“What improved your quality of life so much, you wish you did it sooner?” was asked by u/colorfulsoul_ on Reddit and the thread is worth scanning for ideas to adopt. Someone suggested placing your phone on permanent “Do not Disturb” only allowing calls from “Contacts” — which would save me from a lot of spammers. Other life improving tips were: breathing exercises, buying a good kitchen knife, separate blankets in beds for couples, and buying a cart that will carry all your groceries from your car to inside in one trip. — CD

The most useable flame lighter I have is a Bic Reach. This design takes your usual Bic flick lighter, and outfits it with an extended 1.5” (35mm) pipe that ignites the flame away from your thumb. I find those long butane lighters with a two-button safety switch to be both fussy and unreliable, but a regular Bic can’t reach where I want the flame, so this Bic Reach is just perfect for lighting candles, fireplaces, camp stoves, etc., reliably on the first try. It’s probably not what you’d carry everyday in your pocket, but perfect in the utility drawer. — KK

I stopped using a neti pot to irrigate my sinuses with salt water because of the risk of infection. I switched to pressurized aerosol saline mist, called Simply Saline by Arm & Hammer. It’s sterile and convenient. It never fails to get rid of my phantosmia whenever it flares up. — MF

The easiest way I know to boil eggs is with an Instant Pot pressure cooker. Put one cup of water into the pot, add 1-6 eggs (use a steamer basket if you have one), and cook using low pressure for 3 minutes. Let the pressure subside without releasing the valve. You’ll have perfectly boiled eggs. — MF

The Curious Reader has a great outline of the 4 different reading levels and sub-types pulled from “How to Read a Book.” The first level being Elementary Reading — where the main question of reading is “What does the sentence say?” Level two is Inspectional — where you ask, “What is the book/article about?” This is how I read most news articles and blog posts. Level three is Analytical — when you want to really understand the topic by asking questions and chewing and digesting it. The fourth level of reading is my favorite: Syntopic Reading. This is where you read multiple books on the same subject and compare and contrast the ideas. Each reading level serves a different purpose, so it’s helpful to ask yourself before reading, “What do I want out of this book or article?” — CD

Short videos are an emerging art form. With the advent of phone cameras and free editing software they are within reach of almost any maker. One of my favorite seats to see the best art video shorts is to go to the Vimeo Staff Picks. They go through an ocean of new creations and curate the best video shorts. — KK

An under-appreciated Google search trick is to focus your search by excluding all unwanted alternative meanings — you append a minus sign in front of the term(s), as in < dolphins -miami > for non football dolphins or < orange -color -telecom > for the fruit. — KK

My Boing Boing friend David Pescovitz wrote about this incredible video of Smac McCreanor’s interpretive dances running side-by-side with videos of hydraulic presses squishing things like books, mugs, fruit, cookies, and kitchen tools. Brilliant. — MF

Before I transition from one room to another I try to grab 10 things that I can put away and clean up. If you have kids and want to get the whole family to participate check out this Apartment Therapy article for tips on how to implement it. When I read this ridiculously simple rule for keeping your house clean it was both an aha moment and a duh moment. — CD

I finally decided to pay for YouTube. Now with YouTube Premium I see no ads of any kind. Given the many hours I spend every day on YouTube this upgrade has been life changing. I already had an adblocker on my browser, but that did not work 100% of the time, and I also watch a lot of YouTube on my TV via Roku, which can’t block ads. For $12 per month all that nonsense is gone, and I get YouTube music as well, which can stream in the background if wanted, and download videos for offline (airplane) viewing. Thanks to my friend Hugh, who kept insisting I needed Premium; you were right. — KK

My mother-in-law got a new bed and the headboard was squashing the extension cord plugged into the wall. I bought this SlimLine Flat Plug extension cord with a right-angled plug and it solved the problem. It has a low-profile and the cord comes out parallel to the wall. Just what we needed! — MF

I’ve been using this Divergent Association Task to measure my verbal creativity. It takes less than 2 minutes and involves thinking of 10 words that are as different from each other as possible. The test was designed by a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard, and according to the study — which involved 9,000 participants all over the world — people who are more creative generate words that have greater distances between them. You can choose to participate in the study anonymously or not. I’ve been taking the test everyday to try to beat my own score. — CD

To find a list of all the Netflix titles in a specific genre, zero in on a movie genre using the codes listed here. Add the code to this URL: https://www.netflix.com/browse/genre/CODE. For example https://www.netflix.com/browse/genre/10398 shows you Netflix’s Japanese movies, and https://www.netflix.com/browse/genre/7687 shows you film noir titles. — MF

Wayfinder is a soothing online game that involves traversing a vast landscape collecting fragments of seasonal-inspired poetry to restore balance to the natural world. The game itself is short but uses machine learning to create thousands of combinations of verses and visuals so that you have a completely new experience each time you play. It’s very lovely. — CD

Here is some great advice on how to find the right therapist. One of the first steps is to figure out what kind of therapeutic framework you need. When I first started therapy I had anxiety that sometimes resulted in panic attacks. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy taught me how to redirect a thought so that it doesn’t create overwhelming feelings that would affect my behavior. Now, 8 years later, I have a person-centered therapist that I talk to about all aspects of my life. Each session feels like I’m catching up with my very insightful and intelligent friend who I can vent to and ask for advice. I always tell my friends that you are allowed to break up with your therapist if the fit isn’t right. I saw three therapists before I found my most recent one, who I’ve been seeing for three years now. Finding the “right therapist” feels like you’ve acquired a super power. — CD

I’ve ceased all subscriptions to the paper version of newspapers or magazines — except one. I subscribe to Uppercase, a paper-based magazine celebrating art and crafts. Each issue is overflowing with exuberant examples of creativity from non-famous artists. Painting, textiles, ceramics, patterns, vintage, printmaking, etc. It’s a hand-made quarterly, with no ads, unabashedly analog, and basically the work of one woman, who tends to feature art that is invigorating, positive, and joyous. The periodical itself is a work of art that reflects the passion of an artisan, and I derive immense pleasure from its curated pages. — KK

An Arduino is a small easy-to-program device that lets you add interactivity to your projects. Because Arduino is open source, you can buy inexpensive clones. My favorite is the Keyestudio Plus. An Arduino Uno is about $25, and this clone is half the price. The best thing about Keyestudio Plus is that it has a USB-C jack instead of the bulky USB-A jack found on the Uno. It has a lot of other useful features like additional pins for power and a switch to change the voltage from 5V to 3.3V. Here’s a photo of one next to an Arduino Uno. (If you want to learn how to use an Arduino, I have a class on Skillshare you can take using this link for a one-month free trial). — MF

The simplest toys are the best. Our favorite family social puzzle is a tangram, an old classic from China made of 7 geometric pieces that you arrange to fulfill a required silhouette. With two sets you can race to finish. It is much harder than it looks, yet doable and fun for small folk. You can make a tangram from cardboard, or 3D print one yourself, but the version we grab is Tangoes, a tidy travel case with two sets of pieces, plus cards (with solutions) for all the target images. We own 3 or 4 Tangoes ($12), enough for larger groups. — KK

I love these colorful food savers by Hutzler. I first bought the grapefruit saver ($7) because I can never finish a whole grapefruit, but then I had to get the yellow onion ($5), because I often cut in to new onions forgetting that I previously saved half of one. These are the perfect shape for each vegetable/fruit and super easy to spot in the fridge. I plan on expanding my collection! — CD

When we recently had an all-day power outage in my Los Angeles neighborhood, I used my Westinghouse WH2200iXLT Super Quiet Portable Inverter Generator to power our computers, cable modem, Wifi system, refrigerator, coffee grinder, and fan. True to its name, this gas generator purrs. It ran quietly in the backyard from 7am until 5pm with temperatures reaching 90 degrees. — MF