The other day, I went to El Pollo Loco and had their chicken quesadillas with avocado salsa verde. It was delicious, so I sought out how to make a healthy version at home using my air fryer. Though my version doesn’t taste as good as El Pollo Loco’s, it’s healthier, still tastes pretty good, and is much cheaper. For the salsa, I found one that tastes almost the same as El Pollo Loco’s. Here’s my recipe.
Most of the time, stud finders are sufficient to tell you what’s behind some drywall since most drywall just has 2×4 wood studs behind it. But what if you’re still unsure of what’s really behind some drywall. Here’s a simple way to visually peek behind drywall without making a mess or giving yourself a lot of work.
Note: When the joint compound dries, it will become very hard, and you can probably stick a nail or screw in it to hang something. For a one-inch hole, to keep things simple, I didn’t use any joint tape, and this method worked just fine without it.
Chicken sandwiches are very common at fast-food restaurants. They taste good, but you have to drive there, wait in line, and pay between $4 to $6 for just one sandwich. In this post, I share a better chicken sandwich that only takes literally 3 minutes to make at home. First, let’s take a look at some popular fast-food chicken sandwiches.
KFC’s Chicken Sandwich – $3.99
Popeye’s Chicken Sandwich – $5.99
McDonald’s McChicken – ~$4
McDonald’s McCrispy – ~$5
Burger King’s Royal Crispy Chicken – $8
Chick-fil-A® Chicken Sandwich – $6.59
Note: all of the sandwiches above look good in the marketing pictures, but when you get them, they don’t always look that great.
Now, here’s my recipe for a better and healthier chicken sandwich that only takes 3 minutes to make at home.
Panini sandwiches are usually made with a panini press, but I’ve found that using an air fryer is easier and better. Here’s how to make a turkey and cheese panini sandwich in an air fryer.
Ingredients
2 slices of turkey
2 slices of mozzarella cheese
2 slices of bread (sourdough, etc)
mayo
Instructions
Preheat the air fryer to 400 F
Spread mayo on one side of each slice of bread
Assemble the sandwich as follows
Bread slice (mayo on outside)
Turkey slice
Cheese slices
Turkey slice
Bread slice (mayo on outside)
When the air fryer is preheated, set the time to 10 minutes and place the sandwich inside
After 5 minutes, flip the sandwich
Increase or decrease the frying time to suit
Here are some ingredient options for making different panini sandwiches. The ingredients are listed in the order of the sandwich layers.
Meatball and cheese panini
mayo
bread slice
meatballs cut in half
pizza sauce
mozzarella cheese slices
bread slices
mayo
Chicken and cheese panini
mayo
bread slice
grilled chicken strips or sliced lightly breaded chicken breast
pesto sauce
roasted tomato
mozzarella cheese slices
bread
mayo
Turkey and cheese panini
mayo
bread slice
turkey slice
cheese slices
tomato slices
turkey slice
bread
mayo
BBQ chicken and cheese panini
mayo
bread slice
cheese slice
shredded chicken
bbq sauce
bread
mayo
Kebab and cheese panini
mayo
bread slice
cheese slice
kebabs
tzatziki sauce
tomato
bread
mayo
Beef brisket and cheese panini
mayo
bread slice
cheese slice
beef brisket
bread
mayo
Corned beef and cheese panini
mayo
bread slice
cheese slice
corned beef
bread
mayo
Following are different types of pre-cooked meat you can put in your panini and their prices.
$13 / lb at Costco$10 / lb at Costco$8.48 / lb at Costco$13 / lb at Costco$14 / lb at Costco$6 / lb at Costco$3.32 / lb at Costco$12 / lb at Costco$5.60 / lb
I recently picked up an e-scooter and have been having fun scooting around on it. Now, I want to explore more places and make animated route maps. To do this easily, and to film my rides, I’ve come up with the following setup and process.
The Scooter (and accessories)
I have the HiBoy S2 electric scooter with seat.
I strapped a 10′-selfie stick to the back so I can take footage like this.
I used two short ratchet straps.
I installed this U-bolt mount on the handlebar to mount another selfie stick to get footage from the side like this.
and like this
depending on the angle and length of the stick.
Here’s what the U-bolt mount looks like.
For the camera, I use the Insta360 X5. Since it’s a 360-degree camera, it can capture everything around you.
Make sure to get a handlebar phone mount, like the one below, so you can easily see turn-by-turn directions on your phone.
Next time, I might get this more powerful scooter instead.
Create a Bike Route
To create a bike route, I like to use the Ride With GPS website. Create a free account and then click “Plan a Route”. By default, you will see something like this.
I like to change the map from “RWGPS” to “Google Map”.
Let’s say we want to create a bike route in Golden Gate Park. Type “Golden Gate Park” in the “Location” field and choose one of the matches.
The map will show a location in Golden Gate Park.
Check “Bike Paths”.
You should now see a bunch of dark green lines representing bike paths.
Let’s start the bike route at the Conservatory of Flowers. Search for it in the location field. A popup will appear on its location on the map. Click “Start route here”.
There’s a legend showing you the various surfaces. Paved trails are solid. Unpaved trails are dotted. Plain trails are unknown.
Let’s ride from the Conservatory of Flowers to Rideout Fountain. Click on a path by the Rideout Fountain. RideWithGPS will automatically create a travel segment following paved bike trails between those two locations.
If you make a mistake, you can click the left arrow to undo your changes.
Now, let’s go to the Music Concourse and the Japanese Tea Garden. Click on the paths near those locations to continue the route.
Since there is no direct path from the Music Concourse to the Japanese Tea Garden, Ride With GPS shows the route going backward a bit before making a U-turn to head to the Japanese Tea Garden.
Now, let’s ride around Blue Heron Lake and across Strawberry Hill. Click on points along paths where you want to go. This is what I came up with.
Now, let’s see if we can ride through the San Francisco Botanical Garden. Click on points on various paths where you want to ride your bike/scooter. Since the bike paths aren’t all connected, the following is what Ride With GPS gave me.
Now, let’s ride to the California Academy of Sciences and then head back to the starting point (the Conservatory of Flowers). This is what I got.
Click Save and name the route.
Click “View Route”. You will see the entire route, the elevation, and the total distance (4.1 miles).
You’ll also see the distance and percentage on paved and unpaved trails.
You’ll also see the cuesheet, showing turn-by-turn directions.
Create an animated route video in AvoMap
In Ride With GPS, click “Export GPX File” and download the .gpx file.
Go to AvoMap.com, create a free account and log in. You can create a video by specifying waypoints, or you can upload a GPS file. Since we already created a route and we have a GPX file, click “Upload GPS File” and select the .gpx file you just downloaded from Ride With GPS.
You should see something like this.
Now, on the left, you can adjust various settings, e.g.
change units from metric to imperial
enable “Dynamic camera”
add “Fly-in” animation with a duration of 8 seconds, a zoom level of 100 km
add “Fly-out” animation with a duration of 8 seconds, a zoom level of 100 km
“Traveled Distance” activated
Elevation enabled with “Chart background” disabled
If you buy credits, you can export the video, which would look something like this.
Get Turn-By-Turn Directions
When you’re about to go on your ride, you can get turn-by-turn directions using the Ride With GPS mobile app. However, this is a paid feature. If you don’t ride often, you can buy the monthly subscription for $10 a month and just cancel before the end of the first month.
Recording Your Ride’s GPS Data
When you ride, you may not necessarily follow your planned route. If you’d like to track your actual route taken, you can record your GPS data live while you’re riding. You can do this with the paid version of the Ride With GPS mobile app or with the free Geo Tracker Android app. Just tap the red record button to start logging your GPS data, including while the app is running in the background. When you’re done, tap again to stop recording. You can then export the GPS data in GPX format, which you can then import into AvoMap to create a video.
Convert a Google Map to GPX
If you want to create a travel route using Google Maps and then make a video in AvoMap using the Google Maps route, just create directions in Google Maps, optionally with multiple stops, and then copy and paste the URL into https://mapstogpx.com/. Download the GPX file and upload it to AvoMap.
E-scooter Riding Laws in California
Must have a driver’s license
May not ride on any sidewalks
Must ride on designated bike lanes
May ride on car roads where the speed limit is < 25 mph
E-scooters are not allowed on the Golden Gate Bridge, but e-bikes are allowed on both sidewalks.
E-scooters are allowed only on designated bike paths in Yosemite National Park, whereas e-bikes can be used on both bike paths and park roads. Learn more
Note: if you cook the rice wrong, it will come out mushy. Carefully follow the rice-cooking instructions if you want the rice to come out good.
Place the rice in a fine-mesh sieve or colander and rinse under cool running water. Gently stir the rice as you rinse. Keep rinsing until the water runs clear. This is critical for removing excess surface starch, which is the primary cause of gummy or mushy rice.
Put the rice in a deep pan.
Add the water to the pan and lay the rice out evenly. Note that adding too much water will make the rice mushy.
Cook on medium until the water boils.
Cover the pan with a lid, reduce the heat to low, and simmer the rice for 15 minutes or until all the water is gone.
Turn off the heat and let the rice rest for 10 minutes with the lid still on.
After resting, gently fluff the rice with a fork to break up any clumps and create individual, separate grains. Avoid stirring the rice while it’s very hot and moist, as this can cause it to break apart and become mushy.
Add chopped green onion, cilantro, and the seasoning paste to the rice and mix.
Cook 2 eggs (I prefer sunny side up)
Transfer the rice to a plate, put the eggs on top, and garnish with some chopped cilantro.
Add slices of cucumber and tomato to the plate.
Enjoy
The rice while cookingThe cooked rice (notice it’s not mushy)The rice after adding green onion and the seasoning paste
One of the concrete slabs (7′ x 8′ x 3″) by my driveway was cracked and sunken. The previous owner created the slab and didn’t include rebar. I paid someone $75 to break the slab into small chucks.
He used my jackhammer to break the slab, which you can buy on Amazon for $140.
I then rented a box truck from Home Depot for $29 / 75 minutes and took the concrete to GreenWaste. The cost to dump the concrete was $54.
Here’s how the space looked after removing the concrete. I would need about 0.5 cubic yards of concrete.
If I wanted to pay a concrete supplier like EZ-MIX CONCRETE to deliver pre-mixed concrete by truck, it would have cost me about $600 because they charge a minimum of 2 cubic yards.
I posted an RFQ on Yelp and Thumbtack and got the following quotes for both labor and materials:
Contractor 1: $1200
Contractor 2: $950
Contractor 3: $800
Contractor 3 happened to live 2 blocks from me. I chose him because he showed me the sample concrete work he had done, which looked very good, and his quote was the most reasonable. He went to Home Depot to buy rebar and about 35 bags of 60 lb concrete.
According to Home Depot, the concrete cost would be about $160 + tax, which includes 10% extra concrete.
There were 3 workers who came at 7 AM to start the project. First, they cut the rebar using an angle grinder and laid it down.
They then mixed the concrete with water in a wheelbarrow by hand using small shovels.
They should have just used an electric mixer to make mixing easy.
They then used a rake and a long bar to push and even out the wet concrete.
They then used a rough float to even out the surface.
They then used a large float to smoothen the surface.
Cypress trees are fast-growing, tall, narrow, evergreen trees.
They look nice, but if they grow too tall and it’s very windy, they can become a liability if they fall and damage your or someone else’s property. Unless they’re located far from where they can cause damage, the safe thing to do is to cut them short. If you wait too long, cutting the top off can be difficult and expensive. For example, in the video below, you can see one person on a ladder cutting the tree trunk on one side and two people on the ground holding and pulling a rope tied to the top part of the tree to ensure the tree falls away from damaging anything.
Cutting tall Cypress trees can be expensive. For that reason, it’s best to cut these trees before they get too tall. For example, I have 6 Cypress trees in my backyard. I was able to cut them so they were about 10′ tall. I rented a 14′ A-frame ladder from Home Depot and strapped it to the roof rack of my car using heavy-duty ratchet straps.
If the trunk was too difficult to cut with the sawzall, I’d use my Ryobi 40V HP Brushless 14 in. Battery Chainsaw. Cutting the trunk with this chainsaw was easy but a bit dangerous as you had to hold it with two hands due to its size and weight, unlike the one-handed compact sawzall.
To be safe, you can have someone hold the ladder while you’re up on it or strap the ladder to the tree or a nearby fence to prevent it from falling over.
To eliminate maintenance and water costs, I replaced my front yard with rocks and 6 Cypress trees. The front yard slopes away from the house toward the street. Since I don’t need to water any plants or trees (the Cypress trees can survive off of rainwater in the Winter), I put down 20-mil thick pond liner. Where two pieces of pond liner meet, I overlap them by 12 inches.
Along the perimeter, I screwed 2x4s into the sides of the concrete using concrete screws. I stapled the pond liner to the 2x4s along the perimeter and then screwed 1.5″ x 1.5″ brown drip edge to prevent weeds from sneaking their way up along the crevices.
If one of your edges is not a standard concrete slab, you may install a short retaining wall. In my case, I made a wall using 12″ wide pressure-treated wood that I held in place using metal stakes. I used brown deck screws that were designed for exterior use to minimize rust and corrosion.
I should have placed the pond liner under the wood before securing the wood in place. Since I didn’t do that, I stapled the pond liner to the side of the wood and then screwed thin wood wrapped in brown plastic (bender board) over the pond liner and into the wood. That should prevent weeds from growing between the wood retaining wall and the pond liner.
