If you are anything like me
the thought of going to the giant-mega store to buy a wine was always overwhelming! The the good new is buying a good wine is not as hard as you may think. Here is a little cheat-sheet to help you figure out what you are going to buy on your way to that romantic evening or dinner party. Continue reading
How To
How to Use a Sluice Box
In the early gold 
rush days the sluice box consisted of a simple wooden trough lined with raised obstructions placed at a ninety-degree angle to the flow of the water. These obstructions are what are known as riffels. When all of the gold carrying gravel is “run” through the sluice the water is shut off and the riffels are removed. The heavy materials containing the gold known as concentrates would be gathered. This run would sometimes consist of processing several tons of gold-bearing gravel through the box. Continue reading
How to Bring Wine As a Gift to a Party.
Many people like to pla
y the “what if” scenario, so it’s a good thing to do. What happens if you don’t chill the wine before presenting it to someone? Well, it depends on why you are bringing the wine over. If it is as a hostess gift, it doesn’t matter whether you chill it or not because you are giving it as a gift. The people are likely going to set the wine aside to be enjoyed by them at a later date. If you were to provide it chilled, it is as though you are asking for a portion of your gift and that is rude. Continue reading
How to Stake a Gold Claim
You might be surpr
ised to learn that you can still find gold in the United States. In fact, over 80% of the world’s gold is still yet to be found. I guess once you realize these facts the questions are: Where can I go to find gold? And if I do find gold how can I be sure I get to keep it? Well, there are two likely routes you can go to answer these questions. First, you can join the Gold Prospector’s Association of America (GPAA) then you are entitled to go out and prospect on any of there gold claims or land leases across America. If you are the more adventurous type you can strike out on your own on any of the open public land across the country and try and stake your own claim.
Here is the Idiot’s quick guide on how to find and stake your very own gold claim: Continue reading
The Top Three Things to do as a family in Yosemite with Young Children
As a father of not one but TWO sets of twins 
under the age of ten it is important to find something that we all can enjoy and accomplish when we are in the great out of doors. We as a family of 6 make the trip to Yosemite National Park every year. We have whittled them down to a top three must do events each time we head to camp in the valley.
Continue reading
Where to Look for Gold in a Stream or River
When I first started 
looking into how to find gold I assumed that all of the gold that was there to be found already had been. As it turns out, I was wrong. Really wrong. Less than 10% of all of the world’s gold has been extracted from the earth. That is great news for those of us that still want a chance to go out and find our share. Continue reading
5 Ways to Make the Most Money out of Your Garage Sale
Do you have stuff lying around that you haven’t looked at or touched in the last six months? Do you want to make a few extra bucks? My family and I had a garage sale this last weekend and as I was negotiating with strangers for cash in exchange for my old junk one thing kept running around in my mind. How can I do this better? As soon as the last customer was gone I spoke to all of my friends and family that I know to be garage sale veterans. Here are the 5 most common things that I learned for you so that you don’t have to look like an “Idiot” the next time you want to have a garage sale. Continue reading
The Prepared Idiot 