Connexion
If you own a house with some trees on the property, you probably don’t think about them much unless they require maintenance—and in those moments you think of them as expenses. Sure, those trees have value due to their natural beauty and shade (or possibly the fruit they grow), but few people think about the trees in their yards in terms of having a monetary value.
But you should, because trees on your property actually do have value—and that value is often substantial. First of all, maintained trees in good condition add property value in general—as much as 15%. But some species of tree can be worth a lot of cash if they’ve been allowed to grow to enormous proportions in your yard—a nondescript elm tree with a 20-inch trunk, for example, might be worth as much as $30,000. And some trees have been appraised for more than six figures. Some trees are so valuable poachers actually invade people’s property to steal them.
If you’re currently peering out your window at the trees in your yard and wondering if you’re sitting on some sort of woody goldmine, here’s how to find out the tree value on your property.
The simplest way to get an idea of how much your trees might be worth is to use an online calculator like this one, which uses the USDA Forest Service’s i-Tree software, or the slightly simpler ones here. These calculators rely on you to input accurate information, so you might need to sleuth out the species of your tree and do some measurements and observations in order to get a truly accurate valuation.
It’s important to note that these tools offer a sense of the value your trees are adding to your property—by providing shade, cleaning the air, removing carbon, and cooling your home. If the calculator says your tree is worth $15,000, you probably can’t just sell it for $15,000, or add that amount to your home’s listing price when you sell your house. But these tools do offer a starting point for valuing your tree.
If you want to get a more accurate value for your tree, you’ll need to hire an arborist to conduct an appraisal, which is a real, actual thing with a lot of science behind it. You can find a consulting arborist at the American Society of Consulting Arborists (ASCA) website.
Tree appraisals are mostly used to determine insurance values in case your trees are damaged, destroyed, or improperly removed from your property and you need to make a claim. But you can sell a tree from your yard if the tree is valuable enough, and if you can find a nursery or other entity interested in buying it. And if you have a lot of hardwood trees on your property, you can find companies like Sell Your Trees that will pay you for them, then come and remove them at their own expense (making an appraisal even more important so you know you’re getting fair value for your trees). If your trees are valuable and mature (meaning they’re fully grown and not a sapling, like the trees you buy at a nursery), you can also sell them on an online marketplace like Re-Tree, which can also give you an idea of how much that specific tree is worth.
The most valuable and easiest to sell trees (based on Re-Tree’s catalog) include:
Japanese Maple. These majestic and colorful trees can sell for $400 to more than $8,000 depending on health, maturity, and specific type.
Flowering dogwood. Whether pink or white, these beautiful trees can be worth as much as $4,500.
Tricolor beech. This ornamental tree changes colors with the seasons, making it a beautiful addition to any landscaping project, and can sell for as much as $8,000.
Gingko. These slow-growing trees are terrific shade trees, and can sell for $5,000 to $6,000 each.
Black Walnut. The wood of the Black Walnut is valuable for furniture makers, and can sell for as much as $2,500.
Even if the trees in your yard aren’t super unique and rare, you can still often sell them for a few hundred bucks if they’re healthy and mature. If you’re looking to monetize your trees, it’s worth having them appraised and seeing what the market will bear.
Getting your spring garden into shape, doing some pruning, or planting might call for some new tools. If your tools have been stored outdoors, they might have some rust, or your tools might be worn out after years of service. Even with meticulous maintenance, shears, mowers, and other equipment will wear out over time. Gardening equipment generally need replacing after about six years, although with good maintenance can last as long as 10 to 12 years. If you're running into trouble with some of your gardening tools, Fiskars—known for their high-quality scissors—makes tools with a good reputation for durability and sharpness. Here are some of the best sales on offer this week from Amazon.
For cuts up to ⅝ inches thick, a pair of Fiskars bypass pruning shears will do the job. The pruners are on sale for $9.98 right now, 52% off their regular price. You can also get a set of pruning shears that comes with the bypass pruning shears as well as a pair of micro tip pruning shears on sale right now for $24.40, 40% off their usual price. These are good quality all-steel shears and they come with a lifetime warranty from Fiskars.
For precision trimming your grass around landscaping features, outbuildings, or hedges where a string trimmer won’t work, a pair of Fiskars grass shears is a good solution. These grass shears are on sale right now for $17.99, 44% off their regular price. This set of grass shears has a rotating head to allow both vertical and horizontal cuts to save your wrists when you’re getting into tight spaces or odd angles.
The Fiskars lopper for trimming tree branches up to 1 ½ inches thick is on sale right now for $17.99, 42% off their regular price. The handles of these loppers are extendable from 24 ½ inches up to 37 inches to give you added reach as well as leverage.
If you’re looking for a quieter, zero-emission mower, you can go with a walk-behind push mower. The Fiskars 17” push mower is on sale right now for $171.58, 24% off its normal price. In addition to being quieter and having no emissions, this mower uses no power source besides you, so it’s also the cheapest to run.
If you’re doing some spring planting and find that you need a new garden trowel, the Fiskars ergo trowel is a good buy. It’s a heavy duty trowel that’s designed to be comfortable to hold while you’re digging and it’s on sale right now for $8.79, 32% off its regular price. It has an aluminum head, so rust won’t be a problem, and it’s lightweight as well.
Cutting overgrown weeds and vines can be a challenge—plus, machetes are fun. Fiskars has an 18-inch curved blade machete ax that’s on sale for $39.58, 52% off its normal price. A machete is good for cutting back dense brush and thick, overgrown areas, and the sharp, curved tip can also be used for trimming small branches and cutting through roots.
If you’re anticipating having some bounty from a vegetable garden, a container for harvesting will come in handy. The Fiskars harvest basket is on sale for $21.59, 42% off its usual price. The basket has three compartments, one large one that can double a colander for rinsing produce, one small compartment with smaller drainage holes, and one compartment with no drainage for collecting flowers or other plants you want to keep fresh in water.
If you have some garden beds to dig out, or some dirt to move, you’ll need a good quality shovel. The Fiskars digging shovel is on sale for $28.99, 37% off its regular price. The shovel blade is about 8 ½ inches wide, with a foothold on the top side of it to make it easier to push into the soil with your foot.
Sometimes major life events—like a divorce or a job in a new city—make our real estate decisions for us. The rest of the time, however, we're left to our own devices. While there are a number of factors that determine when, exactly, is the best time to put our home on the market, real estate analysts and forecasters can turn to data from previous years to make a general prediction as far as the time of year when sellers stand to benefit the most.
According to a recent report from realtor.com, this very week—April 14-20, 2024—is the best time this year to sell a home. That may be nice to hear if your home is currently on the market, but it's not necessarily useful information for other would-be sellers, who have missed 2024's sweet spot. The good news is that if they don't need to sell immediately—they can take the next year to get their home ready to list in time for the best time to sell in 2025.
Based on real estate trends in past years, spring is the best time of year to sell a house, according to data from realtor.com. "Housing conditions in April may differ year to year, but seasonality suggests that within a given year, the best time to sell will fall around mid-April," says Hannah Jones, an economic research analyst for realtor.com. "For example, today’s market is relatively challenging and this year’s sellers have adjusted their expectations accordingly, but this spring will be the best combination of conditions within the year for sellers."
So what is it about spring that puts people in the mood to buy new homes? According to Jones, it comes down to two major factors. First, spring "starts the seasonal ascent in home prices, and quickens the pace of sale," she says. Also, because housing inventory typically increases in the spring, but hasn't yet reached the heights of summer and early fall, sellers can expect more buyer attention. "The combination of higher-than-average prices and buyer demand, coupled with quick market pace and low competition from other sellers makes mid-April the best time to sell," Jones says.
Even if you haven't officially gotten the ball rolling—or are still on the fence about selling your home—there's still time to get it ready and listed for next year's spring selling season. While forecasters haven't pinpointed the specific week yet, according to Jones, mid-April 2025 will likely be the best time to sell a home next year, "assuming typical seasonal housing market patterns hold."
Of course, the amount of time you'll need to get your home market-ready depends on variables like its current condition, and how much work (if any) you plan on putting into it before selling. But to give you a general idea, the findings of a different survey from realtor.com indicate that roughly 80% of sellers take between two weeks and six months to prepare their home for sale, with the largest share taking between one and three months.
It's also worth noting that more than half of seller surveyed (56%) said that the process of getting their home ready to list took longer than they had expected—so learn from their mistakes, and make sure you give yourself plenty of time. Not sure where to start? Here are some of the steps you'll likely need to take in order to list your home next spring:
Before reaching out to potential listing agents, you should have a general idea of where you want to be after you sell your home, says Maureen McDermut, a realtor with Sotheby's International in Montecito, California. Are you moving out of state, abroad, or staying local? Whether you're moving to a new state, country, or staying local, start familiarizing yourself with the real estate market in that area so there are no major surprises further down the road.
According to Jones, it's helpful to engage with an experienced listing agent early on in the process. In addition to walking you through what needs to be done in order to get your home ready to list in the spring, they'll also help set your expectations for a listing price based on the area, and help you determine whether it makes more sense to take on major renovations and repairs, or sell your home as-is.
But don't simply hire the first agent who comes up in an online search; keep in mind that this is the person you'll be advising you on how to get top dollar for your home. McDermut recommends looking up reviews for your potential listing agents on Zillow or other real estate websites, then interviewing between three and five local agents before making a decision. "While almost all of us have an agent in the family, it might be a better move to hire someone else, especially to avoid family conflicts," she says.
Ideally, you should have your listing agent in place roughly four to six months before getting your home live on the market, McDermut says. For example, if you want to list your home in April 2025, you should interview agents in December and make your decision by January. "I would absolutely make sure an agent is hired 90 days prior to your target listing date," she says.
After assessing your home, your listing agent will probably have a few recommendations for making it more appealing to potential buyers. Remember that they're on your team and also benefit from your home selling for as much as possible. "While some of the advice might sound insulting—especially when it comes to a large project you undertook on the home—your agent wants to help you get your home in the best shape possible to sell," McDermut says.
Take sliding barn doors, for example. While it wasn't that long ago that they were all the rage, they've since fallen out of favor, and according to McDermut, buyers don't want the hassle of having to replace them. That's why as a listing agent, she would advise sellers to have new doors installed before putting their home on the market.
Start the decluttering process as soon as possible. "In today's market, buyers may wish to move in as quickly as possible, so you want to be ready," McDermut says. "If it isn't a necessity of everyday living, move it into storage or sell it."
While you have some time before you need to worry about interior listing photos, don't put off the exterior shots for too long. More specifically, arrange to have exterior photos taken of your home when it looks its best—which in many cases is when your trees, flowers, and plants are in full bloom and looking lush, says Haley Bartlett, a realtor at iGo Realty Denver. "Planning ahead and taking outside photos during that season can lead to more buyers taking note of your home when it is time to sell," she says.
If you're having your home professionally staged, the interior listing photos are typically taken seven to 14 days before it hits the market, says Ashley Oshinsky, a real estate broker and the owner of Higher Living Real Estate. "The reason for this is staging charges by the month, so the longer it sits in your home the longer it needs to be paid for," she says.
According to McDermut, this is often the hardest step for sellers who have a lot of memories attached to their home. "As you're going through the process, it helps to start thinking of your home as an investment, which it is," she says. "The sooner you can get to that state of mind, the sooner you will be able to carry on with the other tasks of selling your home."
In this column I try not to cover topics that any normal person already knows are fake. I don’t bother writing about people who think Elvis is alive or that the Earth is flat, because anyone with two brain cells to rub together already knows those are bullshit, and believers are a tiny minority on the fringes of society.
I had considered “chemtrails” in the “no one takes this seriously” column, but I was wrong. This week, legislators in Tennessee passed a state law that bans “the intentional injection, release, or dispersion, by any means, of chemicals … substances, or apparatus … with the express purpose of affecting temperature, weather, or the intensity of the sunlight." In other words, they banned chemtrails.
While the legislation was drafted partly in response to a Federal government report released last year on solar geoengineering—basically the idea of cooling the planet by reflecting sunlight back into space—some lawmakers didn't get the memo. Here’s what Tennessee Sen. Frank Niceley said in support of the law: “This will be my wife’s favorite bill of the year. She has worried about this, I bet, 10 years … If you look up—one day, it’ll be clear. The next day they will look like some angels have been playing tic-tac-toe. They’re everywhere. I’ve got pictures on my phone with Xs right over my house. For years they denied they were doing anything.”
The report that riled up Tennessee legislators explicitly says the research "does not signify any change in policy or activity by the Biden-Harris Administration." We don't even know how or if it would work, so solar geoengineering is a non-starter. Chemtrail conspiracy theories are fake and dumb. But Tennessee's decision to outlaw both could be a great and/or hilarious thing—if they follow the letter of the law they wrote.
Believers call the long, white trails sometimes left in the sky by jet airplanes "chemtrails." They believe chemtrails are the result of the government intentionally spraying biological or chemical agents into the sky in order to change the weather, control the population, and/or make people sick (the specifics depend on who you ask).
But the trails Sen. Nicely has pictures of on his phone are really called "contrails," short for condensation trails, and no one is denying anything. Contrails are the result of water vapor released from aircraft engines’ exhaust. They are mostly ice crystals, basically jet-made clouds, and there is no evidence they can control people’s behavior. But they might actually change the weather. (More on that below.)
Contrails are an interesting conspiracy theory element because you can walk outside and see them for yourself; but sometimes you don’t see them, just like the Senator said. So are some aircraft spraying chemicals and others not? According to the authorities, no one is spraying anything. Contrails only form under certain atmospheric conditions, even if it looks like angels have been playing tic-tac-toe.
Chemtrail conspiracy theorists are partly right, but, as is usual with conspiracy theorists, not in the way they think they are. The U.S. government really is trying to control the weather by releasing a chemical into the air from planes. It’s called cloud-seeding, and the chemical, silver iodide, is harmless to humans. The idea is to prevent droughts by making clouds more productive. Cloud-seeding has been around since the 1940s. It's difficult to say for sure whether it works (it’s hard to get a control group of clouds), but it’s not secret. There are ongoing, relatively small, government funded cloud-seeding programs in several states, including Utah, Wyoming, and Colorado. But not in Tennessee, obviously.
The second part of the chemtrails theory is a little right too. You don’t need to be a conspiracy theorist to accept that the U.S. government has a long, troubling history of secretly dispersing chemical and biological agents in the air over the U.S.; They admit it themselves. But the government (officially) halted biological and chemical weapons programs in the 1960s, and in 2023, the U.S.’s last chemical weapon, a sarin nerve agent-filled M55 rocket rocket, was destroyed, according to the international oversight group The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.
So weather control programs and secret dispersal of chemicals exist, and the U.S. is looking into solar geoengineering, but nothing connects jet engine vapor-trails to any of these things. That doesn't mean contrails are benign though; they might even be worse than conspiracy theorists fear.
In another “a broken clock is right twice a day” victory for conspiracy theorists, legitimate research indicates that contrails are harmful, maybe extremely harmful, but not because they contain population-control nanobots.
It's hard to pin down the specific causes of temperature changes in a system as complex as the climate of a planet, but research has long supported the theory that jets creating tiny clouds in the sky prevents heat from escaping the planet, leading many climate scientists to regard contrails as a major contributor to global warming.
Contrails may be worse than the effect of burning all that jet fuel in the first place. According to the Yale School of the Environment, the constant injection of jet-made clouds has a “daily impact on atmospheric temperatures that is greater than that from the accumulated carbon emissions from all aircraft since the Wright Brothers first took to the skies more than a century ago.” To make matters worse, efforts to cut the CO2 emissions by making jet engines more efficient tends to produce more contrails that last longer.
So yes, conspiracy theorists, those streaks in the sky are a serious problem that could be contributing to a lot of people dying in the future. (Don’t worry, we’re using AI to stop it, which should work out great.)
Tennessee law-makers may have crafted this legislation to thwart a federal program that doesn’t exist and fight a made-up phenomenon, but depending on how it's interpreted and enforced, this law could be the most consequential piece of environmental protection legislation in U.S. history—or it could be a clear enough lesson in what happens when you let conspiracy theorists pass laws that Tennessee won't vote for dumb people anymore. (I can dream, right?)
To really ban "chemtrails" you'd have to ban all jet travel over Tennessee, which would lower the total amount of contrail-based warming on earth. But that's just the beginning. Tennessee outlawed releasing anything that “affects temperature, weather, or the intensity of the sunlight" without defining any of the terms, so it could be read to ban all pollution—from cars, airplanes, factories, or anywhere else—because it contributes to global warming (ie: affects temperature.)
To be fair, the law says the chemicals must be released with “the express purpose of affecting temperature, weather, or the intensity of the sunlight," so it probably wouldn't apply to factories, since raising the temperature of the earth is a secondary effect of industry. But sunglass manufacturers could be in the crosshairs. What is a pair of sunglasses if not an apparatus that affects the intensity of sunlight? Maybe sunglasses only affect sunlight's intensity on a personal level, but the law doesn't define what "affects the intensity of sunlight" means, so it could be read to cover Ray-Bans and beach umbrellas. You could make a case that the letter of Tennessee's law bans heaters, air conditioners, stoves, and ovens too, since they are all apparatuses with the express purpose of changing temperature. Water is a chemical, and spraying it onto people at an amusement park is an attempt to change temperature, so goodbye, cooling misters.
I could go on, but it's all ridiculous. We know that Tennessee is not going to shut down its airports and turn into a post-industrial, sunglass-free state where cooking is outlawed. The law isn't likely to be enforced in any way, and its only real-world effect will be to make people like Senator Niceley's wife happy that someone is finally doing something about those pesky angels playing tic-tac-toe in the sky.
In this complex world, it’s easy to believe that the future is out of our hands. But there are some who understand that the future doesn’t just happen — it’s made. Among these are the TED Fellows: innovators, activists, artists, inventors and dreamers. The TED Fellows program, now celebrating its fifteenth year, provides communication training, professional tools, network-building opportunities and amplification on the global stage to early-stage innovators working across multiple disciplines in over 100 countries.
We are thrilled to announce the 2024 cohort of TED Fellows, whose work spans five continents and represents 11 countries — including, for the first time, Georgia. This year’s TED Fellows include an entrepreneur who is reshaping health care in conflict zones, an engineer who created a cold chain solution saving lives in rural African communities and a scientist pioneering new, safer AI technologies — to name just a few.
Each TED Fellow was selected for their remarkable achievements, the potential impact of their work and their commitment to community building. TED is honored to welcome these new Fellows into this dynamic global network of 500+ Fellows creating meaningful change in their communities and the world.
Mohamed Aburawi
Health systems entrepreneur | Libya + Canada
Mohamed Aburawi is a surgeon and founder of Speetar, a digital health platform reshaping health care in conflict zones across the Middle East and Africa, especially his native Libya. Through this work, Speetar is helping to dismantle barriers to quality care and advocate for health care as a fundamental human right.
Sahba Aminikia
Composer, artistic director | Iran + US
Iranian-born composer, pianist and educator Sahba Aminikia is the founder and artistic director of Flying Carpet Children Festival, an annual mobile arts festival and artist residency for refugee children escaping conflict zones.
Joel Bervell
Medical mythbuster | Ghana + US
Joel Bervell is a medical student educating people about health care disparities and biases through viral social media content. By sharing stories and studies with his audience of more than one million about the neglect of marginalized groups, he advocates for change in the health care system.
Lehua Kamalu
Ocean navigator | Hawaii + US
Lehua Kamalu is a captain and navigator of traditional Hawaiian ocean-voyaging canoes. She preserves and teaches these ancient sustainable navigation practices by integrating them into digital storytelling and daily life for future generations.
Huiyi Lin is an economic policy researcher and half of Chow and Lin, an artist duo addressing food insecurity and poverty. This photo is from Chow and Lin’s series, The Poverty Line, which shows what people can afford to eat at the poverty line in countries around the world.
Huiyi Lin
Visual artist, poverty researcher | Singapore + China
Huiyi Lin is an economic policy researcher and one half of Chow and Lin, an artist duo using statistical, mathematical and computational techniques to address food insecurity and poverty. Chow and Lin combine research, design and photography to raise awareness about global inequality in visually arresting ways.
Ramin Hasani
AI scientist, entrepreneur | US, Austria + Iran
Ramin Hasani is cofounder and CEO of Liquid AI, where he helped invent liquid neural networks: a new AI technology inspired by living brains and physics. These revolutionary networks are more flexible and efficient than current AI solutions, shaping the future of machine learning and artificial intelligence research.
Paule Joseph
Chemosensory researcher, nurse | Venezuela + US
Taste and smell researcher Paule Joseph explores how conditions such as COVID-19, obesity, neurodegenerative disorders and substance abuse affect the chemical senses. Her lab combines clinical research, behavioral neuroscience, genomics and molecular biology, offering insights on how taste and smell affect our daily lives.
VacciBox (pictured here) is a cold chain solution saving lives in rural African communities. It was created by mechanical engineer Norah Magero.
Norah Magero
Mechanical engineer | Kenya
Norah Magero is a mechanical engineer and creator of VacciBox, a cold chain solution saving lives in rural communities. She is working to build an Africa that manufactures and produces its own climate-health care technology.
Royal Ramey
Wildland firefighter | US
Royal Ramey is the cofounder of the Forestry and Fire Recruitment Program (FFRP), a nonprofit providing career opportunities to formerly incarcerated firefighters in California. A 12-year wildland firefighter veteran, Ramey draws on his own lived experience, rethinking job training for the formerly incarcerated and addressing the challenges they face re-entering the workforce.
The Enguri River in western Georgia is a local swimming spot — but it’s also an illegal route into the de facto region of Abkhazia. Photojournalist Daro Sulakauri documents the impact of Russian occupation in her native Georgia, defending against the erasure of Georgian culture, history and borders.
Daro Sulakauri
Photojournalist, visual artist | Georgia
Photojournalist Daro Sulakauri chronicles social and political issues in the Caucasus. By focusing on issues that are considered taboo, such as early marriages and the impact of Russian occupation, she defends against the erasure of Georgian culture, history and borders.
Erika Moore Taylor
Equity bioengineer | US
Biomedical engineer Erika Moore Taylor researches how ancestry and sociocultural data affect disease development. Unlike many researchers, she accounts for diverse populations when building regenerative tissue models to create more equitable disease models.
TEDFellows_2024_Cohort-Announcement_TED-Blog
Upgrading your outdoor space with a TV can be a fun way to blend indoor and outdoor living, especially when entertaining. The process might seem daunting, but with the right hardware and placement, it’s actually a pretty simple DIY job.
The first thing to consider when choosing an outdoor TV is where you'll be putting it and what kind of sun exposure the area gets. TV companies sell full shade, partial sun, and full sun models, so make sure you take that into account. You can also consider the time of day you generally plan to use your outdoor TV. If it’s after dark, a screen that’s less bright will likely work, while one you plan to use under full daylight conditions will need to be significantly brighter. If you only plan to use your TV at night, you can also choose to use a projector and screen for a larger image at a lower cost. However, you will need to bring the projector indoors overnight or cover it well to keep it from getting damaged by moisture or dirt.
Mounting your outdoor TV can be as simple as mounting one for indoor use, but you should make sure that the hardware you choose is as water resistant as your TV to avoid damage from a broken hanging bracket, for example. A good outdoor bracket will be waterproof and weatherproof, and it should be able to tilt so that you can get the best view. To attach your mounting bracket, you should also make sure to use good quality screws that are intended for outdoor use as well.
Even though an outdoor television is designed to withstand some of the outdoor elements, a cover will extend its life and better protect it from moisture, dust, and debris when you’re not using it. Cutting down on rain and dirt will keep all the inputs for power and networking safe and sound for longer than an uncovered TV.
Protecting your cords can prevent electrical shorts from moisture making its way in between the ends of your cords and causing damage to your electronics as well as reducing the risk of fire. For networking, you should make sure you’re using a weatherproof cable that’s intended for outdoor use. Even if you have a TV that uses only a wireless input, you should still make sure that your power cable is protected. Where cords are plugged in to each other should be in as dry a spot as possible, and you should use a cord that’s meant for outdoor use. You can use individual covers for extension cord plugs, or you can use a larger weatherproofing connector box for multiple cords and power strips.
While you can use an outdoor TV anywhere that you can get power and a signal to it, you can greatly improve your viewing experience by placing your TV in the right spot. Keep your eyes out for the sun when picking your spot, and think about how glare will affect your picture quality at different times of day. Also, while outdoor TVs are listed as “weatherproof,” cutting down on direct sunlight, rainfall, and wind will prolong the life of your appliance. Consider placing your TV on a porch, under an awning, or beneath an overhang to keep it protected. You can install a standard door or window awning for around $100 that can give your outdoor TV some extra protection from the elements.
This week, I dig around in the cesspit of online "alpha male" influencers to find out what "soft guy era" means. I also look into the wholesome "Utah Fit Check" trend, find out what happens when AI starts making memes, and investigate the Humane AI pin, a new tech gadget I decidedly do not want.
Man-space influencers on TikTok and elsewhere have been hyping the phrase "soft guy era" for the last week or so, working hard to get the hashtag trending and plant the idea in people's minds. And it seems to be working—at least on young men. So I looked into it, and I wish I hadn't.
According to Scarfacemark, the person at the center of the soft guy trend, a man in his “soft guy era” wants to find a woman who will “take care of him in ridiculous ways.” Seems straightforward enough, but Scarface isn't expressing a desire to be what used to be called a “kept man.” Like most everything from red pill and red pill-adjacent people, the "soft guy era" is a reactionary and dishonest concept, a troll driven by misogyny and money.
"Soft guy era” is a reaction to the “soft girl era” trend that became popular, particularly with young African-American women, in 2023. “Soft girl” seems to mostly be about self-care and living a life that isn’t about struggle. For some women, that means expensive vacations and lavishness, or it means looking for a more gender-traditional relationship, where the man makes the money and the woman keeps house. And that’s the inflection point for man-fluencers.
In the world of online woman-hating-for-cash, the “soft girl” thing is an affront to men—an injustice, even though a man supporting a woman is rooted in patriarchal ideas that online dude-guys usually support. It's another gender-war double-bind: Women who want careers are hated, and women who don’t want careers are hated too. The hatred is the real point. Influencers come up with slightly unique wrinkles on time-tested misogynistic ideas and use them to rile up weirdos and increase their view-counts and sell ugly t-shirts and cryptocurrency, or whatever they do to scrounge up the rent for their condos.
I dug around on both the #softgirlera and the #softguyera hashtags. The most-trafficked videos on the former are sappy odes to successful relationships, yearnings for romance, and pleas for peace and gentleness. The top “soft guy” posts are not like this. They are nearly uniformly unfunny "comedy videos" made by a cadre of weird, greasy cranks acting like they’re making jokes when really they’re being assholes. All these dudes pretend they’re rich “alpha males" turning away super-models, and it's a transparent act to everyone but the children and teenagers they prey upon. Maybe the soft girls are working an online hustle of their own, but at least they don't make me feel like I need a shower and a nap.
Remember when it was funny to gross out your friends by making up sexual practices like the “Mississippi Mudslide” or “The Angry Algonquin?” The “Utah Fit Check” is nothing like that. It’s an innocent TikTok challenge where you wear some baggy jeans, give a thumbs-up to the camera, then jump in the air and try to spin twice before landing. Or just spin once—no one is keeping score.
The trend was started by Utah TikToker Michaelmal568. He posted the first video with the hashtag. It seems like he just wanted to show off his outfit, but he went a little too far, and people found it amusing/endearing, and thus a trend was born. It's now spreading across TikTok, Instagram, and everywhere else. Everyone is trying it, and some are failing. Some are pushing the envelope. (Apparently cleanly landing even one spin is not easy, so props to Michaelmal for the semi-clean 720.)
There’s an interesting cross-generational wrinkle to the story: The song you play for a proper Utah Fit Check video is “Harness your Hopes,” an obscure B-side from 1990s alternative band Pavement. I’m always happy when something I liked a million years ago finds a new audience, although more annoying TikTokers have started using Billy Joel’s sappy “Vienna Waits for You” instead of Pavement. They should be ashamed of themselves.
Online people have started outsourcing meme creation to artificial intelligence, and it’s going as well as you’d expect. In this subreddit devoted to the subject, the memes are either incomprehensible or just not funny. They’re not even “so bad they’re good,” they’re just boring. One redditor asked AI to make memes only AI would understand. AI didn’t make anything particularly interesting with that prompt either.
As artificial intelligence gets “better,” it’s losing the one interesting thing it has going on—that surrealist edge that gives everyone a queasy feeling—and replacing it with absolute averageness, complete mediocrity. The future is going to be computer-generated boredom on a level we are only starting to see. But at least we'll all be unemployed.
When a trusted, respected, even-handed tech reviewer like Marques Brownlee posts a video where he calls a heavily hyped, this-will-change-everything tech device, “The Worst Product I've Ever Reviewed,” a lot of people take notice—especially when the product, the Humane AI Pin, is backed by hundreds of millions of investor dollars, and was invented by two ex-Apple higher-ups who worked on the iPhone and iOS.
The Humane AI Pin is a wearable AI assistant that promises to take users beyond the cell phone by packing a camera, light, laser projector, a phone, and more into a tiny, slickly designed device you can stick on your lapel. You can ask it questions in plain English, dictate to it, take pictures, make calls, send texts, and other basic assistant functions. It will even project information onto your hand with a laser if you can't talk to it.
So what’s the problem? According to Brownlee, everything. The Humane AI’s artificial intelligence is slow to respond and often factually wrong (like AI always is). The battery life is terrible. It overheats easily. It’s heavy. The projector function is hard to read, and it often doesn't understand what you're saying. But the worst thing about it is that it doesn’t connect to your phone or anything else. The Humane AI pin is like paying $700 and a monthly, mandatory $24 subscription fee for a second phone that’s markedly worse in every way than the one you already own. It turns out, a touch-screen interface is way better than a voice-only interface. Who could have guessed?
If you’re a tall person and find yourself struggling to live in a home that isn’t designed for someone of your stature, you might dream of a gut renovation to fix the problems vexing you most, or even a custom-built tall person house, with everything sized and scaled for you.
While those options aren't likely possible (nor practical), there are a few products you can buy that can have a huge impact on your comfort level at home, without a major renovation.
If you find yourself peering easily over the shower curtain and you’re forced to contort yourself into odd shapes in order to fit under the shower, an adjustable shower head like this one from Waterpik will change your life. Its flexible design means it can be adjusted to accommodate just about any height, so if you’re sharing your bathroom with a shorter person you can both be comfortable while taking a shower. Alternatively, any detachable shower head (like this one) will improve your situation by allowing you to at least get under the water without doing impromptu yoga poses.
The standard height for kitchen countertops is 36 inches. This works for most people, but if you’re very tall, you probably have an aching back after a short time hunched over your counter to make dinner. If raising your cabinets or renovating your whole kitchen isn’t an option, a raised cutting board can at least make food prep more comfortable for you.
If you’re living in a home designed for a much shorter person, a kneeling chair (or two, or three) will make everything a lot easier. Instead of standing, hunched, over a low counter or having to sit down on the floor to deal with your fridge or dishwasher, a kneeling chair will get you to a comfortable height, er, comfortably. Use one in any situation where you would normally crouch or kneel for long periods of time and be happier for it.
It might be obvious, but if you’re a tall person a bigger mattress will absolutely change your life. A California King is 84 inches long, which should be big enough for most taller folks—but there are several even larger choices if you can fit them into your home and need even more legroom. The Texas King is 98 inches long, and the Alaskan King is a whopping 108 inches square, which should be big enough for even the tallest people.
Standard toilets are 14-15 inches high. If you’re a tall person, using one can be a very unfortunate experience. A few extra inches will make using the toilet a lot easier, and replacing a toilet isn’t a difficult job—it’s actually something most people can do DIY. And if DIY isn’t your bag, it’s not terribly expensive, averaging less than $400 (t counting the cost of the toilet itself).
Tall folks have big clothes, and big clothes have a tendency to fall off (or be deformed by) standard hangers—but if you’re reading this, you probably know that. Adjustable hangers that can expand to fit your shirts and other clothing items prevent both of these scenarios, keeping your wardrobe looking good—and off the floor.
Finally, a small renovation can pay huge dividends. If you’re constantly dodging light fixtures and ceiling fans that seem to have been placed directly in your airspace, recessing the lighting in your home and switching out standard, head-chopping ceiling fans for flush-mounted, low-profile versions will eliminate a real danger and make your house a lot easier to navigate—especially in the dark.
As anyone who has bought a house has figured out at some point, there are a bunch of hidden costs to homeownership, including unplanned repairs, taxes, and insurance. Whether those things come as a shock depends on how much research you do before you buy. As CNBC reports, 33% of new homeowners reported in a 2023 survey that their property taxes were more expensive than they expected.
While property taxes are unavoidable, an unpleasant surprise is not. Here's what you need to know to prepare for your tax bill—especially if you are purchasing a new build.
Whether you're buying a newly built or existing home, you should gather as much data as possible about your purchase and the true cost of ownership, from property taxes to insurance to HOA fees, rather than focusing solely on the sticker price.
Valerie Saunders, president of the National Association of Mortgage Brokers, recommends tapping the expertise of everyone, from your realtor to attorney to loan originator and mortgage broker, as they will be familiar with factors like the market you're entering and how property appraisal works in your county.
"There's so much information at our fingertips now, there's no reason not to do your research," she says.
Saunders notes that you can also find publicly available data about your property through the county tax assessor or property appraiser. Look up the website for your county and search for your lot (you may need the tax ID number from your sales contract) to see the current assessment. For new developments, this may consider land only, which means you can expect property taxes to be higher in the future once your home is included in the appraisal.
If you're moving into a neighborhood or new development with other homes that are at least a year old, check the county data for what your neighbors pay in taxes. This may not be an exact reflection of your future bill—especially if square footage, amenities, or lot size are drastically different—but it can give you a starting point for what to expect.
You'll also want to gather information about other expenses that can add to your monthly bill, such as HOA fees and recycling and wastewater management.
Saunders recommends having a plan for covering an unexpected tax increase, whether that's allocating your income tax refund or putting money into a savings account every month.
Typically, you'll put estimated property taxes into an escrow account when you purchase your home. But if your taxes are based on an assessment of land only when you close, the next assessment will almost certainly be higher, and you may end up with an escrow shortage. In this case, you'll have to pay back your lender to cover the difference.
If you don't have a lump sum already saved, consider calculating the worst-case scenario (how much you think your taxes will increase), dividing that dollar amount by 12, and setting that money aside every month to prepare for a higher payment. And don't drain your savings for non-essential home improvements or purchases if you anticipate a tax increase.
While every county handles tax assessment differently, most reassess every year. Knowing the dates and deadlines for this process can help you plan for potential increases and be strategic about lowering your tax bill.
For example, any permanent structures added to your property will increase the assessment, so call your county office to get an estimate for the value before you build (you may want to hold off on construction until after the next reassessment). You may also qualify for certain exemptions that can lower your tax burden.
If you want to create a garden retreat and have a convenient spot for hosting, or just a quiet spot to enjoy your morning coffee, a garden room is just the thing. With more insulation than most sheds, a garden room allows you to enjoy your outdoor space while having some cover from the rain—and some shade, too. Here’s what you need to know to build a garden room on a budget.
A garden room can be a retreat if you want some peace and quiet, a place for entertaining, or an alternative to your home office. You can really use it for anything you want, and you can customize it to your own purposes. Adding furniture and decor to suit the needs of your space will help to make your garden room functional, and having plenty of windows to bring the outdoors in will help to keep your outdoor space open. Since a garden room is insulated, it can be comfortable year-round, but unlike a tiny home, you don’t necessarily need to worry about plumbing or running power.
If you plan to add a garden room, you’ll need to measure your space first to make sure you can fit the size and type you want. Make sure to check zoning regulations before deciding on placement of your garden room to determine if you have enough clearance from your property line and that you’re in keeping with any other rules or ordinances—and choose a flat spot with good drainage.
There are a few options for constructing an outbuilding that are worth considering as a basis for a garden room: You’ll need to either build a deck structure or pour a concrete slab for your structure to sit on. Here are a few good options for how to build a structure on a budget.
A metal shed is one possible option for building a low cost garden room. The pros of going with a metal shed to structure your garden room are that it is an inexpensive option at between $299 and $400, and you can usually get the size you’re looking for. The downside of a metal shed is that you’ll need to cut through the metal to add windows and it doesn’t come insulated, so you’ll need to add that yourself.
Using a wooden shed kit as the basis for your garden room is a good way to build a decent quality structure while saving some money. You can get an all-wood, cedar shed kit for less than $500 plus the cost of delivery, and you’ll be able to customize it easily with some basic woodworking tools. A shed kit doesn’t come with insulation, so you’ll need to add your own, and it’s a little more expensive than a metal shed, but it’s easier to customize and can be purchased with windows already installed.
You can choose to build your own frame for your shed if you have a chop saw and some basic carpentry knowledge. Framing your own allows you to customize everything, but it requires more skill because you’ll be cutting and assembling all your own parts. A simple structure isn’t too difficult to build, and you can also choose to use a framing kit that costs around $60 to make assembly easier.
Since most sheds don’t come pre-insulated, you can use radiant barriers like the type used for garage doors, neoprene insulation, or reflective heat barrier insulation, all for around $15 dollars a roll. These insulation types can be installed on interior walls and then covered with your desired finishing material to make the inside of your shed more comfortable. Once the insulation is installed, you can use paneling or drywall to finish your interior.
Mason bees are pretty incredible: They’re docile, they are easy to raise, and they are amazing pollinators of spring flowering fruit and nut trees. These bees don’t use hives the way honey bees do, instead preferring to place their eggs in narrow holes, plugged up with mud (hence the name “mason”).
Their gentle nature and solitary habitat preferences make mason bees a great species to “keep” in your yard. That is, if you do it right. If you don’t do it right, you might be harming them more than you’re helping them.
Former evolutionary biology professor Colin Purrington took to X (then Twitter) a few years back to tell us all the ways our good intentions have gone awry, and it's worth a reminder if you want to set up a mason bee house in your yard or garden this spring.
Tweet may have been deleted
If you’re going to make your own mason bee house, Purrington offers his own tutorial here, along with a slew of additional reading you can take advantage of. If you’re leaning toward a store-bought variety, don’t simply grab the first cute structure labeled “mason bees” that you see. It’s important to educate yourself about the species first to understand how to most effectively help them—and not accidentally harm them instead.
The biggest problem Purrington points out with some store-bought mason bee houses is that the blocks and reeds are glued to the back of the house. That means you can’t add new nesting material each spring, greatly increasing the risk of parasites and fungus.
You’ll find some great info here on the year-round care of mason bees, including storing the nesting tubes and blocks and harvesting the cocoons.
Mason bee houses should be placed against a flat surface in an area protected from high winds, approximately six feet off the ground and south-facing, if possible. Do not hang mason houses by a string from a tree limb; allowing the eggs to be knocked around in every passing breeze isn’t helpful. They’ll also need to be close enough to pollen-producing plants (they won’t travel farther than 300 feet), as well as a good supply of claylike mud to cover up their nesting holes.
The roof of a good mason bee house will have a bit of an overhang to protect the holes from rain and lower the risk of the larvae and pupae rotting inside the nest.
If you’re now questioning the quality of your mason bee house, you can always ask Purrington directly for his opinion (hey, he offered).
Tweet may have been deleted
Your 3D printer can be used for all sorts of hobbies and projects around the house. While a 3D printer is great to create fun stuff, it can also be practical. Designing and printing your own components for home-improvement projects is a fantastic way to develop your skills and make your home customized for your needs and style.
Making a cable reel to store charging and other power cords to keep them from getting tangled is a simple and practical project to try with your 3D printer. Depending on the size of your 3D printer, you can scale your cable reel to fit a variety of cable types all the way up to big extension cords for use in your home workshop.
You can use your 3D printer to create custom outlet covers and light-switch plates. Printing your own allows you to match the style to the rest of your home or create something unique that’s perfect for you. To make a switch plate or outlet cover, you’ll need to take into account the screw placement as well as holes for the outlet and light switch.
If you want to hang a shelf on the wall, you can print brackets with your 3D printer. You’ll need to create a shape that has a right angle and has holes for using screws to attach it. Adding an angled support to make the bracket more sturdy is a good idea to make sure your shelf is structural.
You can 3D-print coat hooks, plant hooks, and hooks for hanging up Christmas lights and other holiday decorations. Make sure to use the appropriate filament if you plan to use the hooks outdoors so that they will stand up to the weather. You can also create custom designs to fit with your decor as well as making multiple hook brackets for use in a bathroom for towels, or a mud room for coats.
If you’re updating cabinets or furniture, you can print some drawer pulls with your 3D printer to customize your new look. Make sure to take note of sizing if you choose to use a pre-made file instead of one you customize yourself. You can use your imagination to create a drawer pull that will look the best with your decor and function well with your furniture.
Keeping leaves from clogging up your downspout can be a challenge. But luckily you can print your own downspout filter with your 3D printer to keep leaves and other debris from ending up inside your downspout. While you can likely find a file that’s designed for your type of gutter, you might need to modify one for an exact fit.
To level furniture on an uneven surface and protect your floor from scratching, 3D-print some adjustable feet. Note that you’ll need to also get hardware in the right size. Once the feet are placed on the ends of your furniture legs, they can be screwed in and out for leveling.
If you’re a gardener, or if you just have an expanding collection of climbing house plants, getting the right support for growing plants or training them into the shape you want is important. You can 3D-print your own plant clips. There are a few different designs available if you don’t want to make your own file, so you can get the size and shape you’re after.
Tags de l’article
Tags de l’article
Lateo.net - Flux RSS en pagaille (pour en ajouter : @ moi)