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Archive for the 'Guest Reviews' Category
My good friend Andy from Station Atomica! has once again written an awesome guest review for Review Bunker - make sure to stop by his blog to check out more from Andy, after the review. If you are interested in writing a guest review for Review Bunker, please visit the contribute page.
The Canker Sore Diaries
Here’s a news flash: Canker Sores Hurt and I Would Rather Not Have Them. However, the universe is a cruel, spiteful place and has seen fit to endow me with an almost super-heroic ability to develop and maintain canker sores the way the X-Men’s Wolverine heals wounds. As soon as one disappears, another starts up in an endless struggle to make me cry like a pansy when I go to a Mexican restaurant.
For those familiar with canker sores, you have my sympathies. For those not, try to imagine a tiny gremlin (like in the movies but smaller) who lives in the back of your throat. This gremlin will lay fairly dormant all day until you have the audacity to try to eat. As long as you can eat food without having it actually touch your mouth you should be fine, but woe unto he who actually attempts to chew his food. Now in this scenario, the gremlin will pull out the cutest of tiny shotguns and start to open fire on your lips, gums, and the insides of your cheeks. This is what canker sores are like.
Now if this was a canker sore review I would stop here and say that canker sores get 0/5 stars. But this is a toothpaste review, so why the hell am I blathering on about canker sores? Well, Squigle Enamel Saver (the toothpaste) claims to be specially formulated to reduce canker sore formation.
Squigle Enamel Saver Toothpaste Review
Squigle Enamel Saver bills itself as “mouth friendly,” meaning that it contains no harsh abrasives, detergents, or other unsavory substances that correlate to canker sore formation. After over a year of constant use I am ready to present my (highly unscientific and totally anecdotal) findings to the public: Squigle Enamel Saver Toothpaste kicks ass!
A little over a year ago, my battle with canker sores was nearing defeat. I estimate that I had at least one canker sore about 50% of the time, and that is ridiculous. Out of sheer desperation I researched canker sores online for a cause and possible treatments. Surprisingly there doesn’t seem to be many straight answers to these problems. Canker sore research is virgin turf it seems, but what little information there was pointed toward several causes, many out of my control or unavoidable. The exception was the ingredients in my toothpaste. This is where Squigle Enamel Saver comes in.
At first blush, the product comes off as one designed for hippies to use after a snack of granola and bamboo fronds. Phrases like, “Free of artificial preservatives,” and “No animal testing” adorn the electric blue packaging. But desperate times call for desperate measures, and despite misgivings I also feel when in the homeopathic section of my local Whole Foods I decided to order a tube (for the low, low price of $7.25 plus shipping).
More than a year has passed, and the change has been dramatic. My canker sore count has nosedived, and in fact I have only had two or three small episodes in the last year. I don’t care if it is unreasonably priced, this stuff has my vote for mayor, governor, and president if a dental product could hold office. For me, Squigle Enamel Saver Toothpaste worked extremely well.
As for the other concerns one has when selecting toothpaste, Squigle Enamel Saver stacks up quite nicely. What I mean to say is that it cleans my teeth well and doesn’t taste like a trucker’s armpit drippings. It also touts something called Xylitol all over the place too, which as near as I can figure out has decent plaque and cavity fighting ability due to being a sugar alcohol or some crap. Kinda like fake sugar that bacteria go nuts over but die because they don’t get the energy they need from it.
Squigle Enamel Saver might be expensive and have ugly packaging, but it gets the job done and has improved my quality of life about as much as a tube of toothpaste could ever hope to. My only gripe is having to order it online, as that is the only way to get a hold of the stuff. Recommended.
Thanks again, Andy for the review. Look for more guest reviews from Andy in the future!
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One of the three faithful readers I have here at Review Bunker, my mother, has recently had an experience that lent itself quite well to a review, and being the great mother that she is, she agreed to write up a guest review on her experience. Thanks mom, and here’s the review!
Last night my husband and I were invited to join friends for a pre-opening stay at the brand new Hilton Garden Inn in Laramie, Wyoming. It was a rare treat to stay in a previously unoccupied, state of the art hotel where we were wined and dined along with the family and friends of the developer/owner of the hotel. The food was incredible and included some of the best shrimp, oysters and scallops that I have ever had, some delicious lightly smoked and roasted beef, and many other delectable items.
We were given a private tour of the entire facility which includes a large, beautiful conference center. It seems no expense was spared on the creation of this Hilton Garden Inn. The kitchens have the latest technology which enables them to serve fresh, hot food to hundreds of people simultaneously.
Each hotel room is equipped with a flat screen television, microwave oven, refrigerator, coffee maker, and high speed internet hookups. The beds are dual-controlled air type mattresses and unfortunately it wasn’t until this morning, after a less than sound sleep, that we discovered how the controls work, and that a less firm setting would have been more comfortable. The shower had great pressure and even the shampoo and soaps that were provided were very luxurious. Some of the rooms have hot tubs in them and we were shown the presidential suite that has a large bath tub with a flat screen TV on the wall.
The hotel also has a well equipped gym with the latest and greatest in exercise machines. There is a pool and hot tub area with a fun giant mushroom water fountain that would be a blast for kids to play in, and a flowing stream of water that acts as an in-pool tread mill for swimmers who don’t want to actually do laps.
The staff all seemed very capable and excited to be working at such a fine hotel. It apparently took an enormous team effort to get everything in place with all the last minute details. Rumor has it that the management has a deep appreciation for the employees and treats them accordingly.
All in all, it was a very fun and pleasant stay and I would recommend The Hilton Garden Inn to anyone that will be visiting in Laramie, Wyoming for the next 50 or so years, as the hotel seems so well constructed that it will undoubtedly still be there. I would give our stay there a definite 5 stars!
The Hilton Garden Inn (Laramie, WY): 
5/5
5/5
Thanks for the review mom. If anyone else has any feedback about The Hilton Garden Inn in Laramie, or any other Hilton hotels, feel free to leave a comment!
If you enjoyed this post, Please consider subscribing to my full-post feed, or subscribing to receive my posts by email. Also, please check out my contribute and get reviewed pages. Have anything to say? Please comment!
Greetings! My name is Brian Purkiss and I’m doing a guest post for Kevin over here at Review Bunker. I’m an freelance designer, writer, and web consultant for hire. If you like my post, check out my blog - plainbeta.
Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoy this review!
My first review here shall be of twelve year old Meghna’s blog, Meghna’s Pages.
First Impression: Girls’ blog. New to blogging. Elegant. About blogging.
Upon closer inspection I realize that I’m partly true, partly false.
The author is indeed a girl (as I said, 12 years old), she’s new to blogging, and going for a more elegant feel.
However, where I was wrong was about her topic.
To put it in her words, her blog is “an attempt on creative writing and contains humor, stories, poetry, fiction, fantasy, bizarre, oddities, school, children, books, reading and the like.”
Ok, this is my biggest flag.
Meghna, you have about three seconds to keep your visitors from leaving your blog and about ten seconds to get them to start reading your content.
You need to grab your reader’s attention.
Ok, how do you do that?
Well, many ways.
Your title needs to be your web site’s title.
Would you be confused if a web site’s title was “Sophisticated Essays on the Nature of Man” and the url was http://IlovePuppies.com? Yeah, that would be confusing.
While that is a bit of an exaggeration, you get my point.
If your URL is MeghansPages.blogspot.com then your title needs to be Meghan’s Pages.
Similarly, your tagline needs to be concise and powerful.
Your current tagline is very explanatory, but it also long for a tagline.
Consider my blog’s tagline: design & blogging
Instantly you know what my blog is about - design and blogging.
While yours doesn’t need to be as short as mine, it should be a little shorter. Remember, you have three seconds to capture your reader’s attention before he/she does a Google search and has access to another million web sites.
Before I branch away from the attention grabbing topic, let’s examine your layout.
Your layout is one of the most influential parts of your blog.
While it is not the most important part of your blog, your layout can keep visitors just as easy as driving them away.
While I think it fits you, I think you could do a little better.
It seems a little too peach - it’s slightly overwhelming and the contrast between the white content area and the peach background is a little too hard on the eye.
Personally, I think you should switch to Wordpress.
You can have free hosting via Wordpress.com, but self hosting throuh Wordpress.org will be best.
But that is not the purpose of this review. But hey, if you want you can contact me and I’ll be happy to share my reasons.
Ok, back to the layout.
I think you have too many widgets.
Lemme go down the list.
About Me
Eh… Alright, ‘About Me’ is needed. But you need to have an individual page for your About info that sticks with your layout (which I don’t think you can do with Blogger). You should tell about your blog, and then about yourself.
AdSense Ad
I realize that you want to make money, but you don’t want to devalue your site.
The colors in your AdSense Ad and the colors in your layout clash too much.
I just recently got a new layout for plainbeta, and in it I removed all of my AdSense ads (Read about it). Why? Because AdSense often detracts from your blog (More thoughts on AdSense)
While that doesn’t make AdSense evil, you should think about including it.
If anything, make it work with your site more.
As I Say…
?
Yep. I’m confused, but that doesn’t make me want to stay. While I find it humorous, it just clutters up your sidebar.
Technorati
Ditch it.
If someone wants to check your Technorati Authority, they’ll do it themselves. The colors don’t work with your layout and they just clutter up your sidebar.
Label Cloud
Keep it.
Tag Clouds are great ways of getting your visitors deeper into your content.
Just don’t let it get too cluttered.
Blog Archive
Eh… I’d get rid of it.
Trend Watch
Is your site about shoes? Nope.
So why are you trying to sell them?
You’ll be a lot more effective using that space on something related to your web site.
Search
VERY IMPORTANT.
But you don’t need that large ‘google’ - that’s something Wordpress would fix. ;-)
It should also be moved further up and have your web site as the default field to search.
Best Posts
Excellent. Very nice to have.
Recent Posts…
Get rid of it.
People don’t need that widget to see your recent posts.
RSS
Again, excellent. You need that.
But make it more prominent and above the scroll.
I Like to Read…
If you want that, then have a unique page for it.
Although, again, I don’t think you can do that with Blogger. (but you can with Wordpress!)
Follow Me
Put that in your about page.
My Awards
Nice!
Congrats on the awards!
But that should be in your about page. Don’t clutter your sidebar.
‘my motivators’
There is a lot of discrepancy on these, but I think they shouldn’t be there.
If you want, create a ‘community page’ (like on binh.name).
Ok, let’s move away from the sidebars.
Your Content
Not bad!
You have some nice content in there.
Your writing could be improved, but hey, couldn’t everybodys?
I don’t see too many blogs along these lines - you have some potential.
I like the use of images - very nice.
Although, you should float them.
You can learn about floats here.
If you can’t figure it out, I could create a simple float script for you and teach you how to use it.
I also like the use of Related Posts.
That will help drive your visitors further into your blog.
Three things I’d change in your content though.
Get rid of the Digg widget.
Unless you’re expecting to get to the front page of Digg, they’re useless and detract from your web site.
I would also get rid of the AddThis widget for similar reasons. If someone is using any of those services, they don’t need your widget for it. Again, it detracts from your web site.
And finally, I’d get rid of the guitar with Meghna on it.
It gets repetitive and a little annoying. :-/
My Conclusion
Your blog has some potential.
You mainly need to refine the look.
Clean up the blog and make it less ’spammy.’
Make the purpose of the site clear.
Props Meghna for starting young.
I hope you make it big one day!
-Brian Purkiss
Thanks Brian for your guest post, I’ve enjoyed having another person’s perspective and style in the blog feedback section, and I hope we see more from you in the future. To read more from Brian make sure to check out his blog, plainbeta.
-Kevin
If you enjoyed this post, Please consider subscribing to my full-post feed, or subscribing to receive my posts by email. Also, please check out my contribute and get reviewed pages. Have anything to say? Please comment!
My good friend Andy from Station Atomica has graciously written Review Bunker’s first ever guest review! After you read his post below I highly suggest you visit Station Atomica and read what else Andy has to offer - he has a hilarious writing style as well as outstanding original digital artwork. If you are interested in being a guest reviewer for Review Bunker, please read the contribute page. And now, on to Andy’s review…
I have been using a variety of Gerber brand multi-tools for several years now, and have most recently been putting the Gerber Multi-Plier 600 Pro Scout Needlenose to the test. Of course that name is way to long for normal use, so I refer to him mainly as Gerb-Dog. He has seen heavy daily use for about seven months now, so lets see how old Gerb-Dog has fared.
Vital stats first:
The Multi-Plier 600 Pro Scout Needlenose is made of stainless steel, and comes with a nifty black nylon sheath with a Velcro flap and a loop in the back to slide onto a belt. It uses the classic Gerber one handed opening technique that is as easy as a flick of the wrist. This makes it more convenient to operate when only one hand is available, something to consider when looking at multi-tools that use the butterfly style of opening. According to the Gerber website the following tools are present:
- Needle nose pliars - duh.
- Wire cutter - at the base of the plier’s mouth.
- Wire crimper - welp.
- Serrated knife - knife is only half serrated toward the base.
- RemGrit saw with universal coupler - pretty bad ass little saw.
- Fiskars scissors - they actually work.
- Cross point screwdriver - I guess it is technically different than a Phillips head, but no it is the same.
- Small and medium flat blade screwdrivers - yep.
- Can opener - what do you need with a can opener? get back to work.
- Bottle opener - you’re fired.
- File - double sided: course and fine.
- Ruler - most inconvenient ruler ever.
Time for the part of the review that you can’t get from a high-paid fancy pants Gerber shill. Overall I like the tool. It definitely has its good points, but is by no means perfect. For your convenience I have divided my opinions into easy to reference pro and con categories:
Pros
- Like most Gerber multi-tools you can open it in one quick flick of the wrist. This has the effect of making you look incredibly cool in addition to being convenient.
- The pliers, Phillips head screwdriver, saw, scissors, and file are flawless. Work perfectly.
- In case you missed it, the tiny little scissors actually work. This is nothing short of a miracle.
- It is very comfortable in the hand when really bearing down on the pliers.
- Saw is mounted on a coupler that allows for replacement of the blade. The included blade is quite good for small jobs.
Cons
- Flat headed screwdrivers are a joke. They will chip the first time you really crank on them, and may snap off entirely. Definitely for light work or girly-men.
- The knife dulls easily and suffers from the same propensity to chip at the tip. They say they are made of steel, but I guess it isn’t Hanzo steel.
- Screwdrivers good for limited use, don’t try to drive any huge deck screws into wood or anything. The handle may get in the way in tight spots when using the screwdrivers.
- Worthless bottle/can openers where real tools should go. You WORK for a living, and you don’t need the worst can opener in the world.
- You can get more accurate measurements by measuring in Ancient Egyptian cubits than you will get from the ruler, which is impossible to really use.
All in all, The Gerber Multi-Plier 600 Pro Scout Needlenose is a convenient multi-tool to use for light work. Many of the tools are excellent, but the material seems to chip, bend, and shatter more than competing products like Leatherman multi-tools. Excellent to carry around for the pliers alone, and due to the one-handed design it is ideal as a quick access backup. Gerb-Dog’s done well.
Gerber Multi-Plier 600 Pro Scout Needlenose: 
3.5/5
3.5/5
Thank you once again Andy for writing the inaugural guest review here at Review Bunker. Don’t forget, everyone, to stop by Station Atomica to read more from Andy, and if you enjoy the guest review format, make sure to subscribe to my feed, and look for more guest reviews in the near future from a variety of authors.
If you enjoyed this post, Please consider subscribing to my full-post feed, or subscribing to receive my posts by email. Also, please check out my contribute and get reviewed pages. Have anything to say? Please comment!
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