Stellarium: A Handy Desktop Planetarium

...n you can also take a look at the moon. In the pre-personal computer era I used to use a planisphere. I still have my 1980s era plastic planisphere. But the planisphere does not show the planets or moon. You’ve got to hunt down that info elsewhere. And my planisphere is so small that it’s hard to use. Thankfully, there’s a powerful, free open-source solution: Stellarium. Stellarium is a computer based planetarium that comes in OS X, Windows, Linux...

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Tomato Grafting Fail

...have purchased or made a seed starting mix rather than the potting soil I used. I ended up with weak seedlings. Secondly, I did not manage the post-graft period well. Having a greenhouse within which to create a “healing chamber” for the grafted plants would have made the process much easier. Since I have no space or desire to build a greenhouse I’m, most likely, going to give up on attempting to graft my own tomatoes. I did this project out of a...

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Kitchen KonMari Session, Illustrated

...roject. After some tense moments, we managed to purge a decent number of unused kitchen items and Kelly rearranged the cabinet to place frequently used items on more accessible shelves. Ironically, the kitchen cleaning session overlapped with the lunch hour preventing meal preparation. We decamped to a local Mexican restaurant for a meeting with a friend and Kelly finished this KonMari session on her own later. I’d call it a victory but we’ve stil...

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Getting Online Hearing Aids

...s in the ear is a one-size-fits-all plug as opposed to the custom earmolds used by HearX. This cuts down on costs and means that you don’t have to go in for a fitting. I haven’t noticed any significant difference in terms of audio quality or comfort between my Audicus hearing aids and my HearX hearing aid. I’ve been using my Audicus hearing aids for two years with no problems. I have a few important tips if you’re considering a hearing aid: When I...

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Natural Cooling: The Fresh Air Bed

...and in many homebrew kitty window solutions. But enough about cats, what we really need is to bring back the California Fresh Air Bed Company’s clever indoor/outdoor bed. As many consider downsizing to smaller houses, space and energy saving furniture such as this make more sense than the oversized sofa sectionals that plague our modern mega-houses. Save Save Save Save Save Save Save Save Save Save Save Save...

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