"What is the optimal temperature for a refrigerator?" The best place I can think to get the answer is Sears. I would consider Sears to be the ultimate source on refrigerators. Where do you go to buy a fridge? Sears.
To answer this question Sears Canada says, "To keep food at its freshest, the optimum temperature for the inside of a refrigerator is 38 to 40 degrees F."
At first I was gonna say 39 degrees is the best, because that's the average of 38 and 40. But a couple other sources recommend it a bit lower. That's why I'm sticking with 38 instead of 39 degrees.
"The refrigerator's fresh food compartment should be 34 - 40 degrees F with an optimum temperature of 37 degrees F." Mid-America Parts
Mid-America Parts sounds really official. 37 sounds good, but 38 will save some electricity. Besides, the temperature at the bottom of the fridge will typically be lower, so might as well measure it at the high point and go on the higher end of the range. And let the stuff on the bottom sit more towards the bottom of the range. Man, I sound like an expert!
"The optimum temperature is approximately between 35 and 38 degrees Fahrenheit" buzzle.com
I don't trust a website with the name buzzle.
"Ideal Temperature: Refrigerator, 32 to 40 degrees" Real Simple.
Uh, Real Simple. Did you give us a broad enough range there? Thanks.
"The optimal temperature is considered 35-38�F." thehome.com
Another one with a low estimate. Let's go with the 38.
"The preferred temperature is somewhere between 35 and 38 degrees F." Howstuffworks.com
"The optimum temperature for your refrigerator is 38-49 degrees Fahrenheit." Allthingsfrugal.com
Now i'm all for being frugal and saving electricity, but of course the FRUGAL website would say to jack your fridge up to 49. Hey guys, the fridge isn't a sauna!
This research started as a project on my 43 things to figure out exactly how cold my fridge is, and what I should set the number dial at.
Illinois voters, if you care about our teachers, I urge you to vote NO to the Illinois Constitution question that will appear on your ballot this November:
Public Questions
To the Voters of Cook County:
“Shall the Illinois Constitution be amended
to establish a recall process for the office
of Governor and other statewide elected
officials?”
Every ten years this question is put on our ballots to see if the public wants our constitution re-evaluated. Well, sounds nice and good, right? Re-evaluate our constitution.
Consider this. It's gonna cost us $100 million in taxpayer dollars. It's likely to be run by the same politicians that have created a virtual stalemate in Springfield. And worse yet...
This convention will consider TAKING AWAY THE PENSION from our teachers. Full disclosure: my dad is a retired college professor from an Illinois state school. He worked for 35 years. Instead of a 401k, the state offered to let him put HIS OWN MONEY into a pension fund. And now the state is going to consider taking away the pensions from our teachers.
Please understand that this money is not state money. It is money that my dad put into his own fund. And now the state wants to take this away. It's downright wrong.
I strongly urge you with my heart to vote NO to the Illinois Constitution question that will appear on your ballot.
What is the next facebook app that will grab attention?
Here's eight apps that have gotten me addicted for periods of time in the past year:
• (fluff) Friends: pick a cutesy pet, and feed other cutesy pets
• Friends for Sale: buy your friends
• Trading Post: a micro-economy of baseball cards
• Wrestler: Take turns putting wrestling moves on your friends
• Rock Paper Scissors: great simple app
• (Lil) Green Patch: send tons of plants to your friends
• Pieces of Flair: customize a cork board with buttons of your interest
• Bowling Buddies: bowling game online
Do you have any current Facebook apps that you enjoy spending time on?
I'm thinking of getting a stegosaurus. What does it eat? I heard they are vegetarians, that's good, cuz i wouldn't want to be buying meat for him all the time. I'm thinking of feeding him whatever is in season. So right now he would be getting buckets of apples.
Do you also sell heavy-duty fencing to keep the stegosaurus in my property? Or do you recommend that I just dig a moat? If so, how deep and wide should it be? I'm thinking 20 feet wide by 20 feet deep.
Thank you for selling stegosauruses on ebay, I haven't been able to find one anywhere!
I like calling the name of Cherry Pepsi to be "Cheery Pepsi." If you enjoy Cheery Pepsi or Cheery Coke, please let us know what you like about it in the comments.
The Polling Place Photo Project by the New York Times encourages Americans to photograph their polling place and submit their photos to their website. It sounds like a great project that would be fun to get Chicagoans in on. But are we technically allowed to take photos in polling places?
When I go into my polling place and start taking photos, I want some sort of official word about if I'm allowed to take photographs, so I emailed the Election Specialist for the Illinois State Board of Elections. Here's his response:
Are we talking about people who are registered voters in a particular polling place incidentally taking a picture while inside of the polling place but outside of any voting booth and not depicting any unwilling other people? I don’t believe that Illinois Election law explicitly prohibits such a thing, and if done with no disruption to the voting process I wouldn’t expect any problems to arise from it.
If the people are not voters (or law enforcement or other poll watching personnel with proper credentials legitimately in the polling place), then such photography would not be permissible because the person would not be able to legally be in the polling place.
Similarly, no photographs should be taken within any poll booth (vote fraud issues), depicting anyone in a poll booth (violation of the right to a secret ballot). Nor could it be done showing unwilling people (privacy concerns and issues relating to voter intimidation) or in a way that disrupts the voting process.
I am aware that many election authorities, with appropriate prior notice so as to inform the poll workers and make the requisite arrangements, will permit media to take pictures in some polling places so as to have the appropriate visuals to accompany their stories. These visits are scheduled for lighter periods during the voting day so as to avoid disruption of the voting process.
Ken Menzel
Election Specialist
Illinois State Board of Elections
James R. Thompson Center
100 W. Randolph Street, Suite 14-100
Chicago, Illinois 60601
After my thank you response to him and asking his persmission to forward his email, he replied with a summary:
You may forward this message on if you so desire.
As to taking a photo when you go to your own polling place, the best advice I can give is to let the poll workers know before you do (it is simple courtesy as well as something that avoids any appearance of impropriety) and to be careful and respectful as to the other voters who have their own privacy rights at stake.
Ken
I must say that Ken was very kind to take the time to type out that explanation. It makes me happy that we have government officials who do respond to the public.
Someone on reddit linked over to my Biden-Palin word cloud and gave me 4,400 visitors.
Interesting that out of the 5,406 views (an addition 1,000 came from places other than reddit), this image has gotten only one favorite. I wonder if this is typical of reddit traffic to flickr where people go to just to view something, and then they don't fav the image. Perhaps they aren't members of flickr (but who isn't, really? If you are techie enough to be on reddit, chances you are are on flickr too).
I looked up the past month's most popular posts on reddit with "flickr" in the post.
The general rule... for every 1,000 to 4,000 reddit visitors to your flickr image, you can expect one user to fav your image.
There were some other photos that had hundreds of favorites. I did not include those, because I'm assuming the photo caught on in popularity and got favorites before it was posted on reddit.
And there's another factor that reddit is just text links with a tiny thumbnail. People will click on the link because it has an interesting title. Much like the "Creepy little green bugs [pic]. But when you get to the image, it's kinda gross. Only one out of 1,302 views fav'ed it. Maybe my word cloud isn't that interesting to make people to want to fav it. Or maybe reddit users just don't fav items on flickr that much.
E) Mount Prospect: 675 feet
In 1871, real-estate agent Ezra Carpenter Eggleston built a four-block residential subdivision on farmland south of the railroad. Eggleston named the area Mount Prospect because the village sat on the highest point in Cook County. Eggleston went bankrupt, since the area failed to prosper until a railroad station was established. (source: Wikipedia)
Wembleyheads on 43things wants to prepare a dish for a politically-themed potluck. It needs to be named something like “Barack-oli casserole” or “Palin-guini” or “McCain-aroni and cheese.” There are awards for the best names!
Here are some ideas:
Barack Obama Dishes:
Barak O’Banana Splits
Baracklava (aka Baklava)
I just googled baracklava and got this:
Baracktoberfest. We will eat Barackwurst, Baraccoli & Cheese, Baracklava, and drink Baracktails. We will dance to Barack ‘n Roll, or play video games on my XBaracks 360.
But they didn’t mention Baracky Road ice cream or Barack of Lamb. That’s from my friend fred. and McCain Sugar.
I’ll be Barack!
John McCain Dishes:
Bring some water and call it a bottle of tears if McCain wins.
Get some McDonalds and call it McCainolds. Which has a hidden pun, cuz it says McCain OLD. Then again, McDonalds? lame-o.
I’d like to see you do something with “my friend” or “cronies” That cracks me up whenever McCain says those phrases. Can you make a crony cake? I don’t know what that would be. A crowbar inside a cake? In all reality, that’s kinda gross. Can you imagine baking a cake for people to eat, and then there’s a freakin crowbar in there?
Or you could do something their cities of origin.
—Barack Obama’s Springfield lettuce.
—Biden’s Scranton?... uh.
—Palin’s Wasilla… um.
—McCain’s hometown is Alexandria, Virginia? Alexandria? uh..
Well, i’m blanking on the last three.
A random snail mail letter was sent to me from a six-year-old thinking I work at the corporate headquarters of McDonalds. He has some incredible ideas for a McDonalds playground design with crazy tubes, slides, and mazes of various levels.
He must have found me by doing a search for McDonalds online, because I often post about McDonalds. And it's not unusual for people to think spudart.org is some sort of official site for stuff, like the official blog for the Cubs announcers, the official site for the tv shows American inventor and Deal or No Deal, and now the official customer service department of McDonalds fielding wonderful ideas about playground design.
How in the world do I respond to him? Please leave your ideas in the comments below.
Check out all of his crazy ideas in this video of me opening the letter and reading it:
While Joe Biden was smacking down Sarah Palin on the Vice-Presidential Debates, the Chicago Cubs were suffering their second playoff loss to the Dodgers. Since Biden was so dominating, he should have gone over and played for the Cubs! They could use the help.
It was a hard choice to decide to watch the VP debates or the Cubs playoff game. I chose the VP debates. Although I'm sure many Cubs fans skipped the debate to watch the game. I'm glad that of all the teams in the playoffs, that MLB chose the Cubs/Dodgers to be on the same time as the presidential debate. Both Illinois and California are clearly going to Obama. That leaves all the other borderline states open to watching the debate.
=====================
The International Olympic Committee has trademarked a line from the Canadian national anthem, "with glowing hearts," and is threatening to sue anyone who uses the line in Canada, as part of the Vancouver Games.
The committee is so serious about protecting the Olympic brand it managed to get a landmark piece of legislation passed in the House of Commons last year that made using certain phrases related to the Games a violation of law. The list includes the number 2010 and the word "winter."
=====================
Ok, so you can't say the phrase "Winter 2010." You can't say, "with glowing hearts." Oh how I would love to grab "Winter 2010 with glowing hearts dot com" as a domain. But I'm too chicken. Please. Someone do it. I want to see what the IOC does.
Whoever gets this domain should link to this post. In fact, I encourage people to write about this (and you could even copy this post word for word) and then the owner of winter2010withglowinghearts.com could link to all of our blog posts. (thanks to sparxmind for this idea).
Cities in Trouble vs. Growing Cities A map showing the cities in recession. And the cities where the economy is expanding. I find it hard to believe there are so many cities where the economy is expanding.
The World, Justified--Strange Maps A great idea: the world we live in as only one of four possibilities, the others being a left-aligned, centred and right-aligned world. Our world is a justified one, i.e. aligned with both left and right margins.
Artwork featuring Barack Obama The 31 finalists, chosen from over 1000 pieces of art submitted to the Manifest Hope Gallery Contest by MoveOn.org members and other grassroots artists.
...
...
...
