Reusing For Toilet Paper Rolls

Available in any house, toilet paper rolls usually go to the bin after they lost their utility. However, with all the concern about reusing and recycling materials, lots of new ideas of how to create something useful with them came up and some of them are really good. We searched a lot and selected six great ideas to reusing toilet paper rolls at home in a creative and original.

Hair Accessory Holder

Always losing your hair clips, barrettes and scrunches? You can use a toilet paper roll to keep them together and safely kept. You will never waste time anymore looking for your hair accessories in messy drawers.

Creative ways to reuse toilet papers rolls 5

Cables Organizer

Nowadays, with so many electronic gadgets at home, cables are something inevitable that takes up lots of space at home. However, you can keep them save and organized using toilet paper rolls. This is a simple and cheap idea that will help you organizing drawers and cabinets saving space for other important things.

Creative ways to reuse toilet papers rolls 6

Planters

If you are trying to start a garden at home, toilet paper rolls are perfect to serve as planters for herbs and small flowers. You can place many rolls in a bigger box, fill them with good soil and use different seeds for each one. The roll material is a good idea because it retains water keeping the soil always wet.  This idea is good to make with kids, teaching them the process of growing a plant.

Creative ways to reuse toilet papers rolls 1

Pencil Holders

Due their shape and size, toilet paper rolls are perfect to serve as pencil holders. The only thing you need is close the bottom with a piece of paperboard and a bit of tape. After that is only decorating them as you want, you can use colorful papers, paint, felt…. Use your imagination! Kids love craft like this and it is a good opportunity to have fun with them.

Creative ways to reuse toilet papers rolls 2

Birds’ Feeder

If you have a garden at home and want to attract birds to it, a nice idea is putting a bit of food to them outside your house. If you don´t have a bird feeder you can create one only using a toilet paper roll, peanut butter and birds´ food.  Spread a bit of peanut butter in the entire roll surface. Then put it inside a bowl full of birds´ food. The seeds will stick on the peanut butter. After that is only hanging your feeder in a tree and wait for your little visitants come.

Creative ways to reuse toilet papers rolls 3

Gift Boxes

Perfect to use as a gift box, toilet paper rolls are simple to be transformed in a nice package. You can use them in the original way, cover it with a beautiful paper or use your favorite color paint. To transform it in a box you only need to fold both edges to inside. Use a nice ribbon to give a romantic look and it’s done! Perfect to store candies in children´s parties or a small present.

Creative ways to reuse toilet papers rolls 4

Imagine you entering in a fashion bar or in that new restaurant in your city and facing these weird funny bar  stools! Your first thought may will be “I won´t sit on this” but after a while it´s impossible not to want take a funny picture sitting on these funny and creative things!

Funny Bar Stools

From women legs to animals´ paws these stools are becoming the new trendy in many countries around the world!  Restaurants and pubs owners are using this idea to transform the environment of their shop and clearly they are being successful in it. The stools grab the attention of anyone that pass in front of the place and bring lots of curious people to inside.

Creative Bar Stools

Leggy stools are the most common ones, specially shaped in sexy women´s legs! But you can also find different ones: horse saddles, motorbikes, animals’ tails, bikini´s butt and even oversized objects. Anything serves as inspiration to these stools which add a great look in the decoration of any bar!
However, if you don´t have a restaurant or a bar and still wants to have these funny stools you can use them to decorate your barbecue area or a room in your house! I´m sure your friends will have lots of fun every time you invite them to visit your home.

Essential Tips You Will Need When You Travel With Kids

1) Organizers

More organized you are less stressed you will be when you need something. Use plastic bags with labels to organize essential things as medicines, toiletries, accessories, kids’ games, craft materials… This will prevent them to disappear inside you bag and you waste lots of time and effort looking for them.

Travelling with kids essential tips 1

2) Separate The Outfits

An intelligent way of packing your kids clothes is using different plastic bags for each outfit. Chose the entire outfit at home and pack it in a plastic bag (upper part, bottom part, underwear, accessories) this will make easier when you need dress them because you won’t take all clothes inside bag to look for pieces. When the day is over you put the dirty clothes in the same bag and it is done!

Travelling with kids essential tips 4

4) Toys and Games

If you are travelling with kids you must understand that they need something to distract them during the trip. Toys, games, craft materials and books are good options to make them busy when they are anxious or impatient. Separate their favorite ones to be used during the trip and let them play a lot.

Travelling with kids essential tips 5

4) Car Organizer

As we have just seen, kids need lots of things to keep them busy and entertained so an essential thing to have if you are travelling by car is an organizer that you can place in the back of the seat. There you can put everything:  toys, bottles, craft material, food and they are all accessible to the kids when they need them.

Travelling with kids essential tips 3

5) Food Kit

Prepare a mix of different things to take with you in the trip and place them in a single place. This will make easier for kids chose what they want to eat and let the car free from those plastic packages.

Travelling with kids essential tips 2

6) Cleaning Supplies

Some things are essential when travelling with kids: baby wipes, extra clothes, towels and a trash bag. It doesn´t matter how old are them, they always pour something on their clothes or get sick during the trip. So have these items always in hands is something more than necessary.

Travelling with kids essential tips 6

New Creative Uses for Pool Noodles

1) Door Stopper

If you have toddlers at home you know how difficult it is to keep them safe with so many dangerous objects inside home. One of them is the door! They love open and close doors and their hands and fingers are always in danger with this simple action. To prevent them to get hurt, place a piece of pool noodle on the edge of the door.

6 New Creative Uses for Pool Noodles

2) Bed Protector

Another good use for pool noodles is placing them under the sheet of a kid´s bed to keep them save. Small kids are often falling out of their beds during the night and this idea will protect them if they roll while they are dreaming.

6 New Creative Uses for Pool Noodles

3) Organize Boots

Use pool noodles to keep your boots upright and avoid damaging their fabric.Cut the noodles in the same high as your boots and place them inside each pair. Your closet will be more organized and your boots save from those ugly wrinkles.

6 New Creative Uses for Pool Noodles

4) Pool Floating Cooler

This is a nice and creative idea for the ones who like spending the summer inside a swimming pool. You can make a floating cooler to place your drinks using a simple plastic box and some pool noodles. Cut the noodles and tie them with a rope or wire around the box. Fill the box with ice and drinks and have fun!

6 New Creative Uses for Pool Noodles

5) Trampoline Protector

Kids (and also adults) love trampolines and they are quite good to make exercises and have fun. However those springs in the edge are always dangerous especially for kids. A nice idea is using pool noodles to cover the springs and protect kid’s feet and hands. Apart from that, the trampoline will look more beautiful with colorful pool noodles around it.

6 New Creative Uses for Pool Noodles

6) Car Door Protector

Narrow garages and small places are a nightmare for drivers and car doors. Sometimes it is almost impossible get out of the car without touching its door on the wall, especially when we have kids. A nice, practical and cheap way to avoid the damage is fixing a pool noodle along the wall with some screws and a drill. Now you can open your door´s car without problem.

6 New Creative Uses for Pool Noodles

Hotel tipping guide, from bellman to valet

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(Photo: Bernd Vogel/Corbis)

When it comes to hotel gratuities, even the most seasoned travelers admit to being stumped. That’s why we’ve put together this handy cheat sheet, which you can take with you the next time you’re on the road.

• Bellman: $1 to $2 per bag.
• Concierge: $10 to $20 for performing a special service, such as scoring tickets to a sold-out event or wrangling lost luggage from your airline.
• Doorman: $2 for hailing a cab in rush hour or in the rain; $1 for each bag.
• Housekeeping: $5 to $10 per day. Leave it at the front desk if you want it divided equally among all your housekeepers.
• Room Service: A service charge is almost always included in the bill. To personally thank your server, 5 percent will suffice.
• Valet: $5 when your car is delivered.

Note: Gratuities are often lower or not expected outside North America. Follow local tipping customs when traveling overseas.

Weekend Trips You Should Take This Summer

(Photo: Simon_sees / Flickr)

Go wine surfing

This isn't what you might think. Unlike the water sport, "wine surfing" is perfect for the sedentary, uncoordinated, thirsty set. At Gourmet au Bay in Bodega Bay, Calif. — the only waterfront wine bar on the Sonoma Coast — customers can order a flight of three wines (of their choice) presented on a plate-sized surfboard. Ideally, the wine is consumed on the deck while gazing at the Pacific. A harbor seal or two might even make an appearance.

Wine surfing encapsulates what's so special about the Sonoma Coast: the combination of brine and wine. Spot gray whales from Bodega Head in Sonoma Coast State Park. (More than 20,000 gray whales migrate through the area annually.) Take in some actual surfing (or kayaking, or paddleboarding) with rentals and lessons from Bodega Bay Surf Shack. And when you're done frolicking with sea creatures, you can relax in front of one of those famous California sunsets with a locally sourced vintage.

Plan Your Trip: At the well-reviewed Bodega Bay Lodge, almost all rooms have bay views and much of the food comes from local family farms. It's easy to get to Bodega Bay (known as the gateway to the Sonoma Coast) from major metropolitan areas such as San Francisco and Sacramento; it takes less than three hours to drive from either city to Bodega Bay.

(Photo: F Delventhal / Flickr)

Climb giant sand dunes

"You must do the Dune Climb," says everyone who's ever been to Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. It's the thing to do here. Towering sand dunes, which loom about 400 feet above Lake Michigan, afford beautiful views and a butt-kicking workout.

Once you've scaled the dunes and snapped a few selfies in front of the vista, take advantage of the picnic area at the base. Or cool off with a dip in Lake Michigan's clear waters — the dunes are terrific, but many people come here for the beaches. There are numerous beautiful ones at Sleeping Bear Dunes. Scuba diving opportunities abound as well. The Manitou Passage Underwater Preserve, right next to Sleeping Bear, is one of the best places to explore underwater shipwrecks in Lake Michigan.

Plan Your Trip: Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore is a 5.5-hour drive from Chicago. Alternately, you can get there via short direct flights from Detroit, Chicago, or Minneapolis to nearby Traverse City Cherry Capital Airport. A good lodging choice is The Homestead, which offers various budget options (including Grand, Classic, or Simple accommodations) and views of Sleeping Bear Dunes or Lake Michigan from select rooms.

(Photo: Madeleine Holland / Flickr)

Learn the secrets of Gilded Age servants

Behold the fabulous homes on the craggy coast of Newport, R.I. from the Gilded Age era featured in trending films and television shows such as “The Great Gatsby” and “Downton Abbey.” In fact, scenes from the 1974 Gatsby film were shot at Rosecliff, one of Newport's 11 American palaces.

While much historical light has been shed on the lives of Newport's wealthy barons and heirs, a quieter yet perhaps more interesting social history is that of the many servants who lived and worked in Newport. For a behind-the-scenes look at what daily life was like for the common people of the early 20th century, take the new Servant Life Tour at The Elms, a dazzling mansion modeled after a French chateau. The tour will take you through the bowels of the manse: in servant entrances, up hidden staircases, and through boiler rooms. You'll hear true stories of the butlers, chefs, and maids who kept Newport's mansions cooking. Advance reservations are required for this popular tour, which frequently sells out.

Plan Your Trip: Newport is within driving distance of many major northeastern cities: It's a 90-minute drive from Boston and a 3.5-hour drive from New York City. Newport accommodations are notoriously expensive, but you can save quite a bit of money by staying in a guesthouse. Summer rates at the William Gyles Guesthouse start at $39 per night — an incredible bargain for the area. It's not fancy, but it's comfortable.

(Photo: John Fowler / Flickr)

Visit an island in the sky

Utah's lyrically named Island in the Sky sits 1,000 feet above the otherworldly terrain of Canyonlands National Park. The “island” is the most visited spot in Canyonlands — probably due to the extensive views of the park afforded from this towering mesa. A camera is key: In this extraordinary place you'll undoubtedly snap the most beautiful photographs you'll take all summer.

The site's heavenly elevation belies its ease of access. Explore the Island via the Grand View Point Trail, a painless two-mile round-trip trek. (More challenging trails are available, too. See the trail map here.) Paved roads with scenic pullout areas — at which you can stop to view the colorful canyon landscape — snake through the Island.

Plan Your Trip: The Canyonlands National Park Visitor Center is a 5-hour drive from Salt Lake City and a 40-minute drive from Moab, Utah. Since Utah is blessed with national parks aplenty, you'll probably want to visit a few other natural wonders during your weekend trip. Find a three-day itinerary from Salt Lake City to Arches and Canyonlands national parks on the Utah Office of Tourism website.

(Photo: vetaturfumare / Flickr)

Explore New York City by bike

You may have already heard the news: This spring, a bike-share program was finally established in the Big Apple. It's called Citi Bike, and it features 6,000 bikes available for instant use at docking stations in Manhattan and Brooklyn. So if you haven't yet biked the streets of New York, now is the time to try. The program offers a very fast and fun way to get from, say, your Brooklyn pizza shop to your Manhattan deli, especially when you’re faced with a route that requires complicated subway transfers and a lot of walking. Sometimes it's just easier to hop on a bike — and it's far cheaper than taking a cab.

Plan Your Trip: Although airfares for round-trip flights departing on a Friday and returning on a Sunday or Monday can be expensive, it's possible to find deals. At the time of publication, I spotted weekend flights from Nashville to New York's LaGuardia on American for $217 round-trip.

Or take the train. Amtrak is offering a 25 percent discount on Northeast Regional fares to New York when you book at least 14 days in advance.

(Photo: Ali Razfar / Flickr)

Go on a weekend cruise

Afraid you might feel claustrophobic or seasick on a sailing? Embarking on a two- or three-night cruise is a smart strategy for testing the cruising waters. Take a "cruise to nowhere," which is essentially one that sails out into the open ocean, turns around and then comes back; or take a repositioning cruise, which is when a ship moves from one port to another and takes passengers along. Some short cruises include one or two port visits, as well.

Though they may sound ho-hum, cruises to nowhere can be a lot of fun, especially if you're on a new ship with innovative attractions. One of my favorite cruises ever was a round-trip voyage to nowhere and back on Norwegian Epic out of New York.

Plan Your Trip: You have lots of options here. In August, Carnival Glory is sailing a two-night cruise to nowhere out of New York. Onboard, you can imbibe at one of 22 bars and lounges, endure a massive caloric onslaught at Guy's Burger Joint, or simply sit on your balcony with a good book and gaze at the ocean. Rates start at $279 for an inside cabin and $449 for a balcony.

Also this summer, Disney Dream and Royal Caribbean's Enchantment of the Seas are sailing three-night Bahamian cruises out of Port Canaveral. Norwegian Sky is doing three-night Bahamas sailings out of Miami. There are also a few three- and four-night Carnival cruises going round-trip from Florida ports.

(Photo: Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex)

Here's the secret to having the best summer ever: Put an amazing weekend trip (or three) on your to-do list. You'll have extraordinary travel adventures without using precious vacation days. And your friends will be totally jealous when they see your Facebook photos of beautiful canyons, sprightly harbor seals and Gilded Age mansions. Here are seven ideas for easy, unforgettable weekend trips that are within a day's drive of major U.S. metropolitan areas.

Blast off in a space shuttle

Get up close and personal with one of the most sophisticated pieces of machinery built by humankind. The space shuttle that logged 125,935,769 miles and spent 307 days in orbit is on display at its new home in the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex. The Space Shuttle Atlantis features fun interactive exhibits, including one that NASA astronauts call "the world's most realistic simulation of a vertical space shuttle launch." Strap in, count down and experience the ascension into space. (Watch a video of the experience below.)

Plan Your Trip: The Space Center is a roughly 75-minute drive from Orlando, the "Theme Park Capital of the World"; a 3.5-hour drive from Fort Lauderdale; and a 2.5-hour drive from Jacksonville. This excursion is also a nice option for cruisers sailing out of Cape Canaveral, as it's just a short drive from the cruise terminal.

High water in Venice

Photo: Therese Trinko / Flickr)

The Grand Canal is busy with waterbuses, water taxis and gondolas. In this photo by Therese Trinko, taken in the late afternoon from the Rialto Bridge in Venice, it depicts a scene that would be familiar to Canaletto and Giovanni Bellini.

The city of Venice, now threatened by subsidence (buildings sinking very slowly into the Venetian lagoon) and a rising sea level, is taking measures against this threat. The MOSE project, now under construction, is a fantastically complicated barrier of 79 separate 300-ton submerged flaps that will be raised to keep the Adriatic Sea at bay at times of extremely high tides.

5 Can’t-Miss July Getaways

Terrific picks for getaways in the peak of summer

 


It’s summertime, and the living is easy—at least when you’re on vacation. The secret of a great getaway this time of year is to avoid places that are too hot, too crowded, or too expensive. Here are five places that come into their prime in July.

Saratoga Springs, New York
This summer marks the 150th anniversary of the Saratoga Race Course, which ran its first thoroughbred meet when Lincoln was president. Nowadays races are held for six weeks every summer (July 19 – Sept. 2, 2013), every day except Tuesday. Beyond horses, the picturesque little “city in the country” in upstate New York is blessed with an overabundance of summertime riches, including a vibrant Victorian downtown, city and state parks dotted with healthy mineral springs, and a high-powered cultural calendar that includes rock and pop concerts plus visits by the New York City Ballet (July 9-13), National Ballet of Canada (July 16-18), and Aspen Santa Fe Ballet (July 24-25). Stick around for August and you can also catch the Philadelphia Orchestra (August 7-24).

Portland, Oregon

Flickr: LikeWhere

It’s hard to think of a northwestern city that embraces summer with more gusto than Portland, whose healthy-living vibe shines through its myriad farmer’s markets and outdoor cafes. There are an exceptional array of ways to get active, from hiking and kayaking to cycling on 300+ miles of city bike lanes, paths and boulevards. Love music festivals? The Waterfront Blues Festival (July 4-7) is the largest of its kind west of the Mississippi, while the Cathedral Park Jazz Festival (July 18-21) is the West’s oldest and largest free celebration of jazz and blues.

(MORE: Planning a visit to Portland? Find a kid-friendly hotel.)

Aruba

Flickr: Nestor's Blurrylife

Blessed with year-round constant temperatures and a location below the hurricane belt, drop-dead-gorgeous Aruba makes a good choice in any season. Still, the smart money is on the summer, when prices take a dive. With the Aruba Tourism Authority’s “One Happy Family” package, available now through September, kids under 12 stay free at more than 10 hotels on the island. Participating hotels include Divi Village Golf & Beach Resort and the Aruba Marriott Resort & Stellaris Casino.

Providence, Rhode Island

Flickr: Muffet

Summer evenings in Providence are brighter thanks to Waterfire, an annual installation of small bonfires that dot the downtown rivers. The city has a pleasing, laid-back college vibe—Brown University and Rhode Island School of Design are within a stone’s throw of each other—with shoppers heading for the Downcity Arts District and food lovers filling the many unpretentious yet excellent cafes and burger joints in town.

Grand Traverse, Michigan

Flickr: The Last Cookie

Known for its world-record tart cherry harvests, this gorgeous little town and its environs along the shores of Lake Michigan is revving up for the National Cherry Festival (June 29-July 6) and more than 150 events, including live music, air shows, pie-eating contests, and even a cherry pit-spitting contest. A staple on “best small towns in America” top 10 lists, Grand Traverse tempts with a fabulous food scene (chef Mario Batali summers here) and natural wonders that include freshwater beaches and the spectacular Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.

Summer’s Hottest Craze: 5 Places to Try a Cronut

From cro-cremes to doughssants, these morning treats are worth a stop during any big-city vacation. 

Watch your back, cupcakes.

The latest portable-sweet craze, the “cronut,” has hit big this summer: made of croissant dough, cronuts are fried, doughnut-style, before being filled with cream and topped with icing or sugar. Manhattan’s Dominique Ansel Bakery is the epicenter of the cronut craze—and has even trademarked the name, leaving other pastry chefs to create their own croissant-doughnut hybrids: the doissant, the crullant, the crognet, and more.
Since any kid (and most parents) enjoy a sweet morning treat while on vacation, we found the best options for getting in on the cronut craze around the U.S. (While these bakeries tend to run out of their hybrid pastries by mid-morning, families may have a leg up on the competition, thanks to kids who naturally wake up at the crack of dawn.) By summer's end, we predict many bakery windows will start advertising new takes on this fried delight—but for now, here are five cities where you can get ‘em while they’re hot:
New York City: Dominique Ansel Bakery
The jury is out on whether this baker in New York’s Soho neighborhood actually invented the deep-fried croissant (his, like many, has a vanilla crème filling), but he is definitely pulling most of the hype, and has even trademarked the name Cronut. Ansel’s bakery opens every morning at 8 am, but these days, you’ll want to get there earlier to stake out your place in line. (189 Spring St.; $5 each.)

(MORE: Read parents’ reviews of kid-friendly hotels in New York City.)

Philadelphia: Swiss Haus Bakery
Located in Philly’i s Center City, this 88-year-old bakery has introduced a version called a Swiss Cro-Creme, featuring both a vanilla cream center and a cinnamon glaze. (35 S. 19th St.; Opens at 9 am on Sunday, 7 am other days; $5 each.)
Los Angeles: Semi Sweet Bakery
This downtown bakery calls their hybrid doughnut a crullant, a tip of the hat to the beloved cruller—and may actually be leaner than its fried peers, since it’s baked and has no icing (not yet, at least). Each customer is limited to two crullants, but they are a relative bargain at $3.95 each. Given how many donut shops abound in the strip malls of L.A., don’t be surprised if you see many more flaky knockoffs popping up around the city soon. (105 E. 6th St.; Opens daily at 8 am.)

(MORE: Find things to do in L.A. with kids.)

Washington, DC: The Chocolate Crust
Say hello to the DC-based doissant. This fried delight is made with chocolate croissant dough, filled with Hazelnut Nutella Pastry Cream, and topped with pink icing, pistachios and anise sugar. You can buy up to a dozen at once and 48 if you pre-order. (5830 Georgia Ave. NW; Opens daily at 8 am; $4.75 each.)
Chicago: La Boulangerie and West Town bakeries
At La Boulangerie, with locations in Chicago’- s Lakeview and Logan Square, “crognets” look a bit more like traditional doughnuts and come in plain, vanilla, cream, chocolate and fruit jam. Smart money says to arrive between 11 am and noon, reportedly the sweet spot for getting them fresh. (Opens at 7am weekdays and 8am on weekends; $5 each.)

Meanwhile, at the West Town Bakery—with one shop in Ukrainian Village and another in downtown’s Acme Hotel—you can find a rectangular, long-john version, a "doughssant," in fabulous combo flavors such as chocolate-raspberry, blueberry-lavender, and coffee-cream-cheese. (Opens at 7 am; $3.50 each.)

Just Explain It: The Truth About Left-handed People

About 90 percent of people in the world today are right-handed.  That makes life for the other ten percent who are left-handed a little more complicated, including, by the way, the President of the United States.

Every day, left-handed folks quietly face obstacles most right-handed people will never know.  It could be something as simple as driving a car, or using a can opener or a pair of scissors.

In this Just Explain It, we’ll look at the truths and expel myths about left-handed people.
          
First, did you know that five out of the last seven United States presidents were left-hand dominant? In 1992, all three major presidential candidates were left-handed. Four years later in 1996, the top three candidates for president were again lefties. Of the three, Senator Bob Dole was the only one who was originally right-handed.  He learned to use his left hand after a World War II injury paralyzed his right hand. Then in 2008, long-time Senator John McCain campaigned against then Senator Barack Obama for the White House.  And if you haven't guessed it already…they're both left-handed.  

Why are so few of us left-handed?   The reality is, we really don’t know.  One theory is that handedness could be a result of genetics.

Scientists say there are two genes associated with handedness.  One is the D gene - it promotes right-hand preference.  The other is the C gene…it has the ability to promote a preference for either hand.  The D gene, however, is more frequent in the population.  But when the C gene is present there’s a 50 percent chance that a person could be right or left-handed.

Another theory on handedness has to do with our brains. They’re made up of two halves.  If the left half of your brain is dominant, then you’re most likely right-handed.  But with lefties, it’s more complex.  Seventy percent of left-handers are also left-brain dominant. The other 30 percent of lefties have right-side dominant brains or the dominance is evenly distributed between both sides.

However, if you’re born with a preference towards your left hand…you can be trained to use your right. But why would anyone actually do that?

Maybe because people believe in myths like, right-handed people live longer healthier lives.  Or that it’s difficult for left-handed kids to learn how to write the alphabet. Or maybe they think lefties are clumsy.

During the 18th and 19th centuries, left-handedness was considered a disability and children were taught to use their right hands.  Even today the popular website Thesaurus.com describes left-handed as awkward or sinister.

But not all of the myths about left-handers are negative. One myth suggests they are more creative and smarter as a group than their right-handed peers.  So far scientific research has yet to find any truth to these claims.  In fact, a 2013 survey out of New Zealand found that personality wise; lefties and righties were the same. 

Life might be a little more complicated for left-handers when it comes to cutting a piece of paper or opening a bottle of wine, but it seems to be a good sign if you’re trying to make it to the White House.

Every year on August 13th, lefties around the world celebrate their hand preference.  It’s been happening since 1992 and raises the awareness of the difficulties left-handers face every day in life.

Do you think being right or left-handed leads to success in life? Let us know what you think. Give us your feedback in the comments below or on Twitter using #JustExplainItNews.

As glacier melts, secrets of lost military plane revealed

By Yereth Rosen

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - An Alaska glacier is exposing remains from a military air tragedy six decades later.
Relics from an Air Force cargo plane that slammed into a mountain in November 1952, killing all 52 servicemen on board, first emerged last summer on Colony Glacier, about 50 miles east of Anchorage.
That discovery, by Alaska National Guard crews flying training missions out of Anchorage, put into motion a sophisticated recovery program carried out by the Hawaii-based Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command.
After last year's initial work - when nearly everything that rose to the glacier's surface was picked up - the JPAC team came back this summer to collect additional relics pushed out of the ice since then.

"As the glacier melts and the glacier moves, more material comes up to the surface," Dr. Gregory Berg, the forensic anthropologist who leads the team of specialists examining the crevasse-ridden ice field, told reporters at a news briefing last week.


                              [Shrinking glaciers behind a third of sea-level rise: study]

Among the personal items collected so far: A tiny fishing kit, a compass, a survival kit, a survival suit, a hockey puck, and a mini-box of Camel cigarettes. Those and other items are being saved for a future memorial, said Doug Beckstead, a historian at Anchorage's Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson.
Also collected were some human remains, which Berg declined to describe in detail. But he said the material, encapsulated for decades in ice, is well-preserved and includes "things we believe to be tissue" - a contrast with conditions in Southeast Asia or other hot climates where the team travels to retrieve military remains long ago decomposed.
The remains will be sent to a laboratory in Hawaii for analysis, including possible DNA matches with surviving relatives, officials said.
No positive identifications have yet been announced. It usually takes several months to complete laboratory work, said Lee Tucker, a JPAC spokesman who travelled to Alaska. Identifications are expected to be announced "in the near future," Berg said.
Berg and his team must tread carefully, skirting deadly crevasses and deep water-filled holes while trying to collect as many items and remains as possible.

They want the grinding glacier, as it moves over time, to reveal more relics over what is expected to be a years-long project, but they do not want it to carry the items all the way into the terminus lake, where they would likely be lost forever.


                                         [It's alive! Moss frozen for 400 years grows again]

So far, only the lightest pieces have been pushed to the glacier's surface, and only a small portion of the 154-foot aircraft has emerged. "We don't have all 52 guys lined up neatly, ready to be located," Berg said.
The wrecked cargo plane, a C-124 Globemaster II, slammed into Mount Gannett in midwinter, an accident blamed on bad weather. Although officials knew the site of the crash, remoteness and winter weather made recovery impossible at the time. The wreckage was soon buried under snow and gone from sight.
When finally spotted last year, the debris was 12 miles from the crash site, having been shifted by the glacier. The ice has flowed another 275 meters (902 feet) downslope since last year, Berg said.
For Alaska-based military members supporting the JPAC effort, there is another mission: removing the crash debris that is not useful to the investigation.
As of early July, local military personnel had removed about 1,800 pounds of aircraft debris, said Lieutenant Colonel Adrian Crowley of the Alaskan Command. "That is the plan, to remove as much of the debris as possible from the site, to be good environmental stewards," he said.

Video game starship worth $9,000 destroyed in ambush

Imagine spending years devoting your time and your finances to acquiring an impressive video game spaceship, one of the biggest and most valuable the gaming world has ever seen.
Now imagine all of that work being destroyed in minutes.
One player of the long-running online game EVE Online experienced that horror Sunday, when an ambush destroyed his supercarrier valued at a whopping $9,000.
The massive world of EVE Online is all about buying, piloting and blowing up spaceships. It’s not for the faint at heart, in part because its in-game currency, called ISK (Interstellar Kredits), carries a real-world value. The Revenant -- one of only three ships that big in existence -- carries a value of 309 billion ISK, making it among the priciest bits of code in the game.
That also made it quite the target.
The ambush played out with plenty of intrigue. Players in the Pandemic Legion received an SOS and assumed it was a player in distress. It turns out the player they had put in charge of leading their fleet was actually a spy for an opposing group, who led them directly into a bunch of dreadnaughts and supercarriers. The owner of the Revenant, a player named TSID, could do little to stop the virtual bloodbath, and the rest is EVE Online history.
The economy in EVE Online is a living thing. CCP, the game's developer, actually has an economist in-house who monitors the virtual world, working to curb inflation or introducing new types of technology to absorb currency. It’s like a virtual Federal Reserve, selling bonds to shrink the money supply.
Technically, players cannot exchange ISK for real-world cash, but CCP does let them use that in-game currency to buy real-world objects (such as graphics cards) and 30-day game time codes.
This isn't the first time the game has seen major losses. Eight months ago, a ship carrying valuable blueprints worth $6,000 in real-world money was destroyed by other players. And while losing a $9,000 spaceship is a serious bummer, the Revenant is still a far cry from the most expensive video game object, an honor held by a $350,000 space station in fellow online world Project Entropia.

7 Best Supplements for Weight Loss

You can lose weight without starving yourself or drastically restricting your food choices. You can eat reasonable portions and put in reasonable workouts at the gym, and you can shed fat while you do it.

How? It all comes down to eating the right combination of foods--foods that will shift your body out of fat-storage mode and into fat-melting mode. Specific vitamins and nutrients can actually help to flip an internal switch that signals cells throughout your body to burn more calories, wasting many of those calories as heat. Without these important nutrients, the opposite happens. Your body holds onto fat. Your metabolism slows and your weight-loss efforts become an exercise in futility.

Optimize these critical fat-melting nutrients so you can finally drop those stubborn pounds and keep them off for good. In this way, you can still consume reasonable portions and put in a reasonable amount of exercise. Yes, you still have to watch your portions. Yes, exercise is still important. But fat-melting foods work in your favor so you can eat and move in a way that is reasonable, effective, and realistic for life.

BEWARE: The 3 Biggest Weight Loss Mistakes

Vitamin D
How It Melts Fat: Study after study shows that vitamin D helps to ensure body cells listen and respond to insulin, a hormone secreted from your pancreas. One of its jobs is to help glucose get into body cells, which burn glucose for energy. How well insulin pushes glucose into cells is called "insulin sensitivity." The more sensitive your cells are to insulin, the better. The less sensitive they are to insulin, the more likely the calories you eat will end up in your fat cells.

When levels of D are low, levels of parathyroid hormone (PTH) rise. Higher than normal levels of PTH trigger a series of reactions that eventually lead to fat cells converting sugar into fat and hoarding fat rather than releasing it to be burned, explains Michael B. Zemel, PhD, director of the Nutrition Institute at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.

A lack of vitamin D may also interfere with leptin, a hormone that signals your brain to stop eating. Your body doesn't know when it's full, so you continue to eat.

Calcium
How It Melts Fat: Calcium is a mineral that works in tandem with D to help you shed fat. Calcium is stored in fat cells, and researchers think that the more calcium a fat cell has, the more fat that cell will release to be burned. Calcium also promotes weight loss by binding to fat in your GI tract, preventing some of it from getting absorbed into your bloodstream.

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Protein
How It Melt Fat: In addition to keeping hunger in check, eating protein at every meal helps to keep body composition--the amount of fat relative to muscle--in better proportion. Along with calcium and D, protein helps you to preserve muscle mass as you drop pounds. A recent study out of the University of Illinois found that women who consumed protein twice daily lost 3.9 percent more weight than women who consumed less of it on a diet. They not only lost more weight, they also got stronger as they did so, with their thigh muscles alone ending up with 5.8 percent more protein at the end of the diet than before.

Omega-3 Fatty Acids
How They Melt Fat: omega-3s enable weight loss by switching on enzymes that trigger fat-burning in cells. They also help to boost mood, which may help reduce emotional eating. And omega 3s might improve leptin signaling in the brain, causing the brain to turn up fat burning and turn down appetite. Fatty fish like salmon (which are also high in vitamin D) are one of the richest sources of this fat. Other foods, such as some nuts and seeds, contain a type of fat that can be converted into omega-3s after ingestion.

Monounsaturated Fatty Acids (MUFAs)
How They Melt Fat: One Danish study of 26 men and women found that a diet that included 20 percent of its calories from MUFAs, a type of fat found in olive oil, nuts, seeds, avocados, peanut butter, and chocolate, improved 24-hour calorie burning by 0.1 percent and fat burning by 0.04 percent after 6 months. Other research shows that MUFAs zero in on belly fat. Specific foods that are high in MUFAs--especially peanuts, tree nuts, and olive oil--have been shown to keep blood sugar steady and reduce appetite, too.

PLUS: 5 Fatty Foods That Make You Skinny

Conjugated Linoleic Acid (CLA)
How It Burns Fat: CLAs are potent fat burners that are found, along with D and calcium, in dairy products. They are fatty acids that are created when bacteria ferments the food in the first part of the stomach of cows, sheep, and other ruminant animals. The CLA that is created through fermentation then makes its way into the meat and milk of these animals.

When we consume these foods, the CLA helps blood glucose enter body cells, so CLA can be burned for energy and not stored as fat. CLA also helps to promote fat burning, especially in muscles, where the bulk of our calorie burning takes place.

Note: There's a downside to this fat melter. Most of these studies involving CLA were performed using huge amounts of CLA--amounts that you'd only be able to consume if you ate 40 pounds of beef at once. (We don't know about you, but we certainly can't eat 40 pounds of beef for dinner.) While you might not be able to consume enough of it through food alone to melt off a huge amount of fat, but you can consume enough of it to help nudge your metabolism into a fat-burning state. And when you add it to the other fat melters--especially the D, calcium, and protein--you will create the perfect environment for total-body fat burning.

Polyphenols
How They Melt Fat: Polyphenols are the antioxidants that give green tea its health-and metabolism-boosting punch. Research shows they boost resting metabolic rate by up to a whopping 17 percent, helping the body to burn more fat. One recent study done on rats found that EGCG, the polyphenol in green tea, blocked weight gain and prevented metabolic syndrome when rats were fed a high-fat diet. You can actually feel this effect after you drink the tea. Your body will literally heat up as your cells waste calories as heat. Green tea is a great winter elixir for that reason. Drink a cup whenever you feel chilled and are tempted to eat even though you are not really that hungry. The tea will warm and soothe you, reducing hunger and cravings.

5 weird things that happen after you die

The grave, gross facts about how your body decomposes

 

 

Nature isn't kind to the human body after death. Thankfully, the days of natural decomposition have been replaced by decidedly modern rituals of death. We can choose to delay the decomposition process by being embalmed, where our bodily fluids are replaced with preservatives. Or we can be cremated, where we are cooked at temperatures as high as 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit for several hours while we turn to ash.

 

While our modern disposal rituals might not sound appealing, the process of nature composting us back into the Earth is even less so. Even earliest man knew how to put some distance between himself and his decomposing dead. In 2003, archeologists found evidence of ancient humans who had buried their dead in northern Spain about 350,000 years ago.

 

So what happens during decomposition? Here are five weird ways our bodies deconstruct after death.

 

Your cells burst open. The process in which the human body decomposes starts just minutes after death. When the heart stops beating, we experience algor mortis, or the “death chill,” when the temperature of the body falls about 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit an hour until it reaches room temperature. Almost immediately, the blood becomes more acidic as carbon dioxide builds up. This causes cells to split open, emptying enzymes into the tissues, which start to digest themselves from within.

 

You turn white — and purple. Gravity makes its mark on the human body in the first moments after death. While the rest of your body turns deathly pale, heavy red blood cells move to the parts of your body that are closest to the ground. This is because circulation has stopped. The results are purple splotches over your lower parts known as livor mortis. In fact, it is by studying the markings of livor mortis that the coroner can tell exactly what time you died.

 

Calcium makes your muscles contract. We've all heard of rigor mortis, in which a dead body becomes stiff and hard to move. Rigor mortis generally sets in about three to four hours after death, peaks at 12 hours, and dissipates after 48 hours. Why does it happen? There are pumps in the membranes of our muscle cells that regulate calcium. When the pumps stop working in death, calcium floods the cells, causing the muscles to contract and stiffen. Thus, there is rigor mortis.

 

Your organs will digest themselves. Putrefaction, or when our bodies start to look like extras in a zombie movie, follows rigor mortis. This phase is delayed by the embalming process, but eventually the body will succumb. Enzymes in the pancreas make the organ begin to digest itself. Microbes will tag-team these enzymes, turning the body green from the belly onwards. As Caroline Williams writes in NewScientist, “the main beneficiaries are among the 100 trillion bacteria that have spent their lives living in harmony with us in our guts.” As this bacterium breaks us down, it releases putrescine and cadaverine, which are the compounds which make the human body smell in death.

 

You may be covered in a wax. After putrefaction, decay moves quickly to turn the body into a skeleton. However, some bodies take an interesting turn on the way. If a body comes into contact with cold soil or water, it may develop adipocere, a fatty, waxy material formed from the bacteria breaking down tissue. Adipocere works as a natural preservative on the inner organs. It can mislead investigators into thinking a body died much sooner than it actually did, as was the case of a 300-year-old adipocere corpse recently found in Switzerland.

 

In the end, we all return to the Earth: it’s just a matter of how. But whether it’s by composting or the fires of cremation, we all turn to dust and ash — and in some cases, wax.

 

Five apps that changed history

Apps such as mapping software, photo filters and To Do lists have revolutionised the way we live. Here's our five of the best.

 

The Apple App Store celebrates its fifth anniversary today - with more than 50 billion apps downloaded to date.

When it launched back in July 2008 alongside iPhone 3G, there were a mere 500 apps - including SEGA's Super Monkey Ball, Shazam, eBay and even a mobile version of MySpace.

That number has now risen to more than 900,000 - both free and paid-for - including 375,000 specifically for iPad.

Whether they created an app in a bedroom or coded it for a multi-million dollar company, Apple has paid iOS app developers a massive $10 billion in commissions over the past five years.

Apps such as mapping software, photo filters and To Do lists have revolutionised the way we live, work and communicate. Here's our five of the best.

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Angry Birds
Angry Birds has changed gaming forever. The game, created in 2009 by a Finnish studio with 50 unsuccessful apps to its name, has been downloaded a billion times - enough for one in seven of Earth’s population to play it. To put that in context, the best-selling album of all time, Michael Jackson’s Thriller, has sold 120 million in 30 years. Celebrity fans include David Cameron and Angelina Jolie - and its impact on the gaming industry has been immense. In the first quarter of 2012, 10% of the total earnings of the UK games industry were from Angry Birds.

Spotify
The music streaming site has changed the way we enjoy our favourite tunes - instead of buying a CD, or downloading a full album from the likes of iTunes, we now simply stream tracks we like instead. Next to Spotify, even downloaded music feels out-dated. The app offers a huge online library of 18 million tracks available to ‘stream’ (play instantly via the net) in CD quality - even over a phone connection. Phone users have to pay for Spotify Premium - £10 a month - but can download unlimited tracks to listen anywhere.

Google Maps
The fury that erupted around the world when Apple replaced Google Maps with its own, wonky Apple Maps was tribute to how essential this navigation app has become to smartphone users since it launched as a Java app in 2005. Google Maps now offers 3D Street View images, voice-controlled navigation - and the latest version of the Android app suggests nearby places to eat and drink without even being asked. The search giant is now recruiting "Trekkers" - armed with backpack cameras - to photograph outdoor areas its Street View cars couldn't reach.


Flipboard
This app turns multiple news sites into one "magazine" - mixed in with posts from Facebook and Twitter, all presented in a format where users "flip" pages as if reading a magazine. It was originally designed for the Apple tablet back in 2010, and has since taken off on other platforms including Android - it's shipped with new phones such as Samsung's Galaxy S4. Flipboard has been at the forefront of a new digital publishing revolution made possible by the App Store - changing our relationship with Web and magazine content in the same way Amazon's Kindle apps have changed our relationship with books.

TuneIn Radio
Want to listen to rock in Rotterdam or jazz from Jamaica? This global radio app broke down the boundaries between international, national and local radio stations - and mixed in podcasts, radio shows recorded specifically for the web. Tunein offers 70,000 stations and two million podcasts from one app, all free, streaming to your iPhone or Android via wi-fi or the phone network. The app lets you pause and rewind any station as you listen, and offers a mix of worldwide radio and homegrown stations such as Radio 1, Talksport and Absolute.

'Sleepless nights will result': World's strongest coffee contains 200% of caffeine in normal blends

Mike Brown's intense caffeinated dark roast drink, named 'Death Wish Coffee', is blended from the strongest beans in the world and contains double the amount of caffeine of the average Starbucks coffee

 

An online coffee firm have invented what they claim is the world's strongest coffee - which contains 200 per cent more caffeine and comes with its own health warning.

Mike Brown's intense caffeinated dark roast drink, named 'Death Wish Coffee', is blended from the strongest beans in the world and contains double the amount of caffeine of the average Starbucks coffee.

His Death Wish Coffee beans are ground very fine for extra potency - and Mike even says the extreme brew is his most popular blend.

The rather threatening packaging on 'Death Wish Coffee' comes with a skull and crossbones, while a label warns that 'sleepless nights will result'.

Mike came up with the idea after owning and running a coffee company for the 6 years, in New York. However, one problem he frequently encountered was customers craving a strong coffee.

Mike said: 'All of the premium dark roast coffee on the market was not as caffeinated as the lighter roasts.

Customers would come in and say, 'Give me a cup of your strongest coffee.' and I would reply, 'We serve nothing but the best coffee here, but our strongest tasting coffee is not our most caffeinated coffee'.  A puzzled look would usually follow.'

He said: 'I made it my mission to find a coffee that is dark, rich and flavorful but also has high caffeine content. All while being grown organically fairly traded, and shade grown.

Death Wish Coffee is made from Robusta beans which contain 'nearly double the amount of caffeine' than the Arabica beans used by high-end roasters, according to experts.

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A single 12-ounce cup of coffee at Starbucks contains approximately 260 milligrams of caffeine according to EnergyFiend, a caffeine database. The same cup from Death Wish Coffee contains 520 milligrams, double the amount.

Mike added: 'Usually the lighter the roast, the more the caffeine. But most coffee drinkers prefer a darker roast.

'This is medium-roast so it has more flavor than other highly-caffeinated blends. We sell 13 different blends of coffee, and Death Wish is our most popular one.'