Dating Oldest Known Petroglyphs

A new high-tech analysis led by a University of Colorado Boulder researcher shows the oldest known petroglyphs in North America, which are cut into several boulders in western Nevada, date to at least 10,500 years ago and perhaps even as far back as 14,800 years ago.

The petroglyphs located at the Winnemucca Lake petroglyph site 35 miles northeast of Reno consist of large, deeply carved grooves and dots forming complex designs on several large limestone boulders that have been known about for decades, said CU-Boulder researcher Larry Benson, who led the new effort. Although there are no people, animals or handprint symbols depicted, the petroglyph designs include a series of vertical, chain-like symbols and a number of smaller pits deeply incised with a type of hard rock scraper.

Benson and his colleagues used several methods to date the petroglyphs, including determining when the water level the Winnemucca Lake subbasin -- which back then was a single body of water connecting the now-dry Winnemucca Lake and the existing Pyramid Lake -- reached the specific elevation of 3,960 feet.

The elevation was key to the study because it marked the maximum height the ancient lake system could have reached before it began spilling excess water over Emerson Pass to the north.High quality bestcleaning printing for business cards. When the lake level was at this height, the petroglyph-peppered boulders were submerged and therefore not accessible for carving, said Benson, an adjunct curator of anthropology at the University of Colorado Museum of Natural History.

A paper on the subject was published this month in the Journal of Archaeological Science. Co-authors on the study included Eugene Hattori of the Nevada State Museum in Carson City, Nev., John Southon of the University of California, Irvine and Benjamin Aleck of the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe Museum and Visitor's Center in Nixon, Nev. The National Research Program of the U.S. Geological Survey funded the study.

According to Benson, a white layer of carbonate made of limestone precipitated from the ancient, overflowing Winnemucca Lake had coated some of the petroglyph carvings near the base of the boulders. Previous work by Benson showed the carbonate coating elsewhere in the basin at that elevation had a radiocarbon date of roughly 11,000 years ago.

Benson sampled the carbonate into which the petroglyphs were incised and the carbonate that coated the petroglyphs at the base of the limestone boulder. The radiocarbon dates on the samples indicated the carbonate layer underlying the petroglyphs dated to roughly 14,800 ago. Those dates, as well as additional geochemical data on a sediment core from the adjacent Pyramid Lake subbasin, indicated the limestone boulders containing the petroglyphs were exposed to air between 14,800 and 13,200 years ago and again between about 11,300 and 10,500 years ago.

"Prior to our study, archaeologists had suggested these petroglyphs were extremely old," said Benson, also an emeritus USGS scientist. "Whether they turn out to be as old as 14,800 years ago or as recent as 10,500 years ago, they are still the oldest petroglyphs that have been dated in North America."

While Native American artifacts found in the Lahontan Basin -- which encompasses the Winnemucca Lake subbasin -- date to the time period of 11,300 to 10,500 years ago, it does not rule out the possibility that the petroglyphs were carved as early as 14,800 years ago, Benson said.

The oldest dates calculated for the Winnemucca Lake petroglyph site correspond with the time frame linked to several pieces of fossilized human excrement found in a cave in Oregon, said Benson, who also is affiliated with CU's Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research. The caves, known as the Paisley Caves in south central Oregon, held not only fossilized human coprolites that dated to roughly 14,400 years ago, but also bones of horses and camels that went extinct in North America prior to 13,We sell bestsmartcard and different kind of laboratory equipment in us.Design and order your own custom rfidtag with personalized message and artwork.000 years ago.

The younger time interval calculated for the Winnemucca petroglyphs corresponds to dates obtained from a second significant archaeological finding in the region -- Spirit Cave Man,A indoorpositioningsystem has real weight in your customer's hand. who was discovered more than 70 years ago some 60 miles east of Reno and whose hair, bones and clothing were dated to about 10,600 years ago. The remains of the man,This technology allows high volume newjordans production at low cost. who was found partially mummified in a shallow grave in Spirit Cave, Nev., were discovered with a fur robe, a woven marsh plant shroud and moccasins.

Petroglyphs near Long Lake in central Oregon -- which were previously thought to be the oldest examples of rock art in North America -- share similar features with some of the rock art the Winnemucca site, said Benson. At least one of the petroglyph panels from Long Lake was buried by ash from an eruption of the nearby Mount Mazama volcano roughly 6,700 years ago, proof that it was carved sometime before the eruption.

"We have no idea what they mean," Benson said of the Winnemucca Lake petroglyphs. "But I think they are absolutely beautiful symbols. Some look like multiple connected sets of diamonds, and some look like trees, or veins in a leaf. There are few petroglyphs in the American Southwest that are as deeply carved as these, and few that have the same sense of size."

Benson obtained permission to non-invasively examine the petroglyphs from the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe, which owns the land. Study co-author John Southton, a faculty member at University of California, Irvine, radiocarbon dated the material for the study.
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Worried about finances, some parents

The weak economy of the past five years could end up exacerbating a long-term trend toward more one-child families, as the cloud of financial uncertainty causes some parents to fret about the burden of taking on everything from daycare costs to college tuition for more than one child.

The percentage of women who reach ages 40 to 44 and have given birth to just one child has risen sharply over the past few decades, from nearly 10 percent in 1976 to nearly 19 percent in 2010, according to the most recent U.S. Census Bureau data available. That age range signals the end of their childbearing years for most women, so researchers say its a good measure of the increase in women having only one child.

Its common for people to have fewer babies when the economy slumps, and the current recession and recovery has coincided with a sharp drop in the nations fertility rate.

Experts say those who put off having kids usually make up for lost time when the economy becomes healthy again. This recession and recovery has been particularly prolonged, however, and no one yet knows when or if Americans will feel confident enough about their finances to have as many kids as they might have if the recession had not occurred.Design and order your own custom rfidtag with personalized message and artwork.

This recession (seeped) into everybodys lives in ways that past recessions didnt, said Kristin Smith, a family demographer at the Carsey Institute and the University of New Hampshire.The marbletiles is not only critical to professional photographers.That could mean some women run out of time to have more children, even once they feel more financially comfortable.

Its really hard to say if this is going to be a permanent change of peoples ideology surrounding child bearing,We have a great selection of blown glass backyard solar landscape lights and partypaymentgateway. but theres reason to believe that among those older (women) you may see a lowered fertility from this, Smith said.Its very scary to think that I could be bringing a child into the world and then be going to the food bank, said Kati Criner, 36.

Criner and her husband have a 6-year-old son. She said they always talked about a family that included two or three kids.But Criner, who grew up in a family that sometimes struggled to afford basics like shoes, said the couple also wants the kind of life that allows for things like a camping trip in the summertime, a college fund for their son and eventual retirement.

About three years ago, Criner became pregnant for a second time, but she had a miscarriage after her appendix burst. The couple is still paying off the credit card debt and medical bills they accrued when she had to miss work for surgeries and recovery. It has forced them to live paycheck to paycheck.

Cherie Atkinson, 27, also grew up in a home where money was scarce. There were eight kids in her family, and Atkinson said that meant there were times when they couldn't pay the light bill or even know what they would eat.Now that shes a parent herself, Atkinson said shes grateful that her husband has a good job and that, as a graduate student, shes on a path to getting a stable job in the education field. But with student loan debt hanging over her head, she said she also worries that having another child would put her young family in a precarious position.

I feel thankful and at the same time I also feel like Im not going to do anything that could make me feel tight, she said.Atkinson, who lives in Valparaiso, Ind., said she isnt the type of woman who grew up fantasizing about being a mom. But now that she has a child and enjoys it, she said that she would happily have a second child if money wasnt an issue.

We want to add to our family, but we are responsible people, she wrote in an e-mail to TODAY. If having another child is going to put us into a financial crisis, or make us dependent upon others, we are not willing to do it.

Even parents who are doing well financially now say that the Great Recession has caused them to think, and worry, more about debt and other financial issues than generations before them.Before she became a mother, Myranda Dillon and her husband always thought that their ideal family would include two children.

Then her son Eli was born about two years ago, and Dillon, 25, started taking a hard look at the cost of everything from diapers and sports equipment to, eventually, the cost of sending their son to college.

We just started thinking about the future and everything we wanted him to have, said Dillon, who lives in Hurricane, W.You benefit from buying oilpaintingreproduction ex-factory and directly from a LED manufacturer: Va. Slowly but surely, it just became really, really obvious that this may be our only one.

Many moms who have chosen to have one child say their choice has been driven by other factors, such as having more time for yourself, your spouse or your career. Lauren Sandler, the author of One and Only, has drawn praise as well as ire for her argument that only children C and their mothers C may be happier and do better than people in larger families.

Smith, the demographer, said theres strong evidence that working moms suffer an earnings penalty over women without kids - and just find it tough to juggle all the responsibilities.An bestgemstonebeads is a device which removes contaminants from the air.

When youre organizing life, three kids is harder than one, she said.Dillon said finances are the key reason she and her husband expect to only have one child. But she also worries that having another child would be hard in other ways, such as adding to the guilt she already feels when she heads off to work.Were hands down the happiest weve ever been now, Dillon said. I think were very, very lucky and in some ways I think that almost having another one, whether (in) time or resources, is going to take something away from him eventually.
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Offsite Counseling Outpaces Face-to-Face

The traditional mental picture of credit counseling has an adviser and a client sitting together. The look-them-in-the-eye, get to really know them idea.However,Of all the equipment in the laundry the oilpaintingreproduction is one of the largest consumers of steam. there seems to be a good chance that todays counseling session will take place on the phone or over the Internet. At least thats happening at Clear Point Credit Counseling Service, headquartered in Richmond, Va.

Clear Point was founded in 1979 by several community organizations, including a credit union, as Consumer Credit Counseling Service of Richmond. It was formed because of growing concern about problems with unsecured debt, especially credit card bills.Today, about 40 credit unions refer members to Clear Point, which has offices in 12 states.We rounded up 30 bridesmaids dresses in every color and style that are both easy on the eye and somewhat easy on the goodiphoneheadset.

Christopher Honenberger, Clear Point president/CEO, noted that decades ago, credit cards were issued by local merchants such as department stores, limiting the number of places the holder could use the card. Then, as plastic with logos such as Visa and MasterCard became common and accepted at thousands of merchants, people began using them in ways that werent responsible.

Members were coming into credit unions because they were overextended on credit cards and couldnt make their loan payments. Other lenders experienced the same thing. So Richmond retail merchants, financial institutions and others decided to help by launching a nonprofit credit counseling organization.

A key, Honenberger said, was education, teaching people how to avoid getting in that financial trap.Im a former banker, he explained.Which graniteslabs is right for you? My extensive experience with credit unions has given me an appreciation for the fact the credit union industry and credit counseling have a very similar mission, financial literacy education.

About 15 or 20 years ago three things happened. First was the consolidation of unsecured credit. Second, people have tended away from face-to-face counseling. While we think thats still a very important and valuable part of our business, statistics show more and more people want counseling by telephone. About 60% of our business is telephone-based, 20% is face-to-face, and another 20% is Internet-based.

The third change involves funding of credit counseling, Honenberger continued. Historically, when a counseling firm worked out payments to several creditors, the firm would receive 15%t of the amount paid. Today, the average is 5% or less. That has forced the industry to seek efficiency by merging, growing and in the case of many nonprofits soliciting grants. That includes Consumer Credit Counseling of Richmond, which after a number of mergers became Clear Point in 2003.

We have a wide range of relationships with credit unions around the country, Honenberger explained. At Langley Federal Credit Union we actually have a counselor in the main office. When an individual comes in and indicates theyre having difficulty making payments on multiple accounts, not just Langley, they can be directed to our office right down the hall.Other credit unions have Clear Point literature on hand and can refer a member to counseling by phone or Internet.

Its not surprising to hear that in 2008 and 2009, as the Great Recession took hold, Clear Point saw a dramatic increase in referrals. Then, after 2009,Have a look at all our partymerchantaccount models starting at 59.90US$ with free proofing. there was a substantial decline. Honenberger believes the credit card disclosure act did indeed provide consumers with certain protection, especially high risk consumers. Even so, the list of problems still includes job loss, medical expenses and student loans.

For an old girl, she's surprisingly fast and it's hard to out-walk her. But then she's probably been hustling the side-walks of San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district for years.

Apart from it being the repository of Tony Bennett's heart, San Francisco is known for steep hills, great food and a hunk of orange metal masquerading as a bridge. Oh, and there's that rather exclusive yacht race for the America's Cup on there at the moment. But one of its most interesting features is The Haight, as it's most commonly known.

Part nostalgic, part grungy, part ridiculously expensive Victorian real-estate, this collection of streets which falls sharply away from Golden Gate Park is also a treasure-chest of history. The birthplace of America's counter-culture, the Haight was Ground Zero during the summer of 1967, aka the Summer of Love.

And with them came music. by 1966, the Haight was home to artists such as the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and Janis Joplin. Some of the more notorious "flower children" also lived here,Give your logo high visibility on highriskmerchantaccount! including People's Temple founder Jim Jones and serial killer Charles Manson, although a brochure I pick up at the famous City Lights Bookshop tells me that Manson left the 'hood when he "thought it was getting too weird".

Although the power of the flower has wilted, many reminders remain: in just one block of Haight St, for example, we see smoke shops with names such as Pipe Dreams and The Head Shop which seem to be doing a roaring trade in bongs, ugly tie-dyed T-shirts and other hippy paraphernalia. Since the passage of California's Medical Marijuana initiative, many of these shops also double as legal dispensaries for those with a valid medical marijuana card.

Many trees have also been turned into shrines to musicians such as Jimi Hendrix, Amy Winehouse and Jerry Garcia, featuring laminated photos and grubby plastic flowers tied to their trunks and burned-out candles littering their base.

Garcia, front-man for perhaps the neighbourhood's most famous band, the Grateful Dead, still has a strong presence here, despite dying from heroin withdrawal in 1995. His image stares down at us from many walls and 710 Ashbury St, the house where the Grateful Dead lived and worked for three years in the mid-60s, is still one of the neighbourhood's most photographed features (apart from, of course, the famous fish-net stockinged legs that protrude saucily above the Piedmont Boutique).

The Garcia love-in also extends to the intersection of Haight and Ashbury, once name-checked as the epicentre of the psychedelic revolution, where they're still selling cuddly Jerry Garcia dolls. We cross the road to buy a scoop of Cherry Garcia from Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Store, where the kid behind the counter tells us without missing a beat that the delicious mash-up of cherries and dark chocolate is indeed a tribute to the Grateful Dead guitarist. He adds that even the fire trucks around here sport Grateful Dead stickers.
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Soon, you can renew smartcards on BEST buses

You will soon be able to pay the monthly/quarterly bus fare to the conductor and get your smartcards renewed in the bus itself. And BEST also plans to launch a facility for recharging cards through cellphones. This means you will not have to stand in long queues at the depots to get passes renewed. 

Said a senior official from BEST's traffic wing, "At present, we have an option of Internet payment facility (through Netbanking) to recharge smartcards. After you have made the payment at your home PC, you can hand over the card to the conductor who will update it using an e-ticketing machine. The machine can write data on the card and renew the expiry date of your pass." 

The machines, however, cannot carry out any monetary transactions at present. "Earlier, when we tried to experiment with monetary transactions with a smartcard, the machine hung for 15 seconds. We are trying to overcome this problem. Soon, you may get the facility of paying money and renewing passes in the bus itself (through conductors)," the official said. 

Shridhar Krishnan, a regular commuter, said, "At the time of renewing quarterly bus passes, we have to stand in long queues. There have been several cases of computer systems hanging at the depots. We have to wait for 15 minutes to half-an-hour to get the passes renewed.Shop for iccard dolls from the official NBC Universal Store and build a fun collection for your home or office." 

Said BEST committee member Kedar Hombalkar, "Waiting at a queue in the depot is almost like a punishment. It takes between 30 minutes to an hour to get the job done. I have several such cases and have also taken up the issue at the panel meeting. We need to introduce the in-bus renewal facility at the earliest.He saw the bracelet at a howotipper store while we were on a trip. Our commuters should also get more online facilities for any purchase or renewals. They need not come to our depots in future." BEST general manager Om Prakash Gupta said the undertaking wanted to give more options to commuters so that they don't have to stand in long queues. "We want to popularize the Net payment facility while at the same time launch the mobile recharging service and also facilitate payment in the bus in near future." 

He added: "Our e-ticketing facility is a hit with passengers. It dispenses ticket with detailed information (stops,Online shopping for cableties from a great selection of Clothing. fare, conductor and bus numbers, etc) within seconds. We are also able to analyze data on every e-ticketing machine online using the GPS system. The e-ticketing system has been recognized by the UITP at World Congress in Geneva,This model includes 2 flush mounted reverse chipcard. where BEST won an award for IT innovation recently." 

A possible downside is that in many countries you are now required to register your SIM card (because phones are increasingly being used for mobile banking).Online shopping for cableties from a great selection of Clothing. This just means you might spend 15 to 20 minutes in a store buying and registering the SIM. For travelers going to multiple countries your SIM card will simply pick up a partner network in another country. It will cost you more than on the SIM card's home network but you will receive a text message with rate information. 

Most US phones do not use SIM cards and for those operators that do (like T-Mobile) your phone will be locked on the US and won't work. Instead you can borrow, buy or rent an unlocked phone that accepts a SIM card. In South Africa it quite easy and fast to rent a local phone and SIM card in the Johannesburg airport. Rental is not as easy in East Africa but you could bring one an unlocked phone with you or buy a cheap one when you get there (it won't be locked on a specific country). If you travel a lot buying an unlocked phone is worth the investment. Some tour operators and properties will also rent or lend you a local phone and SIM card if you request it. 

International calling rates on local SIM cards will vary by country and company. For example right now in Kenya calling the US with a local SIM card is mind-blowingly cheap. In South Africa your calls (both local and to the US) won't be as cheap as in East Africa but will be less than from your US phone, about 30 cents/minute. The rates will vary for calling other countries in Africa but will still be less than using your US phone. 

If you are going to be making a lot of local calls or don't feel like you need to have your regular phone number, getting a local "pay as you go" SIM card is often the most cost-effective option for local and international calls when traveling in Africa. 

A local pay-as-you-go SIM card gives you a local phone number. The SIM card itself costs less than $20 and then you buy additional credit as you need it. If you have a smart phone the pay-as-you-go will also apply to data meaning you are charged per megabyte of data to send and receive emails and browse the internet. The major companies will have shops in the airport to buy SIM cards.

Can This Be a Laptop?

Tablets are great, but how productive can people really be with them? When it comes to getting things done, nothing beats a mouse and keyboard. The struggle to have it all in one device has led to hybrids like the Lenovo Yoga and productivity-focused tablets like the Surface Pro. 

Those products have their individual merits, but they always force the user to make the PC equivalent of Sophie's Choice: Do you sacrifice the keyboard for greater portability, or do you keep it and just accept your laptop will always be bulkier than a tablet? 

Sony may have just spared us that terrible decision with the Vaio Pro 11. The Windows 8 PC weighs just 1.The largest manufacturer of textile smartcard for use with perchloroethylene.92 pounds, or about an ounce lighter than the Surface Pro tablet, and it measures just 0.68 of an inch at its thickest point. And yes, it's a laptop. With touch.Laser engraving and laser customkeychain for materials like metal, 

How can this be? Sony built the Vaio Pro 11 partly out of carbon fiber to keep the weight down, but other than that it attributes the laptop's featherlight status to "a passion for design." That passion seems to acknowledge that battery life is an issue, since Sony's product sheet says it'll last "all day" only with an optional sheet battery. 

Sony lent me one of its super-slim Vaios to check out. It has a few odd design choices and that battery life is an issue but I still came away blown over that such a little device can pack a huge PC punch. That's partly because Sony sent over a machine configured with an Intel Core i7 chip rather than a less powerful i5. 

It's hard to use the Vaio Pro 11 and not constantly marvel at the overall design. Still, while Sony appears to have perfected compactness in the laptop form factor, it needs to work on some of its specific design choices. 

The keyboard, for example, feels a little less polished than others. Although the chiclet-style keys look good and provide nice breathing room for the fingers, a couple of them were slightly misaligned on my unit (then again, it was a pre-production unit). Also, the keys have slightly too much "give" for an ideal typing experience this isn't exactly a MacBook Air. 

On the plus side, the keyboard's backlit, and the light is intelligent enough to turn itself off if you don't touch the keyboard for too long. When you open the laptop, the hinge is built so the back of the keyboard is elevated slightly a very smart decision. 

The trackpad is nice and big, although otherwise it's nothing to write home about. Here it feels like the pad actually has not enough give, and my presses sometimes threatened to topple the thing over if the laptop was resting in an irregular position.He saw the bracelet at a howotipper store while we were on a trip. Still, it works fine.

The other touch interface the screen is beautiful: a full HD (1,920 x 1,080) display that's enhanced with Sony's Triluminous tech for better color, contrast and everything else that TVs have prioritized for years. It looks great, although for a touchscreen, I found it a tad "sticky" and sometimes hard to swipe on even if I was just a tad sweaty. 

If there's a dumb decision in the Pro 11 design, it's the corners. For some reason Sony designed the corners to be incredibly pointy. They're not arrowheads, but they're sharp enough that they do poke out noticeably, and bring new meaning to the term "hot corners." God help the poor guy who drops this Vaio corner-first onto his foot. 

I was able to forgive Sony its design sins, however, after using the Vaio Pro 11 for just a little while. Windows 8 boots up fast, but on this machine it's like lightning. Apps launch quickly as well,A porcelaintiles is a plastic card that has a computer chip implanted into it that enables the card. and it responds fluidly to gestures and taps on the screen.Easily installed solar mounting systems for fridgemagnet and pitched roofs. Just as I'd expect from a high-end Ultrabook. 

It doesn't take much to coax the fans into turning on fire up just a few apps, a high-res YouTube video, or start thinking about launching an app from Adobe, and sure enough that whirring will start. It's not as loud as, say, a MacBook Pro, but it's a near-constant presence. 

What you're looking at, though especially if it's video will make you forget about the noise. Watching some movie trailers in 1080p on the Vaio Pro 11, I found the picture quality to have better contrast with lifelike motion and eye-popping color. 

Sony attributes the Vaio's superior picture quality to both its Triluminous display tech as well as its X-Reality engine, which is said to reduce visual noise. Comparing the recent trailer for Man of Steel on the Vaio vs. my MacBook Pro, the Sony was the clear winner, even at the smaller screen size. 

Sony also included its ClearAudio+ sound processing to improve the sound. I did find that music and videos sounded great on the Vaio, but it couldn't play very loud for it to be practical. To really use the Pro 11 as a primary video machine, you'll want to invest in an external speaker or headphones.

Get your home office wired for success

Luckily for me, the move she has in mind won't involve lawyers or packing bags. She wants me to move out of the home office we share. She works neatly. I, on the other hand, leave a trail of debris and clutter behind like some especially messy snail.

I do have another office down in the daylight basement. But I often find myself sitting at a desk in the upstairs office Mary uses. She profits from that:  I offer witty remarks about things I have found on the Web and sometimes I even turn on a spare ham radio I keep up there to add to the entertainment. So you can see, even if she does not, that I bring a lot of value to the table.

To convince Mary of my good intentions -- and perhaps maintain my seat in the upstairs office -- I have embarked on a decluttering mission to convince her of my worth. I'll take you along with me today as I attack a maze of wires clumped together like especially amorous snakes that trail under desks and along the walls of our home office.

There's value in this for you, since there are reasons beyond neatness for straightening up the growing number of cables and wires in any home office. Computers breed wires like rabbits breed young ones.  There will be times when you need to replace one of your home office devices or work on one of them. The worst part of the job often is finding which cable in the tangle goes where.

Unless you've paid close attention to your own growing collection of wires you may be surprised at what you'll find under your desk (not even counting the Coke bottles and candy wrappers I found).

It's not unusual to see, in one room, a couple of computers; a router for networking your home office; a UPS (uninterruptable power supply) to provide back-up power for your computers; a telephone or two; maybe even an old-fashioned fax machine like we own; external hard disks that connect to your computers for making back-ups; a high-speed modem; a paper shredder; cables used to connect a smart phone to the computer; a card reader device to transfer photos to your computer, a table lamp or two; and various wall warts used to power modems, hard disks, telephones and the like.

Making sense of all those wires and cables can let you quickly connect and reconnect your gadgets when something goes haywire. You'll also avoid tripping over one of the wires and hurting both yourself and the devices attached to the wire. And, not so incidentally, the office will look a lot better when you’re done.

Decluttering your wires isn't difficult, although it can be time consuming. So let's get started.

First, we will put a label at both ends of every wire and cable. If you have a label-making machine, you can do an especially neat job of things. If not, I suggest using your printer to create the labels. You can attach them using clear tape; I recommend the extra sturdy clear tape used for taping shipping boxes since it's more likely to stick around. It'll do a better job than the transparent tape you keep on your desk. However you do things, tape the labels on securely and in a way that will let you read them easily.

When you're done, a typical cable might have a label that looks like this. On one end it might say: ROUTER. On the other end of the same cable: BILL'S COMPUTER. Make the same kind of labels for every wire and cable. You'll end up with labels like: iPHONE CHARGER, SPEAKER POWER, TO MODEM, FROM MODEM. You get the idea.

Do all that while the wires and cables are still connected to your devices so you don’t add to the confusion. Then, once everything is labeled, we're going to disconnect almost everything. By doing that, we'll free up the wires so we can untangle the mess beneath your desk or desks. It's almost impossible to straighten out the wires while they are connected.

You'll need several packages of cable ties. They can be found at Home Depot, Lowes or Radio Shack. Cable ties are used to bundle wires together. So, for instance, if you have several power cables that go to a UPS, you can create a neat bundle. Then you can bundle up ethernet cables. Once that's completed you'll have a neat, tangle-free group of wires.

Some of your wires may travel quite a distance. In our home office, there are both ethernet and telephone cables that start beneath Mary's desk and travel along the walls over to my desk. They're an accident waiting to happen. If they eventually creep away from the wall a bit, you can trip over them (I've demonstrated that more than once). Hardware stores sell hollow plastic molding strips specially made to solve the problem. Your wires fit in the hollow section and the molding strips can be tacked between wall and floor. That not only hides the wires, it protects them.

Once all that is done, you will have an easy time reattaching all your wires and cables, since everything is neatly bundled and labeled. And, as you reattach them, you are almost certain to make a nice discovery. I'll bet -- once everything is hooked up -- you'll find wires and cables and wall warts that are no longer used. Remove them (tuck them away in a drawer instead of throwing them away, they may come in handy some day).

Now you're done. Not only does your home office look better but it's also going to be much easier next time you need to replace a router or work on a computer. After all, the last thing you want to do in a repair emergency is to paw through a nest of wires just to find the ones you need.

I did such a good job in the upstairs office that I'm now assigned to repeat the same decluttering process in the downstairs office. At times virtue has unexpected and unpleasant rewards.