Practice Advice: Get More Life Out of Your Guitar Strings

Different guitar players have different body chemistries.  The chemistry of our hands reacts with the strings, and that is bad because it causes corrosion, which shortens the life of strings.

I used to know a guitar player whose hands were so acidic that he could only used his strings a few times before they sounded terrible.  I learned from him that it is a good idea to wipe a guitar down after use.

I, myself, do not have hands that cause much corrosion, and as I said, people’s body chemistry varies.  However, it is always a good idea to wipe down your strings after use with a clean cloth.

Always wash your hands before playing too.  Often times, our hands have oil on them.  The body chemistries that shorten string life can be countered by washing your hands.  Not only will your guitar sound better, but you will also save money while you are at it.  You may even want to wet the rag with a cleaner to help get off that extra grit, but consult your local guitar store before doing that, as you don’t want to use a solvent that might damage your guitar (in addition to cleaning it).

Exercising With Soup Cans

Usually, most of the exercise one should be doing is by weights that are 5Ilbs or less. There may be instances where one might want to isolate a major muscle group and exercise with far more weight than 5Ilbs though. For example, my biceps get just about nothing out of a 2Ilb work out, no matter how long I exercise for. Also, for the purpose of rehabilitation, it might be desirable to isolate a specific muscle. However, for the vast majority of people, soup cans are an excellent source of weight for exercise.

Save yourself the money and don’t even bother buying weights that are less than 5Ilbs. Use canned food as weights instead. Also, it is always better to use 2 separate weights if you are exercising, such that the weights that you are using aren’t connected by a bar. Bars make it so you can lift more, but the problem with using a bar, such as in a standard bench press is that the bar helps stabilize your arms, so your minor muscle groups, the one’s primarily used for stabilization, don’t have to do as much work. That is, when you are working out, you might be lifting more weight as you practice with a bar, but you won’t have any more real strength. Real strength requires that it is not just your major muscle groups that are fit, but also your minor ones as well. The thinking: 2 soup cans = no bar.

Minor muscles groups by nature can’t lift as much weight. Even some weight lifters that can lift hundreds of pounds might find themselves stressing to get 20 repetitions with a 1Ibs soup can. What’s more, if you don’t exercise minor muscles and just exercise your major muscle groups, your body will look odd. People will be able to see that you have not approached your discipline with a holistic spirit of attaining fitness. In my opinion, if you don’t use the minor muscle groups, you are perverting your body, and it should not surprise you that you don’t look as good as you could if you had spent some more time taking a holistic approach.

Save Money on Your Heating Bill by Owning a Fish Tank

This may sound crazy, but a lot of the things I say or write are borderline crazy. Most fish sold in pet stores are tropical fish. They need heated water. Goldfish are an exception to the rule. The exact temperature of the water necessary to maintain tropical fish may vary.

If you are looking to have a tank primarily for its use as a house heater, I recommend something easy like Neon Tetras, as maintaining fish tank with community fish that are hardy is going to be less labor intensive. We are all looking to save time! Also, it is a good idea not to buy rare fish because they sometimes come from either Africa or the Amazon, where they are in short supply in the wild.

It is such that fish tanks require heat. And, heaters run at a temperature that is hotter than the water, but it results in heating the water to probably at least a temperature where it can help heat a house. Having several fish tanks, like maybe one in each room might be able to heat a house, but even having one will almost certainly take a chunk out of a heating bill. That is, the heat a tank requires is probably higher than what you would normally keep the temperature of your house at, so what ends up happening is that the water in the fish tank ends up warming the house.

If you have a two story (or more) living space, I advise you to put the heating in the lowest parts of the house. Heat rises.

Many, if not most houses are heated by heating water. Hot water is hot water. However, fish tank hot water won’t enter a house quite as fast as it would if copper piping were used. In my opinion, fish tanks could be designed better, such that they could be both an aquarium and a house heater. For example, fish tank design could incorporate copper.

The most important part about having a heater is that they don’t require a lot of energy to operate. Most tropical fish tank heaters range from 50watts to 150watts of power. That is about the same as a light bulb. So, basically what I am saying is that you can add a lot of heat to your house for the cost of operating a light bulb. That is a good deal! Even 2 or more heaters, with a fan to blow over the surface in order to spread the heat is a good idea.

I haven’t seen tropical fish tanks optimized for house heating yet, and it is probably because most people that raise tropical fish to be sold in pet stores raise them in areas where it is warm enough year round that heaters are not required, but fish tanks could also be better designed, such that they assist in heating your house.

Next, there are ways of improving house heating if you have a fish tank.

1. Position the heater such that the water flow from the fish tank filter blows over it. A very small filter is capable of achieving this tank circulation effect. I have a mid-sized filter, which operates at 5watts. Even slightly increasing water circulation, and thus flow to the extremities of your tank it ensures that the heat can then leave the fish tank in an optimized way.

2. You might have low power fan (0.5amps or less) blowing over the surface of your aquarium, increasing the distribution of heat from your fish tank to the rest of the room.

3. Also, air bubblers can be of assistance, where a pump, pumps air into your aquarium for the fish to breath. That air will heat in the tank as it rises to the surface, and is released.

4. Then, there is the use of the fan that I used to spear the heat.

5. Lastly, don’t forget to clean your tank, as algae and debris will hold in precious heat, costing you money.

Anker Products are a better buy than Best Buy

I am thrilled with my Anker product that I bought from Amazon.com. It was power cord that I needed for my lap top. First, I shopped at Radio Shack. They said, $70. I left, and asked Best Buy. They to said $70. So, I left both places, coming home empty handed. I decided to try Amazon.com. I found a company that I had never heard of before, Anker, and they were selling the cord I needed for $12, but it came to $15 with shipping. That's a $50 difference! I had to give Anker a try!

The cord came early. It has worked for several months without breaking. The design is robust. I saved over $50 from purchasing a universal from a local store. Usually, I try to buy local, but I just can't argue with a savings of $50! Best Buy is not the best buy, and neither is Radio Shack either. Anker is now my first choice. I highly recommend Anker.

1st Bartering - Sandwich, MA Public Library

I like to go to the library. I use it for many reasons. However, this blog is not about that. It’s about bartering. I had lost my library card, and there is a fee for a new card. The fee is $3. I’m okay with it. The fee probably even written into law or something. Don’t let anything stop you from bartering. Many times people will waive something, especially if you can give them something in return. So, to get the fee waived, I offered about $50 in free books. The idea was to be somewhat charitable in addition to making the trade.

Naturally, there was a little stammer in by the librarian. She had probably never encountered something like this before. She was not the head librarian, so she said that she wanted to consult her superior before making the decision. In my town, I don’t know of many people that barter. That is a shame.

When the librarian said that she would have to ask her superior, I retracted my offer of the books. In Hyannis, I know that there is a place where I can leave books, and though I would get nothing in return for it, I feel laws should not be hard and fast, such that they can’t be waived. That is, I felt a need to give to charity, but it is important not to squander one’s valuables. If it wasn’t worth it to the librarian to give me a free card in return for about 7 books, 2 of which were hard cover, I didn’t want them to have my books. Seriously, I was offering them a trade of about $50 for a $3 card. If it wasn’t worth it to them, then I would take my books elsewhere, where there was nothing that could be offered to me in return. Maybe, the next place wouldn’t squander it? However, I am glad that there was no squandering, and I was proud of how my town acted with my generous proposition.

I prefer to give to charity locally before I give it away to places further away though it is important not to neglect places that are further away. In the story of the city of Sodom in the Bible, according to legend lack of hospitality was the reason the city was destroyed. As the legend goes, the people in Sodom would starve anyone who visited by doing things like raising the cost of bread. So, what this legend tells us is that it is important to be hospitable to everyone, and not just locals. This is why the Sandwich Public Library was my first choice to give books.

Luckily, the librarian made a split decision, and decided to waive the $3 fee. I am very proud to live in the town I live in. I like for it to be a nice place and a part of that is actually working to make it a nice place. Hopefully, by bartering, I have helped improve the world, and not ripped off the town. What do you think?

The Value of a Penny

During childhood, mom bought lobsters about once a week. I pled that she would buy me a lobster shaped lollypop, but every time the same, “No! We don’t have enough money for a (lollypop).” True, lobsters cost more than lollypops, but she drove home a point, the value of a penny.

Often, she gave me $0.10 or $0.25 for penny candy. Some pieces cost a penny, some cost a nickel, etc. I learned important budgeting skills.

When I was about 6 or 7yrs old, my allowance was $1 a week. But, I would also go collect tin cans at construction sites, redeemable for $0.05. After a half a year of discipline, between my allowance and cans I saved up $20 and bought an electric train set.

Later, my family went through an extended period of having $40 each month. We weren’t paying our rent, but we never once had to go to a local food pantry for free stuff. $40 a month was plenty.

So, though learning the value of a penny wasn’t immediately important, 25yrs later it made a big difference.

Eating the Apple Core

I don’t mean to suggest that the apple core is the tastiest part of the apple. However, a lot of work goes into apple picking. Apples are heavy and picking them is back breaking work. So, even if you don’t care about saving money, save someone’s back. Maybe, if you save an apple picker’s back, one day your back will be saved. The same is true for all the people that work in the supply chain to make sure that apple gets from the tree to your belly.

Apple cores are perfectly edible. Nothing special needs to be done with them. I usually eat the bottom off the apple, and then work my way up to the stem. I don’t eat the stem.

If you eat the apple core, then you will be adding fiber to your diet, which is a good thing. If you have the money to throw out apple cores, why be wasteful? Just think; you’ll save yourself the extra effort of lugging it to the dump. And, you say, “It’s not a problem to bring a few apple cores to the dump,” well as my dad says, “Pennies make dollars.” Maybe in a lifetime eating apple cores will only save you one trip to the dump. However, I try to avoid trips to the dump. I was raised with a pennies make dollars mentality. I try to get the most bang for my buck. So, I not only eat the meat of the apple. I also eat the apple core.