5 Things To Avoid When Hanging Your American Flag

5 Things To Avoid When Hanging Your American Flag

Displaying the American flag can be a great way to show patriotic spirit and inspire feelings of national pride. However, it’s crucial to follow proper etiquette when hanging the flag to ensure you treat this symbol of freedom with the respect it deserves. Here are five things to avoid when hanging your American flag.

Putting Your Flag Up in Harsh Weather

Although the American flag symbolizes resilience and endurance, do not keep it outside when conditions are particularly rough. According to the US flag code, you should not hang your flag during severe weather unless you have an all-weather flag.

You can also research tips on safeguarding your flag from poor weather, such as how to protect your American flag from snow. This knowledge will help you on days when the weather starts out fine but worsens, and you cannot take down your flag until you return home or the storm subsides.

Hanging Your Flag the Wrong Way

It’s not uncommon for people to hang the flag in a way that doesn’t follow proper flag etiquette. When hanging the American flag horizontally or vertically on a wall, the union (the blue field with the stars) should always be in the upper left corner. When flying the flag from a pole, you should place the union at the peak. Displaying the flag incorrectly is known as a signal of distress, so it’s important to get it right.

Using a Flag That You Should Replace

A worn-out or damaged flag can detract from the intended message of patriotism, unity, and respect. The flag code recommends you should replace flags when they become frayed, faded, or otherwise damaged beyond repair. If your flag needs an upgrade, be sure to invest in a new one and retire the old flag according to proper disposal methods—usually by respectfully burning it in a flag retirement ceremony.

Hanging Another Flag Above It

Something to avoid when hanging your American flag is putting another flag above it. The flag code says you should not fly other flags above the American flag on the same pole, except for church pennants during naval services. When displayed with flags that are on other poles, you should hang the American flag first and take it down last.

Leaving Your Flag Up at Night Without Lighting

If you choose to display your American flag during the nighttime hours, it must have adequate lighting. The flag should always be visible, so make sure it’s well lit when natural light is unavailable. Invest in a solar-powered flagpole light or another reliable light source to ensure people can see your flag.

Properly displaying the American flag is important for showing your respect and appreciation. Avoid these common mistakes when hanging your flag to ensure your display sends the right message.

The Complete Tightwad Gazette

Book Review: The Complete Tightwad Gazette
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The Complete Tightwad Gazette is along-awaited complete compendium of tightwad tips for fabulous frugal living!

In a newsletter published from May 1990 to December 1996 as well as in three enormously successful books, Amy Dacyczyn established herself as the expert of economy.

Now The Complete Tightwad Gazette brings together all of her best ideas and thriftiest thinking into one volume, along with new articles never published before in book format.

Dacyczyn describes this collection as “the book I wish I’d had when I began my adult life.” Packed with humor, creativity, and insight, The Complete Tightwad Gazette includes hundreds of tips and topics, such as:

  • Travel for tightwads
  • How to transform old blue jeans into potholders and quilts
  • Ten painless ways to save $100 this year
  • Picture-framing for pennies
  • A comparison of painting versus re-siding your house
  • Halloween costumes from scrounged materials
  • Thrifty window treatments
  • Ways to dry up dry-cleaning costs
  • Inexpensive gifts
  • Creative fundraisers for kids
  • Slashing your electric bill
  • Frugal fix-its
  • Cutting the cost of college
  • Moving for less
  • Saving on groceries
  • Gift-wrapping for tightwads
  • Furniture-fusion fundamentals
  • Cheap breakfast cereals
  • Avoiding credit card debt
  • Using items you were about to throw away (milk jugs, plastic meat trays, and more!)

The Complete Tightwad Gazette also contains recipes galore, from penny-pinching pizza to toaster pastries¸ And much much more . . .

How to Flush the Toilet When the Water is Off

How to Flush the Toilet When the Water is Off

 

Disaster Tip: How to Flush the Toilet when the Water is Cutoff
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While remodeling my bathroom and having my water turned off I realized that some people (my wife being one of them) may not know how to flush the toilet when the water is off.

Because of this I wanted to share a simple disaster pooping tip.

This simple video shows a basic concept that many people may already know, but it is something I feel is worth sharing.

If you do not know how to flush your toilet when you don’t have any water then this video will show you how.

You don’t have to throw the water in the tank for this tip to work.  Alternatively, you could pour the water into the bowl directly.  However, I like this way so I can quickly flush the toilet and have the contents of the bowl disappear.

This seems to work better for my wife’s sensibilities.

Anyway, if you already know this then take comfort in that fact.  However, I hope that some of my readers learn something from this post.

It is my goad to help people learn tricks to more easily become self reliant, but ultimately my desire is to help develop the proper mindset so that more people learn how to figure out their own tricks – because if they share them I can learn from them – which is easier on me… LOL

Finally, when little issues like this come up, being prepared with a solution goes a long way to help my family understand the benefits of a prepared life.

Thanks for watching.

How to Carry Duct Tape While Backpacking

 

Duct Tape Tip for Backpackers
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A common trick among backpackers is to wrap some duct tape around their water bottle or lighter so that they always have a couple feet readily available for quick repairs.  This is an easy duct tape tip that ensures you always have some tape on hand.

I find that having some duct tape with me in the things that I carry everyday helps me stay prepared. When hiking, I can use it on “hotspots” to prevent blisters, and its invaluable for survival when making things like plastic water stills and bags. However, since I spend most of my time in an office, I tend to use my duct tape in more normal ways.

This tip is useful more than just outdoors-men.  I have a cut off ink pen body wrapper with duct tape on a monkey fist hanging from my keys.  In the end, it really does not matter if you wrap duct tape on your keys, lighter, water bottle, or frame of your pack.  What matters is that duct tape is dead useful, but a roll is bulky and heavy.

This simple tip ensures you have some if needed as well as saves weight and space.

This duct tape tip is one of my favorites as it keeps tape close at had for any emergency purpose as well as makes my water bottle easily distinguishable from the ones carried by everyone else.

You can also use this tip on hiking sticks and trekking poles – I even know a handy guide to purchasing trekking poles.

How to Use a Rubber Band for No Drip Painting

DIY: No Drip Paint Tip
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When I paint, I tend to paint everything – hair, clothes, ceilings, walls, and an extremely irritated house cat.  I’m not saying I am messy, but I do drip paint everywhere.

I found this no drip paint tip to help me stay clean and paint free so I thought I would share.

You can wrap a rubber band around the handles of a paint container so that the top of the bands cross the center of the open can of paint.

Then as you dip your brush in paint, you can rub the excess paint off on the rubber band rather than the side of the container.  The paint will end up back in the can instead of the sides and top of the can itself.

Try it, it works.

I should have done this when I was painting my new fence, but I did not take the time to dig out a rubber band.  This caused me to get paint all over myself as I climbed around the hillside.  This an the aluminum foil tip makes for easy clean up after painting jobs, which is nice because I hate painting.  I wish I could find a better way of painting my beehives because it means I have to paint a lot.