Exercise your ears

We all know that loud noise can damage your hearing - but it seems not enough noise can also impair it. Consequently, people in cities have better hearing than those in quiet villages.

Researchers at the Universtity of Giessen in Germany spent over a decade testing the hearing of some 10,000 people. As expected, people exposed to very loud noises as part of their jobs, such as construction workers, had poor hearing. But those living in quiet rural areas had hearing not much better. And people, including airline pilots or orchestral musicians, who encoutner constant noise at work, could hear very well. Firefighters, whose lives can depened on sounds, had exceptional hearing.

The team concluded that continual exposure actually "trains" the ear to tolerate it; it is sudden, extreme noise that does the damage. Which would explain why Asian villagers, whose quiet lives are punctuated by occasional firework celebrations, have the worst hearing of all. » Continue reading

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NoFollow No More

UPDATE: Since Google does not allow author link in Blogger comments anymore, HashOut does not support nofollow free author links anymore.

I felt that the people commenting on this blog were not really getting their due. The NoFollow attribute which comes by default with the Blogger templates just stifles the incentive to comment. I've thus decided to remove NoFollow from the comments section. And since my comments are moderated, I have no worries about spam as I can decide what goes live.

Hope that will entice you to comment more and actively participate in the discussions.

For those of you who are interested in removing the NoFollow attribute from the anchor tags in the comments section of your blog but do not know how, here is a simple guide to remove NoFollow from Blogger layouts (only for the new Blogger Layout templates). » Continue reading

Read more on About HashOut, Blogger, Blogger Hacks, Blogging

Time Management at Work

Tricks to get more done in less time, from the clients of US career coach Terry Kozlowski:

Don't overdo overtime. One study found that worker productivity sharply declines after 50 hours a week. Make evening plans to avoid lingering. "When I know I have to leave for a 6:30 gym session, I don't say, "I'll just do that later during the day," says a consulting firm executive.

Schedule even the small stuff. Looming little tasks can add up and distract you, says a website producer. "But when a call is set for 3pm, I forget it and focus on the project at hand."

Take a vacation. The former CEO of an engineering firm, required his staff to use all days off. "They'd return with a fresh perspective -- and ideas."

Master the meeting drain. Use time between meetings for jobs you can finish. "I can't force the concentration for big things," says one business manager. But 15 minutes is perfect for answering email. » Continue reading

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Breakfast for Dessert?

Looking for an after-dinner snack? Try cereal -- it may help you lose weight, say American scientists. Of 58 overweight nighttime snackers, half ate a 150-calories bowl of cereal and low-fat milk at least 90 minutes after dinner; the others ate as usual. After four weeks, the cereal eaters had lost one kilo, and ate 140 calories less than usual after dinner. The others ate 85 calories more. The study was funded by the Kellogg Company, but the researchers say the type of cereal doesn't matter. What does: sticking to the serving size. » Continue reading

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Peanuts for preventing nut allergy

An increasing number of children are allergic to some kind of nut, with potentially fatal consequences. About 20% seem to "grow out of" their allergy in time, though there is a chance the allergy may come back. Now scientists have found this chance can be lowered -- by eating peanuts.

Studying 68 children who had outgrown a peanut allergy, researchers at Johns Hopkins Children's Center in Maryland, USA, found none of those who regularly ate peanut products redeveloped an allergy, whereas those who did have a recurrence had seldom eaten peanuts. This suggests children who've outgrown an allergy should eat peanuts at least once a month, but consult your doctor first. » Continue reading

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Placing AdSense Ads in the middle of Blogger posts

Hackman has an interesting hack to place AdSense ads right in the middle of your blogger posts. In this hack, Hackman places a HTML comment at the desired location in the post body while composing the post. Then using JavaScript he moves the contents before the HTML comment to a blank <div> tag before the AdSense code.

Hackman's hack is meant to work with the classic templates of Blogger. I have tweaked it a little to make it work for the new Blogger (layout) template. Here you go...

Find the <data:post.body/> tag in your new Blogger (layout) template and replace it with (Use copy-paste as some text below might be out of view):

<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'>

<div expr:id='"adsensical" + data:post.id + "start"'></div>

<div style="margin:5px 0 -5px 10px">
<!--PLACE YOUR AD CODE HERE-->
</div>

&lt;div id="adsensical<data:post.id/>end">
&lt;div id="adsensical<data:post.id/>body">
</b:if>
<data:post.body/>
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'>
&lt;/div>
&lt;/div>

<script language="JavaScript">&lt;!--
//AdSensical Place Ads in Middle of Blogger Posts
//By hackman_3vilGuy http://adsensical-adsense.blogspot.com
//hackman {AT}caller {DOT}me {DOT}uk
//Modified for New Blogger (Layout) Template by Aziz (http://hashout.blogspot.com/)
topbit=document.getElementById("adsensical<data:post.id/>start");
bottombit=document.getElementById("adsensical<data:post.id/>end");
s=document.getElementById("adsensical<data:post.id/>body").innerHTML;
var regexIndex=s.search(/&lt;!--adsense-->/igm);
if(regexIndex>0) {topbit.innerHTML=s.substr(0,regexIndex);bottombit.innerHTML=s.substr(regexIndex+14);}
//-->
</script>
</b:if>

Now just replace <!--PLACE YOUR AD CODE HERE--> with your AdSense JavaScript code which you got from AdSense Setup and place <!--adsense--> anywhere within your post where you want the ad to appear (Make sure you insert it in Edit HTML mode).

The above code displays ads only on item (post) pages. If you want to display the ads on main or archive pages also, just remove the <b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'> and </b:if> tags. AdSense will automatically display only the first three ads on the page (in order of its appearance in the HTML) including the ones outside the posts section.

If you do not insert the HTML comment into your post content (HTML), then the ads will appear before the post body, but after the post title.

If you would like to see it working live before you begin implementing it on your blog, take a look here.

Related posts:

• How to place google adsense code on web pages
  
• How to insert Google Adsense ads before or after each post in the new Blogger (Layout) template

» Continue reading

Read more on AdSense, Blogger, Blogger Hacks, Blogging

More reasons to drink tea

Scientists can't stop finding health benefits for tea. Tests at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, suggest that tea, and particularly green tea, may improve your memory and slow the onset of Alzheimer's.

A previous study in Chicago of people prone to tension headaches found that caffeine alone gave as much pain relief as ibuprofen. And a team in Illinois have found that polyphenols in black tea stop plaque forming on your teeth, and reduce the level of cavity-forming acids. » Continue reading

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