Rolled my clothes for 10 years, finally tried packing cubes last month.

Just got burned booking a coliving in Medellin, check the background first

I paid $600 upfront for a month at a place in El Poblado last week based on the photos alone, turned up and the wifi was a joke and the hot water gave out every other day. The owner kept pushing coworking memberships and tours instead of fixing the basics. Has anyone else dealt with coliving spots that look great online but fall apart once you arrive?

Question about those carbon offset subscriptions for flights

I signed up for a $15/month carbon offset subscription through my airline last January after a trip to Denver, but I'm starting to wonder if the money actually goes to real projects or just marketing fluff. A buddy in the forestry department at the university nearby told me some offset programs don't hold up under scrutiny, and now I'm second guessing if I should just keep driving instead. Has anyone here looked into the actual impact of these programs or found one that's legit?

Why does everyone wrap their brisket in foil instead of butcher paper?

I watched 3 guys at a comp in Kansas City last weekend all foil up their briskets right after the stall, and I swear they all ended up with steamed bark that peeled right off. Am I missing something, or is butcher paper just the way to go for a good crust?

Hot take: using too much water in my wash kit was making everything worse

After fighting with wet ash clumps for 6 months on a job in Portland, a customer’s plumber friend told me to barely dampen the brush head and it cut my cleanout time in half has anyone else been drowning their flues without realizing it?

I built a whole Mandalorian helmet from a thrift store bike helmet and some old floor mats

Last weekend I found a basic bike helmet for $4 at Goodwill, cut up some leftover car floor mats for the armor plates, and glued it all together with a hot glue gun. The whole thing cost me maybe $12 and a few hours of work, and it looks way better than I thought it would. Has anyone else tried using car mats for armor pieces, or got other cheap material tips?

Hit 200 hours on my new forge and the difference is real

I got a Johnson 2400 last fall and just passed 200 hours of run time. The heat control is way steadier now than it was at 50 hours, especially for welding Damascus billets. Anyone else notice a big change in their forge's performance after a certain number of hours?

Warning: I tried using a cheap knockoff compression tool on a job in Tempe last week.

The crimp failed after two days and the customer called back with a full signal drop. Switched back to my Klein CT100 and haven't had a single issue since. What's the one tool you guys absolutely won't cheap out on?

Overheard a foreman say 'a good fitter is a lazy fitter' and it's been bugging me

I was grabbing coffee on a job in Tacoma last week and heard a foreman from another crew say that to a new apprentice. He meant it as a compliment, saying the best guys find the smartest, fastest way to do a job without extra work. But it rubbed me wrong. I've always been taught that taking your time, double-checking every bevel and root gap, is what keeps a boiler from failing. My old journeyman in Philly drilled into me that rushing or cutting corners on a 2-inch schedule 80 pipe weld is how people get hurt. But I see the other side too, especially on tight deadlines. If you can set up your rig once and knock out ten perfect welds without moving, that's skill, not laziness. Where's the line between working smart and getting sloppy? I'm curious what you all think defines a 'good' boilermaker on the fit-up side.

My whole view on the moon landing shifted after I found my grandpa's 1969 newspaper with a weird printing error in the photo caption.

I was looking at the front page from July 21, 1969, and the caption under the 'lunar surface' shot read 'simulated environment' for a split second before the ink smeared, which made me dig into how newspapers actually received and printed those first images. Has anyone else found a weird physical clue like that in old media?