Friends in Boxes

One evening, shortly after I purchased my recently flipped home, I loaded the dishwasher only to find out that it was not attached to our sparkling granite countertop.  I found this out when the dishwasher fell forward from the weight of the dishes in the pulled out upper rack. Nice.... This was one of many 'surprises' of my home purchase.  After that happened I set out to get the problem fixed.  I figured there must be a way to mount the dishwasher bracket to the granite.  The brackets are normally screwed into the underside of a counter.  Good granite installers will put a layer of plywood underneath the counter so that you can mount the brackets to the wood.  Mine, of course, didn't have any plywood, or any pre-drilled holes. I inquired as to how much it would cost to do this from a granite installer, and the price was in the $100's.  Wow... Then I found Granite Grabbers .   The idea was simple enough.  An epoxy glue strip attached to a metal plate with the screw

Picked up some of these Popchips at Target tonight. They're potato chips...but not baked or fried. They are pressure cooked. And I can verify the barbecue ones are pretty freaking good. Price wise...I think they were pretty expensive since it was only a 3 oz bag..but you're not paying for any of the oil that's soaked into the chips. 1 oz Popchips has 12o calories, 0 cholesterol, 4 grams of fat, 0 grams of saturated fat vs 1 oz Lay's regular chips: 130 calories, 10 grams of fat, 3 grams of saturated fat Check it out at Popchips

Psst. Want to know a secret? You're not brushing your teeth very well. That is, if you're using an 'old fashioned' toothbrush. In case you didn't know it, the debate between manual vs. electric toothbrushes is over . And it's long over. You can go over here and read all the studies you want to convince yourself that it's time to give up the manual and go electric. And it doesn't have to cost a fortune. There are several good electric toothbrushes that are under $20. I personally believe (and there are studies to back me up) that oscillating toothbrushes like the Braun Oral-B are the best electric toothbrushes out there. The Braun Vitality Precision Clean is about $18. I've been testing one out for about a year now and it's fine. I also have a more expensive Oral-B, (About $70 originally) but the only real difference you'll notice is battery life. If you travel, you might want to get the more expensive one (it has a NiMH batt

I have to admit, the first time I heard of a bagless vacuum cleaner I was very interested. Anyone who has ever gone to a Wal-Mart at 11pm in search of an elusive vacuum cleaner bag gets a warm feeling when thinking of the self-sufficiency of a bagless vacuum cleaner. Before buying my first bagless vacuum, I remember seeing TV adds for the super lightweight Orick with David Oreck making a huge mess while trying to clean out a competitor's bagless vacuum. "Look at the mess!" he would say. I remember thinking, "this poor old fool...trying to cling to the past with his 'bag' vacuum cleaner. . His days are SO numbered" Then one day, after purchasing my 2nd bagless, I caught onto the scam. It turns out, David Orick was right. What they don't tell you about bagless vacuum cleaners is that while it's true there are no bags, there are plenty of (more expensive) filters to wash, and you can only do that for so long. And it really is filthy. Tak

Well, it's been just over a year and a half that I've owned the 2006 Toyota Rav 4. In that time, I've learned that that Toyota is not immune from quality control problems. In the last year, my Rav 4 has spent 5 days in the shop. Here's a list of the repairs I have had to make: Windshield leak (Covered by a technical service bulletin) - The passenger floor board started to fill up with water every time it rained. - Fixed Engine control module re-flash (Covered by a technical service bulletin) - The Rav4, particularly when cold, would drive as if you started out in 2nd gear. Kind of like you were pulling a trailer of bricks. - Fixed Excessive sulfur smell (Covered by a technical service bulletin) - When the engine was cold, the exhaust would smell like rotten eggs. Whenever I came to a stop, the interior would smell the same way. The repair replaced the catalytic converter. Unresolved - This is still and issue even after the fix. My car still smells like

Just in time for tea! This is probably one of the best food products I've tried in a long time: True-Lemon . Finally a lemon substitute that actually tastes like lemon. Lemon is great in so many things, but it's hard to keep around your house so that you always have it. I used to drink lemon in hot tea, but after a while it didn't make sense to buy a whole lemon when all I wanted was a slice. Old lemon substitutes like Realemon always tasted too bitter...never quite like the real thing. True-Lemon really does taste exactly like real lemon in tea and water. And now they have available True-Lime and True-Orange. Both are pretty good, but True-Orange is not quite as good as the other two. It tastes like orange, but has the slight taste of Tang . Still, for the lemon and lime, I'd be very nervous if I worked for Realemon. According to their website, True-Lemon is available in 12,000 stores and True-Lime is available in 8,000 stores (you can look for a stor