Sweat: The Big Picture

By Bes Zain in General 3 Comments

Whatever you do, online or offline, your body basically dictates how you feel doing it.

Your body’s condition also strongly influences how well you do things, online or offline.

Too tired while playing a game? You won’t enjoy the game as much. Too sleepy while watching a movie? You’re not going to remember or understand the movie that much. In physical pain while working? Well, your work is probably going to get affected.

Body not feeling fresh? Your thoughts through the day will also not be as exciting.

Like many other things, your body sweat (ewww!) also dictates how you feel and how well you do in both online and offline things.

Lucky for you, studies have been done to help you figure out how much you sweat, why you sweat and what you can do to avoid sweating.

Sweat: The Big Picture

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2012 New Year's Resolution

2012 New Year Resolutions – What are Yours?

By Bes Zain in Life 24 Comments

2012. Today marks the day when so many of us will start hoping for an awesome 2012, compared to 2011 at least. We have new plans, new goals, new dreams and new wants. For me, New Year Resolutions are simply a way to start acting on things in life on a certain date. This is like a push: giving yourself and thinking of a specific date, today, to start doing things.

Our needs may remain the same, though our wants are changing. A few years ago I wrote on how setting achievable goals was not as useful as we usually think. It seems setting New Year goals offer no help unless the goals we’re setting focus on our entire life, and not just 365 days of our life limited by a calendar year name.

Here are my 2012 plans that I’m working on to create an impact on my life that will last forever. The focus is on simplifying the complexity I’m adding to my life, and the complexity that is my life.

For My 2012 New Year Resolutions, I’m Going to…..

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Why is she going out with him?

IS SHE REALLY GOING OUT WITH HIM?!

By Lilly Nelson in featured, Life 14 Comments

Is she really going out with him is a great song, but how often do you hear the same lament? “Everyone I like only likes jerks.” “I’m smart and funny. Why doesn’t anyone want to be with me?” “Why is she with him?” How often have you heard or said that yourself?

The world of dating has changed significantly from your Mom and Dad’s apple pie Norman Rockwell scene. No longer do people regularly go steady through High School to marry their sweetheart after college. In fact the average person gets married at 26, followed two years later by a divorce. With the plight of older women and men fighting to meet Mr or Miss Right before biology takes over, there is an increasing amount of pressure on the single today.

With that in mind, let’s broach the subject of those folks who are nice and perpetually single. You know the type. That sweet friend of yours who seems to always be single no matter how desirable they may be. That nice guy who brings flowers to a first date and opens all doors. That sweet funny girl who lost her most recent boyfriend. We love them, but only as friends, and we want to see them happy. Or maybe that sweet funny person is you.

The “Nice Guy”

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An Illustrated Guide to Preparing for Death

Social Media Policies When You Die

By William Eve in featured, Online 21 Comments

Death not only affects our friends and family members anymore. When someone dies, there are literally hundreds and sometimes thousands of people – wondering – where did that person go? Posts go unwritten and shared, but that person keeps showing up in our feeds, on our friends list and even when we go to their profile. Why? Well, because most likely that person died, and their profile is still sitting in cyberspace, very much still alive. What happens to the Social Media Policies when you die?

The Reasoner covered this topic in 2009 in the form of asking: If you die, what will happen to your online accounts?

New rules have been put in place, recently – by most of the social media sites to modify this uncomfortable situation. I mean, imagine how family members feel every time they log into Facebook or Twitter and see their deceased relatives profiles or tweets over and over, knowing this person they loved, has moved on.

This is what prompted some of the most popular media sites to take action. Even though a huge percentage of Facebook users profiles are not alive – most offer alternatives to try to dissuade this painful situation.

Facebook

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Stop hiding from others!

Stop Hiding from People if you Want Happiness

By Bes Zain in featured, Life 26 Comments

Stop hiding from people if you want a happier life and if you want happiness.

There is no other way to emphasize something as important as this without stating it directly. Regardless of your goals, wants or needs, this one major negative element in your life will ultimately affect everything else in your life negatively.

In fact, this major element of hiding from people in your life, is what affects your daily life, all your actions, and your future.

We prefer hiding from people. We do it daily. We accept it as being so normal that we do not even think about its existence. We just react to it as if we had a life dedicated to hiding from others. This fear that makes us hide from others, for any reason, is actually making us fail at almost every great opportunity that comes our way. For every person we claim we like hanging out with, there are probably 2 people out there we hide from.

Phone, emails, txts, in person, on the road, online, people around us, etc: we like hiding for various reasons wherever we are. We hide from bill collectors, people who honk at us, people we find annoying, people who forward us annoying emails, other students who may make fun of us, kids who may bully us at parties, and many other groups of people. When we hide from others, everything we do in life revolves around the fact that we’re afraid. How can our life be productive, minimalistic, or even happy when it is based around fear?

Such fear ensures that all your goals, dreams and efforts in life are always inferior to what they could be.

While we may not be able to control the outcome of an uncomfortable situation, we can definitely change the way we react to people related to the situations in question.

Chill. Relax.

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26 Comments on Stop Hiding from People if you Want Happiness
Republic Wireless - Real Freedom or Really Limited?

Is Republic Wireless Really Unlimited?

By Bes Zain in featured, Online 11 Comments

Republic Wireless just opened up their $19 / month unlimited minutes, unlimited text and unlimited data plan. The social media world has been clogged with thousands of posts about this for the last 2 weeks. The idea is very promising: offering unlimited minutes so you can call anyone or receive phone calls, unlimited outgoing and incoming text messages, and unlimited online browsing and data usage, and all for only $19 a month without any contract. The biggest and most important part of the news is the way this will work: over wi-fi networks.

The idea is not completely new. Vonage tried and is continuing to try something similar: offering a home phone service all via your home internet connection. Republic Wireless takes that to the next level: allowing you to carry a cell phone anywhere you want and connect primarily through wi-fi networks to make your calls, send and receive txts, and consume as much data as you wish. Republic Wireless says that everything is offers is unlimited, and there is no limit on anything.

Now that the service and the details are official out, it is time to ask: Is Republic Wireless really unlimited?

The Catch – Limited Cellular Usage

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11 Comments on Is Republic Wireless Really Unlimited?
It's time to go to college. Are you going to?

Reasons Why NOW is the Time to Go to College

By Brandy Olson in featured, Reviews 83 Comments

There’s been a lot of talk about the perpetual state of the unemployment rate in this country. When that mixes with the record level of college enrollment seen in the United States the resulting thought can be a little bit more than intimidating. But it’s abundantly clear that when jobs do return, they will almost exclusively return for the college educated. It’s come down to a choice between almost certain defeat and an uphill battle. Statistics don’t lie: it doesn’t matter if we’re talking about business degrees, accounting degrees, or even English degrees, having a diploma is guaranteed to significantly improve your chances of getting a job.

Here are some additional reasons why now is absolutely the time to get yourself enrolled in a four year college or graduate program:

FINANCIAL AID HAS NEVER BEEN EASIER AND MORE SECURE

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How many Real Offline Friends do You Really Have?

By Bes Zain in featured, Life 42 Comments

Everyone has online friends. Or almost everyone. These days the craze is over at Google+. You or at least one of your online “friends” is searching for a Google+ invite this very moment. Or they are already on Google+ adding others right now. Regardless, the craze is to find a good new social network and to start adding people. It seems the more people you have on your “friends” list online, the more popular or important you seem online, even if you never, ever interact with your online “friends” from your “friends” list.

This trend started from MySpace and Xanga probably, or even before, carried onto Twitter and Facebook, and now it lives in Google+ also. It will keep on going, since people want more “friends” online. As long as having “friends” makes you more popular than having no audience online, you will want more “friends.” (more…)

42 Comments on How many Real Offline Friends do You Really Have?
Should you always tip waiters?

Should You ALWAYS Tip Waiters?

By Bes Zain in featured, Life 33 Comments

I can say with 100% certainty that you ate something in the last 24 hours. Unless you’re starving somewhere, chances are you eat 2 or 3 times a day. We cook at home and we go out to eat. Going to a restaurant to eat, while fulfilling our craving to survive, is like an enjoyable experience for us, like a joy ride. And in that joy ride, surprisingly, we usually have come to pay more attention to the people who bring the food than the food itself.

If you get a happy, polite waiter, you will most probably consider your dining experience a good one. Get an impolite waiter or someone who ignores you, and you may consider your trip a waste of time and money, even if the food was good. Not only that, but at the end of every such experience, you come face to face with the bill that creates the most difficult question for you.

“How much should I leave as a tip for this waiter?” (more…)

33 Comments on Should You ALWAYS Tip Waiters?
Do you celebrate Independence Day? Why or Why Not?

Why Do [or Don't] You Celebrate 4th of July?

By Bes Zain in featured, Life 17 Comments

4th of July is USA’s Independence Day, when America called and considered itself a free nation. It probably can’t get much simpler than that in terms of the definition. Celebrating Independence Day is now a tradition where people in America [or other countries for their Independence Day] get together for parties, food barbecue or for fireworks to mark the anniversary of becoming a separate country. For millions of people, it is as important or sometimes even more important than any religious event.

Today, millions of people in America will either be setting off fireworks themselves or watching others do it. It’s a trend that many call “a family tradition.” This trend is so popular that many people define their “patriotism” by it. For such people, you’re not an American if you don’t celebrate Independence Day. At the same time, there is a growing number of people who do not celebrate Independence Day. They have their own reasons, also listed below.

To get a solid idea of why you celebrate or don’t celebrate Independence Day, let’s go through 5 reasons why others do and don’t celebrate it.

5 Famous Reasons We Celebrate 4th of July

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17 Comments on Why Do [or Don't] You Celebrate 4th of July?
Local Hospital Jobs - Live Case Study

Live Case Study: 300k Page Job Turnkey Website

By Bes Zain in featured, Online 5 Comments

Face it. Each and everyone of us works hard or easy to try and make money. Some people rely on others to make money while trying to spend less, and some people rely on their work to make money while trying to spend more. Regardless of what you are doing, as long as it does not hurt others and is legal, whatever you do is good if it makes money.

The Reasoner and Social Improve are already profitable blogs for me. In fact, soon they’ll replace everything else for me in terms of becoming the biggest and main sources of income. I’m thinking of releasing a monthly income report for each site; we’ll see. In the meantime, I’m trying several different things just to experiment, for fun and to see what’s true and what’s not.

Local Hospital Jobs - Live Case Study

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Animal Shelter. Caging animals is good?

Are Pets Our Slaves?

By Bes Zain in featured, General 20 Comments

I have a “pet” cat. I call him my cat friend Whisper. He lives with us in our home. He runs around the house, eats awesome cat food, get treats almost every day, and gets to sleep on top of us or lay in our path at any time. In addition to all of that, he is also a slave. He is not allowed to run away. He cannot do things we don’t want him to do. He cannot scratch the carpet. He has to eat when we feed him and what we get him. He basically lives a life that his human friends, or “owners”, force him to. Like any other slave in this world.

This is of course in addition to the fact that all “pet owners” are forced, legally, to have their pet reproductive organs removed or rewired so that the animals in question will not breed. We cry if such experiments happened to any human ethnic group, but doing it to animals? It’s all fine. No one cares. Destroy his body parts! We’ll call it neutering. Remove her body parts! We’ll call it spaying. It’s all right; because he and she is just a cat, a dog or some other animal. And in addition to making sure “it” cannot reproduce as it wishes, we also have our societies built to enslave such animals into being our slaves. Whisper, unfortunately, was already neutered and was available for “sale” at PetSmart.

Of course, since “slavery” is considered bad and having a “slave” horrendous, we call them “pets” now. And we simply have “pets” which are non-human animals. What an awesomely disgusting replacement.

Pets locked up in our homes

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10 Stupid Things Starbucks Customer Do

By Bes Zain in featured, General 30 Comments

You probably drink coffee or most probably know someone who drinks coffee at least every day. And chances are at least one of such people drinks at Starbucks. The world’s largest coffee retailer also attracts the world’s most premium-type class of citizens who walk into Starbucks daily to proudly use Starbucks lingo to order even the simplest of drinks. These customers walk in and order coffee like it was an order of all variety of events in one’s life. People customize their drink down to the boiling temperature that they would like to taste. This is Starbucks. This is exactly why people consider Starbucks coffee a premium lifestyle instead of a coffee choice.

Like any other business, Starbucks also gets many different kinds of customers. Walk into any Starbucks and you may notice rich people, poor people trying to act rich, poor people trying to feel rich, strange people wearing jackets in summer, people bringing their dogs inside when they clearly know dogs are not allowed, people running into Starbucks before meetings or yoga classes just to try and get some coffee within 30 seconds, people who stay at Starbucks all day to pass their daily life or to try and get free internet. Many famous Starbucks locations even have the homeless people staying inside for warmth and a place to sit at, while also sipping coffee and taking showers inside the restrooms using only water from the sink. Starbucks has it all, and it still manages to keep a very classy brand image alive and thriving. (more…)

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New Netflix Layout - more focus on Visuals and Streaming

Why Netflix Changed the Instant Watch Layout

By Bes Zain in featured, Online 66 Comments

Update: Since this article was written, Netflix has increased membership prices.

Netflix recently announced the biggest Instant Watch layout change for all Instant Watchers. This change has caused the 2nd biggest anger and uproar among Netflix fans in Netflix’s history, more of which I’ll share below. Over 2000 Netflix blog readers have protested against the change.

The new Netflix interface is in my view very beautiful. It also, however, changes a lot of navigation features that seem to have every Netflix user talking about it. While you can make up your own mind as to whether or not you like it, it is very important to understand why Netflix made these changes. When you realize the reason behind these changes, you can get kind of a good glimpse of where Netflix is headed or where it wants to go.

Here are 3 main reasons, of the many other reasons, why Netflix changed its previous Instant Watch layout into a bold new one.

3 Main Reasons Netflix Changed Instant Watch Layout

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Day 27 – Tomato Bisque Soup & Grilled Cheese Sandwich

By Bes Zain in Food, Vegetarian 5 Comments

Today Katie asked me if I wanted to participate in the ritual called cooking. I grew up in a culture where cooking happened every 5 minutes, so it is not something that bores me. However, becoming vegetarian has made me, for a reason not fully known at the moment, respect food more and celebrate it more. So I helped Katie with cooking today, albeit very little.

She wanted to make Tomato Bisque Soup and Grilled Cheese Sandwich. For me, anything with tomato used to be a very doubtful element in life. Too much of tomato for me used to be a big no no, and now I’m going to be having to eat Tomato soup? I was actually hoping the grilled cheese sandwich would turn out to be the life saver for me.

Is Tomato Bisque Soup good? I wonder!

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