Helping You Help Yourself #18

feature image via shutterstock

A small trick for sufferers of bruxism and jaw-clenching (like me!): if your jaw is feeling particularly tense, hold your fist just underneath your chin like you’re The Thinker, and then try to open your mouth down into it, so you’re pressing very hard against your fist with your lower jaw but your mouth isn’t actually opening. Hold this for 30 seconds or so, and repeat a few times if you need to — it won’t fix your problem entirely, but it should make your muscles there a little less tense.

Rookie is here to teach you how to clean a grimy bathtub.

Don’t want to give the gift of sustainably-harvested bamboo bowls and silverware packaged in miles of environmentally unfriendly wrapping paper? Here’s how to wrap gifts in fabric.

gift

This week I learned that if your printer is printing things that are faded-looking or patchy even though you have full ink cartridges, it might be because you need to clean the printer heads! If you have one of the fancy modern printers with a screen interface, you can run a maintenance cycle and take care of it without even having to open the printer.

Here is a very comprehensive wikihow on how to avoid talking to people on phones and/or get off the phone with someone. Sort of related, here is “how to torture people who talk loudly on their cell phones in public,” which I have no desire to do but maybe you do?

Do you love meatloaf? Here’s how not to fuck it up.

I googled “why are my succulents dying” to figure out why my succulents keep dying, and found this helpful list! Here are things to keep in mind if you want to keep succulents indoors. Mine are still probably going to die but maybe this will be helpful for next time.

Hen_&_Chicks_(succulent_plant)

Whether you have some backache you want to treat or your girlfriend is just tired of you trying to shove your cold feet underneath her on the couch to warm them up, we could all use a DIY heat pack.

Here is a guide for people who don’t have time to clean their house right now but want their house to look clean.

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Rachel

Originally from Boston, MA, Rachel now lives in the Midwest. Topics dear to her heart include bisexuality, The X-Files and tacos. Her favorite Ciara video is probably "Ride," but if you're only going to watch one, she recommends "Like A Boy." You can follow her on twitter and instagram.

Rachel has written 1142 articles for us.

11 Comments

  1. omg i killed two succulents already and this list is exactly what i needed! also the jaw-clenching is something i’ve noticed i do too so this is so helpful!

  2. I recently had a meatloaf fiasco, where the beef and pork I had bought went bad in two days but I didn’t realize until I was halfway through the recipe and I had to go to the store last minute and the only ground meat they had was turkey!! It was still pretty good but I don’t think I’d recommend it. Now I know why it was kinda weird.

  3. When I first saw the cover picture for this article, I thought it was a picture of a t-rex sticking its head in the dirt like an ostrich.

  4. YES! I was just thinking last night before I fell asleep that I should take a bath this week!!! and that my succulent doesn’t look so good! THANK YOU YET AGAIN RACHEL!! YOU SAVED THE DAY!

    • Update: I just had the most wonderful bath!!!! I havent taken a bath in a REALLY long time!!! It was so perfect!
      and my succulent Rowlf is looking pretty great! I pruned the dead leaves and spruced it up a lot! Thank you <3

  5. It’s the end of the semester, and I’ve been sleeping with my jaw clenched so tightly I’ve been biting my tongue :( I hope doing the jaw relaxation exercise before bed can help.

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