Lifehacker

When I got my dental night guard, the woman who made the molds was adamant that I only, only, rinse it with warm water every day and occasionally, let the soft bristles of my toothbrush scrape any excess mouth detritus from its delicate features. This would be enough, she assured me. (I was skeptical.) She was also…Read more...

Water flossers like the Waterpik have flooded the shelves of dentist offices and retailers. While their popularity is unquestionable, does Waterpik remove plaque or clean your teeth better than regular old floss?Read more...

You’re a busy person. You have a job, maybe more than one. You have a family, friends, hobbies, worries, and all kinds of unique responsibilities. It can be hard to find the time to fit it all in, but you still need to find time to get it in, if you catch the drift here.

There are things about our existence in the modern world we tend to think about constantly, like lunch or whether we can get away with wearing our favorite sweats for a fourth day straight. Other aspects of modern life are almost invisible to us, like the energy that is magically delivered to our homes on a daily…Read more...

If you were always more into the geography bowl over the spelling bee, you’re in luck. The latest addition to the Wordle-esque turf war is a global challenger called “Worldle.” And chances are excellent this geography-based guessing game will destroy the ego your 25-day Wordle streak has built up.Read more...

If you use the Microsoft Office suite of applications, such as Word, Excel, or PowerPoint, you’ll have noticed these apps try to save all your files on OneDrive. For some people, that’s a great system because it keeps an online copy of their file in the cloud. But if you prefer to keep local copies of your Office…Read more...

A spin bike is one of the best home-gym investments you can make, since it lets you work on your cardio fitness even when the weather is too hot or cold to go for a ride or a jog outside. And unlike a rower or a set of kettlebells, you don’t need much in the way of technique: just hop on and start pedaling.

The Nintendo Switch offers several play styles, an advantage of its hybrid console/handheld nature. You can play docked and connected to your TV, or portably in handheld or tabletop modes. The Switch also supports a number of first and third-party controller options out of the box. These options make finding a…Read more...

With inflation topping 7% and consumer confidence at a 10-year low, it’s a foregone conclusion that the Federal Reserve will raise the federal funds rate in the near future. It could be at their meeting in March, or it could come even sooner at an emergency meeting, but it’s coming. The first hike is likely to be…Read more...

We’re halfway through February, a month in which resolve is weakened and resolutions are abandoned. Even if you started the year with the best eating habits in place, bad weather, a chocolate-focused holiday, and life have a way of derailing these best laid meal plans.

As the good book says, to every thing there is a season—a that’s especially true in relationships, which have distinct phases couples navigate, usually without even realizing that they’re leaving one and entering another.Read more...

Volcanic eruptions are more than juicy fodder for middle-school science fair projects. When hot gasses and molten rock spew from openings in the earth, it can quickly alter landscapes, level buildings, and kill a lot of people. Just ask the citizens of ancient Pompeii (if you can find anyone.)

No matter your opinion on Dr. Gary Chapman and his “5 Love Languages,” (some say it revolutionized their marriage; some say Chapman, a Baptist pastor with a Ph.D. in adult education, is a “therapeutic fraud”), you can’t deny that the idea he made mainstream—focusing on showing love and affection to our romantic …Read more...

There’s nothing quite like a proper shower after a long day. But if weak water pressure and irregular spray patterns are preventing you from washing away your troubles, then it might be time to give your shower head a deep clean.

Mono is a disease best known to afflict teenagers and young adults, with the main symptoms being excessive fatigue and getting teased about who you have been kissing. But anyone can get it, and it’s worth knowing the rest of the symptoms.

The world doesn’t need to know when you’re taking a shit. Sure, it’s a normal bodily function that nobody need be ashamed of—but sometimes you just want to poop without announcing it to everyone via sounds and smells. Here’s how to do that.

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Valentine’s Day is, among other things, a great excuse to eat obscene amounts of chocolate (as is any day before or after Valentine’s Day). Relationships are cool and everything, but whether you’re in one or not, you deserve to celebrate love with delicious treats. You can easily find recipes that serve two or more,…Read more...

It’s not your imagination—everything is more expensive than it used to be, but especially used cars. Once the safe harbor for folks without the savings and/or credit for a new vehicle, used cars are suddenly worth their weight in gold, and the internet is filled with horror stories of 2003 Camrys with 150,000 miles…Read more...

When a video call ends, there’s always that initial worry: “Did I really leave the meeting...can they all still hear me?” If you successfully ended the call, you’re usually in the clear, and can continue with whatever noisy activity you want without fear. However, Zoom has a bug that can give you a jolt, seemingly…Read more...

Hopefully, you’re getting some love from your Valentine(s) today. If not, how about a gift from the country’s largest passenger railroad service? Now through Feb. 16, Amtrak is offering a buy-one-get-one free (BOGO) ticket as part of their Amtrak Loves You Sale.

Ideally, you wouldn’t store any sensitive personal information in the cloud. There’s always a risk your online accounts will get hacked, so in theory you’re better off storing all your documents and data offline. But that’s not really how the world works anymore, and the convenience (or necessity) of maintaining easy…Read more...

Wining and dining is a Valentine’s Day tradition, but I tend to prefer snacking and cocktailing. If you would like to make a similar pivot, you’re going to need some cocktail recipes. Lucky for you and your beloved, we have plenty.Read more...

It’s a fundamental fact of human life that we lose about 100% of the umbrellas we buy. Just about everyone has experienced that moment when you’re six blocks away from the restaurant and the rain starts to fall, bringing to mind a crystal clear image of your umbrella on the floor under your table. This is why every…Read more...

If you’re a people-pleaser, you’re probably empathetic and giving. Don’t get me wrong—these are admirable qualities to have. At the same time, if you’re always accommodating other people’s wants and needs, it shouldn’t be at the expense of your own.

YouTube’s algorithm is designed to keep your eyeballs glued to video after video (after video, after video...). The dangers of this rabbit hole are well-documented. However, for every ideological radicalization enabled by YouTube, I like to think there’s at least one innocent, newfound pop culture obsession discovered…Read more...

In addition to our skin and our hair, winter also can take a toll on our eyes—and for many of the same reasons. When it’s cold outside, we want to spend more time inside, where it’s warm and dry. Unfortunately, these warm and dry conditions have a tendency to make our eyes feel dry and irritated.Read more...

Although there’s no rule saying that we have to like everyone we encounter, if it’s someone we have to deal with on a semi-regular basis—like a co-worker, relative, or a friend’s partner—we are expected to be at least civil towards them. This is the case even if we really dislike them, and want to leave a room as soon…Read more...

You’re probably already familiar with classic fruit/flavor pairings like apples and cinnamon, or cranberries and oranges. But what about grapefruit and tarragon? Or peaches and maple syrup?Read more...

Once upon a time, motivational posters adorning the walls of guidance counselors’ offices and office cubicles told us that “failure is not an option.” But at some point, that messaging eased up on failure, but found a new worst outcome: Regret.Read more...

If you’ve ever scrolled through a plant-focused Instagram account and wondered how the person’s home could possibly look so green and lush, there could be a few different explanations. The cynical ones involve the person having the financial resources to fill their space with countless plants—and possibly pay someone…Read more...

“I never smile if I can help it,” Dunder Mifflin Assistant (to the) Regional Manager Dwight Schrute tells the camera in an episode of The Office. “Showing one’s teeth is a submission signal in primates. When someone smiles at me, all I see is a chimpanzee begging for its life.”

Super Bowl LVI kicks off on Feb. 13 at 6:30 p.m. ET (3:30 p.m. PT). That leaves you two days to figure out how to stream the game online if you don’t have live TV or don’t feel comfortable watching at your favorite local drinking spot due to the still-cresting omicron wave.Read more...

A ton of people are going to bet on the Super Bowl this Sunday. Sports betting is legal in some form in 30 states, and 31.4 million Americans are expected to put down a total of $7.61 billion on the game, according to projections from the American Gaming Association.

Most people new to the gym don’t give much thought to which direction the plates face on a barbell. But serious lifters have very strong opinions about it, and in time, you too will need to choose a side. But why does anyone care? Let’s examine the controversy.

Everybody loves a good mystery, and some internet users have taken that to the next level. Sleuthing forums and online crime-solving groups have emerged across the web, letting ordinary people help solve high-profile cases.Read more...

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Quick, how do you hold your phone? Is the bottom of it resting on your pinkie, while you cradle the back with your index, middle, and ring fingers, and your thumb does all the scrolling? Alas, like the many other seemingly easy, intuitive things we do, it is wrong.

When you’re contemplating having children, you might conjure up a certain image: Well-behaved children playing nicely and taking turns on the swing in the backyard, or family movie nights where everyone agrees on the movie, or family dinners where everyone eats what you serve without complaint. Once you actually have…Read more...

My most looked-forward-to appetizer at any casual party is pigs in a blanket. I expect to see them at least three times a year—Christmas Eve, New Year’s Eve and whatever Super Bowl party I attend. If they’re missing, I’ll have something to say about it. These petite bites blend sweet, buttery,…Read more...

Video games have a reputation for frenetic action, but there is a whole clasee of simulation games that fly in the face of that conventional wisdom. They don’t put you in an imaginative situation, hand you unlimited power, or raise your adrenaline by creating life-or-death conflict. They aren’t exciting. Instead,…Read more...

Baseball might be the American pastime, but our version of football is a distinct cultural phenomenon. As much as the sport itself reflects our values, football movies go a step further, allowing filmmakers to craft and coax a straightforward story out of a game that can be chaotic and unpredictable.

Last month, we warned you about a major security flaw affecting Apple’s Safari browser. This flaw potentially allowed hackers on one website to steal your personal information from other open sites, which is, you know, bad. After months of delay, Apple finally patched this gaping security breach, just in time for…Read more...

Living in the city doesn’t mean you can’t ever leave the city.

For the longest time, a Nintendo generation meant one console and one handheld. The Game Boy alongside the NES. The Game Boy Advance next to the GameCube. The Nintendo DS and the Wii. In the Switch, Nintendo combined console and handheld into one, seemingly ending the need for a traditional mobile Nintendo system. But…Read more...

I have a new item for your to-do list: Make a better to-do list. As I’ve written before, I’m a huge proponent of tracking all the little details of your life with spreadsheets. I would never dream of dismissing the mighty pen and paper, but spreadsheets offer the ability to organize every corner of your life with much…Read more...

This week, young people are posting puzzling videos about housework, finding naked men in the trunks of their cars, and virtually riding horses together. It’s a strange and wonderful world.

If you frequently keep running out of storage space on your computer, it’s past time to take just a few steps to sort your problem out. Many of us tend to accumulate tons of junk on our computers, and while you might think to buy more storage, you should also consider just taking a few steps to teach your computer…Read more...

The vast majority of umbrellas are panic-purchased from drug stores or randos on the street during a sudden rainstorm. Therefore, the vast majority of umbrellas are purchased after conducting exactly zero research. And that is how we end up with a collection of ragged, cheap umbrellas that collapse into a useless…Read more...

In the United States, school sex ed classes don’t really educate you about sex; most of the time, they’re just trying to scare you away from doing it at all. In the process, it’s easy to pick up misconceptions, or to be subjected to straight-up lies. So we’d like to clear the record, and help you un-learn some of…Read more...