#how to condense it so it doesn’t take as much space while also retaining the visual clarity

[sodacowboy]

:/

[cheri-translates]

[CN] Victor’s Remembrance Date (Eng Translation)

🍒 Warning: This post contains detailed spoilers for a date which has not been released in English servers! 🍒

Note: A bullet-point summary, but important scenes have detailed translations!

This format will be used in subsequent translations because pausing at every frame takes too much time (I’ll still do it for Gavin’s dates because I’m biased) :>

Doing this will also retain some novelty for you when the date comes to EN! :)

In his birthday event, Victor is eight years old and takes a plane alone to visit his mother in France

His birthday wish: I wish for my mother to be healthy, for my father’s work to go smoothly, and that my family can be together more often.

His mother plays “Serenade” (by Franz Schubert) on the piano. She tells him that it’s a song to be played to someone you like (this piece of information will be important in the date)

The actual date begins on 12 January, the evening before Victor’s birthday

MC is in Souvenir to ensure that her preparation for Victor’s surprise party is complete - both the cake and gift are done

Victor suddenly calls and tells her to pack her luggage so he can whisk her off to Paris to settle some issues with a program

Several hours later, they reach Paris

MC can’t help feeling downcast because her efforts to prepare the surprise party went to waste

Even though she’s used to having their private time taken over by work, she still wants to help him celebrate since it’s a special day

He happens to be free that evening, so she hopes to give him a surprise

But Victor suggests that he brings her to meet someone

Along the way, he purchases flowers, and MC’s mind wanders for a while

Afterwards, she realises that Victor is bringing her to his mother’s former residence, which is near a university

IT’S SO PRETTY

He starts talking how his mother allowed students to stay here whenever they wanted to, so it’s kept in good condition

And that she used to be a student in the university as well

MC starts feeling very anxious because it’s as though she’s here to meet the parents

In her fluster, she accidentally presses on the piano keys, and Victor asks if she’s preparing for an impromptu performance

MC starts playing "Serenade” on the piano because she heard him listening to it in the car before

She doesn’t know what it means to Victor

Victor is stunned for a while but recovers

Victor: MC.

Victor rarely calls my name in such a serious manner. It takes me a long while to react, and I nod numbly.  

His low voice seems to have a deliberate warmth in it, and it softly encases me within.

Victor: I’ve never cared about a “sense of ceremony”. A lot of ceremonies are meant for others to see. My life does not require the participation and approval of many people. A certain dummy seems keen on this though, and is always thinking of holding parties, giving gifts, preparing surprises…

Victor’s frown disappears. His dark eyes are dyed with a faint smile.  

Victor: So… it’s not a bad thing to switch the roles sometimes. MC, this is my “sense of ceremony”.

MC gets flustered and accidentally reveals that she prepared a cake as a birthday surprise

They leave the residence, heading towards the café where the cake is at

Just as we reach the opposite end, a small souvenir stall catches my attention.

In the midst of various souvenirs, one particular item takes up half the space. With a closer look, I realise that those are locks.

MC: Eh? Did we walk past the Love Lock Bridge just now?

I can’t remember when I first came across the story related to this bridge.

Legend says that if two people who are mutually in love hang the lock on the bridge, they will be together forever, until death.

I hurriedly turn around, but only see glass railings, and the slow-moving water under the bridge. There is no place to hang the lock.

Victor: Due to safety concerns, this bridge underwent a rectification a few years ago, and the railings are completely made of glass now.

I look towards Victor in shock.

MC: How did you know that I was thinking about this?!

Victor: A dummy’s thoughts are written all over her face. There’s no need to guess. For example, it’s clear from your face that you want to buy the lock as a souvenir.

Not wanting to be seen through once again, I retort in a soft voice.

MC: …I wasn’t planning to buy it at first, but since you put it that way, I have no choice but to buy one.

While saying this, I pull a resigned Victor to the small stall, and carefully select a lock.

Among the various fancy designs, a relatively simple red coloured heart lock catches my eyes.  

MC: I’ll have this one!

After paying, I stuff the lock and its golden coloured key into Victor’s hand.

Victor: What are you doing?

Looking at his hesitant expression, I smile and blink at him.

MC: This is your birthday present. A heart lock – there’s only one in the world! You didn’t guess it this time round, right?

Victor’s expression freezes for a moment, but it quickly returns to its usual state. He purses his lips into a line.

Victor: You’re right. Even after a year, your taste has not improved. However…

“Kacha”

Victor raises his hand and locks the heart lock.

After that, he places the golden coloured key into my palm.

The cold key and the warm fingertips – these two feelings mingle on my skin.

Along with his voice, they take over my senses.

Victor: Take it.

MC: For me…?

The white breath from my words spin in the air, and finally condense into a smile, appearing on his lips.

Victor: This is a key – there’s only one in the world. Now, I’m giving it to you.

The sun has completely set, encasing the world in a cloak of fiery red.

In the distance, the Eiffel Tower lies in the sunset. Sentences strung with beautiful French words drift into our ears. The occasional noise from pedestrians passes us by.

Everything is quiet and tranquil. Only my heart is beating wildly.

I curl my finger, holding the key tightly, as though I’m grasping a switch to the future.

MC: You… why are you suddenly saying such childish things…

In contrast to my wavering voice, the sound of Victor’s laugh is clear as it lands on my ears.

Victor: I said it before. It’s not bad to be like this sometimes.

His voice and the music of a cello from a café somewhere are both low and long drawn.

A bird flies over the Seine River, and the streetlights flicker for a moment before they light up.

The bell tower rings five times in the distance, and the lingering sound in the air reminds me of the time, and also tugs at my heart.  

It is 5pm in Paris, which is also… 1am in Loveland City.

After a second of hesitation, I make a decision.

I suddenly lift my head, directly meeting Victor’s gaze. I stare at the reflection of myself in his eyes.

I stand on my tiptoes and pull on his tie, secretly retrieving the present I prepared since this morning from my pocket.

I can see a flash of astonishment in Victor’s eyes, but that emotion is soon concealed and becomes even more profound and tender.

Cooperating with my movements, he leans down, and his hair sweeps across my cheek.

Like the evening light in the sky, and the streetlamps that were just lit, the gentle and soft sensation lingers where we touch.

In the midst of my rapidly beating heart, I release my hold. I take out the present, both cheeks red.

MC: I was lying just now… this is my real present. Victor, happy birthday.

Before I finish speaking, Victor reaches out to hold onto my waist, pulling me over.

The sudden closing of distance leaves me unable to react. I can only look dumbfoundedly at the person before me, and stare into his deep eyes.

Victor: Don’t move.

This is a very light and shallow kiss.

Like a feather, gently brushing across my lips. Like gentle waves on shallow water.

Yet, utterly special under the encasement of the sunset, the music and chiming of the clock mingling together.

It leaves an indelible mark in the deepest parts of my memory, and the most tender parts of my heart.

-

Phone call: here

Video call: here

[primoheat]

Homeowner’s Checklist for HVAC Maintenance

Spring HVAC Maintenance Checklist

If you want to keep your home clean and comfortable throughout the summertime, spring cleaning means more than just dusting and scrubbing. Between chilly winters and blazing summer heat, a decent amount of stress is put on your heating and cooling system. That’s why including HVAC maintenance in your spring-cleaning schedule is a must.

Before you switch your thermostat to cool, check these easy maintenance tasks off your list. Doing so can keep your system running smoothly, which means a comfortable summer and no costly repairs.

First, start with the outdoor HVAC unit:

Remove any condenser covers, coil blankets, or lids: If you canvassed the open-air loop to ensure it throughout the cold weather months, make certain to eliminate the cover prior to beginning the framework. These covers ensure and keep avoids with regard to your unit, yet additionally limit wind current and any warmth move. Beginning the framework with any of these covers set up, in any event, for a brief time frame, could seriously harm your framework. Numerous individuals neglect to eliminate their covers each year, regularly bringing about significant fixes or even substitution of the entire framework.

Inspect the outdoor unit panels: These boards are intended to encase the electrical associations and should be set up to help ensure both you and your framework. In the event that you are feeling the loss of a board (potentially because of wind) or if the board is skewed, this could present dangers for both you and the protected activity of the gear. In the event that the board covering the electrical associations is absent or strange, you should call a certified professional furnace repair abbotsford for an evaluation prior to beginning your framework.

Remove any debris from the outdoor coil: Depending on where you live or what side of the house your framework is found, you may discover refuse or vegetation blown into or against the curl. The framework curls are intended to move heat, and any trash restricts this impact. To get the most ideal exhibition from your framework, eliminate flotsam and jetsam from the loop and encompassing region. In the event that there is a great deal of residue or dust in the curls you can as a rule wash this off with a nursery hose, however make certain to keep the shower restricted to the loop territory and get it far from any electrical boards. Additionally, while mulching in the spring, be mindful so as not to pack mulch around the foundation of the unit. This is particularly valid for heat siphons as there's feasible a space under the unit and this ought to consistently be kept open to permit great wind current to the open-air unit.

Repair or replace any damaged pipe insulation: There are two refrigerant lines running from your outside unit to the indoor air controller – a little one and a bigger one. The attractions line is the bigger copper pipe on the outside unit and this line takes the cool refrigerant back to the blower in the open-air unit. On the off chance that the bigger attractions line has harmed protection, this could cause a deficiency of cooling for the outside unit which could harm your framework and may likewise cause energy use. Harm to the froth protection can be brought about by sun decay, freezing water caught in the froth or winter creatures searching for asylum or food. The protection ought to be set up to keep up legitimate framework cooling. If protection needs supplanting, do as such prior to beginning the unit. Look on the copper pipe for a size (5/8, 3/4, 7/8, and so forth) to decide the appropriate size for your substitution protection. It very well may be feasible to discover the protection at a nearby tool shop. When introducing this protection, be mindful so as not to twist or pull on both of the lines as this would make the lines crease or to foster a break which would bring about a refrigerant hole. (NOTE: ONLY the bigger line needs protection. The more modest copper line doesn't need protection.)

Then, inspect the indoor HVAC unit:

Change the air filters: The adjustment of seasons is normally a happy chance to supplant your indoor air channels. As indicated by the U.S. Branch of Energy, the main upkeep task that will guarantee the effectiveness of your climate control system is to regularly supplant or clean its channels. With the ordinary wind current impeded, air that sidesteps the channel may convey earth straightforwardly into the evaporator curl and disable the loop's warmth retaining limit. Supplanting a grimy, stopped up channel with a perfect one can bring down your climate control system's energy utilization by as much as 5% to 15%. You can discover most regular substitution channels at your neighborhood tool shop yet you should know the size and model number of your present channel to guarantee you get the correct one. In the event that it is too enormous or too little it won't function admirably and this could hurt your framework too. Channels have a "MERV" rating. Created by ASHRAE, the Minimum Efficiency Reporting Value (MERV) rates channel execution on a size of 1 to 16. The higher the MERV esteem the more proficient the channel is at catching airborne particles. For instance, a MERV7 channel is a decent normal rating for the basic 1" size range.

How to change your indoor air filter:

Check the coil “condensate” drain: This channel, which is typically plastic, is situated on the indoor air overseer and is utilized to eliminate the dampness gathered from the muggy air in your home while the climate control system is running. Since the curl's temperature is lower than the encompassing air, water from the air will gather on the loop and trickle into the plate beneath. This dense water needs to stream to a channel or the plate will top off and flood the unit or conceivably spill water out beneath your indoor unit and into your home which could cause an expensive wreck in a completed territory. Check to ensure the line is in the appropriate spot and has not been knock or broken over the cold weather months. Review it to see that it will deplete to the fitting area. After fire up, on a hot, moist day when your AC has been running a great deal, it is a smart thought to check this line again to ensure it is depleting appropriately and not spilling.

Clean the supply vents and return grills: Make sure that all inventory/return air barbecues and vents are open and liberated from trash. It would likewise be great to utilize the vacuum to eliminate any pet hair or residue that may have collected during the past season alongside any blocks which confine appropriate wind stream to and from your air controller. A few houses have separate winter and summer supply vents, or house drafting, and some even have separate frameworks – one for warming and one for cooling. In the event that you have a framework like this you may have put additional plastic material over the AC vents to forestall drafts during the colder season and all through winter. Assuming this is the case, it is essential to eliminate these before you turn on the AC or you won't have appropriate wind stream back through the framework and this could cause serious harm. When all is said in done, cleaning all vents toward the start of each season is a smart thought.

Turn it on and make sure it works:  After going through the agenda, sit tight for a decent, hot day when you have some extra time. Turn the framework on and check to ensure you have cool air emerging from the indoor vents for the initial couple of moments subsequent to beginning it, and afterward two or three hours for the duration of the day. After the initial couple of moments, you should feel cool air emerging from the registers. On the off chance that no air is coming out (or assuming the air coming out doesn't feel cool), something may not be right and you ought to quickly kill the framework at the indoor regulator. You can go through the agenda once again and afterward attempt it once more. In the event that the issue continues, turn the framework off and call a decent HVAC project worker who can analyze the issue. Leaving the framework turned on when it's not running as expected can cause a great deal of harm. It never damages to request that a HVAC proficient assistance analyze the issue if your framework isn't working as expected.

In summary, a brief inspection of your system now could help keep your system running worry-free through the heat of the summer. While performing this general inspection, take note of the overall system health in order to assess the likelihood of a problem down the road. If your system is old and has endured an unusually harsh season, it might be time to call for help. A qualified air conditioning repair abbotsford can help you complete a much more thorough spring technical inspection to avoid system failure in the hottest months of the year. Technicians can also help address any further concerns you have, so be sure to let the contractor know what you found during your own spring inspection.

[ontrackmind]

Study Style

So, I made a post recently about how I like to take notes in medical school. Today, I want to talk about how I study in medical school. These methods might not work for everyone, but I find that this method works for me. I have a daily routine, weekly routine, and a test prep routine. If you are looking for some tips, maybe these can help. The most important part is to know how you study. Knowing what works best for you and sticking with it will ultimately help you more than using an ill-fitting method that someone else came up with. Try out a few things, but if it isn't working then try something else. If you notice improvement, then don't change things! Don't try to fix what isn't broken.

If you are looking for a change, this is what I do:

1. Read the handouts/pre-class material! I make sure to read all of the handouts before class. Often we have more material recommended than we can possibly read for each class. I start with the pre-made pdf files and journal articles because I figure, if it was important enough for a professor to synthesize into a condensed document, it is important enough to know. When I get stuck on a concept, that's when I refer to the textbook for help. A lot of people in my class use first aid as they study, too. I will use it for pathways or if someone in our class points out that a particular section is extra helpful for our class material, but otherwise, I plan to use first aid mostly for Step study. I have found that it is better to read the handouts and be exposed to the material, even if I am confused, than it is to go into a lecture completely blind. It is much harder to follow new material at a fast pace.

2. Do the objectives/Know the main points of each lecture Each week, I fill out our weekly objectives. These are often broad, big concepts that we need to know for the exam. While it's not comprehensive, it is a great place to start. I review all of the weeks' objectives over the weekend. Often, our material builds on itself, so if I didn't understand a topic last week, I will struggle to understand a more advanced concept next week.

3. Flashcards In the evenings, I try to do a few Anki cards. Sometimes it is a class made deck or the pre-made Zanki deck. This doesn't always happen, but when I do get to do some flashcards, I feel like I retain information better. Spaced repetition does indeed help with recall.

4. Use outside resources when needed Usually on Friday or Saturday, I use outside resources like pathoma, sketchy, or boards and beyond. I find that these things are helpful, but since they are supplemental to our class material (and are often more Step focused than our curriculum is), I set aside time for these resources separately. Knowing the information will be helpful for Step, but it isn't always the most high yield for my classes.

5. Handwritten notes before exams Before exams, I start transitioning to paper notes during study time. If we are given flow charts or tables that could be helpful for the exam, I usually print those specific pages and practice drawing it from memory. It's a great way to learn concepts or test your understanding. I also start to write out pathways, rewrite anything that requires basic memorization, and will hand write notes about concepts that I really struggle with. I find that I remember things longer/better when I take the time to write them out. It takes a while, so I try to limit my handwritten notes to when it is truly needed.

6. Flashcards again! (Quiz style, not learning style.) The 2 weeks before exams, I really amp up my use of Anki cards as a way to quiz myself. I also find any/all practice questions we have had from the unit and take them in a "mock quiz" environment. I try to reason through each right and wrong answer without using notes. It is a great way to test myself. I really try to test myself here. I try to come up with a reasonable answer before flipping the card. Don't just do it half way and read the answer when you haven't come up with one. That's not testing yourself. That's just reading.

7. Practice questions If I can find a quiz bank- even better! I save questions from study groups/student organizations and Board Vitals until a few days before the exam. I find that this helps me test my reasoning/recall and helps with my test anxiety. I am a very nervous test taker, so simulating a test environment before the actual test helps reduce my nerves, especially when I take time to go through every missed question thoroughly.

8. Work in a group only if it is helpful for you I do not do well with study groups. I like to share resources, but as soon as you put me in a room with other people, I get distracted. I have to study on the silent floor of the library or at home where I can't talk to other people or get off task. I don't remember information as well when I study "conversation style" or in group work, and I often get confused when concepts are verbally explained. I also find that I hate being quizzed by other people. It takes me longer to learn things with other people than it does on my own. This isn't the case for everyone, but I know this is how it works for me, so I only will agree to study groups for group projects or when it is actually "light studying" during a weekend day.

9. Take breaks, but not too often I am VERY task oriented. Checklists are my life. If you have ever looked at my snapshots of my planner, you will see that there are lists for basically every day, with sticky notes containing more lists on top. Since I know I am task oriented, I generally plan my study time around goals rather than time limits. (While I love the pomodoro method, it doesn't always work well for me. Task based planning works better). I usually set a goal of 1-2 tasks before I allow a break, and I tell myself what the break will be and how long it can take. If I'm in deep study mode/crunch time, that includes scheduling meals, phone calls to family, checking email, paying bills, watching Netflix, etc into my study breaks. Doing this helps keep my day structured and goal oriented without setting specific time limits. And, seeing unfinished tasks on my to-do list is a great motivator to get back to work once I have finished my dedicated "study break task."

10. Don’t pull all nighters                                                                                      If you are tired and unmotivated, staying up late just means more procrastination Plus, anything you read/review won’t stick as well because you’re exhausted. If you are cramming for an exam, the stress might make you feel worse, and you will be mad at yourself if you oversleep for an exam or can’t concentrate on the test because you’re too sleepy. When I find myself lolling off to sleep, I know it is time to turn out the light and get ready for bed. Even if I decide to wake up a little early the next morning, getting the extra sleep will help me in the long run. I find that getting a decent night’s rest helps reduce my stress level and helps me stay focused when I sit down to study next (plus, I fall asleep in class less!) Most of the time, I have found that staying up all night just isn’t worth it.

I have a million other nuances about studying I can share, but everything gets very person-specific after this point. What I like/do might not fit everyone, but it has worked well for me. Hopefully everyone else studying out there finds their ideal study style, too. Happy studying!

[bryonysimcox]

A best friend and a Roman city: Week 4, Spain

For the first time in our journey in Suzi the van, we’ve spent a whole week in one place. Zaragoza has been a welcome change of scene and a welcome change of pace.

Zaragoza was sort of the first big stop we always had planned before embarking on this overland adventure. That said, we’d also put a pin in the Alps but never quite made it there (see Week One Blog Post). Everywhere else we’ve visited has been pretty much been co-incidental or inevitable en-route.

We didn’t know what to expect from Zaragoza. It’s not somewhere that George or I have visited and it’s not really somewhere that’s on our ‘places we’d love to visit’ list, but it just happens to be where George’s best friend lives. Having been faced with a long-distance friendship the whole time we lived in Australia, as soon as we realised we’d be driving through Spain we knew we had to see Manny and spend some quality time together. He’s been living here for more than three years now, where he teaches English as a foreign language. He’s a keen musician who busks frequently in the city, and is also writing a novel.

(images) Scenes from our wanders in Zaragoza.

The arrival into Zaragoza is pretty magical. It’s surrounded by mountains to the north and a desert to the south, and arriving by van from the town of Huesca really shows off the city’s dramatic and isolated setting.

Once settled here, we first caught up with Manny on Tuesday. Not only was it really good to hang out with him again, but it was fascinating to talk from a placemaking perspective about the urban design and planning of the city. Over a coffee in Parque Grande, Manny reflected that Zaragoza has no clearly defined centre, that it has piecemeal incoherent architectural landmarks, that it turns its back on the river Ebro and that perhaps as a result, the city just doesn’t have that ‘pizzazz’ that other cities give you.

(images, left to right) George and Manny in Parque Grande, Manny performing at a local bar, and George walking back to our camping spot in the neighbourhood of Actur.

Maybe I’ve been biased by Manny’s opinions as a local, but I’ve definitely found his sentiments resonate as we’ve explored the city. It just feels like even though it is beautiful, well-kept and has iconic landmarks, it still lacks a certain something. This has been especially apparent when we’ve looked for a single neighbourhood which condenses some of the cultural and culinary destinations that George and I would usually look for (the ‘hipster’ street, basically), and struggled to find one.

Not having the pressure of wanting to go out into the city and explore every single day has given us time to focus on the final stages of the ultramarathon documentary.

At least three full days this week have just entailed us staying and working in the van. We found an ‘Area Autocaravanas’ (the equivalent to an Aire du Camping Car in France) which is not particularly idyllic but well-appointed and well-used too, and have stayed in the same spot for the whole week. This has provided a welcome break from the daily task of looking for a place to stay, a place to fill up water and a place to empty the wastewater. It has also been the first spot warm enough for me to have a makeshift shower - putting to use the 3 litre plastic bottle which previously contained ‘red wine’ (aka vinegar) that we bought wine in the week before in the Pyrenees!

(images, left to right) Making the most of waiting in the launderette by writing this blog post, George napping in the van, and my first very exciting homemade shower moment!

With the gorgeous sunshine not only allowing us to fling the van doors open but to keep all our equipment and laptops charged up too, we’ve been able to get our heads down and do some work. For George, this means doing the final motion graphics, sound design and colour grading for the ultramarathon documentary and for me it means creating collateral and sending emails to find new collaboration and commission opportunities for our documentary channel Broaden. We’ve got a couple more film ideas in the bag and a few people in Spain we’ve been liaising with, so watch this space. We promise we’ll have some videos out shortly!

On the topic of filmmaking, we went to a great film screening with Manny and his friend Saul on Saturday. While we’d been in Huesca at the end of the previous week, George had spotted a poster for the prestigious Banff Mountain Film Festival, with a screening date in Huesca. George had heard of the festival before, and knew that a selection of films were screened in different countries as part of the world tour. Given that we’re in the throws of making a 30-minute documentary about ultramarathon running in Mont Blanc, this world tour screening seemed too good an opportunity to miss.

(images) Sunset over the expanse as we drove to Huesca.

Watching films about the crazy endeavours of humans who kayak, climb, base-jump, cycle down, run up and kite-ski around mountains was pretty special.

Not only was there a refreshing diversity of films, but the whole night itself felt like a brilliant adventure, having two friends traveling with us in Suzi and venturing out of Zaragoza to another town for the night. It was also the perfect introduction to George’s documentary, which he screened to Manny and Saul the following evening. I think it was a huge weight off George’s chest to show others the fruit of his labour for the last three years, especially because the only other people who have seen it to date are the three runners from the film and me! Needless to say, Manny and Saul were really impressed and the film does now feel like it is 99.9% complete.

Experiencing George commit to this mammoth 3-year filmmaking project has thrown into question my own commitment to new projects and my tendency to undertake lots of smaller endeavours rather than one big thing. Consistently writing these blog posts and making collages as AnalogueBryony is one way that I’m trying to stay more focussed, but I’m also really excited to see Broaden grow and offer the chance to direct my energy into some longer, meatier creative projects.

There are certainly really enjoyable parts of this city, and its Roman history is particularly fascinating. 

I was never a huge fan of learning about the Romans at school, but my mum’s obsession with them must have rubbed off on me! I convinced George to visit the Cesar Augustus museum in the centre of Zaragoza, which turned out to be one of four connected museums each located at key historic sites: a river port, the forum, swimming baths and the theatre. The Roman city here used to be called Cesar Augustus (in fact if you say Zaragoza slowly you can hear the roots of the name!), and was incredibly prosperous around the 1st and 2nd century AD. It always amazes me how advanced their technology was, and we walked through stone tunnels that would have been part of a complex drainage system, accompanied by lead pipes which are still intact today.

(images) The Cesar Augustus Forum Museum - a fascinating place and a pretty cool building too.

I wasn’t hugely impressed by the central Cathedral up close, although I can’t deny that it looks pretty beautiful from across the river, topped by a technicolour ceramic tiled roof. I did really enjoy the central market though, and not only because we got some delicious cheese and tomatoes there (though that helped…). Manny later told us that the market has just undergone a big renovation, but I was really impressed by how the design has retained a sense of organic activity and local charm, unlike some other redeveloped markets that I’ve been to (e.g. the highly curated and touristic Time Out market in Lisbon).

(images, left to right) The newly refurbished central market, colourful tiles adorning the Cathedral’s roof, and a perfect lunch in the sunshine.

The ability to relax in the precious company of friends and a chilled-out vibe have defined this week.

I think we’ve really needed a change in pace and so our visit to Zaragoza has been well-timed. By the time we move onwards towards Barcelona in a day or so, a whole month will have passed since leaving the UK.

The experiences start to stack up like tiny tiles in a mosaic, but I still can’t see the bigger picture: where this journey will take us exactly and what will happen along the way. For that, I have to wait.

[cloudoclock]

(Sixth Form) studylife Masterpost

Hey everyone, today I decided to make a masterpost for those going into sixth form. I, myself am in the transition between year 11 and sixth form/college and as a very determined student, I thought it would be a good idea to place all my collated tips and resources in one place. 

Websites and Resources

Revision world - this is the best place for summaries and guides across all exam boards for most sixth form courses. 

Specs - Going to your exam board website and priniting out your specifications are a big help because you can outline your own self study throughout the year. Keeping track is essential.

Specimen Papers and Walkthroughs - we all know how useful practice is and finding up-to-date papers are essential for calming yourself into the exam mindset. Walkthoughs on youtube are also great because it gives a condensed version of exam thought process.

Powerpoints  or Prezi- this one is a bit of an odd one and does require a bit of digging. Search up “a level (subject) powepoint/presentation” and there may be a presentation from random teachers on a unit from your subject. On Prezi there are loads of presentations that are easy to follow and vary in content.

Youtube - of course everyone’s favourite site is a useful resource. However, once you click on a video, its so easy to use the excuse of watching one more video that just happens to be totally irrelevant to your revision but pops up at the time. I suggest using the filter and search for playlists of the topic you are looking for if you want to keep it short and save whatever you watch into a playlist for later.

Emma studies - this is truly my prinatable queen annd planner life saver. She has all these free printables and layouts that you can just put in your binder and in your books to keep up with your work.

Study Methods

Cornell Method - I have been using this style of note-taking ever since summer started and I can honestly say it helps. Having the clear space to outline exam questions that may correspond with your notes, is great for quick run throughs because you can then retain memory in a more substantial way.

Colour schemes- this may be just because I am a typical studyblr but having some sort of code and theme to work with, is great for organisation. You don’t need to buy fancy brushpens for your titles or paint your notes with highlighter so it looks pretty. This could be  just using a black pen for notes, a green pen for corrections or revision additions and a blue pen for unit outlines. As a visual learner, it is important that my work stands out as well as it being important that its not too cluttered. Find a balance.

Rewriting Notes after class - now I know the idea seems long winded and a waste of your time, but its actually essential for the fast past environment in sixth form. I learned from GCSEs that you really do have to make an effort throughout the year so that you don’t have time pressure on to of exam stress. What you write down in class really is not a reflection of what you absorbed in that lesson. By going through lesson notes and understanding it in your own time is the basis of revision. At a level, there honestly isn’t time for putting off things, unless it is for your well-being. Starting early also doesn’t guaruntee it will be easy.

Music

My light playlist - this playlist is pretty chill and a bit of a autumn night vibe.

Reading playlist - there’s pretty good scores on here for reading sessions for a bit of a switch from the usual…

Lofi playlist- because its cool (^O^)

White noise- if music distracts you and you still need that bit of sound to keep you sane while you study.

Supplies

Home Binder/ expanding file - depending on however many subjects you took, you should have a file for each of them and it should be a place where you can keep it all in units.

Binder for lessons- this should be the binder you take to school and transfer notes in and out of for every subject so you have what you NEED when you need it.

Refill pad/ notebook- I would suggest getting book with perforated pages so you can swap around work to their allocated “home” or using a5 notebooks for each subject if you really want it that way.

Post its/ page tabs- these are great for reading holy grails if you do english literature like me and you’re constantly reading. Small, tidy and useful

Planner- please, please, please get a planner. Organisation is your best friend and keeping a planner on you is a good way to make yourself aware of plans and scheduled work sessions.

USB - not many people talk about having a usb, maybe because we are in the digital age of sharing. When you need to quickly open docs or powerpoints in school, or in the library or at home, no one has time to wait for google drive. I learned how important it was to have a usb in gcses and it is worth the extra effort.

Tips and advice

The jump in self discipline, workload and effort at a level is different for everyone, but it is helpful for you prepare in whatever way you can, so that the hit isn’t so scary.

Your friends are not always the best people to organise study groups with. Unless you are sure, that work is going to get done , its best that you find people that you can get serious with.

If you feel yourself losing focus and even after taking a break, you’re uninteressted,stop and refresh at another time or the next day. If you continuosly burn yourslef out, you wll find it diffiult to come back to the work becaause you’re constanlty reminding yourself of how much of a chore it is.

Ask your teachers and your head of year questions. The magic word “ucas” is going to be popping up and soon enough you’re going to be worrying about your personal statement. If you have a query, find a time to talk with them because it is invaluable support. If you’re like me, write on a piece of paper the questions you have and meet your teacher in a free or at lunch so you can be comfortable and get down what you can.

You can buy all the supplies and ask all the questions but implemting these keys are all on YOU. If you feel yourself slipping, be honest and accept it because if you keep running from it, you could seriously damage your physical and mental health. Keep a diary so you can notice patterns in your energy.

Your best is your best. Succcess is subjective and no one can take that from you. When you get your results, you know what you put into those exams/coursework , so you are entitled to disappointment or joy.

This took me a while to make so I appreciate any comments or reblogs. I love you random person.  You can follow my studygram too @solarsafestudy because I share a liitle bit more of myself on there <3

[uomo-accattivante]

What would it look like if, in 2018, the most talented actor in all of Hollywood actually lived in New York City to be near the theater, avoided social media, and had zero interest in growing his personal brand? Well, he’d be poised to have one hell of an interesting career. Here, Zach Baron talks it out with the man himself: Oscar Isaac.

Oscar Isaac slips unnoticed through his neighborhood of the past several years, Williamsburg, Brooklyn, on a gray January afternoon. He's been in New York long enough to know how to avoid drawing strangers' attention; he's also just naturally gifted at hiding when he needs to hide, whether on-screen or off. When he takes a part, he tends to disappear in it. Already, his catalog of doomed, slightly abrasive idealists—whether in the Coen brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis; the tech sociopath he played in Alex Garland's Ex Machina; or as a quixotic, ill-fated mayor in the Paul Haggis–directed HBO series Show Me a Hero—is one of the most surprising and vivid early bodies of work we have going in movies today. He's the rare actor who seems totally indifferent to whether or not he is loved. So of course people love him.

He's found success as a leading man only recently, but in a way that seems impossible to replicate; he's done it, improbably, as an actor, rather than as a brand, or as a fun talk-show presence, or just as a handsome face that cameras happen to have an easy time with. (Up close, he is in fact handsome, but in what I'll describe as an entirely non-Hollywood way—a fortuitous assemblage of the right imperfections.)

In the past year, Isaac had a small part in George Clooney's Suburbicon and a large part in Rian Johnson's Star Wars: The Last Jedi, which he's just finished promoting. In March, he'll star in Annihilation, Garland's second film. Isaac plays a military man and husband to Natalie Portman, and spends most of the movie shirtless and in fatigues, exploring the limits of his own sanity. It's a Technicolor nightmare of a film, and Isaac, characteristically, feels right at home in it.

There's a degree of difficulty to nearly every part he takes on, dating back to his breakthrough with Inside Llewyn Davis, where he made a wastrel folk singer who's hard to love into someone who holds your eye in every scene. At a Hollywood moment when audiences are learning to suspect what goes into success—think of Harvey Weinstein and of all the careers he seemingly elevated or destroyed—Isaac's work makes it plain what went into his: a prodigious amount of old-fashioned talent.

In conversation, he's self-deprecating about the work but honest about his own abilities—like, for instance, his skill with the guitar. “I think the fact that I can play really well kind of sealed the deal on that one,” he says about being cast in Llewyn Davis.

GQ Style: Is that natural talent, being able to play well, or is that training? Oscar Isaac: I've been doing it for a very long time—I should be way better for as long as I've been doing it. But singing and playing guitar by myself is something that I've done for a while.

But it's more than just singing and playing in that film. Llewyn Davis is an unsympathetic character who also needs to hold an audience's attention throughout the film. How do you go about making that happen? I found him very likable. He just doesn't do stuff like smile. But it never crossed my mind that he was not going to be likable. I just assumed like, “Yeah, I understand this person. And if I understand him, I'm sure other people are going to want to understand him, too.”

Inside Llewyn Davis was when I think most people really noticed you for the first time. Did that film change things for you? Yes, without a doubt. I mean, the day that I got the part, I got like 15 offers or something. Immediately everyone was like: “Oh, oh, the Coen brothers think he's good? Oh, okay, well, then he's probably good.” And then they sent the offers. It's silly, to a certain extent. I mean, they didn't know if I was going to totally beef it. But it ended up being good, and it changed everything.

Sometimes I can't tell if your performances are the result of natural ability or of a ton of preparation—for instance, in the now famous scene in Ex Machina where you dance, I've always wondered how much of that is “Oscar can dance” and how much of that is “Oscar is technically adept at doing what the script asks him to do.” That's what it is. It's like, okay: I need to make it look like I'm really good at doing this thing. What is everything that I have to do to make it seem that this is something that I can do or that this person does believably? It is a bit technical in that way.

Is that the same kind of technical challenge presented by something like X-Men: Apocalypse, when you're playing a giant blue villain? In X-Men, not so much. I think I was just marveling that I was able to stand and not fall over. I was wearing a crazy suit, encased in prosthetics and plastic. I was just sweating into my face and had no way of reaching my face. I couldn't turn or look. That was very hard. That was just surviving. You see me surviving in that movie.

I assume acting in the Star Wars movies, where there is so much other stuff going on around you, is a little bit like that. The truth is, in all movies, you're just a piece of it. In everything you do, there are so many people that are making something. Obviously this is exponentially bigger, but you're still serving somebody, you're servicing some thing, and when you're making it, it just goes back to trying to make a good character, or trying to make it honest, trying to make it believable, and knowing that sometimes you're just there for scale: “Just stand closer to the spaceship so they see that we really built it.”

How do you tune out the spaceships and do believable work, then? It's challenging—you get very self-conscious because the things that you're being asked to do are so strange and difficult to relate to. For instance—and this also speaks to Rian's great eye for detail—I'm in a little cockpit that they've built, and they've got the close-up, and they say: “Okay, so you're driving. Now I want you to look to your right and you see one of your resistance pilots blow up, and then you look to your left and you see another resistance pilot blow up, and then you look forward, and then I want you to make a calculation that we're losing too many people, and then I want you to say, ‘Pull out,’ right? But don't do it from fear. Do it from a place of assertiveness, but also I want to see how dramatic it is, right? And so…go.” With no words, right? And so it's very difficult not to feel like, “Wait, what am I doing here?” And to synthesize it all to make it work. But it's a fun challenge as well. And Rian was right there. It's like: “Okay, that one felt like it was a little too afraid.” “Okay, well, that one felt too casual now, so…” And sometimes it gets even weirder when you're in space. Space makes things weirder. [laughs]

So you're committed to one more Star Wars film. This is my understanding. I don't really read what I sign. [laughs] But from what I've been told…

Have you ever been part of one thing for as long as you've been part of this? No, not at all. Or done something where you do one and then go back to it later or don't know what you've signed up for. I don't know what the next story's going to be. I have no idea. So you just have to go with it.

You've been able to do other stuff in the meantime, though, like Annihilation,right? I was shooting that at the exact same time as Star Wars, so that just felt like playground time. It was very condensed. I think I was only on it for nine or ten days in a row.

Alex Garland shoots seem really intense. It was definitely intense and full-on. But I would kind of come in, sometimes still dressed in my Star Wars stuff, and change out of it and put the fatigues on, and just have fun with my friend, you know? Alex and I became very, very close, and I find him to be an incredibly authentic person, and super talented. I didn't think it was going to work, but the fact that they were shooting at Pinewood [Studios, near London], on the same lot as Star Wars, that made it possible. I could literally walk from my set on Star Wars over to the Annihilation set. That was pretty cool—that felt like old-school Hollywood, like in the ’30s. Or it made me think of Pee-wee's Big Adventure, when they go on the studio lot for the first time and you see all the different productions.

What about Garland's work makes you come back to do it again, do you think? The very allegorical nature of sci-fi, and particularly with Annihilation, the idea that we self-destruct, we are doomed, and we do it to ourselves. That it's actually in our genes to self-destruct. That's the reason he did the whole movie. And I think, for me, I get very drawn to these characters.

Why? Because we're all doomed. You and me and everybody.

We end up in a restaurant not far from Isaac's apartment. In our booth, he looks at my wedding ring and asks: “How long have you been with your wife?” He just got back from his honeymoon, he says, down in the Caribbean—in the New York afternoon light his skin still retains an improbable amount of sun. He asks what my wife does, and I tell him. “That's cool,” he says, “an editor and a writer, two journalists together.” He and his wife, the documentary filmmaker Elvira Lind, got married last March. Their son, Eugene, was born last April. I'm wondering why this is a conversation we're having. We've just met, and Isaac has always seemed reluctant to talk much about himself; part of what draws you to him is that you don't know much about him. But I don't end up wondering for long.

He's had the kind of year, it turns out, that you think about for the rest of your life—one of those 12-month periods so full of life and death and all the attendant highs and lows that you can't really even comprehend it. Your own recent history ends up feeling like a foreign object in the palm of your hand: You look at it and have no idea what exactly it is you're looking at.

GQ Style: Why did you decide to get married now? Isaac: Tons of reasons. She's Danish—she's not a citizen, and she was very pregnant, and there was an element of figuring out “Well, where are we going to be?” And us wanting to be a family unit a bit more. Also, the Danes, they don't really believe in marriage. I think it has a lot to do with the equality of the sexes over there. Marriage doesn't mean anything financially, because the state takes care of people. So the marriage itself becomes less important. But, you know, at the time, right before it happened, my mom was ill, and so I saw her carrying my child, bathing my sick mom—seeing her do that, I just thought: I want to be with this person forever and ever. And I just wanted to take that extra step as well. And so my mom passed in February and we got married in March and our son was born in April.

Have you processed all that yet? It was a wild year. I think I'll be processing it for the rest of my life. There's a little bit of an untethered feeling since then. A lot of stuff that I felt I knew and had direction about now just feels a little bit disconnected and floating around.

Immediately after that, you starred in Hamlet at the Public Theater in New York. Were you able to compartmentalize all those feelings while doing that show six times a week? It didn't really afford me the luxury, because Hamlet is about everything. In fact, it gave me space to deal with stuff that's unimaginable and impossible to comprehend and to give voice to it, give word to it. This fucking guy William Shakespeare wrote this thing that's like a religious text—it helped give a context and an understanding in words to some of the deepest feelings that I think a human can experience.

Was it overwhelming at any point, processing those emotions onstage every night? It was very physically overwhelming. The thought was “I'll do the play at night and be home during the day.” But when I was home during the day, I was a vegetable. I was constantly connected to a steaming machine to steam my vocal cords. I was on vocal rest—I couldn't speak. But I felt like it gave me a psychological space to deal with a lot of stuff. And in fact I was afraid when it was over that I wasn't going to know where to put a lot of the pain—but also the joy—of those two things happening right on top of one another. But you figure it out. It feels like it was a dream now. It was just a few months of performing, and then it was gone. It's as if it didn't happen.

I was going to ask if you felt like you got any closure when the show ended. But it sounds like— No. No, not really. But it was one of the most incredible experiences of my life, and my wife, God bless her, was with a newborn at home while I'm doing Hamlet, and that was a lot to deal with. She's an incredible woman. But doing something like that, because it's something personally so profound to do, it loosens things up a little bit. So at the moment it doesn't feel so much like I have to hunt for that thing that's going to be so fulfilling that I have to do it, because that already happened. You climb the mountain and then you get there and you just see a bunch of other mountains. And eventually I'll get to the other mountains, and they'll be slightly different. But I think, those feelings of—that drive of youth, like, I need to say something—I'm sure that'll come back at some point. But after doing Hamlet, it feels less burning in me.

Isaac has been in New York since 2001, when he came up from Miami to do a play and eventually enrolled in Juilliard. He's 38. Audiences may have only noticed him around 2013, but Isaac has been doing this for more than 15 years. Part of the maturity and ease of his on-screen presence surely dates back to his first years in New York, when he made the same mistakes most of us do—and gradually, through failure and disappointment, learned how to be an authentic person, in his life and in his work.

Soon, he says as we order another round of drinks, he'll move out of this neighborhood to a new one in Brooklyn. His place around here is 650 square feet, and right now everybody's on top of one another. He loves the apartment—“great windows, man.” But it's time to let it go. He's only just now, he says, catching up to the present, and what it demands.

GQ Style: What was it like working as an actor in Miami? Isaac: I was constantly auditioning for stuff like Spanish commercials. A couple movies. I remember my mom driving me around to all these auditions, and getting the phone call with my mom that I didn't get a commercial, a film commercial in Spanish. I was crushed. But I think it got more difficult the more little things happened—like after I got out of school, and I got a job that I liked a lot, on a film by Scott Z. Burns [2007's Pu-239]. Early on I did feel that if they just gave me the one shot, I'd show the world, I could show everyone. And then, right out of school, I get the shot, which was a great role. It went well. And then…that was it. And so then I was like, “One more shot.”

Did you find Juilliard illuminating? They break you down and build you up into an actor. And there were elements of that that I really enjoyed. Even when they tried to put me on probation because they didn't think I was trying hard enough.

Were they right? No, I was trying really hard! Maybe I just had like a bad couple months where I just… I was trying, I was trying too hard really.

Is there a Juilliard technique that you still consciously employ? I think the basic thing is just the time doing it. The amount of time getting to do scene work and putting plays up and having an audience.

Is there stuff you learned and thought, That's fascinating, and I'll never use that? There were a lot of things that you just kind of let roll off your back. Especially the stuff that tried to get very much into, you know, “Why did you make that choice? What does that say about you as a person?” And that stuff, I just kind of heard it and then just let it go, knowing that that's not my bag. What it says about me as a person is not my concern.

Certain directors, like Ridley Scott, seemed to notice you relatively early on. And in 2010 Scott cast you as one of the main villains, King John, in Robin Hood—did you feel like you'd made it then? Not “I made it”—but like, “Fuck yeah!” Also, being a Latino kid from Miami, where the best you could hope for is going out for Spanish commercials and, like, Gangster Number Three, which is crazy. And then to have Ridley Scott be like, “Yeah, you can be king of the whites.” It was amazing.

After lunch we wander outside and walk back to his place at a nostalgic pace. He points to the new condo buildings on one block: “This used to be, like, a cool lighting store.” At a coffee shop, he orders a cortado, then feels for his wallet, only to realize he doesn't have it. He shrugs and gives his best movie-star smile: “You got me?”

Part of what he's doing now, he says, is trying to disengage himself from the machine he's finally found so much success in. “It's difficult, because you've been waiting so long for people to say yes,” he says. “And then, when you get a lot of yeses, it's very difficult to say no. But there are so many more logistical things that come into play for me now, especially with my family. And I do think it's important to take the time and go back to the well and refill and not just be so concerned with output. I think a lot of it's just not making plans and doing stuff around the house and normalcy—just quiet. Those kind of things I find refill me. You can hear things better when things get a little quieter.”

GQ Style: How much of the time are you actually in New York? Isaac: It changes all the time. I'm here now for a couple months, and then I think I'll probably just be here for really three months out of the whole year.

Is it a conscious decision to live here, rather than in Los Angeles, where your industry is based? Well, theater was always super important. I always knew I wanted to do theater in New York. So L.A. wouldn't have been an option because of that. I like L.A. But I don't like myself in L.A.

What do you mean by that? I just feel anxious when I'm there. And I just get annoyed with myself more. It's not L.A., it's me. There are definitely a lot of tempting things about it. It's like the ring in Lord of the Rings—you put it on and you're like, “Whaooo, no!”

Do you feel like Hollywood is doing enough that you're interested in? So much of the industry's money and time go into stuff like Star Wars, rather than stuff like Annihilation. I think there's a lot out there. Especially now that TV has opened up a whole new way of telling stories.

What was your experience doing a six-part series on HBO, with Show Me a Hero? It's just crazy, because you're doing a six-hour movie in two and a half months or three months. That was insane. Sometimes the ones that are the most difficult end up being the ones that you remember the most or feel most accomplished by doing.

The director of Show Me a Hero, Paul Haggis, has been accused of sexual misconduct by multiple women, although he has denied all the allegations. You've worked with him—how do you make sense of that story? It's wild. I mean, who knows? It's impossible to know. It's what's so strange about this moment—like, how do you make an informed enough of an opinion about things?

I wonder if in the future you and other people working in Hollywood are going to have to find more thorough ways of vetting the people you work with. Yeah…I need to know way more about people. You want to have faith that there's a system, a very fair and just system that will make sure this shit doesn't happen, but that's failed, clearly that's broken down totally. So then what happens? It's got to go to the streets, right? And that's when there's collateral damage. But that's part of it, too. If you don't have a system in place that people can have faith in, then you have to demand it, by any means necessary. That's the only way to move forward.

Do the Weinstein revelations make you rethink your relationship to the industry overall? No, because I wasn't affected the way some people were—horribly affected by those fucking predators. I wasn't a victim of that stuff. So as far as the way I interact with it, obviously I think there's a reckoning that was going to happen and needed to happen. The chickens have come home to roost. And I don't think it's just something that's going to die out. I think it's a real thing that's going to bring about change. I feel hopeful. It feels like sometimes the stuff that goes on in this particular industry would be illegal in any other one. It's that weird art-commerce water—there's something about that really murky place where you go to dinners and you have drinks. You know, even this, what we're doing right now. It goes on in this weird grayish place, you know? And so people that have that predatory thing, they can just take advantage of every single aspect of it. There's an intimacy about it that's really nice, but the fact that that can be leveraged in such an awful way…

You were talking about pulling back a bit from work, anyway—seems like you've really chosen stuff with a high degree of difficulty in the past. It's just the best stuff that I've been able to get, you know? Especially the early stuff—it was just auditions. You audition for a lot of shit, and then you hope they give you some of the stuff, and luckily I was able to get some of those roles. I guess after Llewyn Davis it became more about, like, All right, I gotta choose.

Is there a type of part you get offered a lot now that you regularly turn down? Haha, no. No. Keep on offering, please.

This story appears in the Spring 2018 issue of GQ Style with the title “The Long Play.”

Zach Baron is GQ's staff writer.

[webcricket]

Movie Night

Characters: CastielXReader ft. Sam and Dean Winchester

Word Count: 2255

A/N: Sidelined by a snow storm and a Winchester’s whim, a mopey reader misses a certain blue-eyed seraph. Pining/longing and powder-white fluff.

Dean racks the pool balls – the echoing clink of the resin rises above the pleasant din of conversation in the bar. He smirks, winks, and murmurs something in a self-assured husky tone to the sturdy brunette with an arm draped across his shoulders as he chalks the stick and prepares for the break shot. The brunette giggles into her cocktail – too enthusiastically, too loosely.

If you were paying any attention to the company surrounding the table, you would see the disparaging roll of Sam’s hazel eyes in response to his brother’s shameless flirtation. He’s decided in this moment he’ll definitely be stuck sleeping in the Impala. Your regard drifts beyond the yellow glow of lamplight illuminating the table and the sibling antics of the Winchesters – focus fixed on the entrance to the hall. The thick tar-stained oak door swings inward and the sleeve of a tan coat appears in the opening. The smiling mien of a bearded stranger follows – not the handsome stolid features of the angel you hoped to see.

Dean takes his shot. The sharp crack fractures the atmosphere and your reverie, the chaotic scatter of balls muffled by green felt.

You flinch at the noise. Concurrently, your phone vibrates and you nearly topple your glass of beer in haste to peer down at the device clutched in your fingers. It’s nothing more than a weather alert advising of the snowstorm. The very same snowstorm Dean insisted he wasn’t driving through when he detoured with a decidedly undemocratic vote early afternoon to this particular bar situated conveniently across from a pay-by-the-hour or night, whatever you fancy, motel with the neon vacancy sign lit gleaming red.

Instead of a cozy evening in the bunker, cuddling with the angel you adore and watching Netflix, you’re now an unwitting accessory to Dean’s desire to get laid. Sighing, you concede cuddling is probably too strong a descriptor anyway for sitting on opposite ends of the couch casting furtive glances at one another every few minutes.

This thing between you and Castiel – it’s complex, and for all you know entirely one-sided, potentially even non-existent, or at the very least not nearly as complicated as you believe. You don’t know what to call it, but when you’re near him you feel lighter and more yourself than when you’re with anyone else. You don’t have to pretend with him – don’t need to act out the part of the tough, confident, unwavering, and never self-doubting hunter role you don with others. You let your guard down in his presence. You feel vulnerable with him. And although your pulse quickens and your cheeks tint rosy beneath the intensity of his blue regard – this vulnerability doesn’t scare you like you believe it should because at the same time you feel safe in his presence. Whatever it is, whether it’s reciprocated or not, you crave the angel’s companionship and being apart from him tonight, when you were supposed to reunite at the bunker after a week spent working separate hunts, pits your soul with hollow longing.

Damnit Dean, you think, exhaling another deep sigh. Not like anyone else had plans tonight. Plans – there you go exaggerating again, as if a variable and ultimately impromptu movie night relying on both of you defying the lethality of your occupation to survive another day was a firm plan. The shared tradition isn’t exactly etched in stone; yet somehow, after every case, whether worked together or apart, you both drift to that same overstuffed hardly rodent-gnawed at all leather couch unearthed from the recesses of the bunker’s storage room. It’s a standing date, except for the fact it also isn’t.

“Hey, you okay?” Sam’s sinewy digits touch your wrist, wrenching you from your thoughts. He probably noticed all the discontented sighing.

“Yeah, never better,” you snort, feigning a strained half-smile. The brothers don’t know how you feel. Or if they do, they’re smart enough not to directly insinuate anything. “Nowhere else I’d rather be. I mean, playing the part of an unnamed extra in Dean’s weather-related whims turned benders turned booty-calls is literally the highlight of my existence. You of all people must know what an honor it is just to be an obligatory part of these momentous occasions.”

“Yeah, right. A real honor,” Sam chuckles, drawing a long draught from his pint of beer and scowling at his jovial brother. Wiping his mouth with the back of his red-flannel shirt sleeve he steadies his gaze again on you and continues prying. “You just seem…quieter than usual,” he points out, gesturing at your untouched beer, ever the diplomat in his word choice. “You sure you’re feelin’ alright? I could walk you to your room if you want to turn in.”

Your gaze follows his to the forgotten warm amber ale perched in a puddle of condensation. “Golden,” you insist again. “Maybe a little overtired is all. You know, you boys went and spoiled me offering me a place to call home. I suppose I’m missing the comfort of my own bed and what not.”

“Uh huh,” Sam smirks and sips his beer to suppress the shadow of a smile that sneaks to his lips. “Does this what not you so casually reference have a name?” he murmurs through the foamy fizz of the alcohol.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” The words leap off your tongue with rawer defensiveness than you intend – so much for the brothers not suspecting anything.

“Nothing,” he hums in mock-contrition, nodding toward the cell in your hands and failing to suppress the smile lighting up his eyes. “You, uh, you hear from Cas yet?” he asks as if he wasn’t just alluding to the angel. “He make it home okay?”

You stare at the muted black screen of the phone and shake your head.

“I’m sure he’s fine,” he reassures. Amusement in his features dissolving with sincerity, he extends a lanky limb in your direction to squeeze your arm. “What’s a little snow storm to an angel of the Lord?”

“Depends,” you deadpan. “Did Dean replace those bald tires on his truck yet like he said he would?”

Dean’s boisterous booming laughter draws the consideration of both you and Sam. You both agree to yourselves without speaking it’s good to see the elder Winchester letting loose – good to see that twinkle of joy sparking in his eyes. He deserves this distraction, no matter how mopey you might be as a result.

“Hey, you know he’ll call you as soon as he can.” Sam’s fingers prod lightly at your shoulder. “He always does, right?”

“Or he’ll call Dean, or you,” you correct. “I’m no one special.”

A frown traces Sam’s mouth and he moves nearer to stoop and press a chaste kiss to the top of your head, whispering into your hair, “That’s not true.”

“Like you’d know.” You brush off his comment as blind surrogate-brotherly affection despite the hopeful flutter of your heart.

“Well, Sam’s the brains of this operation, so whatever he says is probably true,” Dean muses, totteringly drunk in his approach and blissfully ignorant as to what the conversation is about as he sidles up to his brother and smacks him hard enough on the back to cause Sam to lurch forward under the impact and spill his beer on you.

“What the shit, Dean!” you hiss, recoiling backward too late to avoid the splattering beverage saturating your shirt. Well, it’s technically Dean’s shirt you borrowed, but he still doesn’t have the right to be so careless when it’s you wearing it.

“Sorry, sweetheart!” Dean pecks a sloppy kiss to your cheek. Wagging his chin, he arches a meaningful brow toward the buxom brunette grabbing her coat from a hook on the far wall. Throwing his arm across Sam’s shoulders, he yanks him down to eye level and ruffles his hair, murmuring, “So much space in that big noggin for that giant brain, right Sammy?” Freeing his protesting brother, he pulls the Impala’s keys from a pocket, jangles them once, and slaps them hard to Sam’s chest. “Which is why I don’t have to explain the sleeping arrangements tonight.” Jostling the wincing Sam roughly, he grins and repeats, “Right Sammy?”

“Right.” Sam huffs and reluctantly grabs the keys.

Dean careens himself in the direction of the door to recommence his midnight rendezvous.

Grimacing, Sam smooths his disheveled hair.

You suck in a shallow breath – the bar atmosphere suddenly stodgy in your lungs. The aroma of booze soaking your clothes doesn’t help. “I’m gonna get some fresh air,” you mutter, slipping away toward the rear exit before Sam can object.

Leaning into the door, it shovels a curving path through the piling snow as you push it outward. The bracing air instantly stings your cheeks and frosts your lashes. You climb onto a picnic table sheltered beneath an awning and wedged kitty-corner to a wall. Flipping the lapels of your jacket up to shield your neck from the draft of wind and hugging your arms across your body to retain warmth, you peer out into the bleary expanse of the white-washed field stretching out behind the building. A wayward dusting of snowflakes gathers on the dark denim of your jeans, glittering in individually unique icy glory before body heat ferries them into obscurity. The starkness of the snow, the cushioning embrace of every subtle sound, is stunning.

Caught up in the beauty of the landscape, senses numbed by the cool air and the rhythmic flap of the canvas canopy catching the breeze over uncounted minutes, you startle at the familiar gravelly tone emergent behind you.

“Sam said I’d find you out here.”

You turn, surprise widened eyes landing on Castiel. While you hoped he would show up when you texted earlier to say you and the Winchesters regretfully would not arrive home tonight, you had not dared imagine he would actually make the trip.

“Aren’t you cold?” He strides forward to stand beside the table, squinting into the bleached night, whipping wind tousling his dark curls.

Your teeth chatter, “I-I, y-yeah, m-m-may be a l-little ch-chilly.” Joints frigid, you stiffly slide off the table and rub your tingling limbs in a futile attempt to produce friction.

He shrugs the trench coat off his shoulders and spins to settle it around your shivering form, asking, “Is that any better?”

You nod, but it’s the warm regard of his shining blues and proximity more than the weight of the fabric that flushes you head to toe with heat. The wind gusts and you steady your swaying frame with a palm pressed to his chest.

Clasping a broad hand to your elbow, he pivots to buffer you from the swelling squall. “We should go inside,” he says, dropping his chin to look at where your trembling fingers still rest, throat bobbing in a thick gulp, “it’s warmer in there.”

“N-no,” you object, curling your fingertips into the fabric of his shirt. “I-l like it out here. It’s f-fine. The snow-”

“-is lovely. I agree,” he finishes, as though reading your mind. “At least let’s sit in the truck. I can run the engine for heat.”

“Okay,” you assent, following as he leads you around the perimeter to the outskirts of the parking lot and ushers you, fingers lingering at the small of your back, into the cabin of his truck.

The metal door slams with a muffled thud and he moves to the driver’s side to clamber in himself – a swirl of snow sweeping in with him as he shuts the screeching door. Twisting the key, the engine sputters begrudgingly to life. A local religious radio program blares from the speakers. “Sorry,” he apologizes, fingers outstretching to silence the radio and turn up the heat. “It’ll, uh, take a few minutes for it to kick in,” he mumbles. He flicks the windshield wipers to clear the snow collecting on the glass and blocking your view. “I think,” he adds, rotating the knob for the heater again, spinning it to the maximum setting, brow furrowing in reflection. “I mean…I never use the heat. I expect it works. Dean said the AC is shot though. So perhaps-”

Fixated on his every action and word, you wonder why he can’t seem to stop fidgeting or rambling. It’s not like him to be so outwardly flustered. “Cas?” you interrupt.

“Hmm,” he hums, still absorbed in jabbing at the temperature controls.

“Why are you here?”

He freezes, torso expanding and contracting in a deep and totally unnecessary breath as he abandons the knob to recline against the seatback. He tilts to face you, features soft, the hint of a small smile playing at the corner of his mouth, simply offering in explanation, “I, uh…it’s movie night.”

With those words, you know he feels the same longing you harbor in your heart – the why is that he missed you. And now that you’re here together, it doesn’t matter that you’re sheltered in a rusty truck with no heat in the midst of the biggest snowstorm to descend on the Great Plains states in nearly a half-century. You scooch across the seat to snuggle against him.

He willingly opens his arms to nestle you close.

Smile on your lips, watching snow blanket the world beyond the truck cabin, listening to the soundtrack of your angel’s beating heart accompanied by the buffet of wind and patter of ice crystals against glass, it dawns on you just before slumber seizes that this is your favorite genre of movie – a love story with impossible odds.

[brwsa12]

The Evolution of Laundry Rooms in Adelaide Laundry Renovation

It isn’t fair that the room and kitchen get the entire eye when it comes to renovating or redesigning it. What about the laundry renovation?  However, since you pay most time in this area washing garments, it’s worth giving this area an update.When it comes to Adelaide laundry renovation, it would be updating or installing water condensation, storage possibilities, work surfaces, sink selection. In addition to the lighting, your wall and floor coverings also need to be taken into account.

The laundry is usually forgotten or sacrificed during a home renovation to extend the budget for different areas of the house. And, whereas this makes sense on paper, it isn’t invariably the simplest selection – particularly if you've got a poorly designed laundry or you are trying to sell your home.

SOME LAUNDRY ROOMRENOVATION TIPS

Before you create any laundry style choices, it’s necessary to take your lifestyle into thought. Take the time to think about the inclusions and appliances you would like currently furthermore, how your desire might change in future.

Consider some questions before going for Adelaide laundry renovation

·        Should you have got a folding station next to or on prime of the dryer?

·        Would like to keep an area for a dangling rod?

·        How would you add cabinets into the design?

·        Where can you retain the laundry baskets?

·        Would you like to move plumbing and electrical for the appliances or to add a sink?

The good news is that by selecting the proper new appliances and renovating your laundry area, you'll be able to create an area that maps to your work flow.  You’ll even be able to invest in energy-efficient appliances which will prevent money over time and will additionally prevent major wear and tear on your garments.

 Doing laundry renovation is more than simply obtaining quality products at nice costs. Sure, this can be a large a part of the equation, however there are several different factors to contemplate.

 STORGE SPACE: Functional laundry wants adequate storage to deal with your laundry things, from detergents to laundry baskets, and everything intermediate. Your bench top ought to be positioned either over laundry bins or over your appliances. If you don’t have an infatuated laundry space, think about putting in a pull-out bench top while laundry renovation which will serve this purpose.

  CRETE THE COUNTER SPACE YOU NEED: Front-loading washers are game-changers in some ways. If you have got enough area to put in your washer and drier side by side instead of stacking them, a two- or three-sided tabletop that matches over your washer and drier provides you a flat surface for folding. If the area is at a premium and you have got to stack your laundry appliances, you'll install a folding table that doesn’t take up the area or get within the method as you are attempting to induce to the washer and drier.

 SINK SELCTION: You may assume, choosing the correct sink appears boring and trivial, however, don’t create the mistake of subsiding for any old laundry sink. If your budget and house afford it, think about obtaining a deep sink to simply soak garments or hand wash delicate things. Opting for Stainless-steel is often a much better alternative than a plastic laundry tub because it’s less possible to depart marks and is less complicated to scrub.

 For Adelaide Laundry Renovation, contact Bathroom Renovators Warehouse who is specialist laundry style and renovation team. They provide extensive range of laundry fixtures and fittings so you find the product that is right for you. If you'd like a free, no-obligation initial consultation to discuss about choices and concepts for your laundry renovation, they’ll make sure that each facet is taken into thought.

[asksythe]

FtGoG Snippet: That Other One (Part 2)

There’s a part 3. Didn’t mean to, but this snippet grew past what I intended for it. It’s basically the condensed core part of the Gaara snippet.

……………………………………………..

He did not know when it started. Perhaps that first day, when he relented and allowed her to lead him under the shade of the garden. Perhaps later, when his violent encounter with the Kyuubi host made him realize that he too, had something he wanted to protect. Perhaps even later than that. He was 12, a child. He knew nothing of love except that he had suffered plenty at its hand. It took until he was 14, when one day his brother jokingly told him—“It would have been creepy or inappropriate if you didn’t look like a little squirt. As it is though, you just look like a particularly clingy five year old.” he laughed at the boy’s stunned face. “You follow her everywhere! Somebody should pay that poor woman for babysitting you almost every day.”—for him to realize something was up.

He was 14, not quite a child in the eyes of his people, but not yet a man either. He was a creature locked in between, stuck in a metamorphosis that would take years to complete, twisting and squirming in the skin it was trying to shed. He looked at her. She was 21 that year, a woman grown, lovely, resplendent, like the sun wrapped up in a shell of flesh, and all of the sudden, the creature stirred somewhere in the pit of his stomach, clawed its way up, wrapped itself around his heart, squeezed. A visceral something bloomed in his chest.

He tumbled, dazed and confused. He wanted… He didn’t know what he wanted. Just that he wanted it very, very badly.

Adolescence. A bewildering, mortifying, and sometimes painful thing to go through. Not even the ninja-born were spared this humiliation. But most ninja his age had help, had support, had structure and discipline to fall back on, had been primed for the budding of their adulthood, for their sexuality. The boy, on the other hand, knew of no such things. His murderous child self had barred him from a proper education on the topic. And so when the onset of his own adolescence came, he flailed and floundered, ill at ease in his own body, at a loss at what to do, how to deal with it all. It was as if overnight, he had grown bigger than his skin and his bones could accommodate, and now the seams were coming apart, the gangly limbs tangling over each other, and always it happened when she was around to set off weird sparks in his stomach.

One day, he realized that he wanted more of her, more of her presence, more of her voice, more of her attention, and her time. He did not know why he wanted this, just that he wanted it, and the wanting would not go away, would become an incessant niggling that only grew and grew over time if he attempted to ignore it. He had never been denied the things he wanted before, by dint of his strength and what he meant to the village, so even now, after all that had happened and how much he had changed, he saw no reasons to deny himself what he wanted.

His first few attempts were crude and clumsy. Brazenly and without asking for permission, he inserted himself into her days, into her work, into her routine. He went to her house in the morning, ate breakfast with her, walked with her to the plantations, stayed there by her side. He accompanied her to meetings with civilian and ninja representatives alike. He followed her to the schools and to scheduled gatherings with the children of Sand. If she felt any sort of irritation, she did not say it. Instead, despite the abruptness of his intrusions, she welcomed his presence with an easy smile, as she always did. Eventually, the frequency of his presence by her side garnered notice, until his sister took him aside for a quick chat.

“You know, Gaara,” she said, tone apologetic. “Your following Kagome around was cute when you were a little thing, but you’re a big boy now. You know how it looks right? It doesn’t look good. I mean… even Kankurou notices and you know he’s a dolt about things like these.”

He stared at her mulishly. Temari sighed, rubbed the back of her neck.

“You know you’re giving her trouble right?”

… What?

“You are. You keep following her around and usually that’s not a bad thing so long as you don’t neglect your own work. Added security and all, but part of her job requires meeting with civilians and such and… well… your reputation precedes you. The elder folk, they remember how you were like… before.”

… Oh…

“They are scared Gaara… of you. And when they are busy being scared of the Jinchuriki in the room, they are not paying attention to her or the proposals she needs to push through. And worse, word is getting around. People tend to be nervous when they know they are going to have to share an enclosed space with a Jinchuriki with… a history. She hasn’t said a thing yet, but Oren told me two satellite town representatives who dropped out of a scheduled meeting without a reason last week… and… well... she needed them there in the room with her.”      

He stared at his sister in shock and mortification and not a small amount of irritation. He hadn’t realized, one part of him thought. So what if a few busybody civilians didn’t have the guts to stand in his presence? If they couldn’t deal with a mere ninja child, why then did they apply for citizenship in a ninja village in the first place? Thought the other part. But the idea of him making troubles for her, even unwittingly, was strangely uncomfortable, more so than the fact that apparently his mere presence was enough to send some paper-pusher civilians running. Finally, he muttered under his breath, “I’ll stop…”  

His sister pat him on the back. “You’re a good boy, Gaara. One day, everybody will realize that, even those old codgers. But for now, if it’s friendly company you want, I know a couple chuunin who really want to talk to you. Said they owe their life to you. How about…”

He put the rest of her ramblings out of his ears. It wasn’t them he wanted. He wanted… the only one he wanted… The creature stirred, restless.

Nevertheless, he kept his word and kept his visits to a minimum. For a while he tried to bear the incessant niggling, tried to wait it out, see if it would stop, see if he could stop it. It didn’t. He couldn’t. It grew. It was a constant white noise in his head, an itch that slowly overtook him, gradually getting so bad he felt like grinding his teeth in frustration at times. He found himself thinking of her in the morning when he woke up, and in the night before he went to sleep. They still met, of course, but it wasn’t nearly enough. And once in awhile, he’d catch the derisive laughter of Shukaku at the back of his head, the sound of it suggesting the raccoon knew some secret that the boy himself wasn’t privy to. It was, in one word, maddening!

He lasted for two whole weeks before his frustration and his impotent anger started giving birth to errant thoughts. He was a ninja, born and bred. Rules were meant to be broken or bent completely out of shape by people like him—whichever way was more convenient. What sort of ninja would he be if he didn’t even attempt to exploit the obvious loopholes in Temari’s words? If he couldn’t be seen with her openly, then he just had to make sure that nobody saw him.

Subterfuge and illusions were not his forte, but that was not to say that he had no skill in the art. He was a more direct kind of shinobi, and didn’t usually bother with the roundabout ways to deal with problems, but he did know a little something. His ninjutsu were taught to him by his father, and among the many, many ways to kill and maim someone with sand and chakra, he was also taught a way to spy on someone from afar. A technique requiring both a genetic affinity for certain elements and precise control of chakra to create a third eye made of either gold dust or sand. The eye, when properly connected to the optic nerves, granted vision from a great distance. It would be like he was right by her side, even if his physical body sat on the other side of the village.

Obviously, the original technique itself was unfit for the task. Too obvious. The moment the eyeball appeared anywhere near her, he’d be busted, if not by the kunoichi around her, then by either his siblings or, if he was unlucky enough, his own father, the one who taught him the technique to begin with. But the underlying ninjutsu principle was exactly what he needed. It would require just a little bit of tweaking to be up to the task.

He spent a week modifying the Daisan no Me. He broke the shape of the eyeball, forcing it back into clumps of condensed sand. He didn’t need the enhanced 360 degree vision that came with that form. Then he made the sand disperse a little. Desert village or not, floating clumps of condensed sand would still send warning signals to any ninja with some skill to their name, let alone the kunoichi around her who had all been trained for the task. He experimented with the nerve connections. Taking her strangely potent sensory ability into mind, he dropped the chakra amount put into the technique until it became a thin thread barely held together by his will.

The result was a technique that would be no good for any sort of reconnaissance requirements. It retained the massive range, but it could only focus on a single close proximity target at a time and if he didn’t concentrate, then the visual quality transmitted through the link would be all but useless. Prolonged use also put a greater mental strain on him due to the focus required. In return however, it became an extension of himself. He could see and hear through it, and manipulate it to a greater extent. Its form had become a mist of dust particles, which was all but invisible unless the right light was put on it. And to top it off, the amount of chakra powering the entire thing was so faint it got lost in the ambient energy of the earth. It was a work of combined precision and his own inborn affinity for the desert element. Even his father, the creator of the original technique, would have trouble replicating something like this. Certainly his control of gold dust was impeccable, but the boy was born from the desert element itself. From the moment he exited his mother’s womb, he had been cradled in sand. The difference in affinity between father and son was significant.

He felt strangely pleased as he contemplated this. Rare were the times the son could claim he surpassed the father in just about any things.  

After a few tests, he deemed the technique ready, then, selecting a day, he set about field-testing it for the first time. In a training session when she came by to check up on him, he tagged her with the locator end of the technique, and later on that day, when he was ensconced in the safety of his own room, activated the seals. It blinked to life with a thought, the vision, the sound, the scene.

It worked. It worked perfectly. Sitting on his bed with one hand on his eye and the other on his ear, the boy watched her in the company of her kunoichi bodyguards as they made way from work to home. Not a one of them noticed anything was out of place, not her, and not the sensor specialist assigned to her protection. Happiness born not from battle sparked through him. Excitement from having successfully circumvented the sister’s order. Pride at having created a technique that bested even the most adept of sensors, even if it was built on top of what his father gave him and was probably good for nothing else. He sat up a bit straighter, allowed himself a smile as his specter followed her in his place.  

For the next several weeks, the boy knew contentment. He still prefered to physically be in her company, to claim her attention for himself, to have her speak to him, smile at him. But following her as a specter as she went about her day had its perks. He learned little things about her, things that he hadn’t noticed before or she simply hadn’t done in his presence. He learned that she apparently had a love for Oden of all things, and that during lunch time she would occasionally steal away to the nearest garden or plantation where she sat alone in silent contemplation. He often wondered what she thought about during those moments. Old memories perhaps, of that faraway homeland she would never see again, of friends and comrades she would never reunite with? Could she have left her own family behind? Left someone important behind? Could she be thinking of them, even now? The thought rankled him something deeply, for reasons he couldn’t quite grasp. The idea that someone somewhere inhabited a part of her mind even now…

But then he would immediately dispel such thoughts by sitting beside her in specter form. It didn’t matter if she used to have a home somewhere else. Suna was her home now. She was happy here, he was sure of it. And perhaps it was not memories of the past that occupied her mind, but plans for the future. He wondered if he were in those plans, in her thoughts, the same way she was in his. Like that, he wiled the days away at her side. Gentle mornings, lazy afternoons, breezy sundays under the shade of the orchards, where she read him a new story from the big book she had been working on. The god of happiness, a monk once told him, is in the little things. If that was true, then perhaps the boy was the happiest boy in Suna at that moment, for he had not one, not two, but a thousand little things with which to entrap said god, a thousand such moments when he could feel nothing but a quiet, sated sort of contentment, when everything was right in the world, and he was exactly where he needed to be.    

But of course, like all good things, it had to end.

........................................

TBC

........................................

A/N: Two guesses as to what happens next.

Part 3 (and probably last) will come soon. It’s the whammy part, the most intense and gut punching part of the snippet. Arguably, also the part that requires the most nuanced writing and technical skill to pull off. 

Funnily enough, part 2 is pretty fluffy compared to part 1 and part 3. Gaara is being a bit of a teenager (as befitting of his age and life experience) in this part, getting into troubles and rationalizing it away (I’m totally not gonna be busted by my siblings or my father!). I felt amused when I wrote that part of the snippet. 

For people who feel like I’m just out to make Gaara suffer, well, please don’t be so upset. I’m not being mean to Gaara for no reason you know. As I said before, I always prioritize plot and characterization over everything else in the story. This may not look like it, but this is very much part of Gaara’s character arc in FtGoG. After part 3, I’m gonna do a mini post on canon Gaara characterization and the things I want to do with his characterization in FtGoG. All of this suffering has a point to it. I may be a sadist, but suffering with no cause and no context is just plain crude. 

 Also... 

Joke Omake: What if Gaara were socially tone-deaf enough to just use the original Daisan no Me instead of tweaking it into a discreet specter form? 

One fine morning in Sunagakure, an eyeball made out of sand appeared over Kagome’s shoulder and started following her around the village, prompting all sorts of reactions from villagers and ninja alike. On the other end of the village, a panicky Temari hunted down her little brother and yelled at him. 

“I told you to stop following her already!”

“...I’m not following her.”

“Your eyeball is! That’s even worse!” 

And that is the story of how Rasa was forced to finally talk to his youngest son about the birds and the bees and other related topics, thus traumatizing the both of them in the process. 

[eastcoastenthusiast-blog1]

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The service man finally relented and mentioned if we call Monday, he'll be sure we didn't get charged for a second name. The information within the following articles is for fixing some of the most common varieties of furnace issues. They should be capable of offer you a good estimate of how a lot of your utility cost comes from your furnace versus the remainder of your property. Whatever our technicians quote you is strictly what you will pay, irrespective of how lengthy it takes us to complete the repair. For men and women, who are organizing to install the furnace for the very first time, have to be really meticulously concerning the placement and position of the ducts. The general process is quite similar to that of the furnace and condensing system, although the cooling and heating is carried out via warmth pump, which is usually powered electrically. 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For one thing, change furnace filters typically, a minimum of each other month you probably have a mix heating/air-conditioning system. Presently, you should receive a budgetary estimate and explanation of what parts will must be changed. If the blower is left running repeatedly then it could trigger your furnace to work improperly. Furnace filter comparisons, air quality ideas, how often to switch your filter and more. The warmth exchangers within the furnace are then heated, warming the air because it passes via. When the temperature indoors falls beneath a sure point, the thermostat alerts the furnace which mixes air and gas and the combination gets ignited by an digital combusted, scorching fuel begins to rise through the heat exchanger located above the burner and heats the air which is circulated throughout the house. Labor costs for furnace set up differ depending in your location and the HVAC professional performing the set up. We are going to teach you about the merits of each furnace with the intention to make a effectively-knowledgeable selection. So you should keep in mind all these items ahead of buying a new furnace in your house. Needless to say simply because a furnace has a one hundred,000-BTU capability doesn't suggest that it will probably properly heat a house that requires a hundred,000 BTUs. If there usually are not two slots out there or you may have an older fuse panel, you'll have to have an electrician install a sub panel prior to the new furnace being put in. If you are having problems with a furnace take a step back, relax, and run the cycle once more. A gas furnace typically needs repair of three components: thermocoupler, pilot mild, or some electrical component. Yes, after all, there could also be some loose or faulty parts that really should be changed, and in that case, an HVAC technician is the one that would be the best choice to take care of the job for you. Two: Inadequate heat from the furnace - The causes for this problem are: the blower being occluded, blower belt being unfastened, burner is dirty or the filter is soiled. It will make a 96 AFUE high-effectivity furnace run at 66 % to 86 p.c and make a cheap 80 AFUE not much better than an open fire. As an illustration, as a substitute of merely charging you a taken care of fee for a service call, they may tack on numerous totally different expenses, comparable to a cost for coming to your neighborhood, or a price for getting into into your basement. They probably price more, though, working between $four hundred and $1,500 relying on dimension and class.

[lindawood]

How to Make Espresso at Home: A Starter Guide

If you’re a coffee aficionado interested in pulling great shots at home, our review of the best espresso machine, grinder, and accessories can help you pick out a great beginner setup—but you’ll need a little practice and patience to get the hang of it. With that in mind, we enlisted David Castillo, the training and education manager at Joe Coffee Company in New York City (I also work at Joe Coffee Company as a consultant), to spend some time with the Breville Infuser (our top-pick machine), and give us some advice on getting started.

Though I have a long coffee background myself, including not just consulting at Joe Coffee Company but researching and writing Wirecutter’s guides to coffee grinders and drip coffee makers, and serving as associate editor at coffee news website Sprudge.com, I’ve spent nearly all of my time in the coffee industry on the drinking side of the bar. So I asked my colleague David if he might drop by my home testing lab and share his award-winning expertise using the beginner-friendly gear we recommend.

The bare minimum setup you’ll need to get started brewing espresso is the machine itself (which, in the case of the Breville Infuser, comes with a portafilter and tamper already) and, whether you do the grinding yourself or not, some coffee ground correctly for espresso (a much finer grind than you may be used to for filter coffee). Ideally you’ll grind coffee for each espresso right before you pull the shot, because coffee goes stale rapidly once it’s ground. And although picking out a coffee bean strictly marketed as “espresso” isn’t necessary, you’ll find that the best roasters strive to build coffee blends that taste balanced and pleasing in the espresso brewing process—as well as retain their best characteristics when served with milk.

Grinding and measuring your coffee

Before pulling your shot, weigh out about 13 to 15 grams of coffee. Just be sure to tare out the empty portafilter before you fill it with grounds. Photo: Michael Hession

For precision, it’s best to use a scale to confirm that you’re dosing each shot (that is, measuring out the coffee grounds) correctly—at least until you’re sure you’re doing the exact same steps the exact same way every time. At Joe Coffee Company in New York City, where United States Barista Champion finalist David Castillo directs the public education program, “Everything we teach first is by weight,” he told us.

For a double shot of espresso (about 2 ounces), a standard dose is between 13 and 18 grams of coffee. But because every espresso machine is different, you may start to home in on your ideal dose by having just enough head space left over once you’ve tamped down the shot to gain good clearance for brewing when you lock the portafilter into the machine. We found that for the Infuser 15 grams was a good place to start for a double shot.

Coffee needs to be ground much finer for espresso (left) than for drip coffee (right)—start by aiming for something a bit finer than table salt (bottom). Photo: Michael Hession

Once you know how much coffee you want to put in and start pulling shots, you’ll have to dial in your grind size to the right parameters so that water saturates the grinds properly, rather than under-extracting (grind too coarse, tastes sour) or over-extracting (grind too fine, tastes bitter). As a general guidepost, coffee ground for espresso should be very finely ground, less coarse than sand, but not so fine that the machine can’t even push water through the portafilter. Trial, error, taste, and visual inspection—call in Dr. YouTube for a consult if you need to—of the shots as they are flowing out will help get you to the right grind size.

When adjusting your grind size, always remember to purge the grinder by letting it run for a couple of seconds to flush out any remaining particles of the previous grind setting, or you’ll get a potpourri of grind sizes in your next shot, and will be none the wiser to what the right grind should be.

Pulling a good shot

After filling your portafilter, gently level the grounds with your hand. Video: Michael Hession

Ready to get started? Fill your portafilter with a double-shot dose of coffee, weighing it if you can. You’ll have a mound of espresso that needs distribution to make sure the portafilter fills evenly without leaving huge gaps or channels for water to seek. Distribute the coffee by hand, then set the portafilter down on a steady surface like the edge of a countertop and tamp as evenly as you can (it’s important to do this with the same pressure each time to ensure consistent brewing from one shot to the next).

Be sure to apply even pressure with your tamper, and make sure the grounds are level in the portafilter. Video: Michael Hession

Run the machine briefly without a portafilter in place to purge the group head (the nozzle where you insert the portafilter). Now lock that portafilter in the machine, get out a vessel—clear glass like the 3-ounce version of our favorite Duralex drinking glass is easiest for beginners to see the consistency and layering of their espresso—and start your shot!

Use a stopwatch to time your shots. It should take around 30 seconds to pull a double shot (about 2 ounces) of espresso. Photo: Michael Hession

Castillo advises timing your shots to get the best brew ratio (the ratio of ground coffee to hot water). “Typically with espresso we use a 1:2 brew ratio, because espresso inherently is a very concentrated drink,” he said. To achieve that ratio, he recommends a shot time between 24 and 30 seconds. If your machine seems to be pulling shots way faster or slower than that, it’s likely that your grind size is off—make adjustments and work your way toward that target time range.

Some semiautomatic machines like the Breville Infuser come with preset times for both single and double shots, but you can also start and stop them manually. And once you’ve figured out your ideal timing, you can adjust the preset times accordingly and repeat them at the touch of a button.

A properly pulled shot of espresso should be a swirled or speckled mix of caramel brown and lighter blond tones. A shot that is uniformly light in color is likely to be taste a bit sour, and is a sign that you should use a finer grind setting. Photo: Michael Hession

Now that you’ve pulled your first shots, you can get down to the nitty-gritty of making them more perfect. If everything looks visually okay at first—a nice volume of viscous liquid, with a caramel-colored crema on top of the shot—taste it, and go from there. Just remember: Nothing you can read will train you to produce good espresso more than training your palate by tasting, tasting, tasting, and adjusting, adjusting, adjusting.

You should clean and dry the portafilter after each use to ensure that coffee buildup doesn’t form on the inside (here’s a good video on how to do it from Whole Latte Love).

Castillo has one last tip: “It’s crucial that you make a mess in the kitchen. That’s part of it.”

Frothing milk

The key to good steamed milk is finding and maintaining the sweet spot that generates foam but doesn’t make big bubbles. Photo: Michael Hession

Want to add milk? We recommend a full-fat cow’s milk (because it’s delicious), but there are many made-for-baristas milk alternatives (oat, almond, soy, and beyond) available that perform well when steamed. Castillo recommends filling the pitcher to just about a finger’s width below where the spout begins. Before plunging the steam wand in, make sure to purge any condensation first by turning it on for a moment. Otherwise, especially with the Infuser, you’ll get a bunch of dribbles of hot water in your milk before the pump is ready to go. (You’ll also want to purge the wand again, then wipe it down fastidiously with a wet rag, when you’re done.)

To steam, place both hands on the pitcher (you’ll need to feel the temperature of the milk) and position the wand’s nozzle at a slight angle near the pitcher wall. “As soon as you turn it on, you want to lower the pitcher,” said Castillo. “Move it farther away from the steam wand until you hear a hissing noise, which is air being introduced into the milk—that’s what creates all the texture.” The trick (which takes some practice) is to keep the nozzle just below the surface of the milk, maintaining a quiet hiss that creates fine, velvety bubbles, rather than a loud screech or gurgle that creates unwanted large ones.

By holding the steam wand just off-center, you can create a whirlpool effect in the milk pitcher. Video: Michael Hession

Though some instruction manuals say to swirl the milk while steaming, Castillo recommends holding the steam wand just off-center, to allow the force of the steam to create a whirlpool effect by itself. “When the pitcher gets to about hand temperature, you want to push it back up and stop the hissing,” he warned. “You don’t want to aerate past hand temperate because that’s when your milk changes from smooth and silky to grainy and bubbly.” Did you oversteam your milk and end up with giant foamy bubbles, instead of a tight silk? You can always coax the bubbles out a little bit by swirling the pitcher and thunking it on the countertop.

Keep learning and improving

As you refine your technique, you’ll definitely want to dig deeper into online tutorials and YouTube videos (Seattle Coffee Gear has a lot of great how-tos, as does Whole Latte Love). Or, if you want to go really far down the rabbit hole, Scott Rao’s The Professional Barista’s Handbook is chock full of both espresso theory and science. And with coffee having the renaissance that it is, local coffee companies in many major (and some minor) cities offer barista classes that can give the hands-on experience that no amount of reading will provide.

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How to Make Espresso at Home: A Starter Guide

If you’re a coffee aficionado interested in pulling great shots at home, our review of the best espresso machine, grinder, and accessories can help you pick out a great beginner setup—but you’ll need a little practice and patience to get the hang of it. With that in mind, we enlisted David Castillo, the training and education manager at Joe Coffee Company in New York City (I also work at Joe Coffee Company as a consultant), to spend some time with the Breville Infuser (our top-pick machine), and give us some advice on getting started.

Though I have a long coffee background myself, including not just consulting at Joe Coffee Company but researching and writing Wirecutter’s guides to coffee grinders and drip coffee makers, and serving as associate editor at coffee news website Sprudge.com, I’ve spent nearly all of my time in the coffee industry on the drinking side of the bar. So I asked my colleague David if he might drop by my home testing lab and share his award-winning expertise using the beginner-friendly gear we recommend.

The bare minimum setup you’ll need to get started brewing espresso is the machine itself (which, in the case of the Breville Infuser, comes with a portafilter and tamper already) and, whether you do the grinding yourself or not, some coffee ground correctly for espresso (a much finer grind than you may be used to for filter coffee). Ideally you’ll grind coffee for each espresso right before you pull the shot, because coffee goes stale rapidly once it’s ground. And although picking out a coffee bean strictly marketed as “espresso” isn’t necessary, you’ll find that the best roasters strive to build coffee blends that taste balanced and pleasing in the espresso brewing process—as well as retain their best characteristics when served with milk.

Grinding and measuring your coffee

Before pulling your shot, weigh out about 13 to 15 grams of coffee. Just be sure to tare out the empty portafilter before you fill it with grounds. Photo: Michael Hession

For precision, it’s best to use a scale to confirm that you’re dosing each shot (that is, measuring out the coffee grounds) correctly—at least until you’re sure you’re doing the exact same steps the exact same way every time. At Joe Coffee Company in New York City, where United States Barista Champion finalist David Castillo directs the public education program, “Everything we teach first is by weight,” he told us.

For a double shot of espresso (about 2 ounces), a standard dose is between 13 and 18 grams of coffee. But because every espresso machine is different, you may start to home in on your ideal dose by having just enough head space left over once you’ve tamped down the shot to gain good clearance for brewing when you lock the portafilter into the machine. We found that for the Infuser 15 grams was a good place to start for a double shot.

Coffee needs to be ground much finer for espresso (left) than for drip coffee (right)—start by aiming for something a bit finer than table salt (bottom). Photo: Michael Hession

Once you know how much coffee you want to put in and start pulling shots, you’ll have to dial in your grind size to the right parameters so that water saturates the grinds properly, rather than under-extracting (grind too coarse, tastes sour) or over-extracting (grind too fine, tastes bitter). As a general guidepost, coffee ground for espresso should be very finely ground, less coarse than sand, but not so fine that the machine can’t even push water through the portafilter. Trial, error, taste, and visual inspection—call in Dr. YouTube for a consult if you need to—of the shots as they are flowing out will help get you to the right grind size.

When adjusting your grind size, always remember to purge the grinder by letting it run for a couple of seconds to flush out any remaining particles of the previous grind setting, or you’ll get a potpourri of grind sizes in your next shot, and will be none the wiser to what the right grind should be.

Pulling a good shot

After filling your portafilter, gently level the grounds with your hand. Video: Michael Hession

Ready to get started? Fill your portafilter with a double-shot dose of coffee, weighing it if you can. You’ll have a mound of espresso that needs distribution to make sure the portafilter fills evenly without leaving huge gaps or channels for water to seek. Distribute the coffee by hand, then set the portafilter down on a steady surface like the edge of a countertop and tamp as evenly as you can (it’s important to do this with the same pressure each time to ensure consistent brewing from one shot to the next).

Be sure to apply even pressure with your tamper, and make sure the grounds are level in the portafilter. Video: Michael Hession

Run the machine briefly without a portafilter in place to purge the group head (the nozzle where you insert the portafilter). Now lock that portafilter in the machine, get out a vessel—clear glass like the 3-ounce version of our favorite Duralex drinking glass is easiest for beginners to see the consistency and layering of their espresso—and start your shot!

Use a stopwatch to time your shots. It should take around 30 seconds to pull a double shot (about 2 ounces) of espresso. Photo: Michael Hession

Castillo advises timing your shots to get the best brew ratio (the ratio of ground coffee to hot water). “Typically with espresso we use a 1:2 brew ratio, because espresso inherently is a very concentrated drink,” he said. To achieve that ratio, he recommends a shot time between 24 and 30 seconds. If your machine seems to be pulling shots way faster or slower than that, it’s likely that your grind size is off—make adjustments and work your way toward that target time range.

Some semiautomatic machines like the Breville Infuser come with preset times for both single and double shots, but you can also start and stop them manually. And once you’ve figured out your ideal timing, you can adjust the preset times accordingly and repeat them at the touch of a button.

A properly pulled shot of espresso should be a swirled or speckled mix of caramel brown and lighter blond tones. A shot that is uniformly light in color is likely to be taste a bit sour, and is a sign that you should use a finer grind setting. Photo: Michael Hession

Now that you’ve pulled your first shots, you can get down to the nitty-gritty of making them more perfect. If everything looks visually okay at first—a nice volume of viscous liquid, with a caramel-colored crema on top of the shot—taste it, and go from there. Just remember: Nothing you can read will train you to produce good espresso more than training your palate by tasting, tasting, tasting, and adjusting, adjusting, adjusting.

You should clean and dry the portafilter after each use to ensure that coffee buildup doesn’t form on the inside (here’s a good video on how to do it from Whole Latte Love).

Castillo has one last tip: “It’s crucial that you make a mess in the kitchen. That’s part of it.”

Frothing milk

The key to good steamed milk is finding and maintaining the sweet spot that generates foam but doesn’t make big bubbles. Photo: Michael Hession

Want to add milk? We recommend a full-fat cow’s milk (because it’s delicious), but there are many made-for-baristas milk alternatives (oat, almond, soy, and beyond) available that perform well when steamed. Castillo recommends filling the pitcher to just about a finger’s width below where the spout begins. Before plunging the steam wand in, make sure to purge any condensation first by turning it on for a moment. Otherwise, especially with the Infuser, you’ll get a bunch of dribbles of hot water in your milk before the pump is ready to go. (You’ll also want to purge the wand again, then wipe it down fastidiously with a wet rag, when you’re done.)

To steam, place both hands on the pitcher (you’ll need to feel the temperature of the milk) and position the wand’s nozzle at a slight angle near the pitcher wall. “As soon as you turn it on, you want to lower the pitcher,” said Castillo. “Move it farther away from the steam wand until you hear a hissing noise, which is air being introduced into the milk—that’s what creates all the texture.” The trick (which takes some practice) is to keep the nozzle just below the surface of the milk, maintaining a quiet hiss that creates fine, velvety bubbles, rather than a loud screech or gurgle that creates unwanted large ones.

By holding the steam wand just off-center, you can create a whirlpool effect in the milk pitcher. Video: Michael Hession

Though some instruction manuals say to swirl the milk while steaming, Castillo recommends holding the steam wand just off-center, to allow the force of the steam to create a whirlpool effect by itself. “When the pitcher gets to about hand temperature, you want to push it back up and stop the hissing,” he warned. “You don’t want to aerate past hand temperate because that’s when your milk changes from smooth and silky to grainy and bubbly.” Did you oversteam your milk and end up with giant foamy bubbles, instead of a tight silk? You can always coax the bubbles out a little bit by swirling the pitcher and thunking it on the countertop.

Keep learning and improving

As you refine your technique, you’ll definitely want to dig deeper into online tutorials and YouTube videos (Seattle Coffee Gear has a lot of great how-tos, as does Whole Latte Love). Or, if you want to go really far down the rabbit hole, Scott Rao’s The Professional Barista’s Handbook is chock full of both espresso theory and science. And with coffee having the renaissance that it is, local coffee companies in many major (and some minor) cities offer barista classes that can give the hands-on experience that no amount of reading will provide.

[sketchtheghost-blog]

Straightforward Strategies To Heating and air conditioning Which Are Easy To Follow

The final thing any individual desires is to locate that the heating system or A/C model is malfunctioning. Handling your home's Heating and air conditioning system is crucial to trying to keep your environment comfortable. If you'd like for more information, the next report has some great suggestions! Prior to call an individual to help you correct your computer, make sure to know what type of method you may have in position. Make a note of what brand your system is together with the model amount and, if they're available, maintenance data. If you need to have someone emerge to fix the system, it will be easy to aid the service provider comprehend more details on what is going on. Your outdoors condenser enthusiast can be really helped to run much better by you cleansing the lover rotor blades and coils HVAC Repair just before summer season establishing. In case you are performing more than a light area washing, be sure that the power is shut down on the HVAC system. Additionally, it's vital that you clean out foliage as well as other dirt externally condenser model. Your HVAC device may suffer when shrubs start to get rid of their results in. Ensure that the unit's lover grill is washed frequently when the results in start to tumble. Usually, the unit need to work unnecessarily tough. Thoroughly clean the supporter blades and coils on the condenser enthusiast every spring. Prior to do so, turn off the strength to make sure that none of the pieces will shift whilst you work on it. Get rid of the barbecue grill and also the rotor blades, and then you will give them a gentle clean. Your HVAC process could go through when bushes begin decreasing their foliage. Cleaning your unit is essential due to its usefulness. Usually, the device will have to job needlessly challenging. In order to improve performance, spot new backyard devices or move your present device to a place which resides from the color. You reduce costs by doing this as the ac is currently yanking in chillier air, which happens to be much easier to awesome additional. If at all possible, set your HVAC in a shaded location when it is outdoors. In case the atmosphere your device pulls in is cooler, it will need a lot less vitality to regulate just before it's filtered into your house. Study multiple building contractors before choosing one particular. Talk with diverse recommendations to look for the right one to your situation. It will help you are making a good choice. In no way let your home achieve a dangerously warm temp. It can be only easy for an aura conditioner to lessen the temperature in the home by 20 qualifications F very quickly. Should your home occurs to get near 100 diplomas Fahrenheit, then you will only have the capacity to reasonably cool to close to 80. Depending on the amounts of moisture, that is certainly not much of a secure temperature in relation to resting or escaping from the heat of summer season. Before you hire any HVAC business, inquire further just how long they've been available for business. Organizations with established track records usually provide better assistance. Hiring a new professional indicates getting a even bigger danger. Sometimes ac units get iced up. Freezing empty lines are also achievable and may be wrongly recognized for spills. If you see this, swap your thermostat to fan only to eliminate the compressor. If this type of doesn't operate, contact an expert. Think about having a radiant buffer placed in your attic room so keep the successful performing of your Heating and air conditioning system. It disables the heat from inside, decreasing exactly how much vitality you need to cool down your home while in summer season. If it's done correctly, the attic room could become yet another beneficial liveable space. Do you want a whole new Heating and air conditioning program? There are certain things you want to remember. Method scores are derived from the region that could be cooled and warmed effectively from the program. You are happier getting a model that is certainly a little too large for your needs than buying one which is a tad too small. Identifying the direction where your property confronts might help make your Heating and air conditioning process efficient. When you purposefully spot bushes, it's easy to prohibit a few of the morning sunlight so that your residence won't grow to be overheated. If there's significantly less heat in the home, your Air conditioning work less. Retain the services of an HVAC licensed contractor that is efficient and fast. The very best organizations maintain the professionals doing work truthfully as well as on time. An informed professional will likely very easily detect any difficulties with your Heating and air conditioning. Once they determine what the thing is, it's only a matter of time well before they already have it again and working appropriately. If you wish your Heating and air conditioning device to get more potent, just look at where the top of your residence confronts. You may help to keep your property amazing with the ideal positioning of shrubs. The less heat inside the house, the less time that this Air conditioning has to job. The Heating and air conditioning process in your house is a key component to your cozy environment. Unless you take better care of it, you residence isn't comfortable. Making use of the recommendations right here will help keep the Heating and air conditioning program functioning appropriately.

[morintpyogyvltm]

How You Can Make Heating and air conditioning Devices Transactions Much easier

The final thing any individual wants is to find that their heating or possibly a/C model is malfunctioning. Handling your home's HVAC system is important to keeping your setting comfy. If you'd like to acquire more information, the following write-up has some good assistance! Before you decide to get in touch with people to assist you in obtaining your computer fixed, know which kind of system you're utilizing to start with. Take a look at the device or maybe the owner's guide to obtain the brand and model quantity. This will likely make sure that you can give your professional everything that they need. Just before the summer time you must clear out your condenser fan's blades and coils. Usually turn the device off prior to deciding to do anything to it, which includes inclined. Take away foliage and particles through the exterior system. Clean the dirt on your condenser units. You cant ever explain to when issues will stack up, specially adhering to rainwater or blowing wind hard storms. This can ruin your units. It could overheat, ultimately causing catastrophe in your process. Every early spring you need to ensure your condenser fan's coils and rotor blades on the fan part are thoroughly clean. Turn the strength off so practically nothing goes. Then take away the barbecue grill, get rid of the rotor blades and clean it from top to bottom gently. Be sure to have your Heating and air conditioning method checked out at least twice annually. Check into it every six months before you decide to go in the cold and hot weeks. Though it might appear as nothing is improper using the device, a straightforward assessment can prove or else. Backyard condenser products need to be switched off when the weather transforms cool. If temps go below 60 you operate the potential risk of harmful a system that continues to be on. This will be sure that your method is useful each and every year, which can save you a great deal in fix fees. When possible, placed your HVAC in the shaded place when it is exterior. As you become your ac to draw in amazing oxygen it won't need to do an excessive amount of work to cool it which helps you AC Repair save some money. Regular upkeep of your model ought to be executed every year. While in service the tech will examine the engine and re-fill the device essential fluids. Those activities are likely to support your system at top overall performance. Shut down your outside condenser in the event it will become chilly out. The machine will end up damaged should you not look after it. This will likely make sure your program continues to be in very good doing work purchase every year, saving you funds on pricey improvements.

You have to have your Heating and air conditioning program checked out at least one time, but ideally a second time, annually. An Heating and air conditioning professional will inspect the complete program, like the essential oil, the motor unit, as well as the ductwork. These basic things will keep your system jogging at optimum performance. Sometimes air conditioners get iced up. Very cold strain line is also possible and might be incorrectly recognized for spills. If you see this, swap your thermostat to fan simply to eliminate the compressor. If the doesn't function, phone a professional. Think about possessing a vibrant buffer set up in your attic space so keep the efficient working of your own Heating and air conditioning program. It prevents the heat from inside of, minimizing just how much power you have to cool down your home while in summer season. If it's done right, the attic could become yet another helpful liveable space. Do you need a brand new Heating and air conditioning process? There are some things you want to be aware of. System scores derive from the spot which can be cooled and warmed effectively by the program. You happen to be more satisfied getting a model that is certainly a little too big for your needs than acquiring a single that is a bit not big enough. When figuring out which size of air conditioning unit to buy, initial measure the location which needs to be cooled. The calculation to determine the size of the device is normally 20 BTU for every sq . ft . of area. When a number of spaces must be cooled, decide the square footage for each room then add the amounts collectively. Retain the services of an Heating and air conditioning service provider which is successful and speedy. The best organizations retain the technicians doing work genuinely and on time. An experienced specialist will likely effortlessly diagnose any difficulties with your HVAC. When they understand what the problem is, it's just a matter of time well before they may have it back and jogging appropriately. If you want your Heating and air conditioning system to be more potent, just examine where the front of your house encounters. You may help to keep your property cool together with the tactical positioning of bushes. The less warmth indoors, the much less time that this Air conditioning needs to operate. Heating and air conditioning systems are crucial investments, since they make your property a lot more secure. Keep in mind prior recommendations once you should get yourself a new program. These suggestions will assure you acquire a method that may satisfy you.

[madmgarc-blog]

All about my 1:1 Classroom

I think it would be so incredible to one day have a 1:1 laptop or tablet initiative in my classroom.  Some schools just feel fortunate to have 1 textbook for every student, much less every student having an amazing piece of technology.  The advantages and possibilities of what I could do with these and my students is endless. There are several things that I would do in my 1:1 classroom to make the most of their educational opportunities and integrate this technology into their learning experiences. 

In chapter 7, Dirksen talks about developing skills, and of course the one thing that is absolutely necessary when developing skills -- practice.  Sure, we don’t like to practice.  We just wish we learned something once and then we were automatically an expert at it.  But, unfortunately, that’s not the way it works. We’ve all heard the saying “to become an expert at something, practice it 10,000 times” and while we don’t have a chance for out students to practice all the content we teach them 10,000 times, we can certainly give them opportunities to practice.  And this is where our 1:1 technology can come in handy.  There are an unlimited number of fun and creative ways that technology can be used to help kids practice what they have learned.  And there are a lot of advantages to practicing with technology in this setting.  No waiting turns.  Nobody unnecessarily falling behind.  Because everyone gets one.  They can work at their own pace.  I can know immediately when they need help or are struggling.  Bonus: kids love being on technology.  And if you can do such fun kid-centered things with it.  Maybe make the practice in the form of a game that they will be even more inclined to use.  Oh, and another fabulous way having a 1:1 technology initiative will help on practice: students can practice slowly.  They can practice it gradually and over time which is something Dirksen thinks is extremely beneficial to retaining content.  She reiterates SPACE OUT YOUR PRACTICE.  And this is so easy when you have a 1:1 initiative. 

Another way that the 1:1 initiative will come in handy in a fantastic way relates directly to what Dirksen discusses in chapter 9 which is about designing for the environment.  She talks about “learning the right things.”  This basically means that all the knowledge required in school isn’t necessarily something you have to know by heart.  I took trigonometry last summer.  And, no, it wasn’t an enjoyable experience.  Especially when you condense 15 weeks into 3... but that’s another story.   Anyway, on the exams, the professor would give us some of the formulas.  The formulas would be useless unless we knew how to use them, but it would have be extremely difficult and unnecessary to actually memorize them.  Now, on the other hand, we HAD to learn how to use the formulas with problems.  That is what Dirksen is talking about.  Now, you might be asking, what does that have to do with a 1:1 classroom??  Well, laptops and tablets can be extremely useful in helping students focus on what they actually need to learn.  For example, another interesting (and helpful) idea that Dirksen brought up in the chapter was the use of what she considers “job aids.”  In my classroom this would look like charts, graphs, diagrams, etc. that students could access on their device.  Maybe they would show the cursive alphabet, reference for the times tables, a flow chart that helps students start writing an essay.  Things that would aid the students in learning, but things that they do not actually need to learn, or know off the top of their heads. 

Now, not to totally ruin this post, but, I just happen to be an over-thinker and a perfectionist, and, well, there is one caution I have with a 1:1 initiative.  While having this program implemented into my classroom, I want to make sure that the technology doesn’t take over the classroom.  When used responsibly, technology can have a hugely positive impact on the students in your class.  But it’s also important to not let it replace all the actual teaching going on there.  In this decade, elementary students in our classes have grown up with every type of technology at their finger tips.  Sometimes they think that is all there is.  But it’s not.  And we have to show them that.  Technology is an aid to learning, it can even be a scaffold, but it cannot replace it altogether.