Wednesday, September 15, 2021

Housing Hunt

Looking For A New Apartment? Here's A Checklist To Help With The Housing Hunt

August 31, 202112:03 AM ET

RUTH TAM

ANDEE TAGLE

19-Minute Listen

Whether it's your first time renting or you're looking to move soon, here are actionable tips and a checklist to help with the hunt for a new home sweet home.

Meredith Miotke for NPR

A house isn't a home just because you pay the rent. It takes research, a disciplined budget and a strong sense of your priorities to find a place where you can feel like yourself.

The process can be time-consuming, expensive and draining. Here are tips if you're planning a thorough search.

Make a wish list

Make a list of all the tangible and intangible things you want in a home.

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Home means something different to all of us, so this list can be pretty personal, says Ronda Kaysen, Ask Real Estate columnist for The New York Times.

"If you have a disability, it might be really, really important that you have a building with an elevator," says Kaysen. "If you are living alone, you may feel more comfortable in a neighborhood where there's more foot traffic at night."

Whatever it is, circle the things that are most important to you so you know what's truly non-negotiable.

Illustration of a large checklist with items to consider before renting. Is the place cat-friendly? Does it fit your budget? A small person with a large pen stands before the checklist looking up at it.

Meredith Miotke for NPR

Schedule a tour

Check out a listing in-person before committing to it. Channel the pickiest person you know and ask the property manager about everything. Checking out properties takes time, so give yourself time to make a thoughtful decision. Kaysen says two months is a great head start. Below is a checklist to keep in mind as you view places. Here's a friendly PDF version that you can print out to take along on your housing hunt.

Rent & Finances

Rent (Any deals?)
Utilities (If they aren't included in rent, what is their average monthly cost?)
Security deposit (How much is owed/is it being held in an interest bearing account?)
Application fee
Move-in fee
Pet fee
Extra fee for amenities? (Do you have to pay more for gym or pool access?)

Utilities & Amenities

Water (How is the water pressure? How long does it take for hot water to flow?)
Electricity/Gas (How are your appliances powered?)
Heating/Cooling (How well will your unit retain warm or cool air?)
Cable/Internet (Which providers service your unit?)
Trash (How often is trash picked up? Is recycling included?)
Laundry (If not in-unit, how do you pay for it?)
Package delivery (Is there a package receiving system?)
Does the kitchen have essential appliances? Fridge, stove, oven, microwave
Does your building have storage options?
Are pets allowed?

Security & Safety

How many secure/unsecure entrances are there to the building or home? (If you enter a code to access your building, how often is it updated?)
Is there a history of pests?
Working smoke detectors, carbon monoxide detectors, fire extinguishers?

Location

How close is the trash room? How close is the elevator?
Is parking included? If not, what are your options for street parking?
How close are you to public transit?
If you work outside the home, how long is your commute?

Working Condition

Do the windows open easily? Do they lock properly? Are the screens in good condition?
Is the paint chipped or peeling?
Are there cracks, stains or bubbles on the wall or ceiling?
Do the lights work?
How many outlets are there and where are they located?
Do the drawers open and close? Are the hinges to cabinets and doors fastened properly?
Is the carpet clean?
Any strange smells?

If you can't see a place in-person, Kaysen suggests doing the tour with a property manager over video call. You can also enlist a friend to check out a place for you in-person and do a call with them.

"Have them show you everything," she says. "Don't just look at the [online] pictures or the prerecorded video."

Mind your budget

In addition to rent, there's utilities and rental insurance to factor in each month. There are also one-time fees like the security deposit, as well as application and move-in fees.

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You can offset these costs by living with roommates or negotiating certain deals. If you negotiate, do your homework and come to the table with facts about the market. Landlords may be more or less open to cutting you a deal depending on what's important to them.

Read the fine print

Don't just eyeball and sign your lease – read it! A lease is a contract between a tenant and landlord and "the guiding principle when you rent an apartment or rent a house," says Johanna Shreve, chief tenant advocate for Washington, D.C.

Keep an eye out for hidden fees. Is there a penalty for breaking your lease early or paying your rent late?

If you're lost in the legalese, Shreve says you should "seek out legal counsel through legal aid or through the bar association in the state that you live in in order to ensure that you understand what you're getting yourself into."

Above all: know your rights as a tenant and understand what you're committing to.

Investigate your landlord and know who to call if things go wrong

Search a landlord online before you sign with them. You can run their name through public search engines or city databases to assess whether their operation is legal and if they have a reputation for fair management.

"You might also want to read reviews online, especially for really big landlord companies," says Kaysen. "You could be a little stalkerish and stand outside the building and find [a current tenant for their opinion]."

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"Find out how the maintenance is handled. Like, if something breaks, who do you call? How do they fix it? Asking these questions will give you a lot of information about how they respond and what kind of landlord you're getting," says Kaysen.

If you think your landlord is trying to take advantage of you, or if they're not making repairs fast enough or responding to an emergency, your city may have a housing department or tenant advocacy group that can help.

Be considerate and communicative

If you live with or near other people, they can make the difference between whether your house feels like a home.

Don't be loud! Don't assume common space is your personal storage space. Introduce yourself to your neighbors and invite them over to your new place.

"Basic kindness toward other people goes a long way," says Kaysen.

The podcast portion of this story was produced by Andee Tagle.

We'd love to hear from you. If you have a good life hack, leave us a voicemail at 202-216-9823, or email us at LifeKit@npr.org. Your tip could appear in an upcoming episode.

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Monday, 14 December 2020

How to Do Pushups

Verywell Fit

How to Do Pushups

Proper Form, Variations, and Common Mistakes

Elizabeth Quinn

Reviewed by

Tara Laferrara, CPT

Updated on April 11, 2020

Targets: Chest, arms, shoulders, core

Level: Beginner

The pushup may just be the perfect exercise that builds both upper-body and core strength. Done properly, it is a compound exercise that uses muscles in the chest, shoulders, triceps, back, abs, and even the legs.

It has many modifications so beginners can start with easier versions and work up to the standard pushup, while you can find a challenging variation if you are advanced. You can do the pushup as part of a bodyweight exercise session, a circuit training workout, or a strength workout.

Benefits

The upper body muscles that come into play in the pushup are the deltoids of the shoulders, the pectoral muscles of the chest, the triceps and biceps of the upper arm, and the erector spinae of the back. The abdominal muscles used to hold the body rigid during the pushup are the rectus abdominis and the transversus abdominis. As the pushup involves multiple joints, it is a compound exercise.1

In daily life, you will often need to push against objects, from doors to shopping carts. The functional fitness you develop with pushups will serve you well. Working the stabilizer muscles around the shoulders can help protect you from rotator cuff injuries. Pushups are also a measure of overall fitness, allowing you to assess whether you need to be doing more to keep your body in good working condition.

Step-by-Step Instructions

Get on the floor on all fours, positioning your hands slightly wider than your shoulders.2
Extend your legs back so that you are balanced on your hands and toes. Keep your body in a straight line from head to toe without sagging in the middle or arching your back. You can position your feet to be close together or a bit wider depending on what is most comfortable for you.
Before you begin any movement, contract your abs and tighten your core by pulling your belly button toward your spine. Keep a tight core throughout the entire pushup.2

Inhale as you slowly bend your elbows and lower yourself until your elbows are at a 90-degree angle.
Exhale as you begin contracting your chest muscles and pushing back up through your hands to the start position. Don't lock out the elbows; keep them slightly bent.

Repeat for as many repetitions as your workout routine requires. If you have to pass a fitness test (such as the Army Physical Fitness Test) you can use a few simple strategies to build your strength and endurance in order to do more pushups. One popular strategy is the "one more pushup a day" approach. This is when on day one you do one push-up, then on day two you do two push-ups, and so on.

Common Mistakes

It is easy to start making errors with pushups if you are fatiguing or if you haven't built enough core strength. Look for these and switch to an easier variation if you can't maintain the best form.

Sagging in the Middle

The most common problem is sagging in the middle, caused by not properly bracing the core and keeping the torso stiff throughout the movement. This is not only bad form, but it can also cause back pain. You can practice with a modified plank exercise to build your core strength. Once you master that, try doing a pushup on your knees, practicing keeping your torso stiff.3

Neck Alignment

Your neck should be in neutral alignment with the head in a straight line with the spine, eyes to the floor, and the top of your head pointed at the opposite wall. If you point your chin up or drop your head so you much that you can see your toes, you are out of alignment.

Locked Elbows

Locking your elbows at the top of the movement is a mistake you might make as you fatigue and want a little rest. But this places too much stress on the joints and can lead to strain or injury. Always keep a slight bend in the elbows. If you are fatigued, it's time to take a rest before doing another set.

Hands Too Far Forward

If your hands are farther out from your body than your shoulders you are placing more strain on your shoulders. While you can vary how close your hands are together to get different effects, they should be under your shoulders.2

Limited Range of Motion

If you are only going down partially with most of your pushups, you aren't getting the full benefit. It is better to switch to an easier modification (such as knee or incline pushups) that you can do with the full range of motion.

Modifications and Variations

Whether you are a beginner or you need more challenges, there is a pushup for you. One of the great things about the pushup is that by varying the exercise you can change the stimulus on your muscle. Beginners can build the strength they need to work up to standard pushups while advanced exercisers can work their muscles in new ways.

Need a Modification?

Try these variations if you need less difficulty:

Incline Pushups: If a standard pushup is too difficult, you can start by doing pushups against a table or bench.3 Stand several feet away from the object. Use the same pushup technique as above to lower yourself until the elbows are 90 degrees, then raise back up. Keep your core tight the whole time.
Bent-Knee Pushups: This is a modified version of the standard pushup performed on the knees rather than on the toes. Be sure to keep the knees, hips, and shoulders all in a straight line. Do not allow yourself to bend at the hips.

Up for a Challenge?

Try these pushup variations for increased difficulty and to work your muscles in different ways.

Stability-Ball Pushups: Add core stability work for increased difficulty and effectiveness. Make sure you can do about 20 basic pushups before trying these.
Pushup Lat Row: This variation adds alternating dumbbell lat rows to the top of each rep. This modification increases the intensity of the exercise, activates the core stabilizers, and engages the latissimus dorsi (back) muscles.
Medicine-Ball Pushup: Perform a standard pushup with one hand on top of a medicine ball. This works the shoulder in a slightly different range of motion which increases shoulder stability.

Alternating Medicine-Ball Pushup: This variation adds core stability as well as a modified range of motion during the basic pushup movement. Roll the medicine ball between each hand after a rep and add a new balance challenge.
Decline Pushups: This is a more difficult pushup, performed with the feet raised up on a box or bench.3 You can adjust the box height to increase or decrease the resistance using just your body weight.
Diamond Pushup: The diamond push up is done with your hands close together and the index fingers and thumbs of one hand touching the other hand and making a diamond shape. You then do pushups with your hands touching the center of your chest and elbows close to your sides during each rep.

Clapping Pushup: This is a plyometric exercise in which you push yourself up with enough power so that your hands come off the floor and you clap in midair. This exercise is not for novice exercisers. You can get injured very easily if you haven't worked up to these one at a time.

Safety and Precautions

You should not do pushups if you have a shoulder, wrist, or elbow injury. Talk to your doctor or physical therapist to see if this is an appropriate exercise. If you want to protect your wrists, you can place your hands on dumbbells or pushup bars to keep them in a neutral position. If you feel shoulder pain during the pushup or hear a clicking noise in your shoulder, end the exercise.

Try It Out

Incorporate this move and similar ones into one of these popular workouts:

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Article Sources

Google Task

The Google Tasks guide—everything you need to build a productive, simple to-do list workflow

By Matthew Guay · November 17, 2020

It's the simplest to-do list app, hidden behind a button in Gmail and Google Calendar. And yet, Google Tasks is one of the most popular to-do lists thanks in part to that simplicity. You don't always need a full project management system to keep track of your work. Sometimes, simpler is better.

Imagine a paper to-do list with a checklist of things you need to do. Perhaps you'd indent some tasks that are part of a larger task; maybe you'd scribble a quick note under a task with more details, or write a due date beside critical tasks.

Digitize that simple to-do list and you've got Google Tasks.

It probably helps, of course, that Google Tasks is built into Gmail and Google Calendar—even if it's a little hidden. Here's how to find Google Tasks—and how to get the most out of it.