10Apr / 2012

5 Experiences in Nature to Try Before you Die

I don’t know why people travel all around the world just to see landmarks that you can catch in a postcard. Get out and live!

Here’s my short bucket list of 6 experiences in nature to try before you die. What are yours?

Sleep in a Tree

When people think of sleeping in a tree, usually it involves either carving a little hole at the base of the trunk like in the book “My Side of the Mountain” or climbing high and strapping yourself down with a rope like in the recent Hunger Games movie.

But in Pfronten, Bavaria in Germany, Waldseilgarten, there is an extremely resort that lets guests sleep hanging from the tree tops or off a cliff ledge. The hanging tent, also known as a portaledge, is generally used by rock climbers and features a fabric-covered platform that is suspended from a single point.

Kayak the Fjord Norway

The Fjord Norway is a magnificent piece of nature in Southwest Norway. The mountain areas accumulate lots of snow during the winter seasons that slowly melt to provide an amazingly long season of running water through valleys carved out over millions of years.

For the faint-hearted, there are certainly smoother and more peaceful routes to take that will avoid you kayaking down a waterfall.

Ride a ‪Galápagos tortoise‬

If you venture over to the Galápagos Islands, I don’t think your trip would be complete until you get to ride a giant tortoise! As the largest living tortoise weighing in at over 900 lbs, I think it could probably carry you for at least a foot … tortoise foot that is.

Since they are kind of endangered, I recommend having a faster method of escape in the event you get chased away by government officials or any PETA members that might catch you.

Truffle Hunting in Florence

This might be just for me, but truffles are like ridiculously delicious (not to mention expensive). Just had to include one thing that involved discovering food in the wild.

And of course once you find a few truffles, enjoy a home-cooked italian meal while you’re there featuring your truffles.

See a Great White Shark Flying

Flying may not be the right term here, but seeing the immense great white shark jumping out of the ocean off the coast of South Africa is truly breathtaking.

Pictures don’t do this justice, you just gotta see for yourself.

Posted by in Adventure, Get Out and Live, Travel

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05Apr / 2012

It Ain’t Easy Being Green (In the City)

But, it can be done. And we have help. Excellent help.

Enter Urban Gardens.

Urban Gardens is one of our go-to resources for cool eco-friendly products, designs, and ideas for small spaces and urban gardens.

You know, like being able to hang a balcony farm outside your apartment kitchen.

You’ll not only find green products, but also crucial advice from fellow city-dwellers that can guide your pad to be on its’ way to super duper greenness.

Now most of us probably live in 1-bedroom, studios, or tiny flats in the heart of the concrete jungle, and are wondering…

“How in the world can I live more sustainably?”

This, my friends, is the goal of Robin Plaskoff Horton, UG’s founder. Her mantra is Unlimited Thinking for Limited Spaces. She knows quite well we all don’t have 2-acre backyards, let alone any grass.

From Robin…

Get your green on.

“Urban Gardens is my platform for sharing my love affair with city life, design, and nature with urban dwellers and others with limited spaces.

I explore and showcase what’s out there in the urban garden universe–from the amazing products of talented new designers, to community gardens experimenting with edible landscaping, sustainable urban agriculture and micro-farms, to guerrilla gardeners transforming derelict abandoned properties into lush, or at least, provocative garden spaces.”

Sound pretty neat? We think so, and encourage you to check out UG to see the kind of things she highlights.

Posted by in A Day In The Life, Op Ed, Products, Tips and Tricks

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03Apr / 2012

Video of the Day: One of the Gnarliest Waves Ever Ridden

How insane is this.

Hang 10, brah.

Posted by in Adventure, Water Activity

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02Apr / 2012

Live Life, Don’t Watch It

Here’s a little dose of motivation on this Monday morning.

News flash: Channel surfing isn’t a sport.

With the inundation of reality television, people seem increasingly content to spend time watching life on the tube, instead of actually living one themselves. Elevating those who fight, backstab and cheat into celebrities and role models.

You know the “stars” I’m talking about. The Snooki’s of the world.

Our question is this…

Do you want to spend your nights staring at televised strangers, or do you want to do and be more?

We think this is a time when we should live life, instead of just watching it. Where reality stars are replaced by real friends, family, and teammates.

We celebrate those who choose to ignore the banality of today’s reality television climate, in favor of creating your own stories. Let’s get off the couch, and get out and live.

Because in the end, life deserves to be played.

[Related: The Zen of Doing]

Posted by in Advice, Get Out and Live

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30Mar / 2012

Just for Fun: 11 Things That Piss Me Off

1. Bathroom attendants.  Find me one person who makes less than $4 million a year that enjoys a nice bathroom attendant.  Go ahead.  Places that employ these guys have such terrible identity crises.  They obviously want to be some classy joint, they think they’re a classy joint, but they haven’t been getting that respect yet.  Ergo, hire a homeless guy to wash people’s hands. In summation: No thanks, I can wash my own hands, and no, I’m not giving you a tip.  I hate you.

2. Lines in stores. Why is it that everyone wants to go shopping when I do? It’s not like everyone works during the week, sleeps in on the weekend, goes out weekend nights, and only has weekend days to do all their shopping. I mean, you know what I’m saying… right?

3. People who speak different languages to each other in elevators. It’s not like the elevator isn’t already the scariest, smallest place on Earth… and now you have to talk to your friend in a different language. What are you trying hide? Huh? HUH?

4. Websites that still have popups. Seriously. It’s 2012. Let’s get with the program. Popups are so 2004 (and scream ‘p0rn site’).

5. Dentists who try to have a full out conversation with you while they are working in your mouth. Clearly you are the ones with your hands all over my teeth. Is your mission to get me to bite you while telling you what I do for a living? I don’t want to be rude and not answer you, but I also don’t want to drool all over your hand and my face.

7. People who still use middle-school-esque wording seriously. Including LOLZ, luv, and 143. Also, people who still type like this. WuTz Up BiTcHeZ? Is that really necessary? No. Not at all.

8. Annoying laughs. There is nothing more horrible than hearing an annoying laugh… except when you have one… or when you’ve grown to embrace one. No, it’s not that you actually like the laugh… You just can’t picture life without it.

6. Stepping in gum. Have you ever stepped in gum?  Biggest day-ruiner ever.  There’s no recovering from it.  Next thing you know you’ve got pine needles stuck in there, it’s all wedged in the treads of your kicks, you contemplate suicide, etc.

There’s no way to easily remove it, either.  Grab a stick and start clawing away?  Walk on peanut butter?  Doesn’t matter.  That gum is destined to destroy your life and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.

9. The Verizon store. If your phone breaks, you are pretty much screwed because now you have to find the time between your job and your sleeping schedule to spend hours upon hours waiting in Verizon for them to tell you your phone has water damage, you suck, or you are about to be phoneless or broke.

10. Credit Minimums + ATM fees. I don’t carry around a lot of cash.  Sorry, I’m not a drug dealer, hooker, bartender or gangster (the four cornerstones of the cash only marketplace).  So inevitably I end up at a bar after ordering a drink or two, and the lass behind the bar tells me I’m still $3 short of the minimum.  FFFFFFFFF.

What really gets me going are places that don’t take credit cards, and then in their nicest tone they tell you that they have an ATM right around the corner.  Which they obviously own.  Which clearly has a $7 fee.  KICK. IN. THE. FACE.

11. The DMV. AKA, hell. If you walk into the DMV, you’re bound to wait, I don’t know… 3-4 hours? Awesome. If you make an appointment, you still have to wait when you get there. Wait a minute… isn’t the point of the ap”point”ment, to keep it?


Posted by in Comedy, Op Ed, Rant

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29Mar / 2012

Video of the Day: People ARE Amazing 2012

This is one stellar compilation.

Posted by in Adventure, Video

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28Mar / 2012

28 Ways to Know You’re a GenY or Millenial

What does it really mean to be a GenY or Millennial?

Countless research studies, articles, and Millennial “experts” are out there telling us this is who GenY and Millennials are — but are they right? Well it’s time we went straight to the source…  actual GenY and Millennials. Crazy, we know.

What you’ll find below is a solid list from miscellaneous emails on what it really means to be a GenY or Millennial.

1.‘You have died of dysentery’ does not sound morbid at all, but only stirs fond memories of playing Oregon Trail.

2. Sometimes when someone is talking you completely tune out and just start counting how many times they say “like”. Thanks, middle school english teachers.

3. You’ve learned the best way to communicate is to ignore some one’s phone call, let them leave a message, listen to the message, then respond back to them with a text message, that way you keep personal contact to a minimum.

4. You know that if Carmen Sandiego and Waldo ever got together, their children would be completely invisible.

Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego...?

5. You kind of miss school. But it’s pretty much impossible to communicate that to someone who is actually in school.

6. You remember how cool it felt to get a pager.

7. “Do you have any kids” has somehow become a semi-normal question.

[Related: 20-Something Signs You’re Officially An Adult]

8. You know who Blossom is. And Joey. Whoa!

9. You know what pogs are.

10. You thought Mary-Kate and Ashley were adorable. Now you think they’re hot. Weird.

11. While driving yesterday you saw a banana peel in the road and instinctively swerved to avoid it…thanks Mario Kart.

12. You have a bunch of old mix tapes, and/or you remember giving mix tapes to a girlfriend / boyfriend. And to this day, that mix tape was probably the most time you’ve ever spent on a gift.

overdramatic mix tapes ftw

13. “Dry clean only” actually means “I’ll never, ever, ever wash this.”

14. Somewhere deep in your parents house resides a sweet collection of Michael Jordan and Shawn Kemp basketball cards.

15. You remember when Apple computers had black and green screens. That used floppy discs.

16. In your memory, the best TV was summed up with four letters (TGIF).

17. You still can’t believe your parents turned your old bedroom into an office. Obviously your bedroom should have been left intact as a permanent shrine.

18. Mario Brothers 3 for Regular Nintendo is still your favorite video game. And you saw The Wizard in theaters to catch a glimpse before it came out.

19. You know exactly what Up, Down, Up, Down, Left, Right, Left Right, B, A, B, A, Select, Start means.

20. ‘Who was hotter — Kelly Kapowski or Topanga Lawrence?’ is a very legitimate debate.

oh hi tuh-pannnga

21. You still feel like a kid most of the time, until you see a real kid and think, “good God, kids are young these days.”

22. You prayed daily that you could have an Uncle Jesse and Uncle Joey.

23. Eating Fruity Pebbles over the sink is a totally normal dinner.

24. You remember memorizing the lyrics to “Gin and Juice”. And not understanding 83% of it. You can still recite most of it.

25. You played kickball at recess, on the regs.

26. People are beginning to point out your gray hair. “Wow, thank you for letting me know I have gray hair. I’ve never noticed that before.”

27. You know who Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan are. Probably Kristi Yamaguchi too.

28. You now understand what your parents meant when they said, ‘You’ll understand when you’re older.’

Via AllGroanUp

Posted by in Comedy, Op Ed

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27Mar / 2012

Video of the Day: Peanut Butter Tuesday

Here’s a throwback video, apropos for today.

Pure genius.

“Peanut Butter Tuesday, you know what I mean!”

Watch the original, almost equally as funny (and strange) here.

Posted by in Comedy, Video

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26Mar / 2012

WTF: Chillin’ In Your Blandito

Oh, the things you can find on the internet. Earlier today, while we were exploring the wonderful world that is Pinterest, we came across the Blandito. What is a Blandito, you ask?

Let us indulge you.

The Italian company that makes Blandito says:

For every time you need a break, a snooze, a little bit of sweet idleness, blandito fits your body, wraps it, hugs it. With no hard structure inside, it is soft and malleable, its covering is completely removable and machine washable.

So basically, it’s a big, soft, hot dog/burrito/taco shell that you can change the shape of, sleep in, and awkwardly spoon in. It looks very strange, yet oddly comfortable.

You’ll just have to judge the Blandito yourself. Cool, or… bland?

via CollegeCandy

Posted by in Op Ed, Products

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23Mar / 2012

10 Ways to Get Yourself Fired

1. Make mistakes. And don’t say sorry.

2. Sleep through your alarm every day. If you’re well rested, you’ll do a better job – even if you come in an hour late every day… right?

3. Take 2 hour lunch breaks… and don’t bring your cell phone with you. During this time, go shopping, go home to watch One Tree Hill on SoapNet, or (if it’s nice out) lie out at a nearby park (or in your parking lot if it’s not covered).

4. If asked to stay late, say no. Every time. If asked why you can’t stay, say you have to feed your cat. Meow.

5. Try to make others laugh by making rude/unnecessary comments after someone speaks.Even if it’s the CEO. You’re, like, really funny so it’s okay.

6. If you’re supposed to be answering phones, put on headphones and rock out. Other people can answer the calls you miss.

7. If someone asks you to do something, always say no… no matter how open your day is.

8. Hit on a select few of your coworkers (guys and girls). Do your best to creep them the fuck out.

9. When in possession of the company credit card, head to nearest bar and buy shots for everyone around you. Rage.

10. If you don’t feel like going into work, don’t go. Validate your absence by telling your employer ‘at least you didn’t have to pay me.’

via ForverTwenty

Posted by in Op Ed, Video

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