Random Questions

What are the general parameters on his fussiness? Simple textures? Specific nos? I love Nigella Lawson’s Bright Rice and Masoor Dal. Both are very easy to make but not sure about picky eaters…

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I don’t use a grill or grill pan at all and it still comes out great. The texture is very good and it’s mostly about whatever type of BBQ sauce you choose.

Oh, also I don’t use peanut butter (allergy), I use tahini instead.

(ETA: Oh, I stick it under the broiler for a couple of minutes instead of the grill step, to get it a little charred. But that might be unnecessary and depends on your tolerance for the risk of using the broiler.)

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Ooo, I’m going to try this!

Oooh depending on his particularities:

Tempeh BLTs (tempeh marinated in maple syrup, oil, either liquid smoke or smoked paprika, pepper)

Seitan jambalaya (might not be good if beans are out)

If he likes nachos, I’ll see if I can get my friend’s vegan nachos recipe, they’re so good.

Also, I have several vegetarian and vegan cookbooks, including Veganomicon. Let me know if you have particular requests.

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I make a Mexican bulgar we use in tacos, etc. when we want to cut down our meat.

I have several houseplants (pothos and philodendron) that I started in pots. I think they’re growing! But they seem to have attracted gnats. Does anyone have recommendations for how to get rid of the gnats in a pet-safe and plant-safe way?

ETA: I think I found a solution online (vinegar and dish soap as a trap + let the plants completely dry out and sit for several days). But if anyone has better ideas, I’ll all ears.

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I’ve been told that if you put like an inch of sand on top of the soil it will help keep the gnats from being able to lay eggs. I haven’t tried it myself yet, but it sounds legit.

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I am a houseplant addict and I have battled the fungus gnats! I have researched extensively and have had success.

  • If you truly have fungus gnats, the vinegar traps sadly won’t help at all (those do help for fruit flies though!). I do think that’s a good way to find out for certain whether you have fungus gnats or fruit flies.
  • I use yellow sticky traps around the soil of my houseplants to catch adult fungus gnats and prevent as many as possible from laying eggs.
  • Fungus gnats lay their eggs in the potting soil of houseplants. Bti ( Bacillus thuringiensis subspecies Israelensis) can kill the eggs-- I personally use the Mosquito Bits brand. I measure out one tablespoon of the bits and let them sit in one liter of water. In 30-120 minutes, I use that water to water the plants (it’s kind of like tea). You want to water such that all of the soil gets a good soaking. There are other brands with bti but I’ve also read that a successful alternative is to use a Systemic Insecticide.
  • Repeat watering with Mosquito bits tea for 3 weeks. It can easily take that long for an infestation to abate.
  • I have read that you can use sand as @chaskavitch mentions, however, I have read that it can interfere with allowing the potting soil to maintain the right moisture level for your plant, so I haven’t tried it yet.

It can take a while to win the battle against the pesky gnats, but it can be done! I’ve been doing it again the last few weeks-- interestingly I started out at the end of summer with a bad case of fruit flies and then we got rid of all those with vinegar traps. Immediately thereafter the fungus gnats descended again. I think my current infestation has just now abated!

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Oh, this is delightful news! I don’t have gnats just now, but sometimes I do, and I always have mosquito bits on hand for mosquitoes.

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Thanks, this is super helpful!

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A friend recently got a concussion and started going back to work this week. Any advice for handling screentime? I remember research on… refresh rates? Blue light filters? @neovonretorch @Meowkins

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My recommendation is to ask for flex time to give eyes a break if they need it before going back to work. Also going back to early can make healing slower so to use time if they need and have it.

Avoid sunglasses for the screen even if it’s tempting.

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I tried amber glasses a little bit I wasn’t sure if they were helping.

All of my computer screens are now 144 Hz and none of them use PWM for brightness. My phone is 90 Hz and uses DC dimming for brightness. Still seem to get a little fatigued from all the screens after over a year, but much better than the first few months.

Also have to be careful with my transitions glasses because if I let sun in, using screens with the dimmed lenses really wears on me.

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Should I purchase a home warranty for my new-to-me home?

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They’re usually too full of gotchas to be worth any peace of mind. There was a discussion about them in this thread a couple weeks back I think.

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I love my lightweight vac! For the stairs, you might want to consider cordless or not as an option, since tripping over the cord is not good.

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Which one do you have?

We didn’t for the exact reason Esme said. There’s a laundry list of ‘not covered,’ and not a lot that seemed useful beyond what insurance would cover or that we would just pay for ourselves.

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Thanks @neovonretorch and @Meowkins !

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I have a question. Er, maybe several questions. About backdoor ROTH IRAs. (Yes yes nobody here is giving me official financial advice.)

Current status: I have some $ invested in a Traditional IRA from the last ~5 years. Some of it was from years where it was definitely tax-deductible, some was from years where it was definitely not tax deductible. I have a good while left before I’m retirement-age and the cash flow available to invest/incur more taxes, if necessary.

  • apparently the Build Back Better bill is going to get rid of the ROTH conversion backdoor? except it would go into effect at the end of 2021 despite the text not being final yet? :thinking: I’m confused and running into lots of scammy looking scare headlines when I google it. I guess my question is: it’s a good idea to do this in 2021, and I shouldn’t put it off, right? My income is going to be high this year and low next year, so normally I would be tempted to wait.

  • The examples I found on Google all talk about the simplest case, i.e. moving 6k into an IRA and then immediately converting it. Is there a limit on how much of a traditional IRA you can convert to a ROTH in a given year or is it OK to just convert the whole thing?

  • For the “pro-rata” rule, how do I figure out what $$ were tax-deductible? I can dig out my previous years’ tax returns but is there another obvious way to do it?

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