Twitter and Tumblr make it easy to be completely unfiltered in a very public way. If you're going to rant hard on a subject that you feel passionately about, feel free to do it, but don't post it online until you've had a chance to think about it for a while. Good rule of thumb: give it 24 hours. If you still feel the same way about the issue, and just as passionately, and are willing to stand behind it if you're called into question, post it. If you were called onto national television and asked to defend your opinion, would you want to do it? If the answer is no, you might think twice about posting it for all the world to see online. Ever see the video of protesters holding anti-Socialism signs who are asked to define Socialism, and can't? You don't want to be them. You'll be on a fast-track to embarrassing yourself if you go out and start ranting about an issue you know nothing about. Get smart before you start making noise. Again, it can't be stressed enough, if you're not informed about a particular issue, we don't need your opinion about it. Keep it to yourself. Ad-hominem attacks are directed at the character of a particular person, not the work or the words that came from that person. It's a good idea to mock the creator of "Two and a Half Men" for the terrible show he's responsible for, but not because "he has a dumb face and bad clothes." That doesn't have anything to do with the subject at hand. Avoid the temptation to attack the character. . Your rant has to make sense, even if it's running on its passion. Be familiar with the basics of creating an argument and sustain it with good points and logic, or your rant will fall apart. Every argument should include: A clear thesis Supporting evidence Good examples Warrants and backing logic A summary or conclusion It's important that you save a good rant for something that you're going to be able to dismantle with surgical precision, not something that just rubs you the wrong way and which you feel like making noise about. The bus was late again? Ok, so what? If you can answer that question with a good example, that it made everyone on your bus late for work, say, then you've got a good rant on your hands. If the only consequence is that it took you five minutes more to get to the coffee shop, save it. Four-letter words are like cayenne pepper: they can add a little spice to a dish, but nobody wants to eat fistfuls of the stuff. If you do decide to throw in a couple of curse-bombs into your rant, make them count, don't make them the center of attention.

Summary: Let it sit before you make it public. Address the issue from an intelligent point of view. Don't make it personal. Avoid logical fallacies Don't rant just to rant. Keep it as clean as possible.

Keep lists of needs that will require a trip and try to accomplish multiple objectives with each. This will not increase your fuel mileage (the number of miles your car moves for each gallon of gas), but it will help you drive less (which, in turn, means you use less gas). Take the route with the fewest stops and turns and least traffic. Take highways in preference to city streets when possible. Put it in a spreadsheet. It will keep you focused, and other methods are inaccurate; you will never know for sure if you're saving fuel, wasting fuel or just seeing errors from gas pumps that stop pumping at different points, or fractions of miles being dropped off your 'trip' odometer when you reset it.

Summary: Plan your trips. Plan your route carefully. Maintain a log over time of how many miles you go (the main odometer) and how much gas you put in (from the gas pump, including fractions).

Practically any grain, nut, or seed can be turned into flour. Try exotic items such as quinoa, popcorn, acorns, and peas to the more traditional options like rice, wheat, oats, and barley. Fresh, whole wheat berries, rye berries, whole oats and the like can often be found at health food stores, sold in bulk. They'll be white, russet, purple or amber-colored. And it's cheaper by volume than the pre-made stuff, too! Know what kind of flour you want to make. Want whole wheat flour? Get whole wheat berries (they don't look like berries -- that's just what they're called). Want rye flour? Get rye berries. Flour ain't no rocket science! Each kind lends itself to a different use. Spelt, Emmer and Einkorn grains are on the comeback and are healthy versions of wheat, too. For yeast breads, hard red (winter or spring) wheat is best. For breads that don't need yeast (like muffins, pancakes, and waffles), soft white is the standard choice. Spelt, kamut, and triticale work, too. If you'd like to spend hours cranking for your daily forearm workout, you're more than welcome. Or you could throw the seeds/berries/nuts/beans in your blender/food processor/coffee grinder and let it do the work for you. If you do use some sort of electric device, the higher powered it is, the finer your flour will be. The manual mill really has one advantage: It doesn't produce any heat to damage the nutrients of the seeds. Other than that, it just takes a lot of time. The main drawback of electric mills is that they're just mills and they're a bit expensive (your cheapest one is going to run at about a couple hundred bucks). The only downside of using a blender/food processor/coffee grinder is that it may not get you the finest quality of powder ("finest" here meaning like small, not of good quality). It all depends on the specific product you're using.
Summary: Obtain your grains, seeds, nuts, beans...something to grind to a pulp. If you're going for wheat flour, know what's best for your cooking needs. Choose your grinding mechanism.