I like shopping online - it's easy to do, secure (pretty much all credit cards have online protection guarantee and unless you're shopping in shady online places, you're very safe), and best of all - no driving to the mall or shop! You simply can't beat the selection of products available online and the prices are usually much cheaper given online stores' lower overhead cost. You'd have to pay shipping most of the time, but think of all the gas and time you're saving.

But how can you make online shopping better? How about with online coupons: many stores have "coupon code" or "promo code" during checkout that will give you discounts, free shipping and even free goodies. Given the highly competitive nature of ecommerce, these coupons can be very, very good.

The problem is how do you find these coupons? Most online stores give them to existing their customers to promote return business, but that doesn't mean that you'd have to buy something first to get a better deal later.

With a little legwork (fingerwork?) you can save a lot with online coupons. Simply go to these "coupon aggregator" websites:

• CurrentCodes.com
  You can browse by merchant and categories in CurrentCodes.com, though it's best if you know exactly what you're looking for. For example, selecting coupons for computers bring up hundreds of available coupons, which will take quite a bit of time to sort through.
  
  If you know what you're looking for, say a specific product, then it's easy to find the keyword using your browser's search capability (CTRL-F for Firefox, CMD-F if you're using a Mac)
• RetailMeNot
  Guy King, the founder of BugMeNot, an online repository of username and passwords to bypass registration on otherwise free websites, started another venture in 2006 called RetailMeNot. The website lets users post and retrieve web coupons from 40,000 stores.
  
  While a lot of online coupon sites concentrate on US retailers and etailers, RetailMeNot lets you browse for coupons from retailers in UK, Canada, Australia, Germany, India, France, and the Netherlands.
• FatWallet
  FatWallet.com was started in 1999 by Tim Storm as a single page listing coupons for a handful of retailers. I suppose it resonated with cheapskates everywhere since it has since grown to be one of the largest websites on the Net!
• Ask Deal
  Ask Deal is a new service by Ask.com, aiming to become the premiere search engine for deals, coupons, bargains, and sales. Ask.com doesn't host the coupons themselves - instead, they aggregate such information from the websites above and many others. You can even find local coupons in your area (by zip codes).

Bonus: Black Friday
There's shopping and then there's Black Friday shopping. In the United States, the Friday after Thanksgiving is the traditional start of the Christmas shopping season. Competition is cutthroat and therefore retailers offer unusually good doorbuster and loss leader deals to draw people to their stores.

If you don't mind waking up really early in the morning, standing in line for hours before the store open, and jostling with hundreds of people for a few select products, then shopping on a Black Friday can save you a lot (and I mean a lot) of money. But keep the kids at home - people have literally been crushed and trampled to death by shoppers desperate for cheap goods.

Two good websites that offer a sneak peak at Black Friday deals are BlackFriday.info and bfads.net

Working in front of the computer has taught me this about using online tools: while there are certainly a lot of them, I find that I only use a handful of the most useful ones every day.

Online tools are wonderful and they certainly are time savers. The hard part is to wade through hundreds of them to find that one gem. So, to help you save time, here is a list of the 10 Most Useful Online Tools Ever:

1. Google as Calculator, Unit Conversion, Currency Conversion and Translator

I know, I know - everyone already knows about Google. While it's certainly a popular search engine, did you know that you can use Google to do math, convert units of measurements, and even translate one language into another? I use Google for exactly these purposes every day:

• Google as Calculator
  Enter what you'd like to calculate in Google's search box as you would a regular calculator. For example:
  
  3x6=
  200/15=
  ((50+9)/45)-(9/5)=
  (sqrt 10)^5=
  
  You can do both simple arithmetic and advanced math. Google Guide has a neat article explaining all of the math functions built into Google's calculator
• Google as Unit Conversion
  Need to convert one unit of measurement into another? Just ask Google:
  
  yard to inch OR yard in inch*
  meter to feet OR meter in feet
  kg to lbs
  
  You can even do math conversion. For example:
  
  5 yards to inch
  2 days to seconds
• Google as Currency Conversion
  The same goes for currency. Simply query Google:
  
  USD to GBP
  Dollar to pound
  5 EUR to USD
• Google as Translator
  This one is pretty neat: Google Translate
  
  You can enter a word, a block of text or even a URL and have Google translate it from one of 51 languages supported into another. You can even have Google auto-detect the language!

What's even better is to do these without ever going to Google.com. If you select Google Search Engine Add-on for Firefox (it should come as a default), you can enter the query directly on the search box and the answer is displayed automatically right then and there. *A funny thing is that "yard to inch" doesn't work here, but "yard in inch" does.

2. Ta-Da List

Ta-Da is a very useful, easy to use - and best of all, free - online to-do list by the folks at 37signals. I use it every day to jot down tasks and ideas. You can even share your list with other people or make it public.

3. Creative Commons Search

Creative Commons Search is the easiest way to find creative commons- or CC-licensed images that you can use for your blog or website. Best of all, it is available as an add-on to Firefox.

Alternatively, you can also do CC license search directly in Flickr - simply check the "Only Search within Creative Commons-licensed content" at the bottom of the page.

Be sure to understand the various Creative Commons licenses - some require attributions, prohibit derivative works, and allows only non-commercial use of the image.

4. Clipart.com

Sometimes, you simply can't find the appropriate free image for your blog or website using Creative Commons Search. There are a lot of stock photo websites, but I find the most cost-effective one is clipart.com. For $34.95 a month or $159.95 per year (that's just $13.33 per month), you have an unlimited access to 10+ million royalty-free cliparts, photos, and illustrations.

The downside of clipart.com is that their photo quality is rather poor when compared to other stock photo websites. My other favorites are iStockPhoto and Dreamstime. In addition to buying a single image, they also offer subscriptions, but at a much higher price than clipart.com.

5. Dafont and What The Font

Need a free font? You can't go wrong with Dafont, where you can download free fonts (some are restricted to only personal use). The website classifies fonts according to various categories like calligraphy, decorative, typewriter, and dingbats. It will even display your phrase in various fonts so you can see exactly what they look like.

Ever seen a font that you like and want to know what it is? You can submit an image to MyFonts' cleverly named tool WhatTheFont! to identify it for you. This online tool is beta, and it doesn't always correctly identify the font, but at least it gives you useful alternatives even if it can't find the right one.

6. Down For Everyone or Just Me?

When I can't access my favorite websites or even my own blogs, I always wonder if it's the fault of my local ISP or whether the sites are actually down. The simplest way to check is by visiting Down For Everyone Or Just Me?

All you have to do is enter the domain name and it'll check for you.

7. Pandora

I don't know if you'd classify Pandora as an online tool - but the free Internet radio is so useful for finding new music that I'll put it on this list. The best thing about Pandora is that you can personalize it to play only the music you like.

In 2000, Will Glaser, John Kraft and Tim Westergren started the Music Genome Project to classify songs using a complex algorithm involving almost 400 attributes. A musician would analyze a particular song and classify it according to categories like "dominant use of harmony," "driving shuffle beat," "highly synthetic sonority" and so on. The idea is that if you like one song, then you should also like another one with similar musical qualities (or "genes," as they call them).

Today, the technology is used by Pandora - you can enter a particular song title or an artist's name, then it will create a special channel that - in theory - only plays similar music.

Unfortunately, due to licensing restrictions, you can only listen to Pandora if you're located in the USA. If that's the case, there's always YouTube where you can listen to music videos ...

8. Vector Magic

This one is rather obscure for non-designers, but I find it quite useful. Whenever I have to convert a bitmap image into vector art, I simply upload it to Vector Magic and voilà! - it's automatically done. In my experience, it's definitely worth the $7.95/month subscription, though you can try it for free first.

9. Cachefly

For a large-ish blog or website, you'll find this service very useful: a Content Delivery Network or CDN to host static files like images and media files. Putting these files on a CDN instead of your blog server helps reduce the load of your server. So instead of serving bulky images, your server can focus on delivering only small HTML files - thus greatly improving its performance.

Serving large image files from a CDN should also improve the page load speed for your readers. This is because most CDNs operate several nodes spread around the world. A reader in Europe would automatically be served from a nearby CDN server in Europe, rather than having to wait for the file to be delivered from, say, a server in the United States.

I use Cachefly, which caters to smaller companies. I find their setup (a regular FTP) easier than using other popular CDN services like Amazon's CloudFront or Simple Storage Service (S3).

10. Carbonite

The last tool here is actually the one I hope I never have to use. Carbonite is an online backup tool that automatically backs up files from your PC or Mac. It costs $54.95 per year, which is a bargain as compared to losing your files if your hard disk crashed (yes, there are services that fix broken HD, but those cost hundreds and hundreds and hundres of dollars).

The good thing about using an online backup service is that it's automatic. Sure you can do this by burning the content of your hard drive into a CD or a DVD, or copy it into an external hard disk, but when was the last time you did this? I thought so.

Having had a hard disk crash on me before, I can tell you this: it's a matter of when, not if. So whether you decide on using an online backup service (besides Carbonite, there are plenty of others like Mozy, though I haven't personally used them all) or an external hard drive (I do both, actually, just in case), please backup your computer today.

Lastly, a caveat: like I mentioned above, I haven't needed to use Carbonite's restore function. There are people who complain about their service, but I think the same goes for practically all online backup services.

Bonus: IronKey

Technically, this one isn't an online tool, but I find my IronKey to be so useful that I have to include it in this post somehow.

There are plenty cheaper USB or Flash drives, so why choose one that costs of more than $60 for a 1 GB drive? (I have the 8 GB version, about $170 from Amazon) The answer is simple: built-in encryption. IronKey is also waterproof, electromagnetically shielded, and darned near indestructible. Those features are nice (indeed, IronKey is military-grade), but I'm no James Bond ...

If you want to store sensitive personal data, this is the simplest way to do so. When you plug it into a standard USB socket, IronKey will ask for your password before letting you access the data. If it got stolen, and the thief entered the password wrong 10 times, the drive will automatically self-destruct and erase its content.

IronKey also offers private surfing using a built-in Firefox browser - but I find this to be too slow to use comfortably. Anyhow, Firefox 3 (and Microsoft Internet Explorer 8) now offers "Private Browsing" mode, so the point is rather moot.

Oh, and backing up your IronKey (while maintaining the encryption) onto your PC is also easy with a built-in function.

I'll be the first to admit that this list is too short - we didn't even talk about GMail, Google Docs, Microsoft Office Online, and Google Analytics. These are very popular tools and I thought that many of you'd already use them.

Got anything to add? Let's hear about 'em in the comment!

Hand as measurement tool (adapted from Wikipedia)

If you’ve ever needed to measure the width of a box but have no ruler, here’s a handy (literaly) tip: just use your hand as a measuring tool.

• 1 inch = width of thumb
• 3 inches = width of four fingers of the palm closely pressed together
• 9 inches = outstretched span of hand (from thumb to little pinkie)

This idea shouldn’t strike you as strange. Indeed, historically, people measured lengths with units derived from the human body:

• Cubit
  The length of the forearm from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger. For the average adult, this translates to 18 inches or slightly less than 46 cm.
• Span
  An outstretched hand of an adult. The length from the tip of the thumb to the little pinkie is a span. Two spans make a cubit. In the average adult, this is about 9 inches or slightly less than 23 cm.
• Handbreadth or palm
  The width of four fingers closely pressed together. Typically 6 adult handbreadth or palm makes a cubit. This is about 3 inches or almost 8 cm.
• Foot
  Yep, it’s the length of a foot – which came to be defined as 12 inches (which was the length of King Henry I’s foot). The average Caucasian person’s foot length is actually about 9.4 inches.

Obviously, your hand may yield a different result. So take 30 second taking measurements of your hand. Who knows when it’ll come in … handy!

Most of us think of ketchup as a condiment, but would you believe that the ubiquitous ketchup can be used to restore chlorine-damaged hair and make copper pots shiny? Read on:

• Restore chlorine-damaged hair
  Chlorine from the swimming pool can turn blond hair green or give your hair a distinct smell. The household solution is quite simple: a ketchup shampoo!
  
  Do this in the shower, as it can get quite messy: massage ketchup into our hair and leave it for about fifteen minutes, then wash thoroughly. The green color and chlorine smell are gone.
• Brighten copper pots and pans
  When your copper pots and pans get tarnished and dull, don't reach for expensive chemicals. Simply rub ketchup and a pinch of salt onto the copper surface and let sit for about 30 minutes. Rinse and dry for gleaming copper pots.
• Brighten silver jewelry
  If you have silver ring, earrings, necklace or bracelet that has gotten a little dull over the years, simply dab some ketchup on it for a few minutes. If it has detailed surface, you may have to use a toothbrush to make sure the ketchup gets into the little crevices. Rinse with water to reveal a shiny silver jewelry.
• Get rid of skunk odor
  If you've been skunked, here's an easy way to get rid of that terrible skunk odor: soak your clothes in tomato juice or a solution of ketchup and water. Beware of stains - you don't want to trade a smelly shirt for one with a ketchup stain!

How about if we told you that you can save money and the environment
at the same time without any sacrifice at all? Sounds too good to be true?
Actually, it’s not: a few simple changes in the way you do laundry
can translate to big savings.

For example, did you know that you can save as much as $70 per year by
simply washing your clothes in cold water rather than hot? That’s super
easy, right?

While it’s true that front-loading washing machine is more energy efficient
and may save you money in the long-run, there’s quite a bit of money-saving
things you can do with your regular ol’ washer and dryer.

Here’s a list of easy peasy things you can do to save a bundle of money
while doing the laundry: more …

Got crying baby? Here’s an urawaza – a quirky, everyday tip from Japan – on how to stop a baby from crying instantly: make a slurpy sound with a mouthful of water!

[YouTube Clip]

Why does this work? There are two possible reasons: 1) sound that you make while sloshing the liquid in your mouth reminds the baby of the noises they hear in the womb, or 2) the sound distracts the baby from crying and while pondering the source of the weird sound, the baby forgets why it’s crying in the first place!

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade ... or use them to polish chrome, get rid of bad cat litter box odor, deodorize your garbage disposal and more! Here are some unusual uses of lemons around the house:

The science behind these ingenious household uses of lemon is citric acid: a natural, organic acid that is present in concentrations as high as 8% in some varieties of lemon.

The wonders of citric acid have been known by scholars in Europe since the medieval times. The benefits of lemon and lime juice were recorded in a 13th century manuscript.

AROUND THE HOUSE

• Get rid of cat litter box odor
  Cut up a few lemons and put near the cat litter box. The lemons will soon neutralize the odor, leaving the room lemony fresh.
• Get rid of stain on marble
  For stubborn stain on marble, cut a lemon in half. Pour some salt on top of the stain and rub with the cut lemon. Be careful, however, as the acid in the lemon can actually cause more damage.
• Get rid of ants
  Squirt some lemon juice into holes and cracks where the ants are coming in. Place small pieces of lemon rinds or peels around the house.
• Get rid of roaches and fleas
  Wash your floor with the juice of 4 lemons in about half a gallon of water.
• Get rid of moths
  Hang a sachet of dry lemon rind in the closet to get rid of moths.
• Get rid of mothball smell
  Now that you can use lemon to get rid of moths, you won't need those mothballs anymore ... but how do you get rid of the lingering mothball smell? Lemon to the rescue (again!) - simply wash the drawers and closet with a solution of lemon juice in water.
• Polish chrome
  Got dull chrome faucets? Simply rub lemon rind, rinse and dry with a paper towel.
• Clean tarnished brass, bronze, copper, and stainless steel
  Make a paste of lemon juice and baking soda and apply to the tarnished area. Let soak for 5 to 10 minutes and wash in soapy water.
• Air freshener
  Put a mixture of lemon juice and water into a spray bottle. Voila! A natural and inexpensive air freshener. You can also put slices of lemon in a dish or a dish of lemon juice and baking soda mixture to help absorb bad odor and freshen the room.
• All purpose cleaning solution
  Add lemon juice, vinegar, and water in a spray bottle for a natural, all-purpose cleaning solution.
• Furniture polish
  For varnished wood, add a few drops of lemon oil into a cup of water.
  For unvarnished wood, mix equal parts of oilve oil and lemon juice. Use dry cotton rags to wipe the furniture.
• Toilet bowl cleaner
  Make your own toilet bowl cleaner with 1 part of lemon juice to 2 parts of borax. You can get rid of toilet rings by applying this solution and letting it sit for a couple of hours before rinsing.

DOING LAUNDRY

Down(y) with laundry detergent! Skip the powders and turn the Tide against chemicals and Cheer for the Ultra alternative ... lemon!

• Use lemons instead of bleach
  Soak clothes in a mixture of lemon juice and baking soda for half an hour before washing.
• Get rid of stain, mildew and rust
  Scrub mildewed clothes with a paste of lemon juice and salt. Let dry in the sunlight, then wash. Remember to test for color fastness before using this technique!
• Whiten clothes
  To boost your laundry detergent and whiten clothes, add 1 cup of lemon juice into the washer.

IN THE KITCHEN

Besides food, lemon have plenty of other uses in the kitchen. For example:

• Get rid of garbage disposal odor
  If your garbage disposal smells bad, simply put leftover lemon and orange peels and grind them down the drain. Do this as frequently as needed to keep the garbage disposal odor away.
• Get rid of bad fridge odor
  Here's an easy way to get rid of musky or bad refrigerator odor. Soak a sponge with lemon juice, place on a plate and leave it in the fridge overnight.
• Get rid of cutting board odor
  After cutting meat, fish, onion, garlic and other smelly food, you can get rid of bad cutting board odor simply by rubbing it with half a lemon. This also works for wooden cutlery and bowls.
• Clean your microwave
  Got hardened gunk of food in the microwave? Don't reach for harsh chemicals, use lemons instead! Add 1/4 cup of lemon juice to 1-1/2 cup of water and microwave on High for about 10 minutes. The water will boil and steam will condense inside the microwave. The gunk will easily wipe away with a paper towel or cleaning rag.
• Lift tough grease stain
  Put lemon peel in a water with some water in a blender. Apply the mash to the tough grease stain and scrub.
• Brightens aluminum pots and pans
  Fill the pot with water and add 3 tablespoons of lemon juice, then boil for 15 minutes. For the outside of the pots and pans, scrub with a half of a lemon.
• Prevent potatoes and cauliflower from turning brown
  Potatoes and cauliflower can turn brown after being boiled. To prevent this, simply add a teaspoon of lemon juice into the water before you turn on the stove.
• Prevent avocado and guacamole from turning brown
  The culprit is oxidation - when a cut avocado is exposed to air, an enzyme called polyphenol oxidase change the structures of phenolic compounds in the flesh of the avocado and thus their color. Since the enzyme doesn't work as well in acidic environment, you can slow down this reaction by sprinkling lemon or lime juice.
• Prevent apple slices from turning brown
  Same idea as above. For apple slices, simply rub them with half a lemon.
• Prevent rice from sticking
  Add a teaspoon of lemon juice into the water before you cook the rice. The lemon will also make the rice whiter and brighter!
• Make lettuce crisp again
  Got soggy lettuce? Don't toss it way - You can "revive" it by squeezing half a lemon into a bowl of ice water. Soak the soggy lettuce for about an hour. Rinse and dry the lettuce before serving in a salad or sandwich.
• Get rid of cabbage odor
  If you don't like the smell of cooking cabbage, simply put a slice of lemon in the pot.

If you only need half a lemon, don't throw the other half away! Squeeze the remaining lemon juice into an ice tray and freeze. Each ice cube of lemon juice is equals two tablespoons. (You can pop 'em out after they're frozen and put them in a freezer bag for storage).

HEALTH & BEAUTY

Before you reach for that expensive cream and lotion, give the humble (and cheap) lemon a try:

• Soften dry and scaly elbows
  Make a paste of lemon juice and baking soda. Rub into your elbows to exfoliate and soften the scaly skin. Repeat daily as required.
• Soften rough hands and feet
  Soak in equal part of lemon juice and water. Rinse, then dry with a towel. Repeat daily as required.
• Clean your face
  A rinse with lemon juice and water will clean and exfoliate your face for pennies as compared to expensive facial soaps.
• Clean your hands
  If your hands smell from peeling garlic or cleaning fish, rub your fingers with a lemon wedge to remove the odor.
• Get rid of dandruff
  Got itchy, scaly dandruff? Apply lemon juice directly to your scalp and massage it in before you hop on the shower. Then rinse away and wash your hair as usual.
• Remove warts
  Apply lemon juice directly on the wart with a Q-tip. Repeat daily until the wart disappears.
• Treat poison ivy rash
  Apply lemon juice directly to the rash to soothe the itching.
• Treat insect bites
  Apply a slice of lemon onto insect bites to help soothe the irritation.
• Lighten age spots
  Got liver spots and freckles? You can lighten them without expensive skin creams with lemon juice. Apply lemon juice directly to the spots for 15 minutes. Then rinse with water. Repeat daily until you lighten that age spot.
• Whiten nails
  Soak your fingertips in a mixture of lemon juice and water (1/2 cup lemon juice to 1 cup of water). You can also rub lemon rind on the nails to whiten them.
• Treat acne and blackheads
  Got blackheads? Dab lemon juice directly on the acne breakout once a day for several days until the condition improves.
• Disinfects minor scrapes
  If you've got minor cuts and scrapes and don't mind a little stinging, you can use lemon juice as a disinfectant. Simply apply a few drops of lemon juice to the cuts and let sit for a minute or two before rinsing with water.
• Heartburn relief
  Drink a glass of water and 2 teaspoons of lemon juice.

In The Simpsons episode Lemon of Troy, the beloved lemon tree of Springfield is stolen by the kids from nearby Shelbyville. To get it back, Bart Simpsons and friends used Ned Flanders' RV as a Trojan horse to get into an impound lot to save the tree.

Homer gleefully remarked that "no one in history has ever done anything this clever"

MISCELLANEOUS

• Shoe polish
  Add a few drops of lemon juice to olive oil. Apply to shoes, then buff with a clean rag for a perfect shine.
• Soil amendment
  If you need acidic soil (for azaleas and rhododendrons, for example) , simply add lemon rinds to the ground.

Welcome, everyone! Cluebert is a new website dedicated to bringing you time and money saving tips, useful news and practical knowledge for everyday life, with a particular focus on green living.

Need to find out a quick way to quiet a crying baby? Want to save $70 doing laundry without any sacrifice? Need to measure a small box but forgot your tape measure? You’ve come to the right place!

Cluebert is brought to you by the folks of Neatorama, one of the web’s most popular blogs. We know that “how-to” is a crowded field on the web, but we believe that we can bring a unique (and fun) spin while remaining true to the focus of bringing useful and practical knowledge to our readers.