me off at the four-way stop!” “Woe is me! My addled brain confounded my feet, and I have unfortunately collided with this rock!” instead of “S*** I just stubbed my toe on this f***ing rock!” Keep a vocabulary list of the new, less offensive words and phrases you have learned and are practicing. Writing down and memorizing words and phrases to replace profanity will help you remember to use them. You can also have fun learning new replacement words. Stop using swear words in writing. Once you start removing or replacing swear words from you spoken vocabulary, you might want to start cleaning up your writing as well. Texts, emails, and other common forms of writing are all contexts in which you might swear. Since it is hard to guarantee that information will be kept private once it is written down, you can use less offensive language in these contexts. You never know when your boss will check your social media accounts, for example! Some techniques include: Using Grawlix. Grawlix is a string of typographic characters meant to represent profanity without actually writing the word. For example, you can type “#$&*” instead of “s***,” or “*&#%!” instead of “f***!” Use combinations of letters, numbers, and symbols to form nonsense words that resemble swear words. For example, “5h17” instead of “s***,” or “13itch” or “81tc#” instead of “b****” Use acronyms instead of full phrases. For example, “WTF” instead of “what the f***,” or “SOB” instead of “son of a b****” Use apps to remove swear words electronically. Certain apps, such as Clean Reader, have been developed to remove swear words from e-books. Similarly, certain media players, such as iTunes, allow you to select a “clean” setting that removes explicit songs when listening to your music. Using these apps may help reduce the amount you curse by exposing you to fewer swear words. These apps cannot remove swear words from printed texts, obviously.
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Make notes on how you swear. Think about where you can and cannot swear. Consider using a reward system to motivate yourself. Think about what you are trying to say when you swear. Use euphemisms. Invent new, inoffensive expletives You can invent nonsense words to use instead of swear words. Use outdated swear terms. Borrow fictional swear words. Swear in a foreign language. Bleep yourself. Speak eloquently. Keep a vocabulary list of the new, less offensive words and phrases you have learned and are practicing. Stop using swear words in writing. Use apps to remove swear words electronically.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Take-Care-of-a-Singapura-Cat
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How to Take Care of a Singapura Cat
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To take care of a Singapura cat, feed it a high-quality diet consisting mainly of meat. You'll also want to keep your Singapura indoors to keep it safe from cars and other animals. Since Singapuras have short, smooth coats, you should only need to brush them occasionally to remove any loose fur. Due to their short hair, you'll only need to bathe your Singapura if it gets into something sticky or grimy. Additionally, set time aside to play with your cat and give it affection since Singapuras are very social, loving cats.
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Take your Singapura in for regular veterinary checkups. As with all pets, your Singapura needs regular veterinary care. Annual veterinary checkups allow for preventative care, such as vaccine administration, to be given, as well as the ability to catch health problems before they get too serious. Discuss testing for problems common in Singapuras. They are generally healthy cats but the most common inherited disease they get is called pyruvate kinase deficiency. This is a condition that causes anemia in Singapura cats. When you first get a cat, take it in to get evaluated by a veterinarian. Feed your Singapura high-quality food. Giving your Singapura quality cat food will keep to keep it healthy throughout its life. Since cats are strictly carnivores, quality cat food should consist mainly of animal tissue. Take a look at the ingredient list of a food you are considering and make sure that meat or seafood, or their byproducts, are the first couple of ingredients. This will help you make sure you are purchasing a high-quality food. Consult with your veterinarian for suggestions about what type and brand of food to give your cat. Avoid cat foods that are made mostly of grains. A cat's biology is not made to process grains. Also make sure that you think about your cat's age when picking out a type of food. Cat food is formulated differently for kittens, adults, and seniors, based on their specific nutritional needs. Provide clean drinking water. You should provide clean and fresh drinking water for all cats. Singapuras can expend a lot of energy due to their curious and playful personalities, so they will need access to water so they don't get dehydrated. Encourage your cat to drink water by having multiple water bowls in different locations throughout your home. You might also consider purchasing a water fountain bowl for your cat. If your cat is not drinking a lot of water and looks dehydrated, discuss switching its food to wet food with the cat's veterinarian. Giving the cat wet food can give it much needed water. Have your cat desexed. In order limit the general pet population and to keep your cat healthy, it is important to get your cat desexed. Spaying or neutering your cat can improve their behavior, by eliminating spraying and sexual activity. It can also reduce the chances of mammary cancer in older female cats. Discuss the timeline for desexing with your veterinarian. It should typically be done when the cat is between three and six months old. Keep your Singapura indoors. While many people are hesitant to keep their cats indoors because they think it is cruel, it is actually more dangerous for a cat to let it outside. Cats that are let outside can be injured by cars or other animals, get diseases or parasites, or even ingest toxins. In order to avoid these hazards, it's best to have your cat be an inside cat. The curious nature of Singapuras means that they can get into a lot of trouble when allowed to roam outside. Keeping your Singapura inside increases its life expectancy and it helps to protect wildlife, in particular birds, from being killed by your cat. Comb your cat occasionally. Singapura cats have short, smooth coats that need little maintenance. However, you may want to comb your cat once in a while to pull out shedded fur and to keep it off your furniture or floors. Many cats love the touch and attention that comes with combing. Use a long-toothed metal comb to comb your Singapura. These are commonly sold at pet supply stores. Trim your cat's nails. It is important to trim your Singapura's nails so that it doesn't tear up your furniture or snag a nail and damage its paw. Hold the cat's paw in one hand and use cat nail trimmers, or human nail trimmers, to trim off the very end of the cat's nails with the other hand. Trimming back further could result in you hitting the quick, the vein inside the nail. This will cause bleeding and pain for the cat. Some veterinary offices offer regular nail trims performed by a technician for a low cost. If you are uncomfortable trimming your cat's nails, you can take it to a groomer that is experienced grooming cats. You can also ask your veterinary provider to trim your cat's nails when you bring it in for another issue. Inspect and clean your cat's ears. Because the Singapura's ears are so prominent, they tend to get dirt and debris in them. While the cat may spend some time cleaning its ears, you can help by inspecting them regularly and cleaning out any dirt or debris that you see. You need to be careful when cleaning a cat's ears. Use a commercial product that is designed for cleaning the ears of cats and follow the directions on the packaging carefully. Never place a cotton swab or other item in your cat's ear canal. This can cause serious damage. Only clean the external portion of the ear. Don't bother with bathing. Singapura cats rarely need bathing, unless you are exhibiting one in a cat show. If you do need to bathe one, such as if it gets covered in something sticky, then it simply needs to be towel dried, not blown dry. This cat's short coat will dry quickly on its own. Clean your cat's litter box regularly. In order to keep your cat happy and healthy you need to give it a clean place to relieve itself. Put the cat's litter box in an easily accessible location and clean it daily. This is a very important part of providing the right environment for your cat. You should also be sure to use a litter box and litter that your cat likes. Spend quality time with your cat. Singapura cats are very social creatures that love interacting with their people. This means that they will require a lot of love and attention. If you have a Singapura it is likely that you spend a lot of quality time with them because they demand it. Singapuras love to play with their people. Get a string toy or laser toy and spend some time playing with your cat often. Give your cat enriching toys and furniture. Although Singapuras are very people focused, they also like to play and run around with cat toys and on cat structures. Provide your cat with a variety of toys they can run after, such as bell balls, and furniture they can climb on, such as a cat tower. Singapuras can be very curious, which means that they will explore every inch of your home. Give them lots of stimulating toys in order to minimize this curiosity, which can get them into trouble occasionally. Intelligent, curious cats like the Singapura benefit from puzzle toys. These are interactive toys that require the cat to solve a problem in order to get a treat. This offers great mental stimulation for your Singapura. The Singapura's life can also be enriched by having other cats to run around and play with.
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Take your Singapura in for regular veterinary checkups. Feed your Singapura high-quality food. Provide clean drinking water. Have your cat desexed. Keep your Singapura indoors. Comb your cat occasionally. Trim your cat's nails. Inspect and clean your cat's ears. Don't bother with bathing. Clean your cat's litter box regularly. Spend quality time with your cat. Give your cat enriching toys and furniture.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Become-Friends-with-a-Girl
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How to Become Friends with a Girl
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Becoming friends with a girl is easy if you're nice and make an effort to get to know her. Take any opportunity to sit near her or hang out with her so you can talk to her. Start conversations about things you have in common, compliment how she looks, or ask what she's been up to. Be kind to her as much as possible, just like you'd be with your other friends. Don't be afraid to tell jokes and be a bit silly. If you're nervous about talking to a girl, remember that she's human and she's more like you than she is different.
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Try to be in some of the same places. In order to become friends with a girl, you have to become familiar to her first. A girl may not be comfortable with a stranger walking up to her and starting a conversation out of the blue, but if she's seen you around and you've seen her around, that barrier falls. You're no longer scary. Are you in a few of her classes? Do you share a hobby? Great. It's actually proven that humans like things the more they are exposed to them. It's the reason the same song gets played over and over on the radio and why commercials get repeated endlessly. So the more she's exposed to you , the more she'll be inclined to like you. In psychology, this is called the mere-exposure effect (in case you were curious). If you have to, put yourself in her line of fire. Does she always sit towards the left side of the classroom? Can she be found at a certain Starbucks on Wednesday afternoons? If you know where she'll be, be there once in a while. As long as you're not breathing down her neck, you're on the right track. Interact with her. Okay, now that you both know who each other is and that you have a certain something in common, you've got to interact with her. It can be as simple as a passing remark about your teacher's ridiculous tie or a question about what time practice is next week. Don't be afraid to start off small -- after all, you've gotta start somewhere. She's a girl. She's just a girl. There are billions of them on this planet. When you ask her a question or make a funny comment, you will not spontaneously light on fire and the world will not explode. If she's friend material, she'll be happy to respond. Most girls are no different from guys when it comes to conversation. Don't come on too strong! Friendships develop over time and it can really make a girl uncomfortable if you start treating her like your best friend when you've only just met, especially if she's shy or socially awkward. Be bold. Lots of people are shy when it comes to reaching out to others. She may love to have a new friend like you, but she might not make herself vulnerable and put it all out there on the line. Be bold and amp up the conversation. Ask her her opinions on things, questions about your classes/hobbies/mutual friends, and just keep the conversation going. Take note of what she's wearing, carrying, or seems interested in. Be observant. Does she have wikiHow pulled up on her phone? Awesome -- you read this sweet article the other day on how to regain control of a spooked camel. What's her favorite article? Make her laugh. The simplest way to become someone she wants to be around is to make her laugh. When she thinks of being around you, she thinks of having a good time -- bingo! You're in. Feel out her sense of humor and keep the good times rolling. This is a way to also keep the situation light and fun. Making her laugh lets her know that you're just trying to have a good time, whether it's the middle of 5th period history that's a total drag or after a particularly intense practice that took all Thursday night. Brighten her day and she may want you around. However, don't just be the class clown all the time; that will make you look one-dimensional and, frankly, kind of boring after a week or so. Treat her like a lady. Girls need to know that you respect them and value their companionship, even if you don't want to date her. So while you need to think of her as a normal person, refrain from being a dude's dude around her right away. Hold a door for her, cover her if she's short on change, text her if she's going through a tough time, tell her she looks nice before a big event -- the small stuff. Be delicate with this. While a certain amount of flirting can be nice, it has to be within reason and done right. You don't want to mislead her! Just think of yourself as a gentleman around her. Be valuable to her. This step has absolutely nothing to do with making friends with girls and everything to do with just making friends. Do you have any friends that don't add something to your life? Probably not. So be of value to her. What "value" is depends on you. What are you good at? What do you know? Why should she want to keep you around? What makes you a good friend? And yes, there are answers to all those questions. Maybe you're really smart, funny, or know lots of different people. Maybe you've traveled a lot or have an interesting hobby. Zero in on what makes you you and put that out there. If you're smart, help her with a class; if you're funny, keep her laughing; if you're well-connected, introduce her to some new people she might like. Make yourself valuable. Splash around the praise. Girls love compliments that are genuine. As long as you keep it clear that you're not hitting on her, she'll love the praise. Is she wearing an awesome Daft Punk shirt? Tell her! Did she do great at the volleyball game last night? Tell her! Everyone loves feeling good about themselves. Make her feel that way, too. This is a touchy one. You do not want to tell her, "Your eyes are like pools of moonlight that see into my soul." Nor do you want to tell her, "Ohmigod, you're so smart!" when she just got a D on an exam. Your compliments have to be well-placed and genuine. Girls can tell when a compliment is forced and fake. Try turning things around and complimenting her in a subtle way. Lend her your gear and borrow hers. The iPod, the laptop, the books, the guitar, you know the drill. Both of you should feel it's okay to share treasured things with one another. Don't just suggest it out of nowhere or it might look like a technique. Wait until the opportunity presents itself. Or, you know, create the opportunity. Did you miss a class the other day? Ask to borrow her notes. Does she have the 4th season of Archer? Aww, man, you gotta borrow that right now! The street runs both ways, for sure, but you can start it. When you ask to borrow things from her, it cues her that it's okay for her to borrow things from you. . Laugh at her jokes Since you're cracking jokes here, there, and everywhere, she's probably going to throw in a few, too. If they're not funny, let her know by changing the topic or slightly modifying what she said. Laughter will bond the two of you, even if the joke isn't Facebook status worthy. Friends give each other a certain amount of crap. Even though she's a girl, there is still crap to be given! If she throws out a particularly bad joke, you're allowed to tease her a bit. This interaction somehow builds solidarity and as long as you're good-natured about it, she'll respond with a smile. Always be there for her. She should know that she can count on you through thick and thin. You'll offer her a shoulder to cry on when her relationships go wrong. You'll drive her to the station in the middle of the night to get back to her family in the pouring rain. That you'll study with her for a really hard test. This doesn't have to be said -- after enough time, it'll be understood. Girls get emotional. When she gets like this, it's important just to listen. She may not want an actual solution, regardless of how much she's complaining. Being there, listening to her, and telling her she can handle whatever she's going through is infinitely valuable on its own. Let your other friends know she's your friend, period. If they want to date her, it's fine by you but you're always keeping an eye out for her. That'll keep them on the straight and narrow too. And that's what being a true friend is all about. After all, she's like your sister, but better (no fighting over the bathroom). Let your girlfriend know she's your friend, period, too! Sometimes girls get a bit intimidated by other girls; if you approach this topic like it's no big deal, your lady should (hopefully) not have a problem. Heck, maybe the two of them will even hit it off! Stay open about your feelings. There's a school of thought that says guys and girls won't always be "just friends." At one point in time or another, either she'll have feelings for you or you'll have feelings for her. If this does happen (which it might), stay open about it. The absolute worst is living in a does-she-or-doesn't-she state of mind. Avoid this by being direct. And because you're such good friends, you can do this! Hopefully she'll be direct with you, too. If you start to notice mixed signals and you think she might be developing feelings, let her know how much you appreciate her friendship. There are delicate ways you can tell her you're just friends without hurting her feelings. Nip the problem in the bud as soon as you can!
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Try to be in some of the same places. Interact with her. Be bold. Make her laugh. Treat her like a lady. Be valuable to her. Splash around the praise. Lend her your gear and borrow hers. . Always be there for her. Let your other friends know she's your friend, period. Stay open about your feelings.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Grow-Bamboo
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How to Grow Bamboo
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To grow bamboo outdoors, start by picking a spot in your yard that gets at least 8 of sun each day. You should amend the soil in that area by adding in compost. You might also want to surround your bamboo with a barrier made out of sheet metal to keep it from spreading or getting damaged by wind. Start your bamboo indoors and wait until they are 3 to 4 months old to transplant them outdoors. Space the plants 3-5 feet apart and water them every day until they are established. Then, water 2-3 times per week.
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Know the difference between the three major types of bamboo. Bamboo plants are typically classified as clumping bamboo, running bamboo, or reeds. Reeds are rarely planted in yards, if ever, so you can expect to deal with either clumping or running bamboo. Running bamboo sends out rhizomes, which spread into other areas, causing the plant to become invasive. Clumping bamboo grows in tight clusters and rarely spreads out over larger areas. Pick the best bamboo variety for your climate. Most bamboo varieties do best in tropical climates, but if you live in a somewhat cooler area, there are a few hardier varieties you can attempt to grow with some success. If you living in warmer hardiness zones, like zones 7 through 10, a few good choices might be Bambusa multiplex 'Alphonse Karr' , Borinda boliana , and Phyllostachys nigra. The first two are clump bamboo types, while the last is running bamboo. For slightly cooler climates, like those found in hardiness zones 5 and 6, try the clumping type Fargesia dracocephala 'Rufa' or the running type Pleioblastus viridistriatus. Pick the best spot in your yard. Bamboo needs a great deal of sun, so you should usually pick a spot in your yard that receives 8 or more hours of sun daily. Note that some tropical species do require shade during the hottest parts of the day, however. Shade can be especially important during winter. The combination of frost and direct sunlight can dehydrate the plant quickly. As such, if you live in an area that receives frost during winter, you should opt for a spot that receives partial shade instead of one with direct sun. Amend the soil. While bamboo can do well in many types of soil, it does best in loam or marly soils. Improve your odds of success by digging and mixing in amendments to the soil before planting. Work garden compost or manure into the soil to provide it with additional nutrients. Ideally, the compost should be worked into the bottom of the transplant hole so that the bamboo roots sit on top of it. Loam soil is a mixture of five parts topsoil composted with two parts sand, two parts silt, and one part clay. Avoid rocky or soggy soils, as well as soils that are relatively impermeable. Prepare for wind. Bamboo has a shallow root system, yet it also grows tall and fast. As a result, it can easily get damaged by strong winds. You will need a barrier to prevent this from happening. The easiest way to protect your bamboo is to position them behind garden hedges or trees. Otherwise, you might need to build a fence around the area. Prevent bamboo from spreading. If you are planting running bamboo, you will need to construct a barrier to prevent the bamboo from invading other parts of your yard. After determining the area in which you want to confine the bamboo, install barriers of sheet metal or concrete around the perimeter. These barriers should be 3 to 4 feet (0.9 to 1.2 m) deep. Plant during spring. Bamboo grows quickly and needs quick access to warm, frost-free temperatures. Sow the seeds after the final frost of the season for best results. If you are starting your bamboo plants from seeds, you should start in the very early sprint so that the plants have enough time to establish themselves by summer. If you are transplanting established seedlings, any part of spring is suitable for planting. You should avoid planting bamboo in the fall, especially if you live in cooler climates, since the plant needs time to harden before cold, drying winds of winter begin. Conversely, if you live in severely hot climates that regularly reach temperatures hotter than 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius), you need to plant the bamboo early enough in the spring or in the early fall to avoid the intense heat of summer. Prepare the seeds. Bamboo seeds need to be cleaned and dried in the sun for 1 to 2 hours. Afterward, you should soak the seeds in clean water to break them out of dormancy. Soak the seeds for 6 to 12 hours. Drain the water 10 to 20 minutes before you sow the seeds. Plant the seeds in plastic seedling containers. If growing bamboo from seed, you will likely have better results if you plant the seeds in soil-filled plastic pallets meant for seedling growth. Fill the seedling containers with a mixture made from 8 parts topsoil, 1 part ashes, and 1 part fine wood chips or rice husks. Filter this mixture through a wire mesh to remove stones and debris before filling the containers. When filling the containers, leave the soil fairly loose. Make small holes 1 to 2 inches (2.5 to 5 cm) deep in the center of each seedling compartment. Drop one seed in each hole and cover the seeds gently with additional soil. Moisten the soil immediately and water daily. Let the seeds grow in an area of partial shade. Transplant seedlings after 3 to 4 months. Even though adult bamboo grows quickly, in the early stages, most species of bamboo will not be strong enough to transplant any earlier than this. Transplant the seedlings into small, separate pots or into poly bags filled with a mixture made of two parts manure, three parts soil, and one part sand. Bamboo seeds usually germinate after 10 to 25 days, and initially, the leaves are very fragile. It takes 3 to 4 months before the seedlings produce a rhizome, or stem, capable of producing new sprouts. This is the point in time at which bamboo can be transplanted. Note that if you are transplanting bamboo seedlings instead of growing the plant from seeds, these are the instructions you need to pay attention to. Space bamboo 3 to 5 feet (1 to 1 1/2 m) apart when transplanting them to your yard. If you ultimately want to create a dense screen of bamboo, you will usually need to plant the young seedlings this far apart early on. This is especially true of running bamboo. The plants should be transplanted to your yard once they reach 16 to 20 inches (40 to 50 cm) tall. Remove them from their pots or poly fill bags and place them directly into the ground. The hole you transplant the bamboo into should be roughly twice as wide as the bamboo root mass. If working with clumping bamboo, you can place them within 1 to 2 feet (30.5 to 61 cm) since these varieties will not spread out much. Note that clumping bamboo gains 1 to 2 feet (30.5 to 61 cm) of height yearly, while running bamboo gains 3 to 5 feet (0.9 to 1.5 m) of height yearly and spreads out at about the same rate. Water the bamboo regularly. Most species of bamboo require consistent watering, but you should not let the bamboo roots sit for an extended period of time in excess water. Bamboo seeds and young shoots should be watered daily during mild and dry weather. After bamboo plants have been established in your yard, you should water them twice a week during mild weather and three to four times a week during hot or windy weather. Spread mulch. Organic mulches help keep bamboo growth in check and can protect the bamboo from potential threats. Grass clippings make one of the best mulches for bamboo since they are rich in nitrogen and silica. Compost and hay can work well, too, as do many other types of organic and untreated mulch. Protect the bamboo in winter. Bamboo is a warm weather plant, so you should take extra precautions during winter to prevent the plant's roots from completely freezing. Apply an extra thick layer of mulch to protect the root systems of the mulch during freezing temperatures. If cold, harsh winds are a problem, you might need to construct a temporary barrier to shield your bamboo. If your bamboo takes on a dry look or silver color, this could be an indication of cold injury. Use a fertilizer high in nitrogen. Organic fertilizers are often recommended, and nitrogen promotes stronger, greener plant growth, so a fertilizer fairly high in nitrogen is usually best. Apply fertilizer once in the early spring and once in the summer. This schedule corresponds to the main growth seasons of bamboo. If using an organic and mild bamboo, you can apply fertilizer monthly throughout the spring, summer, and early fall. Thin and prune the bamboo as needed. As bamboo spreads, you might need to thin it out to prevent the stalks from crowding into one another and cutting off nutrient supplies. If you want to prevent running bamboo from spreading and do not have a barrier installed that can do so, you will need to cut new shoots off at ground level as soon as they appear in areas you do not want the bamboo in. Remove old, unattractive bamboo branches once a year. Trim them back until they look neat. If you cut bamboo just above a node, it can grow back. Protect the bamboo against pests and disease. Bamboo is resistant to most pests and diseases, so you only need to apply pesticide and fungicide after a problem develops. Some species of bamboo can fall victim to scale insects, red spider mites, and rust. Since adult bamboo is fairly hardy, however, mites are usually only a problem for new shoots. If you suspect that pests or fungi are a threat to your bamboo, quarantine new plants and spray them with a miticide or fungicide before transplanting them. Consider harvesting your bamboo. Fresh shoots of bamboo can be used for food, so if you want to add it into your diet, harvest young shoots within the first couple of months. Bamboo is best when fresh, but you can also can it or freeze it for long-term food storage. Fresh bamboo has a crisp texture and sweet flavor. Bamboo is a good source of fiber and is roughly equal to the onion in terms of nutritional benefits.
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Know the difference between the three major types of bamboo. Pick the best bamboo variety for your climate. Pick the best spot in your yard. Amend the soil. Prepare for wind. Prevent bamboo from spreading. Plant during spring. Prepare the seeds. Plant the seeds in plastic seedling containers. Transplant seedlings after 3 to 4 months. Space bamboo 3 to 5 feet (1 to 1 1/2 m) apart when transplanting them to your yard. Water the bamboo regularly. Spread mulch. Protect the bamboo in winter. Use a fertilizer high in nitrogen. Thin and prune the bamboo as needed. Protect the bamboo against pests and disease. Consider harvesting your bamboo.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Get-Preapproved-for-a-Mortgage
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How to Get Preapproved for a Mortgage
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To get preapproved for a mortgage, start by contacting lenders directly to ask about their specific requirements for preapproval. Then, fill out an application form with your lender and provide them with whatever documentation they need. Commonly, lenders might require 1 to 2 months of pay stubs, 2 years of tax returns and W-2s, a quarterly statement of your assets, like savings accounts, checking accounts, or other investments, and, finally, your social security number.
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Check your credit reports for free. You are entitled to review your credit report from each of the three main credit companies once a year for no cost. If you want a copy of your report more frequently, you will have to pay a fee. But even that fee is worth spending if necessary to buy a house. To get your free credit report, visit www.annualcreditreport.com. You can also get it by calling 877-322-8228. The three credit agencies are Equifax, TransUnion and Experian. Do not contact them directly for your report. Checking your own credit report or credit score does not affect your credit score in any way. Your own review is considered a "soft" inquiry, which does not count against your credit score. Know your credit score. In addition to keeping a record of your outstanding credit and other liabilities, the credit reporting agencies calculate your credit score. This is a single number that summarizes your reliability as a credit risk. The most prominent credit score is the FICO score, a registered trademark of the Fair Isaac Corporation. This is the score that most lenders and credit agencies rely on. The score ranges from 300-850, with higher numbers representing a better financial risk for lenders. Correct any errors before you need to apply. The credit report contains the information that banks and other lenders will see when you apply for a mortgage. It is therefore important for you to study the report carefully. Check it over for accuracy. If you see anything that appears incorrect, contact the credit reporting agency right away. Part of their function is to maintain accuracy and investigate any reports of fraudulent or incorrect activity. You can reach the three agencies at the following numbers or websites: TransUnion - www.transunion.com, or 877-322-8228 Experian - www.experian.com, or 888-397-3742 Equifax - www.equifax.com, or 800-685-1111 When you call, have your credit report with you. Tell the customer service representative, for example, “I just reviewed my credit report, and I see some incorrect information. What can I do to have this investigated?” The customer service representative will take some information from you and will then begin an investigation. You should receive a response within a week or two. If you do not, you should call back and inquire. Fix whatever negative items you can. If you find entries on your credit report that are negative but correct, you need to repair them as soon as possible. Correcting these items may not automatically improve your credit score (although some of them might), but correcting them will show potential lenders that you can pay off your obligations. Over time, your credit score will improve. Some things you can do to help your report are: Resolve any late payments. Keep your credit card balance above 0% but below 50% of your limit. Prepare explanations for any problems. If you have negative items on your credit report that are accurate, but in the past, you should prepare an explanation for them. For example, if you were evicted for nonpayment of rent three years ago, you may be able to explain that you were not working at the time, but since then you have a new job with a much high salary. If you can show a good work record for the past year or so, the lender should be able to accept that the problem of nonpayment was a result of your unemployment and is not likely to happen again. A good explanation should be honest, accept responsibility for what happened, include documentation to support your current, improved situation, and promise to avoid that problem in the future. Research potential lenders. Before you can get a preapproval letter, you need to select a lender. Preapproval does not lock you in with a particular lender. Nevertheless, you should do some research and make a choice of a lender before seeking preapproval. In choosing a lender, you should consider several factors: Do you want a local bank where you can get live, personal service? Are you comfortable doing most of your banking online? Are you willing to pay more in fees if you can get a lower interest rate? What is the reputation of each lender you are considering? Review interest rates. Although a preapproval letter does not generally lock you in to an interest rate, you should still compare rates of various lenders. If someone is significantly lower or significantly higher than other lenders today, chances are that they will probably be the same in a few weeks if and when you do sign a mortgage. You can compare many lenders' rates directly online. When comparing rates, compare the same type of mortgage. You cannot compare the rate on a 15 year mortgage with the rate on a 5 year adjustable mortgage. One handy service, www.CompareInterestRates.com, helps you compare rates of many lenders on one screen. You just need to select your location and the type of mortgage you are looking for, and it will show you about thirty to fifty different lenders, their current rates, and their contact information. Inquire about preapproval policies. When you select a lender that you believe you will want to work with, contact a representative and inquire about their preapproval policy. Find out how much information they will require for the preapproval. At this stage, you should try to find a lender who will require as little as possible, although the trend is for lenders to require more and more personal information. It is common for lenders to require tax returns, proof of employment and proof of your assets. Ask about fees for preapproval or application. Find out what the bank will charge for a preapproval letter. Some banks will conduct the preapproval process without charging a fee, while others will charge a fee. If the bank charges a fee for preapproval, find out if there is also a separate fee for the mortgage application or if the preapproval fee covers both. You should also ask if the fee is refundable if you do not go through with the mortgage. You may prefer to choose one bank that does not charge an application fee over another bank that does. Do your research before committing to any one lender. Complete the application form. The preapproval process begins with a complete application form. The lender will gather information about you, your spouse or partner, if any, and your overall finances. Complete the form as fully and accurately as you can. Omitting any information will only slow the process. Some banks may use the same application for preapproval that they use to apply for the mortgage itself. This may save some steps later if you wind up applying for a mortgage with that bank. Provide documentation. The lender will require certain documents to support your application. Prior to about 1990, you merely had to give your employer's name and state your annual income, but now it is common to require the following documentation: one to two months of pay stubs, showing annual payment as well two years of federal tax returns, including W-2 statements a quarterly statement of all assets, including savings accounts, checking accounts and any other investments Social Security number (to get your credit report) Answer any additional questions. The lending officer at the bank may have other questions or need additional information from you. You should do your best to provide as much honest information as you can. Wait for a decision. While you are waiting, you can continue looking at houses, and tell owners or brokers that you have started the process for preapproval on a loan. If you find a property that you wish to buy, and you need the preapproval letter to be expedited, you should contact the bank right away and inform them of that. They want your business, so it will be in their interest to speed up the process if it helps you. The preapproval process may take as long as two to four weeks. If you need to make an offer sooner, try requesting a pre-qualification letter. This is a similar letter that requires much less documentation, but also carries less weight. Receive your preapproval letter. Within about two weeks after completing the application, you should receive a letter from the lender with its decision. You need this written letter so you can show it to sellers and brokers as you shop for a new home. Look for the amount of the preapproval. The letter should tell you the details of the loan that you will qualify for. This should include the maximum amount of the loan and the duration of the loan. This will give you an idea of how much you can spend during the house hunting process. It also shows sellers that you are serious when you make an offer. Note the duration of the preapproval. Most mortgage pre-approvals are good for between 60 and 90 days. This is important for you to recognize, because if you do not make an offer on a home within that time, the letter will expire. You may still be able to show it, to demonstrate the general condition of your finances, but you should plan your house hunting within that time frame. Show your preapproval when you make an offer on a house. Some brokers or homeowners will not even accept offers from people without preapproval letters. Even if they do accept such offers, they will prefer an offer that is accompanied by a valid preapproval letter. This letter will help your offer take precedence over others.
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Check your credit reports for free. Know your credit score. Correct any errors before you need to apply. Fix whatever negative items you can. Prepare explanations for any problems. Research potential lenders. Review interest rates. Inquire about preapproval policies. Ask about fees for preapproval or application. Complete the application form. Provide documentation. Answer any additional questions. Wait for a decision. Receive your preapproval letter. Look for the amount of the preapproval. Note the duration of the preapproval. Show your preapproval when you make an offer on a house.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Install-a-Drip-Irrigation-System
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How to Install a Drip Irrigation System
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If you want to install a drip irrigation system, start by installing a backflow preventer in the mainline so your drinking water doesn't get contaminated. Then, attach your controller to each valve using direct burial irrigation wire. Next, cut tubing to your desired length for your drip lines, attach connectors to each drip line, and connect them to your mainline. Finally, put a valve on the end of each tube so water doesn't leak out, then test the system.
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Check legal requirements. Before you begin, contact your water purveyor or municipal water department to ask about laws, codes, and permits related to drip irrigation systems. Each area and water purveyor may have its own requirements, and some require a licensed irrigator and/or backflow tester to be present during the installation. These precautions ensure a safe installation that will prevent contamination from your irrigation system into drinking water. If you plan on using the drip irrigation as a temporary system while your landscaping gets established, mention the expected time frame. The requirements may be lighter. In many areas, including some U.S. states, proceeding without the proper permits or supervision can lead to fines, a court appearance, or even jail time. Divide your garden by water needs. Before you purchase your supplies, you'll need to know what exactly you need. Sketch a rough map of your garden, or the area you wish to drip irrigate. Divide the map into several regions based on one or more of the following: Watering needs of each plant. Mark these heavy, medium, or light. Levels of sun or shade. If most of your plants have similar watering needs, use sun exposure to divide your garden. Plants in full sun will need more water than plants in partial or full shade. Soil types: Take this into account if your garden has major soil variation. See below for more information. Design the irrigation layout. A typical drip tube can reach a maximum length of 200 ft (60 m), or 400 ft (120 m) if the water enters the line at its center. If you need more than one drip tube, you can install a lateral line with two or more drip tubes extending from it at different points. For large gardens, use a pressurized mainline instead of the lateral line, and consider looping it in a full circle, which allows you to double its length to 800 feet (240 m) (240 m). Sketch the proposed layout onto your map. Ideally, each drip tube should serve an area with similar watering needs. "Distribution tubing" is a smaller alternative to drip tubing. This can only reach a maximum length of 30 ft (9 m). Use only for potted or hanging plants to prevent clogging. Typically, the mainline runs along one length of the garden, or around the entire perimeter for large properties. Divide your garden into watering zones. Your drip emitters and tube diameter will determine the system's maximum GPH (gallons per hour). In order to meet your entire garden's water needs, you may need to divide your system into several zones. By installing a "zone control valve" in each zone, you can direct flow to one or two zones at a time. It's best to install each valve near the center of the zone, so it pushes water out at even pressure in all directions. If the drip system will be permanent, it's worth the cost of an electric valve that hooks up to an irrigation controller. Manual valves are tedious to operate and often mistakenly left operating for longer than intended. The equipment you buy should come with recommended maximum tube length and GPH. You can also calculate this yourself using hydraulic flow calculations. Decide on a water delivery method for each area. There are several ways to deliver water from the drip tubing to the plant. Determine which to use for each area in your garden: Drip emitter : The most common option, this is a smaller diameter line attached to the main tubing. Punch holes using a drip irrigation hole punch anywhere along its length, so the water flows toward the plants. See below for information on types of drip emitters. Pre-installed emitter lines : This drip tubing has evenly spaced emitters, suitable for crops, orchards, and vegetable rows. It also works for shrub beds and other densely planted sites, and even under turf if installed correctly. Micro-sprinkler heads : Halfway between drip irrigation and sprinklers, these low-pressure sprinklers are less efficient but harder to clog, which may be useful in hard water areas. They work well in shaded area and for plants that prefer misting. Porous pipe : This cheap alternative to drip tubing drips along its entire length, with no way to maintain water pressure or control rate. This is not recommended, as it clogs easily and may have a shorter maximum length. Never mix it with other types of emitters. Narrow down the type of drip emitter. If you decided to go with drip emitters, there are many types to choose from. Basic turbulent-flow emitters are a good default, but consider the following options in special circumstances: Note: regardless of the time of emitter you choose, it should be self-flushing so it stays clear when the zone is shut off. Use pressure-compensating (PC) drip emitters for changes in elevation over 5 ft (1.5 m). The "PC" label is unregulated, so look up product information and confirm it works with your desired flow rate before buying. Adjustable drip emitters can be water wasting and prone to flooding plants if not checked often. If your plants have varying water needs, it's usually better to install several standard, color-coded emitters at different strengths (such as 1, 2, and 3 GPH). Turbulent-flow emitters are a good, cheap option for all other purposes. Vortex, diaphragm, and long-path emitters will all work fine. These variations are less important than the differences described above. Plan the flow rate and spacing. Now's the time to figure out how many emitters you need. Each emitter has a certain flow rate, usually expressed in GPH (gallons per hour). Here are some general guidelines based on soil type: Sandy soil: This soil falls apart into grains when rubbed between your fingers. Space 1 to 2 GPH (3.8 to 7.6 liters per hour) emitters about 11" (28 cm) apart. Loamy soil: Quality soil, not too dense or loose. Space 0.5 to 1 GPH (1.9 to 3.8 LPH) emitters about 17" (43 cm) apart. Clay soil: Dense clay, slow to absorb water. Space 0.5 GPH (1.9 Lph) emitters about 20" (51 cm) apart. If using micro-sprinklers, space them 2–3 inches (5–7.5 cm) further apart than described above. For trees or other plants with higher water needs, install two emitters spaced evenly around the root zone. Don't mix and match emitters with different flow rates on the same drip line. Purchase equipment. Besides the pipes and emitters, you'll need a plastic fitting for each connection, plus an end cap or flush valve for each drip tube. In addition, you'll need an "air vent" on the lateral line. This pops open when the zone shuts off to help flush the emitters. Read the instructions in the next section for additional equipment necessary to connect the system to a water source. Compare all sizes and threads before purchasing. You'll need adapters to connect pipes of different size, or to attach "hose thread" to "pipe thread." If using a lateral line, use black polyethylene tubing. (PVC irrigation piping is only rated for below-ground use.) If using a mainline, choose piping made from copper, galvanized steel, PEX, sturdy PVC, or heavy polyethylene. Bury PVC to protect it from sunlight. The size and type of your pipe determines the maximum flow rate. For most homes, ¾" Class 200 PVC pipe is large enough, supporting a flow of 10 gallons per minute. If your water supply has a higher flow rate than that, increase the size of your pipes and zone valves accordingly. Install the mainline with a backflow preventer. Every irrigation mainline must be its own closed system, with backflow assemblies preventing any contamination back into the drinking water supply. Your backflow assembly must stop all backflow from both back pressure and back-siphonage, and comply with all laws and local code. Hook up a controller. If you want to water your garden automatically, install an irrigation controller to a convenient location. Wire this to each zone control valve using direct burial irrigation wire (type AWG-UF) and waterproofed wire splices. Sheathe any above ground wires in conduit. Add a filter. Drip tubing is easily clogged by rust, minerals, and other particles in the water. Use a mesh sized 155 (100 microns) or higher, and rated for twice your expected water pressure. Connect a pressure regulator if necessary. Also called a pressure reducing valve, this reduces and regulates water pressure in your irrigation lines. Install this if your system has a water pressure above 40 psi (2.8 bars). Fit the lateral line if necessary. If more than one drip line will run from this line, install your PVC lateral line first. Each drip line in the area will run from this pipe. Don't forget to protect your lateral line from sunlight using aluminum tape. Assemble the the drip lines. Use a tubing cutter to cut the drip tubing to desired lengths. Push each drip tube into a connector and attach the connector to your pressure regulator or lateral line. Lay out the drip lines on the surface of the garden. Do not bury your drip lines, or they may end up chewed by rodents. Cover them with mulch if you wish to hide them — after you finish installation. Add control valves before each drip line if you want to be able to adjust or shut them off individually. Stake the drip lines in place. Secure the drip lines using ordinary garden stakes. Attach the emitters. If you are using drip emitters or micro-sprinklers, attach these along your drip lines. Use a small punch tool to pierce the drip tube, then insert the emitter tightly. Do not use a nail or other improvised object, which may create a leaky, ragged hole. Cap the end of each drip tube. Attach a flush valve or end cap to each drip tube to prevent water leaking out the end. While you could just bend the tube back and crimp it shut, these tools make it easy to inspect and clean clogged tubing. Test the system. Set the timer on manual and turn on the water supply. Adjust the control valves until the emitters release a slow, steady trickle of water. Once finished, set the timer according to your garden's needs. Check the whole system for leaks and repair if needed: For metal to metal connections, either wrap the threads with Teflon tape no more than three times, or apply a small amount of pipe thread paste ("pipe dope"). Using too much tape or pipe dope can make leaks worse, especially with soft metals such as brass or copper. Plastic threaded connections seal better than metal and are not designed to work with Teflon tape or pipe dope. Tighten them as far as you can by hand, then use a hand tool to tighten no more than one full turn.
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Check legal requirements. Divide your garden by water needs. Design the irrigation layout. Divide your garden into watering zones. Decide on a water delivery method for each area. Narrow down the type of drip emitter. Plan the flow rate and spacing. Purchase equipment. Install the mainline with a backflow preventer. Hook up a controller. Add a filter. Connect a pressure regulator if necessary. Fit the lateral line if necessary. Assemble the the drip lines. Stake the drip lines in place. Attach the emitters. Cap the end of each drip tube. Test the system.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Handle-Prozac-Withdrawal
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How to Handle Prozac Withdrawal
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If you're worried about handling Prozac withdrawal, start by talking to your doctor so they can walk you through the withdrawal process. Try to reduce your dosage slowly over a few weeks or months, which will give your body more time to get used to you quitting. Since feeling feverish is a common withdrawal symptom, try to dress in layers so that you can strip down or put something back on depending on whether you feel hot or cold. You should also try to maintain a balanced diet and get plenty of sleep, which will help your body function at its best. Additionally, talk to your doctor before taking any over-the-counter supplements to reduce withdrawal symptoms, such as melatonin for sleeping problems.
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Talk to your doctor. If you've decided that you don't want to take Prozac anymore, it's important to have a conversation with your doctor about your options. Don't be afraid to ask about what Prozac withdrawal will be like and how to prevent it. If you want to stop Prozac because of side effects, your doctor may want to switch you to another medication. If you can't afford your prescription or your doctor does not want to keep prescribing it for you, have a conversation about the best way to stop taking Prozac. You may also want to ask about any nonprofit organizations that may be able to help you pay for your medications. Keep in mind that you have to take antidepressants for at least six months to see an effect. Wean yourself off. The single best thing you can do to prevent withdrawal symptoms when you stop taking Prozac is to reduce your dosage very slowly over the course of several weeks or even months. Talk to your doctor to determine the right schedule for you. It will depend on a variety of factors, including your current dose and how long you have been taking Prozac. If you start experiencing severe withdrawal symptoms, call your doctor right away. He or she may recommend that you revert to a higher dose and taper off more slowly. The more slowly you taper your dosage, the less likely you are to experience withdrawal symptoms at all. Stay motivated. In order to psychologically prepare yourself for withdrawal, take a moment to think about why you want to stop taking Prozac. Come up with a specific goal if you can, and consider writing it down to help keep yourself motivated and committed. If you do start experiencing withdrawal symptoms, it's important to remind yourself that they are only temporary and that it is necessary to endure them in order to reach your goal. You may find it helpful to keep a journal during the withdrawal process so you can go back and look at your progress. Get support. You will have a much easier time dealing with the symptoms of Prozac withdrawal if you have at least one person to confide in. This person can help you stay motivated, can support you when you feel emotional, and can help you out if you're not feeling well enough to do things around the house by yourself. It's best to talk to the person you choose before you stop taking Prozac and explain the symptoms you might experience, as well as your reasons for wanting to stop taking the medication. There are also a variety of support groups online. These may be helpful if you would like some information regarding what to expect from other people who have experienced Prozac withdrawal, or even just some encouragement. Some areas have crisis lines and hotlines that you can call for help and support. You can also try an online chat line if you are feeling suicidal. Prevent a relapse of depression symptoms. In order to avoid the depression or anxiety you were experiencing before you started taking Prozac, it's important to have a plan for how you will combat these symptoms. Depending on your unique circumstances, you may want to try therapy, a different medication, or even lifestyle changes, such as a healthier diet and increased exercise. You may feel depressed or anxious while your body is withdrawing from Prozac, but it may not be a relapse of the condition that caused you to take the drug in the first place. If your symptoms are only temporary, they are likely just a symptom of withdrawal, so do your best to cope with them. If you continue to feel depressed or anxious even after the other symptoms of withdrawal have passed, you may be experiencing a relapse, so talk to your doctor about your treatment options right away. Your doctor will have to monitor your mental status and your risk for suicide. Studies have shown people on antidepressants have a higher risk than placebo for suicidal ideation. Embrace a healthy lifestyle. In order to help your body function at its best, it's important to take up some healthy habits. Make sure that you eat a balanced diet, stay hydrated, exercise, and get lots of sleep. Try to establish a regular schedule and reduce your stress as well, as this will increase your chances of being able to combat your depression and anxiety without Prozac. Cut yourself a little slack and let yourself relax while you withdraw from Prozac. Try to avoid committing yourself to anything strenuous or stressful, as you may not be feeling up to participating. Wear layers. You may experience fever-like symptoms while withdrawing from Prozac, so it's a good idea to dress in layers. This will allow you to strip down to a light layer when you feel sweaty, and to bundle up when you get the chills. Consider supplements. There are a variety of over-the-counter supplements that may help reduce certain symptoms you are experiencing during Prozac withdrawal. It is important to talk to your doctor before you start taking any supplements, as they may interact with one another or with other medications you are taking. If you are unable to sleep, you may want to take Melatonin. If you are feeling fatigued, you may want to take a Vitamin B complex or Rhodiola Rosea. If you are feeling depressed, anxious, or irritable you may want to try Sam-e or magnesium. St. John's Wart can be helpful in treating depression as well, but overlapping its use with Prozac is not recommended, because St. John's Wart can make Prozac's side effects worse; wait two weeks after you finish taking Prozac to try St. John's Wart. If you are experiencing brain zaps or mental fogginess, omega-3 fatty acids (like fish oil or krill oil) may help. Ask your doctor for a prescription. If your symptoms become severe, your doctor may be able to offer you some relief by prescribing a medication to help combat nausea or insomnia. These will be taken for a very short period of time. Remain calm. It's important to keep in mind that withdrawal symptoms are temporary and are not dangerous or damaging to your health. Try not to panic if you experience unusual symptoms like brain zaps. Feel free to contact your doctor if you are having trouble coping with your symptoms. He or she may be able to offer you additional advice on how to reduce the symptoms, which may include temporarily increasing your dosage of Prozac. Your doctor can also help you identify if you have any symptoms that are not related to Prozac withdrawal.
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Talk to your doctor. Wean yourself off. Stay motivated. Get support. Prevent a relapse of depression symptoms. Embrace a healthy lifestyle. Wear layers. Consider supplements. Ask your doctor for a prescription. Remain calm.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Unicorn-Horn
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How to Make a Unicorn Horn
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If you want to make a unicorn horn out of paper, trace a triangle with a rounded bottom onto a thick sheet of cardstock or scrapbooking paper. Use craft scissors to cut out the triangle shape, then cut the tip off of the triangle so it has a flat top. Starting on one side of the triangle, roll the paper into a narrow cone, then tape the outer edge of the cone to give it extra stability. Attach a ribbon or elastic to the base of the horn to hold it in place, then paint or decorate your unicorn however you like!
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Get heavy weight paper. To make a unicorn horn, you will need piece of thick, heavy weight paper. Cardstock or a thick scrapbooking paper would be best. You can use decorative paper to make your horn unique. Cut a cone shape out of the paper. Draw a large triangle with a rounded bottom on the paper. Cut along the outline of the triangle. Then, cut the tip off of the top of the triangle so it has a flat top. Roll the paper into a cone. Start on one side of the triangle and roll it towards the other side, making the triangle form a cone. Tape the outer edge of the cone to secure it. Then, put a piece of tape on the edge of the paper in the inside of the cone to give it extra stability. Try to keep the base of the cone about the size of a milk jug's top to make it look like a horn. Attach a ribbon or elastic. Use a hot glue gun to glue a ribbon or piece of elastic to the base of the horn. Glue one side of the ribbon to the inside of one side of the horn, then repeat with the other side. Decorate your unicorn horn. You can decorate your unicorn horn to add finishing touches and make it unique. Be creative and express yourself! There are many different things you can use to decorate your horn. Paint Ribbons Glitter Stickers Markers or crayons Get a party hat. You need a party hat that is made from lightweight cardboard to make a unicorn horn. You can find them at your local party store and some grocery stores. Undo the party hat. Find out where the hat is connected, and undo it so you can roll it out flat. If the party hat is taped, remove the tape or gently cut the tape to undo it. If the hat is glued together, carefully use scissors to separate it. Then, unroll the party hat out flat. Keep the elastic attached to the hat Roll the hat tighter. To make the horn, you need to roll the hat up again, but roll it tighter than it was before. Start with one side of the party hat, and roll it towards the other side creating a tighter roll. Keep rolling until you have a nice tight cone shape. Tape the hat together. Use tape to secure the hat into the horn shape. Use a hot glue gun, or put several pieces of tape on the outer edge of the party hat to secure it to the hat. Wear your new unicorn horn. Put the base of the horn on top of your forehead and pull the elastic over the back of your head to wear your new unicorn horn. Get a piece of 9”x12” foam sheet. You need large foam sheets to make a foam unicorn headband. You can get them from your local craft store or buy them online. Self-adhesive foam sheets work well for this project. Draw a diagonal line on the foam. On the back side of the foam sheet, use a ruler to draw a diagonal line from the bottom left corner up to one inch inside the top right corner. Cut along the line. Use scissors to cut along the line you've just drawn. You will end up with a shape that looks like a triangle with one corner that's flat. Roll the foam into a cone. Start with the bottom left corner of the foam and roll it towards the bottom right corner to form the cone. Continue rolling until the top corner is completely rolled around the cone. Glue the foam. Use hot glue to glue the top corner down onto the cone to secure the cone in place. You can also put some glue on the inside to hold the bottom of the cone in place. Trim the bottom of the cone. Use scissors to trim the bottom of the cone so that it is even and can stand up flat on a table. Cut fringe into the bottom of the cone. Use scissors to make snips up ¼ inch from the bottom of the cone. Snip every ½ inch around the bottom of the cone to create fringe. Cut a circle from the leftover foam. Use the leftover foam you have to cut a circle that is ½ inch larger in diameter than the bottom of the cone. Glue the foam to the headband. Get a plastic headband to glue your horn to. Use a hot glue gun to glue the foam circle to the bottom of the center of the headband. Then, put the cone on the top of the headband directly above the foam circle. Glue the cone onto the circle by gluing each piece of fringe onto the foam circle. Add embellishments. Make your unicorn horn headband unique by adding embellishments onto the horn. Use your imagination and make it yours. Add jewels to the horn and headband. Glue ribbons to flow down from the top of the horn. Use glitter glue to add designs to the horn. Finished.
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Get heavy weight paper. Cut a cone shape out of the paper. Roll the paper into a cone. Attach a ribbon or elastic. Decorate your unicorn horn. Get a party hat. Undo the party hat. Roll the hat tighter. Tape the hat together. Wear your new unicorn horn. Get a piece of 9”x12” foam sheet. Draw a diagonal line on the foam. Cut along the line. Roll the foam into a cone. Glue the foam. Trim the bottom of the cone. Cut fringe into the bottom of the cone. Cut a circle from the leftover foam. Glue the foam to the headband. Add embellishments. Finished.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Grow-an-Orange-Tree
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How to Grow an Orange Tree
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To grow an orange tree, purchase a young tree from a nursery and plant it into a pot larger than its roots. When you're ready to plant the tree outside, dig a hole just deep enough to cover the roots, then plant the tree and cover it with the soil. Water your tree infrequently but heavily, because orange trees prefer to be in soil that dries out. When applying fertilizer, give trees aged 2-3 years 2 tablespoons of nitrogen-high fertilizer 3 times a year and adult trees 1 1/2 pounds of fertilizer per year.
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Understand the problems with growing from a seed. An orange tree grown from seed will be more vulnerable to disease, and its oranges may not taste like the fruit the seed came from. The tree could also take between four and fifteen years to bear fruit for the first time. A young tree purchased from the nursery is actually a combination of two plants: one tree bred for healthy roots and other attributes, plus branches of another tree grafted onto the first. These branches come from a tree that produces high quality fruit, and because they are already mature, the tree should produce fruit within a year or two after purchase. All that explained, feel free to continue with these steps if you're up for a challenge. Select seeds before they have dried out. Cut open an orange carefully without breaking the seeds inside, or simply use the seeds that aren't damaged by the knife. Pick out seeds without any dents or discolorations. Seeds that appear withered and dry, usually after they've been left out of the fruit for too long, have a lower chance of growing. Note that some varieties of orange are seedless. Ask a fruit seller for a variety with seeds. Wash the seeds. Hold the seeds under running water and gently rub off any pulp or other material that has gathered onto the seeds. Be careful not to damage the seeds, especially if some are already beginning to sprout. There is no need to dry the seeds afterwards. Keeping them moist will make them more likely to sprout. Get the seeds to sprout faster by keeping them moist. Assuming you're using seeds that haven't yet begun to germinate (sprout), you can shorten the time it takes to reach that point by keeping them in a moist environment. You could keep damp seeds in a plastic bag in the refrigerator for 30 days before planting, or simply keep the soil they're planted in moist, but not soggy. If you are using seeds that have dried out, they are in a dormant state and can take months to germinate, or fail to do so at all. Professional orange growers soak some slow-germinating orange varieties in gibberellic acid before planting to speed up the germination even more. This is typically unnecessary for a home project involving a handful of seeds, and can easily backfire if the wrong amount is used for your orange variety. Plant each seed in a small pot of well-draining potting mix or soil. Plant them about 1/2 inch (1.2cm) beneath the surface. Orange trees aren't too picky about which potting mix you pick, but it is important that water does not pool around the seeds (and later roots) and cause rot. Water should drain through the pot quickly when you water the soil. Optionally, you can purchase citrus potting compost to add to the mix, which will increase its ability to hold nutrients and create the more acidic (low pH) environment that citrus trees thrive in. Remember to put a plate or other object underneath the pot to catch the draining water. If the soil is poor at draining, mix in hardwood bark chips. This makes the soil less compact, which lets water drain through faster. Keep the soil in full sunlight. Whether indoors or outdoors, the soil does best at temperatures between 75º and 85ºF (24º–29ºC). Sunlight is the best way to warm your soil to the correct level, since a radiator could dry out the soil too quickly. If you live in a cold or low-sun region, you may need to keep your orange tree in a heated greenhouse or conservatory, even before it's germinated. Add a balanced fertilizer once every two weeks (optional). If you'd like to speed up the tree's growth, adding a small amount of fertilizer to the soil every 10–14 days will help. To get the best results, you would need to tailor your choice of fertilizer to the level of nutrients in your soil, which should be on the label of the potting soil if you purchased it. Otherwise, choose a balanced fertilizer with relatively even amounts of nutrients. Stop adding fertilizer once the plant has grown into a young tree. Follow the instructions for a Seedling or Young Tree instead. It shouldn't need additional fertilizing until its second year. Remove the weakest of the three sprouts when the seeds sprout. Citrus seeds have the unusual ability to produce exact clones of the mother plant, called nu-cellar seedlings. These are typically the two fastest-growing sprouts, while a third "genetic" offspring tends to be smaller and slower-growing. Cut off this weak third sprout in order to produce a tree with the consistent quality the parent was bred for. Plant the tree into a pot slightly larger than its roots whenever necessary. Whether you just purchased a tree or have been growing it for years, you should plant it in a container that the roots easily and comfortably fit into, but not into one far larger than the root ball. The best time to re-pot your orange tree is in the spring, before it has put a lot of energy into growing. Cut off any dead or broken roots before planting. First sterilize the knife by boiling it or rubbing it with alcohol to reduce the chance of transmitting disease to the tree. Pack the soil gently around the roots to remove pockets of air. The top roots should end up just under the surface of the soil. Consider an outdoor location. Oranges can grow in USDA hardiness zones 8 through 10 (with minimum annual temperatures of 10 to 40ºF / -12 to 4.4ºC). If you live in one of these warm climates, you may be able to find a place to plant the tree outside: Choose an area protected from the wind. To allow for root growth, plant standard-sized orange trees at least 12 feet (3.7m) from walls and other large obstacles, and 25 feet (7.6 m) from other trees. If using dwarf orange trees, look up your variety's requirements. The trunk itself can grow to be 10 feet (3m) wide. Plant the tree at least 5 feet (1.5m) from foot paths to keep them clear. Plant outdoor trees in existing soil. When planting orange trees outside, dig a hole just deep enough to cover the roots. Cover the roots with the soil you just dug out. Potting mixes tend to hold too much water for orange trees, which can lead to rot. Do not cover the trunk with soil, or the orange tree could die. Keep your tree in full sun and warm temperature. Keep an eye on young seedlings, since they are always more vulnerable to burning or other dangers than established plants, but orange trees should do best in full sun. The best temperatures for orange trees are between 75ºand 90ºF (24–32ºC). They will do poorly in spring or summer temperatures below 45ºF (7ºC), and depending on variety might die in temperatures of 32ºF (0ºC) or below. Sustained temperatures above 100ºF (38ºC) for several days will likely cause leaf damage. If your adult tree is exposed to too high temperatures, hang a sun shade or sheet over the tree until the temperature decreases below 100ºF (38ºC). Move your orange tree indoors before a frost occurs. Citrus trees are more vulnerable to frost than heat, although some varieties may be able to survive a mild period of frost. Water the plant with infrequently but heavily. Orange trees, once grown into young trees rather than sprouts, prefer to be in soil that dries out before being watered again. Wait until the soil feels dry when you make a deep hole with your finger, then water heavily until the soil is soaked. A large adult plant should be left alone until the soil is dry to 6 inches (15 cm) beneath the surface. Typically, the tree can be watered once to twice a week, but this varies depending on temperature, humidity, and amount of sunlight received. Use your judgement and water more regularly during hot, dry seasons, although you should generally avoid watering plants while the sun is high in the sky. If your tap water is hard (mineral-heavy, leaving white scale on kettles or pipes), use filtered water or rainwater instead to water orange trees. Fertilize carefully according to age. Adding fertilizer or manure at the right time gives the trees all the nutrients they require to grow and produce fruit, but incorrect use can burn the tree or cause other damage. Use a special citrus tree fertilizer, or any fertilizer that is especially high in nitrogen. Follow these instructions for applying fertilizer or compost: Young trees 2–3 years old should have two tablespoons (30mL) of nitrogen-high fertilizer spread under the tree 3 or 4 times a year, immediately before watering. Alternatively, mix one gallon (4L) of high quality composted manure into the soil, but only in the fall when rains can wash away excess salts before they cause damage. Adult trees 4 years or older grown outside require 1–1.5 lb. (0.45–0.68 kg) of nitrogen a year. Your fertilizer should say what percentage of nitrogen it contains, which will allow you to calculate how much fertilizer you need to use to achieve the correct amount of nitrogen. Scatter over the root area of the tree and water into the soil, either annually during the winter or in three equal batches in February, July, and September. Remove dust from indoor plants regularly. Dust or grime buildup on a plant's leaves can prevent it from photosynthesizing, which is part of how it gains energy. Brush or rinse the leaves every few weeks if the plant is kept indoors. Understand that pruning is rarely required. Unlike some varieties of trees, orange and other citrus will do fine without pruning. Only remove completely dead branches, and suckers near the base that look especially unhealthy. You may prune your tree to shape its direction of growth and keep it short enough to pick all the fruit, but only remove heavy branches during winter months to avoid sunburning the exposed inner tree. Protect burned or withered trees by wrapping the trunk in newspaper. If your tree is still young and has just been planted outdoors, it may be especially vulnerable to sunburn. Tie newspaper loosely around the trunk and large branches if you see signs of sun damage, or are living in an area with strong sun. Test soil pH if the leaves are turning yellow. Yellow leaves may be a sign of alkalinity, or too much base salt in the tree. Test your soil pH to confirm this. If the soil is too alkaline, apply an acidic (low pH) fertilizer and heavily wash the soil to leach out alkaline salts. Too much manure fertilizer, or manure applied during the dry season, can be a cause of alkalinity. Wash off aphids with soapy water. Aphids are small green pests that feed on many types of plants. If you see them on your orange tree, wash them off with soapy water. Many other solutions are detailed in the Control Aphids article if this does not work. Get rid of ants and other pests feeding on the tree. Ants can be difficult to eradicate, but placing the pot in a larger container of standing water makes it impossible for them to get to it. Use pesticides sparingly and as a last resort, especially if the tree is bearing fruit. Insulate trees that will be exposed to frost. If possible, young trees should be brought indoors before the frost. However, if they are planted outside and you have no space indoors, you should wrap the trunks with cardboard, corn stalks, fleece, or other insulating material. Cover the trunk all the way up to the main branches. Healthy adult orange trees will rarely die due to frost, but they can experience leaf damage. Wait until spring to see which branches survive before pruning the dead ones off. Encourage fruit growth next year by picking all the ripe fruit this year. Leaving fruit on the tree may reduce the amount the tree produces next year, although if you are only using fruit for home purposes an adult tree should produce more than you need. Some varieties, such as mandarins and Valencia oranges, alternate years of heavy production with years of light production. Fertilize less during the year leading up to light production, since the tree has lower nutrient needs.
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Understand the problems with growing from a seed. Select seeds before they have dried out. Wash the seeds. Get the seeds to sprout faster by keeping them moist. Plant each seed in a small pot of well-draining potting mix or soil. Keep the soil in full sunlight. Add a balanced fertilizer once every two weeks (optional). Remove the weakest of the three sprouts when the seeds sprout. Plant the tree into a pot slightly larger than its roots whenever necessary. Consider an outdoor location. Plant outdoor trees in existing soil. Keep your tree in full sun and warm temperature. Water the plant with infrequently but heavily. Fertilize carefully according to age. Remove dust from indoor plants regularly. Understand that pruning is rarely required. Protect burned or withered trees by wrapping the trunk in newspaper. Test soil pH if the leaves are turning yellow. Wash off aphids with soapy water. Get rid of ants and other pests feeding on the tree. Insulate trees that will be exposed to frost. Encourage fruit growth next year by picking all the ripe fruit this year.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Learn-About-Cars
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How to Learn About Cars
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To learn more about cars, start by deciding what you want to learn. For instance, you can learn more about makes and models by scrolling through photos and reading reviews. Additionally, check out fan sites and forums for popular car models to learn more about your favorites. For example, you can find sites for Jeep, Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen, and other popular brands. Alternatively, if you want to learn how to work on cars, you might watch YouTube videos and tutorials created by car experts and mechanics. You can find lots of step-by-step demonstrations of how to do car repairs, as well as tips for beginners.
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Search YouTube for tutorials on car mechanics. YouTube is a great place to find detailed, step-by-step videos on basic and complex car repair topics. Look for videos that have higher views and positive comments to be sure you're getting reliable information. Start by searching for tutorials for beginners and then browse to find other videos that interest you. You can also browse through https://www.wikihow.com/Category:Car-Engines to find wikiHow articles on car repair. Pair these how-to articles with the YouTube videos for a more complete understanding of how to fix cars. Look for fan forums on particular makes or models. Many types of cars have legions of enthusiastic fans. While this is especially true for older cars, some makes (like Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen, and Ford, for example) also attract large followings. Google something like “fan forums on Wranglers” to find an online community that shares your specific interests. These forums are great places to ask questions about specific types of cars. Users will also probably announce events like car shows on fan forums. Go to websites that provide reviews and ratings on cars. This is especially important if you're buying a new or used car. Websites like Kelley Blue Book can tell you the value of particular cars, along with top-rated features or issues the car has had in the past. If you want to learn about a wide variety of cars, browse through to read about all kinds of makes, models, and classes. If you're hoping to learn more before buying, look up cars that are in the class you're interested in (SUVs, for example). Watch car-related TV shows. Why not learn while you're being entertained? Start with the BBC's Top Gear, which is available to stream on Netflix. Alternatively, you can watch the Grand Tour on Amazon Prime. You can also try Fast'N'Loud on the Discovery Channel or Wheeler Dealers. These shows generally feature luxury and iconic cars. Watching them is a fun way to expand your knowledge about cars you might not see out on the road every day. Use the public library to take out books on cars. Dust off and renew that library card if you haven't used it in a while! Not only is the public library free, it's a great place to browse through the stacks and find books you didn't even know existed. If you're looking for a specific title, speak to the librarian. If your local branch doesn't have it, they can order it from elsewhere. Be prepared to wait 2-4 weeks if you request a book from another library. Your library also likely has a large collection of eBooks available for loan. Talk to your librarian about setting up an online account to get access to this collection. Attend car shows and other meetups. Go online to search for car shows and car-related meetups in your area. If you're on a particular fan forum, ask users if they know of any good ones that are coming up. These fun events will connect you with other car enthusiasts who will be happy to answer any questions you've got about cars. Take a few courses at a local community college. Look for introductory courses for car mechanics. Start by taking just one class to see if you like it. If you enjoy it and can fit more classes into your budget, enroll in two next time. Not only will you meet other people to study with as you both learn about cars, you'll also have access to reliable and experienced instructors. Visit an auto supply store and talk to the employees. Most employees at these types of stores have some basic or even advanced knowledge of car repair. They'll also be able to help you understand the pros and cons of different car products and tools. Ask questions when there aren't any other customers in the store, and when the staff don't look too busy. Be polite if the employees say they don't have time to talk to you. Purchase an inexpensive car with some minor issues. Go online to look for cheap used cars in your area. Figure out the maximum amount you're willing to pay for a car that you're essentially practicing on, and use that number to guide your search. Try to stick to cars that are relatively close to where you live, as you'll likely need to pay to have the car transported to your house. If possible, when purchasing a car some distance away, load the car onto a trailer and tow it yourself. If you aren't confident enough to do this; get somebody else to do it for you. Don't go for a car with tons of issues just because it's cheap. Instead, look for a car with problems you can realistically fix. If you're unsure about the seriousness of the problems, bring a friend who's got more knowledge about cars to look at the car with you. Buy a basic car mechanic's kit. Go to an auto supply shop and ask an employee to point you in the direction of a good starter tool kit. If you want to make your purchase online, Google “starter car mechanic's kit” to find some options. Very basic tool sets might cost as little as $20 USD. However, a more comprehensive kit will probably run about $100 USD. Find the car's service manual online or at a dealer. The service manual is the complete repair how-to guide, not the small booklet that usually goes into the glove box. You can generally purchase these at car dealerships. You might also be able to find used copies on websites like eBay. This repair guide should provide you with specific instructions on fixing the exact make and model you've purchased. Use YouTube videos to learn how to fix specific problems. It's much easier to learn how to do things when you can watch each step unfold. You might not be able to find a video featuring the exact car you've purchased, but you'll surely be able to find tutorials on fixing the problems your broken-down car has. Watch the full video several times before starting to work on your car. You might also consider setting up a laptop in your garage or car repair shop so you can watch the video while you fix your car.
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Search YouTube for tutorials on car mechanics. Look for fan forums on particular makes or models. Go to websites that provide reviews and ratings on cars. Watch car-related TV shows. Use the public library to take out books on cars. Attend car shows and other meetups. Take a few courses at a local community college. Visit an auto supply store and talk to the employees. Purchase an inexpensive car with some minor issues. Buy a basic car mechanic's kit. Find the car's service manual online or at a dealer. Use YouTube videos to learn how to fix specific problems.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Skateboard
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How to Skateboard
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To learn how to ride a skateboard, first find a flat, open area you can practice on, like a sidewalk, driveway, or empty parking lot. Wear a helmet to protect your head if you fall. You might also want to wear long pants, a long-sleeve shirt, and elbow and knee pads. Practice standing on the board without moving to get used to balancing. If you're regular-footed, put your right foot on the back of your skateboard. If you're goofy-footed, put your left foot on the back of your skateboard. If you're not sure, put the foot you normally kick with on the back of your skateboard, or do whatever feels most comfortable. Keep your feet shoulder-width apart, and bend your knees a little to help you balance. Next, practice pushing off of the ground with your back foot so you start moving forward. Place your back foot back on your board after you push off. Remember to keep your feet shoulder-width apart and bend your knees to stay balanced on your board. When you start to slow down, push off again with your back foot to keep moving. To turn, shift your weight and lean in the direction you want to turn. If you're regular-footed, lean forward to go right or backward to go left. If you're goofy-footed, lean forward to go left and backward to go right. To stop your skateboard, place your back foot on the ground and let it drag until you come to a stop. Once you're comfortable with the basics, you can practice riding faster and doing tricks.
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Find a board appropriate for your interests. Skateboards can be cheap or expensive and come in a variety of sizes and styles. The two most basic are regular classic skateboards and longboards. Visit your local skate shop or a skating website to check out some affordable options. Classic skateboards have curved noses and tails, and have a concave to help with tricks. They come in a variety of sizes, and most are about 31" or 30 in length long and 8" wide. These are the boards to buy if you want to skate at the skatepark or on the street and to do tricks, eventually. Longboards or cruisers have a longer and flatter body. The length of the board varies, but they can be up to twice as long as a classic skateboard, making them much more stable and rideable for beginners. You can't really do tricks, but if you're interested in skating as a way of getting around or bombing hills, it's a great option. Penny boards are good for somebody who wants to leisurely ride a skateboard down the sidewalk, but are bad for somebody who is taller than the average five-year-old and/or want to do tricks. They're small so they're difficult to balance easily on. A beginner skateboard should cost between $50-$150. Try to have your board set up for you at the skate-shop with the right kinds of trucks and wheels for what you'll be doing. Just remember, NEVER buy a Walmart board. They will snap quickly and are hard to learn on. Go to a real skate shop. Get some appropriate footwear. Skate shoes are typically sold by brands such as Vans, Airwalk, Converse, or Etnies. They have sturdy sides and flat bottoms, perfect for gripping the board. While you can always skate with regular sneakers, it's a lot easier to maneuver around the board with skate shoes. Never try to skate in sandals or flip-flops. You need to be able to move your feet around easily and feel comfortable. Without these, you can hurt your ankle easily and are a lot more likely to fall. Get the appropriate safety gear. When you're first starting out learning to skate, you're going to fall down. Probably a lot. Consider investing in safety equipment such as a helmet, knee pads, and elbow pads to protect you from falls and accidents. This is especially important for beginners. Some states, like California, require all skaters to wear helmets on the street. Make sure to get a helmet that fits your head properly. Before you go to the store, use a tape measure to measure the circumference of your head, just above your eyebrows, in a straight line around your skull. Buy a helmet that fits snugly. There's nothing lame/childish about pads. It's important to protect yourself from serious head injuries. Find a good place to skate. A level, concrete driveway or parking lot is a good place to start getting comfortable on the board. Make sure there isn't anything in your way and be wary of cracks, loose stones and potholes. Running over a little pebble can account for a whole lot of crashes, especially with hard wheels. When you're just beginning, you can practice balancing on grass or carpet first so your board won't be rolling everywhere. Skateparks are great places to skate once you've got some experience. If you're just trying to get the board to stay under you without falling down, parks might be a little intense. If there's one in your area, go watch some skaters for tips, but stay on the sidelines. Consider getting someone you know that's good at skateboarding to teach you. Your dad probably can't shove it or anything, so ask someone from a local shop or park if you can watch them. Bring some beginners and ask if what he's doing is intermediate to advanced skating, if it is, perfect. You have a teacher. Skating with friends is a big part of what skating is all about. If you've got some skater friends, get help learning from them. Learning from friends is infinitely better than learning on your own or on the internet. Stand on the board properly. Put the board flat on the ground and stand on it to learn to place your feet properly, and get your balance without falling down. Stand with your feet angled sideways on the board, your feet lined up roughly with the truck screws that attach the wheels to the board. Regular foot means that you've got your left foot forward and your right foot in the rear. This usually means that you'll use your right foot to push. Goofy foot means that you've got your right foot forward and left in the rear. Usually, this means you'll use your left foot to push. Rock back and forth a little to see how the wheels move and how much sway you've got on the trucks. Just get comfortable. Try pushing off very gently and placing your feet on the board. Turn your front foot slightly so it's more straight with the board, instead of sideways on the board. Use your other foot to gently push off, going very slowly at first. You don't want to have an accident just because you were going too fast before you were ready. After you get some momentum, practice putting your back foot into place on the back of the board, just ahead of the tail curl, around the trucks. Get your balance and ride, bending your knees some to keep your balance. Mongo foot means that you feel more comfortable pushing off with your lead foot, and riding with your back foot. Some people see it as acceptable, but it will hinder you later and it's an awkward motion to swing your front foot around. If you find yourself pushing mongo, try switching from regular to goofy or vice-versa. Give yourself another push when you slow down. Keep practicing, making little push-offs, and pivoting your feet to ride on the board until you slow down. Then pivot your riding foot straight, push off with your other foot, and pivot back. The more you do this, the more comfortable you'll become at riding the board. Try speeding up, but just a little. Like a bike, some riders find it actually quite a bit easier to keep your balance when you're moving a little quicker. If you start speed-wobbling, you can tighten your trucks. This will make it harder to turn but you can practice with tight trucks until you get your speed wobble under control. Shifting your weight forward usually helps. Flex your ankles and shift your weight to turn. Once you've got the hang of pushing off and riding some, try turning the board gently by shifting your weight. Ride with your knees flexed, keeping your center of gravity low to the ground. Then, shift your weight forward some to turn right (if you're riding regular foot), and rotate your ankles back to turn the board left. Depending on how loose your trucks are, you may have to only shift your weight very gently, or really bend into it. You can loosen your trucks by turning the large bolt in the center of each truck (lefty loosy, righty tighty). This puts more (tight) or less (loose) pressure on the bushings and makes turning easier (loose) or harder (tight). If you have trouble balancing or falling while turning, shift your upper-body weight in the opposite direction. What really matters is that your feet pivot the deck so the trucks do the turning. Put your foot down to stop. To stop, you can simply put your pushing foot down when you've slowed down some, and halt your momentum. However, don't just jam your foot down hard at a fast speed. Start by dragging lightly and drag harder when you're going slow. Keep your riding foot on the board, or it'll just keep going. You can also shift your weight back and scrape the tail against the ground if you want to stop. Some longboards have built-in plastic "brake" pads along the back lip of the board, while others won't. This is usually a bit more difficult, and will scrape away at the back of the board. An alternative that won't damage your board is to put your heel behind with your toes still on the tail when you do this. Your heel will drag on the ground instead of the tail. You should practice getting on and off before you start skating at high speeds. One exit strategy if you're riding on flat without pads is to take your back foot off in front of you and walk or run away from the board. Try riding switch. Once you get very comfortable just riding your board, try switching around and riding with your back foot in front and your front foot in back. If you want to be a really good skater, you'll learn to skate equally comfortably from both directions, if you get switched around for a trick. This comes in handy when you try a half-pipe, or any number of different types of skateboarding tricks. Learn to fall properly. All skaters fall early and often. It's a part of skateboarding. It's important to wear the proper safety gear at all times, and learn to fall properly. To keep yourself from getting injured more seriously than the regular scrapes and bruises that are the skaters calling card, you can learn a few little tricks to keep yourself safe. Put your arms out, but keep them loose. If you're very rigid, you risk breaking wrists and ankles more seriously than if you use them to cushion your fall. Roll out any time that you fall. You might scrape yourself up, but it'll hurt a lot less than if you're landing with a splat. Bail out if you see something going bad. If you're going too fast and can't control your board, just jump off and land on your feet, or roll into the grass. Don't stick on a board that you've lost control of. Watch more experienced skaters to learn tips and tricks. Find some other skaters to skate with. It helps you to learn from their styles or different skill levels. If you don't know anyone, just talk to some other skaters at the local skate park. They are usually friendly, and will help you out. Experiment, make a higher ollie, read about how to do another trick, whatever your heart desires. Your teacher is more a friend than an instructor now, share skills with him, and anyone else you want to show off to. For tips on how to do the moves, you can always watch a move in a video in slow motion and pay attention to the foot movement. Sequential photos are another great way to learn. The more you practice, the better you will be. Don't get discouraged because you can't land a trick the first or second try. Just practice and have fun, and you will get the trick eventually. Start by popping the front up with your back foot on the tail. An ollie involves popping the board up into the air and landing on it safely. The first part of this trick is to get comfortable shifting your back foot for the tail of the board to hit the ground, so you can pop it up and into the air. Get used to this motion, it can't be stressed enough. As you stand on the board, practice rocking back, popping the nose up into the air and staying balanced. You can even try it in motion if you work up the nerve. Before you even try the first motion of an ollie, it might be a good idea to just stand beside the skateboard and practice popping it up into the air. Use your foot to stomp on the tail and see how much pressure it takes to pop it up in the air. This is also useful to pop it up to your hands and pick it up easily. One common mistake is to push too hard down on your tail, which prevents your board from going up in the air. Instead, flick down with your ankle to send the board to the floor, then lift later. Try to pop up the board while you're stationary. Stand on the board and flex your knees quite low, shifting your center of gravity down over the trucks. Shift your back foot back so it's on the tail. Pop the tail back, as you would while you're doing a manual, except all the way to the ground. Then pop it up into the ollie. Don't start in motion just yet. Before you can nail an ollie on the ground, it's quite dangerous to try one while you're skating. You'll probably wipe out. Pop the board up into the air and jump. To get the board to pop, you want to simultaneously slide your front foot backward just a little and leap into the air, bringing your knees up to your chest, while you stab down on the tail with your back foot. This needs to be done in one swift motion, and it's somewhat difficult to get the hang of at first. You want to jump up into the air and off the board at the same time as you pop down with your back foot. You'll leap with your front foot just a little before you leap with your back foot. Imagine you're running sideways and trying to jump over a cone. You want to do that kind of motion. Drag your front foot forward to catch the board. After the board pops up in the air, drag your front foot forward to flatten the board back out and keep it under control. You'll need to start doing this pretty much as soon as you jump into the air. Push the board down by straightening your legs out. After you've straightened the board, push it back to the ground by straightening your legs and landing on the board in riding position. The most important thing to remember is to land with your feet over the bolts and knees bent, this improves your chances of rolling away successfully and keeps the board from breaking as often, as well as avoiding injury. No shame in bailing out. If the board hasn't stayed straight, or it just doesn't feel right, don't try to land on it. Land on your feet instead. In fact, it's probably a good idea to practice your first ollie by just jumping off the board and landing beside it. Try an ollie in motion. Once you can land ten stationary ollies in a row, try doing one in motion. Push off and start skating at a low to moderate speed, then crouch down and pop the board up just as you would when you're standing still. One way you can progress from doing an Ollie is to Olly over small items, like.a stick or a curb. This is the fundamental skill to learn, which most other popping style tricks are based on. For more information and links to specific trick articles, check out the next section. Try a pop shove it. Do an ollie as high as you can, then as you level off your feet, give a nudge with the front foot on the board so it spins 180 degrees. You may want to use a little "scoop" motion with the back foot to make it spin easier. Try a kick-flip. Do the same thing as a pop shove it, except when you nudge the board, kick the little area where the side of the board rises. Try out a few different motions until you get it to spin. This is not an easy trick, so practice and don't give up. Try to grind. Start with a fairly low rail (equal to or less than one foot.) This is not easy, so take it in steps. Start out simply rolling up to the rail, then jump off of your board and land with just your feet on the rail, letting the board roll away. Next, practice popping the board up as you jump, but don't worry about where it goes after that. Just make sure that your feet land on the rail. Make sure you roll up to the rail at a slight angle, not completely straight. This way, there's less risk of one truck getting caught on the start of the rail. Now it's time for the real thing. Ollie as high as you can, in the direction of the rail. Land with your feet on the bolts and the board balanced on the rail. If the deck is sliding sideways on the rail, it's a board-slide. If you stay in the direction of the rail so your trucks lock in and grind it, it's a 50-50 grind. Once you get to the end of the rail, turn the board around if you're in a board-slide (so it faces the right direction) and land over the bolts. If you're doing a 50-50 grind, lift the front wheels slightly (by pushing on the tail, again slightly) to the front of the board doesn't plummet down. An alternative is to ollie off. . Head to the skatepark and learn to drop in Dropping in takes guts, but it's worth it. Start with your tail on the coping (the metal on the top of the half-pipe) and your foot just behind the bolts, but far enough back to balance. Put your front foot over the bolts, and slam the board down. Don't hesitate, or you will fall. It takes confidence and power. Be sure to lean forward in this motion. If you don't, the board will slide out from under you. Your shoulders should always be parallel to the board. Don't worry about coming down on the other side, just hop off of your board at the top. Do some lip-tricks. Some good ones are a Rock to Fakie, Axle Stall, and Nose Stall. These look impressive, but are not that difficult to learn if you have several months of experience. When you go to the skatepark always be aware so you don't get hit. Trust me it hurts.
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Find a board appropriate for your interests. Get some appropriate footwear. Get the appropriate safety gear. Find a good place to skate. Consider getting someone you know that's good at skateboarding to teach you. Stand on the board properly. Try pushing off very gently and placing your feet on the board. Give yourself another push when you slow down. Flex your ankles and shift your weight to turn. Put your foot down to stop. Try riding switch. Learn to fall properly. Watch more experienced skaters to learn tips and tricks. Start by popping the front up with your back foot on the tail. Try to pop up the board while you're stationary. Pop the board up into the air and jump. Drag your front foot forward to catch the board. Push the board down by straightening your legs out. Try an ollie in motion. Try a pop shove it. Try a kick-flip. Try to grind. . Do some lip-tricks.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Grow-a-Cherry-Blossom-Tree
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How to Grow a Cherry Blossom Tree
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To grow a cherry blossom tree, start by getting a young tree that's 2-3 years old from a nursery. Once you have your tree, plant it in a sunny spot that has deep, fertile soil. Tie the tree to some stakes in the ground to protect it from strong gusts of wind until it gets more established. After you plant your tree, don't worry about watering it regularly unless you experience a drought. To help your cherry blossom grow healthy and strong, apply a general fertilizer every spring.
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Choose the type of cherry blossom tree you want. There are actually a variety of different cherry blossom trees available, each with different features. The Yoshino cherry tree grows quickly and has wide-spreading branches, while the Okame cherry tree has a rounded appearance and is a bit smaller. The Kwanzan cherry tree is a tall tree that provides enough space to walk beneath it and admire it's bunches of blooms. There are also several kinds of weeping cherry trees, and you can choose one by size, if you have a specific spot to fill. Pick a spot with full sun to partial shade. In order to blossom, your cherry tree will need lots of sunlight, so choose a spot that gets at least four hours of direct sunlight per day. If possible, choose a spot that is elevated compared to the rest of your lawn or garden to keep cold air from settling around your cherry tree. Cherry blossom trees grow best in USDA hardiness zones 5 through 8. Select a space with deep, fertile soil. The soil beneath your cherry tree should be rich and deep. It's important that the soil is moist, but well-draining. Cherry trees can adapt to several soil types, but do better in acidic than alkaline environments. . Procure a one- to two-year-old tree Nurseries sell cherry blossom tree planting stock as young trees, rather than seeds. Choose a tree in the type you have selected that is one- to two-years-old and that has been grown in an environment similar to the one you plan to transfer the tree too (i.e. sun exposure, soil type). Plant your cherry blossom tree after the last frost. To ensure your new tree thrives, plant it after the last frost of the season. Do an Internet search to find the average frost dates based on your location. Space your tree 10 to 20 feet (3 to 6 m) from other foliage. A cherry blossom tree needs lots of room to grow. Plant the tree 10 to 20 ft (3 to 6 m) from other trees, shrubs, flowers, or foliage. This also helps reduce the spread of pests or diseases between plants. Prepare a hole for the tree. Dig a 2 feet (0.61 m) by 2 ft (60.1 cm by 60.1 cm) hole that is 1 ft (30.5 cm) deep by in your chosen location. Layer a small amount of organic matter in the bottom of the hole. Place your tree in the hole. Carefully put your young tree in the hole. Make sure the surrounding soil is level with the top of the roots of the tree. Add or remove soil from the bottom of the hole if necessary. Fill the hole with soil. Mix organic matter in with the soil you removed from the hole and fill in the area around the cherry blossom tree. Level out the soil with the surrounding area and tamp it down firmly. Stake the tree to the surrounding area. To reduce movement due to strong winds, use tree ties to anchor your tree to two tree stakes. Place the stakes opposite each other, 2-2.5 ft (60.1-76.2 cm) from the trunk of the tree. Attach one tree tie from each stake to the trunk of the tree, about one-third of the way up the trunk. Water the tree thoroughly. Water the area thoroughly until moist to set the soil in place. Let the soil drain well, as cherry blossom trees don't do well when sitting in soggy areas. Fertilize your tree after watering. Sprinkle all-purpose fertilizer around the roots of your cherry tree. Choose a granular kind, rather than a liquid, as it will slowly release nutrients into the soil that surrounds the roots of your tree. To determine what type of fertilizer to use, pick up a soil test from any garden center. If your soil is deficient in any specific nutrients, like nitrogen, phosphorus, or magnesium, choose a fertilizer that will add more of that nutrient. Otherwise, just use a 10-10-10 all-purpose fertilizer. Surround the root area with bark or wood chips. Cover the root area with bark, wood chips, or garden compost to protect the roots. Layer 2-3 in (5-7.5 cm) of the material in a 2-ft-wide (60.1-cm-wide) circle around the tree trunk. This helps protect the tree roots from extreme temperature changes. Water only during a drought. Cherry blossom trees do not require much care after planting. They will receive enough water from the natural environment, so only water them during extremely dry periods of the summer. If the leaves are wilting or the soil has begun to crack, give your tree a long drink. Avoid pruning your tree. There's usually no reason to prune your tree, but if you find it to be absolutely necessary, do so between May and August, which is when the tree is actively growing. Fertilize your tree in the spring. Apply a general granular fertilizer to your tree once per year, in the spring. Sprinkle the granules around the base of the tree so nutrients can be absorbed through the root system. Enjoy your brilliant, beautiful cherry blossoms! Flowering cherry trees grow at a rate of between 1 and 2 ft (30.5 to 60.1 cm) per year. Even young trees will bloom, and they begin to flower at the first sign of spring, usually around April, depending on where you live. Look out for aphids. If you aren't able to see the little bugs, look out for curling leaves. Black cherry aphids leave behind secretions that infect the twigs and leaves of cherry blossom trees. Treat the tree with insecticide to remove the aphids. Inspect the joints and branches of the tree. If you see small growths on the joints or branches (usually light brown in color), your tree may be suffering from black knot fungus. Remove the affected branches to prevent the disease from spreading to the rest of the tree. To control fungal diseases, soak your pruning tools in alcohol after using them on an infected plant or tree. If you see branches in the spring or summer that don't have any leaves on them, it could indicate that branch is damaged. Examine the leaves of the tree. Watch out for a gray or silver appearance of the leaves on your tree. This silver leaf fungus occurs when branches begin to die, so cut back diseased branches immediately. Watch the bark, as well. If you see white, flaky scaling, for instance, it could indicate that there's a pest living in the tree.
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Choose the type of cherry blossom tree you want. Pick a spot with full sun to partial shade. Select a space with deep, fertile soil. . Plant your cherry blossom tree after the last frost. Space your tree 10 to 20 feet (3 to 6 m) from other foliage. Prepare a hole for the tree. Place your tree in the hole. Fill the hole with soil. Stake the tree to the surrounding area. Water the tree thoroughly. Fertilize your tree after watering. Surround the root area with bark or wood chips. Water only during a drought. Avoid pruning your tree. Fertilize your tree in the spring. Enjoy your brilliant, beautiful cherry blossoms! Look out for aphids. Inspect the joints and branches of the tree. Examine the leaves of the tree.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Prepare-for-Jail
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How to Prepare for Jail
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Preparing for jail involves finding out about how things work in your jail and getting in the right state of mind. Find out how to deposit money into your jail account so you can spend money in the commissary once you're inside. You should also ask about what educational, religious, and work programs your prison offers, so you can make the most of your time. Start to get into the prison mindset before you arrive so it won't be too hard to adapt. Jail can be stressful, but plan to distract yourself by working out and learning new things. Choose some books you want to read inside as your jail's library will probably be small. Learn to keep to yourself and hide your emotions from other people, so you don't make yourself vulnerable in jail.
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Talk to your employer. Whether you're going to be in jail for a couple of days, a couple of weeks, or longer, you need to be honest with your employer. Tell him why you are leaving. You don't need to be explicit - especially if the details are sensitive - but you should not leave him and your co-workers in the dark. They'll need time to cover for you while you're gone. Get your finances in order. Talk to your credit card companies. Put your cell phone plan on hold to avoid unnecessary charges while you are in jail. Not taking care of something so simple as this can ruin your credit for you when you get out. If you have a financed car, try to sell it. Many ex-prisoners face bankruptcy when they get released because they don't focus on these issues beforehand. In some states, your bank may be able to provide a line of credit to cover your time in jail. This can be applied to your mortgage, car payments, and many other financial issues. Talk to your bank to see if there is anything they can do to make your transition in and out of jail easier on you. Borrow money to put on your account. When you get into the jail, you'll have a flex account you can use to buy basic things from the commissary. Make sure you have surplus cash just in case. It will come in handy while you are in there. Get your attorney to file for a review at sentencing. If you are sentenced to 12 months in jail, you can have your case reviewed after a couple of months. If you've behaved well in prison and your lawyer makes a good case for your release, you may get to leave early. Determine your custody rights if you have children. A convicted parent's rights differ depending on the crime committed, the state convicted in, and penitentiary held at. In general, protective custody transfers from one parent to the closest of kin (for your child). This means that if you get locked up and your significant other is still free, they'll have the most immediate chance of guardianship. After parents, custody can be temporarily transferred to aunts, uncles, siblings, or grandparents. A judge and children's services will be a part of the decision making process in these respects. If your child doesn't have a family member to take care of them, they'll be placed in foster care for the duration of your sentence. Cases vary based on the crime you've committed. For violent offenses, you may lose custody completely - in which case your child may be put up for adoption. If you can figure all of this out before you go to jail, you'll be in a much better position. Filing claims, talking to judges, and working through the red tape while behind bars is a difficult task. Learn how visitation works. Every jail and prison run visitation differently. Everyone will only allow visitation on certain days and hours. Figure out these ahead of time so you can schedule when visits will come. Try to arrange family and friends to come on different days. Spread them out. It will give you something to look forward to. Also figure out what you can do during visitation. This can range from simply talking to board games. Other places allow conjugal visits. Contact your jail before you are put in to see what they allow. Figure out how money works inside. Most places keep a tab for you so you don't lose your money inside or have it stolen from you. You'll want to figure out how you'll have access to your money. Most places have a commissary desk where you can spend your money. Also figure out how you can deposit money into your account. Most places ask for a check, but some places allow you to deposit money online. This is a great option for family members on the outside. It'll save them a trip to the office in the jail. Learn what constitutes “good behavior”. Many jail or prison sentences can be reduced for good behavior. Talk to your jail ahead of time to see what specifically they look for. Simply asking might even help you get in good with the guards and staff. Avoid drugs and other violent/sexual offenses. Remember that, especially in the USA, jails are overcrowded so time off for good behavior is possible. Some jails will even cut your sentence short by a third for good behavior. Talk to your jail about general services. Educational services, work programs, and detox/medical options are available at most jails. In order to make the most of your time, you'll need to be aware of what is offered. Don't waste your time behind bars. Take the time to learn, pick up a craft, or get off of drugs. Most of these services are free to use while serving time. Most jails have multi-denominational chapels as well. These can be great sanctuaries — literally and figuratively — for while you are serving time. Ask ahead of time, if you can bring your own religious texts or trinkets. Some prisoners claim that an unspoken rule is not to mess with religious people in jail. Be yourself, but don’t draw attention to yourself. Don't stick out. You want to be yourself, because you have to live with yourself while you're in prison. But this doesn't mean that you have to be the center of attention either. Don't be outspoken. Don't yell when a soft voice will do. Don't pretend to be “hard” or someone you're not. The other inmates will sense that you're a phony and find reasons to mess with you. Socialize, but don’t “associate”. The wrongfully convicted and recently released writer and speaker, You want to cultivate a reputation as an individual man. Friends are important. Owing friends a pound of flesh is not advantageous to you. When fights break out, it is often because of associations or gang-like pressure. One person has a “beef” with another and they call on their friends to settle the score. If you aren't a part of this jail-time détente (a French word meaning release from tension), you won't be called into battle. Lose the attitude. Going in angry can get you in a pickle with your new cell mates. Attitudes turn into animosities. Don't make enemies just because you are bitter at yourself, another, or the system. Don't have a big mouth. “Playing the dozen” or exchanging insults will only end in sore relationships. Don't be surprised if inmates have low self-esteem. One particularly poignant comment can make the difference between playful banter and a painful beating. Know how to answer the golden question. “What are you in for?” You should respond vaguely and politely. You don't want to ignore the questions. That'll just make your cell mates push harder. The hardest part of jail time is the boredom. New people mean new distractions. Don't build up their anticipation or sense of mystery by refusing to answer. Just be vague. Don't engage in shop talk. Some inmates will boast about their exploits. Don't join in, especially if you haven't been charged with any other crimes. The last thing you want is for someone to figure out some reason to keep you in longer. Don't reveal a crime that might get you into trouble. Even other inmates will judge you based on your past. For example, it is not a good idea to tell everyone you were sentenced for a hate crime, child molestation, or some other offense that most would deem horrendous. If you do reveal this, you'll probably be picked on more, because the inmates will feel justified in doing so. Don’t touch other people or their stuff. If you bump into someone else, apologize and then move on. If your apology isn't accepted, try one more time and then leave immediately. Don't touch other people's stuff (books, pencils, or clothing) without permission. This extends to food as well. You'll have very few personal possessions in jail. Most people guard their things far more closely in lock up. This brings us to the unfortunate myth of prison rape. Rape is uncommon in jail. You won't be cornered in the showers and taken advantage of. Consensual sex is far more common that forcible sex. Doing time is boring and lonely. Some men use sex to pass the time. These same men consider themselves straight on the outside. Sexuality is a spectrum and jail time proves it. If you are not interested, just make sure that you don't give out any signals that you are. Don’t snitch. You've probably heard the adage “snitches get stitches”. There is truth to this claim and unfortunately, the jail/prison system is operated in such a way that snitching is a serious temptation. Guards will offer you special treatment, better meals, increased visitation rights, and protection in exchange for information on Johnny What's-his-name. You might agree to supply the information because you haven't gotten used to the food yet or you miss you family terribly. On the flip-side, if word gets out that you are a snitch or that the guards are giving you special treatment, the other inmates will find reasons to harass you. Eat. Meals come few and far between, and minutes seem like hours in jail. Don't give away your food. This might seem like favoritism. The food is the worst you will ever eat, but now is not the time to be picky. Save up some money and buy Ramen noodles from the commissary desk. Get in shape. If your jail has gym equipment, use it. You have nothing but time. Many jails in the US don't have gym equipment any more. Rumors say it's because inmates were getting too strong for the guards. More likely, its absence is best explained by the costs associated with purchasing and maintaining gym equipment. Either way, you can still work out. Do pushups, lunges, sit-ups, and other exercises in the confines of your cell. Take up jogging/running on the rec. field. A healthy body leads to a healthy attitude, which can make your stay more bearable. Read a lot. Reading is the easiest and cheapest form of entertainment and education in the joint. There may be a TV available, but inmates rarely come to a consensus on what to watch, so most just read. There is a lot of time to kill in jail. Books generally take a long time to read. Pick up-lifting, interesting, or informative books. Whatever will lift your spirits or keep you engaged is best. Why not try Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo? Maintain outside relationships. Call and write to your friends and family frequently. It will give you a sense of connection with the outside world. Phone calls can be made differently based on your location. Some jails/prisons require phone cards that can be purchased at the commissary desk (a general store in a jailhouse). The same goes for stamps. Just be aware that all communications in and out of the jail are subject to surveillance. Don't call to tell your loved ones where the body or money is buried — either literally or figuratively. Communicate with your lawyer. Depending on your case, your lawyer might need information from you. In order for him to work hard on your behalf, he'll need you to be as cooperative as possible. Moreover, talking with your lawyer about your case and your time in lock up can be a great way to pass the time. It can give you hope if you receive good news, but at the very least, you'll be informed. Often times, lawyers can help with other problems associated with jail time. Issues like child custody and paying bills can often times be completed through your lawyer.
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Talk to your employer. Get your finances in order. Borrow money to put on your account. Get your attorney to file for a review at sentencing. Determine your custody rights if you have children. Learn how visitation works. Figure out how money works inside. Learn what constitutes “good behavior”. Talk to your jail about general services. Be yourself, but don’t draw attention to yourself. Socialize, but don’t “associate”. Lose the attitude. Know how to answer the golden question. Don’t touch other people or their stuff. Don’t snitch. Eat. Get in shape. Read a lot. Maintain outside relationships. Communicate with your lawyer.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Snickerdoodle-Cookies
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How to Make Snickerdoodle Cookies
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To make snickerdoodle cookies, preheat the oven to 400 °F and let butter come to room temperature on the counter. Then, mix the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Next, cream the butter and sugar together with an electric mixture, which should take 3-5 minutes. Then, add the vanilla extract and eggs and beat for 2-3 more minutes before slowly adding in the flour. Roll balls of the dough in cinnamon and sugar and bake for 8-9 minutes.
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Preheat the oven to 400 °F (205 °C). As the oven is heating up, line your baking sheet with parchment paper. If you don't have any parchment paper, non-stick cooking spray will do in a pinch, or a little melted butter. Let the butter soften outside the fridge for 5-10 minutes. You want it to be soft, but not liquidy. Room temperature should be fine, as it will be easy to blend. If you need, put the butter briefly in the microwave — 4-5 seconds, tops. Whisk together the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Mix everything well so that there are no clumps and everything is well distributed. Cream of tartar leads to a light tang and helps the cookies get fluffy. However, if you want crispier cookies or don't want this tangy edge, you can skip the cream of tartar. Using an electric mixer, cream the butter in with the sugar until completely mixed. Mix the butter/margarine and sugar together until fluffy. Keep your electric beaters on medium speed and work the softened butter until it is a nice whipped, semi-stiff mixture. All of the sugar should be incorporated into the butter. This should only take 3-5 minutes of mixing. Add the vanilla extract and eggs and beat for 2-3 minutes. Keep the mixer going until the eggs are completely incorporated into the butter mixture. Use a rubber spatula to scrape the sides of the bowl as necessary, making sure everything is well mixed. Want tangier, less sweet cookies? Skip the vanilla. Turning your mixer to "low" speed, slowly add the flour mixture. Add the flour in small chunks, keeping the mixer going the entire time. This prevents flour "explosions," where the beaters scatter the flour instead of mixing it. As you add flour, keep scraping the sides of the bowl to make sure everything is getting added in. After dough is thoroughly mixed, chill it for 30-45 minutes to guarantee the best results. In a shallow bowl, mix equal parts white sugar and ground cinnamon. Start with 2 tablespoons of each, adding more as necessary. Feel free to play with this ratio as well -- while few chefs use more cinnamon than sugar, many will add a few extra parts sugar to avoid overly spiced cookies. Roll the chilled dough into 1" wide balls, then roll each ball in cinnamon sugar. You can use a small spoon to measure out the dough, then roll it between your palms to form the dough balls. You then roll the dough in the cinnamon sugar to coat it completely. Set the cookies on the parchment-lined baking sheets and cook for 8-9 minutes. Make sure the cookies are at least 2 inches apart, as they will flatten and spread as they cook. Remove from the oven when the outside edges are just turning golden. A good snickerdoodle has a light, chewy texture, not a crunch. You want to try and keep the tops of the cookies light, so remove them when the outsides are just getting golden for the best cookies. Let them cool on the baking sheet for 2-3 minute before eating. Add cinnamon to the dough for an even stronger-flavored snickerdoodle. If you really love the spiced aspect of the cookies, you should up the ante a bit. Add 2 teaspoons of cinnamon to the dough for a darker, richer, and more spiced snickerdoodle. You could even try a few more spices, such as: Chai spice Pumpkin pie spice Ground nutmeg and cloves Ground ginger Toss in cocoa powder and chocolate chips for some chocolatey snickerdoodles. Add 1/2 cup of unsweetened cocoa powder along with the flour, stirring in everything else like normal. Then, if you'd like an added punch, add in 1/2 cup of chocolate chips after you've incorporated all of the four. You can either roll the final cookie in cinnamon sugar or a dusting of cocoa powder and white sugar. Consider adding a hint of citrus, creating orange or lemon tinged snickerdoodles. The sharp, slightly sour hint of citrus goes incredibly with the cinnamon sugar and is easy to add. Simply toss in either of the following ingredients in with the eggs for a wonderfully light cookie: 2 tablespoons orange juice, 1 tablespoon orange zest 1 tablespoon lemon juice, 1 tablespoon lemon zest Toss in some additions, like chocolate, chopped nuts, or dried fruit, to take the cookie to the next level. If it goes well with cinnamon sugar, it will go well in your snickerdoodles. The choices here are endless, but common add-ins include: White chocolate chips Butterscotch morsels Dried cranberries Toasted walnuts or pecans. Try your snickerdoodle with a tablespoon of instant coffee. Added to the flour, this little burst of cafe will give a light coffee flavoring to the cookies without overpowering them. This little bit of flavoring goes particularly well if you toss in some chocolate chips, as well. Substitute spiced rum or maple syrup for vanilla to give your cookies a new flavor dimension. You'll want to use 2 tablespoons rum or syrup in place of the single teaspoon of vanilla extract. Both versions go well with add-ons, with dried fruit matching the rum well and toasted nuts complementing the maple syrup sublimely.
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Preheat the oven to 400 °F (205 °C). Let the butter soften outside the fridge for 5-10 minutes. Whisk together the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Using an electric mixer, cream the butter in with the sugar until completely mixed. Add the vanilla extract and eggs and beat for 2-3 minutes. Turning your mixer to "low" speed, slowly add the flour mixture. In a shallow bowl, mix equal parts white sugar and ground cinnamon. Roll the chilled dough into 1" wide balls, then roll each ball in cinnamon sugar. Set the cookies on the parchment-lined baking sheets and cook for 8-9 minutes. Remove from the oven when the outside edges are just turning golden. Add cinnamon to the dough for an even stronger-flavored snickerdoodle. Toss in cocoa powder and chocolate chips for some chocolatey snickerdoodles. Consider adding a hint of citrus, creating orange or lemon tinged snickerdoodles. Toss in some additions, like chocolate, chopped nuts, or dried fruit, to take the cookie to the next level. Try your snickerdoodle with a tablespoon of instant coffee. Substitute spiced rum or maple syrup for vanilla to give your cookies a new flavor dimension.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Become-a-Security-Guard
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How to Become a Security Guard
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If you want to become a security guard, look on job boards online for entry-level security jobs and submit an application. If you're called for an interview, you'll need to submit to a background check, a drug test, and fingerprinting. To become a licensed security guard, look up the requirements for your state or country. Typically, you'll need to undergo about 40 hours of training that deals with property rights, detaining suspects, and emergency procedures.
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Be at least 18 years of age. In order to be a security guard, you must be at least 18 years old in in the United States. However, the age requirement may be different depending on the country where you're looking for work. For example, you need only be 17 to apply to be a security guard in Hong Kong, but you have to be at least 19 to work as a security guard in British Columbia, Canada. If you'd like a position where you'll be armed, then you typically need to be at least 21 years old in the United States. Have a clean record. When you put in your application to be a security guard, you will have to pass a background check to more forward in the process. You'll need to take a drug test and have your fingerprints scanned. If you choose a position where you'll need to be armed, then an even more thorough check may be done. The thoroughness of the background check also depends on the state; for example, in Texas, you'll need to prepare for an “FBI style” background check. Have a high school diploma or a GED. Though all you'll need to be a security guard in most places is a high school diploma or it's equivalent, some companies prefer to hire guards with a two or even a four-year degree in criminal justice or police science. Though getting this degree just for the purpose of being a security guard may not be necessary, having a background in these fields will make you a more desirable candidate. You may also need a bachelor's degree to work at a high-class facility such as a casino. Have a driver's license to make yourself a more desirable candidate. Though this isn't mandatory and may not apply to you if the work you choose doesn't require you to drive as part of your commute or while on the job, having a driver's license can make you a more desirable candidate and will make you open to more types of positions. Consider procuring a driver's license before you begin the application process, if it's not too much of a challenge. For example, having a driver's license is essential for being an armored car guard. If the workplace where you're seeking employment knows you have a car and a license, you'll be a more desirable candidate because you'll have an easier time getting there than somebody without a car. Follow the requirements of your country or state. The requirements to be a security guard are different in different countries, and even in different states. Before you apply for this position, you'll need to look into what your country or state require of you before you move forward. Here are some differences to keep in mind: In the United States, for example, you'll need to complete state certified training in Delaware, training at an approved training center in Texas, and on-the-job training in New York. Each state has different requirements, so it's important to know what you're signing up for. For example, to be a security guard in the United Kingdom, you'll need to complete your training to receive a Security Industry Authority License. Apply for a license in your area. Check out the requirements of your state or country to make sure that you meet the age, education, or any other requirements you may need. Once you turn in your application and are approved to begin training, you can move forward. You'll have to undergo a background check before you can be approved to begin training. You'll have to pay an application fee; the cost varies, but it hovers around $50, which is what you'll have to pay to apply in California. Complete your training. Each state and country has its own training requirements, but it's likely that you'll be training in how to detain suspects, property rights, and emergency procedures. Some states have state-mandated training while others allow training from a third-party company, so it depends on the laws of your particular state. Some will even focus on on-the-job training. In general, training takes about 40 hours, and you'll complete the first 8 hours before starting work, and will complete the 16 more hours after a month of training and the rest after around six months of training. It's typical for employees to provide instruction for newly-hired guards, though the amount of training you'll get on the job will vary. Your training may even include learning about protection, public relations, report writing, and first aid. In many states, you'll also continue to do 8 hours of yearly training so you stay up-to-date. Complete training for additional requirements, such as carrying a firearm, baton, or tear gas. Some guard duties require you to carry a firearm, baton, or even tear gas. With power comes responsibility, so if this sounds like the right path for you, you'll need to complete additional training — typically at an additional cost — to get licensed to carry these additional weapons. Jobs that require you to carry these weapons tend to offer higher pay. Remember that this license will allow you to carry a weapon on the job, but not to carry a concealed weapon in your daily life. For example, the permit for carrying a firearm as a guard in California costs $80 dollars and you'll need 14 additional hours of training. One career choice can be to be an armored car guard, which is a guard who protects money and other valuables during transit. You'll work with a team of guards to pick up money from businesses and move them to another location. You'll need a firearm and will wear a bulletproof vest, because this can be dangerous work. That said, the pay is higher than it is in other types of guard work. Just know that being an armed guard is not possible in every country. In fact, it's illegal in some countries, such as the United Kingdom, Switzerland, or the Netherlands. However, in some other countries, such as Israel, it is mandatory for security guards to be armed. Register your fingerprints. After you've completed your licensing requirements and application, you'll be issued a fingerprint card that you'll need to take to an agency-approved fingerprinting site in order to have your fingerprints registered. You'll have to pay a fee, somewhere in the neighborhood of $50, to have them processed. This is an important step that will make your job as a security guard official. Registering your fingerprints will also ensure that it'll be known if you commit any future offenses. After getting your license, find work in a sector of your choice. The options are almost endless when it comes to finding a place where you can work as a security guard. However, the type of place where you choose to work will greatly affect what your work days will look like, so it's important to consider this when making a choice. Be aware that it can take a while to find a full-time security guard position; however, there are many additional part-time jobs available around the holidays, and some of them can turn into full-time jobs. Still, it will take determination and perseverance to find work. Here are some places where you can seek employment: Retail stores. Security guards in retail stores protect people, records, merchandise, money, and equipment. They may also work as undercover detectives to prevent customers and employees from shoplifting. 'Office buildings, banks, hotels, and hospitals. Security guards in these locations work to keep the customers, staff, and property safe. Museums and art galleries. Security guards in these locations work to protect the paintings and exhibits from the people at the museums. They may also work at a security line near the entrances and may have to look through handbags of patrons. Factories, government buildings, and military bases. Here, the security guards not only protect the workers and the equipment, but they also check the credentials of the people and the vehicles that enter and leave the premises to make sure that no unauthorized people enter these locations. Schools and universities. Here, guards patrol the buildings and the grounds and keep the students safe. They may also work at school events and keep the campuses safe at night. Parks and sports stadiums. The security guards at parks and stadiums control crowds, direct traffic, and help people find their seats. Bars and nightclubs. The guards here make sure people are old enough to enter, turn away rowdy or drunk patrons, and keep people in order. Complete your daily duties. Of course, your job description will vary significantly depending on the place where you work. However, there are some duties that many security guards have to fulfill during their time on the job. To be successful at what you do, you have to perform them rigorously while making sure never to take your eyes off the people and property under your protection. Here are the duties you may typically have to do: Monitor alarms and closed-circuit TV cameras Control access for employees and visitors by checking their credentials Conduct security checks at the entrance of a building Write daily or weekly reports of what you observed Detain violators Interview witnesses for court testimony Have patience. One thing you'll need to succeed as a security guard is patience and lots of it. Much of your job will lie in standing around and looking out for trouble. You may go days, or even weeks, without finding something to act on. Of course, this depends on the line of work — if you have to help people go through security, then you'll have less down time. Either way, you'll have to have the patience to stand around and focus on your job without letting your mind drift. Even if something out of the ordinary or dangerous only happens for five minutes a day, you need to have the patience to stay alert to stop trouble before it gets out of control. Communicate well. Whether you work with a partner, patrol a store with several other guards, or have to instruct people who go through security at the front of a building, it's important to have people skills to do your job well. You want to be firm without coming off as gruff to help people quickly get through security, and you want to have a good working relationship with any colleagues so you can keep each other in the loop about any potential problems that you've come across. Though much of your job may not require you to talk much, when you do communicate with others, it has to count. If you see a suspicious customer at the other end of the store, you have to make it clear that the other guards should be alert to it. Be observant. A security guard needs to be extremely observant. You have to be able to watch the world and people around you and to be on the lookout for anything out of the ordinary. You may spot a shoplifter, a brewing fight, or a customer who is obviously drunk and needs to be escorted from the store. If you're an armoured car guard, then you may spot something much worse — a criminal who wants to rob your cash-filled car. You need to have your eyes and ears open at all times and never stop being on watch, no matter how seemingly ordinary your day seems. There's a reason why security guards were formerly called “watchmen.” Your job is to keep watch over the people and property you're responsible for, and not to let your mind drift for a second. Keep up your physical strength. Security guards need to be physically fit. Not only will your job most likely require standing on your feet all day, but you may also have to move property if your job calls for it. Most importantly, you'll need your strength in case you need to detain a person; you have to be quick and strong so you don't let any criminals slip through your fingers. You should also have physical stamina in order to endure the many hours you will spend standing up; if you're a guard in a museum or another place where you are required to sit, you will also need stamina to stay in this same position, too. Make sure to have at least a few days of cardio training and strength-building exercises each week. Use quick decision-making skills. When you find yourself in a dangerous situation, you'll need to quickly decide how you should proceed. You may see that a criminal is getting away and will need to determine how he can be most efficiently detained. You'll need to know shortcuts and hiding spots, and you'll need to know when to quickly ask for help from the other guards. You can't dilly dally or you'll be letting a dangerous person get out of your hands, or worse, you could cause harm to yourself, others, and the property you're supposed to be protecting. It's important to be alert during all points of your job, so your mind can quickly come up with a solution when the job calls for it. If you find yourself nodding off while standing up, you won't be able to make a snap decision when you awake to find that a customer is stealing a valuable piece of property. Advance in your career. If you are an exceptional security guard, you may be able to move up in your career in the future. If you gain many years of experience, you may even become a supervisor of other guards, or even a security manager. If you're armed, then you have a greater chance of moving forward in your career and will also make a higher salary in the process. You may also work at an organization that contains higher levels of security, which will raise your salary. Some guards who have a lot of experience as well as management skills even open up their own security guard businesses.
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Be at least 18 years of age. Have a clean record. Have a high school diploma or a GED. Have a driver's license to make yourself a more desirable candidate. Follow the requirements of your country or state. Apply for a license in your area. Complete your training. Complete training for additional requirements, such as carrying a firearm, baton, or tear gas. Register your fingerprints. After getting your license, find work in a sector of your choice. Complete your daily duties. Have patience. Communicate well. Be observant. Keep up your physical strength. Use quick decision-making skills. Advance in your career.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Prepare-for-Each-School-Day
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How to Prepare for Each School Day
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To prepare for each school day, start out by checking your schedule for the next day and making sure you have everything you will need in your backpack. For example, if you have gym class tomorrow, make sure that you have your gym clothes. Most importantly, double-check that all your homework is in your bag. Then, lay out your outfit for the next day to make it easier to get dressed. Finally, make sure that your alarm is set for the right time in the morning.
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Check your schedule the night before. Do you need your P.E. items for tomorrow? Do you have any homework to turn in? Checking your schedule means it will be a whole lot easier in the morning. Pack your bag with these needed items. Make sure that your bag has a compartment for books, P.E things, and a lunch bag. You should also have a smaller section for your wallet, keys, and folding umbrella. Making sure that your bag is packed with everything you need the night before will help you in the morning. Make sure your clothes are laid out the night before. This will mean you are much more time efficient in the morning. Make sure that they are clean and ironed the night before, and hang them front and center in your closet or drape them over a chair. Try to place them where they will not get dirty or crumpled. Prepare lunch the night before. Salad, wraps, pasta. Whatever you eat, try to prepare most of it the night before. Have a regular bath and bedtime. Set an alarm. Whether it's your phone, clock or even your parents, have something or someone to wake you up in the morning. Splash water on your face. Doing this wakes you up more, especially if you feel tired in the morning. Eat a good breakfast. Eating a good breakfast improves your performance for your entire school day. Try not to eat foods that are sugary, try sticking to foods that might give you more energy. Do not just drink half a glass of water and a bowl of cereal, eat a larger breakfast; it will give you much more energy in the morning. A study shows that students that eat breakfast do better in school and tend to recieve higher test scores than students who don't. So try being one of those students who is better, and eat breakfast. Here are some good choices for an excellent meal: Eggs Fruit (apples, oranges, pears, and bananas are great choices!) Toast or rice Granola bars Fish makes an excellent breakfast food as its high good oil content helps your brain and will make you feel full for longer A porridge made of oats or a variety of other grains Make sure you drink plenty of low-sugar beverages that appeal to you! In some countries such as the USA, people like to drink milk or orange juice with breakfast. However, in continental Europe, those beverages as not necessarily seen as healthy and in many parts of Asia adults rarely drink (if you are not of the breastfeeding age, why drink milk?). Also have an orange and a glass of water rather than just the juice is a more natural way for your body to process this food. Have a routine. Make a list of things you will need to do in the morning and any after school activities. Allocate time to each task. Many people allow themselves an hour to get ready, while others only take about fifteen minutes to get themselves ready for the day. On a weekend or an extended vacation, practice your morning routine and see how long you will need for each lesson. You do not need to plan out every aspect of your after school activities, but make some things certain, such as your study time, a bedtime, and a dinner time. A good after-school schedule might look something like this for the average middle schooler: Come home-3:00 Do homework-3:30 Go to basketball practice-5:00 Come home and eat dinner-6:30 Study-7:00 Shower-8:30 Watch TV-9:00 Go to bed-10:00. Set aside a special place to do homework. It should be somewhere away from electronics and other distracting noises. Be sure to have plenty of materials and supplies needed, such as paper, pencils, etc. Have a snack available during study. Check backpacks for homework, graded papers, invitations, and memos. Be sure to empty backpacks of unneeded items.
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Check your schedule the night before. Make sure your clothes are laid out the night before. Prepare lunch the night before. Have a regular bath and bedtime. Set an alarm. Splash water on your face. Eat a good breakfast. Make sure you drink plenty of low-sugar beverages that appeal to you! Have a routine. Set aside a special place to do homework. Check backpacks for homework, graded papers, invitations, and memos.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Answer-Expected-Salary-in-Email
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How to Answer Expected Salary in Email
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Before you write an email stating your salary expectations, start by calculating your approximate yearly cost of living, including your rent, bills, and monthly spending money. When you're writing the email, start by thanking your potential employer for the opportunity, then provide a range of salaries you'd accept, based on the cost of living you calculated and on searching Glassdoor for what others make in the same position. Conclude your email by noting that your expectations are flexible, and negotiable based on whether or not you get a benefits package.
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Calculate your living expenses. Figure out the minimum that you need to make in order to cover your monthly costs, then multiply it by 12 to get the minimum that you need to make each year. It may help to create a spreadsheet that lists your costs while you're calculating them. These costs can include things like rent, bills, and extra spending money. You'll also want to consider taxes when calculating your income and expenses. To figure out your net pay, deduct the taxes you have to pay from your total pay. Remember to include quarterly or yearly bills that you need to pay as well. Research how much others make in the same position. Search sites like Glassdoor, Indeed, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics to find salaries for your particular job. This will give you a better idea of what you should be making in the position and can help you set a number for your salary expectations. You can sometimes find past salaries at the specific company you are applying to on sites like Glassdoor. Knowing this information will inform you how the company is paying employees in similar positions. Determine the cost of living in your area. The cost of living in certain cities, states, or countries varies significantly and affects how much people get paid in the area. Websites like Glassdoor, Salary.com, and Payscale.com have local employment statistics so that you can see what people are generally earning near you. Use these websites to help narrow down your salary expectations. For instance, if you live in New York City, the cost of living, and thus the salaries, will be much higher than if you lived in Raleigh, North Carolina. Be honest with your salary expectations. Don't ask for more than you think you're worth just because you want more money. On the flip-side, you should also not low-ball the number or you may end up getting paid poorly in your new position. Be as honest and upfront as you can with yourself and your potential employer when responding to expected salary questions. Provide a simple and concise subject line. The subject line should be short and to the point. You should add some identifier so that the person can easily find the email when they search for it. For instance, the subject line could be something like, “Garrett Anthony - Expected salary information.” Use the same tone as previous correspondence. If your correspondence with the employer has been formal thus far, keep it that way in your email. If you've been communicating on a more informal basis, a “Hello,” followed by the first name will probably suffice in the intro. Use salutations like "Mr.," "Ms.," and "Mrs." if you've used them throughout the hiring process. For formal communications, you may want to start the letter with something like, “Dear Mr. Smith.” For more informal jobs, a “Hello John” or “Hi John,” should suffice. Write a short 2-3 sentences thanking them for the opportunity. A small thank you paragraph will let them know that you're still interested in the position. This is also a great way to segue into the more serious conversation of salary and benefits. The first paragraph can be something like, “Thanks so much for the opportunity! I appreciate the time that you've given me during this process and I'm excited about the prospect of joining the team.” Include your expected salary and 2-3 sentences and why you deserve it. The second paragraph should include your expected salary. Make sure to justify the number with a couple of sentences highlighting your education or experience. This will improve the chances of you getting the salary that you want. Your second paragraph can be something like, “Based on my 5 years of experience, I think that something in between $50,000 and $65,000 would be appropriate.” Double-check your email for grammatical and spelling errors. Double or triple check the email before you hit the send button to avoid leaving the wrong impression. Spelling and grammar errors in your email can make you look unprofessional and could hurt your chances to get the job. Run spell and grammar check on emails before you send them to avoid mistakes. Even though the email is short, it's important that everything is clear and correct. Provide a salary range that satisfies you instead of a concrete number. If you're unsure of what the employer is willing to pay or what you want to ask for, you can give them a range. Use your research and find the lowest and highest paid people with similar experience in your particular position to create that range. Giving a range will show them that you're flexible and may benefit you during salary negotiations. Say that the salary is negotiable based on benefits. Benefits can save you a lot of money so it's important that you take them into consideration when answering the expected salary question. On the flip side, the job may offer no benefits. In this case, it's okay to ask for a little more than the market average to make up for the lack of benefits. You can write something in the email like, “Negotiable based on the benefits package.” For instance, if the position offers health benefits that would normally cost you $2,000 per year, you'll need to calculate that into your expected salary. Let them know that you are flexible with the salary. Tell the employer that you're flexible, especially if you really want the job. This may keep you in the running and could come in handy during salary negotiations later. You can write something like, “I'm highly flexible with my salary and would love the opportunity to join the team.”
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Calculate your living expenses. Research how much others make in the same position. Determine the cost of living in your area. Be honest with your salary expectations. Provide a simple and concise subject line. Use the same tone as previous correspondence. Write a short 2-3 sentences thanking them for the opportunity. Include your expected salary and 2-3 sentences and why you deserve it. Double-check your email for grammatical and spelling errors. Provide a salary range that satisfies you instead of a concrete number. Say that the salary is negotiable based on benefits. Let them know that you are flexible with the salary.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Comic-Book
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How to Make a Comic Book
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The best way to create your very own comic book is to dream up and draw 2 or 3 main characters. Sketch rough thumbnails of your storyline to get your creativity flowing, then start your final draft by outlining panel borders and dialogue bubbles. Finally, sketch in your drawings and go over the pages in ink to complete your masterpiece.
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Design some memorable characters and create initial sketches. Start by thinking about who your main character is going to be. Either start by sketching out an interesting character with a distinct visual style and decide what they're like after you've drawn them, or pick 2-3 distinct personality traits and sketch a character that fits what you imagine based on their personality. There's no real wrong way to invent a character, so let your imagination run wild! Characters can be animals, historical figures, or entirely invented from thin air. Make your personality traits as specific as possible will make it easier to jump-start an idea for a plot if you don't have one. “Willing to do anything to help their family” is better than “loyal,” for example. You can certainly start with the plot first and develop your characters later. The characters and plot are equally important, so the order isn't necessarily important. Just start with your best idea and work from there. Select a setting for your story to take place. Setting refers to the time and place where a story happens. If your story is going to be about a cowboy, for example, your setting might be “the wild west, a long time ago” or “Kansas, 1880.” Pick a setting that makes sense for your story and you can draw. The setting can be real or imaginary. If it doesn't matter to you and you want to focus on the characters, make it something that will be easy to draw, like the desert. If you're making a really simple comic, you can simply leave your background blank and have no clearly-defined setting for your story. This is a particularly acceptable choice for comedic comics where the emphasis is on the writing. Create an outline for your plot and identify a conflict. What is your main character going to do and what is the main conflict of your story? Take a blank piece of paper and jot down a few ideas based on what you want your comic to be about. Put your conflict into the simplest terms possible to create a basic outline for what your story is going to explore. Conflict refers to the 2 people or ideas that are fighting against one another in your story. This can be as simple as superhero vs. villain or as abstract as freedom vs. order. Comedic comics don't necessarily require conflict, but they sure help anchor the story in something concrete! Your comic doesn't have to have a resolution if you want to turn your comic into a series. Compose your script and proofread it carefully to avoid mistakes. Since a lot of comic storytelling is visual, focus on writing strong, punchy dialogue that communicates each character's attitude. Give different characters different vocabularies and speech patterns to make them distinct. Once you've written your script, proofread it 2-3 times to check your spelling and word choice. Speech bubbles in comics are pretty small. Try to keep most of your dialogue as short as possible. A single speech or line of dialogue may require multiple panels if it's really long. Make notes about what your illustrations might look like on the side of each page as you're proofreading. This will make it easier to figure out what you want to draw. Share your script with a friend, parent, or teacher to see if they have any suggestions on how to improve your writing. Most comic book scripts are written like movie scripts. Simply put the characters name at the beginning of a line and write their dialogue out. Give each piece of dialogue a separate line to make it easy to read. Make notes about setting, tone, or theme in between your dialogue. Determine how many panels you’re going to need to depict your action. First, take a red pencil and read through your script. Draw a line at each point where you think you want to start a new page based on how fast you want your story to progress or how many lines of dialogue you've passed (16-20 lines of dialogue is usually the maximum for a page). Once you have your pages separated, use a different color pencil to split your pages up into distinct panels. For particularly momentous or emotional moments, consider giving the moment a larger panel, or even its own page. More than 6-8 panels on a single page is going to be too much for most readers to process. More than 3 speech bubbles in a single panel is going to be too much dialogue to fit in one illustration. An individual page usually has 1-3 key actions take place. These actions could be a piece of important dialogue, a character going from one location to another, or a character interacting with another character. Avoid overloading your pages with too many events to give your readers time to process what's happening. You can always revise the order of your panels or number of pages. Don't worry about it if you change your mind when you're proofreading! Draw thumbnails to create a storyboard. Once you know how many pages you need, grab a blank sheet of paper for each individual page that you've marked out. Draw a rough draft of the individual panels on that page and create simple sketches of what you're going to include in the final product. These pages can be stick figures and basic drawings if you'd like—it's more about understanding the flow and layout of your comic. You can find pre-generated templates with different panel configurations online at sites like http://comicbookpaper.com/. You can also choose to draw the panels out yourself or sketch where you'll put them in your digital program. Use a variety of layouts so that your individual pages don't get repetitive. For example, if every page has 9 panels that are arranged in the same way, your reader is going to get bored. Try to make the last panel on each page a unique, interesting, or powerful moment right as tension or conflict is rising. This is called the “cliffhanger” method and will keep your reader hooked on finding out what happens on the next page. Sketch out your panels in pencil to get a rough idea for the action. If you're working on paper, jumping right to pen and ink can be disastrous. Start by drawing tentative outlines for your characters and action with a pencil. You can add backgrounds later, so focus on framing your characters in each panel. Use a variety of compositions to keep the visual information fresh and interesting on each page. For example, in one panel, you can draw the character's face close up, filling the entire panel. In the next panel, you can draw them standing on the left side of the panel, leaving plenty of room for background information. Don't draw your characters floating in the middle of every panel to keep things fresh. Pay attention to how characters are framed differently in movie shots. You'll notice that characters aren't always filmed right in the middle of the screen. Comics take a lot of visual cues from movies, so use film shots as inspiration for your images. In order to focus on composition first, draw your rough sketches out before you start inking or adding details. You can use a simple style and make your characters basic if you want to emphasize the story and can't draw well! There's no rule that says comic books have to be extremely detailed. Start with an establishing shot at the beginning to reveal your setting. An establishing shot refers to an image in film or comics that shows the reader where the action is taking place. This can be a simple drawing of a city's skyline or a detailed depiction of a clearing in the woods. Make your first 1-3 images drawings of your setting so that readers know where the action is taking place. Use a separate establishing shot for each new location. It's normal for a single comic to take place in 4-5 different locations. A common technique is to “zoom in” on the action. For example, you might start by drawing a city's skyline in the first panel. The second panel could depict the street where the story takes place. The third panel might show a single window where we see the character sitting down at a desk. This is a good way to establish where your character is without using written words. Add detail and ink your characters, leaving space for the speech bubbles. Once you've got the layout finished and you've sketched what's happening in each panel, start adding details. Use your pencil or tablet to sketch out more visual information and erase or remove guide lines before inking your characters in black ink lines. Add your textures, facial features, and key details to give your images some definition. Add detail to all of your panels in chronological order if you want a consistent drawing style. If you aren't worried about it though, you can certainly ink and color your panels individually. Color your characters in and compose your background textures. Once you've finished inking your characters, add color to make them pop off of the page. Draw your backgrounds out and use a variety of drawing techniques to compose your backgrounds. Even if your action is taking place in a city, you don't need to draw a detailed landscape in every panel. In fact, this would result in over-crowded frames that contain too much visual information! If you're working digitally, watercolor brushes can make abstract backgrounds pop and keep the focus on the action. If you're hand-drawing your comics, use cross-hatching, which is a variety of perpendicular lines, to create cool abstract backgrounds. Once you've given the reader an establishing shot to indicate where the action is taking place, your readers will assume the characters are still in that location in the subsequent panels. You don't need to keep reminding them with detailed backgrounds. Hand-drawn comics can be made with markers, colored pencils, or a combination of the two. It's really up to you! Touch up the illustrations and add minor textures and elements. Once most of your panels are fleshed out, add minor details or textures to the images. Use a smaller marker to give characters facial hair, sweat drips, or unique features. Go through each panel and ask yourself, “Does this image work on its own as an individual piece of art?” If the answer is no, you should probably keep working on the image and add more details until it looks like a complete piece. If you're going for a simple comic, there's nothing wrong with emphasizing the story over the images. Feel free to stop when you're happy with each panel. Finish your comic by adding your dialogue. Add your dialogue to the speech bubbles by adding them digitally or writing them out. If you're writing them by hand, use a ruler and pencil to draw horizontal lines to write your dialogue out evenly. If you're adding your dialogue digitally, download a free comic book font that readers will recognize to reduce the odds that your dialogue doesn't fit the comic book aesthetic. Common comic book fonts include Komika, Adam Warren's pro font, and Badaboom. These are universally-recognizable fonts that people will immediately be familiar with. Using a non-traditional font can make your comics feel unprofessional. Download free comic book fonts online at https://www.dafont.com/. If you're hand drawing your letters, make sure that you space your letters out equally and keep your style uniform to avoid an inconsistent look. If a character yells or you want to add a sound effect, like “Boom!” or “Ugh!” feel free to put it outside of a speech bubble in a different font. Create a comic on paper if you want an original piece of work to photocopy. If you want to keep it old school, feel free to create your comic on paper by hand. While you can use standard printer paper, there are sketchbooks designed for comic books where each page is larger to make it easier to draw details. Some of them are designed to be folded in half for easy photocopying. If you make an original comic on paper, you can photocopy it to reproduce it. You can even get it bound into a book at the printer. If you're using paper that folds in half, each single sheet will have 2 separate pages on it. For example, if your comic is 32 pages, your first page will have page 1 on the left side and page 32 on the right. The next sheet will have page 2 on the left, and page 31 on the right. This is why the thumbnails are so important! Each sheet will be 4 pages if you're using the front and back of the paper. When you bind the book, you'll place your sheets on top of one another and staple them in the center so the pages are in sequential order. Work from a template or blank comic to make things easy. There are plenty of online templates that can be printed out and draw directly on. This method will ensure that you don't need to worry about sizing your panels. Like creating a comic book from scratch, this method will make it easy to reproduce your comic since you'll simply need to get your pages photocopied at a printer. You can find a ton of free templates online at http://comicbookpaper.com/. Use an online program to create simple digital comics. There are several free resources available online to make rudimentary comics, although most of them don't offer the kind of creative control that most illustrators want. If you're making a short comic or working on a school project though, they can make comic creation quite easy. Pixton, Strip Generator, and Make Beliefs can all be used to render simple comics in your online browser. An excellent program for making shorter digital comics can be found at https://www.pixton.com/. Pixton uses pre-rendered characters that you can place yourself to give them original dialogue. Make Beliefs is an easy-to-use site that can be found at https://www.makebeliefscomix.com/Comix/. It also uses pre-rendered characters though, and you can only have a total of 18 panels. You can find Strip Generator at http://stripgenerator.com/. You can import images and draw your own characters in Strip Generator, but the customization options can be kind of tough to make the most out of if you aren't great at digital illustration. Work entirely in Illustrator for a professional-looking comic book. Most professional comic illustrators work entirely in a digital program like Adobe Illustrator, ArtRage, Affinity, or Procreate. Using this strategy, you can draw each panel individually and then import the images and resize them to fit the panels in a new project. This method is much more time-consuming, but it ensures total creative control and you'll be able to undo mistakes, rearrange panels digitally, and make major changes without running the risk of ruining your original art. If you're interested in self-publishing, you can import your templates into Blurb and pay to get your comics printed professionally. Visit Blurb at https://www.blurb.com/comic-books. Most professional illustrators use a drawing pad that plugs into your computer. These look like big screens that you draw on with a stylus. This is the most efficient way to draw digitally.
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Design some memorable characters and create initial sketches. Select a setting for your story to take place. Create an outline for your plot and identify a conflict. Compose your script and proofread it carefully to avoid mistakes. Determine how many panels you’re going to need to depict your action. Draw thumbnails to create a storyboard. Sketch out your panels in pencil to get a rough idea for the action. Start with an establishing shot at the beginning to reveal your setting. Add detail and ink your characters, leaving space for the speech bubbles. Color your characters in and compose your background textures. Touch up the illustrations and add minor textures and elements. Finish your comic by adding your dialogue. Create a comic on paper if you want an original piece of work to photocopy. Work from a template or blank comic to make things easy. Use an online program to create simple digital comics. Work entirely in Illustrator for a professional-looking comic book.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Write-a-Speech-Introducing-Yourself
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How to Write a Speech Introducing Yourself
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To write a speech introducing yourself, start by organizing the information you want to include. When writing content, consider the purpose of the speech, your intended audience, and your goals for the introduction. You can speak about your education, professional background, career/career goals, and outside interests, but keep things brief and to the point. Only include information that is important and relevant to your listeners. Don't forget to state your name in the first sentence of the speech.
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Make an outline of your speech. Start by making a skeletal draft of your main points. Strip the speech down to its bare bones to determine what is most important to say, and in what order you should deliver those facts. This is the basic structure which you will build your speech around. State your name in the very first sentence of your speech. This can be very straightforward: "Good afternoon!/Good morning! My name is Deshawn Smith, and I am a computer programming student at the University of Arkansas." If the introduction is work-related, mention your interests and your career goals together in the same sentence. This will save on time and convey that your personal interests can serve your professional goals. For example, "I am working on an app that allows people to order pizza from their Twitter account." You may want to mention your education or professional training background, if it is relevant and appropriate. "This is the fifth app I've designed. My second app, which helped people locate dog parks near them, won an award at my university." Mention hobbies or outside interests. Depending on the scenario, you may also want to mention any relevant hobbies or additional experience you have. Mentioning interests and hobbies could help cement your authority on a certain subject, or it could feel tangential, depending on the purpose of your introductory speech. If you are explaining your passion or goal and how it helped formed your progression up to this point, that can help you tell a compelling story about yourself. For example, if you're writing a speech for your college speech class, you might want to explain how you got into computers at an early age and why they're important to you now as you pursue your career goals. If, however, you are introducing yourself to potential clients at a business lunch, they are probably not interested in your hobbies. They will want to know what you are doing right now and what your skills are. Try writing one draft with your experience/hobbies and one without, and run both versions by an objective listener who can give you feedback before your speech. Sell yourself. If you are trying to make a good first impression in a professional context, it's important that your speech conveys your capabilities and skills. You can accomplish this without sounding self-congratulatory by tying your past accomplishments with your future goals and aspirations, letting others know that your anticipated contributions in the future are grounded in your contributions from the past. Highlight the qualities, skills and experience you have that are most relevant for the audience and occasion. For example, "Because of my background in app writing and my extensive network of professional connections, I have a strong grasp of what today's young professionals are looking for. My apps offer convenience and immediate gratification." You are trying to present yourself as a professional while making a strong and lasting impression. If you're trying to sell yourself to a group of new colleagues, you probably won't need to tell them about your family life, or anything outside of work that isn't directly relevant. Set yourself apart from your peers. Present yourself honestly, but do so in a way that makes your story stand out from all the rest. If you played an important role in a big project, mention that role. Go further by extrapolating what you have learned from the experience, and explain what ideas you have about how the project could be performed more effectively if it were to be repeated. You can simultaneously demonstrate your skills and experience, while presenting yourself as a forward-looking person who is always learning and developing. For example, you could say, "I spend a lot of time attending app conventions and conferences so I can learn what audiences are looking for. I pride myself on staying on the cutting edge of app design." Try to tie this into your broader outline of your career goals and personal development. Trim your speech down. Some career service advisors recommend keeping your self-introductory speech as short as two or three sentences. Others suggest aiming for five to seven minutes in length. If it is not possible to make your speech this short, or if time permits you to give a longer introduction, you should still trim down your speech to be as concise, yet informative, as possible. Make sure that if this is an assignment, you stay within the assigned guidelines. If your speech is supposed to be 3-5 minutes, a 7-minute speech and a 2-minute speech are equally inappropriate. If you are giving a brief introductory speech in an interview, be certain that you don't go over the recommended time. Use short, simple sentences. Remember that your speech is going to be spoken out loud, and your audience will not be able to go back and re-read your words if something is confusing. Deliver your speech in such a way that no one will be uncertain of what you are trying to say. Avoid long rambling sentences, and use direct and concise prose as much as possible. Think about your sentence structure carefully. Reading your speech out loud will help you determine when you have overly long sentences that need to be restructured. Practice your speech. You should run through your speech out loud well before the actual introduction. Practice different inflections and experiment with how you pace yourself during the speech. You can practice alone by reading at first, but to get some feedback it's a good idea to perform the speech in front of a friend, family member or colleague. Practicing in front of other people will enable you to gauge whether your speech captures the interest of your listeners. Think about which parts of the speech were successful and which parts weren't. Try to get as much detailed feedback as possible by asking specific as well as general questions after your speech. As well as saying "how did you like the speech?", ask specifically what parts were the strongest and weakest. Check that you delivered a clear message by asking your practice audience what they took away from the speech. Memorize your speech. Know what you're going to say, and how you're going to say it, well in advance. Although in some instances it is common practice to read from a piece of paper, try to memorize your speech and read it with minimal prompts. Presenting without reading a paper can create a stronger impression of control, knowledge and confidence. It will also help keep your audience's attention. If you are staring down at a piece of paper all the time, the audience might struggle to truly engage with what you are saying. You can, however, bring an index card with bullet points, just in case you freeze up. You shouldn't write your whole speech on the card, just the main points you hope to cover. Think of the card as a point of reference, rather than a backup for your speech. Determine your audience. If you are writing an introduction for yourself in a professional setting, you will probably choose a different message, and use different language, than if you were introducing yourself to peers in a casual setting. Before you get started on planning your speech, ask yourself the following questions: Who is the intended audience? What is the purpose of my introduction? What are the expectations others may have? Decide what's relevant. If you had all the time in the world, you could probably think of a lot of interesting and relevant things to say about yourself. But the key to a successful self-introduction is being brief and to the point. That means you will need to decide what are the things that are most important or relevant for your listeners to know about you. You will need to deliver that information in the shortest possible length of time. Stick to one or two main points you want to convey about yourself. You can always add more if time allows it. Depending on the audience and function of your speech, you shouldn't allow the focus to become too narrow. For example, if you're introducing yourself to a crowd of prospective investors, you'd focus on your skills to build their confidence in you. If you're introducing yourself to a general audience -- say, for a speech class in college -- you can be a bit more wide-ranging. Remember that you're introducing yourself in general, and you want to present yourself as an interesting and rounded individual. That doesn't mean you should spend time talking about your love of baseball when you are introducing yourself in a professional scenario. Consider the purpose and tone. Whenever you plan a speech, you should always be keenly aware of what your intended goals and outcomes are. Ask yourself what kind of message you are hoping to convey to your listeners. Is your self-introduction to network with others professionally, or just casually (with new friends)? Are you hoping to win someone over to your point of view with this introduction, or to inspire/motivate someone to work hard under your leadership? All of these will affect the things you say in your introduction and the way you say them. Try to relax. If you find that you get especially nervous before making a speech, you might consider using relaxation techniques shortly before you're due to talk. Find a quiet place and take a few minutes to prepare yourself. Take some deep breaths, focus on your breathing, and count the seconds that pass as you breathe in slowly, then exhale slowly. You can also try some visualization techniques to help ease your nervousness and give you confidence for your speech. Imagine the way you will feel when you have finished delivering your speech and are met with smiling faces and resounding applause. Then channel that confidence into the actual speech you are about to deliver. Have good body language. It may seem like a minor point, but a slouching posture could make you appear less confident or less professional, and it may be distracting to your audience. Stand up straight and try to project a strong image. You may find it helpful to push your chest out and suck your stomach in a little to help you keep a straight back, but try to keep it natural-looking. Avoid crossing your arms or clutching your hands. Don't stare down at the ground or cling to the table or lecture in front of you. Make eye contact across the room in a measured and controlled way. Avoid lingering on one person, but also avoid darting your eyes back and forth restlessly. Try making eye contact with one person on the left side of the room, then one person on the right side of the room. Shift across the room, but in a controlled way that feels natural and relaxed. Don't rush. You don't want to drag out your speech, but you also don't want to stumble over your words or read so fast that nobody can understand you. Try to find a balance and speed that you are comfortable with. You need to speak slowly enough that everyone can follow along and understand what you're saying, but not so slowly that it makes your speech lag. Aim for a comfortable, conversational pace of dialogue. Practicing your speech in front of other people, or recording it and listening back are great ways to judge the tempo of your speech. Use humor if you make a mistake. If you make a mistake while delivering your speech, don't panic. Apologizing profusely draws attention to your mistakes and makes them seem more significant. Instead, if you feel like you need to address the mistake, make a humorous remark and then let it go. This will show comfort and confidence. Self-deprecating humor can help you come across as humble and likable. For example, if you've accidentally skipped forward in your speech and have to circle back, you could say something like, "And now I'm going to cycle back and tell you something I forgot before. If you wanted to get to know the "real me," you're seeing it now!" You can also make a quick, humorous nod to your mistake and move on. For example, if you come out and you mess up the very first line, you could say something like, "Wow, excuse me. Here I am so excited to tell you about myself that I've mixed up all my words. Let me try that again." Don't be too self-deprecating, however. You are still trying to ensure people remember you for your strengths and competencies. Move on quickly.
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Make an outline of your speech. Mention hobbies or outside interests. Sell yourself. Set yourself apart from your peers. Trim your speech down. Use short, simple sentences. Practice your speech. Memorize your speech. Determine your audience. Decide what's relevant. Consider the purpose and tone. Try to relax. Have good body language. Don't rush. Use humor if you make a mistake.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Win-a-Street-Fight
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How to Win a Street Fight
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If you want to win a street fight, focus on attacking your opponent's weak spots, like the face, temples, throat, and kidneys. You can punch, scratch, bite, claw, spit, or pull the hair of your aggressor to gain the upper hand. Also, look around for any objects that you can use as weapons—you're defending yourself, so there are no rules. Be as loud as possible during the fight, which will hopefully get the attention of anyone nearby who can help you. For example, you can yell something like, "Help, this guy is trying to hurt me!" or "I need help, someone call the police!" If you are outmatched or outnumbered, try to run away at the first opportunity you get towards a public, well-lit area.
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Stay safe at all times. Though you may not get to choose where a fight breaks out, there are things that you can do to increase your safety in a self-defense scenario. Avoid fighting in the middle of the street or on hard sidewalks, concrete, or places with sharp or hard edges like concrete steps. If your aggressor pulls out a weapon, like a knife or a pipe, then you should just try to run away from them. If someone is trying to rob you at gunpoint, you should give them whatever they want instead of risking serious injury or death. Sometimes self-defense and self-preservation means submitting to force to stay alive. Damage the soft spots on your opponent. Attacking areas like the face, temples, throat, kidneys, solar plexus, may eventually incapacitate your opponent. Scratching, biting, clawing, spitting, pulling hair and attacking eyes can also be used. You are defending yourself from a violent aggressor, not fighting in a ring with rules. Use anything you can to ensure your safety. Use eye gouges and attack their throat with strikes. Hitting the nose blurs the eyes and causes pain, and it just might leave your opponent dazed long enough to get away. Attack their legs. Low kicks should be aimed towards shins, ankles, the insides or back of calves or thighs and kneecaps (if their legs are straight). Do not aim higher than knee or waist height because they will grab your leg. If you have an object like a bat or pipe, you can also aim for their legs. If your opponent is unable to walk or pursue you, you can get away safely without continuing the fight. Attack your opponent from behind. Attacks from behind are difficult to see and avoid, and in a real fight, it is not cowardly to strike from behind. Watch your back, and attack that of your opponent(s). Use lateral movement to move side to side and circle your opponent. Attacking your opponents legs or getting control of his arms from behind may allow you to hold them down long enough for help to arrive. Head butt your opponent fast and hard. Bring the top your forehead down to their nose and face. A headbutt can easily knock someone out or break bones in a person's face. Make sure to tuck in your chin and strike with the top of your head. Aim for the area containing their eyes, nose, and mouth. Learn to grapple. A successful grapple can put you in control, even if the attacker is much stronger or faster than you. Popular grappling styles include Brazilian jiu-jitsu, sambo, and wrestling. Learn how to submit, slam, or choke your opponent if you want to end the fight early. Getting positional control when the fight goes to the ground is also incredibly important. Be aware of your environment. Aside from various objects that can be used as weapons and traps, knowing where to run is very important – especially when you're outnumbered. Use all of your senses. Don't just look around aimlessly, stay focused on what you might have to do. Stand at a safe distance. You should stand safely away from your opponent unless you are ready to strike. The attacker needs to close distance to strike you, so staying just out of their reach means they cannot hit you. Try to stay on the side of the opponent, rather than face them head on. Remember that they can be an obstacle to themselves. Keep your guard up. You can cross your arms, which will allow you to bring them up and protect your face if they lunge at you. Obtain a weapon. According to the rules of "reasonable force," it is your right to use as much force as necessary to ensure your own safety. If you pull a knife (or another weapon) on a guy and he continues the confrontation, then he pushed you to defend yourself. Living is your priority – damaging or intimidating your opponent enough to let you get away is your method. Look for anything that you can use for a weapon like a broom handle, a bat, or garbage can cover. Close the distance when you're ready to attack. Most people find it uncomfortable and unexpected for someone they attack to be right up in their space. Another advantage of staying in close is that your attacker won't be able to fully extend their arm, and it will reduce the power of their punching. Try to wrestle the person to the ground and get control over their body. If they are laying on their back, they won't be able to punch as hard as if they were standing up. Stay as relaxed as you can, and breathe deeply. The more relaxed you are, the harder you will strike and the less susceptible to injury you will be. Regulate your breathing by breathing in deeply through your nose and exhaling out of your mouth. Short shallow breaths will tire you out quicker and could tip the fight in your opponent's favor. The more excited or stressed you are, the quicker you will fatigue in a fight. Establish your balance so that you can stay on your feet. Spread your legs to shoulder width and bend your knees. Going to the ground is very dangerous to the untrained fighter, especially if the opponent has weapons, back-up, or ground-fighting experience. If you find yourself tangled up with them, break away any way you can. Walk away from the fight. Although obvious, the best way to win a street fight is to refrain from fighting in the first place. In the majority of street fights, there will be a warning before actual physical aggression occurs. Try to resolve the fight before it breaks down into fighting. In verbal disputes, stay calm and take a firm stand, but take an apologetic approach. Remain neutral and non-confrontational. You can try to Apologize to the person and explain that you didn't mean to do whatever angered them in the first place. Signs that someone wants to fight you include clenched fists, an aggressive posture, and yelling or cursing. You can say something like, "Hey, I'm sorry that you took it that way, but I didn't really mean anything by it. Sorry for the misunderstanding." If they keep approaching you, remember to keep your hands up or arms crossed just in case they attack. You can say something like "Hey man, back up!" or "I'm not trying to have a fight right now, please give me some space." Know when and how to run. If you are outmatched, outnumbered, or just not willing to fight, then you should run at the first opportunity towards a public, well-lit area with other people. When escaping in the middle of a confrontation, try to impede your opponents as much as possible by blocking them with obstacles. If you can put a trashcan, car, bus, or another barrier between you and the attacker, all the better. Run between narrow paths, such as between cars, a narrow stairwell or a narrow hallway. This will prevent the opponents from ganging up on you. If you know you won't outrun them, don't try. If you are caught (especially with multiple attackers), you are more likely lose the fight due to a simple lack of energy. If you find yourself in this situation, turn around and get ready to defend yourself. Be as loud as possible. Don't be afraid to scream or yell out for help. Look for any authority figures like the police or security guards. Being loud and shouting brings unwanted attention that your attacker would rather not have. It also distracts them and could make them panic, making them less conscientious fighters. If other people see the potential fight, your attackers may be less inclined to use physical violence. You can yell something like, "Help, this guy is attacking me and trying to hurt me!" or "I need help, someone call the police!" When you ask for help, identify a person and look them in the eyes before you begin to yell at them. If you make a scene, then your aggressor could just walk away. Escape as soon as your opponent(s) are incapacitated. Phone the police or alert some other authority as soon as you can. Let them know where you are, where the attack occurred, and describe your attackers. Don't try to stand your ground and beat up everyone if you have to fight multiple people. Find your first opportunity to leave and take it. Apologize for your actions. If you've done something to anger someone to the point where they want to physically assault you, there's a chance you may have done something to provoke them. Think about your actions and apologize and walk away from the person. Try to understand things from their perspective, and make sure that your apology is genuine. Even if you don't understand why they got mad, try to feel empathy towards their anger and diffuse the situation instead of escalating it. For instance, if someone is yelling in your face and getting aggressive, you can say something like, "Hey, I'm sorry I spilled your drink man. It was really crowded, and I got bumped into you. I really didn't mean to mess up your shirt. Are we cool?" If you said something to offend someone you can apologize by saying, "I didn't mean to offend you with my comment. I thought about it and I realized I was being ignorant. I really am sorry. Can we drop it and move on?" Understand the seriousness of fighting. Assault charges can range from a misdemeanor to a felony. If you provoke a fight and seriously injure the other person, you can be charged by your state and serve prison time. The penalties for a serious assault charge can range from a year of probation up to life in prison in some states. Fighting also risks your own health, well-being, and life. You should really avoid fighting at all costs when on the streets. If you want to get out your aggression or you enjoy fighting, consider joining a gym that trains in mixed martial arts. Other types of gyms that you can join to get fighting practice include Muay Thai and American boxing gyms.
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Stay safe at all times. Damage the soft spots on your opponent. Attack their legs. Attack your opponent from behind. Head butt your opponent fast and hard. Learn to grapple. Be aware of your environment. Stand at a safe distance. Obtain a weapon. Close the distance when you're ready to attack. Stay as relaxed as you can, and breathe deeply. Establish your balance so that you can stay on your feet. Walk away from the fight. Know when and how to run. Be as loud as possible. Escape as soon as your opponent(s) are incapacitated. Apologize for your actions. Understand the seriousness of fighting.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Prepare-a-Fashion-Design-Portfolio
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How to Prepare a Fashion Design Portfolio
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To prepare a fashion design portfolio, organize your materials chronologically, starting with the most recent work and moving backwards. You can also tell a story with your work by arranging your material to show development or a guiding principle. Next, pick sketches, swatches, and high-quality photographs of your best work to showcase. Once you choose the items that will go in your portfolio, lay them out on a table to find the best way to organize them before finalizing your plan.
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Check for instructions or guidance on what to include. If you're applying to a design program, they should give a good idea of what they want to see in your portfolio. If you're designing a professional portfolio, you may not have explicit directions. Generally, you should include creative investigation, drawings that show your ability to translate 3D into 2D, color studies, and, if relevant, photos of 3D work that you've done. Do tailor your portfolio to the specific application or the type of work that you want to do. You may want to put together more than one portfolio if you're applying for different positions. Come up with an organizing principle. Whatever you do, you should probably try to keep different parts of one project together as much as possible. So, for example, if you explored organic structures like feathers and leaves for one project and tribal or folk art for another, try to keep the various parts of those projects together. Ultimately, you need an organizational principle because you'll have to choose how you want to present those projects. Do you want to tell a story, showing the links between the different angles you have explored? Do you prefer the simplicity of chronological or reverse chronological order? Think about the work that you've done and see if there are any particular connections that you want to highlight. Remember that whatever you come up with, it should be clear to a viewer what you're trying to communicate. If you're really unsure about this, just stick with something simple, like presenting your most recent work at the front to capture the viewer and then dedicating the rest of the portfolio to showing how you got there. Note that for professional portfolios, you should arrange your work with the most recent pieces first and put older material in the back. Write an explanation to show how you want to organize your work. As with any project, it's easy to become so enthusiastic about an idea that you don't really plan out how you're going to execute it. Before you know it, you're overwhelmed by everything you didn't plan for. The point of this step is to make sure that you've maximized the presentation of your work and that all the parts will be as clear to an outsider as they are to you. Don't just think about what your storyline is: assess how each part fits into that story. Play around with different arrangements and think about how each arrangement affects how your works will be perceived. You may create a diagram or an outline to illustrate why you organized your pieces in a certain way. Show or explain your idea to someone who has worked with you throughout your creative development. Ideally, that person should be a mentor, such as a teacher or someone close to you, who has some experience with building portfolios and can provide feedback on how effective your ideas will be. Gather your materials. Base your materials on the guidelines provided by your specific program. Color samples, fabric swatches, investigative pieces, sketches, photos: everything. You're not going to put all of these items into your portfolio, but do start with the complete collection. Note that you usually can't include actual pieces that you've made, like a corset or a pair of a shoes. Instead, have professional-looking photos taken of those pieces and include the photographs in your portfolio as exhibits of your work. Showcase your strongest ideas. You may not have the resources to make what you're designing, or you may not have all of the skills yet--that's okay. The person looking at your portfolio wants to see how you think and create, so show them your pen and ink sketches or your charcoal drawings. You need to have a couple of different examples of your work represented as well as figure drawings that will demonstrate your ability to represent three dimensions on a two dimensional surface. Anything more than that is bonus material. Pick out a selection of pieces that show your development in each of your projects. These pieces may be a combination of things that have inspired you, early work that you did, or first steps in a developed idea that will reappear later. Try to pick out two or three pieces for each project that you've explored. Do include casual side projects if you're not making a targeted professional portfolio. These unofficial works show the diversity and range of your talents. Plus they offer some insight into your interests. If you have a large volume of work, try to select primarily from your most recent explorations. Include some of your older work to show your development, but emphasize where you're at right now, especially if you're making your portfolio for professional advancement. Select your best pieces. You definitely want to include your best work in your portfolio. Aim to have between one and two pieces of really high quality work per project. Go for pieces that represent your personal style and approach to design. Maybe you tend to focus on designing for a certain demographic (young, fashion forward women, androgynous men, active children, etc) or around a certain theme. You may then include pieces that illustrate your ideal customer or consumer. You may select pieces that have also been well regarded in your design classes and considered some of your best work by professors and peers. Make sure that these works incorporate a range of different types of styles or approaches to fabric and materials. You shouldn't include more than two pieces from one style or approach. For example, maybe you have two pieces that showcase your ability to work with leather. You should also include one to two pieces that show off your ability to work with a different material, like silk or jersey. This will illustrate that you are able to work with several different materials and in several different styles. Fit the pieces together into your chosen arrangement. You may want to begin by laying things out side by side or on a table, just to play with the order. If you choose to have separate sections for each category, figure out how you want to organize the pieces within a particular section. Ask yourself questions like, does a chronological order make sense? Do you have clusters of works that you should group together by subject or by medium? If you discover that something doesn't fit well with your arrangement, don't include it. See if you have a different piece works better with the other parts of the section. You want everything in your portfolio to fit well together. Buy or find a portfolio or presentation case. You can find both portfolios and presentation cases online or at good art supply stores, especially if you already live near an art or design school. Which one you need will depend on the pieces you're presenting. The case should be neat and clean, but if you're a student, it doesn't need to be high end as long as it is functional and effectively displays or stores your works. You may want to invest in a nicer case if you are presenting your portfolio in a professional setting. Presentation cases are like zip binders, in that they generally include sheet protectors and are best for smaller works. They are literally meant to "present" your work, so they're probably your best option if you're just starting out.> If you have larger pieces, like paintings, you may want to invest in a portfolio, which is larger and intended more for transporting works than for presenting them. Rather than presenting your works in a ring binder-style setting, you'll probably end up with loose sheets and works stacked together securely inside. Collage loose supplemental items together and glue them onto good paper. Often your investigative pieces, like interesting textures or structures, will involve a lot of small samples and clippings. Ideally, the person who reviews your portfolio should just be able to flip through it, so collage all of the smaller pieces on letter-sized sheets of paper to make them more readily accessible. Group items by type, or arrange them in a way that makes sense. Provide labels like "color work" or "experimental glazing methods" as needed, and add small explanatory lines or paragraphs if it is necessary for you to show the reader what you were doing. You should use high-quality, acid free paper. Use high-quality glue with a brush that you can apply to the edges of the collage pieces and attach to the paper. Try to avoid rippling of the collage pieces when you adhere them to the paper by using one finger to gently smooth out each piece. Keep your work area tidy so there are no glue trails or sloppy edges on the collage pieces. You want the collage pieces to look professional and clean. Arrange your works and supplemental materials in the case. You should already have laid everything out in order, but if you haven't, start there. Check again to ensure that everything makes sense the way that you have arranged it. Then tuck all of the pieces into your case. Include labels if necessary. You are primarily emphasizing visual design elements and obviously your main communication is through that work. However, if you want to label your creative investigations or each of the stages in a project to make it clear how you progressed, then do so. Just make sure that the label is neat and placed so that it is not covering anything important. Use a computer to print your labels if you have poor handwriting. Add written supplements if required. Requirements vary widely, but depending on the program, you may need to include an essay or an artist statement. Usually, the program will supply its own guidelines for an essay. Artists' statements are less program-specific. An artist statement essentially summarizes your influences, direction, and creative inspiration in a paragraph or two. If you have never written an artist statement before, How to Write an Artist Statement is very helpful.
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Check for instructions or guidance on what to include. Come up with an organizing principle. Write an explanation to show how you want to organize your work. Gather your materials. Showcase your strongest ideas. Pick out a selection of pieces that show your development in each of your projects. Select your best pieces. Fit the pieces together into your chosen arrangement. Buy or find a portfolio or presentation case. Collage loose supplemental items together and glue them onto good paper. Arrange your works and supplemental materials in the case. Include labels if necessary. Add written supplements if required.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Write-a-Character-Affidavit-for-Child-Custody
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How to Write a Character Affidavit for Child Custody
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Before you sign an affidavit form, talk to your friend or relative to ensure you understand the issue at hand. Next, check to see if your state provides an affidavit form, which can be used as a template for your letter. As you write your affidavit, include specific examples of good character, such as the person's roles in the community or as a parent. When you're finished, don't forget to get your affidavit signed by a notary, and make a copy for your records.
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Understand why your affidavit is needed and how it will be used. Before you agree to provide an affidavit, learn what facts are at issue in the case that make an affidavit necessary. Make sure you're not being asked to say something that you don't believe or to testify to facts you haven't observed. If it can be proven that you lied in an affidavit, you can be prosecuted for perjury. Since the affidavit will be filed as part of the case, it will become a public record that anyone can access later. A copy also will be provided to the other side in the custody dispute. Find out the issues involved. You know that custody is being contested. You should also understand why, so you can stick to the facts that will be relevant to resolving the contested issues. For example, if custody is contested because one parent claims the other is an alcoholic, any information included in your affidavit should focus on that issue. If you introduce extraneous matters, you're wasting the court's time. Talk to the attorney who will draft the affidavit. The attorney may want to interview you personally regarding your observations, or s/he may ask you simply to write them down. In the latter case s/he may follow up with questions later if s/he needs more information. Depending on what you say, the attorney may ask you for supporting documents or other evidence to corroborate your statement. For example, suppose you're the child's baseball coach and you're discussing the parent's involvement in the child's activities. You mention that the parent often kept score at games. The attorney might ask to see score sheets his client completed. Review the statements written in the affidavit. The attorney may omit any hyperbole or melodramatic statements you make and may change your wording a bit to suit legal style and format. The affidavit should include only observations you have previously discussed with the attorney. Provide suggestions for revision if necessary. You are signing your affidavit under oath and penalty of perjury, so if there's anything there that you're not 100 percent comfortable saying, you shouldn't sign the affidavit until it's corrected so that you completely agree with it. Sign the affidavit in the presence of a notary. To be valid in a court of law, affidavits must be witnessed by a notary public licensed in your state. Since an attorney has drafted your affidavit, s/he probably will provide a notary public and arrange for you to sign your affidavit, usually in the attorney's office. Appear in court if necessary. Affidavits often are used to establish custody temporarily. However, if your statements are to be used to help make a permanent custody arrangement, you will probably be required to testify in open court. Understand the purpose of your affidavit. Before you begin to write anything down, make sure you understand what issues are in dispute and why you've been called on to provide supporting evidence. You need to know this so you can include in the affidavit only relevant information. If your observations are not relevant to anything at issue in the case, they won't be admissible. For example, suppose your friend's custody of her child is being challenged by the child's father, who alleges that your friend is abusive. Focus in the affidavit on observations you've made that tend to demonstrate your friend is not abusive to her child. Check for affidavit forms. Some states provide affidavit forms, also called "declarations." You can use such a form for formatting purposes, but you'll have to adapt it to suit your own needs. Create the caption. The heading information at the top of the first page of the affidavit is called the "caption." Usually it includes the name of the court, the names of the parties, and the case number. The content and format of the caption should remain the same in all documents filed in the case. Thus you could simply copy the caption of one of the other documents. Title your affidavit. Drop two lines below the caption, and type a title such as "Affidavit of [Your Name]," or simply "Character Affidavit." Use a previously filed document in the case as a guide for how to format the title, as document-formatting preferences differ from one court to the next. Generally titles are centered and in bold-face type. Some courts prefer the title to be in all capital letters or underlined. Identify yourself and your relationship to the party in the case. Start the body of your affidavit by introducing yourself to the court. You may use traditional, formal court language if you prefer, which is "Comes now [your name], a nonparty, and states as follows:" followed by numbered statements. Each numbered statement typically covers one subject. It may be one sentence or several. Make a statement regarding your belief that the person for whom you're writing the affidavit has a good moral and ethical character. Describe your background. Explain to the court who you are and any part of your background or experience that makes you a credible witness. For example, if you are the child's baseball coach and have observed the parent interact with the child at games and practices, you might mention how long you've been a youth baseball coach and approximately how many other parent-child relationships you've observed. Write about your observations. Give specific, numbered examples of things you've personally observed that demonstrate and support your belief about the person's character. Follow the general writing advice: "show, don't tell." Show the court specific facts or instances that illustrate the good character of the person, rather than simply saying the person has a good reputation, or that in your opinion s/he has strong morals. Stay away from vague statements such as "Dad is an actively involved parent." Instead, provide specific instances of Dad's active involvement. For example, if you're the child's baseball coach, you might mention that Dad comes to every practice and every game and also helps the team in the dugout. Be cautious of citing facts that might not be seen as demonstrating good moral character. For example, you may believe that active membership in a church is evidence of good moral character, but that would not necessarily be persuasive evidence in the eyes of someone of a different spiritual temperament. Be objective. Rather than setting forth church membership as evidence of character, talk about the things the person did through the church. For example, building a house for a needy family or operating a canned-food drive might be seen as indicating good character. Try your best to remain balanced. If you know of positive attributes of the other parent, include that information, too. Entirely one-sided affidavits may raise suspicions. Avoid trying to make the person look like a saint. Nobody's perfect. If you list only positive and glowing traits of your friend, your affidavit won't be very credible. If you know of weaknesses, include those as well. It will make your affidavit more persuasive. For example, suppose the child's father alleges that the child's mother, your friend, is an alcoholic. If you know that she sometimes drinks, occasionally to excess, you should include that information. Doing so will lend authenticity to your statement. Remember that you are writing your affidavit under oath. Format your signature block. When you've finished saying everything you want to say, drop down two lines and lay out the area where you'll sign your affidavit. Include a statement such as "I swear the information contained above is true and correct to the best of my knowledge and belief." Leave enough space beneath the above statement for your signature and date. Under that, type your name, address, telephone number, and email address. Add a notary block. Affidavits must be signed in the presence of a notary public, who also must sign the affidavit as a witness and affix a seal. The exact format and space needed for a notary block vary from state to state. Search online to find the form you need for your state, and then copy it onto your affidavit. Sign your affidavit in the presence of a notary. Find a notary public near you, and make arrangements to sign your affidavit in his/her presence. Many banks have a notary available to their customers for free. You can also find a notary service at some private businesses such as check-cashing companies, or at your local courthouse. These notaries typically charge a small fee for their services. Make a copy of your signed affidavit. The person who requested the affidavit will need the original to file with the court, but make sure you have a copy for your own records before you hand it over. Appear in court if necessary. Some family-court judges will want you to appear in court and testify on the stand to the facts stated in your affidavit. Although they may rely on affidavits for temporary decisions, they might want to see you in person before any permanent order is made.
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Understand why your affidavit is needed and how it will be used. Talk to the attorney who will draft the affidavit. Review the statements written in the affidavit. Provide suggestions for revision if necessary. Sign the affidavit in the presence of a notary. Appear in court if necessary. Understand the purpose of your affidavit. Check for affidavit forms. Create the caption. Title your affidavit. Identify yourself and your relationship to the party in the case. Describe your background. Write about your observations. Format your signature block. Add a notary block. Sign your affidavit in the presence of a notary. Make a copy of your signed affidavit. Appear in court if necessary.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Your-Husband-Happy
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How to Make Your Husband Happy
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If you want to make your husband happy, spice up your sex life to keep the flame alive. You can woo him at spontaneous times during the day or even send flirty text messages to him while he's at work. Although you may be busy, make sure you make time for each other by setting up a date night once a week. You can go to dinner and a movie, set up a picnic, or go see your favorite bands in concert. Besides going on dates, spending time at home can be a great way to keep him happy. Consider working on a DIY home project together or cooking dinner together to enjoy each other's company.
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What’s your husband’s favorite food? Try whipping it up when he's had a hard day or you just want to show your appreciation for him. Little things like this can let him know you're thinking of him without a ton of effort. Flannel pajamas are cute, but what about some lingerie? Or some see-through undies? You can really rev his engine by prepping yourself for the bedroom. Make sure he's in the mood before you change into your outfit—if he's tired or grumpy, he might not fully appreciate the effort. No matter how long you’ve been together, sex is a huge part of romantic relationships. If you're bored of your sex life as it is now, try spicing it up with something fresh. This doesn't necessarily mean you have to run out and purchase a toy for the bedroom—it can be as simple as having sex in the morning when you usually have sex at night, trying sex in a different room than usual, or getting a little playful in the bedroom if you're normally super serious. If you aren't sure what to try, ask him! You two can talk about some fun things to do together as a couple. There are tons of distractions vying for your attention on a day to day basis. However, when your husband has something to say, you should give him your full attention. Turn off the TV, put down your phone, and turn to look at him when he talks. Ask follow-up questions to show that you're really listening, and add to the conversation, if you can. Think about how you'd like to be listened to when you talk, then do the same. You can lead by example for a happier, healthier partnership. It may not sound like much, but greetings can make a huge difference. This will reassure him that you like spending time with him, and it lets him look forward to when you get to see each other again. When you get home from work, greet your husband enthusiastically with a long kiss. When it's time for one of you to leave, give him a hug and tell him you're looking forward to seeing him later. It’s easy to get lost in work, kids, and responsibilities. However, date nights can let you reconnect as a couple and catch up with each other as partners, not as parents or managers of your household. Try to do a date night at least once a week where you can go out to dinner or sit down for a meal just the two of you. Maybe you two can take turns on coming up with date suggestions so you don't feel bogged down with the responsibility. Branching out to try new things is always fun, especially with your husband. Think of a few activities you've never done (either on your own or separately), then make a plan to try some of them out. You could go snowboarding, jet skiing, fishing, wine tasting, or even snorkeling. You might even find a new activity that you two can do together on a regular basis! You can incorporate these new activities into your date nights, too. Men usually don’t get a lot of compliments, so they tend to remember them more. If your husband is looking cute today, did something sweet for you, or you're just feeling plain lucky, give him a quick compliment to let him know you're thinking about him. Even just a quick, “You look nice today babe” is a great confidence-booster. Sometimes the day is extra tough, and your husband might be extra grumpy. To make him feel a little better, take over his chores or responsibilities, if you can. If he normally cooks, take over for the night. If he usually folds the laundry, do it for him so he doesn't have to worry about it. This doesn't have to be an everyday thing, but it can make a hard day a little bit better. Then, whenever you have a bad day, you might be able to ask him to take over your chores for the night. It's a win-win situation! You may notice your husband change and grow the longer you’re together. If you notice your husband getting into a new hobby, career path, or professional field, let him know that you have his back and you'll support him no matter what. You can show an interest in his new hobby or job by asking questions and listening to him intently when he tells you about it. Not having the support of your partner can make trying something new even more difficult, so it's important to lift your husband up as he branches out. If he's trying something new that you're interested in, see if you can join in too. Being a good partner also means taking care of your own needs. Make sure you're eating well, practicing good hygiene, exercising regularly, and keeping a positive attitude. Plus, getting some alone time is beneficial for both of you. Communication is a key factor in any relationship, but it’s ultra important in romantic ones. If you're having issues with your relationship, sit down with your husband and talk. It can be scary to talk about your issues, so try facing the problem head on. For example, “Hey babe, can we talk? I wanted to have a conversation about keeping the house clean throughout the week.” Then, use “I” statements, like, “When the house is dirty, I feel stressed out. Could we work on that together?” Every couple argues from time to time, and it’s healthy to work out your disagreements. However, if every argument leads to a yelling blowout, your problems might not be getting solved very effectively. Try to work through problems with an “us vs. the problem” mentality, not “you vs. your husband.” For example, maybe you feel like you've been doing all the housework. You can tell your husband how you feel by saying, “I think I've been taking on more responsibility around the house. Could we maybe set up a chore chart to divvy up the jobs evenly?”
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What’s your husband’s favorite food? Flannel pajamas are cute, but what about some lingerie? No matter how long you’ve been together, sex is a huge part of romantic relationships. There are tons of distractions vying for your attention on a day to day basis. It may not sound like much, but greetings can make a huge difference. It’s easy to get lost in work, kids, and responsibilities. Branching out to try new things is always fun, especially with your husband. Men usually don’t get a lot of compliments, so they tend to remember them more. Sometimes the day is extra tough, and your husband might be extra grumpy. You may notice your husband change and grow the longer you’re together. Being a good partner also means taking care of your own needs. Communication is a key factor in any relationship, but it’s ultra important in romantic ones. Every couple argues from time to time, and it’s healthy to work out your disagreements.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Look-Good-Without-Makeup
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How to Look Good Without Makeup
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Everyone can look good without makeup, especially if you take time to care for your skin. To get clear skin, wash your face twice a day, then apply a moisturizer and sunscreen that's suited to your skin type. Also, try to exfoliate once a week using a clean washcloth or face wash with exfoliating particles, which will leave your skin looking radiant. In addition to good skin care, shampoo your hair several times a week to prevent it from getting greasy and dirty, and consider trying a new haircut for a fresh look. Furthermore, take good care of your body and overall health by drinking plenty of water and eating lots of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and lean meats.
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Wash your face twice daily. Skincare is a key factor in looking good without makeup. Spend what time and money you would spend applying and purchasing makeup on skin care. First and foremost, find a good facial wash that's suited to your skin type and use it twice a day—once in the morning and once at night. Although it may be tempting to wash your face more than twice a day, this is not advisable. Over-washing can make your skin dry and irritable, causing it to look worse rather than better. Develop a skin regimen for your face. Whatever regimen you choose, stick to it, and always follow through. Repeat the regimen in the morning and at night. Wear moisturizer daily. Every time you wash your face, you should follow it up with an application of facial moisturizer. Pick a quality daily moisturizer (preferably one with SPF in it) and apply it every day after washing. Opt for a slightly richer moisturizer to wear at night. Always choose a moisturizer that's suited to your skin type. If you have sensitive skin, go for something gentle and unscented. If you are prone to pimples, try something light and non-oily. Drier skin types should go for heavier moisturizers with soothing, nourishing ingredients like shea butter or aloe vera. Exfoliate once a week. Exfoliation removes dead skin cells from the surface of the skin, leaving your face looking fresh and radiant. It can really help to give a healthy glow to your skin, which is a bonus when you're aiming to go makeup free. Find a skin wash with special exfoliating particles which you can use at least once a week, but as often as every 2 to 3 days, for best results. Alternatively, you can exfoliate using a clean washcloth soaked in warm water. Rub your face gently with the washcloth, in slow circular motions. This option is good for people with skin that is sensitive to the ingredients in any facial washes. Never scrub your face too hard with the exfoliator or use it too often. This will dry out your skin and leave it feeling irritated, which is the last thing you want. Use toner. Toner is a skin care product that has often been overlooked but can do wonders when it comes to improving the appearance of your skin. Toner restores your skin's natural pH balance, along with many other benefits depending on the type of toner. Look for toners that are alcohol-free. These are less drying on the skin and help to even out skin tone. For instance, toners designed for oily or acne-prone skin can help to remove excess oil and tighten pores, while toners for dry skin can help to soothe irritation and lock in extra moisture. A toner appropriate for your skin type can be used everyday, after cleansing and before moisturizing. Always remove your makeup. Even though this article is a guide on how to look good without makeup, chances are you will still want to wear it from time to time. This is absolutely fine, but just make sure that when you do wear makeup, you remember to take it off completely before bed. Makeup that is left on overnight can clog the pores and lead to pimples. Use a specific makeup removing product, like a foaming cleanser or cream to remove the makeup , rather than your regular face wash. Use a special eye makeup remover to clean off mascara, eyeshadow, and eyeliner. Take care of any pimples. Pimples can be one of the main reasons that people are afraid to go bare-faced in the first place, so if you can get rid of those, you will feel a lot more confident about going makeup free. Make sure to follow a rigorous skincare regimen to avoid pores from becoming blocked and remove any excess bacteria from the surface of the skin. Use products targeted at oily or acne-prone skin and look for moisturizers, sunblocks and makeup that are non-comedogenic (non-pore blocking). Look for over-the-counter spot creams and gels which contain ingredients such as benzoyl peroxide or salicylic acid, both of which are extremely effective for clearing acne. If these measures do not seem to be working, consider seeing a dermatologist who can prescribe a stronger medicated cream or even a round of antibiotics or other oral medications. Wear sunscreen always. You should wear sunscreen every day, even if it's cold, cloudy or snowy, as the UVA/UVB rays can still damage your skin. Sun damage will cause your skin to age prematurely, and in extreme cases can lead to skin cancer and other skin conditions. Aim to use SPF 30 or higher and, if possible, find a sunscreen which doubles up as a moisturizer. This will make sunscreen application easy to remember. Stop touching your face. This is a habit many people are guilty of, which can seriously affect the quality of the skin. Picking at spots, rubbing your forehead, or simply resting your chin on your hand are all things which add oil and bacteria to the skin, causing it to break out and look greasy. Rubbing at your face can also loosen the skin, causing premature wrinkles. Therefore, if you want to improve the appearance of your skin, make an effort to stop unnecessarily touching your face. Take care of your skin from the inside out. Be sure to get at least 8 hours of sleep per night, and to drink plenty of water. Sleep gives your skin a chance to repair and restore itself, leaving you looking fresh and without dark circles beneath your eyes, while drinking water hydrates the skin and purifies it from the inside out, flushing out toxins and fueling the skin's metabolism. The exact amount of water you need varies by your individual needs. In general, men need 15.5 cups (3.7 liters) of fluids daily, while women need 11.5 cups (2.7 liters) of fluids daily. Note that about 20 percent of this daily intake will usually come from food; the other 80 percent comes from water and other drinks. Pluck or wax your eyebrows. Keep your eyebrows looking tidy by removing any stray hairs. Having perfectly shaped brows can do wonders for your face by framing your eyes, therefore making them the center of attention. Well-manicured eyebrows can be very striking and add definition to your features without the need for makeup. If you're nervous about plucking and aren't sure which eyebrow shape would best suit your face, go to a beautician to have them plucked or waxed for the first time. Once that's done, you will be able to maintain your new shape at home with a pair of good, quality tweezers. Always pluck one hair at a time, and pluck from the bottom of the brow rather than the top. Shampoo your hair several times a week. It is important to wash your hair frequently to prevent the hair and skin from becoming very greasy and dirty. However, unless you have extremely oily hair, it is probably unnecessary to wash your hair every single day—every 2 or 3 days is generally fine for most people. This will certainly ensure that your hair doesn't get dried out, but never looks dirty either. Use a shampoo and conditioner suited to your hair type and remember to get a haircut every 3 to 4 months to keep hair in tip-top condition. Instead of fixating on the number of days between washes, look to your hair and scalp for signs. If your hair is scalp is itching or if your hair is visibly weighed down with oil, it's time for a washing. Keep your hair nicely conditioned, using a grape-sized dollop of conditioner applied to your roots and pony-tail area daily. For extra shine, smoothness, and softness, rinse with cool water. Tie your hair in a low ponytail at night to prevent any grease from your hair getting onto your face. Curl your eyelashes. Long, curling eyelashes can make you feel very feminine, but you don't need lashings of mascara to achieve this look. All you need to do is invest in an eyelash curler—a contraption that may look scary, but is actually painless and easy to use. The eyelash curler clamps around your eyelashes and is held in place for 10 to 20 seconds, leaving your lashes curled and your eyes looking wider. You can also make your eyelashes appear thicker and darker by applying a coat of Vaseline to your lashes, then combining them through with an eyelash brush. Keep lips looking smooth. Smooth, full lips are much more attractive than dry, cracked ones, so make sure to look after yours using a combination of exfoliation and moisturization. Exfoliate your lips by gently rubbing a dampened toothbrush against them, then hydrate with your favorite lip balm. Protect lips from extreme weather conditions by wearing a lip balm with an SPF in the sun, or a protective chapstick in the winter. Brighten your eyes. A great trick that can brighten up your eyes and give an overall impression of health and alertness is to use some redness-reducing eye drops. These are readily available at your local pharmacy and are a quick and easy way to improve your totally cute and so far sexy appearance. While this is is an option for occasional use, such as an important interview, do not use eye drops on a regular basis. Doing so can cause your eyes to become more dilated and bloodshot, and the preservatives found in these eye drops can be toxic when used frequently. Put some color in your cheeks. One simple thing that can give the appearance of beauty and health is a little rosy color in the cheeks. This can be achieved through frequent exercise and time spent outdoors in the fresh air. However, a quick fix is to gently pinch or slap the cheeks, giving them a little color. Pay attention to dental hygiene. A white, healthy smile can work wonders for your overall appearance, so make sure you give your teeth the care and attention they deserve. Brush a least twice a day, for a minimum of two minutes, using gentle circular motions. Focus on each tooth individually and don't neglect the hard to reach teeth at the back. It is just as important to floss daily as it is to brush. Flossing removes built-up bacteria, food particles and plaque from between the teeth, thus preventing cavities from forming. Also remember to brush your tongue with the toothbrush and use a mouthwash to prevent bad breath. Smile. Smiling brightens up your face and allows your inner beauty to shine through. It gives the impression of happiness and confidence, while also making you more attractive to others. Smiling more often will help you to look your best, regardless of whether you're wearing makeup or not. Get a healthy tan. A healthy glow can transform your appearance, making your skin appear more radiant and your complexion smoother and more even-toned. If you can achieve a tan naturally, while also wearing protection, that's great. However, tanning beds and other options like these are expensive and occasionally cause skin cancer, so try a spray-on tan (good quality—you don't want to look fake) or for your face, bronzer for an extra little sun-kissed glow. Look for facial moisturizers which will slowly build up a natural-looking tan and leave you looking sun-kissed, no matter the weather. Dress well. Feeling good without makeup will rely on how confident you feel about the rest of your appearance. Every girl knows that a killer outfit can make her feel like she can take on the world, so use the time that you would normally spend on making up your face on planning the perfect outfit. Wear clothes that you feel comfortable in and that fit you perfectly. Don't try too hard to fit in with the latest trends or squeeze yourself into tight fitting clothes. You'll look your best when you feel your best. Style your hair. Make sure that your hair looks clean and neat at all times. It just gives you one less thing to worry about. Try a new haircut, like adding layers or bangs or even taking the leap with a pixie cut. Experiment with different styles: straighten your hair, curl it, put it in a bun or plait—use your imagination! Bad hair days can be covered up with a fashionable scarf or beret—or simply use a little dry shampoo to de-grease hair and add volume. Eat well. Looking and feeling healthy has a lot to do with what you put into your body. Skin, especially, can be affected by a poor diet and healthy skin is essential to looking good without makeup. Try to cut out as many greasy, fatty, sugary foods as possible and load up on fruits, vegetables, whole grains and lean meats instead. Remember to drink plenty of water to flush out your system, keep skin looking healthy and prevent you from feeling bloated. Take a vitamin supplement if you feel you are not getting all of your daily requirements from your diet alone. Vitamins A, C and E are all particularly beneficial for the skin. Be confident. True beauty shines from within, so stop believing that you need your mascara to feel confident and start believing in you. Stand up tall, with your shoulders back and your chin up. Make eye contact with people and smile frequently. Remember that makeup is simply a tool used to emphasize certain features—your natural beauty has been there all along.
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Wash your face twice daily. Wear moisturizer daily. Exfoliate once a week. Use toner. Always remove your makeup. Take care of any pimples. Wear sunscreen always. Stop touching your face. Take care of your skin from the inside out. Pluck or wax your eyebrows. Shampoo your hair several times a week. Curl your eyelashes. Keep lips looking smooth. Brighten your eyes. Put some color in your cheeks. Pay attention to dental hygiene. Smile. Get a healthy tan. Dress well. Style your hair. Eat well. Be confident.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Write-a-History-Essay
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How to Write a History Essay
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To write a history essay, read the essay question carefully and use source materials to research the topic, taking thorough notes as you go. Next, formulate a thesis statement that summarizes your key argument in 1-2 concise sentences and create a structured outline to help you stay on topic. Open with a strong introduction that introduces your thesis, present your argument, and back it up with sourced material. Then, end with a succinct conclusion that restates and summarizes your position!
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Evaluate the essay question. The first thing to do if you have a history essay to write, is to really spend some time evaluating the question you are being asked. No matter how well-written, well-argued, or well-evidenced your essay is, if you don't answer the answer the question you have been asked, you cannot expect to receive a top mark. Think about the specific key words and phrasing used in the question, and if you are uncertain of any of the terms, look them up and define them. The key words will often need to be defined at the start of your essay, and will serve as its boundaries. For example, if the question was "To what extent was the First World War a Total War?", the key terms are "First World War", and "Total War". Do this before you begin conducting your research to ensure that your reading is closely focussed to the question and you don't waste time. Consider what the question is asking you. With a history essay there are a number of different types of question you might be asked, which will require different responses from you. You need to get this clear in the early stages so you can prepare your essay in the best way. Look at your set essay question and ask yourself whether you are being asked to explain, interpret, evaluate, or argue. You might be asked to do any number or all of these different things in the essay, so think about how you can do the following: Explain: provide an explanation of why something happened or didn't happen. Interpret: analyse information within a larger framework to contextualise it. Evaluate: present and support a value-judgement. Argue: take a clear position on a debate and justify it. Try to summarise your key argument. Once you have done some research you will be beginning to formulate your argument, or thesis statement, in your head. It's essential to have a strong argument which you will then build your essay around. So before you start to plan and draft your essay, try to summarise your key argument in one or two sentences. Your thesis statement should clearly address the essay prompt and provide supporting arguments. These supporting arguments will become body paragraphs in your essay, where you'll elaborate and provide concrete evidence. Your argument may change or become more nuanced as your write your essay, but having a clear thesis statement which you can refer back to is very helpful. For example, your summary could be something like "The First World War was a 'total war' because civilian populations were mobilized both in the battlefield and on the home front". Make an essay plan. Once you have evaluated the question, you need to draw up an essay plan. This is a great opportunity to organise your notes and start developing the structure which you will use for your essay. When drawing up the plan you can assess the quality and depth of the evidence you have gathered and consider whether your thesis statement is adequately supported. Pick out some key quotes that make your argument precisely and persuasively. When writing your plan, you should already be thinking about how your essay will flow, and how each point will connect together. Distinguish between primary and secondary sources. A history essay will require a strong argument that is backed up by solid evidence. The two main types of evidence you can draw on are known as primary and secondary sources. Depending on the essay you are writing, you might be expected to include both of these. If you are uncertain about what is expected be sure to ask your teacher well in advance of the essay due date. Primary source material refers to any texts, films, pictures, or any other kind of evidence that was produced in the historical period, or by someone who participated in the events of the period, that you are writing about. Secondary material is the work by historians or other writers analysing events in the past. The body of historical work on a period or event is known as the historiography. It is not unusual to write a literature review or historiographical essay which does not directly draw on primary material. Typically a research essay would need significant primary material. Find your sources. It can be difficult to get going with your research. There may be an enormous number of texts which makes it hard to know where to start, or maybe you are really struggling to find relevant material. In either case, there are some tried and tested ways to find reliable source material for your essay. Start with the core texts in your reading list or course bibliography. Your teacher will have carefully selected these so you should start there. Look in footnotes and bibliographies. When you are reading be sure to pay attention to the footnotes and bibliographies which can guide you to further sources a give you a clear picture of the important texts. Use the library. If you have access to a library at your school or college, be sure to make the most of it. Search online catalogues and speak to librarians. Access online journal databases. If you are in college it is likely that you will have access to academic journals online. These are an excellent and easy to navigate resources. Use online sources with discretion. Try using free scholarly databases, like Google Scholar, which offer quality academic sources, but avoid using the non-trustworthy websites that come up when you simply search your topic online. Avoid using crowd-sourced sites like Wikipedia as sources. However, you can look at the sources cited on a Wikipedia page and use them instead, if they seem credible. Evaluate your secondary sources. It's very important that you critically evaluate your sources. For a strong academic essay you should be using and engaging with scholarly material that is of a demonstrable quality. It's very easy to find information on the internet, or in popular histories, but you should be using academic texts by historians. If you are early on in your studies you might not be sure how to identify scholarly sources, so when you find a text ask yourself the following questions: Who is the author? Is it written by an academic with a position at a University? Search for the author online. Who is the publisher? Is the book published by an established academic press? Look in the cover to check the publisher, if it is published by a University Press that is a good sign. If it's an article, where is published? If you are using an article check that it has been published in an academic journal. If the article is online, what is the URL? Government sources with.gov addresses are good sources, as are.edu sites. Read critically. Once you found some good sources, you need to take good notes and read the texts critically. Try not to let your mind drift along as you read a book or article, instead keep asking questions about what you are reading. Think about what exactly the author is saying, and how well the argument is supported by the evidence. Ask yourself why the author is making this argument. Evaluate the text by placing it into a broader intellectual context. Is it part of a certain tradition in historiography? Is it a response to a particular idea? Consider where there are weaknesses and limitations to the argument. Always keep a critical mindset and try to identify areas where you think the argument is overly stretched or the evidence doesn't match the author's claims. Take thorough notes. When you are taking notes you should be wary of writing incomplete notes or misquoting a text. It's better to write down more in your notes than you think you will need than not have enough and find yourself frantically looking back through a book. Label all your notes with the page numbers and precise bibliographic information on the source. If you have a quote but can't remember where you found it, imagine trying to skip back through everything you have read to find that one line. If you use something and don't reference it fully you risk plagiarism. Start with a strong first sentence. When you begin writing up your essay, a strong introduction can set the scene, create interest in the reader, and provide an outline of what is to come in your essay. Try to begin with one or two sentences which announce the topic of your essay and indicate what you will be writing about. The first sentence or two can give a broader view of a problem which you will then focus in on in the rest of the introduction. For example you could start by saying "In the First World War new technologies and the mass mobilization of populations meant that the war was not fought solely by standing armies". This first sentences introduces the topic of your essay in a broad way which you can start focus to in on more. Outline what you are going to argue. In your introduction you should give a clear outline of how you are going to answer the question, and what your argument is. You should give a brief overview of your main points and the type of evidence that you will use to support them. Try to explicitly answer the question in one sentence, and then expand on how you are going to argue your case. This will lead to an outline of the structure of your essay and your argument. Here you will explain the particular approach you have taken to the essay. For example, if you are using case studies you should explain this and give a brief overview of which case studies you will be using and why. Provide some brief context for your work. Depending on the type of essay you are writing, it will be necessary to provide a brief overview of the main historiographical debates for your topic. It is important to demonstrate that you have a good understanding of what other historians have written about your topic, and be able to situate your own argument within this broader context. Have a clear structure. When you come to write the body of the essay it is important that you have a clear structure to your argument and to your prose. If your essay drifts, loses focus, or becomes a narrative of events then you will find your grade dropping. Your introduction can help guide you if you have given a clear indication of the structure of your essay. Develop your argument. The body of the essay is where your argument is really made and where you will be using evidence directly. Think carefully about how you construct your paragraphs, and think of each paragraph as one micro-sized version of the essay structure. In other words, aim to have a topic sentence introducing each paragraph, followed by the main portion of the paragraph where you explain yourself and draw on the relevant evidence. Try to include a sentence that concludes each paragraph and links it to the next paragraph. When you are organising your essay think of each paragraph as addressing one element of the essay question. Keeping a close focus like this will also help you avoid drifting away from the topic of the essay and will encourage you to write in precise and concise prose. Don't forget to write in the past tense when referring to something that has already happened. Use source material as evidence to back up your thesis. Your evidence will be the heart of your history essay. Introduce your different pieces of evidence by directly quoting them, or by summarising them. Then, analyze them in a way that ties back to and supports your thesis statement. Don't drop a quote from a primary source into your prose without introducing it and discussing it, and try to avoid long quotations. Use only the quotes that best illustrate your point. If you are referring to a secondary source, you can usually summarise in your own words rather than quoting directly. Be sure to fully cite anything you refer to, including if you do not quote it directly. Make your essay flow. The fluency of your text is an important element in the writing a good history essay that can often be overlooked. Think carefully about how you transition from one paragraph to the next and try to link your points together, building your argument as you go. It is easy to end up with an essay that reads as a more or less disconnected series of points, rather than a fully developed and connected argument. Think about the first and last sentence in every paragraph and how they connect to the previous and next paragraph. Try to avoid beginning paragraphs with simple phrases that make your essay appear more like a list. For example, limit your use of words like: "Additionally", "Moreover", "Furthermore". Give an indication of where your essay is going and how you are building on what you have already said. Conclude succinctly. A good conclusion should precisely and succinctly summarise your argument and key points. You need to make sure your conclusion reflects the content of your essay, and refers back to the outline you provided in the introduction. If you read your conclusion and it doesn't directly answer the essay question you need to think again. Briefly outline the implications of your argument and it's significance in relation to the historiography, but avoid grand sweeping statements. A conclusion also provides the opportunity to point to areas beyond the scope of your essay where the research could be developed in the future. Proofread your essay. Once you have written up essay, it is important that you set aside sometime to proofread it thoroughly and work on any revisions. Proofreading is not just about picking out typos and grammar mistakes, but can be a good opportunity to evaluate your work more closely, both for style and content. As you read through, think about the language you use as well as your sentence construction. Try to cut down any overly long sentences or run-on sentences. Instead, try to write clear and accurate prose and avoid unnecessary words. Concentrate on developing a clear, simple and highly readable prose style first before you think about developing your writing further. Reading your essay out load can help you get a clearer picture of awkward phrasing and overly long sentences. Analyse don't describe. One thing to look out for when you read through your history essay is whether or not you have allowed any overly descriptive passages to creep in. Remember a history essay is an analysis and not just a narrative of events. History students can find themselves re-telling a series of events rather than analysing them and the historiographical debates about them. When you read through your essay look at each paragraph and ask yourself, "what point this paragraph is making". You might have produced a nice piece of narrative writing, but if you are not directly answering the question it is not going to help your grade. Check your references and bibliography. Your essay is not complete until you have included and checked all your references together with your bibliography. There are many different style conventions for the formatting of these, so be sure to check with your teacher what style you should be using if you don't already know. Although it might seem like an annoying task, if you don't use the right style it suggests laziness to the person marking your essay. A bibliography will typically have primary sources first, followed by secondary sources. Double and triple check that you have included all the necessary references in the text. If you forgot to include a reference you risk being reported for plagiarism.
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Evaluate the essay question. Consider what the question is asking you. Try to summarise your key argument. Make an essay plan. Distinguish between primary and secondary sources. Find your sources. Evaluate your secondary sources. Read critically. Take thorough notes. Start with a strong first sentence. Outline what you are going to argue. Provide some brief context for your work. Have a clear structure. Develop your argument. Use source material as evidence to back up your thesis. Make your essay flow. Conclude succinctly. Proofread your essay. Analyse don't describe. Check your references and bibliography.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Report-a-Stolen-EBT-Card
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How to Report a Stolen EBT Card
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If your EBT card has been stolen, locate the number for your state's EBT customer service line by looking in your paperwork or online. Call the number and follow the prompts to disable your card immediately. Stay on the line to hear instructions on how to order your new card, as the process varies by state.
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Call your state’s customer service line right away. As soon as you notice that your card is missing, you should call to cancel it. EBT cards are not protected by federal laws against theft, so it's important to protect the funds on your card as quickly as possible. For a list of customer service numbers by state, visit https://fns-prod.azureedge.net/sites/default/files/snap/state-lines.pdf. Follow the prompts on the phone to disable your card. There should be an option to report your card lost or stolen right from the menu. This will disable your card immediately, meaning no one will be able to use it. Stay on the line to hear how to order a new card. The process for ordering a new card varies from state to state and may require you to visit your local office. Determine whether your funds are due to electronic theft. If your card was stolen and the person uses your PIN, your funds will not be replaced. However, if you can obtain proof that the theft occurred without the use of your physical card or your PIN, you may be able to recover your funds, depending on the laws in the state where you live. If funds are missing from your account but you have had possession of your card and/or you did not give your PIN to anyone, you may be a victim of electronic theft. If you are able to access a list of your transactions online, examine them to see if there are any PIN-less purchases. If you are unable to see your transactions online, ask your case worker for a statement listing the transactions on your EBT account. Follow the steps for reporting a stolen card. Call your state's customer service line, report your card stolen, and order a new card. This will stop any further funds from being taken out of your account. File a police report. As with any theft, it's important to file a police report to have a legal record of the incident. This may help you as you attempt to recover your lost funds. When you file your police report, make sure you obtain your file number. This will need to be included in your claim. Bring any documentation to your county EBT office to file a theft report. This should be the same place you originally went to apply for your EBT card. Bring your file number from the police station and any other documentation about the theft, including an account summary if you have one. Your case worker will decide whether or not your funds can be replaced depending on the facts of the case and the regulations in your state.
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Call your state’s customer service line right away. Follow the prompts on the phone to disable your card. Stay on the line to hear how to order a new card. Determine whether your funds are due to electronic theft. Follow the steps for reporting a stolen card. File a police report. Bring any documentation to your county EBT office to file a theft report.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Treat-Mood-Swings
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How to Treat Mood Swings
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The best way to treat mood swings in the moment is to breathe deeply for a count of five, then exhale for a count of five. Continue until you feel calmer. As another option, distract yourself from what's upsetting you by doing something you enjoy, like playing a game. If this doesn't help, try releasing your emotions by talking to a friend. However, if mood swings are interfering with your life, a mental health professional can help you learn more coping techniques for dealing with your feelings.
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Meet with your medical doctor. In order to successfully treat mood swings, you will first need to have a medical evaluation. This is to rule out any possible medical issues that can cause mood swings. If you find out you have a medical issue, such as hypoglycemia (low blood sugar), you can work with your doctor to manage your symptoms. Some other examples of medical issues that can cause mood swings include: thyroid issues, dementia, brain tumors, meningitis, and lung or cardiovascular disease. Talk to a therapist. If you have ruled out any medical issue that is causing your mood swings, you can consider getting therapeutic treatment. You will need to first be evaluated by a psychologist (PhD or PsyD), or therapist (MA, MFT) who can properly treat your mental health condition. There are many mental health issues that can include mood swings such as: ADHD, Depressive and Anxiety Disorders, Oppositional Defiant Disorder, Intermittent Explosive Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder, and Bipolar Disorders I and II. Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy can help to reduce mood swings by focusing on changing maladaptive thinking that increase negative mood states. Speak to a psychiatrist and consider medication. Medications, such as mood stabilizers, can be very helpful in reducing mood swings. One way to seek a psychiatrist is to ask your general doctor or therapist for a referral. Another way to find a psychiatrist is to contact your medical insurance company and ask for covered doctors in your network. Regulate your emotions. Using emotion-regulation skills can reduce mood swings. Regulating your emotions is about learning to change the situation you are in or the emotion you are having. One way to regulate your emotions is to use positive self-talk. For example, if you are feeling very sad you can tell yourself, "It's going to be okay. I'm sad right now but I can get through this." You may find that using positive self-talk can help to reduce whatever negative emotion you are experiencing. Sometimes you can't stop your emotions even if you want to. If you feel emotional, but are in a bad environment to express yourself – change your environment if you can. Perhaps go to your car, the bathroom, or somewhere else that you can be alone. If you give yourself a few minutes to let some emotions out (i.e through being tearful), you may feel better and be able to go back to your day. This is one helpful way you can regulate your emotions, by letting a little bit out at at time. Postpone the emotion. One way to cope with negative emotions is to postpone dealing with your feelings in order to continue being productive or until you can get to a safe place to express them. This is a helpful technique because not all places are appropriate to express certain emotions. For example, you wouldn't necessarily want to let out your anger or tears in a crowded office building with your coworkers present. This could lead to negative occupational consequences. Distracting yourself is a great way to postpone dealing with a particular emotion. A good distraction technique is to focus on your responsibilities or work projects. You can also tell yourself, "I know I have some emotions to deal with, but I need to focus right now." Set a time to stress out or deal with the negative emotion. For example, literally write into your schedule "emotional time" from 6 - 6:30 pm. This way you are planning to healthfully express your emotions at a later moment. Avoid completely detaching from your emotions because this can be dangerous and can lead to lack of empathy and crimes or violence against others. If you feel numb or emotionless, contact a mental health professional for assistance. Manage your anger. Anger management is about dealing with your anger before it blows up and becomes a rage. The anger escalation model is a helpful idea that shows how your anger can slowly increase throughout the day. If you don't notice it and cope with it appropriately, it can end up building until it finally blows up and you end up yelling or doing another aggressive action. Accept that anger is a normal emotion and it is okay to feel sometimes. Many things can make us angry. It's what we do with our anger that makes the difference. Good ways to cope with and release anger are: talking to a friend, hitting a pillow (or another soft object that won't cause harm), screaming into a pillow, exercising, and boxing (safely). Change the way you interpret your emotions. The personal meaning you give your emotions can either increase or decrease your mood swings. This is because your thoughts directly influence your feelings and behaviors. Thus, your beliefs about emotions can directly influence your mood swings. Look at your feelings as information instead of thinking of them as terrible things that you need to avoid. Think, "I am feeling a strong emotion. I can try to understand what it means and how I can cope with it." Use your wise mind by analyzing and questioning your thoughts and emotions logically. Ask yourself questions such as: What am I thinking and feeling? What are the words that my mind is saying? Are the thoughts descriptions or evaluations? Accurate or inaccurate? Helpful or unhelpful? Is this thought fact or opinion? Where is my focus of attention? What can I do to cope? Give up control and accept your emotions. Ironically, the more you try to control or fix your emotions, the more mood swings you might have. Sometimes you may want to control your emotions because they are painful and difficult to deal with. Counterproductive attempts at control are classified as either ascent behaviors (increasing activation), or descent behaviors (decreasing activation). Tolerate distress. Sometimes you can't reduce your emotions effectively and you may want to just avoid them. However, Avoiding feeling a powerful emotion or thinking a thought can lead to it gaining power and increasing distress over time. When you have already tried to reduce your emotion severity, but the emotion is just too strong, you can use distress tolerance skills. This means learning to deal with distressing and unpleasant emotions such as: anger, sadness, anxiety, and nervousness. One way to increase your distress tolerance is to radically accept your current feeling and situation. This means not trying to judge it or change it, just accepting it the way it is. You can say to yourself, “I accept how I feel. It's not pleasant but it is what it is. I can get through it.” Since you are having difficulty changing the emotion itself, try improving the current situation in some way. You can do this by using any number of coping skills (which will be further explained) such as grounding exercises, relaxation techniques, creating a mood diary and avoiding coping in ways that will make the situation worse in the long-run (i.e using drugs or alcohol). Allow yourself to express your emotions in a healthy way. Great ways to express your feelings are: writing creatively, talking to a friend, expressing yourself through art or dance, and crying. Distract yourself. Distraction, or using grounding exercises, is about momentarily doing or thinking about something else in order to take power away from the emotion and to distance yourself from it. Divergent thinking, or a grounding exercise, is a way to distract yourself and increase positive mood. For example, a divergent thinking task would be to name as many uses for a household item, such as a cup, that you can think of for 1 minute. Try fun distraction techniques such as: watching a movie, playing a game, reading a book, playing an instrument, painting, drawing, writing a story, cooking, or talking to a friend. Try other grounding exercises such as: naming all of the objects in the room, running your hands under cold or warm water, and thinking of all of the colors you can identify, counting backwards from 100 in your head, thinking of the names of state capitals. Make sure the activity you choose has nothing to do with your current emotion. For example, if you are sad, don't watch a sad movie in order to distract yourself. This may actually lead you to feeling worse. Try anything logical and unemotional that will take your mind off the situation. Use relaxation techniques. Relaxation techniques can help you calm down when you are feeling anxious, angry, or extremely sad. One relaxation technique is deep breathing. Place yourself in a comfortable position and practicing breathing deeply in through your nose and out through your mouth. Focus deeply on your breathing and how it feels throughout your body to inhale and exhale. Do this for at least 5 minutes. Think logically. This is a component of Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), a type of treatment that focuses on emotional regulation and distress tolerance. It focuses on the idea that our minds are made up of a logical and an emotional piece. Individuals who have mood swings may be stuck more on the emotional mind, but need to use a combination of logic and emotions in order achieve a wise mind. Think logically about the situation. What happened? Who was involved? Analyze your own emotions rationally. Question your emotional reaction; is it exaggerated or out or proportion to the situation? Is it possible you are reacting to something from the past (past pain or relationship issues)? Ask yourself, is this situation going to still matter to me in 5 years? How much does it actually affect your life? Monitor your mood. Keeping a mood diary may help you understand your mood swings better so that you can learn to anticipate and cope with changes in emotion. There are different levels of mood swings. A moderate mood swing may include many mood changes throughout the day, can vary from elevated mood to anger to sadness within a few hours, and changes in mood are typically out of proportion to circumstances and cause impairment in functioning. Severe mood swings are rapid mood swings nearly all of the time, with mood intensity greatly out of proportion to the circumstances. Extreme mood swings would be constant, explosive variability in mood, several mood changes occurring within minutes, with difficulty identifying a particular mood, and changes in mood are radically out of proportion to circumstances. Create a mood diary by listing: Day and time of the mood swing. Emotion and intensity of mood (from 0% to 100% intense). What was happening at the time (who were you with and where were you)? What thoughts you had. What you were doing right before the mood swing. What you did after the mood swing (how you dealt with it or coped). Use your mood diary to identify and cope with triggers such as stress and season changes. Avoid negative coping strategies. It is important to learn how to cope healthfully with mood swings and also to avoid bad ways of coping which can cause increased mood swings and other consequences. Some examples of negative coping strategies are: rumination, self-harm, harm against others, destruction of property, and using drugs or alcohol. For example, some people may resort to aggression in order to cope with negative emotional states and to feel better. However, this can cause social and legal ramifications such as loss of friends and arrest. Avoid using drugs and alcohol. These substances may increase your mood swings because they cause chemical changes in your brain and can de-regulate you. If you have the desire to drink or use drugs, try a positive coping resource first such as taking a walk, talking to a friend, or exercising. If you have a problem with drugs and alcohol, seek professional assistance. Exercise regularly. Physical activity can help increase positive mood (by releasing endorphins) and prevent mood diagnoses such as anxiety and depressive disorders. Focus on exercising at least every other day for at least 30 minutes. Or, when you feel a mood swing coming on get out and do something physical. Traditional exercises such as walking, running, and lifting weights are useful in creating a physical activity schedule. You can even do exercises at home. Try sweeping, vacuuming or other types of cleaning. Or, put on a YouTube exercise video for free! Exercise doesn't have to be boring. Try fun physical activities like: hiking, canoeing, fishing, kayaking, gardening, jumping rope, dancing, bowling, shooting pool, kickboxing, doing yoga, and playing sports. Get enough rest. Sleep duration and quality have effects on your mood and overall health. Get less sleep and you might become more anxious or agitated, which can be a trigger to a mood swing. Sleep at least 8 hours per night. Set a bedtime and wake-time and stick to them even on weekends. Stop watching television and using your phone at least 30 minutes before bedtime. Watch your diet. What goes in your body dictates how you will feel physically. Having a healthy diet can produce stability in both body and mind. Make sure you get enough vitamins and minerals in your diet. Ditch the junk food. It doesn't help to cope by overeating or eating unhealthy foods. Don't constantly miss meals. Eat at least 3 solid meals per day. Plan ahead so that you aren't in a situation where you are left without any food during lunchtime. Have snacks with you so that you avoid feeling cranky due to hunger. When you start to experience a drop in energy or start to feel moody, eat a snack. Some good options are: yogurt, fruits, nuts (as long as you aren't allergic), cheese, protein bars, granola bars, and vegetables. Avoid coffee and soda if you can. Soda and coffee will raise your blood sugar levels rapidly however shortly after these levels drop very low thus effecting your mood swings again. If you drink 4 cups of coffee a day and or 4 sodas a day cut the amount in half for a week. If everything is going well, then reduce in half again for another week. Continue on with this program until you are not consuming any coffee or soda. If you need extra help, consult a nutritionist or a Physician who is well educated in nutrition, food and supplementation.
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Meet with your medical doctor. Talk to a therapist. Speak to a psychiatrist and consider medication. Regulate your emotions. Postpone the emotion. Manage your anger. Change the way you interpret your emotions. Give up control and accept your emotions. Tolerate distress. Distract yourself. Use relaxation techniques. Think logically. Monitor your mood. Avoid negative coping strategies. Exercise regularly. Get enough rest. Watch your diet.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Care-for-an-Eastern-Box-Turtle
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How to Care for an Eastern Box Turtle
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To care for an eastern box turtle, keep it in an outdoor enclosure if you live in a climate that's regularly over 60 degrees Fahrenheit, or keep it in an indoor glass tank that holds at least 20 gallons if it's too cold for an outdoor habitat. Either way, make one half of the enclosure warm using the sun or a heat lamp, and keep the other half cool using shade. To feed your box turtle, give it a mix of animal protein and plants once a day, as well as occasional fruits and berries.
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Find a reputable turtle shelter or seller. Turtles taken from the wild, or ones purchased from an unreputable pet store, might be underfed, ill, or not adjusted to captivity. Look online to find a reputable and well-reviewed turtle seller or shelter that you can purchase an Eastern box turtle from. In some areas, taking a turtle from the wild may be illegal. A turtle purchased from a reputable seller will always be legal and likely much healthier than one taken from the wild. If you can't find an Eastern box turtle seller nearby, you could also look for a different species of box turtle more common and easily available in your area. Check the turtle over for signs of illness or injury. Once you've found a turtle you like the look of, pick it up in your hand. It should feel heavy as you hold it and be free of any scratches, nicks, or tears in its skin. Check that its eyes are bright and clear to make sure it is healthy. Any signs of illness or sickness may mean that the turtle is ill and won't live for very long once you take it home. While this is sad, it's better to choose a turtle that is healthy so that you can care for them for a long time. If many of the turtles you check look unhealthy or feel quite light, it may be a sign that the pet store or seller isn't taking good care of their turtles. Look elsewhere for a seller that takes better care of their turtles. Ask if you can feed the turtle. Before you purchase your new turtle, ask the seller if you can try feeding it a little lettuce or some insects. If they don't let you, or if your turtle doesn't eat when offered food, it may be a sign that it hasn't been fed properly or won't accept food in captivity. Make sure your turtle will eat before you take it home. If you can't feed your turtle at the pet store, it likely won't eat and will starve once you take it home. Choose an outdoor enclosure if you live somewhere warm. Outdoor enclosures tend to provide your turtle with more space and will best mirror its natural habitat. If you live somewhere with a large yard that's regularly above 60 °F (16 °C), enclose a 4 by 4 ft (120 by 120 cm) area with a fence that's at least 12 inches (30 cm) high. If you don't want to put up a fence , you could also use cinder blocks or bricks to make a small enclosure. Stack them steadily around the perimeter of your chosen space to keep the turtle inside. As Eastern box turtles love burrowing, you may need to bury some bricks underneath the fence to prevent your turtle from burrowing out of its enclosure. Dig a trench around the perimeter that can be filled with a single layer of bricks, before covering them with dirt and erecting the fence above the bricks. Cover your enclosure with wire mesh to prevent dogs, cats, or other wild predators such as raccoons from getting in and hurting your turtle. Go with an indoor enclosure for better temperature regulation. If you don't have a lot of space outdoors, or won't be able to ensure a temperature above 60 °F (16 °C), set up an enclosure indoors. Purchase a 20 US gal (76 L) glass tank or a large plastic container and find somewhere to keep it in your home. If you choose a glass tank, you should cover the sides with paper or something similar to prevent the turtle from seeing out. Your turtle won't understand that the glass is keeping it in and will frequently try to escape, causing it stress. The tank or container you choose should have high walls, but won't need a lid to keep the turtle inside. As long as the walls of the enclosure are around 12 inches (30 cm) high, your turtle will be safe. Your tank should be at least 36 by 12 inches (91 by 30 cm) in size to keep your turtle happy. Use heat lamps or natural sunlight to warm half of the enclosure. As they are cold-blooded, turtles need to spend time basking in warm light in order to regulate their body temperature. Place a heat lamp over one end of your indoor enclosure, or use the natural sunlight in an outdoor enclosure to keep one side of the tank around 80 °F (27 °C). If it's warm enough to keep your turtle in an outdoor enclosure, the sunlight should be enough to keep your turtle warm as well. Cool the other half of the enclosure with shade. In order to prevent your turtle from overheating, you should give them a section away from direct heat where they can cool down. Plant some small trees or other plants over one half of your outdoor enclosure to protect it from the sun, or position your heat lamp so it only reaches half of your indoor enclosure. The cooler section of the enclosure should be around 70 °F (21 °C). Roughly half of the enclosure should be in direct sunlight or touched by a heat lamp, with the other half cooler or in shade. This will create a gradient of temperatures, so your turtle can always find somewhere comfortable to sit. Install thermometers on each end of the enclosure to make sure the temperatures are in the right ranges. Give your turtle something to burrow into. Your turtle will burrow into the ground to help regulate its temperature or to get a little privacy. Make it easier for your turtle to burrow by putting down a layer of wood chips or dry leaves at least 2 inches (5.1 cm) deep at the base of the enclosure that it can dig into to stay cool. In a larger outdoor enclosure, you can set up a smaller area designed for burrowing rather than covering the whole enclosure in a substrate material. Cover around half of the shaded area of your enclosure with dry leaves or something similar. Don't use gravel, sand, potting soil, or anything else particularly gritty as a substrate. Your turtle may end up ingesting it and become ill as a result. Fill a large shallow dish with clean water. Eastern box turtles need water both for drinking and for soaking in. Place a large saucer or a dish no more than 1 inch (2.5 cm) deep in your turtle's enclosure and fill it with filtered, bottled, or treated water free from chlorine. Keep the water away from a direct source of heat to keep it fresh and cool. Chlorine, which is found in most tap water, can be harmful to turtles. Use filtered or bottled water, or treat your tap water with a water conditioner to neutralize the chlorine. Water conditioners should be available from your local pet store. Decorate the enclosure with logs, rocks, or plants. Adding some decorations to the enclosure will make your turtle feel more at home and give it some more places to be alone. Add 1 or 2 large hollow logs and some plants to give your turtle a place to hide. Add a large, flat rock in the warmer part of the enclosure to give your turtle somewhere to bask in the heat. Make sure any decorations you add can sit sturdily on the ground and won't fall over if nudged. Only use flat rocks in the enclosure. Your turtle will climb on the rocks no matter what, so rocks that are too tall may cause your turtle to fall and hurt itself. Feed your turtle once each day. As quite small creatures, Eastern box turtles don't need to eat a lot or even that often. Choose a time that you can commit to each day to feed until it stops eating. After a week or so, you should have a good idea of how much your turtle will eat in a single feeding. You can feed your turtle by dropping some food in front of it in the enclosure. Alternately, you can hold the turtle in one hand and feed it with the other. Give it a mix of protein and plants. Most vets recommend that you feed your box turtle a diet of 60% animal protein and 40% plant matter. Feed your turtle a mix of animal protein, in the form of crickets, worms, and grubs, and plant matter such as lettuce or other leafy greens. Feeder insects for your turtle should be available at your local pet store. Alternately, you can raise your own crickets for feeding. Some turtles will enjoy being fed, where others will prefer having to hunt for their food. Try both methods of feeding to see which one your turtle enjoys more. Once you know how much your turtle eats, you can try and tailor each meal to give it the right amounts of both animal protein and plant matter. Before then, make 60% of their meals insects and 40% lettuce to keep their diet balanced. Treat your turtle with fruits and berries. Turtles love sweet fruits and strawberries, but shouldn't eat them frequently due to the high levels of sugar. Treat your turtle with a strawberry or something similar once every week or two to keep it happy. It might take a little experimentation to find a treat that your turtle enjoys. Try different types of berries, tomatoes, or any other sweeter fruits and vegetables that you think your turtle may like until you find one they love. Supplement their diet with calcium. While turtles will get some calcium from their diet, its diet will need to be supplemented in order to keep its shell strong and healthy. Purchase a calcium supplement that doesn't contain phosphorous or vitamin D3, and sprinkle a small pinch over your turtle's food 2 to 3 times each week. A supplement designed specifically for turtles should be available from your local pet store. It will likely contain mostly calcium but may have other vitamins or minerals that will help your turtle stay healthy. Mist the enclosure 2 to 3 times each day. Eastern box turtles will thrive in very humid environments, with a humidity of around 65% being most comfortable. Fill a spray bottle with filtered, bottled, or treated water and use it to mist your turtle's enclosure 2 to 3 times each day to keep it very humid. If you want to know exactly how humid the enclosure is, purchase a hydrometer from your local pet store and install it in the tank. Only ever use filtered, bottled, or treated water that is free from chlorine to mist the enclosure. Clean and replace the water each day. As your turtle spends a lot of time in its water, it will likely defecate in the water dish and dirty it often. Dispose of the dirty water, scrub the water dish down, and replace the water with fresh filtered, bottled, or treated water each day to make sure your turtle always has clean water. Clean the water dish out using only water and a brush. Any soap may leave a residue in the dish that could harm your turtle or make it unhappy. If you keep multiple turtles, you may need to change the water more frequently in order to make sure it stays clean. Remove excrement from the enclosure daily. While you don't need to clean out the entire enclosure each day, you should perform a small spot clean every day to get rid of any waste in the enclosure. Use a small scoop to lift up and throw away any excrement sitting in the enclosure each morning. Keeping the enclosure clean will decrease the chances of your turtle getting sick, as well as keeping it happier. If you notice your turtle's excrement becoming a white or grey color, it may be a sign that it is ill. Take it to a vet as soon as possible to make sure it is OK. Give the whole tank a good clean at least once a month. Remove all of the substrate material you have in the enclosure before taking all of the decorations out and washing them down with water. Let the decorations dry before returning them to the enclosure with a new layer of a substrate. Choose a day each month that you can set aside to clean your turtle's enclosure. This will ensure that you clean the enclosure at least each month, and will make it harder to miss a cleaning. Put the decorations back in the same spot to prevent confusing your turtle. You should be cleaning the entire enclosure once each month at a minimum. To keep your turtle extra happy, clean the enclosure out every 2 to 3 weeks. Be prepared for your turtle to hibernate. If you live in a cold area or expose your turtle to cold weather, it may want to hibernate for 4 to 6 months of colder weather. Make sure your turtle is kept safe and warm during this period, and that it has plenty of leaves or substrate to burrow under. Take your turtle to a vet before it begins to hibernate to ensure that it's healthy. If it's not, your vet may encourage you to keep the turtle inside and in a temperature-regulated area to keep it from hibernating. Observe your turtle for signs of illness. There are many different health issues that could afflict your pet turtle, all of which are difficult to detect and treat on your own. If your turtle stops eating, has swollen eyelids, gets red spots or dry skin, or otherwise seems to be acting differently, take it a vet to ensure it isn't ill. As turtles are often considered exotic animals, you may need to find a new vet that specializes in turtle care in order to tell if your turtle is sick or not. Look online to find a vet with experience treating exotic animals or turtles. It may also help to take your turtle for a checkup once each year, to make sure that your turtle is happy and healthy.
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Find a reputable turtle shelter or seller. Check the turtle over for signs of illness or injury. Ask if you can feed the turtle. Choose an outdoor enclosure if you live somewhere warm. Go with an indoor enclosure for better temperature regulation. Use heat lamps or natural sunlight to warm half of the enclosure. Cool the other half of the enclosure with shade. Give your turtle something to burrow into. Fill a large shallow dish with clean water. Decorate the enclosure with logs, rocks, or plants. Feed your turtle once each day. Give it a mix of protein and plants. Treat your turtle with fruits and berries. Supplement their diet with calcium. Mist the enclosure 2 to 3 times each day. Clean and replace the water each day. Remove excrement from the enclosure daily. Give the whole tank a good clean at least once a month. Be prepared for your turtle to hibernate. Observe your turtle for signs of illness.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Write-a-Eulogy-For-Mother
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How to Write a Eulogy For Mother
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Writing a eulogy for your mother is an emotionally difficult process, but it can also be a chance to celebrate her life in your own words. Start by introducing yourself with something like “Hello everyone, my name is Sam and I'm Mary's son. I am honored to be sharing her eulogy with you today.” Then, talk about things like your favorite memories, facts about her life, or the lessons she taught you. Finally, close the eulogy with something like “Thank you for coming to honor my mother today. I know she would be so grateful."
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Think about the goal of the eulogy. When you sit down to create an outline for your eulogy, consider your goals before writing anything down. First keep in mind the difference among a eulogy, obituary, and elegy. A eulogy is speech usually given during the visitation or wake that pays your mother tribute. An obituary is a short announcement of your mother's passing that appears in the newspaper, while an elegy is a poem or song of lament. A eulogy is a speech containing a tribute to your mother's life, which may contain a brief story of your mother's life. Make your eulogy tell your own story about your mother rather than cater to what everyone else is telling you to write. Brainstorm memories and facts. After you have determined the goal of your eulogy, start collecting material for it. Make a list of everything you can think of to use in the eulogy—funny anecdotes, facts about her life, favorite memories you shared, lessons she taught you, and so on. Questions you could ask yourself to help you brainstorm include, What one quality of my mother do I remember most? Try asking yourself, What is something my mother always used to do to comfort me? Once you have your list, whittle it down to stories and memories that achieve the goal you have set for the eulogy. Interview your close relatives. Ask your relatives if they have any stories they want to contribute to the eulogy. More than likely, you will get quite a few anecdotes to add to your brainstorm list. Ask them questions like, What is your favorite memory of my mother? Another question could be, What life lessons did my mother teach you? Organize the body in the outline. In the body, organize your anecdotes in a specific way, such as chronologically or in logical categories. Doing this will give your eulogy focus so that others can follow what you are saying. For example, instead of in order of occurrence, you could group your anecdotes by type: personal memories, others' memories, her favorite things, her influence on your life, her influence on others' lives, and concluding with how much she will be missed before giving the conclusion. You might also use poems or songs performed by other family members for the body. Have an introduction and conclusion. The introduction should open with a brief greeting to the crowd and an introduction of yourself, including your relationship to your mother. The conclusion should repeat the main theme of your eulogy. For example, you could open with, "Hello everyone, my name is Sam and I am Mary's son. I am honored to be sharing her eulogy with you today." You could end with, "Thank you for coming to honor my mother today. I know she would be so grateful." Write for reading out loud. Consider that you will likely read your eulogy out loud at the visitation or wake for your mother. Use diction and vocabulary appropriate for this, such as thanking others for coming. Also makes notes indicating where pauses should occur. This means avoiding a formal tone. Focus on writing the way you speak. Simply reading a script to an audience can feel dry and ultra-formal, an effect you may want to avoid. Try writing your eulogy in a list format, leaving room for improvisation so that you are not constantly looking down at the paper. Begin with the body of the eulogy. Most pieces of writing have a beginning, middle, and end. For a eulogy, you need an intro, body, and conclusion. In order to produce an engaging introduction, start writing the body, then move to the conclusion before returning to write the intro. Writing in this order helps you figure out what you are going to say so that the introduction is more clear. Keep in mind that you will likely write several revisions before coming up with a copy that you are happy with. Ask relatives and friends to read over or listen to you read your rough drafts to help make the eulogy stronger. Choose a tone for the eulogy. The tone for a eulogy does not have to be sad, although it certainly can be. Ask yourself some questions to determine what the mood and tone of your eulogy should be. For instance, how would your mother want you to feel? How do you want others to feel after hearing or reading your eulogy? Consider the personality of your mother. Was she vibrant and energetic? Warm and loving? Think about making the tone of your eulogy match your mother's personality. Understand what not to include. Knowing what a eulogy is can help you decide what things to leave out. For starters, think of a eulogy as a gift to your mother. Your gift will assist everyone close to her in processing the grief they feel. That being said, you can choose to filter out things that don't fit this mold. You will probably want to exclude negative things. If you were angry with her when she passed, forgiving her before penning the eulogy can help you focus on positive aspects. Stay away from trivial facts that do not contribute to the main theme of your eulogy, such as her daily habits. Avoid striving for perfection. Keep in mind that this eulogy does not need to be perfect in any way. View it as a way to honor your mother, and the funeral guests will appreciate it for this gesture. Take pressure off yourself to perform perfectly with this eulogy, which will help you speak from the heart. If you tend to be a perfectionist, try to lower your expectations by imagining how you would expect a sibling to do this, or another relative. Treat yourself as you would them (i.e., have compassion for mistakes). Share the legacy you believe she left. In the body of your eulogy, be sure to include the legacy you believe your mother is leaving behind. A legacy is what you hope she will be remembered for and what she would have been most proud for people to remember about her. Think about if your mother ever told you what she wanted to be remembered for, or ask others if she talked to them about this. If she never told anyone what she wished to be remembered for, think about the main theme of her life. What did she spend the most time doing? What did she sacrifice the most for? Is there anyone who is grateful to her for a service she performed? For example, your mother's favorite sayings or life philosophy, or what she said was her proudest achievement. Detail some of her achievements. Talk about some of the greatest things your mother achieved. This does not have to be something grandiose like designing a famous building or doing something in the public eye. Perhaps you and your siblings are well-adjusted individuals, and that was a great achievement. Achievements can be both tangible and intangible. Bring in touching anecdotes. Anecdotes can be both touching and humorous. In fact, a mix of both creates a balance to your eulogy that relieves some of the heavy burden of grief. Be sure to include both on your brainstorm list. Get ideas from your friends and relatives.
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Think about the goal of the eulogy. Brainstorm memories and facts. Interview your close relatives. Organize the body in the outline. Have an introduction and conclusion. Write for reading out loud. Begin with the body of the eulogy. Choose a tone for the eulogy. Understand what not to include. Avoid striving for perfection. Share the legacy you believe she left. Detail some of her achievements. Bring in touching anecdotes.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Replace-Ball-Joints
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How to Replace Ball Joints
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To replace ball joints, remove the wheel and soak all the bolts in WD-40 or another metal cleaner to make the bolts easier to remove. Then, unbolt the control arm and slide out the ball joint. If your vehicle uses pressed-in ball joints, you'll need to remove the lower control arm and take the assembly to a mechanic with a hydraulic press to swap the joints out. Slide the new joint into place and pump it full of grease.
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Prep the work area. Park on a flat surface and block both rear wheels, front and back. Jack both front wheels off the ground and support the vehicle with jack stands. Chock the back tires to make sure nothing will move anywhere while you're working. Inspect the ball joints to make sure they need to be replaced. Figure out if your vehicle's got a strut-style suspension or a control arm, then check the ball joint by either jacking up the control arm near the ball joint to check for wheel play, or by jacking up the car and using a pry-bar to check for wheel play in a strut-style suspension. There should be no space between the ball joint and the point of contact. If you see any space, or the wheel moves considerably, the joint needs to be replaced. Purchase the correct replacement ball joint assembly for your vehicle. Go to the auto parts store and get a replacement part appropriate for your make and model. All you've got to know is the type of vehicle and you should be able to use the guidebook in the aisle, or ask for help and they'll be able to direct you. Typically, a solid ball joint replacement will run about $80 or $90 new. Compared to the several hundred to a thousand dollars they'll charge at the shop, this can be a very cost-effective DIY project. Remove the wheel and access the ball joint. Depending on the steering assembly, you may also have to move aside the brakes. If so, use a wire to hang the brakes and don't dangle them by the brake lines. You'll also need to loosen the mounts holding the control arm or sway bar in place to give you more room to move suspension parts away. If it's at all possible, try to work around the brake rotor, caliper, and the line without removing the assembly. If you do, you'll have to bleed the brakes , making this a much bigger job. Soak all the bolts with WD-40 or PB Blaster. The ball joints can be some of the gunkiest components on the entire undercarriage, quite caked with dirt and other road grit, and it can be a bear trying to get the ball joint loose from that build-up. To make it easier on yourself, spray some metal cleaner on all the bolts to try to get them to slip off somewhat more easily. Pull the cotter pin and loosen the large castellated nut. The top should look like a crown, or castle, at the bottom. Leave the castellated nut in place, just a few turns in to keep it in a safe place. If you're working on a McPherson strut suspension remove the “pinch bolt” that clamps the ball joint stud. Pop loose the ball joint. The goal is to try to guide it through the hole in the upper half of the steering knuckle. It can be somewhat difficult because of the extremely tight fit which helps hold the ball joint in place and the road grime built up around the suspension, so you will most likely need to use a hammer and a special tool called a “pickle fork” or tie rod separator to get enough leverage to maneuver. With the wrench, remove the largest nut from the joint, replace with the new nut, and then drive the pickle fork between the control arm and the steering knuckle. You'll probably have to hammer it, and don't be afraid to get rough.This will probably ruin the gasket around the ball joint, so make sure you've got one to replace it. By putting the castellated nut on before hammering away, you'll avoid having the ball joint pop completely out and drop onto the floor, or more likely your foot. Remove the allen bolts and slide the control arm free. Loosen bolts or drill out rivets holding the ball joint in place, and slide out the ball joint. Sometimes, it's helpful to heat particularly corroded components with a torch to try to loosen them. Be careful if you try this. If your auto's suspension uses pressed-in ball joints, you'll need to remove the lower control arm and take the assembly to a mechanic with a hydraulic press, who can press the old ball joint out and the new ball joint in. Guide the new joint through the knuckle hole. Slide the new rubber boot over the ball joint's stud and guide the new ball joint back up through the steering knuckle hole, where it came from. Bolt the joint into place using the hardware included. It's not usually advisable to re-use old bolts or rubber boots that covered the old ball joint, which will probably be too corroded if the ball joint wore out. Torque the bolts to the proper specifications. Refer to the manufacturer's service manual and use a torque wrench to tighten the bolts and castellated nut to specified levels; reinstall the pinch bolt if working on a McPherson strut. Generally, the specs will be about 44 pounds per foot on the screws and around 80 for other bolts. Always defer to the owner's manual for accurate numbers, however. Screw in the new grease fitting and pump grease into the assembly. If you removed the brake or wheel, reattach them and lower the vehicle back down to test out the action. Bleed the brakes, if necessary. It's a good opportunity to do any other repairs you might need to do with the brakes, since you've got them off. Replacing a ball joint can affect alignment. If a ball joint is worn enough, and the vehicle was previously aligned, it might be wise have the vehicle realigned.
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Prep the work area. Inspect the ball joints to make sure they need to be replaced. Purchase the correct replacement ball joint assembly for your vehicle. Remove the wheel and access the ball joint. Soak all the bolts with WD-40 or PB Blaster. Pull the cotter pin and loosen the large castellated nut. Pop loose the ball joint. Remove the allen bolts and slide the control arm free. Guide the new joint through the knuckle hole. Bolt the joint into place using the hardware included. Torque the bolts to the proper specifications. Screw in the new grease fitting and pump grease into the assembly.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Spell-Cancelled
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How to Spell Cancelled
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When you're spelling the word cancelled, use one L if you're writing in American English or in AP style. Use two Ls if you're writing in British, Australian, or Canadian English.
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Use "canceled" in American English. Most professional and personal literature produced within the United States only spells the word with one l : canceled. Note that Associated Press (AP) style guidelines formally recommend the American English spelling, so if you're wondering how to spell the word in an academic essay for a U.S. school or university, or wishing to use it in a professional article, it's best to use "canceled." Use "cancelled" in British English. If you're reading something from the United Kingdom, you'll probably see that the writer doubled the l : cancelled. Similarly, other forms of English that adhere more closely to the original British English, like Australian English and Canadian English, also use this version of the word. Don't worry too much. While each version of English has its own preference, you'll likely see both "canceled" and "cancelled" used interchangeably throughout the English-speaking world. It's a good idea to memorize the difference for academic and professional writing purposes, but for everyday usage, either spelling works. The swap is especially common in the United States. While "cancelled" is the preferred spelling by a wide margin in British English, "canceled" beats out "cancelled" by a much smaller margin in American English. In fact, there is roughly one double-L spelling for every five single-L spellings when analyzing literature written within the United States. Outside of the United States, however, the single-L spelling rarely occurs. Learn about the origin of the change. When the American lexicographer Noah Webster created his 1898 dictionary, he dropped the double-L on "cancelled" and several other terms. That was likely when American English first adopted "canceled" as the proper form. When Webster made his change to “canceled,” he also dropped letters from various other British spellings. That's why you'll see words like "color" and "humor" written with only an "o" in American English, even though they're written as "colour" and "humour" in British English. That being said, most American literature still used the double-L "cancelled" for several decades. The literary switch to "canceled" began taking hold in the 1940s and only gained dominance in the 1980s. Follow the same guideline for "cancelling. " Like "cancelled," "cancelling" should be spelled with a double-L when using British English and a single-L when using American English. You should apply the same rule for canceller/canceler and cancellable/cancelable. Note, however, that this rule does not apply to cancellation, which is always spelled with the double-L, or to cancel and cancels, which are always spelled with only a single-L. Apply the same principle to similar words. As a general rule, this principle applies to any word with multiple syllables when that word ends with L. This means that, when using British English, you should double the ending L of such words any time you add suffixes like -ed, -ing, -ist, -ize, and -ise. In most instances, however, you would keep the single-L spelling for American English. Examples of other words following this rule include: level ( leveled/levelled ), quarrel ( quarreled/quarrelled ), and travel ( traveled/travelled ). Understand when American English doubles the L. Within American English, you should double the ending L of a multiple syllable word if the stress does not fall on the first syllable. For example: control ( controlled ), patrol ( patrolled ), and annul ( annulled ) Note that British English maintains the double-L spelling for these words, as well. Know when British English drops one L. If the second-to-last syllable of a multiple syllable word ends with more than one L , you should not double the final L even if using British English. The only relevant example is the word "parallel" ( paralleled ). American English also refrains from adding another L to the end of this term.
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Use "canceled" in American English. Use "cancelled" in British English. Don't worry too much. Learn about the origin of the change. Follow the same guideline for "cancelling. Apply the same principle to similar words. Understand when American English doubles the L. Know when British English drops one L.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Plant-Wheat
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How to Plant Wheat
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To plant wheat, start by tilling your soil to a depth of 6 inches with a rake, shovel or rototiller. If the soil looks dry, spread a layer of compost over it. Then, scatter your seeds evenly so that they are roughly 1 square inch apart. Rake the seeds gently so they go into the soil, which prevents them from being eaten by birds. After planting, you should water the entire area and repeat the process if you have a dry spell of over a week.
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Determine how much space you have. About 1,000 square feet will yield one bushel, or 60 lbs (30 kg), of grain. That's about the space of a backyard. You'll need to figure out how much wheat you want to grow and how much space it will take. Determine the type of wheat you'll plant. Winter wheat is planted in the fall and harvested in early spring. It also tends to be the preferred variety since it is more nutritious and competes with fewer weeds in the spring. Spring wheat is planted in the spring and harvested in the fall. It is the more common variety in areas that have colder winters. Choose your planting location. Your wheat should get plenty of sun while it grows, so make sure you plant it in full sun. The area where you plant should get about eight hours of sun a day. This is true whether you plant winter or spring wheat. Don't plan on planting your crop anywhere where there's too much shade. Time your planting season. Prepare to plant winter wheat in the fall, approximately 6 to 8 weeks before the soil freezes, as this allows for strong root growth. Spring wheat can be planted as early as you can work the soil. Wheat grows best in 70 to 75 degree Fahrenheit ((21 to 24 degrees Celsius) weather, so you should plant your wheat when the weather is approaching that temperature (and eventually rising). Till your soil. You should till your soil to a depth of 6 inches (15 cm). You can use a rake, rototiller, or shovel to prepare the soil, although a rototiller is probably best if you're covering a large area. The ground needs to be as close to even as possible once you're finished, so you might need to run a rake over the top of the soil to even it out. Spread compost if necessary. If your soil is overly dry (it will be a light brown color) or somewhat rocky, you might need a layer of compost. This provides the soil with extra nutrients and can help the wheat grow better. Soil that is a rich brown color and moist to the touch doesn't need any extra compost. Spread your seeds. You can use your hand, but an actual seed spreader is best, because it gives you more even coverage. You should spread the seeds so that you have approximately one seed per 1 square inch (2.5 square centimeters) of space. The package of seeds should tell you how many pounds of seed you should use per 1,000 square feet of planting area, to give you a better idea of how much seed you need for large areas. Rake the seeds. Once you've spread the seeds, they need to get worked into the soil. Using a metal rake, gently rake over the seeds so they get worked into the soil. Make sure you rake evenly so your crop doesn't come up in clumps. Cover the seed with a thin layer of soil. This prevents the seed from drying out in the sun and from birds feeding on it. Cover spring wheat without about 1.5 inches (3.8 cm) of soil. Winter wheat should be 2.5 inches (6.4 cm) deep. The seed should never be covered by more than 3 inches (7.6 cm) of soil. Water your newly planted seeds. You should soak the area that's planted right away. Keep the entire planting area moist until the wheat begins to grow. Cooler weather and more rain means less watering on your part. Water your plants during dry spells. If your planting area goes through a dry spell - no rain for a week or so - you'll need to water the planting area. This will probably be more necessary if you're planting winter wheat than if you plant spring wheat. Weed as needed. Wheat grows very close together, so you might not need to weed regularly. You should, however, keep an eye out for weeds, especially if it's your first time growing and you haven't spread your seeds evenly. Protect your crop from pests. Slugs and insects like sawflies can destroy a crop of wheat. Slugs are likely to appear when the wheat is still very short, under 4 or 5 inches (9 to 10 cm). If you see them, use slug baits to keep them away from your wheat. If you notice sawflies, spray your crop with insecticide to protect the wheat.
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Determine how much space you have. Determine the type of wheat you'll plant. Choose your planting location. Time your planting season. Till your soil. Spread compost if necessary. Spread your seeds. Rake the seeds. Cover the seed with a thin layer of soil. Water your newly planted seeds. Water your plants during dry spells. Weed as needed. Protect your crop from pests.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Compost-Tea
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How to Make a Compost Tea
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To make compost tea, start by putting water in a bucket and letting it sit in the sun for a few hours to dechlorinate it. Then, put a pump aerator in the bottom of another bucket, and attach it to a pump outside the bucket with a tube. Next, fill the bucket halfway with compost, keeping it loose so the aerator will work properly. Fill the rest of the bucket with the decholorinated water and 1 ounce of molasses, and stir. Finally, turn the pump on and let the tea steep for 2-3 days, stirring daily. Strain your compost tea through cheesecloth before you use it.
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Dechlorinate your tap water. You'll need around 3 gallons (11 L) of water to make the tea. Let the water sit out in the sun and fresh air for several hours. This will allow any chlorine in the water to break down, because chlorine will kill the beneficial bacteria in the compost tea. You don't have to aerate the water if you're using well water or another water source that doesn't contain chlorine. Place a pump aerator in the bottom of another large bucket. To make the compost tea, you'll need a 5-gallon (19-L) plastic bucket. Place the aerator from a pond or aquarium pump in the bottom of the bucket. You'll attach this to an external pump, which will keep the tea moving as it brews. Make sure the pump you use is capable of moving at least 5 gallons (19 L) of water. The pump system is necessary to aerate the compost tea as it brews. Stagnant tea will become anaerobic, and this won't be good for your plants. Attach the aerator to the pump. Attach one end of a flexible tube to the aerator in the bottom of the bucket. Attach the other end of the tube to the pump outside the bucket. You can either leave the pump on the ground beside your tea, or clip it to the side of the bucket, just make sure no excess water runs back into the pump. Fill the bucket halfway with loose compost. When the aerator is in place and attached to the pump, add mature compost to the bucket. Don't fill the bucket more than half way, and don't pack the compost down. The compost must be loose for the aerator to work. Be sure to use aged compost, because unfinished compost can contain harmful pathogens that you don't want to spread onto your plants. Mature compost will smell sweet and earthy rather than like alcohol or rotting food. Fill the bucket the rest of the way with water. Once you've added the compost to the bucket, add enough water to the mixture to fill the bucket. Leave 3 inches (7.6 cm) of head room at the top of the bucket, so that you can stir the tea without spilling it. Add an ounce of molasses and stir the tea. The molasses will provide food for the beneficial soil bacteria, and help them grow and multiply. When you add the molasses, stir the tea to fully combine the water, compost, and molasses. Use unsulfured molasses, because sulfur can kill the beneficial bacteria. Turn on the pump. Once you combine the compost, water, and molasses, plug in the pump and turn it on. The pump will send air to the aerator in the bottom of the bucket and ensure there's plenty of oxygen and circulation in the tea. Steep the tea for two to three days. Compost tea takes anywhere from 48 to 36 hours to brew. The longer you brew it, the more microbes there will be in the tea. Don't brew the tea for longer than three days, because the microbes won't have enough food to survive longer than this. The compost tea should always have an earthy smell. If that changes, throw out the batch and start again. Stir the tea daily. As the tea brews, stir it at least once a day to make sure that no compost matter is sinking to the bottom. This will also ensure that everything is moving around the way it should. Turn off the pump and strain the tea. When the tea is finished brewing, shut off the pump. Remove the tubing and aerator from the bucket. To strain the tea, line a second 5-gallon (19-L) bucket with a burlap sac or large piece of cheesecloth. Pour the tea into the lined bucket. Wrap the bag or cheesecloth around the compost and pull it out of the water. Squeeze the bag gently to remove excess tea. Return the compost to the pile. Once you've strained out the solids, the compost tea is ready to use. Turn the compost out onto your compost pile, and work it back into the pile with a shovel or a hoe. Alternatively, you can also work the compost solids into your garden beds. Use the tea within 36 hours. The beneficial microbes in the tea will not survive for more than a few days. Because of their short life span, it's important to use the tea when it's fresh. The sooner you use the tea the better, but don't keep it around longer than three days. Soak the soil with the tea. Compost tea can be applied directly to the soil in your garden beds. Transfer the tea to a watering can and apply the tea to the soil around your plants. You can also place the tea in a spray bottle and apply it to the soil that way. For the best results, apply compost tea to the soil two weeks before your plants start to bud. Compost tea is also a great soil addition for young plants and newly transplanted ones. Transfer the tea to a spray bottle to use as a foliar spray. A foliar spray is something that gets applied directly to the leaves of a plant. If the tea is very dark, combine it with equal parts water and transfer it to a spray bottle. Add ⅛ teaspoon (0.6 ml) of vegetable oil and shake the mixture. Spray the tea mixture onto leaves in the early morning or late evening. The vegetable oil will help the tea stick to the leaves. Always use diluted tea on young or delicate plants. Don't spray plants with foliar spray in the middle of the day, as the sun can burn the leaves.
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Dechlorinate your tap water. Place a pump aerator in the bottom of another large bucket. Attach the aerator to the pump. Fill the bucket halfway with loose compost. Fill the bucket the rest of the way with water. Add an ounce of molasses and stir the tea. Turn on the pump. Steep the tea for two to three days. Stir the tea daily. Turn off the pump and strain the tea. Return the compost to the pile. Use the tea within 36 hours. Soak the soil with the tea. Transfer the tea to a spray bottle to use as a foliar spray.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Play-20-Questions
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How to Play 20 Questions
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You'll need at least 2 people to play 20 Questions. One person should start by thinking of an object, like an animal, food, or thing. Try to think of something that's unusual, like a platypus or a vegetable that doesn't grow where you live. That person will keep their object a secret, and it's the other person's job to guess what they're thinking of. The catch is, you only have 20 yes or no answers! Start broad, by asking things like “Is it bigger than an elephant” or “Is it smaller than a cell phone?”. The person who's thinking of the object will say yes or no, and they're not allowed to lie. Then, the person guessing should base their next question on the previous answer. For example, if it's bigger than an elephant, the person might ask “Is it bigger than a plane?”. The person guessing can ask any yes or no question they can think of, including questions about size, color, use, etc. If you ever get stuck, try asking questions in a different category. For example, if knowing the size of the object isn't helping, ask “Is it alive?” or “Can you eat it?”. You can even ask more specific questions like “Is it electronic?” or “Would you use it at school?”. The person guessing can guess the item at any time, but they have to guess once the 20 questions are up. If they get it right, the two people switch, and the person that was guessing gets to think of the object!
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Gather a group of 2 to 5 people to play the game. This game works best with a small to medium-sized group of people so that everyone gets a chance to ask a question. If the group is too big, you may reach the end of the game without giving everyone a turn. This is a great game to play on a road trip or with a group of friends to pass the time. Choose 1 person to be “it” first. You can pick anyone in your group to go first. Try assigning them based on who the youngest is, who had the most recent birthday, or something silly, like who can eat a piece of pizza the fastest. You can also pick which order everyone takes turns guessing the same way. For example, going from youngest to oldest or in order of birth month. Pick a person, place, or thing if you are “it. ” Think about someone or something that you know enough about to answer some basic questions on. If you choose a person, they can be living, deceased, or even fictional. Make sure you choose a person, place, or thing that most people in your group know about. For example, your item could be “Marylin Monroe,” since she is famous enough that most people will be able to make guesses about her. You could also choose something like New York City, the Eiffel Tower, or even clouds or the sun. Try not to use items like “my mom” or “my dog” unless you are with your siblings or best friends, because the players might not know enough about them to guess. Start by asking general yes or no questions if you are not “it. ” If you are a guesser, you are trying to figure out what the “it” person is thinking of. Try using a fairly general opening question that can be answered with “yes” or “no” to narrow down your options. For example: “Is it a person?” “Is it a place?” “Is it an object?” “Is it real or fictional?” Take turns asking yes or no questions. You can ask questions in any order that you'd like, but make sure each player gets to ask at least 1 question. If a player asks a question that can't be answered with “yes” or “no,” ask them to rephrase it so that it can be. For example, a player couldn't ask, “How old are they?” or “What do they look like?” They could ask, “Are they older than 50?” or, “Do they have blonde hair?” Ask more specific questions as you go along. Think about the questions that have already been asked before you ask new questions. For example, if someone already asked about size, move on to color or smell. This will give you an answer faster and use up fewer questions so you can hopefully win the game! For instance, if you already asked “Is it bigger than a breadbox?” and the answer was yes, try asking something like, “Is it red?” Play until you reach 20 questions or someone gives the right answer. You can either assign someone to count the questions that each player asks, or the group can count them together collectively. If the group reaches 20 questions and they haven't guessed the person, place, or thing, you can tell them what it is. If someone guesses it before 20 questions have been asked, the game is over. Make the correct guesser the next “it” person. If no one guessed the person, place, or thing at all, whoever wants to go next can have a turn. Keep the game going until everyone has had a chance to be “it.” If someone guesses correctly but they've already been “it,” let someone else have a turn instead. Giving everyone a turn makes the game more inclusive and lets everybody have some fun! Write out 10 to 15 topic cards with different subjects of interest. For example, you could pick popular foods, American states, famous landmarks, types of animals, or even famous celebrities. Choose a random bunch of these topics and write them down individually on a note card. Choose 1 person to be “it” and have them read their topic out loud. Pick a volunteer from your class to be the first person to choose a topic. You could pick the student who has been on time to class the most, or choose someone who turned their homework in on time that day. Have them pull a topic card from the pile and let them read it out loud to the class. This narrows down the subject that the person, place, or thing could be to make it easier for your students to guess. Write down the item or person that the “it” player thinks of. This ensures that you know what their item is in case the rest of your students get stuck. You can also double check that the person, place, or thing and the subject card are related, or offer suggestions if your student can't think of anything. For example, if your student pulls the card “types of animals,” they could choose “rabbit” as their item. Make each player ask a grammatically correct yes or no question. If the question isn't grammatically correct, move onto a different player. You can coach your students slightly if they are having trouble coming up with a question. You can let students raise their hands when they have a question or go around the room in a circle or spiral. If anyone gets stuck, try giving suggestions like, “Do you want to ask about its size?” Or, “Can you think of a way to ask about their hair color?” Keep track of your students’ questions and their points. As you play the game, have your students keep track of how many questions they have asked that were grammatically correct. Don't give out any points to questions that weren't phrased correctly. Tally up the running total of questions asked so that you know when your students have reached 20. Assigning points makes the game more competitive and may motivate your students to play. Give 3 points to whoever guesses correctly and make them “it. ” You can have the student who guessed correctly pick a new subject and come up with their own item. If the group reaches 20 questions and no one has guessed the item, have the current “it” player say what it is and give them 1 extra point. You can keep playing new rounds until everyone has gotten a turn, or stop when you feel like your students have gotten the most out of this game. If no one guesses correctly, you can ask for a volunteer to be “it” next.
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Gather a group of 2 to 5 people to play the game. Choose 1 person to be “it” first. Pick a person, place, or thing if you are “it. Start by asking general yes or no questions if you are not “it. Take turns asking yes or no questions. Ask more specific questions as you go along. Play until you reach 20 questions or someone gives the right answer. Make the correct guesser the next “it” person. Write out 10 to 15 topic cards with different subjects of interest. Choose 1 person to be “it” and have them read their topic out loud. Write down the item or person that the “it” player thinks of. Make each player ask a grammatically correct yes or no question. Keep track of your students’ questions and their points. Give 3 points to whoever guesses correctly and make them “it.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Use-Velcro-Rollers
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How to Use Velcro Rollers
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To use velcro rollers, dampen your hair and separate it into sections. Next, starting at the ends, wind one section of hair around a velcro roller so the hair curls down and inward toward your scalp. Continue rolling until the roller is snug against your scalp, then do the same for the remaining sections of hair. Wait 10-20 minutes for the rollers to set, then carefully unwind each roller and use hair spray or finishing cream to set your fresh curls!
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Select or purchase your rollers. If you don't have a pack of velcro rollers of your own, you'll need to take a trip to your local drug store or beauty shop to pick some up. You may even be able to find some in the beauty section of your local grocery. Your velcro rollers will come in various sizes; you should select smaller sizes if you want more curl, or larger rollers for gentler curls. Shorter hair will require smaller rollers. Depending on how short your hair is, you may only be able to get gentle waves due to your hair length. Longer hair works best for curling. Small rollers in long hair will create tighter ringlets, though you may need to use two rollers for hair that is especially long or thick. Large rollers shoulder length hair are excellent for creating volume, but these same rollers will create actual waves in longer hair. You'll need to adjust the size of roller you have to your hair length to create the effect you're going for. Dampen your hair. You may want to wash your hair before you curl, though this is not necessary. You can achieve excellent curls by dampening your hair with water from the faucet or a spray bottle. Damp hair will allow you to bring out more curl, and dry hair will create gentler waves. If you decide to wash your hair beforehand, you'll want to dry excess moisture out of your hair with a towel , blow dryer , or by air drying until it is only damp. Volumizing product might be just what you need to bring out more pronounced curls. Section thicker hair. For especially thick hair, it can be difficult to wind your hair in the rollers without first separating it into sections to make it more manageable. Less thick hair types can likely forego sectioning, and move straight into rolling. Extra thick hair will likely have to use rollers in many small sections to achieve a noticeable curl. Troubleshoot loose or non-sticking rollers. You should not need pins or clips to secure the velcro rollers in place. If the roller is not grabbing your hair and is loose, it could be that you've wound too much hair on the roller. Unroll it and reduce the amount of hair in that segment. Try rolling again until you have a more secure hold. Piggyback two rollers per rolled segment for long or thick hair. Winding too much hair on your roller can diminish its effects, lead to tangles, or cause the roller to not stick in place. Start with one roller halfway up the segment of hair you are working with and roll it to the top. The bottom of the segment of hair should still be draping downward. Use a second roller, start at the bottom, and roll the hair up to meet the first roller. Untangle and a pull free a segment of hair. Take a segment of hair from the section you are working on that is no thicker than your roller and brush it straight. You'll want your hair to be tangle free before you put in your rollers to minimize tangles and frizz. Pull the hair so it is taut and there is no slack. You're now ready to roll. Wind your hair from the ends to the root. Starting from the ends of your hair, wind your hair around the roller so the hair curls down and inward toward your scalp. Continue rolling your hair onto the roller until the roller is snug against your scalp. The velcro on the roller should grab the hair and hold the roller in place Thicker hair might require more than one roller per section of hair. If the roller does not stick or is loose, you have rolled too much hair on it. You might use larger rollers on the top parts of your hair and smaller rollers on the bottom parts to create a natural looking landscape of ringlets. Add volume with your velcro rollers. It's easy to create waves and bounce with wide rollers. When aiming for a gentler curl, you should begin with dry hair. Lightly mist the section of hair you are working on with hair spray or volumizing spray. Pull the section taut at a 90 degree angle from your head, then roll from the end until it is snug against your head, as you would normally. You could also lift the hair at an angle higher than 90 degrees to create even more volume. Tame your frizzy hair with velcro rollers. While your hair is still damp, apply an anti-frizz serum and blow dry your hair lightly. After doing this, you should brush straight any of the loose hair that you did not put into rollers. Use a blow dryer on the hair for about 5 minutes, blowing down the shafts of hair to minimize frizz. Wait until your rollers set. The more time you allow your rollers to set in your hair, the stronger and longer lasting the curl. You should wait at least 10-20 more minutes before unrolling, though those with thicker hair may want to wait longer. If your hair is damp, you can lightly blow dry until your hair is dry, and then remove the rollers. Anti-frizz, styling spray, or finishing cream can help ensure a more polished looking finish. Remove rollers from your hair. Carefully unwind each roller. Pulling the rollers out can leave rollers stuck in your hair and result in a frizzy mess. As you unwind your roller, hold the segment of hair above the roller with your free hand to guide your unwinding. By holding the hair above the roller, you will keep your hair from accidentally getting stuck to the velcro or re-tangled in the roller. Brush out your hair and enjoy the curls. Use your comb to gently combine the various segments of hair together. You can also use your fingers to merge segments back together. Adding baby powder or talcum powder to the roots of your hair can help your curls last even longer. You can also set your curls with hairspray to maintain your look.
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Select or purchase your rollers. Dampen your hair. Section thicker hair. Troubleshoot loose or non-sticking rollers. Piggyback two rollers per rolled segment for long or thick hair. Untangle and a pull free a segment of hair. Wind your hair from the ends to the root. Add volume with your velcro rollers. Tame your frizzy hair with velcro rollers. Wait until your rollers set. Remove rollers from your hair. Brush out your hair and enjoy the curls.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Do-a-Somersault
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How to Do a Somersault
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The best way to start a somersault is to stand straight with your hands in the air. Then, crouch down so that your chest touches your thighs and place your hands several inches in front of your feet. Tuck your head so that you're looking at your belly button. In one motion, lean forward and use your legs to push off the ground so that you roll and land on your back. Follow through by placing your feet firmly on the ground and standing back up!
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Find a comfortable floor. You should use a comfortable mat, a gym floor at your gymnastics school, or a floor with some cushion to do a somersault. If you use a hard surface, such as a wooden floor, then you're more likely to injure your head and neck. Stretch well. You should stretch before you perform any gymnastics skill. For the somersault, there are a few key parts of your body that should be stretched well before you begin so you don't sprain a muscle or hurt yourself. Here's what you should do: The pike stretch. Sit down with your legs straight out and reach forward toward your ankles with your arms to get a deep stretch in the back of your thighs and calves, as well as in your back. The ankle roll. Sit down and hold on to the place just above your ankle and roll it a few times in one direction, then the other. Repeat with your other ankle. The wrist stretch. Get on your hands and knees and put down your hands so that your fingers are facing your legs, not away from them. Move back and forth slightly with your palms down, and then flip your hands so that your palms are facing up while your fingers are still pointed toward your feet. The neck stretch. Move your head from left to right and then up and down like you're nodding. Finish the neck stretch by rolling your head clockwise a few times, and then counter-clockwise. Stand with a straight body. Stand straight up with your hands reaching up and your arms by your ears. Your palms should be facing out, slightly to each side. Your legs should be close together and there should be a slight arch in your back, with your head facing straight ahead of you. This is a classic beginning stance in gymnastics. If you feel more comfortable starting on the ground, however, you can skip this starting position and move straight to the floor. Crouch down. Tuck your legs and place your hands on either side of your feet, facing forward and several inches in front of each foot. Your chest should be resting on your thighs. Round your back and put your head down so that you're looking at your belly button. Remember that your head should never touch the ground in a somersault; holding this position will help keep your head above the ground. You'll actually be landing on your upper back, not on any part of your head. Push off through your legs. Lean forward as you push off through your feet and legs and make your hips come up over your head while your hands stay on the ground. Your arms and legs should be straight while still being a little bit bent as you roll forward and land on your back. Continue to roll forward. Remember that your head and neck should never touch the ground; as you continue to roll, your upper back will touch the ground first as you roll onto the rest of your back before you come up. As you roll, keep your shoulders straight and even; if one shoulder moves before the other, you could hurt yourself and won't land the somersault in a straight position. No jumping is necessary to do a somersault -- in fact, this could cause injury -- all you need is to roll forward using the momentum generated by your legs. Follow through. Your legs should be tucked as you finish the somersault, and you should land on your feet with your arms straight out in front of you. Stand up. To finish the somersault, you should roll onto your feet and use your momentum to stand straight up, with your arms all the way up and your body straight once more. Try a handstand somersault. This advanced move is a combination of a handstand and a somersault. Start with your legs spaced shoulder-width apart and your body straight. Do a handstand and pause for a moment while your legs are straight in the air. Keeping your legs together, bend your arms and lower your body toward the ground, then tuck in your chin and do a somersault. Finish in standing position with your hands over your head. Since this move is rather difficult, you might want to try it with a spotter the first few times. Be extra careful to tuck in your chin so that your head doesn't touch the ground at any time. Do a somersault kip-up. This move is special because of the landing, which looks similar to a back handspring landing. Do a regular somersault, but instead of simply standing up, jump with both feet into a standing position. You'll need to do a fast somersault to get up enough momentum. Use your hands to help propel your body as you jump, then land on your feet and straighten your body with your arms above your head. Do a dive somersault. If you really want to impress your friends, try this impressive variation on the basic somersault. Instead of starting in a fixed position, you run and then dive into the roll. Do a short headfirst dive, as though you were diving over a low log. Land on your hands, tuck in your head and immediately launch into a somersault. Move swiftly to your feet and finish with your body straight and your hands stretched over your head. Don't attempt this move until you've completely mastered the somersault, handstand, front handspring and other advanced moves. Once you get the hang of it, you can start making bigger dives.
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Find a comfortable floor. Stretch well. Stand with a straight body. Crouch down. Push off through your legs. Continue to roll forward. Stand up. Try a handstand somersault. Do a somersault kip-up. Do a dive somersault.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Train-a-Dog
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How to Train a Dog
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To train your dog to "sit," first have your dog stand up and face you. Then, say “sit” and show your dog a treat. Hold the treat up to its nose, then slowly move the treat behind its head. As you move the treat, your dog will naturally sit down to get a better view of the food. Once your dog sits, give it the treat immediately, and give it plenty of praise, too. Try "Good sit!," which will remind your pup what it just did. When your dog consistently responds to the verbal command and hand movement, start gradually making the movement less noticeable until you're not doing it at all. Continue practicing the command a few times a day until your dog does it without a treat. Then, once your dog knows "sit," you can move to more complicated commands, like "lie down" or "come"!
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Choose a dog that fits your lifestyle. After centuries of breeding, the modern dog is one of the most varied species of animal on earth. While there's probably a dog to suit every lifestyle, not all dogs will fit your specific needs. For example, if you like to relax, you should not get a Jack Russell Terrier, known for its constant barking and high energy. Instead, you might want a bulldog that would much prefer to cuddle on the couch all day. Research the personalities and care requirements of various breeds. Ask dog owners about their breed's personality. Mixed breeds are also great options as they can contain personalities of various breeds you may be interested in. Since most dogs live for 10 – 15 years, getting a dog is a long-term commitment. Make sure the breed's temperament is a good match for your lifestyle. If you haven't yet started a family, consider whether you'll have young children around the house in the next decade. Some breeds are not recommended for households with children. Don’t get an aspirational dog. Be honest with yourself about the compatibility of the dog you want with your lifestyle. Don't get a dog that needs a lot of activity just because you want a reason to jumpstart a healthier lifestyle yourself. If you can't follow through on exercising your high-energy dog, you and the dog will both end up frustrated. Write down the needs and temperament of the breed, as well as how you will meet those needs. If it is going to take significant effort to change your lifestyle, you need to choose a different dog. Give your dog a practical name. He needs to be able to learn his name easily, so you can hold his attention during training. The name should also have clear, hard sounds the dog can recognize. Names such as “Buddy” or “Rover” or “Bee Bee” have distinct sounds that stand out from the regular flood of human speech your dog hears. Use your dog's name often when you are playing, petting him, training him, or need to get his attention. If your dog looks at you when you say his name, you know he's learned it. Create a positive association with his name so he'll continue to focus on you when you say it. Praise him when he responds to his name, and give him treats. Schedule enough time for training. Initially, you should start with several 5 minutes sessions spread out throughout the day and go no longer than 20 minutes. This is especially important with puppies as they have a short attention span and get bored easily, just like a toddler would. Those sessions are not the only time you'll train your dog, though. Training actually happens throughout the day when interacting with your pet. S/he is learning from you every time you interact. Bad dog habits develop when owners let dogs get away with bad behavior outside of dedicated training sessions. So, always keep an eye on your dog outside of training sessions. If s/he knows it during training sessions, then make sure he remembers it outside of training. Prepare your mental state for training sessions. When you are working with your dog, be calm and neutral. Any form of agitation and excitement on your part will negatively affect the outcome of training. You should be mindful of the fact that the goal of training is to be able to reinforce good dog behavior and to ignore or not reinforce bad ones. It may sound strict but producing a well trained dog requires the determination and conviction to see it through. Choose the proper equipment. A 6-foot (1.82m) leash and flat collar or martingale collar may be all the you need to start, besides your treats. Consult a trainer for advice on other equipment like a “Promise Leader” head halter, a “No Pull” harness, a metal training collar, or other device. Puppies or small dogs generally do not need harsh equipment. Larger dogs may temporarily need specialized equipment (like the “Promise Leader”) to keep their focus. Manage your expectations and mood. Not every training day is going to be perfect, but don't get frustrated and don't take it out on your dog. Adjust your own behavior and attitude to encourage your dog's ability and confidence to learn. If you have a calm mood, generally your dog will, too. If the dog becomes afraid of your bad mood, s/he will not learn anything new. S/he'll only learn to be wary and not trust you. Dog training classes and a good trainer can help you improve your behavior which will translate to success with your dog. Keep your dog’s temperament in mind. All dogs have different temperaments. Just like kids, different breeds learn differently and at different rates. Some dogs are stubborn and will challenge you at every turn. Others will bend over backwards to please you. You may need to adjust your training techniques to meet the need of your dog's temperament. Give immediate rewards. Dogs don't understand long-term cause and effects. They learn fast. You must praise or reward your dog within 2 seconds of a desired behavior to reinforce that behavior. If you wait too long, s/he will not associate the reward with the action you asked him to perform. Furthermore, you must make sure that your praise is fast enough to be accurate. Otherwise, you may reward behaviors that you don't want. Imagine, for example, that you are teaching your dog the “sit” command. S/he sits for just a moment, but by the time you praise and reward him/her, s/he's started standing back up. In this case, you are rewarding the standing behavior, not the sitting behavior. Consider clicker training. Clicker training is a method of delivering immediate praise with the help of a clicker. You can click faster than you can give a treat or pet your dog's head. As such, clicker training reinforces good behavior fast enough for a dog's learning speed. It works by creating a positive association between the click sound and rewards. Eventually, your dog will consider the sound of the clicker itself reward enough for good behavior. You can apply the principle of clicker training to any dog command. Click the clicker device, then immediately give the dog a treat. This creates a positive association with the click sound. Later, that sound will “mark” a behavior as correct so the dog knows that s/he did something right. When the dog performs a desired behavior, make the click sound, then give him a treat. Once s/he's performing that behavior consistently, you can give the behavior a command name. Begin tying the command and the behavior together with the help of the clicker. For example, before you ever teach your dog the "sit" command, give the click sound, a treat, and praise when you find him/her sitting. When s/he begins sitting just to get the treats, start saying the word "sit" to get him/her into position. Pair it with the click sound to reward him/her. Eventually, s/he will learn that sitting in response to the "sit" command will earn him/her a click reward. Be consistent. Your dog won't understand what you want from him/her if his/her environment lacks consistency. Everyone who lives with your dog should understand and be on board with his/her training goals. For example, if you are training your dog not to jump on people, don't let the kids allow the dog jump all over them. This will undermine all the training you've done. Make sure everyone uses the exact commands your dog learns in training. S/he doesn't speak English, and can't tell the difference between “sit” and “sit down.” Using those terms interchangeably will only confuse him/her. Because s/he won't make a clear connection between a single command and a single action, his/her response to the command will be hit or miss. Always reward success and good behavior with praise, and sometimes a small treat. Small treats help motivate your dog to learn his/her training. The treat needs to be small, tasty, and easily chewed. You don't want it to interrupt the training session or make them full too quickly. Consider how long it takes to chew a hard treat versus a semi-moist treat like “Bill Jack” or “Zuke's Mini Naturals.” Treats about the size of a pencil eraser head are enough to get the positive point across, and you don't have to wait long for your dog to eat it. Use "high value" treats when needed. When teaching difficult or important a command, use a “high value” treat to raise the stakes for him/her. Examples include freeze-dried liver, roasted chicken breast chunks, or slices of turkey lunch meat. As the dog learns the command, phase out the high value treats and bring them back as needed to advance your training, but always give him/her praise. Train on an empty stomach. Don't feed as large a meal as usual a few hours before training your dog. The more your dog wants the treat, the more focused s/he'll be on the task s/he needs to perform to get it. Always end training on a positive note. Even if the training session did not go well and your dog didn't catch on to a new command, end on something that you can praise him/her for. By ending the training session with a command s/he's already mastered, the last thing s/he remembers will be your love and praise. Discourage barking. If your dog barks at you when you don't want him/her to, just ignore him/her until s/he stops, and then reward him/her with praise. Sometimes they bark at you for attention, while other times it may be out of frustration. Do not throw a ball or toy. This only teaches him/her that if he barks, s/he'll get you to do something s/he wants. Don't yell at the dog to be quiet, as this rewards him/her with attention. Take your dog on regular walks with a leash. This is important not just for training, but for his/her physical and mental health. Depending on what breed of dog you have, he may need a lot of exercise to keep him/her happy and in shape. Discourage pulling. Most dogs will pull on the leash when they're learning to take walks. When s/he starts pulling, stop immediately. Don't take another step until the dog comes to your side and focuses his/her attention on you. Change directions. An even more effective method is to walk in the opposite direction and encourage your dog to come with you. Once s/he's caught up, praise and treat him/her. Make it fun to be by your side. Your dog's natural impulse is to chart his/her own course and investigate his environment. You need to make walking by your side more appealing that that. Use an enthusiastic voice when changing directions, and lavish him with praise when he comes back to your side. Pair the behavior with a verbal command. Once the dog walks consistently at your side, you can give the behavior a name, like “heel" or “let's go.” Understand the value of the command. The “come” is used whenever you want your dog to come to you. This command is potentially life-saving, as it can prevent your dog from running off if he gets loose. Prepare your dog for “come” training. You always want to start training indoors (or in your fenced yard) with low distraction. Attach a 6-foot leash to your dog's collar so that you have a way to keep his attention and prevent him from running away. Attract your dog’s attention. You want to make him run toward you. You can do this with high-pitched noises associated with play, with a toy, with an excited clap, or just opening your arms. Running a short distance away from him and then stopping can also work, as dogs will naturally start to chase. Use praise and your “happy voice” to encourage him to move toward you. Give immediate praise. Sound your clicker, give him praise in your “happy voice,” and give him a treat when your dog reaches your side. Pair the behavior with the verbal command. As your dog begins to realize he'll be rewarded for coming to you, start giving the verbal command “come.” When he responds to the command, reinforce it in praise by pairing it with “good”: “good come!” Move the training to more public spaces. Because the “come” command could save your dog's life, he must learn to respond to it even when he's distracted. Move the training sessions from your home or yard to a public park. There are more sights, sounds, and smells demanding his attention there. Increase the leash length. You began training with a 6-foot leash, but you want your dog to come longer distances than that. Try attaching two leashes together to increase the distance. Work up to training your dog off the leash in a fenced environment. This will teach him to come over long distances. Ask someone to help with off-the-leash training. You can play “ping pong” and take turns calling the dog to each of you. Give enormous rewards. Because this command is so important, the praise you give for performing it should be extravagant. Responding to the "come" command should be the best part of your dog's day. Do not create a negative association with this command. No matter how upset you are, never reinforce the "come" with anger. Even if you're furious that your dog slipped the leash and ran free for five whole minutes, lavish him with praise when he finally responds to the "come." Remember that you're praising the last thing he did did , and the last thing he did was to come to you. Don't ever correct, yell, yank or in any way make coming to you a bad thing. You can undo years of training with one bad experience. Never do something your dog won't enjoy after giving a "come." Though you may be tempted to give the command when you need to give him a bath, trim his nails, or cleans his ears, the "come" should always lead to joy. If you have to do something your dog won't like, just go and get the dog yourself instead of giving the command. Praise the dog along the way for being calm and accepting of the task. You can use treats, of course. Go back to basics. If you have a scare where your dog runs loose and ignores the "come" command, go back to leash training. Continue working on the leash until he responds reliably to the "come." Don't rush the training on this command. It's too important to do half-heartedly. Reinforce the training throughout your dog’s life. Because this behavior is so important, it must be reinforced throughout his entire lifetime. If you take off-leash hikes with your dog, keep treats in your pocket to reinforce the command. You also want a command to let the dog know that it does not have to be right next to you all the time. Something like “free” is one way to phrase it, but the idea is that the dog can do what it wants and is not under command until you give it one. Keep the fun going. You don't want the dog to think that every time they come to you, the fun stops, someone puts on the leash, and they go back home. Otherwise, you will start to get less reliable and less happy “comes.” So, call the dog, praise them when they arrive and set them “free” to play again. Acclimate the dog to collar grabs. This doesn't have to be paired with any verbal commands. When the dog comes to you, grab his collar so he doesn't grow skittish every time he feels someone touch it. When you lean over to reward him for the "come," include grabbing the collar in your hand and petting around the neck as you give him his treat. Once in a while, but not always, the leash should be attached when you grab the collar. Also, you can always attach a short leash and let them “free” again. Leashes should mean fun things are about to happen and we get to go places. There is no room for harsh corrections. Understand the purpose of the "listen" command. Also known as the "watch me" command, the "listen" is one of the first commands you should teach your dog. You'll use it to get your dog's attention so you can give him the next command or direction. Some people just use their dog's name instead of the "listen." This is especially useful if you have more than one dog. That way, each individual dog will know when you want it to focus on you. Prepare a handful of treats. These may be dog treats you buy at the store, or hot dogs cut into small pieces. Choose a treat that you know your dog loves and will perform for. Stand near your dog. Don't engage with him, though. If he reacts to your presence, stand still and look away until he loses interest. Say "Listen" in a quiet but firm voice. If you're using your dog's name instead of the "listen" or "watch me" commands, say his name instead. The tone and volume should be the same as if you were calling a person's name to get their attention. Don't raise your voice to get his attention. Save the big booming voice for “life saving” situations, like if he escapes his fence or leash. If you rarely raise your voice, you'll get your dog's undivided attention when you do need to yell. But if you are always “loud” to your dog, they will ignore that sound and tune it out. Shouting will no longer be regarded as something that commands special attention. Dogs have excellent hearing — far better than ours. A fun twist on this command is to see how quietly you can whisper and have your dog respond. People will think you are the “dog whisperer” when you can get him to perform commands with hardly a whisper. Give an immediate reward for the desired response. As soon as your dog stops what he's doing and looks toward you, praise him and give him a treat. Make the click sound before giving praise or a treat if you're using clicker training. Remember that your response must be immediate. The faster you reward him, the better he'll understand the relationship between command, behavior, and reward. Discontinue treats eventually. Once he's mastered the command, you shouldn't give him treats for performing it; however, you should still use your clicker or give verbal praise. Weaning the dog off treats is important because he may start to expect treats all the time. You'll end up with a dog who only performs when you have food. Praise your dog regularly even after he's mastered a command, but treat him intermittently. That's the way to keep it solid in his doggy vocabulary. Once he's mastered command, you can use treats to shape the behavior to be faster or more accurate. He will soon realize that the treats come with the command or activity that follows the "listen." Get your dog into a standing position. The purpose of the "sit" is get your dog to transition from standing to sitting, not just continue sitting. Walk into your dog or step away from him to get him into a standing position. Position yourself in his line of sight. Stand directly in front of the dog so that his attention is focused on you. Let him see that you have a treat in your hand. Focus the dog's attention on the treat. Begin with the treat held down at your side. Raise that hand in front of the dog's nose to let him get the scent, then to above his head level. When you hold the treat above the dog's head, most dogs will naturally sit to get a better view of it. Give him an immediate treat and praise. Follow the routine of clicker-treat/praise or just treat and praise. Say “good sit” when he's performing the behavior you are practicing. He may be slow at first, but more treats and praise will speed up his response. Make sure that you do not praise him until his butt touches the ground. If you praise halfway through the sit, the dog will think that is what you want. Also, make sure that you do not praise him for getting back up, or you will get that behavior instead of the sit. If your dog does not sit with the treat technique, you can use your leash and collar. Stand next to the dog, facing the same direction as him. Place a little backward pressure on the collar to encourage a sit. You may even need to encourage the sit by adding a little gentle scoop behind the dog's hind legs. Gently lean the dog backward with the help of the collar while doing this. As soon as he sits, give him immediate praise and reward. Don't repeat the command. You want the dog to respond on the first utterance, not the second, third, or fourth. If the dog does not perform the behavior within 2 seconds of your command, reinforce the command with the help of your leash. When you begin training a dog, never give a command that you are not in a position to reinforce. Otherwise, you risk training the dog to ignore you because there is no follow through from your end and the commands have no meaning. Create a positive meaning for the dog with praise and consistency. Praise natural sitting behavior. Look for times throughout the day when your dog just sits on his own. Praise that behavior, and pretty soon you'll have a dog that sits for attention instead of jumping or barking at you. Get your dog’s attention. Get some food treats or a toy and find your dog. Hold the toy or treat in view so he focuses on you. Use the treat or toy to encourage your dog to lie down. Do this by moving the toy or treat onto the ground in front of the dog, between his front legs. His head should follow it, and his body should follow shortly thereafter. Give immediate praise. When the dog's stomach is on the ground, lavish him with praise and give him the treat or toy. Be accurate with your praise, too. If you praise him halfway down or up, that is the behavior you will get. Increase your distance. Once he's learned the behavior with the promise of a treat below him, move a little farther away. The hand signal for “down” will become your flat hand — palm down — moving in a downward direction from in front of your waist to your side. As the dog gets more consistent with the "down" behavior, add a verbal “down” or “lie down” command. Always praise him immediately when his belly is on the ground. Dogs read body language well and learn hand signals quite quickly. Lengthen the "down. " As he gets more reliable with “down,” pause a few seconds before praising and treating to encourage him to hold the position. If he pops up to get the treat, do not give it to him, or you will be rewarding the last behavior he did before the treat. Just start again, and the dog will understand that you want him all the way down on the ground, as long as you are consistent. Don't lean over your dog. Once your dog has caught onto the command, stand up straight when giving it. If you loom over him, you'll have a dog that only lays down when you are leaning over him. You want to work on being able to get your dog to lie down from across the room, eventually. Begin doorway “wait”-training early. Teaching a dog to respect the threshold is important. You do not want a dog that runs out the door every time it opens — that could be dangerous for him. Doorway training doesn't need to happen every single time you go through a doorway. But you should make the most of your training opportunities early in your puppy's life. Place the dog on a leash. You should have him on a short leash that allows you to change his direction from a close distance. Walk to the door. Bring the dog along with you on his leash. Give a “wait” command before stepping through. If your dog moves to follow you when you step through the door, use the leash to stop his forward movement. Try again. Praise him when he waits. When he realizes that you want him to stay in the door instead of walking through it with you, lavish him with praise and rewards for the "good wait." Teach him to sit in the threshold. If the door is closed, you can even teach your dog to sit as soon as you place your hand on the doorknob. He'll then wait while the door is opened, and not cross the threshold until you release him. This training should be done on leash at the beginning, for his safety. Give a separate command to encourage him through the doorway. You might use a "come" or a "free." Whatever command you use, it should be the only thing that allows your dog to exit your home. Increase the distance. Practice leaving the dog at the threshold and do something on the other side. You might get the mail or take out the trash before you return and praise him. The idea is that you do not always call him across the threshold to meet you. You can also come back to him. Have him wait patiently while you prepare his meal. There's nothing more annoying than a dog who jumps and barks while you're trying to prepare his meal. Instead, use the “wait” command he learned in doorway training to have him wait outside the threshold of the room where he's fed. When you're ready, have your dog work for his food by commanding the dog “sit” and “stay” while you place the food on the ground. Stand up and wait a few breaths before giving your release word. You can use “free” or you can create a new command for feeding time like “get your food” or “yummy.” Try to choose something you wouldn't accidentally say to other people, such as "time to eat," or, "let's eat," as this might falsely cue your dog that it's time for his dinner. Eventually, he will sit on his own as soon as he sees his feeding bowl. Hand feed your dog. At meal time, start feeding your dog out of your hand. Then use your hands to put the rest of the food in the bowl. This will put your scent on your dog's bowl and also normalize having your hands around their bowl and food. This should help fix or prevent any food aggression tendencies. Teach your dog to “leave it. ” Teaching your dog to move his nose away from food and other items can be beneficial in a number of situations, including when food is accidentally dropped on the floor during family dinner or when your dog seems interested in picking up something potentially harmful during a walk. To teach this command, do the following: Stage one: Hold a treat in your closed hand. The dog will probably lick, sniff, and paw at your hand in an attempt to get to the treat. Eventually, when the dog moves his nose away, praise him and give him the treat. Stage two: Add in the words “leave it.” Say these words when your dog decides to move his nose away. Stage three: Hold one treat in your palm in front of the dog and one behind you in the other hand. Instruct your dog to “leave it.” If the dog gets too close to the treat, make a fist to hide the treat and say “no” or “uh-oh” to show the dog that he won't be rewarded or noncompliance. When he obeys the “leave it” command, give him the treat that's behind your back. Stage four: Place the treat on the floor. Move the treat from your palm to the floor. Continue to reward your dog with the treat you have behind your back. Stage five: Put your dog's leash on and walk past the treat on the floor. Command him to “leave it” without jerking the leash. If he eats the treat, go back to an earlier stage. Stage six: Start using the “leave it” command outside of your home. Understand the command. The “take” is used whenever you want the dog to take something you offer into his mouth. Give your dog a toy to play with. Give him the verbal command “take” as you do so. As he takes the toy in his mouth, reward him for the behavior with praise. (Plus, he gets to play with the toy!) Transition to less rewarding objects. It's easy for a dog to learn "take" when the object is so much fun! When he's mastered the connection between command and behavior, move on to boring objects. Examples might include newspapers, light bags, or anything else you might want him to carry. Pair “take” training with “drop it” training. Once he takes the toy, use the command “drop it” to have the dog release the toy back to you. Give him a treat and praise when he releases the toy, then start again with “take.” You don't want the dog to think that the fun stops every time he releases the toy. Do not get into a tugging match with the dog. When you tug, the dog tugs back harder. Understand the value of the “stand” command. The value of the "sit" and "wait" seem obvious, but you may not understand at first why the "stand" is an important skill to teach your dog. You won't use the "stand" every day, but you'll need it throughout the dog's life. For example, a dog who can stay calmly in a "stand" is the ideal patient at a vet clinic or client at a groomer's. Prepare for the training session. Grab his favorite toy or prepare a handful of treats to both focus your dog's attention and reward him for learning the command. Put the dog in a starting "down" or "lie down" position when working with the "stand" command. He should move from lying down to standing up to get his toy or treats. Focus the dog’s attention. You want to coax him into the standing position by having him follow the toy or treat. Hold the toy or treat in front of his face, at nose height. If he sits, thinking that will earn him a reward, try again, but with the treat or toy slightly lower. Encourage the dog to follow your hand. Flatten your hand with your palm down. If you're using a treat, hold it with your thumb against your palm. Start with your hand in front of his nose and move it away a few inches. The idea is that the dog will stand up while following your hand. You may need to use your other hand to encourage him from underneath his hips to get the idea at first. Give immediate praise. As soon as he reaches the standing position, praise and treat. Although you haven't yet started using the verbal "stand" command, you can use it in your praise: "good stand!" Add the verbal "stand" command. At first, you will work only on getting your dog to stand by following the hand that holds his toy or treat. When he's mastered that concept, begin incorporating the "stand" command into the training sessions. Combine the “stand” with other commands. There are many ways to combine commands. After getting your dog to "stand," you might add a “wait” or “stay” command if you want the dog to stand for longer periods of time. You can also follow with a "sit" or "down" to do some “doggy drills,” and gradually increase the distance between you and the dog. Eventually, you'll have your dog performing these commands from across the room. Understand the command. The “speak” command teaches your dog to bark in response to your verbal cue. On its own, this command is something of a novelty. But in combination with the “quiet” command, it can help manage a barking problem in an overly vocal dog. Take extreme caution when teaching this command. Inexperienced trainers sometimes find "speak" training spirals out of control. They end up with a dog who barks at them all the time. Clicker train your dog. "Speak" training requires immediate praise, more so than other commands do. Teach your dog to associate the click sound with a treat by clicking and treating a few times in a row. Continue this clicker training until your dog sees the click sound as a reward in and of itself. The treat will come later. Figure out when your dog barks most. This will vary from dog to dog, so you have to observe your specific pet. He might bark most reliably when you withhold a treat, when someone knocks on the door, when someone rings the doorbell, or when someone honks a horn. Recreate the triggering event. Once you've figured out what makes your dog bark, perform that action in front of your dog. The idea is to encourage him to bark on his own, then praise him for the action. You can see how this might be dangerous in the hands of an inexperienced trainer. That's why "speak" training is a little different from the other commands. You'll incorporate the verbal command from the very beginning. That way, the dog doesn't think you're praising him for his natural behavior. Use the verbal "speak" command from the beginning. As soon as your dog barks for the very first time, give the verbal "speak" command, click, and give him a treat. The other commands thus far have taught the behavior first, then added a command that preceded the behavior. However, "speak" training gets out of hand too easily that way. The dog gets rewarded for barking at first. Thus, it's better to associate the verbal command with the behavior already in progress. Never reward the dog for barking without the verbal command. Combine the “speak” with the “quiet” command. If you have a dog who naturally barks too much, you might not think teaching him to "speak" is going to help your situation. However, if you teach him to "speak," then you can also teach him to "quiet." While you may not need the "speak" for a dog who barks too much, you definitely need the "quiet." Once your dog has mastered the "speak," begin incorporating "quiet" into your training sessions. Give the "speak" command. However, instead of rewarding the "speak" (barking), wait until the dog stops barking. Give the verbal "quiet" command. If the dog remains silent, reward the "quiet" (no barking) with a click and a treat. Understand the value of crate training. You might think it cruel to pen a dog up in a crate for hours at a time. But dogs are instinctively den animals, so confined spaces are not as oppressive to them as they are to us. In fact, crate trained dogs will seek out their crates as a source of comfort. Crate training is a useful way to manage your dog's behavior when he's unsupervised for extended periods of time. For example, many owners crate their dogs when they go to sleep or leave the house. Begin crate training young. Although older dogs can be taught to enjoy their crates as well, it's easier to train a young dog. If your puppy is a large breed, don't train him in a large crate that you think he'll grow into. Dogs won't relieve themselves where they sleep or relax, so you need the crate to be appropriately sized. If you use a crate that's too large, he might urinate in the far corner of it because he has so much space. Make the crate an inviting space. Don't isolate him in the crate immediately by locking the door the first time you get him to enter it. You want him to create a positive association with the crate, so that he enjoys his time in there. When you begin the crate training process, place the crate somewhere the household gathers. The idea is to make the crate part of the social scene rather than a place of isolation. Place a soft blanket and some of your dog's favorite toys inside the crate. Encourage him to enter the crate. Once you've made the crate an inviting space, use treats to lure him inside. At first, place some outside the door so he can explore the exterior of the crate. Then, place treats just inside the door, so he will poke his head in to retrieve them. As he grows more comfortable, place the treats further and further inside the crate. Do this until your dog enters the crate without hesitation. Always speak in your "happy voice" when acclimating your dog to the crate. Feed the dog in his crate. Once he's comfortable entering the crate for treats, reinforce the positive association with mealtime. Place his dog bowl wherever he's comfortable eating. If he's still a little anxious, you might have to place it right by the door. As he grows more comfortable over time, place the dog bowl further back into the cage. Begin closing the door behind him. With treats and feeding, you'll find that your dog is growing more acclimated to being in the crate. He still needs to learn how to cope with the door being closed. Begin closing the door at mealtime, when the dog too distracted by his food to notice what's going on at first. Close the door for very short periods, lengthening the time as the dog grows more comfortable. Don't reward the dog for whining. When a puppy whines, it may be adorable and heartbreaking, but when a grown dog whines, it can drive you nuts. If your puppy whines inconsolably, you may have left him inside the crate for too long. However, you cannot release him from the crate until the whining stops. Remember — every reward you give reinforces the dog's last behavior, which was whining in this case. Instead, release the dog once he's stopped whining. The next time you close the door on the crate, leave him in for a shorter period of time. Comfort your dog during long crate sessions. If your puppy cries when he's alone in the crate, bring the crate into your bedroom at night. Have a tick tock clock or white noise machine to help the puppy get to sleep. Make sure that they have already eliminated outside and don't need to urinate or defecate. Young puppies should be crated in your room at night so that you can hear them tell you they need to go out in the middle of the night. Otherwise, they will be forced to mess in the crate.
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Choose a dog that fits your lifestyle. Don’t get an aspirational dog. Give your dog a practical name. Schedule enough time for training. Prepare your mental state for training sessions. Choose the proper equipment. Manage your expectations and mood. Keep your dog’s temperament in mind. Give immediate rewards. Consider clicker training. Be consistent. Always reward success and good behavior with praise, and sometimes a small treat. Use "high value" treats when needed. Train on an empty stomach. Always end training on a positive note. Discourage barking. Take your dog on regular walks with a leash. Discourage pulling. Change directions. Make it fun to be by your side. Pair the behavior with a verbal command. Understand the value of the command. Prepare your dog for “come” training. Attract your dog’s attention. Give immediate praise. Pair the behavior with the verbal command. Move the training to more public spaces. Increase the leash length. Work up to training your dog off the leash in a fenced environment. Give enormous rewards. Do not create a negative association with this command. Go back to basics. Reinforce the training throughout your dog’s life. Keep the fun going. Acclimate the dog to collar grabs. Understand the purpose of the "listen" command. Prepare a handful of treats. Stand near your dog. Say "Listen" in a quiet but firm voice. Don't raise your voice to get his attention. Give an immediate reward for the desired response. Discontinue treats eventually. Get your dog into a standing position. Position yourself in his line of sight. Focus the dog's attention on the treat. Give him an immediate treat and praise. If your dog does not sit with the treat technique, you can use your leash and collar. Don't repeat the command. Praise natural sitting behavior. Get your dog’s attention. Use the treat or toy to encourage your dog to lie down. Give immediate praise. Increase your distance. Lengthen the "down. Don't lean over your dog. Begin doorway “wait”-training early. Place the dog on a leash. Walk to the door. Give a “wait” command before stepping through. Praise him when he waits. Teach him to sit in the threshold. Give a separate command to encourage him through the doorway. Increase the distance. Have him wait patiently while you prepare his meal. Hand feed your dog. Teach your dog to “leave it. Understand the command. Give your dog a toy to play with. Transition to less rewarding objects. Pair “take” training with “drop it” training. Understand the value of the “stand” command. Prepare for the training session. Focus the dog’s attention. Encourage the dog to follow your hand. Give immediate praise. Add the verbal "stand" command. Combine the “stand” with other commands. Understand the command. Clicker train your dog. Figure out when your dog barks most. Recreate the triggering event. Use the verbal "speak" command from the beginning. Combine the “speak” with the “quiet” command. Understand the value of crate training. Begin crate training young. Make the crate an inviting space. Encourage him to enter the crate. Feed the dog in his crate. Begin closing the door behind him. Don't reward the dog for whining. Comfort your dog during long crate sessions.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Eat-Marmite
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How to Eat Marmite
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To eat marmite, try spreading a pea-sized amount on some toast or bread. If the taste is too overpowering, mix the marmite with some butter or another spread to dilute it. You can also add some marmite to soup or stew to give it a rich, savory flavor, or pair it with a cheese spread. Also, try spreading some marmite and butter over roasted meats and seafood to create a savory glaze. Some people even enjoy mixing a half teaspoon of marmite in with their spaghetti before eating it.
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Spread Marmite very sparingly. In Britain and other places where Marmite is popular, it's often eaten as a spread on toast, crackers, and other baked bread products. Since Marmite has such a strong salty, yeasty taste, it's usually eaten in small quantities even by its fans. If you're using your Marmite as a spread, rather than using a full spoonful of it like you might for jam or peanut butter, instead, use a tiny pea-sized amount (like you would for toothpaste). Ideally, when you spread this tiny amount of Marmite on your bread, it should leave a paper-thin layer of Marmite — just enough to discolor the bread. You don't want any noticeable "thickness" to the Marmite, as this will give a seriously overpowering taste. Mix Marmite with butter (or another spread) to dilute the taste. One of the most common ingredients to combine with Marmite is butter, especially when the Marmite is being used as a spread. Butter's rich, smooth taste pairs well with the strong, salty flavor of Marmite. If you hate Marmite, try applying a generous helping of butter to your bread before or after you spread on the Marmite — the more you use, the less you'll taste the Marmite. To many, this makes Marmite much more palatable. Take small bites. Getting used to eating Marmite is like the old saying about how to boil a frog — if you drop a frog into a pot of hot water, it will jump out, but if you drop it into a pot of lukewarm water and slowly increase the heat, it won't know anything's wrong until it's too late! Rather than trying to wolf down your Marmite in a few huge bites, instead, take small nibbles to begin. Gradually, as you make progress, the strong, salty taste should become more bearable. If you're having a hard time swallowing even small bites of your Marmite spread, try moving each bite carefully to the back of your mouth so that you can swallow it without much chewing. This should minimize the amount you have to taste the Marmite, but be careful — you'll need to take small bites to be able to swallow them without choking. Take big drinks with each bite. To keep the overpowering taste of Marmite under control, try taking a drink after each bite of Marmite you take. The drink will act as a chaser — the more you sip, the less you'll taste the Marmite and the quicker the taste will leave your mouth. Plain, ordinary tap water is a good zero-calorie chaser, but if you really hate the taste of Marmite, you may want to consider a stronger-tasting beverage. After each bite, try drinking a swig of your favorite soft drink, or, if you're old enough, a stiff cocktail. The strong flavors of these beverages should help "drown out" the Marmite taste. Try not to smell Marmite before you eat it. The senses of taste and smell closely interact with each other to produce the "effect" that you experience when eating food. The way something smells can affect the way it tastes to you (and vice versa). If you hate the taste of Marmite, there's a very good chance you won't care for its smell, either. In this case, try your hardest not to smell the Marmite as you eat it. Usually, the taste, though still strong, will be a little less intense if you make an effort to hold your breath until the Marmite has been swallowed (or nearly so). Pair Marmite with strong-tasting foods to minimize its taste. Perhaps the single easiest way to make Marmite more manageable is to simply not make it the central feature of your dish. Pairing Marmite with other foods (especially ones with distinctive, powerful flavors of their own) can make it much more palatable. Though you may never enjoy Marmite by itself, you may even find that you enjoy it when paired with other foods or used as a minor ingredient in a large recipe! There's no "wrong" way to eat Marmite — any food you enjoy it with is fair game. Just a few foods that some Marmite fans enjoy pairing their favorite yeasty spread with are eggs, cheese, meat, seafood, apricots, marmalade, and more! In the next section, we'll explore a few more flavorful Marmite combinations. Feel free to use any of them as you see fit, or make your own! Add Marmite to soups and stews for savory flavor. In small quantities, Marmite can give soups, stews, and other hearty liquid dishes a rich, savory flavor (and also works great as a browning agent). For instance, try mixing a spoonful of Marmite into a pot of French onion soup in place of beef stock — the flavor of the finished soup goes great with bread and cheese, just like ordinary Marmite. In general, you can usually get away with substituting Marmite mixed with water, your favorite vegetables, and a little oil for beef broth. This can allow you to make great-tasting vegetarian versions of all your favorite carnivorous soups and stews. Pair Marmite with cheeses. Many Marmite fans agree: the spread pairs deliciously with a wide variety of cheeses. Sharp cheddar is an especially great choice — the salty, yeasty flavor of the Marmite enhances the "sharpness" of the cheese, making for a bold-flavored (but tasty) combination. Try adding a few slices of cheese to standard Marmite and butter toast for a satisfying breakfast. Use Marmite as a glaze for roast meats. Though it may sound odd, Marmite can be a tasty ingredient to include in glazes and sauces for meat dishes. Used correctly, Marmite can give the outer "crust" of roasted meats, poultry, and seafood a rich, distinct "umami" (savory) flavor. Try painting a light mixture of melted butter and Marmite over a whole roasted chicken for a savory treat — you should only need a spoonful or two to cover it. If you use Marmite as a meat glaze, you may want to forego sprinkling salt from the salt shaker on your meat, especially if you need to be careful about your sodium intake. Marmite has a very high salt content — it's more than 10% salt by mass! Use Marmite sparingly on spaghetti. Believe it or not, some people not only eat their spaghetti with Marmite — they love it. If you're willing to experiment, try adding a half teaspoon of Marmite to al dente noodles along with a small helping of olive oil! You may want to avoid using fine tomato sauces or cheeses to top your dish until you're positive that you enjoy it! Note that some fans of this recipe describe the flavor as being similar to the British snack food "Twiglets". Hard boil two eggs. If you've recently gained an appreciation for Marmite and you're looking to expand your repertoire, try this Marmite-centered sampler dish, which works as a hearty meal on its own and scales easily for larger groups. Start by boiling a few eggs in a pot of water until they're hard boiled. Depending on the size of the eggs, this should take about eight to ten minutes. Run cold water over the eggs after they're done cooking. Cooling them down halts the cooking process and prevents them from overcooking. Prepare the vegetables. Next, let's get our vegetables ready for the Marmite. Wash a bell pepper, a handful of cherry tomatoes, a cucumber, a carrot, and a few clumps of broccoli under running water. Cut each into small bite-size pieces. Any shapes that look appealing are fine, but, for efficiency's sake, you'll probably want to julienne your bell pepper (cut it into skinny strips) and take thin circular slices from your cucumber. . Make toast Finally, make a few golden-brown slices of Marmite's most well-known companion dish. You can use white, wheat, or even specialty breads like sourdough and rye here — it's up to you! When the toast is ready, butter it. As noted above, butter and Marmite pair quite well together. Plate your ingredients with Marmite in the middle. Arrange your vegetables, eggs, and toast in a circle around the outside of a large plate. Open a jar of Marmite and place it in the center of the dish. Don't forget to peel your hard-boiled eggs. If you'd like to use them to hold Marmite like crackers, cut the eggs into quarters or eights to make skinny, curved slices. Enjoy the Marmite experience to the fullest! Using a butter knife, put small portions of Marmite on each piece of vegetable or egg before biting in. You can eat the toast without Marmite as a "chaser" to ready your mouth for the next bit piece of Marmite, or, if you're bold, just spread a tiny dollop of Marmite on each piece of bread. If you want to, you can even dip your foods directly into the jar of Marmite. Be careful — it's easy to get more Marmite than you intended this way!
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Spread Marmite very sparingly. Mix Marmite with butter (or another spread) to dilute the taste. Take small bites. Take big drinks with each bite. Try not to smell Marmite before you eat it. Pair Marmite with strong-tasting foods to minimize its taste. Add Marmite to soups and stews for savory flavor. Pair Marmite with cheeses. Use Marmite as a glaze for roast meats. Use Marmite sparingly on spaghetti. Hard boil two eggs. Prepare the vegetables. . Plate your ingredients with Marmite in the middle. Enjoy the Marmite experience to the fullest!
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https://www.wikihow.com/Get-Rid-of-Nausea-(Without-Medicines)
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How to Get Rid of Nausea (Without Medicines)
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A simple way to help get rid of nausea without medication is to drink room temperature water or warm herbal teas since dehydration can cause nausea. Try to take sips throughout the day instead of drinking an entire glass all at once, and make sure to avoid very cold or very hot drinks. Consider drinking some ginger tea, which has been used to treat nausea caused by pregnancy and chemotherapy for a long time. While ginger tea is safe for pregnant women, just be sure to let your obstetrician know you're drinking it and to only have 1 to 2 cups a day. If you can't stand the taste of ginger, you can either take a ginger supplement or drink peppermint tea instead because peppermint has also been used to help treat nausea.
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Drink enough fluids to stay hydrated. Dehydration can cause nausea, so it is important to get plenty of fluids. Drink room temperature water or warm herbal teas to help ease your nausea. Avoid very cold or very hot drinks. Take sips throughout the day rather than trying to drink a cup or glass of liquid all at once. If you are too nauseous to eat, then include broths such as vegetable, chicken or beef broths for some nutrition as well. For children, call a physician for advice regarding fluids. They may recommend liquids such as Pedialyte, Rehydrate, Resol, and Rice-Lyte because children are more prone to dehydration, especially if they are also vomiting. Adults may want to try Gatorade for an added boost of essential electrolytes. Try a cup of ginger tea. Ginger has long been used to treat the nausea associated with chemotherapy and surgery. Ginger tea is also considered safe for pregnant women. If you are drinking ginger tea for nausea associated with pregnancy, just make sure that you tell your obstetrician and only have one to two cups a day. Most adults can have up to four to six cups of ginger tea a day. To make ginger tea from fresh ginger, peel and chop ½ to 1 teaspoon of fresh ginger. Pour boiling water over the chopped ginger and add lemon and/or honey to taste. If you do not like the taste of ginger tea, then you can try a ginger supplement instead. The recommended dose is 250–1000 mg taken four times a day. Drink a cup of peppermint tea. Peppermint tea can be made by adding boiling water to ½ to 1 teaspoon of dried peppermint leaves, but most stores carry peppermint tea. You can add lemon and/or honey to taste. Peppermint tea is considered “likely safe” for pregnant women and children. Again, make sure you tell your obstetrician and limit the tea to one to two cups a day. Try adding ¼ teaspoon of caraway seeds to the tea to help settle your stomach. Peppermint is also used to help treat Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease (GERD) and Functional Dyspepsia. Prepare a fennel seed tea. Fennel seed tea is made a bit differently. To make fennel seed tea, add ½ to 1 teaspoon of fennel seeds to 6–8 ounces of cold water in a sauce pan. Slowly heat to boiling while stirring. Allow the water to boil for five minutes. Pour the tea through a strainer and then let it cool down. Add lemon and/or honey to taste. It is unclear if fennel seeds are safe for pregnant women because fennel has mild estrogenic effects. If you are pregnant, talk to your physician before using fennel tea. Sip chamomile tea. Chamomile tea has long been used for nausea and upset stomachs. You can find chamomile tea in most stores. It is safe for children, although you may want to use weaker tea. Pregnant women should avoid chamomile tea because it contains phytoestrogens. Do not drink chamomile tea if you are taking anticoagulants, as it has been found to interact with those medications. Brew a cinnamon stick tea. Cinnamon tea can be made similar to how you make fennel seed tea, using ½ stick of cinnamon or ½ teaspoon of powdered cinnamon. Add the cinnamon to 6–8 ounces of cold water in a sauce pan. Then, slowly heat to boiling while stirring. Allow the water to boil for five minutes. Pour the tea through a strainer and then let it cool down. Pregnant women should not use cinnamon tea. Eat bland foods and include the BRAT diet. The BRAT diet consists of bananas, rice, applesauce and dry toast. These foods are very easy on your stomach, but the diet is thought to be too restrictive and does not provide enough nutrition. The BRAT diet is a good place to start, but incorporate other bland foods, such as saltine crackers, rice or sesame crackers, brown rice, toasted whole-grain bread, or chicken without the skin. Don't add any spices or other seasonings to the foods that you eat. Steer clear of spicy foods if you are nauseous. Eat small amounts of food throughout the day. Eating smaller amounts of food can also help to reduce nausea. For example, you can start the day with ½ banana and ½ a piece of whole-grain toast. Then, have some clear broth and crackers. Snack on some applesauce, then have some boiled chicken and rice for dinner. Stick to a low-sodium diet. Sodium may increase feelings of nausea as well, so it is best to stick to a low-sodium diet if you are nauseous. Do not add salt to your foods and avoid foods that are high in sodium. Read labels and try not to exceed 1500 milligrams of sodium total per day. Choose low-fat foods. Fatty foods may increase feelings of nausea as well, so opt for low-fat foods instead, such as lean meats, low fat dairy products, fruits and vegetables, and whole grains prepared without any added oil or butter. Fatty foods include anything that has been fried, meats with skin and marbling, lamb, oils, butter, pastries, and most fast foods. Stay away from foods known to increase nausea. Many people experience worsening nausea as a result of eating certain foods, so it is best to steer clear of these if you are already nauseous. Keep track of any foods that make you nauseous and avoid these foods as much as possible. Some examples of foods that make some people feel nauseous include: Tomatoes Acidic foods (like orange juice and pickles) Chocolate Ice cream Eggs Use aromatherapy. Aromatherapy uses the essential oils of various herbs to produce soothing scents. Apply a drop of peppermint oil, lavender oil, or lemon oil to both your wrists and your temples, then breathe deeply. Make sure you don't have a skin sensitivity to the oil by first putting a single drop of oil on your wrist. If you have a sensitivity, then you may experience a rash, redness or itching. If so, try a different oil or use a different method to deal with your nausea. Make an appointment for acupuncture or acupressure. In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), the body is seen as having a system of energy meridians throughout. Applying needles (as in acupuncture) or pressure (as in acupressure) to specific points along these meridians can help to re-balance the energy and reduce feelings of nausea. Try the “P6,” “Neiguan” or “inner gate” point. This point is about two finger-widths below the crease of your wrists (at the base of the palms). Start with your palms facing you. Feel for two tendons around the midpoint of that area above your wrist. Using the index and middle finger of the opposite hand, apply firm, but gentle pressure for about 10–20 seconds and release. Make sure you repeat this process on the other arm as well. Perform a breathing exercise. The University of Connecticut conducted a study which indicated that controlled, deep breathing can help to relieve nausea. Other studies have indicated that breathing can help control nausea after surgery. Try this exercise adapted from the University of Missouri at Kansas City: Lie flat on your back and place pillows under your knees and neck to make sure that you are comfortable. Put your hands (palm down) on your stomach, right below the rib cage. Place your hands over your belly with your fingers together. This way, you will be able to feel your fingers separate as you breathe in and this will let you know that you are doing the exercise correctly. Take a long, slow deep breath by expanding your belly, breathing like a baby breathes. This ensures that you are using your diaphragm to breathe rather than your rib cage. The diaphragm creates suction that pulls more air into your lungs than by expanding the rib cage. Make sure that your environment is free from irritants. Some environmental irritants may cause you to feel nauseous. These include strong odors, smoke, heat, and humidity. Do your best to avoid these irritants as they can be “triggers” for either nausea or vomiting. Rest and relax as much as you can. Sometimes being stressed, overworked, or physically uncomfortable may cause you to feel nauseous. Some common causes of nausea are stress, anxiety, and muscle strain. Try to rest and relax to help reduce these unpleasant symptoms and prevent them from escalating feelings of nausea. Stay still. When you are feeling nauseous, moving around too much may make matters worse. Try to keep as still as possible to help reduce your feelings of nausea and prevent them from becoming worse. Sit in a comfortable chair or recline on a sofa or bed. Call your doctor if nothing helps or if you have other symptoms. If home remedies do not help to relieve your nausea within a day or so, or if you are vomiting, then call your physician right away to ensure that you don't have a more serious problem. Consider the cause of your nausea. Nausea — often along with vomiting — is a common problem for many people. The feeling of being “sick to your stomach” can be caused by a number of different things, including: Food sensitivities or food allergies Bacterial or viral infections GastroEsophageal Reflux Disease (GERD) and heartburn Medications, especially chemotherapy and radiation treatments Pregnancy (morning sickness) Migraines and other headaches Motion sickness Pain Determine if you may need to seek medical attention. If you have nausea with or without vomiting and it does not go away within 24 hours, call your physician for an appointment right away. If the nausea improves but you still have no appetite, have a headache or have severe stomach or abdominal pain, call your physician for advice. Nausea, especially when it's accompanied by vomiting can be a sign of a more serious condition such as: Appendicitis Intestinal obstruction or blockage Cancer Poisoning Peptic Ulcer Disease (PUD), especially if the vomit resembles coffee grounds
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Drink enough fluids to stay hydrated. Try a cup of ginger tea. Drink a cup of peppermint tea. Prepare a fennel seed tea. Sip chamomile tea. Brew a cinnamon stick tea. Eat bland foods and include the BRAT diet. Eat small amounts of food throughout the day. Stick to a low-sodium diet. Choose low-fat foods. Stay away from foods known to increase nausea. Use aromatherapy. Make an appointment for acupuncture or acupressure. Perform a breathing exercise. Make sure that your environment is free from irritants. Rest and relax as much as you can. Stay still. Call your doctor if nothing helps or if you have other symptoms. Consider the cause of your nausea. Determine if you may need to seek medical attention.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Become-a-Police-Dispatcher
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How to Become a Police Dispatcher
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To become a police dispatcher, start by earning a high school diploma or a GED certificate since most police departments require this for dispatcher positions. Next, work on related skills such as increasing your typing speed and familiarizing yourself with local geography. Then, apply for open dispatcher positions in your area and take the dispatcher exam. Once you pass the dispatcher exam, the police department will contact you for a job interview!
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Earn a high school diploma. Almost every police dispatcher position requires that you have a high school diploma or a GED certificate. These positions also require that you are at least 18 years old. If you have not yet graduated from high school or you are pursing your GED, you must successfully complete one of these programs in order to be considered for a dispatcher position. Maintain a clear criminal record. Most dispatcher jobs require that you pass a criminal background check and in some cases, may require that you pass a lie detector test. If you were arrested for a minor offense, this may not prevent you from becoming a police dispatcher. As discussed below, once you have identified an open position, you can determine whether you meet the specific requirements for that position. Develop basic typing skills. Police dispatchers are required to type information quickly and accurately. Most police dispatcher positions will require you to demonstrate basic typing skills, such as speed and accuracy as part of the application process. In preparation, you should practice typing until you are able to type 35 words per minute with 90% accuracy. You can check your accuracy and typing speed by using a free online typing test. Familiarize yourself with local geography. Police dispatchers must be knowledgeable about their local geography in order to properly assess and assign emergency response personnel, as well as identify the location of callers. If you know the location where you want to work, study maps of the local area, learn the names of neighborhoods and gain an understanding of the basic layout of your location, including any major landmarks. Search online job sites for police dispatcher positions. Some police departments post employment opportunities for police dispatchers on large, commercial job sites in order to attract the largest applicant pool. A simple way to begin your online job search is to perform an internet search that includes language such as, police dispatcher job openings and that also includes the geographic region that you are interested in working. For example, “police dispatcher job openings in Sacramento, CA.” This basic search may direct you to job postings on large job sites. Search the internet for police department, city, or town websites where you are interested in working. If online job sites did not capture employment opportunities in your preferred work location, you should determine if police departments or municipalities where you are interested in working maintain their own websites. These websites may list employment opportunities, job descriptions, job requirements and salary. Call police departments, if you were unable to locate employment openings online. Increasingly, police departments and municipalities provide employment opportunities online. If you are unable to locate this information, call the relevant police departments' non-emergency phone number. Inquire whether there are any job openings for police dispatchers and ask about the job requirements. While jobs may vary, many police dispatcher positions will require the following: obtain a high school diploma or GED certificate basic typing skills pass a written exam pass a criminal background check speak English or other languages pass a vision and hearing test pass a drug test Request and fill out a job application. Once you have identified a job opening and meet the minimum job requirements, either download the application from the police department, city or town website, request an application by mail, or pick it up in person. Typically, job applications will require contact information, background information (education, work history, references), and may ask you about any criminal convictions. It is essential that you answer all of the questions truthfully. Prepare for the police dispatcher exam. Ask your local police department if they provide a study guide for the exam. Some governmental websites also provide free, downloadable study guides. In preparation for the exam: read through the study guide familiarize yourself with the exam format and types of questions practice answering the questions Take the police dispatcher exam. Most likely, the police department will ask you to take a written exam, as well as other tests, such as a typing test. On the day of the exam you should: arrive on time for your scheduled exam and carefully read all of the exam instructions determine whether the instructions set forth how points are calculated consider skipping questions that you can't answer if the exam penalizes for incorrect answers consider answering all of the questions if the exam only awards points for correct answers be mindful that you are answering questions quickly enough to finish the test within the allotted time Prepare for your job interview. If you meet the basic job requirements and scored satisfactorily on the exam, the police department may schedule you for an in-person job interview. The interview allows employers to assess how well you are able to answer questions, respond to hypothetical emergency situations, and judge whether your demeanor fits well within the office and for the job. Before the interview, study the job requirements, review your exam study information practice answering interview questions based on your study material be able to clearly articulate why you are interested in the job Attend your scheduled job interview. On the day of the interview: arrive five to ten minutes before your scheduled interview, dress in professional attire , and be enthusiastic and confident. Tell the interviewers why you are interested in the position, discuss your qualifications and your desire to be trained as a police dispatcher. Accept the position. If you are offered a position you may have the opportunity to negotiate your salary. The average salary for police dispatchers is approximately $36,300. If your job offer is within this salary range, you may still consider negotiating for a higher salary. If they are not willing to raise the salary, ask the employer to specify the amount and type of job training and certifications. While you may not have a higher salary to start, completed training and certifications may put you in a better position to renegotiate your salary at a later date or seek employment elsewhere as a trained, certified and experienced police dispatcher.
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Earn a high school diploma. Maintain a clear criminal record. Develop basic typing skills. Familiarize yourself with local geography. Search online job sites for police dispatcher positions. Search the internet for police department, city, or town websites where you are interested in working. Call police departments, if you were unable to locate employment openings online. Request and fill out a job application. Prepare for the police dispatcher exam. Take the police dispatcher exam. Prepare for your job interview. Attend your scheduled job interview. Accept the position.
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https://www.wikihow.life/Candle-an-Egg
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How to Candle an Egg
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To candle an egg, start by setting up your candling equipment in a dark room close to the incubator. Next, place the larger end of the egg against the light, and tilt it until you get the best view. Mark the eggs as you go, making notes on what you see so you can keep track of the egg's development. Then, return the egg to the incubator, ideally within 20-30 minutes to keep the egg from getting too cold. Additionally, only candle an egg on days 7 and 14 since you want to keep them safe in the incubator as much as possible.
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Understand why you need to candle your eggs. When you are hatching eggs at home, it is good practice to keep track of how the eggs are developing. However, this can be very difficult (if not impossible) without the use of candling. Candling involves shining a bright light into the egg, allowing you to see its contents and check whether it is developing properly. When you are hatching eggs at home, you will never get a 100% hatch rate. Some eggs will not be fertile to begin with (these are called "yolkers") while others will stop developing at some point during the incubation process (these are known as "quitters"). It is important that you are able to identify and remove these yolkers and quitters during the incubation process, otherwise they can begin to rot and eventually burst inside the incubator, contaminating the other eggs with bacteria and creating a very bad smell. Use the correct candling equipment. Candling equipment doesn't need to be very fancy or specific - in fact, in the old days it used to be done with the flame from a candle (hence the name). The main requirement is a bright light (the brighter the better) with an opening smaller than the diameter of the eggs you intend to candle. You will need to conduct the candling in a very dark room in order to see inside the egg. You can buy specific egg candling devices at any poultry supply store. These usually look like small flashlights which are powered either by batteries or a plug-in cord. You can make your own egg candler at home by placing a 60 watt light bulb inside a coffee can and making a hole with a 1 inch (2.5 cm) diameter in the top of the can. Alternatively, you can take a very bright flashlight and cover the opening with a piece of cardboard with a hole (1 inch in diameter) in the middle. A more high-tech, expensive option for candling eggs is known as an Ovascope. This has a rotating stand on which you place the egg. The egg is then covered by a hood which blocks out any ambient light. You can then view the egg through an eyepiece, which magnifies the egg slightly for easier inspection. Follow an appropriate candling schedule. You should candle your eggs before you even put them in the incubator. You probably won't be able to see anything, let alone differentiate between good and bad eggs, but it will give you an indication of what an undeveloped egg looks like, which can be useful for comparison later. It may also be helpful to look out for any tiny cracks which are not visible to the naked eye. Cracked eggs are more susceptible to harmful bacteria getting inside and affecting the development of the embryo. If you find an egg with a crack, do not discard it just yet, but make sure to take note of the crack and check the egg's progress later. Although some people will candle their eggs every day while they are incubating, it is a good idea to wait until about day seven. There are two reasons for this. Number one: Eggs are temperature sensitive and constantly moving them in and out of the incubator could negatively affect their development, especially at this early stage. Number two: Before day seven the eggs will not have developed very much and it will be difficult to distinguish between good and bad eggs. After the candling on day seven you should leave the eggs alone til about day fourteen. At this point, you will be able to double check any eggs that you were uncertain about the first time and discard them if there are still no signs of development. You should refrain from candling after day sixteen or seventeen, as the eggs should not be moved or even turned in the days leading up to the hatching. In addition, the embryos will have developed so much by this stage that they will fill the inside of the egg, so you will be able to see very little. Hold the egg above the light. Set up your candling equipment in a dark room within close proximity to the incubator. Select an egg from the incubator and hold it above the light. The correct way to do this is as follows: Place the larger end of the egg (where the air sac is) directly against the light. Hold the egg near the top, between your thumb and forefinger. Tilt the egg slightly to one side and rotate until you get the best view. As you work, you should mark each egg with a number and take notes on your findings. That way, you can compare the results of your first candling with the results of your second candling. Try to work quickly, but not so fast that you risk dropping the egg. As long as the eggs are returned to the incubator within twenty minutes to half an hour, there is no risk of the candling process affecting their development. A mother hen will frequently leave her eggs for short periods of time while she is incubating them. Be aware that it will be more difficult to candle brown or speckled eggs as the dark shells do not become as transparent under the light. Look for signs that the egg is a winner. A winner is an egg with a successfully developing embryo. You can tell if an egg is a winner using the following signs: There will be a visible network of blood vessels spreading from the center of the egg outwards. With a weaker candler, you might just be able to make out the clear bottom half of the egg (where the air sac is) and the darker top half of the egg (where the embryo is developing). With a good candler, you might be able to see the dark outline of the embryo at the center of the network of blood vessels. You are most likely to see the embryo's eyes, which are the darkest spots inside the egg. If you're lucky, you might see the embryo moving! Look for signs that the egg is a quitter. A quitter is an embryo which has stopped developing at some point during incubation, for one reason or another. Some quit due to poorly maintained temperatures or humidity, some are contaminated by bacteria, while others simply have bad genes. The main indication that an egg is a quitter is the development of a blood ring. A blood ring looks like a well-defined red circle, which is visible on the inside of the shell. It forms when the embryo dies and the blood vessels supporting it pull away from the center and rest against the shell. Other indications that an egg is a quitter include the development of blood spots or blood streaks inside the egg. However, these dark patches can be difficulty to distinguish from a healthy embryo at this early stage. If you are 100% certain that the egg is a quitter (the appearance of a blood ring is a very definite sign) then you should discard the egg immediately to prevent it from turning bad and exploding inside the incubator. Look for signs that the egg is a yolker. A yolker is an egg that was never fertilized and has no chance of developing an embryo. You can tell if an egg is a yolker using the following signs: The egg looks the exact same as it did when you first candled the eggs before putting them in the incubator. The inside of the egg looks fairly clear, with no visible dark spots, blood vessels or blood rings. If you are unsure, leave the eggs alone. If you think you might have identified a yolker or a quitter, but are not 100% sure, do not discard them just yet. If you do, you run the risk of throwing away healthy eggs. Just make a note of which eggs have a question mark over them, then place them back in the incubator. It is always worth giving them another chance. Check the questionable eggs again on day fourteen. If there are still no obvious signs of development or if a blood ring has finally formed, you can discard them.
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Understand why you need to candle your eggs. Use the correct candling equipment. Follow an appropriate candling schedule. Hold the egg above the light. Look for signs that the egg is a winner. Look for signs that the egg is a quitter. Look for signs that the egg is a yolker. If you are unsure, leave the eggs alone.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Have-a-Rabbit-Friendly-Garden
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How to Have a Rabbit Friendly Garden
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To keep your rabbit safe in the garden, create a secure, enclosed area where it can wander without escaping or being harassed by predators. You'll also need to provide a hutch where it can go to hide and stay out of the elements. Make sure to add a lock so that clever predators can't unlatch the hutch at night. If your rabbit will be moving around freely in the garden, put away chemicals and dangerous yard tools where the rabbit can't get at them. Also, clean up any debris and litter that might harm the rabbit, such as food packaging, cigarette butts, or small toys.
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Keep your rabbit in a securely enclosed area. If you want your rabbit to be able to roam freely in your garden, the entire perimeter needs to be completely fenced in and free from holes. This will prevent your rabbit from escaping and predators from getting in. Alternatively, you can create a rabbit run or pen that keeps your rabbit safely in a specific area of your garden. Pick sturdy, durable materials for fencing, such as vinyl, wood, iron, concrete, brick, or masonry. Chicken wire will not keep predators out. If there are any gaps between your fencing planks, they should be completely lined from top to ground with a heavy-gauge metal wire with a diameter that is no more than 2.5mm so that your rabbit and potential predators cannot wiggle or chew through it. Consider privacy fencing so that predators can't see in. They're less likely to attack what they can't see. If you opt for a run or pen, the wire mesh should be of a heavy-gauge with gaps no bigger than 2.5mm. The edges should be secured, either by digging at least 8 inches of the bottom into the ground or by placing heavy flagstones all around it. Provide your rabbit with shelter. The easiest way to protect your rabbit when they are outdoors by themselves is to get them a hutch. Hutches should provide spacious, secure enclosures with shade, insulation, and ventilation. Most come with a wooden home for your rabbit to rest in and an airy rove for them to play in. The hutch should be elevated on legs or have a heavy-gauge wire mesh flooring to keep other animals out. A hutch is an absolute essential if your rabbit sleeps outside. Lock your hutch. Foxes and badgers are experts at unlatching hutches. If you want to keep your rabbit outdoors at night, be sure to put a padlock on the door of their hutch. Put away tools and chemicals. Keep toxic chemicals, like antifreeze or pesticides, and dangerous tools, like a saw or lawn mower, safely locked away in a shed. Be sure that there are no holes or gaps in the structure that will allow your rabbit to squeeze into the shed. Keep your garden clean. Pick up any debris or litter that could be harmful to your pet. Ensure the area is clear of litter, such as cigarette butts or food packaging, as well as toys and tools that may attract your rabbit. Provide plenty of fresh water. Keep your rabbit's water dish constantly replenished. Hydration is important to their health and essential during summer months to help prevent heat stroke. Providing them with a constant supply of clean water will also help ensure that they won't go anywhere else looking for a drink. Avoid growing plants that are toxic to rabbits. Rabbits aren't picky. Your rabbit will likely chew on anything and everything it comes across. Some common garden species can cause sickness, long-term health problems, or even death when ingested, so it's important that you ensure there are no poisonous plants within your pet's reach. It's always best to keep your rabbit away from evergreen trees, evergreen shrubs, and flowers grown from bulbs. Flowers that are toxic to bunnies include azaleas, bluebells, buttercups, clematis, columbine, dahlias, foxglove, ivy, hellebore, hemlock, lupin, mistletoe, poppy, primrose, rhododendron, and wisteria. When in doubt, look up if a particular plant is toxic to rabbits. Medirabbit offers an extensive list of poisonous species that's available here: http://www.medirabbit.com/EN/GI_diseases/Food/Toxic_plants_en.pdf Grow a bunny garden. Rabbits are herbivores who are famous for nibbling on (or even decimating) garden crops. This means that you can grow much of their food yourself if you want to. Dedicate one bed or more to plants your rabbit loves to eat. The staple of a rabbit's diet is grass hay, but they will be thrilled if you supplement it with fresh fruit and vegetables. Greens, like kale, dark-leaf lettuces, radish tops, and spring greens, are a safe staple for bunnies. They'll also go for broccoli, sprouts, carrots, green beans, pea pods, and peppers. Rabbits love garden fruit, but they should only be fed about two tablespoons a day since it is high in sugar. Try apples, peaches, pears, blackberries, blueberries, raspberries, and/or strawberries. Herbs and flowers can also whet your rabbit's appetite. Basil, coriander, dill, parsley, rosemary, borage, chamomile, comfrey, clover, lavender, nasturtiums, dandelions, and yarrow are all good options to feed your rabbit in moderation. Practice chemical-free gardening. Do not use any weed killers, insecticides, or synthetic fertilizers on areas where you allow your rabbit to roam. Your rabbit can absorb these harmful chemicals through playing in the grass and ingesting plants. Instead, opt for organic gardening practices in those places where you keep your rabbit. For example, use natural, non-toxic alternatives to synthetic fertilizers, such as nutrient-rich soils that are suited to each plant, crop rotation, and organic fertilizers. Your rabbit's droppings actually offer an excellent organic alternative to synthetic fertilizer. Sprinkle them over the top of your beds, or work them just under the surface of the soil with a rake or trowel to give your plants a slow-release dose of nutrients and nitrogen. You can also mix rabbit manure into your compost pile to enrich your compost. Keep your plants safe. If you want to keep your rabbit away from particular plants and crops, be sure to safeguard them with fencing. Use chicken wire so that light can still get through to your plants. The fencing should be at least 3 feet tall with an extra half a foot buried underground to prevent digging under it. The mesh should be no bigger than 1 inch. You can also keep your rabbit confined to an area of the garden where they can't get to your plant beds. Give your rabbit toys. Rabbits are known for destroying gardens with their chewing and digging. To minimize these destructive behaviors, provide them with toys when they're outside that offer convenient alternatives to having their way with your yard. Chew toys like wicker balls and willow sticks can distract your rabbit from your plants. Tunnel toys and digging boxes can keep your rabbit entertained while protecting them from the sun and possible predators. They also allow your pet to express their digging impulses in a safe way instead of destroying your raised beds or scooping out an escape route. Move your rabbit’s run frequently. If you're keeping your rabbit in a pen or run, regularly relocate where it is in your garden to minimize the impact on your grass. That way, you can maintain a healthy lawn that both you and your bunny can enjoy.
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Keep your rabbit in a securely enclosed area. Provide your rabbit with shelter. Lock your hutch. Put away tools and chemicals. Keep your garden clean. Provide plenty of fresh water. Avoid growing plants that are toxic to rabbits. Grow a bunny garden. Practice chemical-free gardening. Keep your plants safe. Give your rabbit toys. Move your rabbit’s run frequently.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Describe-the-Setting-in-a-Story
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How to Describe the Setting in a Story
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To describe the setting in a story, use all 5 senses to help your readers imagine what you're describing. For example, if your story takes place at a beach, you could describe how the sand feels soft and the air tastes salty. However, try to stick with a few main details so you're not overwhelming your readers, and space your descriptions out throughout your story instead of cramming them into 1 long paragraph. If you need some inspiration, try visiting a location that's similar to your setting or looking up pictures online.
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Incorporate the 5 senses to your description. Using touch, taste, sight, sound, and smell can add immersive details to your story that helps readers put themselves in your character's shoes. Think about the setting you've created and make a list of the specific sensory details your character would experience in the location. For example, if your setting is the beach, you could describe the feeling of sand between your character's toes, the taste the salt in the air, the sound of the waves, the briny smell of the water, and the shape of the sand dunes. Visit a location similar to your setting if you can to experience it for yourself. If you're basing your story in a real-life location, take a trip to the place so you can pick out specific details. Keep a small notebook and pen with you and write down what you're experiencing. Incorporate those details into your story to give it more authenticity. If you can't visit the location yourself, research online for firsthand accounts of people in the area. Pull details from what they've experienced, but be sure not to plagiarize them. Look at photographs of a similar setting for inspiration on specific details. If you're having trouble imagining your setting, search for pictures online of similar locations. Look for small details in the pictures that you could include in your own story. Save the pictures and write a few of the details down so you don't forget about them. If you're writing about a real-life location, use Google Street View to look at the area to pull even more specific details. Look on websites like Artstation and Pinterest if you're writing about a made-up universe to get visual inspiration for what your setting could look like. Mix real-life details with your imagination to make the setting specific to your story. Include references to give clues to the time your story takes place. If you're writing a story that takes place in the past, research real events that took place that you can incorporate in your story. Try to incorporate at least 1-2 references of the time period, such as technology, clothing, and the culture, so your reader gets immersed in your story. For example, if you're writing a story that takes place soon after World War II, you may say, “The planes tore through the city, leaving piles of burnt rubble where our houses used to be,” to reference how a battle affected the town's landscape. Choose 3-4 main details to focus on to create a feeling for the space. Too many details could be overwhelming to your reader and they could cause your story to slow down. Choose a few major details of the location that your character might interact with and incorporate them in your writing. For example, if you're describing an abandoned house, you might focus on the wallpaper peeling off of the walls, broken stairs leading to the second floor, and how the windows are covered with rotting boards. Spread the details throughout your writing to avoid long paragraphs. Avoid writing 1 paragraph that explains the setting since readers may skip it if there isn't any action happening. Instead, mention a few details at the beginning of the paragraph followed by your character's actions. If you need more detail in the paragraph, include more near the end of the paragraph. For example, if you're writing about an abandoned house like before, you may write, “I tried to peek through the windows, but the rotting boards blocked my view. I pushed open the door, and it swung open with the loud creak of rusty hinges. As I walked inside, my fingers ran over wallpaper peeling away from the drywall.” This way, details are conveyed throughout the paragraph without being overwhelming. Use metaphors and similes to create figurative descriptions of your setting. Many setting descriptions of setting talk about what the character is literally experiencing, but using figurative language can help readers make connections easier. Compare something in your setting to something else to help convey a mood for your setting. For example, you may write something like, “The wires covered the basement floor, like vines waiting to ensnare me in their trap,” to convey how dense the wires are in a basement. Avoid over-describing settings that don’t matter to the characters. Backdrop settings are not important to the story, so don't include too many details to describe it. Integral settings, however, influence how your character responds and reacts to their environment. Put more time and focus on details for settings that are important to your characters. For example, if your character is walking down a street and having a conversation, it's not important to include detailed descriptions. However, if your story involves a car accident, you might add descriptions like a streetlight that's flickering or a stop sign that was stolen. Try to have most, if not all, of the settings in your story integral settings for your character. Describe how your character interacts with the setting to keep your story moving. Commonly referred to as “show, don't tell,” explain how your character moves throughout your setting while including small details. This will make your story and descriptions more exciting and engaging for your readers. For example, instead of writing, “A log was in front of her. She tripped over it,” you may write something like, “As she rushed through the dark forest path, her foot caught on a log and she fell into the tall grass.” Write about how a change in setting affects your characters. Settings should create different emotions in your character. Use weather and time of day to match how your character is feeling, or change the setting suddenly and describe how it changes your character's mood. For example, if your character is sad you may say, “As she wiped the tears off her cheek, the sun disappeared and a slow patter of rain started to thrum on the pavement. A gust of cold wind blew right through her.” Use setting to help express your character’s feelings or the story’s theme. Theme and setting have an important connection in your story, so make sure they relate to one another. Consider the theme of your story, and work in specific details about the setting to make them reflect one another. For example, if your story is about someone learning to love another person, you could have the setting change from winter to summer to convey the message that your characters are warming up to one another.
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Incorporate the 5 senses to your description. Visit a location similar to your setting if you can to experience it for yourself. Look at photographs of a similar setting for inspiration on specific details. Include references to give clues to the time your story takes place. Choose 3-4 main details to focus on to create a feeling for the space. Spread the details throughout your writing to avoid long paragraphs. Use metaphors and similes to create figurative descriptions of your setting. Avoid over-describing settings that don’t matter to the characters. Describe how your character interacts with the setting to keep your story moving. Write about how a change in setting affects your characters. Use setting to help express your character’s feelings or the story’s theme.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Prepare-for-a-High-Altitude-Hike
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How to Prepare for a High Altitude Hike
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To prepare for a high altitude hike, start by doing activities such as biking or swimming to improve your cardiovascular endurance and help you control your breathing. Additionally, incorporate running into your training to strengthen your leg muscles and get them ready for intense climbing. You may also want to train while wearing a backpack containing all your supplies to ensure that you can handle the extra weight while you're hiking at a high altitude.
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Begin training well in advance. Plan the amount of training you will do based on the difficulty of your hike, and your current fitness level. If you are reasonably fit, and attempting a challenging hike, then you will probably want to schedule at least 5 months of training before your hike is scheduled. If you are really out of shape, you may need to train for much, much longer. Remember that you can never start training too early, but you can start too late. Have a talk with your doctor to make sure that you will not be endangering yourself by taking on this challenge. Train for your hike at higher altitudes. If possible, train for your hike at altitudes at or above 5,000 feet (1,524 m). This will create the ideal training situation, as your body will get used to performing in low oxygen conditions. If this isn't an option for you, don't worry. There are several other steps you can take to train yourself for your hike. Use biking as a way to improve your cardiovascular endurance. Biking is one good way to improve your cardiovascular fitness. If you are not training at higher altitudes, you can still improve your fitness by biking up hills whenever possible. Be sure to wear protective gear while you are biking. A helmet should not be optional. You won't be able to enjoy your hike if you seriously injure yourself because you chose not to wear protective gear while training. Go swimming to improve cardiovascular endurance. Another excellent way to improve your cardiovascular fitness is to swim. An added advantage of swimming is that it forces you to control your breathing (since you have to hold your breath during certain strokes). Stick to strokes such as the crawl stroke (also known as freestyle), which will require you to keep your face in the water for a few strokes before you turn your head to breathe. Practice holding your breath for up to 5 or 6 strokes before taking a breath if you can. Run to improve cardiovascular fitness. Another great way to train for your hike is to get into running. Next to actual hiking, running will be the most similar type of training in terms of movements, so this will be a great way to get your legs prepared for what lies ahead. If you have never run before, you will have to start out slow, but eventually you will want to work your way up to 3 to 5 days of training for 30 minutes to an hour each training session. During each session, you will want to train at a pace that keeps your heart rate at 70% to 85% of your maximum heart rate. You can calculate what your maximum heart rate should be by subtracting your age from 220. Therefore, if you are 20 years old, your maximum heart rate would be 200. Meaning that you should try not to ever let your heart beat faster than that. 70% of your maximum heart rate would then be 140, and 85% of your maximum heart rate would be 170. Thus, during your training, you will want to keep your heart beating between 140 and 170 beats per minute (BPM) A heart rate monitor is perfect for this. Typically, a heart rate monitor is a strap you can purchase at online or at sports supply stores. The strap wraps around your rib cage, just below your chest. The strap then, typically, reports your BPM to a watch that you wear on your wrist. Climb stairs to strengthen leg muscles and lungs. This is another great way to do something that resembles what your hike will be like. You can find a tall building, put your pack on, and simply start walking up the stairs. Try to do something like this at least one day per week. If you can't find a tall building, look for a local high school football stadium. Here, you can walk up and down each row of stairs over and over again. Aim to train for 30 minutes to an hour. Train with your pack on. When you are hiking, you will likely be carrying all of the supplies you need for your entire trip in a big backpack, which means it could be pretty heavy. Pack in everything you will want to take on your trip and wear it while you are training (or at least the weight of what you plant to pack), this way you will know what to expect, and whether or not you can manage the weight you have packed. If you are struggling to carry the weight at a low altitude, then you need to reduce the weight significantly, as you definitely won't be able to manage it at a higher altitude. Obviously you can't wear the pack when swimming, but you can wear it on the bike, while running, or even while out for a walk. Visit your doctor. Though you may think you are the picture of health, it would be wise to visit your doctor for a check up before you go. Explain that you are about to take on a high altitude hike, so you want to make sure there aren't any underlying health issues you should be concerned about. Ideally, you should schedule this visitation before you begin your training so you don't set yourself up for a disappointment a week before your hike. Plan your route well in advance. How much planning you need to do depends on where you are hiking. If you're following a well-known hiking trail, you can contact the organization responsible for it's maintenance. They will usually send you maps and safety information about the routes you are interested in (sometimes in exchange for a minimal fee). If you are planning to hike through relatively uncharted territory, then planning your route will require considerably more attention. You need to ensure that you are allowed to hike in the area. The land you want to hike on may be privately owned, which means there may or may not be an agreement allowing you to hike there. Therefore, you should contact the local area commissioner. Tell them about your planned route, and ask them if you will be violating any laws by hiking there. Don't forget to consider the time of year. During the winter, the days are shorter, and you won't have as much daylight so you won't be able to hike for as long. On the other hand, if you are hiking in a very hot climate, it may not be advisable to hike during the hottest part of the day. It is recommended that you do not hike for more than six hours each day. Be sure that you understand what all map symbols mean, and ensure that your planned route does not take you through terrain that you cannot cross. For example, if you plan to cross a river, where will you be able to cross safely? Have at least one detailed, alternative route. Ideally, you will have two or three routes, but you must have at least one. In case of emergency, you need to know how you can find help quickly. You also need to have alternative routes in case your planned route is not accessible for some reason. Let someone know where you're going. You should not take on a high altitude hike alone. Ideally, you will be going in a group of two or more. In any case, let someone at home know your exact hiking plan. When you will begin the hike, when your scheduled end date is, and the exact route of the hike. Give them a number where they can reach you (if you have one), and let them know when you will get in touch. This may sound scary, and in most cases, it will be for nothing, but it is better to be safe than sorry as nature can be very unpredictable. If you are hiking from place to place each day, let someone in the town know when you will be arriving. For example, if you plan to sleep at a hostel one night, tell them what your planned arrival time is, and what trail you are hiking. This way, they will be more aware if you don't arrive within a couple of hours of your expected arrival. Arrive 2 to 3 days before your hike is to begin. This will allow your body to acclimate to the reduced amount of oxygen in the air. During this time you can make sure all of your gear is packed properly. During your waiting time, do some moderate exercise to get your body ready for the hike. You can also enjoy a short vacation before your hike, enjoying the area around the starting point, and meeting some other people who might also be doing the hike. Pack extra clothes. On a hike, the weather can vary greatly. At higher altitudes especially, temperature can fluctuate greatly. Therefore, try to be prepared for several scenarios. Have long pants, a long-sleeved shirt, a hat, and a pair of gloves that will protect you from several potential weather scenarios. Consider the time of year as well. If you are hiking in the summer, be prepared for higher temperatures, but be aware that temperatures can still drop below freezing at night. During the winter, be prepared for potential freezing temperatures, as well as snow. Don't forget sunscreen. The sun's rays are more powerful at high elevations, so make sure you have plenty of sunscreen to apply to any skin that will be exposed during your hike. Make sure to choose a sunscreen that has an SPF of at least 30. Remember that the sun can still affect you even if it is overcast. Wear sunglasses to protect your eyes. Just like sunscreen protects your skin from the harmful rays of the sun, sun glasses protect your eyes. Without them, you will likely be very uncomfortable hiking all day if it is sunny and/or snowy. Squinting into the sun for a long time is likely to give you a headache. Snow can be very blinding, especially when it is sunny. Bring a hat. If it is winter, make sure the hat is warm. In summer, the hat will be mainly to protect you from the sun. If you have the space, pack a warm weather hat and a cool weather hat. That way you will be prepared if the temperature drops significantly. Pack a sturdy pair of hiking boots. Probably one of the most important things you can pack is your hiking boots. Don't try to break in a brand new pair of hiking boots on a long hike. It could leave you with painful blisters. Instead, opt for a pair you have already been using, who's comfort and sturdiness can be relied upon. If you don't have any hiking boots, and have purchased some new ones for your hike, be sure to break them in before the big hike. You should be wearing the boots you want to hike in during your training so that they will be broken in, and you will know that you can comfortably wear them for several hours. Don't forget to pack plenty of fresh socks. In the winter, make sure the socks are thick and warm. In the summer, make sure the socks are designed to wick the sweat away from your feet. Pack a tent and sleeping bag. If you are going on a hike that will last longer than a day, make sure you have the proper sleeping gear. Temperatures can drop significantly overnight at high altitudes, so make sure you have a sleeping bag that will keep you warm enough to sleep comfortably. Newer tents and sleeping bags can be folded up in to a remarkably small package, and weigh very little. Consider investing in a good one if you plan to go hiking often. If not, rent or borrow a tent and sleeping bag. Bring a sleeping pad. A sleeping pad is an inflatable or foam pad that goes between the ground and your sleeping bag. The purpose of these is to add additional comfort, but also to help keep you warmer. Using a sleeping pad will help keep you from losing heat into the ground. Some people prefer the more expensive inflatable pads, but be aware that these are typically heavier than foam pads, and can puncture if you don't pay attention to where you put it. Foam pads are less expensive, but may also offer slightly less support. If you have room in your bag, consider taking both a foam and inflatable pad. This will give you double the comfort, and will provide the best insulation. Have food and cooking supplies. If you are going on an overnight hike, and won't have a place to stop for meals, be prepared by packing a cooking unit (available at nearly all outdoor stores), as well as food to prepare. Many outdoor stores sell dehydrated food packs that you can carry with you, and either eat straight out of the pack or heat on the stove. You could also pack food such as sandwiches, fruit, and other high carbohydrate foods. These may work fine if you will only need to have a snack on your hike, and won't need to prepare any meals. Don't forget insect repellent. Especially in the summer, there may be lots and lots of mosquitos and other bugs that may bite you. Therefore, you should be prepared by having an insect repellent that you can apply to any exposed skin. Be sure not to put your fingers in or around your mouth if you have applied insect repellent. Not only will it taste bad, it could possibly make you sick. Bring a map. You might have a GPS device, or maps loaded onto a smart phone, but sometimes electronics fail. Have a map of the area, and maps of the trails you will be taking just in case. Most of the more popular trails offer free guides. Enquire about this online or over the phone before your hike begins. Pack a first aid kit. You never know what will happen out on the trail, so it is good to be prepared with some of the basics. Kits are very small and light these days, so don't worry about it taking up too much space. Make sure that your kit contains the following: bandages, gauze, moleskin (to be used on blisters), pain medication, and allergy cream. You should also consider packing Diamox in your kit. Diamox is a medication that is commonly used to treat symptoms of altitude sickness if, for some reason, you are not able to ascend slowly (which is the best prevention for altitude sickness). Stay hydrated. Before your hike begins, you should be well-hydrated. During your acclimation stay, you should be drinking 2 to 3 liters of water each day to prepare your body for the hike. During the hike, keep a 1-liter bottle of water in your pack, and drink often to keep yourself hydrated. If there are stops along the way, refill your bottle, even if you think you won't need it. Have snacks to keep your energy levels consistent. At higher altitudes, your body will burn energy more quickly, so have some snacks such as dried fruit and nuts, fresh fruit, or a bag of chips to eat as a snack. You will want the snack to be high in carbohydrates, so you can quickly replenish your lost energy. Beef jerky, chocolate, and hard candies offer good, light weight snack solutions. Climb slowly to prevent burn out. This is especially important if your hike begins at a lower altitude and increases steadily. You will notice as you hike that you begin to tire more easily, and you may feel short of breath. Take frequent breaks to recover, and go more slowly. Once you have reached an altitude above 6,000 feet (1,828 m) consider resting for a day or two to give your body some time to acclimate. Remain aware of your physical condition. On a long hike, it can be easy to slip into a state where you aren't really paying much attention to how you're feeling physically. However, when you are hiking at high altitudes, you should remain aware of what is going on with your body, especially as you ascend higher and higher. If you begin to experience nausea, a lack of hunger, a lack of thirst, or if you notice a headache, are feeling dizzy, having trouble breathing, or losing control of your coordination, stop. Tell another member of your hiking group. Don't ignore these symptoms, as they may be early signs of altitude sickness. Don't try to tough it out. These symptoms may subside quickly with a bit of rest, but they could also turn into something more deadly if you aren't careful. Focus on deep, even breathing. If and when you start to notice some shortness of breath, stay alert. Focus on taking deep breaths in and out, and make sure that the breaths are even. This will help you avoid over-exerting yourself. If you feel that you are over-exerting yourself, stop and take a break for a few minutes to regain control of your breathing. Stop and rest every 1,000 feet above your normal altitude. Each time you ascend another 1,000 feet above the altitude that you live in normally, you should stop and rest for 2 hours. This will give your body a chance to acclimatize, and will help you avoid dangerous consequences of ascending too quickly. This may mean taking more time than you hoped, and may mean camping over night, so be prepared for this reality. Avoid sleeping at altitudes that are too high. If you are on an overnight or multi-day hike, you should not sleep at an elevation that is more than 1,500 feet higher than the elevation at which you slept the night before. For example, if you slept at 6,000 feet the night before, you should not sleep above 7,500 feet the next night. Be prepared to turn around. With high altitude hiking, it is important that you be ready to turn around and call it quits if any of your hiking group begin to experience symptoms of altitude sickness. It may feel disappointing, but it is better to be safe than stuck on the top of a mountain with a person who is suffering from severe symptoms of altitude sickness.
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Begin training well in advance. Train for your hike at higher altitudes. Use biking as a way to improve your cardiovascular endurance. Go swimming to improve cardiovascular endurance. Run to improve cardiovascular fitness. Climb stairs to strengthen leg muscles and lungs. Train with your pack on. Visit your doctor. Plan your route well in advance. Let someone know where you're going. Arrive 2 to 3 days before your hike is to begin. Pack extra clothes. Don't forget sunscreen. Wear sunglasses to protect your eyes. Bring a hat. Pack a sturdy pair of hiking boots. Pack a tent and sleeping bag. Bring a sleeping pad. Have food and cooking supplies. Don't forget insect repellent. Bring a map. Pack a first aid kit. Stay hydrated. Have snacks to keep your energy levels consistent. Climb slowly to prevent burn out. Remain aware of your physical condition. Focus on deep, even breathing. Stop and rest every 1,000 feet above your normal altitude. Avoid sleeping at altitudes that are too high. Be prepared to turn around.
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https://www.wikihow.health/Control-Sugar-Cravings
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How to Control Sugar Cravings
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One way to control sugar cravings is to drink at least 2 to 3 liters of water every day, since your cravings may be disguising dehydration. If you're still experiencing cravings, try replacing sugary foods with fruit, so you'll still get other nutrients like fiber and antioxidants. Additionally, make sure to eat regular, balanced meals since a lack of protein or healthy fats can cause sugar cravings. To help you avoid giving in to cravings, plan your meals in advance and aim for around 20 grams of protein per meal.
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Look for naturally sweet foods. Foods like fruits that are naturally sweet can help satiate your sweet tooth while balancing natural sugar with necessary nutrients like fiber and antioxidants. Replace processed snack foods high in sugar with whole foods like fruit to help balance your cravings. Dried fruit and 100 percent fruit juices can also help replace refined sugars with natural sugars, but often they have a higher overall sugar content and lack many of the nutrients of a piece of fresh fruit. Be careful of overusing these products. Eat regular, healthy meals. Get three to five small meals comprised of whole foods throughout the day, and snack on healthy snacks such as nuts, fruits, veggies, or small portions of cheese or peanut butter. Eating regular, balanced meals will help curb cravings in daily life. Often, lack of protein or healthy fats can cause sugar cravings. Incorporate some proteins such as lean meats or nuts into your meals, as well as healthy fats like avocado or fatty fish. Remember that these meals should be properly portioned. Look at nutritional guidelines and recommended serving sizes to ensure that you aren't eating too much or too little. Indulge a little bit. Indulge in a small amount of sugar when you crave it most. For example, having a small scoop of ice cream right after dinner could actually help curb cravings for the rest of the evening. Have small, regulated amounts of sugar to help keep cravings in check. Make your treat about quality over quantity. Pick something you know you will truly savor and appreciate and have that in a small amount rather than trying to pack in as much low-calorie dessert as you can. This may mean having a small scoop of your favorite ice cream instead of eating a whole pint of a low-calorie but less satisfying health food brand ice cream. A single “fun size” candy bar or an individual square of chocolate are good options when you want to indulge in a small treat. Avoid artificial sweeteners. Sweeteners do nothing to eliminate your desire for sweet tastes nor do they include any additional nutrients to help prevent such cravings from returning. Avoid foods that are sweetened with artificial sweeteners, such as diet sodas, and instead opt for no-sugar-added products. If you need a sweetener to replace sugar for an activity like baking, try stevia or raw, unrefined sugar. Look for hidden sugars. When you look at food labels, don't just look for sugar or high-fructose corn syrup. Terms like dextrose, corn syrup, fructose, lactose, maltose, xylitol, sorbitol, and many more can also indicate the presence of processed sugars. Consuming added sugar generally only makes sugar cravings worse. Look carefully for sugar by all of its many names in food labels before you eat. Walk away. When you have an intense sugar craving, get up and walk away from any area that has sugar available. If you are in your home, go for a walk around the block to get you away from your kitchen. If you are in public, move to another location where sugar is not available. If possible, find something engaging to do like visit a museum or go window shopping to help distract you from your craving. Practice regular stress reduction. The low serotonin levels caused by stress can make us reach for sugar as a temporary serotonin-booster. Practice daily stress management through deep breathing, reflection, yoga, meditation, or other activities to help reduce stress-based sugar cravings. Even if you do not feel particularly stressed at a given time, still try to employ stress management techniques. The better control you have of your stress overall, the easier it will be to control when a craving strikes. Drink lots of water. Dehydration can sometimes mask itself as a sugar craving. Make sure you get enough water every day to help combat disguised sugar cravings. Try to get between two and three liters of water every day. Other signs of dehydration include dizziness, dry mouth, and infrequent urination. If you experience other signs of dehydration, it may be a good indicator that your cravings mean you need more water. Eat after a workout. Immediately after a workout, your body is seeking to replace the energy it lost and refuel itself. This can lead to intense sugar cravings. To help stop them, have a nutritious snack filled with protein and immediately after you work out. Try a smoothie with natural fruit and milk, or a piece of whole-grain toast with peanut butter to keep cravings away. Remove all sugar from your house. Going cold turkey is a tough but effective way to help eliminate sugar cravings. Start by going through your home and eliminating all foods with processed or added sugars. Read the food labels carefully to determine if there are hidden sugars in them. Try not to focus on removing natural sugars. In moderate quantities, natural sugars from sources like complex carbs are healthy and necessary to consume. Plan your meals ahead. Getting rid of added sugars will take effort. To ensure that no unintentional sugar slips into your diet, plan your meals ahead of time. Focus on incorporating whole nutrients such as proteins, healthy fats, and complex carbohydrates in every meal. Plan snacks as well as meals. Quitting sugar all at once will likely leave you feeling hungry frequently for the first few days. Make sure you can anticipate your hunger and keep it in check. Keep cravings in check by getting around 20g of protein at each meal. This could include 3 oz (28 g) of lean white meat such as turkey or chicken, paired with micronutrient and fiber-rich vegetables like broccoli to keep you full longer. Prepare to detox. Sugar withdrawal is real, and if you quit sugar cold-turkey you will likely feel it. For three to five days, prepare to feel shaky, irritable, and lethargic. For most people, these symptoms only last a few days. If you want to quit refined sugars all at once, it will be necessary to push through those first days. Help your body adjust more easily by not eliminating natural sugars such as fruit. Allow your body to indulge in naturally sweet foods to help lessen detox symptoms.
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Look for naturally sweet foods. Eat regular, healthy meals. Indulge a little bit. Avoid artificial sweeteners. Look for hidden sugars. Walk away. Practice regular stress reduction. Drink lots of water. Eat after a workout. Remove all sugar from your house. Plan your meals ahead. Prepare to detox.
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https://www.wikihow.com/Defeat-Xenophobia
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How to Defeat Xenophobia
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While xenophobia, or the fear of foreigners, may feel like a difficult fight to take on, you can help defeat it through your daily actions. Vote for progressive politicians since they tend to stand for peaceful resolutions and value multiculturalism and the equality of all people. You can also work on or support legislation that combats xenophobia, like the prosecution of hate crimes. Another option is to form or join a nonprofit organization that fights for social equality and inclusion and show up to their rallies and marches, which sends a powerful message that xenophobia is unacceptable.
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Confront xenophobes in your own life. You may have a relative or friend who has nationalist or racist ideals. Spend time talking to them about their point of view. When in conversation with a racist, nationalist, or xenophobe, avoid attacking them directly. Instead, emphasize that it is their ideas which are misguided, and remind them that they are a good person who can and should let go of their intolerance. Use calm, reasoned arguments to illustrate that they don't need to fear a group just because they are different. Surprise them with new information that could change their perspective. For instance, if a Catholic is afraid of Muslims, you might mention that Muslims really revere Mary, or that they recognize Jesus as a great teacher. Ask why a group is perceived as a threat. Xenophobia is often no more than a feeling of suspicion or mistrust of the “other.” Pressing people as to exactly why they consider differences in culture, religion, or dress threatening is the first step toward making them question their own bigoted beliefs. Is it skin color? Accent? Religious practice? Stereotypes about behaviors? These are among the most common causes of xenophobia. Demonstrate how xenophobia is problematic. Xenophobia results in discrimination, racism, and nationalism, which in turn inspire violence, hostility, and exploitation. Many of the world's worst atrocities – from the Holocaust to the Rwandan Genocide – have been inspired by xenophobic sentiments. Educating people about these historical facts will help prevent future outbursts of xenophobia. Other examples of xenophobia which were later accepted as disasters or embarrassments include: The Sacco and Vanzetti case The internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II The 2008 Alexandra riots in South Africa Make fun of xenophobia. Comedy can reveal the absurdity underlying xenophobic rhetoric. Use jokes and satire to illustrate how silly it is to disrespect and deny aid to others just because they are different. For instance, a popular parody group in Hungary criticized their government's proposal to build a long wall along the border to keep immigrants out by expressing excitement for the return of the Iron Curtain. You could also draw a cartoon lambasting xenophobic policies and demagogues. Even though xenophobia is a serious issue, comedy is a good tool to express disagreement with xenophobic notions and challenge xenophobic beliefs. Live your ideals. Be an example to others of how to forge a more united, accepting world. Build coalitions with marginalized groups on social and political issues. Alternately, join a sports team, club, or hobby group that has an ethnically diverse membership. Foreign language study groups are a good choice, as are cooking classes which promote global cuisine. Standing in visible solidarity with the “other” in daily life is a simple but important way to defeat xenophobia. Celebrate diversity. If you live in a big city like New York or San Francisco, visit foreign enclaves like Chinatown or Little Italy. Talk to the people in these neighborhoods and patronize their businesses. Vote for progressive politicians. Xenophobia in politics manifests as jingoism, an extreme and narrowly-defined nationalism coupled with hawkish foreign policy. Progressive politicians are the opposite: they stand for peaceful resolutions, value multiculturalism, and believe in the equality of all people regardless of their nation, religion, or creed. Avoid voting for politicians who support war or punitive sanctions against a different culture or ethnic group simply because they are different. Encourage legislation that combats xenophobia. Laws which strictly regulate hate speech and hate crimes are powerful deterrents against xenophobia. Xenophobes tend to support strict immigration and refugee policies which limit the flow of asylum-seekers. Prosecute hate crimes and hate speech. When foreigners are threatened, attacked, or have their businesses ruined, someone needs to be held accountable. Punishing the perpetrators sends a clear message that xenophobia is unacceptable. Getting assistance and support of law enforcement is crucial. Police are often untrained in how to address hate crimes or, worse, among the chief exploiters of refugees, migrants, and foreigners. Insist on institutional equality. Craft educational curricula that celebrate diversity and encourage tolerance for cultures different than your own. Similarly, institute workplace guidelines in hiring, firing, benefits, and compensation which ensure all workers are treated equitably. In schools, government, and industry, promote positive images of minorities, foreigners, asylum seekers, and other marginalized peoples at risk for being the targets of xenophobic attacks. Organize against xenophobia. Form or join a nonprofit organization that fights for social equality and inclusion. Hold rallies and marches against xenophobic incidents and legislation. Marching sends a powerful signal to xenophobes that their behavior is unacceptable. Use social media to promote your message and actions. Launch public education and awareness campaigns to insist that foreigners and refugees deserve respect and empathy. Include marginalized peoples in the decision-making process. Use relevant holidays like World Refugee Day (20 June) and the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (21 March) to bring attention to the problem of xenophobia. Bring the press on board. Journalists can be an important source of information and education in the fight against xenophobia. Write to your local newspaper, your news website of choice, or your favorite news magazine asking for more stories about how xenophobia is hurting people both abroad and in your state or nation. Repost stories you see online through social media. Make xenophobia a visible issue. Start a blog to criticize and document the xenophobic sentiments you hear from public figures, celebrities, or just people around you. Include the victims of xenophobia in the fight. The “other” should be included in the decision-making process to find out how they experience xenophobia and how they think it could best be combated. Encourage migrants, refugees, and victims of racism and discrimination to speak up about their experiences and how they were made to feel. Give the victims of xenophobia a platform from which to denounce their attackers. The quality and scope of documentation in cases of xenophobic harassment and violence is generally poor. Provide aid to victims of xenophobic attacks. This may include food, shelter, clothing, or non-material aid like counseling. Let the victims of xenophobia know that they have rights and don't need to suffer in silence.
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Confront xenophobes in your own life. Ask why a group is perceived as a threat. Demonstrate how xenophobia is problematic. Make fun of xenophobia. Live your ideals. Vote for progressive politicians. Encourage legislation that combats xenophobia. Insist on institutional equality. Organize against xenophobia. Bring the press on board. Include the victims of xenophobia in the fight.
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