ljyang's Profile

uh, you've got some figures wrong.
US mains voltage: 120V 60Hz
EU mains voltage: 230V 50Hz
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mains_electricity

and many chargers (like laptop chargers and such) are rated to work on either standard, but read your labels and use stepup/stepdown transformers as needed.

when we went to Disney, we got key rings with the little tags that you could write on and we wrote our info there and attached them to their shoes, tucked into the laces so they didn't rattle around. We also use the "if you can't find us or we get separated, find a mommy with a stroller and show them the tag on your shoe". The mommy with a stroller route is our consistent crowd safety lesson. We heard it from another mom as they were getting off the subway in DC and thought it was the smartest thing. There's always a mom with a stroller around, police are sometimes harder to find.

If you want to clean off quickly, cover the grates with foil as you heat the grill up. It'll trap the heat by the grates and get them super hot. After it's been heating for a while, open it up, crumple the foil into a ball and use it to brush off the grates while holding it with tongs. I use left over foil from cooking (washed or rinsed clean) saved through the week for this purpose. I don't have a grill brush because those usually just trap in the grease and get nasty quickly. I just reuse the foil from my kitchen, then it just gets dropped in the recycling bin when I'm done. oil the grates with veggie oil with a towel (regular or paper) and you're ready to cook. This process seasons the iron as you use the grill, and helps food to not stick. Same principle as with a cast iron skillet.

I built one for our toilet with a kitchen sprayer and a few parts. total cost was ~$10 and <10 minutes. I have it hooked to our sink, so you can control the flow easier with the faucet handles instead of trying to control the trigger. We use it to rinse out the little potty for potty training.

If you're not whole chicken eaters, just ask the butcher for 'backs and necks' and make stock with those. you can usually get them cheap (~<$1/lbs). I toss them under the broiler to brown for a few minutes while I chop some onion, carrot and celery. toss into a slow cooker and cover with water. 6-12 hours later, you've got some tasty goodness, all for less than ~$5 usually. then make soup, or freeze in muffin tins for use later. I usually just save bones in a bag in the freezer when we make chicken and make a large batch every 2-3 months and make one pot of soup and freeze the remainder. My slow cooker holds 6qts, so I max that out each time to save time/effort.

If you do want to spray some paint to do it your self, you could easily build a contained spray booth from scrap wood or pvc tubing and plastic sheeting. I used a pvc and sheeting spray booth to paint some furniture a while ago, but you could just as easily bang together some 2x4 for the frame. I made a cube from the pvc to fit my piece, then wrapped five sides in sheeting, put in my piece, then covered the sixth side. I simply cut small slits in one side for me to reach my arms in to paint and move the piece. after I sprayed the piece, I left it to dry, and let all the spray in the pvc/sheeting box settle overnight. It was handy and 3/4 inch pvc tubing is pretty cheap and the sheeting is too. And if you have plastic sheeting and duct tape left over from a few years ago when that was the preferred shelter in place method, you're all set. :) It kept the mess down and the overspray contained. I did it in my basement and garage and it was ok, would have been better to do it outside, but it was winter and temps kept me inside. there was still some smell, so try to do it someplace you can easily air out. The next time I have to do it I'm going to pick up a cheap air filter from goodwill and put it inside the booth and leave it on while I spray to help keep the smell down, or just wait for nice weather and put the booth outside somewhere while I paint.

You could also try getting a plastic owl or some other such deterrent. My neighbors setup a vegetable garden in the front yard and put up an owl to scare away the birds and squirrels.