A recent study suggests that the sweetener erythritol, found in many foods, may put us more at risk for blood clots, and thus for heart attack and stroke. So what is erythritol, and what are the chances you ate something containing it today? I’ll explain.
It’s been a hell of a layoffs season. With this uncertainty in the labor market—not to mention the bigger picture of a looming recession—it’s natural to feel a sense of helplessness. You can’t live in a constant state of paranoia, but it helps to be on the lookout for some signs that layoffs are coming to your office.…
Maintaining healthy teeth is obviously important for us, but the same is also true for our cats. Although we may not think about a cat’s dental health quite as often as ours—and attempting to brush their teeth can be its own battle—cats can develop their own dental issues, including abscessed teeth, gingivitis, or a…
Is it possible to go shopping for a life partner? According to the latest TikTok trend, it might just be: “Home Depot dating,” which has racked up more than 6 million views on the social media app, first started as videos of single women looking for eligible bachelors among the hammers, paints, and screwdrivers in the…
Eating a frozen pizza for supper can feel a little like giving up, but you can’t deny the convenience factor, nor the nostalgic, juvenile appeal. It is, after all, still pizza.
I would never judge or belittle someone for enjoying their freezer pizza au naturel, but a little adornment can do wonders for them. Here are…
It’s been years since Apple launched that gimmicky “there’s an app for that” campaign, but it is admittedly accurate as catchy ad slogans go. Apps truly have become ubiquitous: You have apps to help you work out efficiently and apps to save money at your favorite coffee shop, and with spring cleaning around the…
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)—the federal initiative designed to help low-income Americans access more food—received a temporary boost in response to COVID-19 that is set to end on March 1. These pandemic-era SNAP benefits, known as emergency allotments (EA), are set to expire in 32 states, the…
What if you could create your own personal streaming service? It isn’t a pipe dream: You can actually build your own streaming network that hosts all the shows, movies, and music you already own—all you need to enter the world of media servers is enough hard drive space, a PC, and a stable internet connection.
Sexting is a great tool to use when it comes to spicing up your relationship. Whether you’ve been coupled up for a while or just getting to know someone, sexting can be the perfect foreplay. But when is a good time to initiate sexting, and should you ask the other person first if it’s OK to sext? What are some things…
On Feb. 16, the Portuguese prime minister announced he’s ending the golden visa program for new foreign property buyers, which since 2012, has given residency to 11,000 people who bought investment properties in the country. The prime minister points to rising property values as the reason behind ending the visa…
If saying “no” all the time has you feeling like the bad guy in the family, it might be time for a communication makeover. An avalanche of “nos” can dim your connection with your children, but there are ways to make “yes” a more regular part of your interactions—without handing over all the decision-making power to…
With an almost infinite amount of information constantly at our fingertips, it helps to be able to read quickly—or at least at a decent clip. Although we may not think of what we do as “reading” in a traditional sense, many TikTok videos and Instagram reels have subtitles and captions, so even if you don’t actually…
Whether you’re speaking with your colleagues in a meeting, or firing off one last email before lunch, if you work in an office environment, chances are you utilize certain words or phrases that you wouldn’t necessarily use in your personal life. For instance, you probably don’t ask your kids whether table manners are…
It seemed like streaming services started with a revolutionary idea—only paying for what you want and cutting out the rest. It worked for a while, but now it seems to have come full circle, with some services like Netflix turning their attention to an ads revenue strategy to sustain themselves. Peacock—which you can…
Most professional software these days has switched to expensive subscription-based models, but not Apple: Final Cut Pro still costs the same $299 it did when the app launched in 2011. Still, three hundred bucks ain’t cheap, leading some to seek, let’s say, “alternative” markets for the app. However, if you’re tempted…
Portland was covered in ten inches of snow on Wednesday, which is a lot of snow for a city full of people who don’t know how to drive in snow. This means I’ll be staying home until it melts, and playing a fun game of Chopped with my pantry and chest freezer. I hope to unearth many treasures. Seeing as I’ve already…
When faced with the prospect of propelling our stupid bodies through another stupid day, most of us appreciate a little jolt of energy to get us going and help us tolerate all of this. There are endless choices for a morning pick-me-up, but America has squarely landed on coffee—three in four Americans report drinking…
Pastas have been used in desserts for some time now, like sweet lokshen kugel or white chocolate orzo pudding, but I confess, I’ve been missing out. All this time, my boxes of macaroni have only been treated to savory dressings, vegetables, and meats. I’ve been cooking with one noodle tied behind my back. Pasta is a…
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate just got a bit cheaper—at least for a month. For a limited time, you can get a month of Xbox’s online games and Xbox Live for 84% off: CD Keys is selling digital codes 84% off from their usual $15 price.
Keeping tabs on the TV shows you watch can be a chore—there are so many streaming services to balance these days that it becomes a mess trying to keep up with new series. While film fans have Letterboxd to track the movies they watch, there hasn’t been a similar solution for tracking TV. That is, until Marathon.
Meats are muscles. On account of this, they’re not perfectly symmetrical bricks. Different cuts can be tear-dropped, conical, or otherwise shaped asymmetrically with a thick and thin side. But, alas, uneven shapes lead to uneven cooking. The thinner end of a chicken breast can come to temperature relatively quickly…
It’s never too late to start saving for retirement, but anyone who starts early sure does get a huge advantage. The reason for this is compound interest, which we’ll run the numbers on below. If you’ve been waiting to invest in your retirement until you check off other financial goals (cough cough, students loans),…
I hate baking, especially when pie is the goal. I love to eat it, but I am just not good at making pie crust. If I manage to get the dough into the pie plate free of tears and holes, it will inevitably shrink and pucker in some way. Luckily, that last pie crust woe is quite fixable. I just need to add more pie weights.
You have pots, pans, appliances, sponges, and all the stuff you’d expect to find. And that’s great, but your kitchen can also be stocked for odd problems with surprising solutions. Here are a few things you might want to have in (or around) your kitchen, just in case. Leave some of them in your junk drawer and thank…
If you’ve needed to shop for a car in this inflation-ridden hellscape of a market, you might be searching for a solution to your woes. Aside from buying and leasing, there’s now a third option: a car subscription. “Subscribing” to a car is designed to be more affordable than a rental and more flexible than a lease.…
When asked “ranch or blue cheese?” I usually answer “both.” Though I have a slight preference for blue, I enjoy ranch dressing as much as the next white girl of uncertain European origin, and I don’t see why I should have to choose between the two sauces. Instead of making such a choice, I have done the exact…
There’s little that makes me more anxious than speaking on a telephone with a human being, so believe me when I tell you that this advice comes from a place of love: It’s worth it to call the hotel before booking a room online. You could save yourself a lot of money and even a bit of heartache.
Magnetic flooring is gaining popularity as a flooring option because of its simple installation and low volatile organic compounds (VOC) output. And its glue-less attachment system makes it simple enough for a beginner to tackle.
In 2022, BioCatch, a software company that delivers advanced fraud protection, estimated that there are approximately two million mule accounts in the U.S., and about $3 billion in fraudulent transfers a year. The same research estimates that scammers are lowering their transaction amounts to mules to an average of…
ChatGPT is one of the most exciting new toys on the internet. Ask it for just about anything that can be produced in written form, and it will oblige. Which means that, among many other things, people are using it to generate workout programs. So how do they stack up? I brought the robot’s advice to my garage gym to…
I continue to find it a struggle to keep the Joy-Cons in my oldest son’s hands. As I watch him stumble through each level of a video game on Nintendo Switch, I want him to pause it so I can finish what he started. But after around 10 minutes of hearing his loud noises of frustration, he eventually hands me the…
It’s important to listen to your body. In general, you should know what you’re feeling, and you should be able to relate those feelings to past experiences: This is what it feels like when I’m lifting more than usual and about to set a personal record; that is what it feels like when my old shoulder injury starts…
Stellantis, Fiat-Chrysler’s parent company, is voluntarily recalling more than 300,000 diesel Ram pickup trucks to replace an electrical connector after reports of six fires. The company recommends you park these trucks outside to prevent the potential spread of fire, at least until the repairs are made.
Black History Month is a great time to shout out some of the brilliant podcasts out there celebrating Black history and culture. (Which isn’t to say it’s the only month we should be talking about them—far from it.)
From conversations about Black women on the internet to an exploration of why Black people love…
This week in puzzling online discourse, a subset of Gen Z is looking wistfully back on the era of the Motion Picture Production Code, also known as the Hays Code, a voluntary (well, technically) set of censorship standards Hollywood rigorously adhered to from 1934 through the late 1960s.
It all began with a plea for a…
Adidas is currently having a big sale of over 7,500 items that will go until Feb. 21, and you can combine it with gift card deals and a limited-time discount code. We tried it, and if everything works out the same as it did for us, you can shop with some steep discounts—including already discounted items.
