DIY: Unclogging your drain safely

Lets face it. We’re not even close to the first people to ever use the bathroom we now live with. With that comes many semesters worth of people’s hair that have built up over time. If you’re drain take a long time to empty out, this is likely the reason. 

Heres an easy way to get rid of that disgusting buildup without using those corrosive, harmful, dangerous chemicals like draino, which can permanently damage our buildings pluming system.

Pour 1/2 cup of baking soda down the drain, followed by 1/2 cup of white vinegar. This will create an acidic reaction much like your elementary school volcano science project, eating away at whatever is down in the pipes. Then followup with a cup of lemon juice or diluted lemon juice extract to help neutralize any odours that might emanate from your drain cleaning. That’s it!

We also like to use the baking soda and white vinegar solution on the sink itself, as this simple formula is an effective limescale and scuff marks remover when used with a sponge.

via Apartment Therapy

If its really bad, and this doesn’t seem to work, you can always submit a work order via FCM Here.

-Nick

DIY: Calling for Reader Submissions!

Inspired to re-organize your desk or kitchen and want to tell the world? If you’re proud of something you’ve done to make your room at 2nd Street Residence Hall look or feel like a better place, shoot me a photo, and a basic description of what you did and how you did it Here. Before and afters would be particularly awesome!

-Nick

DIY: Wall Art Anyone Can Make

“Art can be expensive, especially art large enough to fill up big blank walls. Luckily for those of us with much more time than money, it is very easy to create art yourself that looks great and won’t break the bank. Best of all, even if you think you don’t have an artistic bone if your body you can still create some pretty beautiful pieces with a little creativity and the some basic materials. Here are 10 great looking wall art ideas from around the web that are simple enough that anyone can do, no matter your artistic ability.”

For the image above:

 We made a painting this weekend! We’ve been wanting a large scale art-piece to go up on our dining room wall. We had a large framed photograph up but, at 26″ x 32″, it didn’t have the right scale for the room. We wanted to go big. Like, 60″ x 36″ big. Now the last time either of us did any painting was in art school. Back then we didn’t enjoy it much, mostly because neither of us were particularly good at it. Undeterred, we gave it a try. Things tend to be more enjoyable when you do it yourself and it turned out to be a lot of fun.

Inspired by color field paintings, I made a sketch in Illustrator and we tried different color combinations til we were happy. Then it was off to the local art store to buy the acrylic paint, the canvas and some 1/4″ painters tape. A few hours later, we were done and it was up on the wall. We’re enjoying it. It’s the bold, large-scale signature piece the room has been waiting for. We call the piece………“Untitled.”

Click here to see more examples from Apartment Therapy.

-Nick

DIY: keeping your workspace clear.

Hey here are a few great tips I found from another blog.

Get rid of pens and pencils you don’t need. – I have one type of pen I like to use, but every month or my pencil holder gets filled up with other random writing instruments. If you aren’t going to use it, don’t feel bad about throwing it out. It is just clutter.  The less clutter you have, the closer you are to having an organized desk.

Have a place for pocket stuff. Your keys, phone, PDA, wallet, bluetooth ear piece, etc. should have a home. My ideal setup is to keep them in a drawer with wires already run for charging the various items. Unfortunately my current desk doesn’t have drawers, so I have set aside a small amount of space under my monitor that isn’t really usable for work anyway. I have all my charging cables right there so I don’t have to hunt for them

Move electronics out of sight. Your cable modem, wireless router, firewall, battery backup, etc. shouldn’t be on your desk. Even if you have enough room in introduces visual clutter. Once again, cutting down on clutter reduces the amount of work between a messy desk and an organized desk. This organizational tip can go a long ways toward making your desk and office a much nicer place to work

Scratch notepad. During the course of the day, you will have telephone numbers, names, addresses, order confirmations, flight numbers, etc. If you can keep these all in one place, you’ll be far more productive if you need to look something up later. I have the bad habit of grabbing a nearby envelope and writing a telephone number on it. By keeping a notebook, specifically for these types of items, I don’t lose nearly as many things. The Franklin Planner method is to keep all of this info in the diary page of the planner which is probably an even better option

Lighting. Make sure you have enough light on your desk. Maybe it is just me, but a bright work area is easier to keep clean than a dark one

Organize as you go. You should be constantly working on keeping your desk neat. If it gets disorganized in the middle of a big project, take small steps. Clear a 1 foot by 1 foot area before you leave for the day. Make a small effort toward organization may not seem like much, but if you do it everyday, it will keep things headed in the right direction for you.

Read more Here 

-Nick

DIY: Dorm Edition

So this “dorm” room belongs to nyu freshman, and movie star Dakota Fanning.  So we may not all have $8,400 a month to blow on a gorgeous NoLita loft, and us real people have to make do with what we have. NYU residence halls are definitely not too shabby compared to most dorms across the nation, but living in New York City definitely does require a sacrifice of space.

How do we make the best of it? Our own personal spaces affect us psychologically more than we realize, and I know sometimes my entire week can be thrown off if I am constantly having to climb over my chair to get to the bathroom. Having a clear, clean space is important for our wellbeing and productivity. 

This week, I’ll be posting every day with some tips and tricks to making the most of your space, and instructions on some DIY techniques that won’t break the bank, or take hours out of your day.

Stay Tuned!

-Nick

Design Your Own EXPLORATIONS Floor

(Info Session: Wed. 11/09 @ 8PM // 2nd Street E-Lounge (basement)