Flights

I've been trying for months to book a flight, I keep watching fares. I see the following trend with regard to prices. Prices seem to start out in a structured manner, where the first person gets one fare and it goes up for each x people who buy. Then after the first few waves are filled and the flights is only months away, the price starts to rise steadily. It peaks somewhere before, less than 30 days out but more than 14, depending on the airline. Then it starts to fall again because the airline is worried about not filling the flight. As the flight approaches, the price rises again to take advantage of people who book at the last minute (they tend to be the least flexible). Finally, on the day of the flight, one of two things can happen: for popular flight times, the price rises dramatically to take advantage of last minute business travelers who have no choice in flight times; whereas for less popular flight times the price can drop dramatically due to a worry that the flight wont fill up. Spirit complicates this for their customers because they have a $9 fare club which allows you to get deals that are typically on flights in the next 7-30 days and more often on weekday flights than weekend. If you are watching for flgihts, check out AirFareWatchDog. They inform you of sales, even for Spirit's $9 fare club which you can then join to get the fare and cancel after your flight.

Publish Your Own Book!

If you've ever wanted to publish your own book, Lulu.com is the place to be! They let you upload your book and set the price (above their standard rates). Then they print the book on demand when someone buys it and you get the profit! Aspiring writers can use this to get published, or you can write a book just for yourself and purchase the one and only copy before removing it from their site... Publish anything short of photo quality including company books, family trees, your will, your life story, your school essays (I plan on doing that one some day), and a whole lot more!!

Cookbooks and Such...

There is a great site called Blurb that lets you print your own photo books. I'm not talking 50 cents a page either. I'm talking about 11"x17" pages and 400 of them for $100! I am planning on one day printing several things: I want to print a cookbook (I did this once, but on my ink jet printer and with no pictures, plus it is now stuffed with recepies that I have collected so it needs an update). I want to print my blogs (probably just whenever they reach 400 pages, and I'll include the pictures that I have on my personal blog). And I want to print a photo book for each year once my kids are grown up (that's a long time off) with all my best photos and I'll give them each a copy of the "library." Think of the possibilities!

Aerogarden Part 2

Just a note to let you know that I am trying tomato plants in my aerogarden. I'm not pleased with the fact that it has been a month now and the plants are only 6-8" tall and show no flowers or fruit yet. I'll let you know when I have more to report.

Insulation

Ever thought about doing a better job of insulating the outside of your house? There are a lot of options available. The most expensive is to rip down your drywall and put up new with better insulation inside. The next step down is to laminate more drywall over your existing drywall. Going down still further in price is having holes drilled in your block (from the outside) and foam insulation injected (then the holes get patched). But I just found out about loose fill insulation and other similar products which can be blown in to existing walls by cutting small openings in the walls at every stud (usually every 16 or 24 inches). You cut the holes, blow the insulation in using special equipment, and patch the wall back to look good as new. This can be hard when walls are wallpapered because you can't really patch wallpaper. You don't get as much r-value as installing board insulation in new walls, but you save a fortune. Estimates I found online showed an average of 50 cents per square foot for the complete process including patching your wall back to normal, but those could have been old or inacurate estimates, so I recommend you contact several companies in your area and compare their quotes.

Mold Resistant Drywall

Well, you probably have guessed (if I haven't said) that I'm in the drywall business. Today's post is a summary of why you shouldn't use regular drywall when rennovating your house. In fact, if you are buying a new house you should ask if you can upgrade your drywall for a small fee. XP board (or Gold Bond Mold Tough or another equivelent) is a far superior drywall when it comes to mold. Let's face it, people in the desert have to worry about mold these days. Mold is a health hazzard that comes from everywhere and no one should have to deal with it. Having mold in your house can cause all sorts of health problems, and you are far more likely to have these problems with regular drywall.

Now behind tile you need cement board, because that provides a far better mold barrier. But your regular drywall needs a mold and mildew resistant paper AND CORE. Old fashioned green board doesn't cut it anymore, and it doesn't meet commercial building code in my area. I have mold in my bathroom that I need to get rid of, but I'm putting it off until I can redo the bathroom and I'll rip the walls down and build them right. Everyone may have mold in their walls that they can't see! And the worst part is that what you can't see CAN hurt you...

Fix Scratches Yourself

If you have scratches on your car, this site is for you. For small scratches, they sell paint pens that fill in the scratch with your original paint. For large scratches or entire panels, they sell spray paint cans and give complete instructions.

If you are looking for a perfect finish, you should let a professional paint your car, because you wont be as good as a professional and you are likely to end up with slight bubbles or irregularities in the paint. But if you just want to do some light touch up, or if you don't care how the paint looks as long as it is painted, this site is for you!

Incidentally, if you do get your car painted, I recommend using a dealership. They will be more expensive, but the job will usually be done better. I have had body shops that looked like they did a great job but a year later the paint bubbled and cracked!

Fix Your Yellowed Headlights

This post assumes that you have a car with headlights that have yellowed from age. Many people think that headlights yellow because they get wet from inside and the yellow is a discoloration caused by the water that dries on the lenses. While water getting into your headlights can cause its own problems (reducing light output by diffusing the light, for example), these problems are not the yellowing that you may see. This yellowing is a reaction to UV rays that the plastic lense covering the lights has. When certain types of clear plastic are exposed to UV rays for extensive periods of time, they can yellow. This is why garage parked cars will show less yellowing and also cars of people who live up north will show less than those who live in the south.

Fixing this is easy! All you have to do is buy a kit to repair it. These kits are sold in several places on the internet, and range in both quality and price. Remember that more expensive doesn't mean better. The kit will usually have a buffing pad that fits on an electric drill, some compound that strips the top layer of the plastic off, and a protective coat to reduce future damage by making your lenses UV proof. A more expensive option, for people who want their cars to look perfect, is to buy new headlights. I bought a new one after an accident (save money, do your own auto repairs) and it worked perfectly! Depending on your car, the lights may cost anywhere from $40 to $400 or more per side. Mine are $125 per side, so I bought the kit for $25 and cleaned them up.

There is an important safety concern as your headlights yellow. This yellowing reduces light output and causes reduced visibility. You should definately consdier repairing your lenses if they are yellowing.