Whether you’re looking for an apartment close to your school or close to your new job, follow these three rules to get the best out of your new relationship with your landlord. Read your lease, be an aware tenant, and know how to solve a problem.  

Maybe mom’s constant advice about always washing your hands isn’t so annoying after all. UC students and staff received an e-mail Aug. 24 from University Health Services informing the campus community of two confirmed cases of the H1N1 virus, also know as “swine flu.” As of a week ago, the number of confirmed cases had doubled.  

Years ago, all summer entertaining was done in the front of the house. Later, the party moved to the backyard. We started with placing a charcoal grill out back to grill up a few hot dogs and have since moved on to full outdoor kitchens, expansive sitting areas and large grassy lawns on which to play cornhole or catch.   

President Eisenhower said that farming looks easy “when your plow is a pencil and you’re 1,000 miles from the cornfield.” Many would-be gardeners enjoy plowing through seed catalogs, but others in Greater Cincinnati have moved from the “easy” part to tilling, planting and tending to new urban farms in lots and backyards across the city.   

In talking with several jewelers that work with big-time Rap stars, the paper found that many of them have requested cheaper jewelry in the face of the recession. Instead of real diamonds, some have switched to — gasp! — cubic zirconium.  

I recently read an article about making biodiesel fuel out of spent coffee grounds. The grounds yield stable oil that can be extracted and converted into a roasted-smelling fuel. Well, cars don’t run on coffee yet, but there is a place in Greater Cincinnati that exemplifies a kinship between cars and coffee.  

Ally is Cincinnati’s green introduction service, but it isn’t in the businesses of helping ecologically oriented singles find compatible mates. It’s a nonprofit organization that brings together individuals, businesses and other likeminded groups to create green and healthy schools.   

A piece of legendary television history, long considered lost but discovered and restored by the Archive of American Television, makes its DVD debut with its crackling, electrifying energy intact. Budd Schulberg wrote What Makes Sammy Run?, a portrait of venal and ignorant but desperately striving, hustling Hollywood studio boss Sammy Glick, way back in 1941.  

The unofficial local holiday known as Opening Day (referring to Cincinnati’s pro baseball team’s first game, for you non-sporto types) has had its pre-game parade for 90 years. But local folksinger Jake Speed has started what has become a new Opening Day tradition.  

Housed in a former Frisch’s Big Boy, Parkside Cafe (1024 E. McMillan St., Walnut Hills, 513-221-2026) keeps it real with its own drive-thru window, soup and salad bar and what seems to be the original Frisch’s furniture. They must still have the same ice machine, too, because the ice was Frisch’s ice.