Lifehacker

Just when you thought we’d heard the last of Antonio Banderas’ sexy cat voice, spin-off chapter Puss in Boots: The Last Wish (Antonio Banderas) gets a late-in-the-day sequel, 11 years after the last movie featuring the character, and wound up Oscar nominated for its efforts.

Getting accurate speech-to-text has always been a pain in the ass. A decade ago, it would cost you a $199 app purchase—and the result would still require a lot of editing to make it accurate. But this is where we start to see tangible benefits of the AI revolution, where the learning models can do things incredibly…Read more...

A common gripe about bosses is that they give little to no feedback, leaving employees wondering how they’re performing or worried that something might be wrong. But not receiving feedback often means only that: You’re not getting feedback. In many cases, the reason has to do with the manager’s skill set, not yours—…Read more...

Valentine’s Day is embarrassing. All those flowers and that soppy sentiment? No thank you. Not for me, or my fellow misanthropes. Still, many of us manage to find love, despite our poisonous hearts. If you’re lucky enough to meet a fellow traveler who hates the same things you hate, you have to play the game, at least…Read more...

I am tired of being cold. Unfortunately, given the fact that I live in the Pacific Northwest, I am probably going to go on being cold for at least six more weeks. Luckily, I am not tired of eating warming foods, such as soups, big piles of potatoes, and stews. Stews are especially fortifying—particularly, beef stew.Read more...

To hear the TikTok girlies tell it, there’s a hack that will let you EAT MORE FOOD! While NOT GAINING WEIGHT! And it’s great if you are SICK OF DIETING! Never mind that one can achieve all those goals by a simple trick called “not dieting anymore.” No, it needs a name and a strict protocol: reverse dieting.

We don’t generally think of heavy cream as a “cooking fat,” or at least I don’t. To me, it is a drinking fat, a whipping fat, a drizzling fat, and I’m sure it’s all of those things to you as well, but don’t let these cold-temperature applications prevent you from getting heated, especially when it comes to eggs.Read more...

For scrubbing walls, there’s nothing better than a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser (which is actually just a melamine sponge, brand names be damned). But these bad boys can do a whole lot more than de-scuff your walls—when Mr. Clean says “magic,” he means it.

If you’re employed, you’re likely receiving one of two primary types of payment: a salary or an hourly wage. While the difference between the two is easy to understand on its face, it’s important to consider the pros and cons of being being a salaried versus a wage worker.Read more...

Quick, check your pantry: Does your Rao’s Chicken & Gnocchi Soup look green when it should look tomato red? If so, it’s part of Sovos Brands Intermediate, Inc.’s voluntary recall announcement. According to the U.S. Food Drug and Administration’s (FDA), the company issued the recall because they mislabeled some …Read more...

Almost 100 million Americans watched the Super Bowl in 2022. Compare that to the average Monday Night Football game this year, enjoyed by “only” about 20 million sports fans. If you’re one of those 80 million or so casual viewers, I’ve assembled a thumbnail sketch of the themes, dramas, and players to watch for in…Read more...

Love it or hate it, you can’t deny: TikTok is addicting. What makes it so addicting isn’t necessarily the quality of the videos (although there are plenty of great ones). Rather, it’s the impressive algorithm that quickly learns what you like and delivers you relevant videos one after another. While many now get their…Read more...

I’m proud to say I’ve eaten a lot of Italian food in my day. Growing up in New Jersey, if we ever went out to eat, it was likely Italian. It’s a rich, expansive cuisine that’s full of adored classics (I love a towering eggplant parm), but our commitment to those classics can prevent us from discovering lesser known…Read more...

National Pizza Day, Thursday, Feb. 9, is one of many food holidays on our calendar—but I think we can agree that it’s among the upper echelon of food holidays (see also: National Burrito Day in the spring, National Chicken Wing Day in the summer, and International Beer and Pizza Day in the fall). As such, it offers…Read more...

Sometimes quitting is a definitive act that requires soul searching. We tend to reserve this for big changes in our lives: leaving a job, breaking up with a partner, moving to a new city. Contrast that with those things we simply give up on—the things that fall by the wayside, without an explicit decision on our part.…Read more...

With so many do-it-yourself personal finance tools at your fingertips, you might not even consider the need to enlist the help of a real-life financial advisor. From getting out of debt to investing in your retirement, how can you tell which financial milestones are worth the time and money of a professional? Here’s…Read more...

On a Mac, there are plenty of video editors that will happily take your money. But for simple editing, you don’t need to spend a dime. There’s iMovie, of course, which offers enough tools to chop together a video. But for the simplest of edits, don’t bother: You can, instead, use QuickTime to not only trim videos, but…Read more...

If you own a home, you will almost certainly have contractors in your house at some point. Whether it’s a one-day project or a major repair that will take weeks, having contractors in your home is disruptive and stressful—for both of you. Your routine and private space are compromised (plus, the mess)—yet far too many…Read more...

The Notes app hides many secrets (and we’re not only talking about nudes). It’s filled with little-known features like tags, not to mention a literal secret chatting system. One of its best hidden gems, though, is a small button that simply reads “Scan Text.”

If you frequently work out of coffee shops or other public places, you might be concerned about leaving your laptop unattended when you take a quick bathroom break or step away for a call. You don’t want someone sensing the opportunity and snatching your MacBook while your back is turned. Now, there’s a new Mac app…Read more...

Have you found a weird looking rock when out hiking and thought, “I bet that came from outer space!” I have. Sadly, it’s almost definitely not a meteorite. As cool (and lucrative) as it would be to chance on the remainder of a meteor that survived its trip through the atmosphere to strike Earth, finding a bonafide…Read more...

Air fryers are amazing, objectively speaking. The fact that you can crisp something up fast is great; doing so without the use of oil, even more impressive. If you’re curious about the science behind it, all you’re doing is removing moisture from the food faster than a conventional oven can. The faster you do it, the…Read more...

“What are you working on?” my father asked me, genuinely curious. “I’m roasting KFC coleslaw,” I told him. My dad had just finished telling me he does “about six surgeries a day,” which is “not that many.” We all have our roles to play, and I have accepted that the work my parents do (saving the lives of animals) is…Read more...

I’ve lived in places with snowy winters my whole life, and I always think I know what I’m doing—but then I’ll learn something like why ice scrapers have ridges on the back and wonder how I got this far. Read on for more winter driving and car care tips for both the beginners and the seasoned among us.

The used car market has been on an interesting ride over the past year. Prices for used vehicles began to surge early in 2022, by September reaching around a 43% premium over pre-pandemic levels, according to a report from J. P. Morgan. Though prices started to drop (slowly) in the last quarter of 2022 as supply chain…Read more...

The only jam I buy with any regularity is Bonne Maman strawberry preserves. It is a perfect product. It’s sweet and tart, with discernible pieces of berry, and it comes packed in a Bonne Maman jar, another perfect product that I hoard like a little jar goblin.Read more...

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In many places, cash is no longer king. While you still can manage to live a cash-only lifestyle if you want to, few of us do. Some of us don’t even carry cash at all, relying on our phones and credit cards, tapping and swiping at stores and using apps like Venmo or Cash App for personal transactions that would once…Read more...

Sweetened condensed milk is the ingredient behind many delicious treats, like dulce de leche, brigadeiro, Thai iced coffee, and a host of other delights. This viscous, sweet dairy is celebrated for its malty, candy-like flavor, and a thick consistency that allows it to stretch across different lanes of culinary usage.…Read more...

If you’ve played around with ChatGPT at all, you know how impressive (and terrifying) AI can be. ChatGPT can generate just about anything you ask it to, with prompts as simple or as complex as you can think of. Well, Google has figured out how to do the same. But rather than spit out poems or computer programs,…Read more...

In the current inflation-ridden hellscape of a car market we’re experiencing, you might see some advice that leasing is a solution to your car-buying woes. Wouldn’t you rather drive a shiny new car at a lower monthly payment, as opposed to financing a car—even if that means you’ll someday own it outright? While it’s…Read more...

Ford has recalled 462,000 vehicles worldwide (382,000 in the U.S.) because of a video output failure that prevents the rearview camera image from displaying on the dashboard. According to a report from Ford, there have been 17 crashes “minor accidents allegedly resulting from blue screensymptoms,” but is not aware of…Read more...

Why does it feel like every week, we’re coming to you with a plea to ignore the latest TikTok cleaning hack because it’s dangerous, faulty, or useless? Well, probably because we are, and this week is no different: There’s a hack going around advising people to tackle their tile grout with toilet bowl cleaner and…Read more...

If rumor holds, Samsung is about to unveil its latest and greatest devices: The Galaxy S23, the next iteration of its flagship smartphone line, and the Galaxy Book3, an upgrade to the company’s laptop offering. If you want to know everything that’s new as soon as its announced, you’ll want to watch Unpacked 2023 as…Read more...

The gang’s all here for the third and final season of Star Trek: Picard (Feb. 16), as the Paramount+ spiritual revival of The Next Generation finally goes ahead and gives fans what they wanted all along by bringing onboard most of the rest of the bridge crew from the good ol’ Enterprise NCC-1701-D, plus Seven of Nine…Read more...

Like many households, we have a roll of masking tape in the kitchen junk drawer, and frequently use it for all kinds of crafts, labeling, and miscellaneous nonsense. But the edge is often torn in a way that makes it tough to peel up next time. I thought my husband was smart when he came up with the idea of cutting the…Read more...

The idea that we should all be paid fairly for our work is kind of a no-brainer—but how can we as individuals actually make progress towards pay transparency and ensure equal pay for equal work?Read more...

Who among us has never forgotten a friend or family member’s birthday? We all lead busy lives and it’s often all we can do to keep up with our own schedule of meetings, appointments, and deadlines. And even if you do fleetingly remember that it’s your father-in-law’s birthday while you’re in the middle of something…Read more...

Super Bowl Sunday is our nation’s biggest unofficial holiday, and it’s fast approaching on February 12. But football is a divisive sport, and Super Bowl parties can be a volatile mix of barely interested normies who came to see the commercials and super-fans so steeped in football that no one invites them anywhere …Read more...

We’re coming to the end of January, which, for some, may have been quite dry. Abstaining from alcohol has many benefits, and one major drawback: If and when you decided to start drinking again, you’ll find your tolerance is much lower than it was before you took your break.Read more...

Keeping a house in good operating condition is expensive and time-consuming, which is why some folks defer their maintenance or slap together sketchy DIY repairs when things go wrong—and then sometimes try to sell that house to you in the hopes that you don’t notice. That’s why it’s shocking that more and more people…Read more...

Cacti and other succulents have been popular houseplants for years now—and given how easy they are to care for, that’s hardly surprising. The downside? They can also be pricey.Read more...

In theory, cleaning a mirror shouldn’t be difficult. A few spritzes of a cleaning product, followed by a thorough wipe-down, seems like it should leave you with a streak-free, glistening reflective surface. But far too often, that’s not the case.Read more...

As you’re probably well aware, your laptop keyboard is super gross—even if you’ve cleaned it relatively recently. The crumbs, dust, dirt, spills, and oils from your fingers accumulate surprisingly quickly, and can turn into a layer of grimy film.Read more...

When you clean your home, you probably have it down to some type of routine: Tidying up and wiping down set spots in each room. But if that’s the case, it means that you might be missing some hidden mold growth. Here are the spots you should check on a regular basis to make sure that’s not happening.

Target’s first exclusive electronic’s brand, Heyday, is having a 50% sale on many of their products right now—and you may notice that a lot of these products have a striking similarity to Apple products. So if you’re in the market for an Apple-like product and don’t mind not having the real deal, this might be the…Read more...

I’m generally an Apple man, but even I can admit Android’s “blobs” were the superior emoji. They’re cute, they’re fun, they’re unique, and they were unjustly retired in 2017 in a move to make Android’s emojis look more like everyone else’s. It’s a damn shame, but not a shame you have to live with anymore. If you have…Read more...

In this week’s kids-report, the children of post-everything America take a look at the world we built for them and offer a verdict. Spoiler: It’s not super positive. Luckily, development of flying Taser robots is proceeding rapidly; hopefully they’ll soon be deployed to our nation’s schools soon to offer a forceful…Read more...

From a mouse jiggler to help you pretend you’re actively working to a refillable hand-warmer to help you survive the dead of winter, you’re sure to find something on this list that will help you care for your physical or mental health. These are the best self-care deals you can find right now for less than $25, and…Read more...

Chip dip is a flavorful swimming pool in which assorted crunchy foods can dive and swim, but it’s also an excellent ingredient for building substantial meals. Usually packed with seasonings, herbs, cheeses, and plenty of salt, dip can transform the flavor and texture of other ingredients to make a filling meal. From…Read more...