People romanticize either city life or farm life. Living at a distance from the non-stop consumerist rat race of the Matrix allows one to be unplugged from toiling under capitalism, surrounded by open air, nature, and silence. Yet still, major cities offer connection, excitement, and experiences. Desires for entertainment, dining, public transportation, and shopping can all be indulged in a major city. Social butterflies tend to thrive in chaos, delighting in bumping into new and old friends anywhere. Introverts and those who like to keep their circle small may prefer the peace and solitude of a rural community.
Luckily, one does not have to choose between a connection to nature and a connection to people. However, bringing together the best of both worlds does require some professional prowess, mentally and physically. A professional landscaper can design and build a place in your home where you can have both a social life and a spiritual life. With designers and architects, the possibilities are limitless. A French courtyard? A Roman fountain? A Zen pond? These ideas—and many more—can be brought to life with the brains and brawn of an expert team that can turn any blueprint into a masterpiece.
Successful landscaping is about working with the elements incorporating the types of flowers and greenery best suited to your regional conditions, and integrating nature with your style and functional preferences. Couples and families across the country are living the dream, even in Mission Hills! Outdoor spaces elevate homes above and beyond the confines of walls and doors. Patios, pergolas, gardens, sculptures, fountains, paving, and hardscape provide an invigorating escape in your own backyard.
Country living, despite its beauty, has some major inconveniences that can quickly turn the idea ugly. Without the ease and convenience of a department store a short drive away, or one-day shipping through a certain e-commerce behemoth, most inhabitants of the modern world are under-experienced and under-equipped to be as self-sufficient as necessary. Moreover, solitude can quickly evaporate into loneliness. Socializing is easier in the city, or even the suburbs; simply head out to a local bar, mall, gym, and the like. A dining room or backyard is the perfect place to wine and dine with friends and family. Getting people together is easier when people live in the same city or neighborhood in urban or suburban areas, whereas convincing folks to trek through country roads is akin to herding cattle.
Moreover, a garden is a more realistic and practical size for tending and harvesting. Land that sprawls acres and acres might sound like a fairytale because it is. You can expect to have many sun-filled mornings and afternoons outdoors practicing yoga and meditation in a backyard of a city home, but you can expect backbreaking labor in the fields of the country home—the latter of which, few are willing and able to do. For those who want a sprinkle of color with minimal maintenance, ask your landscaper about xeriscaping and low-watering plants. Tired of lawn care and weed whacking? Ask your landscaper about hardscaping.
If you are looking for a professional landscaper, you can give Torrey Pines Landscaping a call today.
Torrey Pines Landscape Company 5560 Eastgate Mall, San Diego, CA 92121, United States
Aesthetic living is an ancient Greek philosophy that focuses on beauty and visual harmony. The goal of aesthetic home life is to create a space that reflects a style or preference such that one may experience maximum enjoyment and happiness.
At first glance, this philosophy may seem more romantic than logical. However, it has indeed been shown that dopamine is released when we look at a space, work of art, or object that is considered beautiful. Most would agree that their physical space and surroundings affect their mental and emotional state. As such, interior designers carefully select and curate colors and textures of walls, floors, furniture, fixtures, and more to ignite inspiration and joy.
Aesthetic design values minimalism and simplicity, preferring the use of natural materials alongside a range of colors, textures, and patterns. The goal is to create fluidity and seamlessness, encouraging relaxation and peace.
A lush green lawn gives a home a visually cohesive exterior, elevating its curb appeal. Unfortunately, outdoor home maintenance can be exhausting and extensive. Moreover, a flawless lawn of real grass is unachievable for many due to environmental factors such as soil quality, climate, and water shortages. Certain regions are not conducive to growing grass at all or are only conducive to growth in certain seasons. Those who have invested as much as they can into lawn care only to be left without the desired result may feel at a loss.
An alternative to real grass is synthetic grass, an excellent option for those who want to create and live in a more aesthetically pleasing home, but cannot justify or afford the required maintenance and care of natural greenery.
A lawn that is patchy or brown can be an eyesore, evoking disappointment and frustration, as aesthetic philosophy may explain. Artificial grass here has the visual appearance of real grass, therefore arousing the same delight.
An aesthetically pleasing home elicits a feeling of luxury. The good news, however, is that the expenditure to achieve an aesthetic home does not necessarily have to be that of luxury. Artificial turf is a reasonable investment in home improvement that can save homeowners financial resources over time while lasting many years.
In California, which is in a water shortage crisis due to drought, putting greens and fake lawns are more common than ever. Some people even prefer artificial grass simply to not have to worry about stains from their children and pets playing in the backyard. If anyone makes a mess, the turf can be easily cleaned with a simple rinse of water.
The turf can be installed by professionals within a single day. Without a bed of real grass to mow, water, and fertilize, the amount of saved time, energy, and money may be spent on relishing in one’s backyard, rather than resenting or worrying about it.
Aesthetic philosophy is not about valuing the superficial over the sentimental. Rather, it is the practice of celebrating life through the beauty of our external environment. It is about bringing forth the best of what life has to offer through crafting a space of living that expresses what we truly like and love, so that we may omit or modify anything that is preventing us from living satisfying lives. Change begins by acknowledging what around us does not satisfy us and then realizing that solutions do exist.
Higher risk is associated with the possibility of higher reward.
Much of history was written by those who dared to take risks.
Unfortunately, we live in a world where seemingly capable but ultimately dishonest people leverage the promise of greatness to defraud investors and manipulate the general public.
As the founder of Theranos, once valued at nine billion dollars, Elizabeth Holmes was named by Forbes as the youngest and richest self-made female billionaire in the United States. The following year, Fortune named her in their article, “The World’s 19 Most Disappointing Leaders.” In response to a bombshell report that the lab results of her blood testing invention were falsified, her now infamous words were, “This is what happens when you work to change things, first they think you’re crazy, then they fight you, and then all of a sudden you change the world.” Holmes was sentenced to jail for 11 years on charges of fraud.
As a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the son of two well-respected Stanford Law Professors, Sam Bankman-Fried had a fall from grace that also made headlines. Bankruptcy had been declared after it was revealed that the former director of an altruistic center had transferred billions of customer funds from his FTX trading platform towards exotic, high-risk investments at his quantitative trading firm Alameda Research—all without disclosure. He had apparently been all too comfortable with risk, mishandling funds without ethical discretion.
Nasdaq-traded and San Diego-based autonomous truck startup TuSimple lost nearly half of its valuation after an investigation revealed that its CEO may have breached fiduciary duties for their involvement in transferring financial and technical information to a Chinese startup. The news is shocking in an industry that is rife with challenges in the era of COVID and labor tensions.
The American economy relies on trucking. Trucking is a risky business—so much so that the United States Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration requires that fleets meet insurance requirements in order to operate. Risks of bodily injury and property damage are inherent and must be mitigated to insure or compensate parties in the event that losses occur. Commercial trucking fleets require specialty insurance, which can be found here. Without specific legal documentation and comprehensive insurance coverage, owners and operators are vulnerable to the risk of financial loss that has the potential to severely compromise the viability of the business.
“In addition to filing an application for operating authority, all applicants for motor carrier, freight forwarder, and broker authorities must have specific insurance and legal process agent documents on file before the FMCSA will issue the authorities.”
Only the future can tell what comes of today’s risk-takers. For those who take risks, it is important to remember that taking shortcuts to success may offer more immediate fame, power, and money, but rarely without ramifications. Without ethics and risk management, leaders put their businesses in danger of not only destroying their reputations but also the lives of all stakeholders involved.
The price of real estate continues to rise across the United States and is likely to continue, especially not in California. Real estate markets have become so prolific that Netflix’s award-winning hit show “Selling Sunset”, based in Los Angeles, now has spinoffs in Tampa and Orange County.
The median price of a San Diego home costs $905,000, which requires an approximate household annual income of $166,828. To make San Diego real estate more affordable, president-elect of the San Diego Association of Realtors Frank Powell says “Build, build, build. If we want to solve this cause, as long as there’s no supply and increased demand, like any other product on the market, it’s going to continuously go up.”
However, the market may now be leveling out, with home sales slowing down ever so slightly. Ben Graboske, president of Black Knight Data & Analytics says that “25% of major U.S. markets saw growth slow by three percentage points in June, with four decelerating by four or more points in that month alone.” That said, the gap between housing prices and the ability to finance represents “a national shortage of more than 700,000 listings” that could take more than a year to normalize.
Exorbitant house prices aside, it’s hard not to fall in love with the weather and culture of San Diego. Moreover, those who own a home in San Diego may find it hard to justify relocating at this particular time in the market. Some homeowners are enticed by the opportunity to sell their homes, a high-value asset in an eager market, in order to earn capital gains that could be then used to purchase a home in a less expensive area. Others might feel locked in—moving in and of itself can be expensive, and moreover, now might be a time to hold rather than sell a high-value asset that isn’t expected to diminish in value anytime soon.
With so much appreciation for their existing homes and so little desire to leave the nest, many have upgraded their homes and had their backyards transformed by San Diego Landscape Designers. Founded by one of San Diego’s very own, Torrey Pines Landscaping designs and builds stunning gardens, patios, water features, fire features, outdoor kitchens, driveways, entryways, patio covers, planters, and more.
Many people no longer see their home as a place just for sleeping, eating, and relaxing. Homeowners desire more functionality than ever from their homes, like home office space to replace or supplement a traditional 9-5 office, or outdoor living and dining space to host friends and family get-togethers to replace public dining and entertainment.
There is no better time and place to start a landscaping project than right now. You can give Torrey Pines Landscape Company a call today.
Torrey Pines Landscape Company 5560 Eastgate Mall, San Diego, CA 92121, United States
Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart (CAPTCHA) is a program that is commonly known to be used to verify that you are indeed human and not a robot while accessing a website.
“Click all the squares that contain traffic lights.”
The application has a bit of a backstory. From 2011, reCAPTCHA was used to digitize millions of New York Times articles that dated as far as 1851. Typing tests asked users to prove their humanity by recognizing obscured or warped text and correctly identifying a string combination of numbers and upper and lower case letters. Optical character recognition programs became more sophisticated, aided by humans answering these CAPTCHA tests. Visual tests followed, requiring that users identify certain objects within a picture split into several squares.
CAPTCHA tests were once as easy as one-click to check off a box. Today, CAPTCHA tests have become a little more rigorous—and a little bit more tedious.
Exactly what is CAPTCHA trying to do?
CAPTCHA tests are mostly used for security, but they’re also used to improve artificial intelligence. The program tests the same content on users around the world and aggregates responses to determine accuracy. This then helps train Google’s artificial intelligence, which is used to improve applications like Google Maps and Google Images.
“In 2014, Google pitted one of its machine learning algorithms against humans in solving the most distorted text CAPTCHAs: the computer got the test right 99.8 percent of the time, while the humans got a mere 33 percent.”
It’s no surprise that one of the inventors of CAPTCHA is passionate about education and technology. His inventions have not only taught robots and humans alike. Luis von Ahn is the co-founder of CAPTCHA as well as the popular language-learning application Duolingo. He is the recipient of the prestigious 2018 Lemelson-MIT prize, which awards those whose inventions have significantly improved society.
There is another invention that involves artificiality imitating reality to significantly improve society. Specifically, it has improved the lives of countless homeowners. It saves people the time, money, and hassle of mowing, watering, and treating their lawns.
Artificial turf is a miracle for those who want everything about a beautiful green lawn without any of the hangups of real lawn maintenance. It may not be real grass, but artificial turf is about as close to having a real lawn maintained by AI robot gardeners. That said, we’re unlikely to see robots doing our gardening any time soon.
Synthetic grass not only allows homeowners to be more carefree, but it is also more durable, meaning that it can withstand wear and tear and the elements. Moreover, your lawn will look picture-perfect year-round, which is nearly impossible in many parts of the country.
There is no shame in fixing a real problem with a synthetic solution. If it makes your life easier, then you deserve to replace your lawn with artificial grass. After all, all revolutionary inventions were borne out of an all-too-common situation that had to be improved.
