Lifehacker

I don’t know who invented the crouton, but they nailed it. Putting a bunch of bread onto a bunch of raw vegetables not only makes that pile of plant matter better tasting and more texturally interesting, it cuts down on bread waste, as the best croutons are made from stale bread.Read more...

It’s normal and expected to be irritable sometimes—when we’re overly tired, when our environment is too loud, when we sit in gridlock, or when someone steals our thunder at work. In some instances, like a traffic jam, there’s nothing we can do to change the circumstances—all we can do is consciously modulate our…Read more...

Traveling alone can be a deeply rewarding, restorative experience. I’m a huge proponent of solo travel. I’ve logged alone time in Cambodia, Germany, Montana, and who knows how many layovers in between. I’m not saying I’ve “found myself” in all these new places, but I’ve certainly learned how to enjoy my own company.…Read more...

For the longest time, it was standard practice to buy a new phone every two years. Some companies even tried to make swapping out your phone once a year the norm. However, the phones of today don’t slow to a crawl after one or two years like they used to. Hardware has progressed to a point where a device can continue…Read more...

If you checked your holiday calendar this morning, you already know we are in the midst of the Parent Teacher Association’s National Teacher Appreciation Week. While many retailers are offering limited-time offers as their way of saying thanks to America’s 3.2 million educators, here are ten companies that offer…Read more...

Divorce is the big “D” word that no one in a marriage wants to think about—but we all know it happens, even to couples whose relationship was once happy and strong. If you’ve been struggling with your relationship—or you’re just someone who’d rather be proactive than reactive when it comes to your marriage—you might…Read more...

I read a lot of science fiction and fantasy because I love it when books take me to new worlds or imagine new realities, but there’s something to be said for writing that connects you with the places you already know. Few things delight me more as a reader than picking up a book and discovering the action is set in a…Read more...

If, for absolutely no reason whatsoever, you’ve recently wondered how long you might survive after the complete collapse of society, the answer was probably troubling. If you’re like most of us, your pantry and fridge are filled with perishable food that might be healthy and delicious, but which will be inedible days…Read more...

As parents, we all want our kids to have better lives than our own. This is especially true when it comes to making sure our kids avoid some of our anxieties, whether it’s a fear of flying, driving, heights, or anxieties surrounding money or socializing.Read more...

Upgrading your home’s security doesn’t have to involve major renovations—to start with, it can be as simple as evaluating your front door and making some small—but key—changes. There are several things you can do to make your home’s main entry point more secure.Read more...

Cinco de Mayo (literally “5th of May”) has a fascinating history, but I’m going to start with what Cinco de Mayo isn’t: It is not Mexican Independence Day. That is celebrated on Sept. 16, and is an important Mexican public holiday. Cinco de Mayo is not a national holiday in Mexico, and how important it is depends on…Read more...

It’s wedding season, and you know what that means. All across the country, people are about to take off work, buy (or rent) expensive new duds, watch that formerly single friend say “I do,” gorge themselves on passed hors d’oeuvres, and get caught up in a Macarena or Electric Slide moment they swore they wouldn’t…Read more...

So many things in our homes that we think of as “single-use” items actually have at least one alternative use—and they often have several of these secret superpowers. A perfect example: sandpaper.

It is ramp season, the season that propels even the most calm and reasonable eaters into a slight panic. Do not get me wrong; ramps are delicious—I like wrapping the broad, garlicky leaves around scallops—but over-enthusiastic and thoughtless foraging can lead to the wild leek being depleted, leaving fewer ramps for…Read more...

Google’s Android 12 security patch for the month of May is here. If you have a Pixel 3a, Pixel 4, Pixel 4a, Pixel 4a 5G, Pixel 5, Pixel 5a, Pixel 6, and Pixel 6 Pro (including any XL variants), you should see this update hit your device shortly. While it’s called the security patch, the update doesn’t just fix…Read more...

Even if keeping a clean home is important to you, there’s a lot to stay on top of. There’s the obvious: taking out the garbage, unloading the dishwasher, vacuuming—let any of those slide and you’ll feel the impact almost immediately. But they are also so in your face that keeping up with them is easy (or easier,…Read more...

If you ever gaze up at the full moon and think, “It’s OK, I guess, but when does it do something?” May is your month. Most of North America will be treated to a full lunar eclipse, a complete “blood moon,” this month. You can watch the entire show in most of North America, all of South America and Western Africa, and…Read more...

I’ve always cooked on gas ranges. I grew up in a house with a gas stove, I have one in my current house, and I remember the electric-only apartments of my young adulthood with disgust. I will complain about them at length, don’t get me started. But evidence has been mounting that gas stoves and ovens cause enough…Read more...

Sometimes the people who love to give advice the most are the least qualified to give it. One person’s “words to live by” might be your “words that ruined my life.” For instance, I know I roll my eyes at a lot of the conventional wisdom that gets repeated over and over, like “winners never quit.” As a certified…Read more...

Is your job safe from artificial intelligence? As a writer who depends on finding the right words for my own thoughts, I foolishly believed I might be relatively robot-proof. Turns out, with AI copywriting sites like Copymatic, I was dead wrong.

That fact that a film is misinterpreted can’t always be laid at the feet of an audience: director François Truffaut famously suggested that it’s nearly impossible to make an anti-war film, since the job of a filmmaker is to create compelling characters and situations that inevitably make war look exciting. You can…Read more...

My sister is terrified of mushrooms, particularly the gills. This is both slightly annoying and deeply amusing. As someone who likes to feed her family (including this sister), rendering mushrooms past the point of recognizability is tedious; as an older sibling, this phobia offers plenty of opportunities for older…Read more...

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Cheez-Its are, perhaps, the perfect snack. The toasty, salty rectangles that have been around for (are you ready for this?) 101 years, excel in not only their crunchy, buttery flakiness but their ability to be easily grabbed without even making eye contact with the box. The toast bubbles? Incomparable. Their…Read more...

We know two things about the state of air travel in the United States right now. First, the number of Americans traveling by air continues to rise back to its pre-pandemic numbers. Second, many airlines are experiencing staffing shortages, forcing them to delay and cancel large swaths of flights. Add these two pieces…Read more...

Smartphones, like most computers, can overheat from time to time. It’s especially a problem during hot, sunny weather, or when using demanding apps and games. We’ve talked about general cooling solutions in the past, but when it comes to the Pixel 6 and 6 Pro, those tips might not be enough. It seems these devices are…Read more...

I’m not the first to point out that the current state of streaming is essentially a cable bundle. The task at hand is for a streamer to convince me it consistently puts out enough high-quality shows to make their service worth more than a free trial. And as I rounded up the most highly anticipated shows premiering…Read more...

Commuting is literally the worst. A recent study by economist Daniel Kahneman revealed that driving to work is the activity we rate as the least enjoyable. It’s worse than housework, answering emails, and actually working. Long commutes destroy marriages, wreck minds, and shorten lives. Commuting can even make you…Read more...

We’ve all dealt with our share of jerks at work. It might be the colleague who sucks up to the boss, the person who manages to do none of the work while taking all of the credit, or the boss that wants to micromanage every aspect of your day. Whatever your work jerk looks like, one thing is for certain: They can make…Read more...

So many incredible meals begin with an onion. They’re an absolute kitchen staple, and the base for the stews and soups that helped us survive the winter. But now it’s spring—time to cheat on them with their fresh and fragrant cousins before the season is over.Read more...

It’s not your imagination: Everything is expensive right now—including homes. Not only do potential homebuyers have to deal with rising mortgage interest rates and inflation, but there are also fewer available options at the moment. This means that some people who might have been in a position to buy a home a few…Read more...

Even if you’re not the most avid birdwatcher, you could probably identify a woodpecker—especially if you saw one on or in a tree. If nothing else, you’d recognize their pointy, drill-like beak that they use to make holes of varying sizes in order to find insects to eat, or create a hole big enough to live in.Read more...

One of the best parts about having a garden in the summer is watching your plants grow throughout the season. But if you’re out gazing at your garden one day and notice some white circular spots on the leaves, or that they look like they’ve been dusted with flour, you may be dealing with powdery mildew.Read more...

The first time you hear it, the noise can be jarring. Seemingly out of nowhere, it sounds like a helicopter is landing on your roof, or a freight train is about to come barreling through your wall and into your home. The room—and its contents—may shake the way they would during a minor earthquake.Read more...

Gardens come in all shapes, sizes, and locations—including growing out of boxes attached to windows. And while window boxes may not seem like gardens in the traditional sense, think of them as mini versions, where you can grow everything from herbs and small vegetables, to flowers.Read more...

No one expects a dog to smell good (unless you’re a big fan of the aroma of corn chips). But sometimes, they can really stink. And no, we’re not talking about a little post-cheese flatulence, or the odor that results from their dip in ditch water: We mean an unpleasant smell that lets you know something is off.Read more...

This week, Google announced they will now allow people to request to remove their personal contact information from its search results. The tech company is permitting the withdrawal of phone numbers, email addresses, and physical addresses in an attempt to protect their users from unwanted direct contact and physical…Read more...

About 75% of recruiters use an applicant tracking system (ATS) for their hiring process—and an even higher percentage (around 99%) of Fortune 500 companies do, as well. Understanding how an ATS works can help you improve your marketability to potential employers and stand out from other candidates in the hiring pool,…Read more...

If only pie recipes asked you to roll the dough into an amoeba shape. I’m excellent at that one. But perfect circles or rectangles of dough? That takes a few reps.

The brilliance of the Nintendo Switch is how it gives you the ability to go from playing a game handheld to experiencing it on your big screen in seconds. That brilliance is certainly dimmed, however, if you have to deal with intermittent blackouts on your TV. If you’re experiencing this issue with your Switch, there…Read more...

The satisfaction of watching your tiny shoots push out of the ground after weeks of waiting is one of the best parts of gardening—unless your seeds don’t germinate as evenly as you’d like. Some of your seeds may not even sprout at all, or meddling squirrels may have carried them away before they got the chance. But…Read more...

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We may never be completely rid of paper—aside from its advantages, paper will always have a “feel” that simply appeals to some folks—but we’re entering a brave new world where digital documents live harmoniously with their printed cousins. You already might keep e-books on your Kindle and print books on your shelf, or…Read more...

If you’re American, it’s not uncommon for your travel bucket list to include visiting all fifty states. You’ve probably gotten some of the big ones, like New York, California, and Florida, out of the way already—that’s because these states have obvious attractions. No one wonders if there are any fun activities to do…Read more...

The early days of social media ushered in an era of Web 2.0 fears, the loss of privacy and the threat of cyberstalking among them, plus the depressing realization that everyone you went to high school with is overtly racist.

Windows 11 makes a big deal about having an account password, and for good reason. If you’re on a shared computer, or if you’re using a laptop, it’s always best to protect your data with a password of some kind. If you’re using a desktop in your own bedroom, though, repeatedly typing in your password can become…Read more...

If you ever need to keep tabs on small changes to a website, Visual Ping can help. Visual Ping is a website and browser extension that tracks websites for just about any text, visual, and formatting change you specify. In a way, it’s like using the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine, only in real time.

This week’s trip into the strange corners of culture inhabited by young people is all about different kinds of danger! There’s the danger of talking to strangers online, the danger of going on first dates, and the danger of pursuing scientific achievement. But let’s begin with the danger of tweeting something weird.

Sometimes, we make colossally bad decisions that mess up our lives for a period of time. We stay too long in the wrong job or a toxic relationship. We hang out with the wrong people, or make a risky investment that doesn’t pan out. There are times when our mistakes and failures can be traced back to a specific…Read more...

“Breakfast in bed” is an enchanting concept—and is traditionally considered the proper way to serve breakfast to a mom on Mother’s Day—but runny egg yolks, pools of syrup, and cutlery of any kind add a certain amount of stress and awkwardness to something that should be relaxing. And relaxation on Mother’s Day, more…Read more...