How not to get ESD zapped while exiting your car

For some reasons, I'm a walking ESD (Electrostatic Discharge) zapper. I can accumulate substantial static just by walking around or standing up from my chair, especially exiting or walking out of my car. This problem has been bothering me for years, especially during the winter season when the air is dry due to the heater plus the cold weather. This may be due to the clothing I wear or my body composition that lacks conductive paths to properly ground myself (scientific explanation).

Whatever the reasons may be, I found a good way to prevent static accumulation. It's simple. I touch the metal portion of the door while exiting the car. By the same token, I touch a large metal body (closet frame, table frame, and etc.) while standing up from my chair. By touching a large metal body, I basically drain the static charge into the large metal body, which is large enough to absorb the electron charges or provides a conductive path to the earth ground, so I don't have to carry the electric charges and use them as a weapon.

Now, only if I can harvest the charges to generate power ....

Earbuds - a hazard to your credit cards

During my last week-long vacation trip, I placed a set of MP3 player's earbuds in my pocket so I could listen to my MP3 players whenever I get bored. (Yes, a week-long vacation could be very boring.) Well, I placed the hotel room card key in the same pocket too. After a day or so, I started having difficulty accessing the hotel facility with the card key. While trying to get the hotel front-desk clerk to re-program my card key, it dawned on me that speaker of the ear bud is made of a large magnet, which could have been slowly re-programming or erasing the information stored in the magnetic strip of the card key. The problem went away after I placed the ear buds in a different pocket.

Just imagine if I placed the earbuds in the same pocket where I stored my wallet. I could have many embarrassing moments when I had to use the credit cards.