rants and raves

Recruit a crew. One adult isn’t enough to have a safe bike bus, so another parent volunteered to serve as the “rear axle,” the rider who stays at the back of the group to watch for stragglers and manage approaching cars. Then I texted…

I love cooking with Mom. Food is a big thing in our family, but my cooking and so much of how I think about it comes straight from her. She's a better, more intuitive baker than I am by a long shot, so when I found a cookie cookbook that…

Autumn is my favorite time in the South. There’s a day, usually in late October, when the humidity finally breaks, the air stirs, and you can feel it in your bones: Summer is over. If you’re in the Midwest, that might be a shame because…

Beauty feels beyond my reach. This isn’t about self-deprecation, I swear. I’m talking about accessing the tools that can help you feel beautiful. Facials and fillers and blowouts seem expensive and exclusive to celebrities and influencers.…

I can’t remember the last time I finished a video game. I’ve had my Nintendo Switch Lite for two years now, and it’s riddled with a number of titles I’ve abandoned for one reason or another. I often scroll through the Nintendo eShop,…

One of my favorite phone features in recent years is Apple's MagSafe technology, which debuted in 2020. With a ring of magnets embedded in the back of the iPhone 12, iPhone 13, and iPhone 14 lineups, you can attach various accessories—from…

One of the coolest instruments I’ve played this year requires a small history lesson: In 1949, in a small home in Queens, New York, a 14-year-old boy named Robert Moog put together his first-ever theremin. He had been obsessed with the…

There's a dilemma every city dweller faces eventually: Where's the fork? Let's say that after a meeting, you finally manage to find the one falafel stand that's an oasis in the food desert of the financial district. The gods smile, and you…

The magnetic attachment is shockingly strong—you could throw an (empty) tumbler from 10 feet away and have it snap upright into place. You also don’t have to buy into any of its magnetic attachments at all—we customized ours by just using…

Filson also has seen fit to provide an expandable, waterproof liner in one of the cavernous side pockets, so you can separate wet gear from dry. If you're on a weekend trip, going to the gym or swimming pool, out hiking, or dealing with…