Your Easy Guide To Car Maintenance And Quick Savings
by: Jeff Slokum
Cars are like electric lights. We often don’t appreciate them until they go on the blink. Regular maintenance checks and simple service can greatly reduce the cost of car ownership and keep you a much happier traveler!
Don’t let the thought of car maintenance intimidate you. There are actually several car maintenance tips you can do – even if you’re totally mechanically-challenged!
For instance, you’ll want to keep your windshield washer fluid reservoir full. This involves screwing off the cap and pouring windshield wiper fluid in the right spot. You can quickly check the fluid levels when filling up at the gas station.
While you’ve got the windshield washer fluid out, pour some on a rag and clean the bug guts, etc. off the wiper blades.
If you see any colored fluid leaking from your car, get it serviced immediately.
If you smell any peculiar odor coming from your car, take it to the nearest service station. Odors mean something inappropriate is going on under the hood of your car!
Every fall, go ahead and replace your wiper blades. You need new ones once a year – might as well get them before winter sets in and you’re wiping away that ice and sleet!
Be sure all your lights are clean and working, including brake lights, turn signals and emergency flashers. You can perform this quick check while filling up your gas tank.
Check your tires once a month – give a look over for cuts, bulges, or nails or other foreign objects sticking out.
Take your car to your friendly serviceman once a month and have the pressure in your tires checked. This service should cost you less than five bucks, if anything.
Every three months have your oil and oil filter changed. Many times an inspection is done during the oil change. It’s worth it to pay a little extra if you have to and have this done. Ask to have your battery checked, too.
Have your air filter changed when it gets dirty. You can ask the folks who change your oil to check the air filter. They’re happy to change it for you.
No matter how non-car savvy you may have felt in the past, finding that you can do some simple maintenance checks puts you in the driver’s seat. You’re likely to discover in advance if your car has a problem that should be taken care of immediately.
About the author:
This article provided courtesy of http://www.gmc-truck-guide.com
Malcolm Gladwell - Outliers
EXPERTISE refers to the mechanisms underlying the superior achievement of an expert, i.e. "one who has acquired special skill in or knowledge of a particular subjects through professional training and practical experience" (Webster's dictionary, 1976, p. 800). The term expert is used to describe highly experienced professionals such as medical doctors, accountants, teachers and scientists, but has been expanded to include any individual who attained their superior performance by instruction and extended practice: highly skilled performers in the arts, such as music, painting and writing, sports, such as swimming, running and golf and games, such as bridge and chess.
When experts exhibit their superior performance in public their behavior looks so effortless and natural that we are tempted to attribute it to special talents. Although a certain amount of knowledge and training seems necessary, the role of acquired skill for the highest levels of achievement has traditionally been minimized. However, when scientists began measuring the experts' supposedly superior powers of speed, memory and intelligence with psychometric tests, no general superiority was found --the demonstrated superiority was domain specific. For example, the superiority of the chess experts' memory was constrained to regular chess positions and did not generalize to other types of materials (Djakow, Petrowski & Rudik, 1927). Not even IQ could distinguish the best among chessplayers (Doll & Mayr, 1987) nor the most successful and creative among artists and scientists (Taylor, 1975). In a recent review, Ericsson and Lehmann (1996) found that (1) measures of general basic capacities do not predict success in a domain, (2) the superior performance of experts is often very domain specific and transfer outside their narrow area of expertise is surprisingly limited and (3) systematic differences between experts and less proficient individuals nearly always reflect attributes acquired by the experts during their lengthy training.
In a pioneering empirical study of the thought processes mediating the highest levels of performance, de Groot (1946/1978) instructed expert and world-class chessplayers to think aloud while they selected their next move for an unfamiliar chess position. The world-class players did not differ in the speed of their thoughts or the size of their basic memory capacity, and their ability to recognize promising potential moves was based on their extensive experience and knowledge of patterns in chess. In their influential theory of expertise, Chase and Simon (1973; Simon & Chase, 1973) proposed that experts with extended experience acquire a larger number of more complex patterns and use these new patterns to store knowledge about which actions should be taken in similar situations.
According to this influential theory, expert performance is viewed as an extreme case of skill acquisition (Proctor & Dutta, 1995; Richman, Gobet, Staszewski & Simon, 1996; VanLehn, 1996) and as the final result of the gradual improvement of performance during extended experience in a domain. Furthermore, the postulated central role of acquired knowledge has encouraged efforts to extract experts' knowledge so that computer scientists can build expert systems that would allow a computer to act as an expert (Hoffman, 1992).
Among investigators of expertise, it has generally been assumed that the performance of experts improved as a direct function of increases in their knowledge through training and extended experience. However, recent studies show that there are, at least, some domains where "experts" perform no better then less trained individuals (cf. outcomes of therapy by clinical psychologists, Dawes, 1994) and that sometimes experts' decisions are no more accurate than beginners' decisions and simple decision aids (Camerer & Johnson, 1991; Bolger & Wright, 1992). Most individuals who start as active professionals or as beginners in a domain change their behavior and increase their performance for a limited time until they reach an acceptable level. Beyond this point, however, further improvements appear to be unpredictable and the number of years of work and leisure experience in a domain is a poor predictor of attained performance (Ericsson & Lehmann, 1996). Hence, continued improvements (changes) in achievement are not automatic consequences of more experience and in those domains where performance consistently increases aspiring experts seek out particular kinds of experience, that is deliberate practice (Ericsson, Krampe & Tesch-Römer, 1993)--activities designed, typically by a teacher, for the sole purpose of effectively improving specific aspects of an individual's performance. For example, the critical difference between expert musicians differing in the level of attained solo performance concerned the amounts of time they had spent in solitary practice during their music development, which totaled around 10,000 hours by age 20 for the best experts, around 5,000 hours for the least accomplished expert musicians and only 2,000 hours for serious amateur pianists. More generally, the accumulated amount of deliberate practice is closely related to the attained level of performance of many types of experts, such as musicians (Ericsson et al., 1993; Sloboda, et al., 1996), chessplayers (Charness, Krampe & Mayr, 1996) and athletes (Starkes et al., 1996).
The recent advances in our understanding of the complex representations, knowledge and skills that mediate the superior performance of experts derive primarily from studies where experts are instructed to think aloud while completing representative tasks in their domains, such as chess, music, physics, sports and medicine (Chi, Glaser & Farr, 1988; Ericsson & Smith, 1991; Starkes & Allard, 1993). For appropriate challenging problems experts don't just automatically extract patterns and retrieve their response directly from memory. Instead they select the relevant information and encode it in special representations in working memory that allow planning, evaluation and reasoning about alternative courses of action (Ericsson & Lehmann, 1996). Hence, the difference between experts and less skilled subjects is not merely a matter of the amount and complexity of the accumulated knowledge; it also reflects qualitative differences in the organization of knowledge and its representation (Chi, Glaser & Rees, 1982). Experts' knowledge is encoded around key domain-related concepts and solution procedures that allow rapid and reliable retrieval whenever stored information is relevant. Less skilled subjects' knowledge, in contrast, is encoded using everyday concepts that make the retrieval of even their limited relevant knowledge difficult and unreliable. Furthermore, experts have acquired domain-specific memory skills that allow them to rely on long-term memory (Long-Term Working Memory, Ericsson & Kintsch, 1995) to dramatically expand the amount of information that can be kept accessible during planning and during reasoning about alternative courses of action. The superior quality of the experts' mental representations allow them to adapt rapidly to changing circumstances and anticipate future events in advance. The same acquired representations appear to be essential for experts' ability to monitor and evaluate their own performance (Ericsson, 1996; Glaser, 1996) so they can keep improving their own performance by designing their own training and assimilating new knowledge.
10000hrs to become an experts
“In study after study, of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice-skaters, concert pianists, chess players, master criminals, this number comes up again and again. Ten thousand hours is equivalent to roughly three hours a day, or 20 hours a week, of practice over 10 years… No one has yet found a case in which true world-class expertise was accomplished in less time. It seems that it takes the brain this long to assimilate all that it needs to know to achieve true mastery.“-neurologist Daniel Levitin
http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracticePR93.pdf
Do You Believe Every Thing You See?
http://www.campaignforrealbeauty.com/home_films_evolution_v2.swf
What happened to truth in advertising? This is very disturbing.
PEACE CORPS AMERICORPS SEE BOOST IN APPLICATIONS
The troubled economy and President Barack Obama's call to service are helping create a surge of interest in the Peace Corps, AmeriCorps and other service opportunities. Meanwhile, the U.S. House last week approved the largest expansion of government-sponsored service programs in years.
Both Peace Corps and AmeriCorps provide modest compensation, student loan deferment and a small scholarship at the end that members can use to pay off debt or pursue more schooling.
"With the job market being the way it is, and my situation, I could definitely do that for two years, then see what the economy's like and in the process maybe help some people out," said Sandow, who has contacted a Peace Corps recruiter and is mulling over an application.
The Peace Corps saw a 16% increase in applications last year over the previous year, said Christine Torres, spokeswoman for the organization's Chicago office.
AmeriCorps saw a tripling in the number of applications in the first two months of the year, said Sandy Scott, spokesman for the Corporation for National Community Service, the federal agency that oversees AmeriCorps and other programs. Some 9,000 people applied in February, compared with 3,000 applicants in February of last year. [read more]
SHOEMONEY GIVES TIPS ON MAKING MONEY ONLINE
If you are really making 100,000 a month
who cares what ads show-up on your site?
GOOGLE ADWORDS GURU TEACHES YOU
HOW TO Attract New Customers to Your Website 24 hours a Day, 7 Days a Week, 365 Days of the Year, Even While You Sleep.(click here).
JOHN DONNE
"All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated...As therefore the bell that rings to a sermon, calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come: so this bell calls us all: but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness....No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee." - John DOnne.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Donne
SHOEMONEY ON MAKING MONEY ONLINE
A frank chat with Shoemoney on what it really takes to be successful online.
JEFF BEZOS - THE INTERNET AND THE 1849 GOLD RUSH
Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos offers clues to the future by comparing the internet phenomenon to the 1849 Gold Rush.
WARREN BUFFETT OF BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY
In this interview Charlie Rose asks Mr Buffett of a major purchase in the works details of which were not know at the time. Since the time of this interview investor Warren Buffett has paid $4 billion for an 80 percent stake in Iscar Metalworking Cos.
Iscar is an industry leader in metal-cutting tools owned by the Wertheimer family.
CAN YOU LEGITIMATELY MAKE MONEY ONLINE?
This is a true account by ANDREW who lucked into $11,000 money=making machine online but the story is representative of how you can make money online with the right idea.
Its a three part story but definitely worth it.
WHAT IS WEB 2.0?
This is an interesting vignette about the web's beginning and how it is transforming our world. There is a hint of humor in this video too by Cultural Anthropology Professor Michael Wesch of Kansas State University.
Music is by DEUS "There is nothing impossible."
MAKE SOMETHING REMARKABLE
Seth Godin is speaking at the Googleplex giving a talk on effective marketing in the new millennium.
Even if you are not into marketing it is worth listening. The idea of making something "remarkable" is fresh and timely in this age of constant interruptions.
WANT TO MASTER GOOGLE ADWORDS?
Perry Marshall shares his own Google Adwords success story and valuable tips at the x10 Seminar in 2005 in Australia.
In Perry Marshall's own words:
"2 years ago I went to Coolum Australia and spoke at Simon Chen's X10 seminar. It was one of the most content-rich seminars I've ever been to. I personally did two sessions on Adwords totalling almost 4 hours of material including a real-life campaign build."It is one hour and 56 minutes of video that is worth the investment. Perry's explanation of the importance of "split-testing" alone is worth this time.
HOW TO Attract New Customers to Your Website 24 hours a Day, 7 Days a Week, 365 Days of the Year, Even While You Sleep.(click here).
DR JAMES WATSON AND THE DNA
James Watson and Francis Crick, crackers of the DNA code, in 1959.
On Feb. 28, 1953, Francis Crick walked into the Eagle pub in Cambridge, England, and, as James Watson later recalled, announced that "we had found the secret of life." Actually, they had. That morning, Watson and Crick had figured out the structure of deoxyribonucleic acid, DNA. And that structure — a "double helix" that can "unzip" to make copies of itself — confirmed suspicions that DNA carries life's hereditary information.
WHO DO PEOPLE WANT TO BUY FROM?
JEFFREY GITOMER teaches the essential of great customer service.
He answers the question:
- Who do people want to do business with?
Week 1 No Smoking by PrincessDiana161
PD161-I have Frankie working the camera today because I am going to start a Vlog about quitting smoking as of today I am going to quit smoking. I went to the doctor's yesterday and I got a prescription for Chantix. C-H-A-N-T-I-X. It's a four to four weeks regimen..you are suppossed to take it for like six month ..but could be three to six months.. I will probably need the six month because I have no will power. I am really bad with that and I need to quit smoking. I need to not just for my health but Frankie's the kids. I should have quit a long time ago but I am a weak human that has weird needs. So..It looks kinda of like the birth control pill
Frankie- It looks like an antibiotic
PD161-No it doesn't look like an antibiotic...it looks like... if you looked at birth control pills it looks like... that!
Frankie-I could be estrogen for your hot flashes
PD161- F..U!.. you know Frankie... I am not that old!! Anyway... so I am going to smoke my last cigarrette. I am sooo scared....what?
Frankie- I am going inside
PD161- You going inside?...You should because I plan to pollute you right now. [PD161 lights up cigarrette]. Yes this is my F..U lighter. If anybody is interested in having this lighter..which I hold very dear to me...[PD161 takes a long puff]hmmm!..so delicious...I will mail it to you. I have a feeling NutCheese is going to want this lighter. This looks like a NC lighter..doesn't it? It is a middle finger and when you press it..ah... [PD161 presses lighter]...F..U, F...U....it says F...U. So it seems like a NC lighter so I think I am going to mail it to her...nice bronze little middle finger.
I have to remove all traces of smoking from my house... that means getting rid of all the ashtrays all the cigarrette lighters that I have. And I do have a nice collection of cigarrette lighters by the way NC..in case you are interested. And..because I can't see anything that will remind me of the cigarrettes the first few day because I will freak out. [PD161 -Takes another long puff]...hmmm....so good...I am really going to miss this...this is messed up...damm you Frankie...damn you and your weak heart..sniff!
I am going to speed this up after this because your are not going to want hear me.. rumble.. ramble..for..[phone rings]...and the phone is ringing..[film cut].
PD161-[having trouble trying to take out a pill out of the box]...get my pill ready...damn...how they expect you to quit if you can't get it out of here?.. oh..here it goes... okay...ok. I will put it right there..[lays pill on table]..evil pill...[takes another puff]...it's supposed to suppress the brain... from the need for...ah...nicotine..just what I need a brain pill..that is exactly what I need!
Frankie-[Frankie's voice heard talking on the phone]
PD161-Frankie is on the phone..he don't give a SH..T!. This is not important to him...since he was never a smoker..he doesn't understand..that...that friend that we make in a little box...[PD161-takes box of cigarrette and rubs against her face]...such a good friend..always a dear...got me through a lot of drunken nights..and..who was there for me after sex?..[looks at box of cigarrettes]...I am going to miss you. [Takes one last puff and puts out cigarrette in ashtray]...that's it folks officially last civalet. [Picks up pill from table] Here I go..[puts pill in her mouth and drinks glass of water]...[swallows and makes a face and waves hands] ..I could never swallow pills. [Takes deep breath and screams as she pretends to fall of her chair then sits back up]...I am ok..[smiles]..I am okay.
So.. I'll be posting some blogs and let you know how it's going. You know..I hope this helps other people..if you know..if you really have a hard time quitting you should see your doctor..talk about your options. See what you can do to quit because it is a nasty habit...and..you know...I..I really should have quit a long time ago but..like I said I am a weak human being...[sighs deeply]..and that's it. Hope I can help you all. Smell you later.
Wish me luck!
If any of you have any positive input
or care to quit along with me
Make a video response
or comment
I can use all the support I can get!!