home improvement

Dori's Days of Rage & Home Improvement Materials block party

In defiance of Seattle's upcoming plastic bag ban, Dori Monson, the Nattering Nabob of Negativity de KIRO (m-f 12-3) is boycotting his regular Fred Meyers store (where he has a favorite deli sandwich) because its location inside city limits will...

Ignore Annual Housing Data -- It's The MONTHLY Data That Matters To Home Buyers

For the third straight month, at least 15 of the nation's 20 largest real estate markets showed relative monthly improvement in May 2008, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index. I use "relative monthly improvement" as another way of saying that markets are "less worse than they were" and that's good for the housing market (although you wouldn't know it by looking at the headlines). Instead of pulling the positives out from the data, newspapers are highlighting the year-over-year, cli...

NETGEAR: Asia Pacific sales soar almost 50% during 2008 2nd quarter

According to RBC Capital Markets, the 2008 2nd Quarter sales of home and SMB networking vendor NETGEAR soared almost 50% in Asia Pacific. RBC Capital Markets Managing Director - Mark Sue commented to yours truly: "NETGEAR's results were not as bad as feared and with better trends from Asia and initial sell in to Wal-Mart, revenues were $204.5M coming in ahead of the consensus of $196M." "Non-GAAP EPS was $0.41 vs. our $0.37 as higher revenues and cost cutting helped OMs improve from 9.5% to 11....

Small Steps to Home Improvement

Did you know? According to Natural Built Home, if you plant a tree today on the west side of your home, your energy bills could be 3% less in five years; and up to 12% less in fifteen years! One...

Recessed Lights and Greenwash

Recessed can lighting is a familiar method of lighting rooms. Rather than having fixtures protruding into the space, the light source is hidden in a recess in the ceiling, reducing glare. But, when the ceiling above is insulated, the can light fixture is a potential source of air leaks and thermal bridging. I recently got a press release from a company advertising a product to quickly and easily “convert” recessed can lights to a pendant light look. But, after a brief look, it turns out to b...

Live on the Scene: Emmy Nominations Hot Tube by The Couch: Jon Unger & Erin Gaughan

Picture it. Richmond, Va. 1992. My first Emmy nominations viewing. My mom shakes me awake and places some Cinnamon Toast Crunch next to me, as I rub my groggy eyes and hope to hear Home Improvement be called in Best...

NailGun Mod Has Emphasis On The Gun Part

NailGun Mod Has Emphasis On The Gun Part: If Home Improvement was still on the air, this is exactly the kind of modified tool Tim Allen would have used to create an entire episode’s worth of grunting wombat noises. He may even have…

home improvement: a makeshift bar

Having barely enough room for essential furniture items (ie. bed, couch, dresser), the idea of having a bar in our 1-bedroom apartment seemed pretty far fetched. However, after recently receiving a bottle of port I find entirely too pretty to tuck away inside a cabinet, I was determined to find a new solution. I bought [...]

Home improvement amid economic hardships

On March 28 of this year I said the following: This weekend the wife and I are going to try tiling the kitchen wall... that'll be a new experience. Wish us luck. For several reasons, our estimated date for the project was off. By just over three months, actually. This past weekend, the wife and I finally got the tiles up on the wall. I'm supposed to be grouting right now, but I'm putting it off in the hopes of getting G-Dawg to help out when he comes to visit us this weekend. Now, this is just o...

Pajiba Love 07/08/08

Pajiba Love You know the X-Files movie must drawing nigh, as internet sightings of Gillian Anderson posed sexily with alien props have increased by as much as 300%. (Popoholic) Amy Winehouse will be damned if she succumbs to lung disease. Nope: she'll bake herself into a delicious snack before she lets that happen. (WIMB) Since Barack Obama has been slandered all over the internet for the past year-plus, it's about time liberals started some unfounded rumors of our own. (SlowlyGoingBald) Meanwh...