Product review: Simon & Tom Premium Fungal Nail Treatment

The Amazon description says that you should see improvement in 2 to 4 weeks. This is an optimistic estimate and it takes majority of people a much longer period to treat nail fungus (this is what my podiatrist told me when I saw him for nail fungus problem). I writing this review after using the preparation for 2 months (I started on 9/10/14 and today is 12/10/14). I do not see any improvement.

Prior to Simon and Tom I have been treating my nails with Formula 3. Formula 3 gave me some noticeable improvement, but have not returned the nails to a totally normal look. Formula 3's active ingredient is Tolnaflate 1%. Simon & Tom has a totally different list of ingredients (complete list below) and I was eager to see how it works. Unfortenately, it does not work as well and I am going back to Formula 3.

Simon & Tom Premium Fungal Nail Treatment comes in a small bottle (0.34 oz) with a dropper and a separate brush applicator. The applicator is not built into the cap like Formula 3, but is separate, so it is a little difficult store between applications because it is wet and oily. I have been taping to the bottle with a piece of scotch tape.

Ingredients:
Water, Glycerin, Dimethicone, Tea tree (melaleuca attemifolia) oil, Cloveleaf (Eugenia caryophylius) oil, Cellulose Gum, Rosemary (Rosmarinus Officinalis) oil, Pomegranate (Punica Granatum) Extract, Argania Spinosa Oil,
Methylchloroisothiazolinone & Methylisothiazolinone, Parfum (Orange Flowers) Coumarin, Eugenol Isoeugenol, Citronellol Dipentene, Linalool Alpha-Isomethyl Ionone, Butylphenyl Methylpropional

This fungal nail treatment is provided by Simon&Tom. Unfortunately, it did not work for me.


You can find it on Amazon by following this link.



Ali Julia review ★☆☆☆☆

Product review: PetsN'all Chickadee, Finch, Small Bird Window Bird Feeder

What fun to see the birds so up close! Surprisingly, it took birds a week to find the bird feeder. We put up two bird feeders on Sunday and for a week had no birds in them even though there were lots of birds in the back yard. Then my husband spread some seeds under the bird feeders on the ground and then a day later there were lots of birds visiting the bird feeders. I think the seeds on the ground helped them find them. We put up two bird feeders each with different seeds and the birds are flying from one to another like a bird seed buffet.  Notice how in the video one bird comes in as soon as the other one leaves, it is as if they were waiting in a queue. This happens all the time.

This bird feeder is 7.25" wide, 5.5" tall, and 3.5" front to back. It is totally open on three sides, and has an oval opening on the side that is towards the window. I like that it has two rails so the birds can sit on the rails while eating or just looking around. The tray has two compartments. Perhaps one of them is meant for water, but since it is winter time and we get a lot of sub zero temperatures I am using both compartments for bird seed.

The bird feeder is held by two suction cups. They provide sufficient suction power to hold the feeder, the seeds, and the birds. The installation instruction recommend cleaning the window and rubbing the suction cups with your fingers to deposit some oil on the cups for a better hold. So far so good.

Update:
Someone asked me if the seeds get wet. I tested them after a rain - yes, they were damp. But the birds seem not to mind.

You can find it on Amazon by following this link.


Ali Julia review ★★★★★

Product review: PetsN'all Clear Window Bird Feeder

What fun to see the birds so up close! Surprisingly, it took birds a week to find the birdfeeder. We put up two bird feeders on Sunday and for a week had no birds in them even though there were lots of birds in the back yard. Then my husband spread some seeds under the bird feeders on the ground and then a day later there were lots of birds visiting the bird feeders. I think the seeds on the ground helped them find them. We put up two bird feeders each with different seeds and the birds are flying from one to another like a bird seed buffet.

This bird feeder 7.5" tall measuring to the peak of the roof, 4" tall measuring to the roof line, 7" wide and 6" front to back. It is totally open on two sides (not counting the ledge for the seed tray).

The bird feeder is held by three suction cups. They provide sufficient suction power to hold the feeder, the seeds, and the birds. The installation instruction recommend cleaning the window and rubbing the suction cups with your fingers to deposit some oil on the cups for a better hold. So far so good.

The reason I am not rating this bird feeder 5 stars that it arrived with a small crack in the corner.

Ali Julia review

Update:
We noticed that one of the bird feeders is more popular than the other. The more popular bird feeder (not this one) has green plastic perches along the edges and we noticed that birds often sit on them. When the birds visited this bird feeder they always landed inside the bird feeder never on the edge. So we decided to add a perch made out of a twig. We put it along the front edge of the bird feeder and attached it with strips of duck tape. I updated the video to show what happened. This bird feeder immediately became just as popular as the other one. Not sure if helps them see the edge better or just added a comfortable place to land... but they like it!

Update:
Someone asked me if the seeds get wet. I tested them after a rain - yes, they were damp. But the birds seem not to mind.

You can find it on Amazon by following this link.



Ali Julia review ★★★★☆

Product review: JENNIE LIU Women's 100% Cashmere Button Front

Shopping for clothing on-line does not always work because some manufacturer size charts don't match the garments exactly right. However, this is not the case the with Jennie Liu. My sweater matches the chart and it is a good fit.

I got purple color and it is a beautiful vibrant color. The design is very simple and clean, I wear it with a lot of things.

I ordered XL which supposed to be 43" at the chest. It is exactly the same width at the bottom of the sweater as at the chest and it drapes well. The length of the sweater is 23" (measured in the front from the neck lines to the bottom). The sleeves are 26.25" measured from the shoulder seam to the edge of the sleeve, they have a ribbed cuff. The sleeve are a little long for me, but I fold them back and they look fine.

I love the way this sweater feels, it is very to touch. It is 100% cashmere and it feels as nice as as you would expect a cashmere sweater to feel. This is a fairly light sweater, perfect either for laying or to wear on its own.

Note that I also got a Jennie Liu's purple and blue plaid scarf where the scarve's shade of purple is a good match with this sweater and they look quite nice together.

Cleaning instructions: dry clean.

Overall, I am very pleased with the sweater. Good fit and it looks beautiful.


You can find it on Amazon by following this link.



Ali Julia review ★★★★★

Product review: JENNIE LIU 68" X 12" 100% Cashmere Scarf

I got the "Purple and Blue Plaid" version of the this scarf. It is a beautiful color combination. The scarf looks the same on both sides (i.e. it is a woven design, rather than a printed design). It feels very soft and warm, just as one would expect a 100% cashmere scarf to feel.

The scarf is 63" long (not counting the fringe) and 12" wide. The fringe is 4".

I also got Jennie Liu's purple cardigan. The purple shade of the sweater matches the purple in this scarf very well. The sweater and the scarf look very nice together.

You can find it on Amazon by following this link.


Ali Julia review ★★★★★

Product review: VonHaus 600W 2-in-1 Upright Stick & Handheld Vacuum Cleaner

What surprised me about this vacuum is that it weighs just under 3 pounds! This vacuum can be used either as a hand-held or as an upright. It has a 240" (20 feet) AC cord. It has a pretty good suction, but no moving brushes. It works best on hardwood and tile. It also works on rugs with a shot nap, but not a long nap. For example, it cleans my silk rugs very well but not the wool rugs which might have little threads or hairs tangled in the fibers.

The vacuum has a telescoping handle. When the handle is extended to the max the top of the handle is 48" high from the floor. The vacuum has a HEPA filter and it is washable. The manufacturer recommends washing it twice a year. The replacement filters can be found here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00OHUQYNQ.

I love how light this vacuum is and how easy it is to use.

You can find it on Amazon by following this link.



Ali Julia review ★★★★★

Product review: Tronsmart Draco AW80 Android TV

As a background for my review I reviewed the previous version of Tronsmart (Vega S89) rating it 3 star ok "Capable device which needs a little more refinement". I am happy to report that the new version made those refinements and I am quite pleased with it.

✅ Set up was very easy. All I had to do is plug in power and connect HDMI cable to my TV. When I selected HDMI output on my TV display it was operational. All I had to do is turn on WI FI and connect.

✅ Tronsmart Draco 6.5"W x 6.5"L x 1.125"H in size.

✅ The screen display is 1080P and it rendered beautifully on my TV.

✅ Tronsmart Draco is running 4.4.2 (KitKat) Android operating system. I have tried a large number of apps that I normally use and have not found any that did not work.
Some of the applications I have tried YouTube, Netflix, Pandora, TuneInRadio, SpeedTest, AccuWeather, Browser, Play Store. All operated smoothly and quickly, I did not run into any problems. My video includes a couple of snippets from different apps such as YouTube, Netflix, and Pandora.

✅ Tronsmart Draco has Ethernet connection built into the unit. I tested both WI FI and Ethernet (the TV is in the room without direct Ethernet connection and I am using Powerline AV Ethernet Adapter Kit). Both worked well.

✅ I ran OOKLA load test to test network speed and it showed impressive performance. The speeds I get in the TV room are as good as I get with my phone when measured in the same room (this room is on a different floor from the main router). By comparison, Vega Tronsmart did significantly worse compared to my phone. So this functionality was greatly improved in this version.

Speedtest using WI FI connection:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tronsmart Draco download: 33.01 mbs
Tronsmart Draco upload: 28.75 mbs

For comparison my phone in the same gets similar speeds.

Nexus phone download speed: 35.68 mbs
Nexus phone upload speed: 29.94 mbs

✅ Tronsmart Draco provides straight Android interface, no custom shell layer. This is what I prefer. One of the thing I did not like in the Tronsmart Vega was its custom UI which took extra effort to remove (a firmware update which allowed to change the custom UI to the standard Google UI).

Is Draco perfect? No. I have a couple of quips.

❌ I found the joystick style remote that came with the Tronsmart Draco cumbersome to use. To enter anything on a keyboard you had to use it as joystick and scroll through the keyboard like a grid. Selecting items on the screen was difficult, more difficult in some application than others. After 10 or 15 minutes of frustrated usage, I switched to an air mouse (my own) which includes a full keyboard on side and a mouse pointer which you can use by pointing at the TV screen. I also tested that a regular keyboard/mouse and that combo work well also. Tronsmart Draco has two USB ports built into it, I am using one of them for my air mouse. This unit really should ship with an air mouse, I can't see any user having a good experience with a joystick control if they are used to a touch screen on their phone or tablet. This is a major quip.

❌ No on/off button on a device. To power it off I need to remove the power cord. Not something I have to do often, but any computer occasionally gets wedged and needs to be recycled now and then. This is a minor quip.

So what is the bottom line? This is a very capable device. After replacing the joystick remote with my own air mouse I am very pleased with it and it has been working flawlessly for several weeks of daily use.


You can find it on Amazon by following this link.


Ali Julia review ★★★★★