I now have a pink banner at the top of the page which reads "IMPORTANT CHANGE, MUST READ!" When I click on it, I am redirected to a post by SWB which talks about the addition of ads to the forum. The thing is, this post is nearly FOUR YEARS OLD!! So I'm wondering if it REALLY took four years to implement the change OR if the pink banner is somehow in error. SWB? Perhaps you could edit the post with a note saying that this is, indeed, current, or some such?

You mean...STRAY? :confused1: NEVER!!

Brag alert! - My children are briliant/talented/wonderful/amazing. If you did things exactly like I do them, your children would be briliant/talented/wonderful/amazing, too! ;)

Sorry, onlittlemonkey, I got that one right! You see, if they eat it and then start to feel bad, that will trigger a "Dr. Hive question", in which case, Garga's advice will automatically kick in. I think it will be a very good thing to formalize these "WTM Rules for Life". When it comes time to turn the forums back on, SWB may find that none of us need the forum any longer! :lol:

Garga had the excellent idea of dispensing critical advice during The Great Blackout of 2018: I thought it would be good to formalize this idea to make sure all bases are covered! :D Everyone should print out this thread just before the blackout so that we will all know what to do during this terrible event! Here are a couple of free pieces of advice from Reg: - Yes, I would DEFINITELY eat that! - My kids do the same awful thing your child just did. - You should have steak and potatoes for dinner tonight. - And definitely DO NOT USE AN APOSTROPHE TO PLURALIZE!! Kittens WILL die!! Does anyone else want to give out some essential "blackout advice"?

That's in Silver Spring, MD. I'm a LONG way from there, and much farther from the city. DC is always a bit warmer than here due to being a bit south, on the other side of the Blue Ridge Mountains and urban heat island effect. If you are in Silver Spring and flying out of Dulles tomorrow morning, then your biggest challenge will be getting around the beltway. If you are flying out of BWI, it should be a bit easier...

It is supposed to be 27F here tonight, so I suspect there will be some frozen spots. Note that we are about 60 miles NW of DC, though.

I fear some here may not survive... :svengo: SAVE THE WTMers!!

We received the Revitive unit on Friday. My initial review: The unit itself: - The main unit appears to be very well engineered and manufactured, but the remote control appears to be a little less "refined". Still, everything works fine. - The Li-ion battery was fully discharged upon receipt. I plugged it in and it was fully charged within about three hours or so. - The battery holds enough charge to operate for a couple of hours, at least. How does it work/feel? - To be quite frank, it feels like getting shocked. Kinda like when you put your finger in a light socket. I must say that's a bit disconcerting at first. - When you first turn the unit on, the level is zero, so you do not feel it until you turn up the level, which you do from the remote control. - Since you control the level, you can raise it to a level that is comfortable to you. - The unit defaults to a 30-minute session, but that can be changed to a longer or shorter time. - The "routine" which is done changes as time goes on. It is quite varied in what it does. Discussion: - I think using this device is comparable to any workout routine. As such, it is important to limit the strength and duration in order to prevent getting hurt. Unfortunately, it is quite a bit different from a normal workout, so I don't have a good feel for how high is too high. It will take a bit of getting used to. - The unit can be turned up A LOT higher than is comfortable. I've never had it all the way up. - I feel the activity a little more strongly on my right leg than my left. I'm not sure why that is. - I had hoped that there would also be some sensations in my thighs, but there is none. All of the sensation is in the thighs (and a little bit in the feet). The unit comes with remote electrodes that can be placed elsewhere on the body, but I doubt I would do that often enough to make it worthwhile. Bottom line: - At this point, the jury is still out. I will update the thread if I make a final decision one way or the other. Please feel free to ask any questions if you have them. But even if I don't end up using it on my legs, I'm thinking I might be able to find a practical use for this device, yet: :lol: :lol:

Revitive This post is not an endorsement or a review, since I have not yet received the product yet. FWIW, I did not purchase the full-price unit, but rather purchased one of the returned units for much less money. It still comes with a one-year warranty and a 30-day return period. MomsintheGarden and I both have suffered from chronic tight calf and thigh muscles. We each have had plantar fasciitis in both of our feet and recently she has been suffering from nighttime cramps in her calves. We have these issues even though when we manage to walk several miles each day during most of the year (although that hasn't happened much lately). The following review on Youtube is what helped me finalize my decision to purchase the unit since the reviewer's symptoms seemed to closely match MomsintheGarden's: MomsintheGarden's first response was, "You spent $170 dollars on that?!" Later, she asked, "So, now you want to electrocute me?!" It's a process... Does anyone have experience with these things? Also, has anyone else paid for one of these using an FSA? That's what I did...

Yes! Absolutely! I've stopped using the warm air drying, however. Even on the coolest "warm" setting, I find that it is pretty warm once my skin gets dry. Perhaps I will use that feature with no heat once it gets warm around here.

BTW, since we are talking about how to save money, I should add that the way we kept our children's car insurance low was by giving them a cheap car and putting them on their own plan. As a result their insurance rates were not tied to any of the expensive cars which were on our plan. (The agent didn't believe this would be cheaper, but later phoned back and told me that it was.)

DS27 was 22 at the time she got her license and was paying $540/year. He was a bit jealous!

Interesting. DD25 got her license when she was 19 and the rate was $435/year.

I still have one of those. I turned it on a couple of months ago and it still works! It probably came from Amazon.

On December 17, 1999, MomsintheGarden purchased two Christmas presents for two nieces who lived in a different state: The World of Beads Basic Beadwork for Beginners Eighteen years later both books are still available on Amazon!

We do not get licenses for teenagers. They keep their learner's permits until they are 19 or 20. That avoids paying for insurance during the most expensive years. Unfortunately most teenager jobs do not pay enough to cover all the expenses for a car (including purchase price, insurance, fuel, maintenance, and repairs).

Narita Airport near Tokyo is amazingly clean.

I bought a Brondell Swash 1000 from Costco for MomsintheGarden (and me) for Christmas and installed it this afternoon. She had never used one before today, but has now survived her first encounter! I have traveled to Japan quite a few times and have used them there on many occasions. They are everywhere: in the airport, in hotel rooms, in private residences, etc. At first they were a bit scary, since I am not able to read Japanese kanji characters and I was never quite sure what the pictures meant. In the end I rather liked them so when Costco offered an amazing deal before Christmas, I couldn't turn my back on it! ;) For anyone who wants a detailed answer to *some* of your questions, here is the Owner's Manual for the Brondell Swash 1000 that we have. We are just starting our home bidet journey, but here are some initial thoughts: - I have always wondered about the question that OP asked. I still do... - One feature of the bidet seat we bought is for sterilizing the nozzles: That sounds very high-tech, but to my mind the statement creates more questions than answers. How often should this be done? How many nano-particles are included with the seat? How long before we run out of said nano particles? Where can I get more nano particles?- The air that blows to dry you off is a bit too cold for the first second or two and then is fine until your bum starts to get dry, then it starts to feel warm. I'm glad it is adjustable. Is there such a thing as "chapped butt"? - I have not used the "front" nozzle, so I cannot comment on that feature. ;). Perhaps MomsintheGarden will comment on it, but I doubt it! - It seems the default wash time is 2 minutes as is the default dry time. - The heated seat is rather warm, even on low. I suspect MomsintheGarden will appreciate this feature even if she doesn't end up liking the rest. - We installed the bidet seat on an elongated toilet bowl. I cannot imagine having one of these on a round toilet, as there would not be much room left. - This thing has a remote control for all of the features. I found myself pressing lots of the buttons. I'm thinking this thing will need frequent washing and I should purchase a spare so that we don't find ourselves without it due to failure, or worse, submersion! While I was installing the bidet seat on the toilet in our master bedroom, DS15, who is a major germiphobe, told me that he used to like that toilet the best, but that he would NEVER use that thing. I told him "GREAT!" And I hope all the other children follow suit! Unfortunately, I suspect the reality will be drastically different. Our toilet might become even more popular than it already is because of this thing. We'll see.

Your son is correct: This year homeschoolers did NOT put in a homeschool code and instead wrote (or checked?) "Homeschool" on the form.

I called the College Board and asked about having DS18's bubbling reviewed for four questions in the Writing section. I was told that they offered this service for the SAT, but not for the PSAT. I spoke with first-level support and their manager and got the same response from both of them. I explained that the score likely did not reflect the student's skills in the Writing section and asked if they could review the workbook BEFORE I have any access to it. The manager agreed to escalate the issue to a higher level and that they would look into it an give me a call. It doesn't sound promising, but I will keep pursuing this for a while.

DS18 and I had a nice outing yesterday and got quite a bit of Christmas shopping done. :001_smile: I finally got a chance to sit down and look at DS18s Writing answers and I am now fully convinced that the four questions he missed in a row were entirely a result of a bubbling error. His technique is to complete a pair of pages and then bubble all of the questions completed. Somehow it appears that he transposed the first two with the latter two questions of the four. In other words, I am now convinced that he actually got only two questions wrong on Writing, not six. With that mistake corrected, he would have achieved a score of 1460 (versus 1430) and a selection index of 217 (versus 211). I will call the College Board tomorrow tomorrow and ask them if they can take into consideration his paper test given we have not yet had access to it it. It cannot hurt. In any case, we will know the truth once we see the paper test. Clearly this is one drawback to these one-and-done standardized tests.

There are several schools throughout the country which reward National Merit Finalists with very high scholarships. I believe University of Arizona and University of Alabama are two such schools. Alabama is where DS15 might end up. DS18 is almost certainly going to Liberty University. They offer a full tuition scholarship to NM Commended students (worth about $64,000) and full tuition plus room and board to NM Finalists (worth about $128,000). DS18 still qualifies for an SAT-based scholarship worth about $6500/year, but we will need to look for other sources, as well. (And, BTW, it is still possible that the cutoff for commended will remain at 211, but we cannot count on that happening.)

Just to follow up on this topic. Almost certainly you will need the 6-digit code for homeschoolers in your state. Those codes begin with "99" and end with "99" and contain a two-digit state code in the middle. This document contains the codes for all states. That is the code which is included at the top of the PSAT score report which is mailed to students. I hope this helps!

Thanks! I just did that. The lady there told me that the deadline for the class of 2018 was October 15, 2017, and that the selections for this class are now finalized. They will not add any further students. She gave me instructions how to move the twins up, if desired. (Please post here if anyone would like to see those instructions.) We have several other avenues to pursue for DS18. For now I think I want to get him out of his room and out of this house. Perhaps some Christmas shopping is in store!