Let’s face it: This whole Christmas tree tradition is pretty strange. Each year we chop down pine and fir trees by the millions, bring them into our homes, hang tinsel and glass balls and then surround them with gifts. Worse yet, even the most devout holiday enthusiasts...
Columbus, imma let you finish, but the first guy to figure out how to shave his face made a pretty amazing discovery, too. In fact, innovations in hygiene are some of the most important discoveries, well, ever—just imagine a world without teeth brushing, body scrubbing and nail...
Oktoberfest might have ended last weekend, but if you thought the chance to drink your weight in Bitburger is over, think again. These days, with everything from lagers to lambics widely available at most stores, enjoying a cold one from breweries all around the globe has never...
Blood, it’s not just for vampires. Because of blood’s many nutrients and its rampant availability—i.e., it flows through the veins of every living being—plenty of other creatures, like the ones featured in our October Halloween Spooktacular edition of the Bathroom Minutes magazine, feast on it, too. But...
“What is love?” No other question has inspired more poets to write, singers to sing and car windows to be broken by Chris Kattan. Thanks to Rutgers University anthropologist and renowned romance researcher Helen Fisher, though, we have an answer: “Love,” it turns out, can be broken...
George R. R. Martin once wrote, “Give me a good sharp knife and a good sharp cheese, and I’m a happy man.” And ol’ George wouldn’t be alone in thinking that cheese is happiness. Whether it’s baked, broiled or fried, the vast majority of the cheese we...
For city dwellers, it often can seem that the best way to escape the summer heat is to hit the road. And, according to Climate Central, an organization of scientists studying climate change, they’d be right. The phenomenon known as the “urban heat island effect” is the...
Getting enough sleep is no easy feat. Balancing work, play and the 11 p.m. bark-a-thon next door can make it downright impossible to get your recommended eight hours. Which is a real shame, because sleep happens to be a miracle drug: It can keep your weight in...
Playing in the warm summer sand is all fun and games, that is, until you start sinking Lawrence of Arabia style. But don’t worry: despite what it may look like in the hilarious stock image above, quicksand won’t actually kill you. A study published in the Nature...
A windy day at the beach can mean collecting sand in interesting places—your shoes, your ears and in your, ahem, crevices. But in locations where the wind doesn’t stop, all that swirling sand tends to collect in another interesting place—sand dunes. Most of these sandy hills grow...
If there was ever a sport where superstition seemingly plays a big role in whether a team wins or loses, it’s baseball. For fans that might mean rally caps, lucky chairs and no-speaking rules. But on-the-field superstition can hold sway over players as well: Even in matters...
It might have started stormy, but since the War of 1812, the U.S. and U.K. have been closer than Tango and Cash—an infatuation that has influenced even the most mundane aspects of American culture. FASHION. The trenchcoat, the preferred article of clothing for exhibitionists circa 1976, became...
