Lifehacker

I don’t know if you’ve heard, but beans are having a moment—and as a longtime devotee of the bean-eating lifestyle, I do love to see it. For many people, though, dried beans are anything but exciting. If you’re one of them, I think bean gravy might just change your mind.

Coronavirus may make for grabby headlines, but so far it’s just not that big a risk to most of us. There are only a handful of cases worldwide, and if you haven’t been to Wuhan, China, your cough is probably just a garden variety cold. Still, if you’re worried, do this with your nervous energy: get your damn flu shot.Read more...

Your baby is going to understand and want to communicate ideas and requests with you a whole lot earlier than they’ll actually be able to verbalize the words. The gap between when a baby and young toddler knows what they want but can’t effectively communicate that to you is frustrating for everyone involved.Read more...

Over on NBC News, writer Sarah DiGiulio described that imminent sense of dread you experience after taking time off, otherwise known as the post-vacation blues—by Monday morning, you’re back in the office, at your desk, and wondering if it was all a dream.

I normally use this weekly column to answer people’s technology-themed questions. This week, I’m taking a slight departure, because I think sharing a reader’s story is important—even though there’s not really much I, nor Google, can do in the case of her locked Google account. There’s a lot we can learn from her…Read more...

You’ve probably seen some scary-looking headlines about 250 million Microsoft users being compromised in a recent data breach. While those numbers are accurate, they don’t tell the whole story—it wasn’t quite as dangerous as it sounds. Let’s quickly go over the details of the breach and ways you can help keep your…Read more...

During moments of personal or professional crisis, my first and only instinct has been to fix the problem by leaning hard into nihilism, reminding myself that in the end, nothing really matters; human relationships are largely immaterial; and at the end of the day, we are all going to die alone. This line of thinking,…Read more...

So you left your phone at the bar last night. Or maybe it was swiped from your bag while you were walking through a busy crowd. Either way, you are now phoneless, cut off from the world, and frustrated. What to do?Read more...

Feeling good about your credit score? A new scoring model could change that, but probably not drastically. FICO announced today that it’s rolling out FICO 10, the latest version of its scoring model used by lenders to calculate your credit score.

If you—or your kids—have ever wondered how big a wolf, a shark or a tiger really is out in the wild, Google has a way to bring their 3D animated image right into your home. All you need is a little curiosity, a browser and an ARCore or ARKit-ready iPhone or Android phone.Read more...

Fitness tracking is one of the best benefits of an Apple Watch. That extra bit of data might help you focus on a great workout once you’re in the gym, but sometimes we need a little more motivation to actually go in the first place—and there’s no better motivator than money.

Android: Your Android comes with plenty of useful tools to keep your smartphone addiction in check. But settings like Google’s “Digital Wellbeing” feature are more functional than fun. They’ll encourage you to use your device less, but they lack a certain flair.Read more...

For some, buying a watch can induce the same choice paralysis as choosing a meal off of a diner menu. There’s so much to consider when buying a watch — analog or digital? Leather, steel, plastic or fabric? Big face or small? Smart or… dumb? Then, there’s the added stress of wealth signaling.Read more...

It’s January⁠—which means your gym is swarmed with resolution-havers. And that’s okay! If people want to better themselves, then they’re just as entitled to work out as you are. The downside, however, is that you’re often forced to wait for a free squat rack, bench press or elliptical. Curious where you can find a…Read more...

For years, I’ve noticed that my temperature is often lower than what it’s “supposed” to be. On a normal day, it might be 97; if I’ve got chills and other clear symptoms of a fever, it won’t necessarily register over 100. Weird, right? But other people tell me they’ve had the same experience.Read more...

When I suddenly found myself without wheels this fall after what I thought was just a fender bender, I spent a few weeks flip-flopping about whether or not I wanted to buy another car.Read more...

Flash Beauty Sale | Macy’sRead more...

It’s always a challenge to get into the tiny spaces of your small gadgets. Coupled with the fact that you (very often) cannot use water to clean them, we often end up with cruddy and/or dusty electronics.Read more...

Biz Ellis on the One Bad Mother podcast calls it being “president of everything.” In a two-parent household, it is very common for one partner to take on the responsibility of all the little invisible tasks that can bog you down in the day-to-day.

When is Half-Life 3 coming out? Perhaps never; who knows. But in the meantime, Valve is giving you a rare opportunity to play both the full versions of Half-Life and Half-Life 2 completely free, with one critical, time-limiting catch.Read more...

There’s a reason why bars at airports are so common—it’s because the food’s terrible. No one loves a cold egg sandwich and watered-down coffee at 6am, after all, and beer might make everything taste a little better.

I know there is a camp of you who don’t believe in washing your cars. And that’s fine! Cars live outside and you don’t really see a point in keeping them shiny and clean. It’s a wrong take, but I respect it all the same. But here today, I bring you a practical reason to wash your car. It has to do with money.Read more...

Joseph Joseph EasyStore Bathroom Storage Organizer Caddy | $12 | AmazonRead more...

How much is an hour worth to you?

If you’re having trouble staying motivated lately, you might just be feeling the symptoms of the post-holiday slump. Fortunately, we have an idea that might help you get through this difficult time.

We’ve been hearing about the resurrected Motorola Razr phone for ages now, but we’re finally a few days out from the official start of preorders: January 26. We’ll show you where to pre-order one, but first, let’s quickly recap the phone’s specs.

Becoming an authorized user for someone else’s credit card has benefits well beyond being able to hop onto someone else’s credit limit. It’s one of the easiest ways to quickly build history on your credit report if you’re just getting started using credit. But what if you reach a point in your life when you want to…Read more...

In recent years, many of us have started to pay more attention to our carbon footprints, and one of the individual actions that can have the biggest impact on that metric is air travel.

If heavy barbells scare you, you’re not alone. Until you have a bit of experience (both lifting and watching others lift) you may feel slightly terrified at the thought of a bar crashing down on you if you don’t make a lift. Fortunately, fails stop being scary once you learn what actually happens when you fail. So…Read more...

If I’d had to guess, I would have told you pre-motherhood that I would be the type of parent who would be a stickler for having her kid send thank you cards after receiving birthday or holiday gifts. You can probably sense where this is going.Read more...

Most folks probably think of DuckDuckGo as the more privacy-focused alternative to Google, but one of the lesser-discussed benefits ditching all that data tracking is increased search speed. The normal DuckDuckGo search eats up less data and requires fewer requests than Google, but there’s also a “Lite” version of the…Read more...

Procrastinators, take heed: Today is the deadline to file a class action settlement claim for the Equifax data breach.

More and more doctors are throwing their support behind plans in which the government would provide health insurance for many or all Americans. The American College of Physicians just released a position paper endorsing single payer and public option health policies, with an explanation of why it believes such…Read more...

HooToo 7-in-1 USB C-Hub | $18 | Amazon | Use the promo code THAH5PWQ at checkoutRead more...

Next month, Netflix gets Anna Karenina, Dirty Harry, Elizabeth, Sex and The City 2, The Pianist, and all seven films in the Police Academy series.

Stumbling across an exciting new way to eat eggs can be the difference between making time for breakfast and skipping it entirely. I’ve gone through several egg phases in the last few years: easy poached eggs had a good run until I discovered cornstarch eggs, which were recently unseated by hard-boiled eggs with a…Read more...

In this week’s episode, Alice and Melissa revisit their Upgrades of the Week from past episodes and see how they’ve held up, from chrome extensions to shifts in mindset. There’s a little bit of pride, a little bit of shame, and a whole lot of improvement. You’ll be so perfect by the end of this episode you won’t know…Read more...

The next time you end a group dinner or outing with “I’ll Venmo you,” make sure you follow up promptly.Read more...

Parenting a child with an identified learning disability is an exercise in frequent and sustained advocacy. And perhaps one of the most confusing things these parents will have to navigate is the IEP—or Individualized Education Program—process. That’s the specialized educational to-do list parents and schools create…Read more...

In a column for the Washington Post, Christopher Elliott of Elliott Advocacy described every crappy seat you might encounter on a flight—there’s the bulkhead row seat that won’t recline, for instance. Or the seat with the entertainment console that doesn’t work, despite all your button-pushing efforts. Of course,…Read more...

Microsoft disclosed a troublesome vulnerability in Internet Explorer last week, affecting various permutations of Internet Explorer 9, 10, and 11 across Windows 7, 8.1, and Windows 10 (as well as various editions of Windows Server). The bad news is that Microsoft won’t likely patch this problem until February—when the…Read more...

Have you ever had to frantically delete photos from your phone’s camera roll to make room for new ones? Us too. If you run up against your storage limit in Gmail, you won’t be able to send or receive new messages—a problem that’s just as frustrating.Read more...

Beer koozies, those little foam sleeves that hold 12-ounce aluminum cans, are great at keeping your bev cold when you’re drinking in the desert. (Or keeping your hand warm-ish when you’re drinking in the snow!) But they’re also excellent little protectors and organizers while you’re on the move.

Apple now sells refurbished iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max smartphones through its online store and at certified retailers. This is good news for anyone who wants to upgrade from an iPhone 8 or older, but might not want to pay full price for an unlocked XS or XS Max (or or make the full jump to an iPhone 11). The XS and…Read more...

A new type of viral illness was discovered in China recently, and the US just got its first case in a recent traveler who arrived in Washington state. The virus, a coronavirus related to SARS and MERS, is sometimes fatal.Read more...

It should come as little surprise that any content you offer to the web for public consumption has the potential to be scraped and misused by anyone clever enough to do it. And while that doesn’t make this weekend’s report from The New York Times any less damning, it’s a great reminder about how important it is to …Read more...

My son and I were both off work and school yesterday, and we had all kinds of plans for how we’d spend the day together. But first, I said, I needed his help with something for a post. “I thought you didn’t have to work today?” he asked with a somewhat accusatory tone. “I want you to test out a fake laser maze that…Read more...

On Monday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made public his resolution which established the ground rules for the Senate trial regarding President Trump’s impeachment—and Democrats, in particular, aren’t happy about it. Curious where we are in the impeachment proceedings? Or wondering what exactly McConnell has…Read more...

Sonos—the audio brand primarily known for its line of wireless multi-room speakers, music streaming devices, and smart speakers—announced today that it plans to drop support for several of its oldest devices in May, 2020.Read more...

I’m not on TikTok. Not even as a casual observer. Nor do I spend much time on Instagram or Facebook, these days. I do maintain a Twitter account, though at this point it’s write-only; I’m also part of both a professional and a social Slack, and in the latter case I deliberately limit myself to only a few of the…Read more...