A nerdy father of two, a husband of a beautiful and understanding wife, an engineer who loves anime and tinkering with PCs and games, but most of all, loves God.
This year, most of our money challenges have focused on saving, from your cellphone bill to your restaurant spending to your debt interest. This month, we’re throwing out a different challenge: come up with a holiday spending plan.
In October, we challenge you to come up with a holiday spending plan so you can avoid any and all debt. It’s not a challenge that produces instant results, but it’s still an important one. Here’s how you can participate.
Calculate your discretionary spending amount: Figure out how much money you’ll have over the next couple of months to spend on non-essentials.
Make a list of your holiday expenses: This calculator can help you plug in numbers for common expenses, like travel, gifts, parties, and so on.
Come up with some numbers: Based on your discretionary spending amount, come up with a realistic spending plan for each holiday-related expense.
Find ways to cut back or earn more: If you’re stretched thin and your expenses exceed your cash flow, decide what expenses you’ll cut over the next couple of months to make room for your extra spending. Or, if your holiday budget just isn’t doable, you may have to adjust some of your expenses. Otherwise, you can vow to find ways to earn extra cash between now and the holidays.
If you’re in, let us know and tell us what your biggest holiday expenses are. At the end of the month, we’ll check back in to make sure everyone’s on track with their plan.
There are helicopter drones and fixed-wing drones, but creating a hybrid of both is tricky. Even Parrot’s Swing, as clever as it is, needs four propellers and elaborate wings to pull off its stunt. However, TU Delft (with backing from Parrot) has a far more elegant solution. Its DelftAcopter drone doubles as both a fixed-wing aircraft and a helicopter using only one propeller — its tailless biplane design lets it take off and hover vertically, but gracefully turn into a fast-moving airplane (up to 62MPH) at a moment’s notice. It’s an incredibly simple design that makes you wonder why someone hadn’t considered it for drones before.
The machine is completely autonomous thanks to GPS, motion sensors and computer vision — it can pick a safe place to land all on its own. The prototype has a relatively long 37-mile range, too, and it can run for an hour on its electric motor. Contrast that with a typical quadcopter drone like DJI’s Phantom 4, which lasts for 28 minutes and tops out at 45MPH.
And unlike some drone experiments, TU Delft already has a clear idea of what its vehicle will do. The DelftAcopter would carry medical supplies to and from hard-to-reach places — you could deliver much-needed medicine to a flood zone. It’s not hard to imagine uses in search-and-rescue and recon missions, too. While it’ll likely take a while before you see the robotic biplane enter service (it only just got its first major trial run this week), it’s easy to see this invention saving lives.
Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson talks to a crowd of supporters at an August rally in Salt Lake City, Utah.
George Frey/Getty Images
hide caption
toggle caption
George Frey/Getty Images
Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson talks to a crowd of supporters at an August rally in Salt Lake City, Utah.
George Frey/Getty Images
Both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump released their medical records earlier this month, and now it’s Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson’s turn to boast that he is “extremely physically fit.”
The letter from the former New Mexico governor’s physician, Dr. Lyle B. Amer of Santa Fe, explains that the 63-year-old Johnson’s “decades of dedication to physical fitness, diet, no drinking, and no smoking have paid dividends as far as his current extraordinarily good health at this time of his life.” (We’ll come back to that smoking line).
And while Trump’s doctor once boasted that the GOP nominee would “be the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency,” it might be Johnson who could claim that mantle if his long-shot bid were to succeed.
Johnson has run 17 marathons, four Ironman Triathlons, is an active rock climber, and climbed the seven highest summits on every continent, including Mt. Everest (just after breaking a leg!). His doctor writes that Johnson, who weighs 172 pounds and has a normal blood pressure and pulse, exercises about an hour a day. Before campaigning for president though, he would exercise approximately two hours a day.
Trump, in contrast, weighs 236 pounds and admitted when he discussed his medical records on The Dr. Oz Show that he doesn’t exercise much (though he said he believed “moving his hands around” as he was campaigning counted) and has an affinity for fast food.
Johnson has Celiac Disease, an autoimmune disorder where he can’t ingest gluten, so he adheres to a gluten-free diet. He doesn’t take any medications (Trump takes cholesterol medication while Clinton takes medicines for her thyroid and to prevent blood clots). Johnson’s doctor does recommend he begin taking a Vitamin D supplement along with aspirin to prevent heart disease.
Amer also writes that Johnson’s “prostate is smooth, nontender, normal for his age,” he has no arthritis, his liver is normal and that his “left big toe has scarring from a frostbite incident years ago.”
While Johnson’s doctor says he doesn’t smoke cigarettes and hasn’t drunk alcohol since 1987, the pro-marijuana legalization candidate is famous for partaking in the drug, he said earlier this summer he has abstained from smoking while he’s running for the White House. The letter from his physician doesn’t address that drug use, and a call to his doctor’s office wasn’t answered.
Johnson’s path to the White House is an uphill one, even with voters frustrated with their choices of Trump or Clinton. But he’s made several foreign policy flubs recently that may have made that climb even more difficult, blanking this week on a foreign leader he admires. Earlier this month, he also wasn’t aware what Aleppo was — the Syrian city at the center of the country’s civil war.
from NPR Topics: News http://ift.tt/2dxWPQv
via IFTTT
Samsung is facing another big problem with one of its products — reports of exploding top-loading washing machines.
The timing likely couldn’t be less serendipitous. Earlier this month, Samsung recalled its new Galaxy Note 7 smartphone after dozens of users reported that the batteries exploded or caught fire.
Both the consumer electronics company and the Consumer Product Safety Commission issued warnings to consumers this week about potential safety issues with some washers. This comes after a class-action lawsuit in New Jersey by U.S. consumers who say their machines exploded during normal use.
Samsung says the issue affects top-loaders manufactured between March 2011 and April 2016 “may experience abnormal vibrations” when washing certain items. It’s not clear exactly how many washers are affected or whether the problem is limited to machines sold in the U.S.
Both Samsung and the CPSC say they are working together on a remedy for affected consumers, but did not provide details.
They recommend that consumers with top-loading machines use the delicate cycle and avoid washing very heavy items, such as comforters or blankets. “Lower spin speed in the delicate cycle, lessens the risk of impact injuries or property damage due to the washing machine becoming dislodged.”
In an email to NPR, Consumers Union, which is the policy and action division of Consumer Reports magazine, says it has suspended its recommendation of Samsung’s top-loading washers, “in the face of mounting consumer complaints of what they called ‘exploding machines.”
It adds, “We are not aware of data on any other Samsung products that would cause us to re-evaluate our current recommendations.”
from NPR Topics: News http://ift.tt/2dBPP4F
via IFTTT
Hello, everyone, and welcome to a very autumnal edition of Will it Sous Vide?, the weekly column where I make whatever you want me to with my immersion circulator. This week, you all got very seasonal and elected pumpkin pie.
Or, shall I say “kind of pumpkin pieâ€?—because tag007’s wife said so. (To be fair, tag007’s wife seems like a smart lady.)
That would have been a delightful all on its own, but then botticellilove had to go and take it up a notch with this boozy suggestion:
Seeing that this tasked combined two of my favorite things (alcohol and pie) I was even more excited than usual to get to sous vide-ing. First things first, I had to infuse some booze. If found a pretty decent looking recipe for spiced rum on Anova’s site, and used that as a template, swapping out rum for rye, because I thought a spicy, slightly aggressive rye would hold its own against a sweet pie a little better than rum. (But feel free to use rum or any other ethanol of your choosing.)
I feel like this little guy should have a name.
For those playing along at home, you will need:
375 mL or rye (I used Bulleit)
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
2 whole cloves
1/2 a cinnamon stick
2 whole black peppercorns
1/2 piece star anise (I effed up and used a whole one; don’t be like me)
2 3-inch strips fresh orange zest (zest only – no white pith)
2 1-inch slices of fresh ginger (not in the original recipe, but I thought it should be in there.)
I poured all of this into a quart-sized freezer bag, got as much air out as I could, and let that thing infuse for two hours at 70 degrees Celsius for two hours.
Once the two hours was up, I removed the bag from the bath and let it cool to room temperature in a bowl, then strained it into a pretty little glass bottle.
“Thanksgiving in a shot glass†is the best way to describe this stuff. It was sweet and spicy, with just a hint or citrus and ginger keeping everything from veering into the land of the cloying. I was pretty happy with my decision to use rye over rum, as a dark, molasses-y rum would have been a little much with all of the vanilla and whatnot. (I would however stick to the recommended 1/2 piece of anise, as it was just a touch too pronounced.)
The beauty of infusions like this is that, once they’re infused, you don’t need to do much to them. You could sip this chilled, maybe with a big rock, and be perfectly content, but it wouldn’t be bad in a toddy either. But we’re not here to make cocktails, are we? We’re here to make pie.
I’ve been making pumpkin pie for a good number of years now (it was actually the first pie I ever baked) and I rarely stray from the Libby’s recipe that’s printed right on the can. Like cheesecake before it, I wanted to try making a “traditional looking,†circular pie that could potentially be cut into wedges, as well as little single-serving pie jars. We’ll talk about the traditional pie first.
Rather than try and sous vide the entire thing in a pie plate (as I attempted in The Great Cheesecake Water Flood of 2016) I poured the Libby’s batter into a bag and submerged it in the water bath for an hour and a half at 80 degrees Celsius.
I then removed the bag of spicy orange batter from the bath and set it on the counter until it was cool enough to touch. Then I piped it into a pre-baked graham cracker crust. (You can use whatever kind of pre-baked crust you like, I just happened to have a bunch of graham crackers lying around.) I smoothed the top with a silicone spatula, and popped that baby in the fridge overnight.
The pie didn’t have that smooth, slightly shiny top that you see on a baked pumpkin pie, and I was a little worried about it holding its form during its journey from pie plate to serving plate.
It didn’t cut very cleanly and, as you can see from the above photo, it couldn’t quite keep it together. It also lacked that smooth, custardy, slightly fluffy quality that makes a pumpkin pie so delightful. The flavors were all there, and the filling tasted like it should, but it was a little lumpy for my taste, so I turned my attention to the jars.
This is where things really got fun, because this is where I started mixing in booze. I prepared three jars with pre-baked graham cracker crusts and spooned pumpkin pie batter into each one. I left one jar plain and dosed the other two with the spiced rye, adding a teaspoon to one and a tablespoon to the other. These were then sealed and submerged for an hour and a half at 80 degrees Celsius, after which they were removed from the bath and allowed to come to room temperature with their lids off. (Removing the lids while they cool helps prevent condensation from collecting and pooling unattractively on the surface or your pies.) These were then place in the fridge overnight, letting me wake to a breakfast of pumpkin pies, both boozy and plain. Let’s examine each one up close.
Plain Jar of Pumpkin Pie
Based on the cheesecake experiment, I had a feeling that the jars were the way to go, and I was correct. This was one of the best pumpkin pies I’ve ever had, with a super creamy, custardy filling that scooped cleanly from the jar, and a smooth, slightly shiny top. The crust also held up well without getting soggy.
Pumpkin Pie with One Teaspoon of Rye
As you can see from the above photo, adding just a teaspoon of the spiced rye to the batter altered the consistency pretty noticeably. This pie was a bit wetter than the plain, but not entirely unpleasant, though the crust was a little soggy in parts. In terms of booze, the rye flavor shone through in a very nice way, adding even more warm, spicy flavor and just a bit of alcoholic bite. All in all, this was a good, but not great jar of pumpkin pie.
Pumpkin Pie with One Tablespoon of Rye
As you probably guessed, this jar was the least successful, and the wettest. It was mealy, the crust was completely saturated, and—I can’t believe I’m saying this—too alcoholic. It actually burned a bit going down. If a pumpkin spice latte and a Jello shot had a baby and that baby was disgusting, this would be that gross basic baby. Do not make this.
Turning back to our eternal question: Will pumpkin pie, both boozy and plain sous vide?
The answer: Why, yes it will, and you should do so, but don’t add booze to the batter. For the best results, cook it in a jar, let it chill overnight, and consume it with a nice pour of a infused whiskey or rum, like the classy grownup you are.
Because most Google apps these days talk to one another, today’s feature introduction to Google Maps comes as no surprise and is most definitely a welcomed addition. For Android users, Google Calendar events will start showing up in Maps under Your Places>Upcoming to help you get to the places you need to get to.Â
Google Maps, at least in recent months, seems to be adding all sorts of information from other Google places, like Contacts and Gmail. With Calendar, they are expanding on that close connection. All you need to do to get your events to show up in the Upcoming section is to make sure you put an address in the “Where†box of your Calendar entries. Assuming you are signed-in to the same account on your phone in both Maps and Calendar, the Upcoming list then is auto-populated.
If you need to get to a calendar event, jump into that Upcoming section, tap on the meeting or date or excursion, and the map will open to that location to let you quickly jump into navigation. If you don’t want something showing, you can tap the menu in that Upcoming entry and “Dismiss.â€
WASHINGTON, DC – SEPTEMBER 21: Mylan Inc. CEO Heather Bresch holds up a 2-pack of EpiPen as she testifies during a hearing before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee September 21, 2016 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. The committee held a hearing on “Reviewing the Rising Price of EpiPens.” (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
Over the nine or so years that Mylan, Inc. has been selling—and hiking the price—of EpiPens, the drug company has been misclassifying the life-saving device and stiffing Medicaid out of full rebate payments, federal regulators told Ars.
Under the Medicaid Drug Rebate Program, drug manufacturers, such as Mylan, can get their products covered by Medicaid if they agree to offer rebates to the government to offset costs. With a brand-name drug such as the EpiPen, which currently has no generic versions and has patent protection, Mylan was supposed to classify the drug as a “single source,†or brand name drug. That would mean Mylan is required to offer Medicaid a rebate of 23.1 percent of the costs, plus an “inflation rebate†any time that Mylan raises the price of the brand name drug at a rate higher than inflation.
Mylan has opted for such price increased—a lot. Since Mylan bought the rights to EpiPen in 2007, it has raised the price on 15 separate occasions, bringing the current list price to $608 for a two-pack up from about $50 a pen in 2007.That’s an increase of more than 500 percent, which easily beats inflation.
But instead of classifying EpiPen as a “single source†drug, Mylan told regulators that it’s a “non-innovator multiple source,†or generic drug. Under that classification, Mylan is only required to offer a rebate of 13 percent and no inflation rebates.
It’s unclear how much money Mylan has skipped out on paying in total to state and federal governments. But according to the state health department of Minnesota, as reported by CNBC, the misclassification cost that state $4.3 million this year alone.
In a statement to Ars, Aaron Albright, a spokesperson for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), said that regulators had told Mylan of the mistake “on multiple occasions.â€
“CMS has… expressly advised Mylan that their classification of EpiPen for purposes of the Medicaid Drug Rebate program was incorrect. This incorrect classification has financial consequences for the amount that federal and state governments spend by reducing the amount of quarterly rebates Mylan owes for EpiPen.â€
Those financial consequences may include penalties and other government claims. However, Albright declined to discuss potential penalties they’re pursuing, saying only: “We are not in a position to comment on specific steps taken by CMS or our other federal partners to correct this misclassification.â€
The question of whether Mylan had misclassified EpiPens came up during a recent Congressional hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Mylan CEO Heather Bresch, defending the company’s prices at the hearing, stood by the classification. She noted that EpiPen was classified as a generic before Mylan bought the drug in 2007.
