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.
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.
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.
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.
In the decades since, we’ve found new, more existential flaws in the matrix, as troll farms …
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…
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…
“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…
Something cool is happening this weekend: Venus and Jupiter will look really close in the sky, almost appearing to touch each other, even though they’re millions of miles apart. They’ll appear their very closest on Saturday, April 30, around 3 p.m. ET. This is known as a “conjunction,” and while the experts at …
I first saw this valuable life hack on TikTok: Search “Mario Run” on YouTube when you need to keep your kid busy for a while. I did, but I wasn’t sure if the resulting videos would actually hold a kid’s attention. So I proposed to my kindergarten-age daughter that she try out a few. Her eyes widened when she saw the…
If you like the idea of a bountiful garden, but you’re less keen on all the watering, fertilizing, and care it entails, I have a gardening philosophy to share with you: It’s called “benign neglect.” The idea is to create conditions favorable for plants native to an area, and just let them do their thing while you sit…
Your wedding is already going to include a toast, so why not also include a toke? According to a recent survey from The Knot, 93% of people serve alcohol at their wedding, with the average couple spending $2,300 to stock the bar with beer, wine, and liquor. If all of those people are going to hit the sauce on the day…
Weeds are everywhere this time of year, pushing up through cracks in the pavement and sprouting in any place that soil and water can gather. They can be unsightly in your garden but they can also wreak havoc on fences, foundations, and walkways if they’re not controlled. While leaving the dandelions for the bees is a…
Ah, confidence. That elusive, intangible thing we all know we need to get the jobs, attract the people, achieve the goals, and make the money. The thing that can take years or even decades to develop, a string of good decisions and positive outcomes to maintain, and awhile to regain once it’s been shaken.
Colons and semicolons are the indie rock of punctuation marks. They’re not mainstream-popular like the period. They aren’t obvious and eager-to-please like the exclamation mark. They’re not everywhere like the comma. But the colon and the semicolon have passion. They’re quirky, snobby, and sometimes prickly. These…
Do you look longingly at those wide, cushioned first-class seats when you board a plane? Us, too. Unfortunately, most of us most commonly fly in coach/economy class, which isn’t exactly the lap of luxury. So we recently asked Lifehacker readers for their best tips for flying both comfortably and cheaply in tight…
“It doesn’t really fry anything.” How many times have we air-fryer-devotees had to listen to those words? How many times have we, with our hands ripping hair from our scalps, had to beg someone to look past the name, and approach the appliance with an open mind? Seemingly mentally strong men—men who are famous for…
Spring cleaning can take many different forms. Sorting through the closet and donating the clothes you never wear. Going through the cabinets and throwing out spices that expired during the Clinton administration. Poring over your credit card bill and realizing you are subscribed to so many streaming services, you’re…
Last week, Mastodon finally launched its free, official Android app, making it easier than ever to use the open-source Twitter alternative on Android devices. Mastodon’s timing couldn’t be better, as Twitter’s board just approved Elon Musk’s $44 billion bid to buy Twitter.
The sudden impending buyout has split the…
A deep-dish, homemade fruit pie is a deal maker. It’s a great housewarming gift, an acceptable apology, and a good way to make friends. A hefty slice sporting a thick layer of cherry filling (or blueberry, depending on your fruit love language) can make anyone reconsider whether they’re actually “too full for dessert.”
For many, summer is synonymous with the adventure of outdoor activities. Long hikes through the forest, morning runs along the beach, and picnics in the park are just some of the activities I will not be participating in during the next several months, though. That’s because for me, the season is synonymous with one…
Learning or teaching a new board game can be equal parts challenging and maddening. Either you’re the one trying to explain the rules to an apathetic crowd, or you’re being “taught” and are expected to pick up every minute detail from a monotone lecturer. If you’re sick of every game night starting the same way,…
Ah, the kitchen—a room so vital to modern life it’s become a fraught battleground. Easily the most expensive renovation you’ll ever oversee, an average “midrange” kitchen remodel costs about $76,000, according to Remodeling Magazine. That cost and stress imbues every design decision with heavy emotion and dread, which…
The modern world is largely safe from the primitives dangers that plagued our ancestors—wild animal attacks are rare; few of us will ever step off a cliff and die because glasses haven’t been invented. This doesn’t mean death and danger have been vanquished. We’ve just forced them into forms that are so new to us as…
Nigella Lawson’s Molten Chocolate Babycakes set me down the path. In fact, it’s only slightly hyperbolic to say her book, How to Be a Domestic Goddess, made me the food writer I am today. Nigella’s writing is and has always been warm and just sensual enough—in a world of didactic, “optimized” food writing and recipes,…
Mulch can serve a variety of purposes in a landscaped yard, from helping plants stay hydrated, to keeping weeds away. But if you live somewhere windy, it can also blow away. Even if you don’t live somewhere where it’s blustery on a regular basis, a storm with strong winds can undo hours of hard work.
Though it’s not difficult to find distilled water in stores, if you find yourself in a situation where you need (or want) to make it at home, you can do so pretty easily. The good news is that you don’t need any fancy equipment to get the job done. The bad news is that it takes some time. Here’s what to know.
Whether you’ve gotten into houseplants during the pandemic, or have long been a fan of their ability to liven up your living space, you’ve probably amassed quite a collection of pots and other containers for your favorite foliage. Unfortunately, at some point, most people will run out of space on their windowsills,…
Audrey Niffenegger’s 2003 novel The Time-Traveler’s Wife was a book that seemed aimed particularly at me. It’s set in Chicago, where I was living when it came out, and I enjoyed following along as the characters rode my busses and ate at my favorite brunch spot. It’s a closed-loop time travel story, which is the best…
If you use Google Messages on Android, it might be silently stealing away battery life from your phone. And while Google has fixed the issue, the patch might not hit your device for some time. Until then, there are steps you can take to stop the app from putting an unnecessary drain on your battery.
Gardening is often pitched as a relaxing, therapeutic activity—and it is relaxing and therapeutic! But it’s also a sign of how advanced society has become that we can regard growing food as a charming hobby instead of an absolute necessity. On the one hand, that’s a clear sign of mankind’s mastery over the world. On…
Every time I feel a new season roll in, I think to myself, “It’s pie season!” Summer? Yes. Winter? Yes. Spring? Let’s have pie! Now that spring is here, we’ll start seeing plenty of strawberries, rhubarb, apricots, and cherries grace our grocery stores and farmer’s markets. All of these gorgeous offerings can benefit…
As the weather gets warmer and you start dragging your lawn and garden equipment out of the garage or basement and into your yard, you may notice that not everything made it through the winter unscathed. For example, you might connect your trusty garden hose to the outdoor waterline only to find that it has sprung a…
It is spring, which means it is the time of year that my husband and I thought maybe we would move into a larger home. It’s actually the third spring we have thought that—the first being right when the pandemic hit, the second being once we were finally vaccinated and ready to start looking but the housing market did…
I recently boarded a plane for only the second time since March 2020, and I’m here to tell you: Flying has not gotten any more pleasant. Seats are just as cramped, cabins are just as loud, and flights feel just as full. Airline travel, in general, is a big mess, thanks staff shortages, overbooking, delays,…
Many gardeners like to use raised beds to grow their bounty—they create a lovely border, limit weeds, and are easier on your back—but they can also be quite costly to fill, especially if they’re more than a foot high. You don’t need to buy several bags of soil to get good quality, nutrient-rich material for your…
Maybe you’ve hit a career rut, or you need one-on-one guidance to overcome a personal struggle—whatever it is, self-help books aren’t cutting it. Asking for help can be the key to getting ahead. But who exactly should you turn to? If you’ve started your search for guidance, you’ve probably seen three different titles…
