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Summer is almost over and if you’re single you may be dangerously close to not having a summer fling. Summer flings are the best and make summer extra awesome and they give you something to daydream about in the Fall. Never fear, the Edukatorz are here and will tell you how to get that summer fling in the next few weeks before it is too late.

1) Go to the Beach

Go to the beach, preferably a beach house. If you’re young and single, it should be fairly easy to find a summer fling. If the cast of the Jersey Shore can find flings, you can too. If you mix sand, pools, bathing suits and booze you’ll find your summer honey. Besides, if you’re lucky this other person will live in another city and you’ll have a story to tell your friends about the girl/boy you got to snuggle with late into the night while on vacation. Read the rest of this entry →

In April, SXSW marks the start of the US music festival season, something that continues through the hot summer months with events like Lollapalooza and deep into the fall with Treasure Island Music Festival. Animal has returned and is here to tell you how to make the most of your music festival experience.

Be prepared. This is the number one rule for attending a music festival. Or really anything in life. It’s not hard. You’re excited to be there, why not set yourself up to make the most of it?

Most of the subsequent tips really stem from just being prepared.

Check the weather and dress accordingly. When attending music festivals, we are usually traveling or in a new place we’re not quite sure of. It’s really easy to think that San Francisco is going to be warm, sunny, and beautiful during the month of August but that’s just not the case. In fact, it’s usually foggy, dreary, and in the low 60s. The same goes with swings in weather. Is there chance of a thunderstorm in that muggy New York heat for Electric Zoo? You’re gonna want to dress light but probably avoid cotton because as soon as that storm moves in and you’re soaked from head to toe, there’s no relief besides getting naked. Read the rest of this entry →

We’re like two years late on this post, but people* still are using Twitter incorrectly and are cluttering up our stream with their nonsense. Below are some do’s and don’ts for using the service in a way that people won’t hate you.

Do be funny and interesting.

You only have 140 characters to work with so make the best of it. People will be even MORE impressed with your wittiness. People won’t want to follow you if you’re boring.

Don’t over retweet.

The occasional retweet without comment is fine, 10 in a row is ridiculous and you’re just going to get ignored (unless you’re @acarvin or @antderosa). Retweeting is fine if you’re adding a funny comment or furthering the conversation. A gazillion retweets does nothing for me. Read the rest of this entry →

Marion Barry - former mayor of DC and current Councilmember. He can get reelected, but Mayor Fenty can't.

As you (may) know, the East Coast half of the Edukatorz lives in the fair District of Columbia. Yesterday we had our primary election, but since it’s virtually impossible to get elected as a Republican in DC (except for the non-Democratic seats on the City Council that’s mandated by law) the primary is the de facto election. The current mayor, Adrian Fenty, lost by a lot. It’s kind of strange that he lost because by all accounts he was doing a good job: public schools were doing better, food carts were deregulated and government in general was less corrupt and more responsive.  If the city is doing so awesome why wouldn’t the mayor be reelected? This is a city that will reelect a crack-head (no, literally a crack-head) to public office. Instead of going into nitty gritty we’ll give you the easy three ways to lose a mayoral race in DC, feel free to apply to other cities or elections if you too would like to lose a race.
Read the rest of this entry →

(via mobilehornet.com)

Cell phones and smart phones are awesome and we don’t know what we’d do without them*, but alas they are not waterproof yet (GET ON THAT ENGINEERS). We’ve gotten various phones over the years wet in a variety of pedestrian and odd ways. Fortunately we didn’t have to go out and get a new phone every time we got it wet.

Take it Apart

Take the battery and SIM card out of your phone. You don’t want to fry anything so it’s important to minimize the amount of battery and water contact. Also, it’s pretty likely that the SIM card will survive it’s unexpected bath if taken out of the phone immediately.

Don’t Use a Hair Dryer

You want to remove the water from your phone, but you don’t want to fry it. Under no circumstances are you to use a hair dryer, microwave, oven or anything that produces heat to dry your phone. Instead get some compressed air or a shop vac and try to remove the water that way.

Put it in Rice

You want to dry out your phone as quickly as possible so put it in a bowl of raw rice overnight and it’ll dry out your phone. It is important you wait until the next morning or an equivalent amount of time for your phone to completely dry out.

See if it Works

Put it back together and see if your phone works again.

*No really. It’s hard for me to think back to pre-cell phone times.

The Edukatorz read the Internet daily (and not just TGRIOnline and Twitter), so we come upon a lot of crap, including this Wall Street Journal blogpost about living cheaply in a new city.* It’s clearly written by a marketing zombie and anyone with half a brain cell pretty much knows the ‘advice’ they’ve spewing off. With Fall approaching it seems like many are off moving to new cities so it seems appropriate to give some tips living cheaply in a new town or any town really.

1) Find a Neighborhood Bar

We realize not drinking is simply out of the question so we humbly suggest finding a neighborhood watering hole. Not only is it a great way to meet new people and make friends, but if you befriend the bartender a lot of those drinks are going to slide off the bill. Bonus points if you can find a neighborhood bar with wi-fi so you don’t have to pay for the Internet either.

2) Use the Interwebs**

Well use the Internet for more than just Twitter/FB, pr0n, Edukatorz and GChat. While hanging out at the neighborhood bar is awesome, you can’t do it all the time (well you can…) so you’ll have to figure out other things to do. If you don’t want to be antisocial in your off time we recommend finding a few local blogs that advertise events and read them. In any big city (and some smaller ones) there are bound to be at least a few free or inexpensive events.

3) Don’t be Boring

Look, you don’t have to spend money to have a good time or at least very little of it. Boring people are bored and bored people spend a lot of money on crap. Find a hobby or volunteer. At the very least go to the library and check out some books so you’ll be interesting. If you’re really strapped for cash you can still go to DJ nights and shows with small covers, just go sober that night or drink at home/your neighborhood watering hole. Whatever it is you’re in to, there’s a chance it can be done inexpensively, just figure out what it is you dig.

4) Eat Well

Eating out all the time is a huge drain on the old budget so we recommend finding Farmers Markets and small ethnic grocery stores to buy your food from. Not only do they have a better selection than crappy grocery stores and corner stores, but they’re often cheaper if you shop smart. If you make friends with a Farmer they’ll often throw in an extra tomato here and there. You can even finagle you’re way into a job at the Farmers Market and get paid while getting discount produce.

* We generally hate all MSM ‘advice’ and culture stories we read, but we just can’t quit them.
** While this is similar to #5 on their list, our point is to not be lame about it.

We took a mini summer vacation, did you miss us? (Just lie and say you did). Coming back from vacation can be tough. It’s easy to stay in vacation mode and get overwhelmed by everything when you come back. Fortunately there are a few things you can do to get back to business after vacation.

Take Care of Things Before You Leave

This is much easier said than done.* Why bother going on a vacation if you’re going to be super stressed beforehand? But you don’t want to come back to a huge mess either. Prior planning makes coming back from vacation a gazillion times easier.

At work make sure all your bases are covered. Make a list of on going projects and make sure you have a coworker to cover them for you.** Also clean your desk/work area – you don’t want to come back to a mess, it’ll just stress you out.

At home try to make your house/apartment/room as clean as possible (or as it’s going to get) so you don’t come home to a disaster zone. If you have pets and aren’t taking them with you make sure you have arrangements for their care. Same goes for plants or anything else that needs to be taken care of. Make sure everything’s turned of before you leave, you don’t want to stress out thinking about how high your electricity bill is going to be or if you left the oven on.

Ease Back Into a Routine

Mentally shifting from vacation mode to life mode is easy if you took care of things before your vacation. But if you didn’t take care of things or were rushed it can be a bit jolting to have to go back to reality after vacation. There’s no point in going on vacation if you’re going to be more stressed out when you get back then when you left. Don’t try to do everything at once, ease back into a ‘normal’ mentality instead of forcing yourself back into it. Take a few hours at work (if you can) to catch up with what you missed when you were out of the office then begin to tackle projects. At home don’t try to do all the cleaning at once, instead do it piecemeal, etc.

*Like arranging guest bloggers or writing posts ahead of time. Oops.
**Make sure to bring something back/get a small gift for your awesome coworker who was nice enough to cover for you.

Last month we showed you ladies how to pick the correct bathing suit, now it’s the men’s turn. Fortunately for men you have it a little easier as there are less choices out there for you*.

Too old-timey.

1) Swim Briefs or Square Leg Suits

Swim briefs, also referred to as Speedos due to the popular brand, do not look good on everyone, neither do square leg suits (think Daniel Craig’s suit  in Casino Royale). When deciding whether or not wear one of these suits you have to ask yourself a few questions.

a) Am I a competitive swimmer (with the body to match)?

b) Do I play water polo (and have attending hot body)?

c) Am I European (or Australian)?

d) Am I gay who works out a lot and thus has a hot body?

If you answer yes to any of those questions then you are allowed to wear swim briefs. Otherwise move onto something else.

Daniel Craig can wear a Speedo whenever he wants.

2) Boardshorts

Boardshorts are clearly perfect if you’re going surfing and don’t feel like wearing a wet suit. They’re also good if you want a little more coverage with your swimsuit while you’re lounging about. We also like them because they tend to have pockets. They also look good if you’re a little fleshy because since the length of the short detracts from your chest and stomach.  Just try not to get too crazy with the design on your boardshorts, you don’t want to look like an Ed Hardy or Affliction model.

Gross! Just say no to Ed Hardy.

3) Swim Trunks

The old standby. They come in a variety of lengths and colors so you should be able to find the perfect swimsuit for you. Just try not to make it too short. We think a mid-thigh level swim trunk in a neutral color tends to look good on most people. It’s classic and sophisticated.

We like. Image via GQ.

*Clearly we’re focused on beach wear or pool wear and not suits for fitness.

So, I know I’m supposed to be writing about food, but tonight is “Taco Night” at my house.  The last time we had Taco Night, we had to address the question that vexes hosts and hostesses everywhere:

What kind of wine should we have with it?

Now, I know there are about 8 million rules for pairing wine.   No red with fish!  The moon is in Saturn, you cannot drink Beaujolais!  Chardonnay is great with everything!*

I am here to tell you to ignore them all, for two important reasons.  The first is that like most drinking, it’s about enjoyment.  If you want to drink a zinfandel with your American cheese and saltines for dinner, and it makes you happy, by all means, proceed (Personally, I’d question your desire to use American cheese for anything other than melting on a burger, but that’s just me.)

The second is that there are really only 2 basic rules for wine drinking, along with a third that while not mandatory, I find extremely useful.  Here they are:

1)      Mix.

2)      Match.

3)      When in doubt, sparkle.

Allow me to explain.

1) For optimal enjoyment, your wine can mix well with your food, or match it by echoing some of the flavors.  In the case of taco night, we like to mix.  Spicy food demands something sweet to help tame the spice.  In the case of taco night, this means a riesling.  Having some salmon with lemon?  Cut the rich flavor it with a crisp pinot gris.  As with many things in life, balance is key.

2) Onto matching!  By matching, what I really means is select a wine that echoes the flavors in your food.  Having some tilapia** for dinner?  Grab a bottle that echoes those clean flavors- maybe a nice sauvignon blanc?  Pulling a nice NY Strip off the grill? Go for a Shiraz, or another bold, slightly spicy wine.

3) When I worked at a wine bar, we were taught to open champagne bottles silently.  That is lame and completely kills the sense of celebration.  My mom needed no other excuse than “it’s Tuesday, and I’d like something to drink with my popcorn” to open a bottle of champagne.  You don’t either.  When in doubt, it is my deeply held belief that you absolutely cannot go wrong with a bottle of sparkling wine.  If you want to get really fancy, you can use the above two rules when selecting, or you can just pick up a bottle, pop it open, and watch people instantly smile.

I’m sure you’re  also wondering how you’re supposed to determine which wines are spicy or minerally or sweet or what have you.  Head over to your local wine store (here in DC, I especially love Ansonia Wines;  AM Wine Shoppe and Cork Market are both good as well) and see what tastings they have.  Talk to the people in the store.  If they’re assholes, find another store.  People who truly love wine are often all too happy to share their knowledge and recommendations with you.

And that’s it.  Taste, taste, taste, mix or match, and when in doubt, get something sparkling.  You’ll be amazed how far those rules will take you.

*- I hate Chardonnay with a passion that I usually reserve for…actually, nope, only chardonnay inspires that level of hatred

Cut. It. Out.

Dave Coulier and awesome are not two words you’d normally put together. He’s no Bob Saget or John Stamos, but Dave Coulier is probably more awesome than you think (though not that awesome).

1) Get Yourself on a Hit Show

No one would have ever heard of Dave Coulier if it wasn’t for Full House. Get onto a family-friendly long running iconic television show and you’re much closer to being awesome.

2) Date Singer-Songwriters

Fun fact: Dave Coulier dated Alanis Morisette and was the inspiration for her song “You Outta Know.” Think about what would’ve happened if Dave Coulier hadn’t of dated the Canadian songstress? We may never have had Jagged Little Pill. Dave’s 15 years older than Alanis Morisette and they started dating when she was 19. Well done Dave.

3) Make Bank off of Kids

Yeah, so Dave makes bank off of kids, he has his own children’s entertainment production company, stars in cartoons and children’s live action shows and has a ‘family friendly’ comedy touring group. So he makes a living being clean and appealing to ankle-biters, not that awesome, but money is awesome.