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    1. Weekly US politics news and updates thread - week of June 9

      This thread is posted weekly - please try to post all relevant US political content in here, such as news, updates, opinion articles, etc. Extremely significant events may warrant a separate...

      This thread is posted weekly - please try to post all relevant US political content in here, such as news, updates, opinion articles, etc. Extremely significant events may warrant a separate topic, but almost all should be posted in here.

      This is an inherently political thread; please try to avoid antagonistic arguments and bickering matches. Comment threads that devolve into unproductive arguments may be removed so that the overall topic is able to continue.

      18 votes
    2. How do you celebrate your birthday?

      There's nothing I enjoy more than waking up late and going through the day without checking the time, and I make a point to do that for myself every year for my birthday. What sort of gifts do you...

      There's nothing I enjoy more than waking up late and going through the day without checking the time, and I make a point to do that for myself every year for my birthday. What sort of gifts do you give to yourself to celebrate the day?

      35 votes
    3. Save Point: A game deal roundup for the week of June 8

      Add awesome game deals to this topic as they come up over the course of the week! Alternately, ask about a given game deal if you want the community’s opinions: e.g. “What games from this bundle...

      Add awesome game deals to this topic as they come up over the course of the week!

      Alternately, ask about a given game deal if you want the community’s opinions: e.g. “What games from this bundle are most worth my attention?”

      Rules:

      • No grey market sales
      • No affiliate links

      If posting a sale, it is strongly encouraged that you share why you think the available game/games are worthwhile.


      All previous Save Point topics

      If you don’t want to see threads in this series, add save point to your personal tag filters.

      12 votes
    4. Help with ants in the shower!

      So after moving, my new bathroom has some issues. Most pressing of all: my shower has ants. It started with a couple, but it feels like it's gotten progressively worse. I researched this issue and...

      So after moving, my new bathroom has some issues. Most pressing of all: my shower has ants. It started with a couple, but it feels like it's gotten progressively worse.

      I researched this issue and have been spraying my shower with a vinegar/water mixture to kill and hopefully repel them, followed by my mom wiping them up to throw away because the scent of ant corpses will attract more ants. But so far, it hasn't really done anything but kept me from using that shower for a week because of the smell of vinegar.

      I sprayed the shower today, when it had possibly the most ants to date, and mom wiped them all up... And then a few hours later I checked and more ants showed up. Actually I just checked again and there are now like, at LEAST fifteen ants in there. At LEAST. So, the vinegar solution obviously isn't repelling them.

      We're at the end of our patience. Tomorrow we'll be sitting down to do some heavy-duty research together. The potential next step, based on the site where I got the vinegar solution, is to pour baking soda and vinegar into the drain to try to dislodge all the gunk, because I've washed ants down there and that can attract more ants. So, that might be why they won't freaking stay away.

      Relevant vent: why does every single site about killing ants include tons of photos of ants!? I'd closed the site I used and I tried to find it again to link here, but had to stop because the first two sites I checked were full of ant pictures. And I freaking hate bugs and can't stand even looking at photos of them. Or at least, not in this context. I don't want to see MORE ants congregating in strangers' showers, knowing they're in mine already make my skin crawl without having an image of what they might look like at this very moment!!

      So, yeah. Researching this has been very difficult for me, but I need those damn things out of my shower so we don't need to share my mom's. So, I'm open to any advice and solutions you all have!

      Some other relevant information:

      • Here's a photo of my bathroom and the shower. Warning: you might be able to see ants if you zoom in on the close-up of the shower, because they were mostly congregated in that area. Otherwise I would have gotten a better photo of the interior. I saw a lot of advice to touch up caulking, but with the type of shower this is, I'm not sure how relevant caulking really is? The shower is very smooth, almost like the rim of a bathtub.
      • There's a skylight above the shower, which was replaced before we moved in. At the very least, it doesn't leak with water when it rains. So help me, if that's somehow the source of the ants........
      • Related to above: there's no window I can open, and the room is quite small and narrow. So, humidity builds up FAST and I don't really have an effective way to vent it out or anything.
      • I've seen a couple in my sink. Key word: a couple. I think the most I've seen there at one time is two, while the shower can have upwards of... I don't even want to try to guess, honestly.
      • I've seen one or two ants crawling up the wall outside the shower, very low down around the moulding. So their nest may be outside the shower?
      • At this point the number has me half-convinced there's a nest somewhere in the bathroom. Or maybe there's an entrance on the top of the white shower walls/rim where it meets the drywall?? Except I've only ever seen one ant relatively high up one of those walls, they seem to stick near the floor... Either way, the number feels extreme to me given there shouldn't be any real points of entrance besides the door and skylight.
      • Given that articles love attaching revolting photos at multiple points, I'll just ask here if there's any chance they're climbing out of my shower head or the drain. One little fact that prematurely ended my first attempt to research solutions: apparently ants sometime come out of bath faucets. So, yeah.
      • At this point, killing ants is secondary to getting them OUT. We've dealt with ant infestations before, we know how to kill them. But that doesn't help when more of them will show up!! I don't want to deal with this problem forever, or even just seasonally!!l

      Please help, and thanks for taking time to read this!

      16 votes
    5. Help cleaning stains off laminate

      Hi all, hoping you might be able to help me. This seemed like the closest Tildes category to post in. Maybe a year ago, I noticed I had tracked something into my apartment on my shoes and it left...

      Hi all, hoping you might be able to help me. This seemed like the closest Tildes category to post in. Maybe a year ago, I noticed I had tracked something into my apartment on my shoes and it left gunk on the floor. I cleaned as best I could and most of it came off but one major spot stained. Everything I tried wouldn't take it off. Over the last year it darkened and is the darkest spot in the photo.

      I was never able to clean it off or figure out exactly what I got stuck on my shoe to cause it. Until a couple days ago when it happened again. And eventually I put two and two together. There's some type of tree that drops some kind of nut or seed near the parking area and when I walk to my trunk after parking I accidentally stepped in one which smushed into my shoe and tracked into the apartment. I don't know what kind of tree or seed it is, but that's what stained it.

      Now that it's happened again it's even worse and I cannot for the life of me clean this off. I have tried 409, rubbing alcohol, Goo Gone, bleach, hydrogen peroxide and nothing cleans this crap off more than it is in the photo. Even scrubbed it with a sponge scrub pad and nothing. It's a smooth surface so it's not like a chunk I can scrape off, it's just like stained the laminate floor.

      Any suggestions on what else I can use to clean this gunk once and for all without damaging my apartments floor?

      Thanks! Here's the photo: https://imgur.com/a/pQ5hw36

      12 votes