My neighbor said my compost smelled like a 'wet dog in a gym bag' and I had to admit she was right.

I was just piling scraps in a bucket under the sink for a week. She told me to add a handful of shredded paper every other day and it fixed the smell in 48 hours. Anyone else have a simple fix that saved their setup?

The difference a proper gravel base made on a job in Bend last month

We did a 200 foot cedar fence line where the first 50 feet had the old, shallow gravel base from the last fence. The new 150 feet got a full 4 inch deep layer of 3/4 minus gravel packed down. After the first big rain, the old section was already leaning, but the new part was solid as a rock. Has anyone else seen a problem that clear from just changing the base prep?

Overheard a guy at the scrap yard say he never quenches railroad spikes

He was picking through a pile and told his buddy he just lets them cool in the air. I tried it on a spike I was turning into a bottle opener last week. The steel stayed a lot easier to work with for the scroll work, and it still hardened up fine for the hook part after a second heat. Anyone else skip the water or oil for certain projects?

Had to choose between two AI tools for writing our weekly email. Picked the cheaper one and it's been a mess.

Warning: I think my thrift store hard drive has a dead person's vacation on it

I picked up a cheap external drive at a Goodwill in Eugene last week, just to see what was on it. It's full of home videos from what looks like a family trip to the Oregon coast in the late 90s. The thing is, the guy filming talks to the camera like he's making a video will, giving advice to his grandkids. It feels really personal and heavy. I don't know what to do with it now, do you just delete stuff like that?

My 'volunteer' tomato plant went from a sad sprout to a total monster in one summer

Last spring, I found a tiny, pale tomato seedling growing in a crack in my driveway gravel. I felt bad for it, so I scooped it up and stuck it in a spare pot with some old dirt, not expecting much. For two months, it just sat there, maybe six inches tall with two sad leaves. Then, around the 4th of July, it just took off. It grew over three feet in a month, completely taking over the corner of my patio. I have no idea what variety it is, but it's now covered in these weird, lumpy pink tomatoes. The only thing I did was start dumping my used coffee grounds around its base in June. Has anyone else had a 'runt' plant explode like that after adding something simple?

Talked to a salvage diver about using a carabiner as a quick-release for a tool bag.

He said he clips his bag to a D-ring on his harness, but runs the strap through the carabiner's gate, not the solid side. If it snags, a hard pull opens the gate and frees it. Anyone rig a similar quick-release for gear down south?

Found a perfect piece of driftwood on the Oregon coast last month, spent three days cleaning it, and my cat knocked it off the shelf this morning.

My uncle told me to never buy a VHS tape with a blank label

He said it was always just a recorded over mess, but I grabbed one from a bin in Toledo for 50 cents anyway. It had a perfect, unedited 1987 local news segment about a pie eating contest that got rained out. What's the best totally random thing you've found on a tape someone else gave up on?

Trying to load my first roll of 35mm took me 45 minutes

The film leader kept slipping out of the take-up spool, and I was too scared to open the back to check. Any tricks to get it to catch on the first try?