I have all tile floors and a senior dog whose senior boyfriend spends a lot of time at my house. The flooring is hell on them — might as well be a skating rink, and mine are quite rough tiles. Keeping nails clipped short helps a lot, but what the old pair appreciates most is that they have soft places to lie down and…

“A fake iPhone battery could actually swell up—or even explode—under normal operating conditions, for example” So can a genuine one. I was shocked that after spending two months in a drawer, my iPhone 5c had swelled up to the point that the display shattered. The phone had been out of warranty for nearly 3 years but…

This would be so useful to me. I currently have two monitors side by side. My main monitor is the software that I use to edit court reporter transcripts. And then the other monitor has all my other apps, including email, documents that I have to refer to while I’m editing, notes, whatever. Just being able to have the…

I lived for a time in a very rural village of about 15 people who did things for themselves since you couldn’t get “professionals” out to our location. So any tool I need for my little homestead, one of the neighbours had and I would get in trouble if I bought something for a single task that I could have instead…

In French and Spanish, the master bedroom has become the “principal” bedroom. I like that better than primary. Main is also better and pretty much a a synonym of principal.

The authorized chain of Apple technicians that I use (iShop Mixup in Mérida, Mexico) won’t even touch your device unless it’s been wiped and reset to factory settings. They cite two reasons for that. The obvious is to avoid this scenario, but also, this way they know that the user has a backup in case something goes…

When I first started drinking coffee, I would put so much sugar in it that there would be sugary sludge left at the bottom of the cup. I was drinking up to 3 cups like that a day and quickly realized just how many calories that was turning out to be. Over a year, I started to cut down on the amount of sugar. Two heapin…

I can’t imagine buying an expensive device and not protecting it. I have a house with all tile floors and not the greatest dexterity. I have a very slim clear case on my phone that has rubber corners and a bumper to protect the screen. If it falls on the screen side, the bumper takes the impact. If it falls and a…

“What’s the point of having a 400-calorie salad for lunch if you’re just going to get hungry and grab a 300-calorie candy bar later? Do yourself a favor and just eat 700 calories of nutritious food in the first place.” OMG Somebody actually gets it. I am so tired of all the food police in my life making sarcastic…

Mexico’s answer to the Ritz is the Cracket. When I found some Ritz at Costco I had to buy them and do a blind taste test with a few friends who were all on team Ritz. We all picked Crackets thinking they were Ritz! I was shocked there’s actually no butter in Ritz.

Canada is about 20 years behind the rest of the world in terms of its cell phone plans. Some of this stuff is actually useful for them. I know plenty of people who can’t afford anything more than a basic plan with a limited amount of minutes and texts. They probably pay more for that than you do whatever plan you have.

*taking notes*

Maybe it’s because I have an older kitchen, but I am not at all worried about what would happen to my counters and floor if I drop the stand mixer - I’m worried about the mixer and its ceramic bowl! $$$ But I did put the toaster away because I didn’t use it that often. I have actually since replaced it with a…

I made it as far as shell. I ordered a half kilo of al pastor taco fixings for lunch today. There’s lots left in the fridge, so I’m sending you virtual leftovers straight from Mexico.

I live alone, so I put a treadmill in front of the TV. I go for time spent on my feet moving over getting hard cardio. I can walk at a pace of about 3 miles per 45-minute show and rack up 5,000 steps easy. Also, I have a big house and I make it a point to always take the long way somewhere and to turn trips upstairs…

I scope (edit) transcripts for court reporters. Easy to make low six figures in this field if you work hard. There’s just so much work and so few competent people doing it. I never thought that kind of income was within reach for me and there really is a psychological switch when crossing that threshold. This is a…

The predominate flavour in pumpkin spice has nothing to do with pumpkins. It’s the nutmeg. The best thing you can do with nutmeg is add it to a white sauce for pasta or vegetables. Ergo, the best pumpkin spice item is mac and cheese.

I have an older friend who just doesn’t get that I am working all day and that it is very disturbing when he message bombs me multiple times during the day. Ping. Ping. Ping. Ping. If I tell him please don’t do that and wait till the evening, he takes that as rejection, and I don’t need to be hurting a lonely old man.…

Parallels works with M1. I much prefer that to Boot Camp because I can run my Windows in Coherence mode, which is a fancy way of saying that it’s not like working in Windows at all (BLISS). The problem though is that apparently not all Windows software it will run on the M1 chip.

Do they actually do this?! I haven’t been able in four years to get them to fix their map so that my address actually shows up where I live (they say their records are correct, so they know better than I do where I live!), so I find it incredible that they would honour a request like this.