Caulking may sound dirty at first, but is an essential and versatile component used in almost all homes and office buildings all over the world.

The word refers to not just the process, but also the material that is used in sealing up the holes or gaps between joints and seams in both structures and plumbing. This is mostly done using a special chemical sold in cartridges, which is loaded into a caulking gun and applied to the target area.

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Caulking vs. Sealant

Caulking is essentially sealing up holes and gaps in different material, but is a different process from applying sealant. While most people use them interchangeably, they do have a few important differences that you need to keep in mind.

The biggest difference between the two is elasticity – while sealant is specifically used for roofing and is supposed to be waterproof, caulk is more rigid and is used for sealing gaps.

Another difference is in the way they are applied. Caulking is usually sold in cartridges and applied with the use of an apparatus called a caulking gun, while sealant can be directly applied onto the leak from the container.

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Types of Caulk

There are many different types and varieties of caulk, each one with their own specific use. However, they can generally be classified into a few major categories. Some of the most common include:

• Acrylic latex – Also called “painter’s caulk”, this is one of the most common and cheapest types of caulk available, as it is meant to cover small holes and imperfections in surfaces for them to be painted on.
• Acrylic tile sealant – This type of caulking is the type used for sealing up bathroom tiles, and often comes in smaller tubes compared to most types of caulk. Acrylic tile sealant resists both mold and mildew, and will take a few years before the next replacement. 
• Silicone – The best way to seal a shower area or bathtub for good is by using a silicone caulk, which has a longer lifespan and works great on non-porous surfaces. However, it is really difficult to clean off and can have a bad smell when first applied.

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• Asphalt – Though mostly used to seal shingles, flashings, and certain roof areas that aren’t exposed to sunlight, asphalt caulk degrades much faster than butyl when placed directly under the sun.
• Adhesives – Adhesive caulks, also known as “liquid nails”, are used to glue almost any surface regardless of porosity and has an impressive lifespan. Though it can be cleaned up with water, the best way to dissolve it or clean it up is by using a solvent.  
• Fireproof – This specialty caulk is often used for insulation and sealing holes where plumbing or electrical wiring goes through, and contains a retardant that prevents fire from travelling through them.

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While there is a lot of great advice on the internet about what you should and shouldn’t eat, everyone has different dietary habits that work for them, and different people would require different quantities of certain foods in order to be healthy. 

A nutritionist’s main role is to help you achieve optimal physical health by offering information and advice on your food choices as well as how you can make the best ones.

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Here are a few reasons why you should see a registered nutritionist today:

1. You’re looking to lose weight.

If you’re not sure what you need to do to lose the weight even after making the healthy choices yourself, a nutritionist might be able to help you pinpoint the problem and tackle it with a customized diet for your specific needs.

Consulting a nutritionist to help you lose weight also keeps you from using unhealthy weight loss methods and reduce any risk of long-term damage associated with unhealthy weight loss.

A nutritionist can even help you break your habit of binge eating, an unhealthy way for managing stress that ends up in potential health risks if left unchecked (as well as help you find more constructive ways to deal with stress).  

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2. You’re experiencing irregular bowel movements.

Something might be going wrong with your dietary system if you find that you need to visit the restroom more (or even less) than you need to, as most doctors suggest that bowel movements need to happen at least once a day.  

To avoid the problem, consulting a nutritionist to know which foods to eat and which ones to avoid is key. A customized diet that is high in fiber can even help for a much easier, less painful time during restroom visits.

3. You have unexpected food allergies.

These are the foods in particular that make up most of the allergic reactions suffered by about fifteen million people in the world: nuts, milk, shellfish, fish, soy, and wheat.

If you find yourself allergic to food that you previously have had no problem consuming, seeing a nutritionist can help you look for alternative sources of the nutrients found in that particular food.

This is especially true with people who suffer from multiple food allergies, though these cases tend to be uncommon. Sticking to a rotation diet, also called elimination diet, will make sure that you don’t develop more allergic reactions to the remaining foods that you eat.

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4. You’re simply too tired to plan your meals yourself.

Being fatigued at work can drastically decrease your work performance, and this can be caused by a lot of things, such as certain foods. Consulting a nutritionist can help you pinpoint which foods make you feel a certain way so that you can switch to alternatives to feel more energetic.

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You may think that with cleaning every inch of your home to keep it free from dust and dirt, you can make it a safe environment that minimizes the risk of anyone getting sick.

Right? Wrong.

You’ll actually be surprised to hear that it’s not just these areas that germs can make their home in, but that they are so adaptable that they can make their home just about anywhere in your home.

It turns out there are more items that you have that you need to replace regularly in order to keep your home truly clean and germ-free, such as the following:

1. Toothbrushes and towels
Okay, this may be a no-brainer, but do you also know how frequently you need to replace both?

The answer is two to three years for towels, and for toothbrushes, it’s every three months. The reason for both is that because we expose them to water and our own dead cells every day, they can easily be a breeding ground for bacteria.

2. Bar Soap
Bar soaps usually last you up to three years (unless the label specifies an earlier expiry date), and if you don’t use your bar soap frequently, three years can actually be a long time.

You can tell if you need to get rid of your bar sop if you start seeing cracks on it. There’s no need to worry too much, though – there’s a good chance you’ll finish it long before it needs to be replaced.

3. Sponges
Depending on how often you use your sponge to wash dishes, you should get a new one between two and eight weeks.
Be sure to boil or microwave it at least once a week to keep it free from any bacteria between uses. If you have a dishwasher, include the sponge along with the dishes by placing it on the top rack.

4. Pillows and mattresses
Like towels, pillows and mattresses can be a breeding ground for things that can give you a bad night’s sleep.
Other than housing dust mites and bed bugs and collecting dust, they can also warp over time with extended use, which can lead to back and neck pains.

And if you have pets, you’re going to have to replace them a lot sooner than you think, since they’re basically furry magnets that attract all kinds of bugs and creepy crawlies that bite in the night.

5. Toilet Brush/Plunger
And last on the list, but definitely not the least, we have the toilet brush and the plunger – two items that you use on your toilet bowl – which of course also means that they’re guaranteed to be a home for bacteria.

Toss them out and get new ones every three to six months. As with most things, you know they’re going bad when they look that way, and that should be reason enough for you to throw them out.

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The first step to living a healthier lifestyle comes with a conscious effort to make a healthy, productive routine, and the first step to doing that is by turning those bad habits into good habits.

Here are a few that you can start breaking, as well as good habits that you can replace them with instead:

1. Staying Up Too Late
Unless your work has to carry on well into the night (or if you have a passion project that you’re working on), staying up too late staring at a screen can reduce your sleep quality and impact your health in the long run.

Replace With: A pre-sleep routine with slow, deep breathing exercises, dim lighting, and even a few minutes of reading a book before going to bed can help signal your brain that it’s time to go to sleep.

2. Smoking
There’s really no excuse for smoking. It puts you at and the people around you at risk for serious conditions later on in life. However, the good news is that smoking-related conditions are highly preventable.

Replace With: Quitting smoking is not easy, but it can be done. There are a lot of steps you can take, such as drinking more water and cutting off all access to cigarettes and triggers that can tempt you to smoke.

3. Stress Eating
There’s a difference between loving food and binge-eating in that while the former is done out of love for gastronomy, the other is a bad way to cope with stress or deal with emotions, and can easily lead to serious weight gain.

Replace With: There are lots of ways to better handle stress – the first of which is by opening up to someone you can trust about the problems in your life.

4. Binge Drinking
Having a good time with friends isn’t at all a bad thing, and neither is having a drink to unwind after a long day. However, excessive drinking by yourself is never a good thing, and certainly not a good way to cope with stress.

Replace With: There are other, much better ways to handle stress and the negatives in life that come your way – and it all starts by opening up to someone who you can trust.

5. Being Too Negative All the Time
Seeing the negative side of a situation can be a good thing, but when all you do is focus on the negative side, there’s no room left to grow and improve yourself to overcome obstacles and come out as a better person.

Replace With: A more positive attitude starts by consciously trying to find the positive in every negative situation you run into. Be sure to do this for a week.

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Today, electricity plays a major part in our daily lives and everyday endeavors. So much so that when something goes wrong with an electrical system, a lot of work is hindered and we find ourselves considerably inconvenienced. Also, it can be dangerous to deal with damaged electrical wires and cables by yourself, so seeking electrician services will be the most optimal decision to make.

Professional service

You wouldn’t want to install power point switches by yourself without having much knowledge about it. Now you’re asking, “what is a power point switch anyway?” When you hire a certified electrical worker, you won’t have to worry about trying to understand all the complex electricity stuff.

Working on an electrical system is complicated and requires quite the expertise for ensured safety and optimum results. With that, calling a licensed electrician here in Singapore for wire short-circuit help is the safest option you can go for when you experience power failure at home or in your office.

There are also other electricians assigned to specific tasks in the field. Residential linemen, for example, are the ones who establish and maintain electrical lines from power plants to residential and commercial areas. There is also a cabling technician who installs and repairs wires for cable television and internet. This can be good to know when calling an electrician depending on the type of service you need.

Guaranteed safety

Problems with electricity usually involves the power supply, but there can still be many factors otherwise. So, you should avoid tampering with your circuit breakers and other electrical works without decent knowledge and caution.

When you experience power failure at home, it should be a good idea to call for electric services, mainly if you don’t know the cause. Conversely, there must just be a power outage in the residential area you’re in. Still, do not try to do things yourself and mess with the wires without notice from a licensed electrician.

Doing electrical works yourself is never a good idea, unless you are a licensed electrician by profession. If you need to connect electric wires in the building, contact a certified electrical contractor based in Singapore. Meddling with high-voltage components without proper knowledge and experience not only risks further damage to property but to your safety as well.

24/7 services

Having problems with our electricity can literally come at any time of the day, luckily for us, another bonus of having electrical service is that you can call even at the dead of night. Some companies have a 24 hour electrician ready on call. Finding a commercial electrical contractor is also pretty common because they cater to HDB commercial units and some also work around the clock.

Employing a home electric handyman that offers his services round-the-clock will be a very worthy investment. You might be working on an important project at night, and then something suddenly goes wrong with the electricity. Having a trusty electrician to call at crucial times like these can take some burden off your shoulders.

No matter where you live in Singapore, you won’t have to worry about solving electrical problems by yourself. The benefits you get from employing electrician services can far surpass the drawbacks of doing amateur electrical works on your own.

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Transporting shipments from one place to another, whether it’s to import or export goods, is something more than just the shipment, the transport carrier, and the destination – it’s also about how you handle the relationships between them.

This is where a freight forwarding service comes in to make sure your goods are delivered on time while still in good condition.

These are the benefits you can get by choosing a forwarding service for your cargo:

1. Consolidation

With a freight forwarder, you can organise shipment after shipment for your business faster and more easily.
The biggest reason why hiring a transport coordinator for global delivery is cheaper in Singapore is because of cargo consolidation—a type of cargo handling process that lets the freight forwarder combine many smaller deliveries into one large shipment.

This way, cargo is delivered much faster and more cheaply because they are done so “in bulk”, to some extent. If the size of your goods is particularly large, you might just end up paying less in your shipping fees.

2. Insurance

This is one thing you won’t be able to get when you try to approach the shipping company yourself. However, you can easily get this with a freight forwarder.

When it comes to both local and international freight, not only do you have minimal control over have your goods, but the transportation carrier ferrying your shipment may also encounter all kinds of factors that could result in the loss or damage of your cargo.

With a proper logistics service, not only will your cargo be delivered on time but also insured in case of any loss or damage during transportation.

3. Better Documentation

To forward shipment by sea from Singapore is one of the complicated shipping methods you can run into, because of the extensive travel time and the amount of logistics behind it. Plus, proper, extensive documentation can be quite confusing if you don’t know the ropes of how the shipping industry works. Thankfully, your freight forwarding agent will not only take care of your forward shipment by sea, but also the important documents that come along with it, such as the bill of lading.

Freight forwarding services make sure that the paperwork for your cargo is updated and that the different customs fees and requirements are met so that it can reach its destination through the different ports and routes that transport carriers may stop in between.

4. Cost Savings

If there is one thing that you should keep in mind, it’s that hiring a cargo forwarder for your goods will save you a lot of money.

In the world of trade, being able to negotiate everything from prices to shipping routes to temporary warehouse storage is crucial if you want your cargo to be transported to and from Singapore quickly and efficiently. Working with a reliable logistics management allows you to save money from every aspect of your shipment and ensures that your goods will arrive safely and will be stored in a secluded and safe warehouse without costing you much.

With both extensive experience and relationships with air freight and sea freight shipping companies under their belt, forwarders are sure to give you the best discounts and rates that will save you more than you would on your own.

But more importantly, freight forwarding offers you the most valuable resource that’s impossible to buy: time.

What are you waiting for? Schedule an appointment today!

(Disclaimer: this list is compiled in no particular order.)

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Long story short, the answer is yes and no. Japanese animation, or anime, is a different genre from other animated movies and series not only because of its distinct style, but also because its target audience are not just children.

History of Early Anime
The first anime film was released sometime in 1916, but it was only 5 minutes long and the drawings were sketched using chalk that were redrawn in between takes. However, this is still unreliable because early Japanese films in general were stored in reels that were dismantled, and some were also destroyed during earthquakes and bombings. The distinction of the first anime film released commercially goes to Dekobo Shingacho – Meian no Shippai. It was followed by several short anime films that were the works of Junichi Kouchi, Oten Shimokawa, and Seitaro Kitayama.

The use of chalk was not productive, so the animators turned to paper cutouts for silent 2d stop-motion anime. Even then, most of the themes will seem familiar to fans today, such as folk tales and samurai life.

In the 1930s, Kenzo Masaoka produced the first anime with pre-recorded voices called Chikara to Onna no Yo no Naka, about a man having an affair. By 1934, anime was made using cels. So far, all the themes of the old anime were not exactly made for children. Some were even made to sell propaganda and promote the military, although educational themes were also produced. In 1945, the full-length anime film Momotaro: Umi no Shinpei was used to send a message of hope, but it was not until 1958, when an anime film was released outside Japan with the production of Hakujaden.

Anime from 1950s to Present
Osamu Tezuka gained cult status as a mangaka (comic artist) and collaborated with animators to produce Boku no Son Goku. The first female animator gained recognition when she directed Ribon no Kishi, while the first anthology was released in 1960 with the title Mittsu no Hanashi, which consisted of 3 segments.

In 1961, the first regular TV anime series Otogi Manga Calendar was aired, but anime TV series was made famous with the release of Tetsuwan Atom, or more popularly known as Astro Boy. The show set the standards and artwork that most anime still use today, such as the stylized hair and big eyes.

The first romance series, Sennin Buraku, and the first children’s series, Tetsujin 28-Go, were both released in 1963. The first anime for girls, Mahotsukai Sally, was released in 1966, while the first space opera, Uchu Senkan Yamato, was aired in 1974.

The Anime Genres
The anime target audience is divided into 5 groups based on age, namely; Shojo (Young Girl), Seinen (Adult Male), Shonen (Young Boy), Josei (Adult Women), and Kodomomuke (Kids).

These are further subdivided into the following categories:
• Action
• Adventure
• Akuma (Demons)
• Bishounen
• Card/Monster Battle
• Comedy
• Drama
• Ecchi (Erotic)
• Fantasy
• Game
• Harem
• Hentai
• Historical
• Horror
• Idol
• Magical Girl
• Mecha (Robots)
• Romance
• Shonen Ai (Girls’ Love)
• Shoujo Ai (Boys’ Love)
• Yaoi
• Yuri

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Not all migraines exhibit the same symptoms and even those symptoms differ in intensity. What makes migraine so complex, however, is that there is no clear explanation of its causes and even its triggers. Trigger factors, or precipitating factors, are the objects and activities that can cause a migraine attack, but they are not necessarily the cause of the illness itself.

Migraineurs have different triggers, and unfortunately, the only way to determine which factors can trigger an attack is by experiencing it. That is why it’s important to keep track of everything you eat and drink and the activities you perform everyday through a diary.

Common Migraine Triggers
Some of the most common migraine triggers that you should look out for are the following:

1. Stress, anxiety, tension, and shock
2. Caffeine (found in coffee, tea, chocolate, and cola)
3. Exercise (either the lack of exercise or too much exercise)
4. Muscle tension and head injury
5. Dehydration (do not substitute for water sugary drinks or beverages with aspartame)
6. Sleep (either lack of sleep or too much sleep)
7. Changes in routine, environment, weather, and sleeping patterns
8. Hormonal changes in women (some women experience migraine during their monthly period)
9. Exposure to high humidity, flickering lights, glare from lights, loud noises, and high altitude

10. Prolonged exposure to the glare of computer screens
11. Skipping or missing meals
12. Eating too much sugary food
13. Consumption of additives in food such as MSG, aspartame, and nitrates
14. Alcoholic beverages (including wine, which has tannins)
15. Cheese (contains tyramine)
16. Use of oral contraceptives (these induce hormonal changes)
17. Grinding of the teeth (this happens during sleep)
18. Perfume and other strong scents
19. Sexual encounters
20. Food triggers

The most common food triggers among migraineurs, besides cheese and alcoholic beverages, are beans (all kinds of beans), chili peppers, pickles, dried fruits, olives, red plums, avocado, citrus fruits, banana, pizza, yeast breads, processed meats, bacon, sausage, hotdog, whole milk, sour cream, chocolate, and vinegar. Migraineurs are often advised not to consume anything with alcohol, caffeine, preservatives, additives, artificial sweeteners, and yeast.

Managing Migraine Triggers
The list provided above should serve only as a guide and is not set in stone, so you might still be able to enjoy some of the food and activities listed above. Remember as well, that some migraine triggers might not cause attacks years later, while new triggers can also appear. Just keep in mind that you have to pay close attention to everything, especially the food that you eat.

Changing your diet and exercise can help, but don’t forget that drastic changes can also trigger attacks. Talk to your doctor about these triggers and take your migraine diary with you next time you book an appointment, so that he/she can recommend a treatment for each stage of a migraine attack.

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