Water Cooler Tip of the Day

So the cold tab broke off your water cooler, what are you to do? Or better yet, what would McGyver do?

He's stick a fork in it!



All credit here goes to Dave!

Trash Tip of the Day

You should have a trash can in every bathroom. Not everything is flushable. You don't want anyone to "wreak havoc on the plumbing."

Wheel Tip of the Day

That most satisfying step of putting together assemble-at-home furniture has got to be putting the wheels on (should you're particular furniture have/need wheels). To keep the wheels on, they're designed to be hard to put on. You try to push them on, but the wheels spin. There is no real place to get a grip except the little area between the wheels, but unless you're 5'2" your fingers are too big to fit in there. So instead of writing 1,000 words doing a bad job of explaining how to put wheels on with the shaft of a screw driver, we'll just show you a picture.

Easy-Setup-Pool Tip of the Day IV

Decide that you need "a few more inches" of water and top off the pool to just over the edge of the inflatable ring. Bad idea.

Wait for the rain to come.

Later, observe what sounds like the coming of a tsunami, or torrential downpour. Look outside to realize that's your pool, not SLOWLY draining, but VERY RAPIDLY draining!

Gallons of water pour through your yard and into your neighbor's.

Go outside in your undees and lift the purging side of the pool an inch or so and draining stops immediately.

Vow to never fill pool above inflatable ring, and vow to always have someone check on your house if you're out of town.

Easy-Setup-Pool Tip of the Day III

Setup the filter, and realize you need to add those chemicals you forgot to buy. Run to Lowe's and pickup granular "pool shocking" chemicals. Mix with water in a bucket and "broadcast" into pool.

Drive past a pool store, stop in and ask if that was the right chemical. It wasn't. Dang.

Pickup granular chlorine, and shock it again. Worry that mixing these two chemicals may cause an explosion, or corrode the pool or your skin.

Pickup testing strips and observe the chlorine level is at the highest readable--10, when it's supposed to be 3. "Guess I'll wait a bit..."

Wait until levels are at 3, then place dog in water to see if he disintegrates. Dog is happy, so jump in pool and splash around. Yay! Easy-setup pool setup!

Easy-Setup-Pool Tip of the Day II

There's still hope. You realize that the only truly level 12' square part of your property is your patio. And lo and behold, it's exactly 12'! To leave some room for doggers to go in/out the backdoor, you decide to setup the pool mostly on the patio, with two or three feet hanging off the edge. Cool! You'll have a pool in no time!

Repeat the steps above, this time filling the pool most of the way. Success!

That is, until the next morning.

Observe the contents of your pool slowly spilling out, and the pool deflated to about half its once-bolstered turgor. Effingham.

Realize that even those 2 feet overhanging the porch were the cause of it. "When they say level, they mean completely level." But, this is fixable.

Run to Lowe's and pick up a bunch of 50 lb. bags of sand to bolster the edge of the pool that's leaking. This will gain you an inch or two of levelness. Perfection. Refill to 2 inches below the inflated ring.

Easy-Setup-Pool Tip of the Day I

If you're like me, you love being in the water! So when you find out that owning a pool is both inexpensive and "easy," of course you should get one, right?

First, pick up your pool at Walmart; yes, Walmart. Then discover that an 18' pool won't fit in your back yard. Return pool.

Exchange the pool for the 12' model, which will fit nicely in the backyard.

Look around for 30 minutes to try to figure out what type of chlorine to put in your pool, and how much. Leave without chlorine. "I'll come back later."

Get back home, unpack the box and observe "must setup pool on completely level surface." Ignore warning, but try to "grade off" your heinously sloped backyard a wee bit with a garden shovel.

Unpack the pool liner, and spread it out on the "level" ground. Stop reading the instructions and try to figure things out on your own.

Realize you need to inflate the upper ring, but don't have a pump.

Run to Walmart, park in the garden section (bonus tip) and pick up pump for $9.96 (made by pool company). Inflate upper ring.

Try to finagle pool into right place without any luck. Break out those instructions, and realize you were supposed to put the ring OUTSIDE the pool, not inside.

Deflate upper ring, put ring OUTSIDE the pool.

Reinflate upper ring; cursing is permitted.

Smooth out wrinkles in pool floor. This is not optional, even if you thought it was.

Begin putting water in your pool! The fun part!

Go outside after half and hour and realize when they said "must be on completely level surface," they meant it. Observe water spilling out one side of the pool, and not even a drop of water in the other side. F.

Deflate upper ring along with your ego.

Summer Tip of the Day

If you are a teacher/student and choose not to work in the summer, here are some productive things you can do to occupy your time:

• Clean the Microwave
• Scrape paint off the front door
• Exercise
• Knit a dish rag
• Paint your bathroom

And here are some fun things you can do:

• Meet friends for lunch
• Read a book
  
• Shopping
• Watch a movie
• Take a trip
  

Fence Building Money Saving Tip of the Day

Fencing can be a DIY project, but it's not for the weak of heart (or body.) Building your own fence is one project that will save you LOTS of money, but may cost you your back and/or your friends (unless you provide beer, although, you may have crooked fence posts.) Especially in Kentucky, it won't take long before you hit solid limestone, and will have to bust it to smithereens. It's also imperative to maintain perfect distances, straight lines, and horizontal and vertical levelness. While one of the more challenging DIY projects I attempted, I did save about $1,200 doing it myself!

Trust Tip of the Day

Here is a guide to test the trust in your marriage:

1. Have husband hold ladder on stairs in narrow, dark hallway
2. Wife stand on top of the ladder
3. Wife sprays hot chemical mixture- spritz oozes all over husband below
4. Using a very sharp tool, girate body while scraping walls
5. Wallpaper shreds and crumbs drop all over husband
6. Reassure husband that razor sharp tools are not going to drop on his head
7. Ask husband to move ladder to next step, spray more stinky chemical, and repeat scraping motions
8. Thank husband for his time, patience, and strong, steady grip

-Kathryn

This just happens to be our 800th Tip! Thanks to all our contributers and commenters. Keep em coming!

Artificial Sweetener Tip of the Day

You know all those artificial sweeteners that hog up room in the sugar caddy? Yep those pastel colored packets that taste nasty. This is about the only good use for them: