Your Open Floor Plan is a Death Trap

...s large volume spaces which when involved in a fire require more water and resources to extinguish. These fires are more difficult to contain because of the lack of compartmentation. Water from a hose stream becomes increasingly more effective when steam conversion assists in extinguishment, without compartmentation this effect is reduced. The simple tactic of closing a door to confine a fire is no longer possible in newer home geometries. Buildin...

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How to Remove Bees From a Tree

...tunately, spraying Bee-Quick into a tree and driving the bees out, with no resources, is really no different than exterminating them. The beekeeper you hire for a tree removal should suggest a trap-out or simply leaving them alone. If the tree is being cut down it’s possible that the section with the bees can simply be relocated or if the hole is large enough to reach into, a cutout can be done. The bees that I took out of the tree back in June ar...

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Hidey Holes and Hooch Hounds

...ition sparked a lot of creativity in the 1920s even among those with fewer resources than Ned Doheny. I sometimes wonder if the trend for built in ironing boards and breakfast nook benches in 1920s era homes had a dual purpose? I also wonder if we’ll see another hidden cabinet trend if marijuana prohibition returns. In case that happens, here’s just a few clever hacks from the 1920s: “I’m just carrying a load of bricks officer.” Too bad everyone l...

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Best veggies to cook in a solar oven

...ructions I like for artichokes in the sparse online world of solar cooking resources. The first round of artichokes I cooked looked like a failure but were actually successful. What I did that time was simply throw them in a covered pot and left them for 2 hours at around 250F. When I went to check on them, I was appalled to see that they’d turned brown. They looked roasted. Their outer leaves were dried out and hard. But I took them inside and tr...

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