Author Archives: Carol Edwards

With nearly one in five Americans reporting “heavy drinking” during the pandemic, it’s no surprise sober curiosity is becoming a burgeoning lifestyle. Sober curiosity — the idea of not going completely sober, but minimizing drinking — started growing in popularity even before COVID, and now the interest is surging.

This is true of daters, as well. A staggering 94 percent of singles said they’d be interested in someone who doesn’t drink at all, according to eharmony’s 2022 Happiness Index, a survey of 3,000 adults over 21. 

But with drinking so paramount to American dating culture — and social culture as a whole — how can one date while sober or sober curious? We asked the experts and found that it’s about being open about your goals, and setting boundaries.

Why sober curiosity? Why now?

“Alcohol might be having a cigarette moment,” said Heather Lowe, certified life and recovery coach with the International Center for Addiction and Recovery Education (ICARE). “Something that was once looked at as a cool pastime is now being reconsidered.” Lowe is also the president and founder of Ditched the Drink, a wellness company whose mission is to help professionals evaluate their relationship with alcohol. 

Interest in sober curiosity was growing prior to the pandemic, with mixologists serving up mocktails and “Dry January” a household term. Now, after a period of high alcohol use for some, this curiosity is booming: Sales of mocktails soared 33 percent from 2021 to 2022, and brewers told the Washington Post they expect the zero-proof market to only climb further.

According to eharmony, 74 percent of singles have considered restricting their drinking to some extent in the past year, with 21 percent considering not drinking at all.

The drinking decline makes sense, considering the overall emphasis on health and wellness lately. Given the last few years, people are starting to pay more attention to their wellbeing, said Minaa B., therapist, mental health educator, and one of eharmony’s relationship experts. 

Alcohol might be having a cigarette moment.

Mental health is top of mind these days — eharmony reports that 73 percent of singles are more attracted to people doing growth work like therapy — but it’s not just about therapy, said B. This also accounts for what we put into our bodies. Sober curiosity considers how outside stressors like alcohol can impact mental health.

The pandemic also made us more aware of our mortality, said Robin Finley, a licensed marriage and family therapist from Thriveworks in South Carolina, a counseling service for individuals, couples, and families. Folks may decrease their drinking for physical health risks, too.

Beyond health reasons, Finley said there can also be a desire to emotionally connect while sober. “I see a recent value placed on developing a real emotional connection as singles and couples are becoming more aware of the altering personality presentation when engaged in drinking,” she commented.

B. agreed, saying, “Sober curiosity is also coming up in regard to building healthier, more authentic connections.” This is true of connection with others, but also with ourselves and what we put into our bodies. 

How to start sober (curious) dating

You may want to try an app specifically for sober dating, like Loosid. Other general dating apps, like OkCupid and Hinge, also have options to share your drinking status. Last year, Bumble even launched a Sober Badge for people to proudly display their preference. Bumble and Hinge have an option to filter out those who drink, too, but you may have to pay for a subscription.

There’s no harm in mentioning your sobriety or curiosity in your dating app bio, said B. Given the newness of the term “sober curious,” it can even be a conversation starter.

Even if you don’t display your status on your profile, B. recommends openly communicating with your potential partner at some point — say, when you’re in the “getting to know you” stage and conversing about your interests.

Finley echoes this sentiment. “Be open, honest, and confident about the stance that you have chosen to take and the changes you are interested in pursuing regarding use of alcohol relating to dating while sober,” she said, “just as you would with your pursuit to develop any core value or self-improvement.”

Be mindful about where you have a date, B. continued. Bars are an obvious choice in modern dating, but they’re not the most comfortable for sober people. Branch out to environments where alcohol isn’t the focus, like a bowling alley or movie theater. That’s not to say alcohol won’t be served there, but it’s not the primary activity.

You can also go out for strictly non-alcoholic drinks, said Lowe. Go out for coffee, lemonade, or a milkshake. Or try something new: Visit a museum or art show, or take a fitness class together.

Set boundaries with your date — and yourself

No matter what kind of connection you’re looking for, whether a fling or long term partner, respect should be at the root, said B. In this case, respect looks like sharing your boundaries: telling your date about your sober or curiosity, that you’d prefer to go somewhere where alcohol isn’t the focus, or that you’re not drinking regardless of where you go.

Consider different signs and cues about this person’s ability to respect your desires, too. Alcohol is entrenched in our culture, and you may encounter people who are judgmental or may be pushy. Should your date pressure you to drink — or act like it’s weird that you’re not drinking — stand firm in your boundaries, B. said.

If someone crosses your boundaries, there are a few different ways to respond. You can restate your boundary (“As I said, I’m not drinking tonight”) or offer a suggestion for how to proceed (“Feel free to get a drink if you want one, but I’ll stick with water.”). If you’re uncomfortable, you can tell your date that in the moment, or message them later if you prefer. You can also choose to end the date if you’re really not feeling it.

On the flip side, they may be genuinely curious about your choices, and that’s OK. But when someone starts using language that makes you feel bad or tries to change your mind, that’s a red flag, said B. You can respond as above, and/or make a mental note to never see this person again.

Lowe suggests having a plan for dealing with the challenge of declining alcohol in a setting that encourages use. You’ll feel more prepared to say no, and it can help build your own self-confidence. 

But what about keeping your own boundary? If you find yourself breaking them — say, drinking when you told yourself you wouldn’t — first off, give yourself some grace, says B. You’re human, and none of us is perfect. We’re also living in a society where alcohol is ever present, and change doesn’t happen overnight.

Go back to your intention for setting the boundary in the first place, B. suggested. Why do you want to make this change? How will you benefit from not drinking on this date?

You may feel a craving, Lowe said, but you don’t have to give in to it. You can “play the tape forward” and envision how you’ll feel after a successfully sober date (and the morning after, to boot). 

Further, consider what support will make this journey easier for you. You can find an accountability partner, for example, or develop rituals and routines to keep you sober. 

Mindfulness, or getting back into the present, can also help in the moment. “When you’re in an environment like that, your mind is most likely racing with an abundance of thoughts,” B. explained, and grounding techniques help you get “back to reality, back to where we are and back into your body.”

B. offered grounding techniques you can use in a situation where people are drinking around you. Pay attention to the senses. If the bar offers peppermints, pop one and focus on the taste. Listen to the music or chatter in the room. Carry sensory items like a fidget spinner or stress ball, if those make you feel better. These mindfulness practices take you out of your head and back into your body.

Again, mistakes happen. There’s no switch flip that’ll kill your desire for alcohol. Beating ourselves up about it actually keeps us stuck in a cycle of shame and guilt, said B. 

Go forth and date without drinking

Ultimately, dating is about getting to know your potential partners. You want to know their interests, but also — and more importantly, especially if you’re looking for a dedicated partner — their values. 

“People’s interests can change over time,” B. said, “but our core values tend to be our character traits and how we engage with the world. Those things tend to stay the same.” 

She’d encourage you to think about their value system  — meaning, what they currently value in life. This tends to come from our core beliefs and what we truly admire and care about. Sharing core beliefs with your partner builds a foundation for your relationship. If not drinking is an important value to you, you want a partner who understands that, if not one who shares the same.

“Being sober or sober curious is a total superpower and you can view it that way,” said Lowe. “Someone who is willing to do the work to evolve, grow, heal, and transform is exactly the kind of partner most people are looking for.”

Good morning, Wordlers! It’s Saturday morning and today’s Wordle is new yet again.

If you just want today’s answer, scroll to the bottom. But here’s a little more on Wordle if you’re (somehow) new to the game: It’s a daily word game created by Brooklyn-based software engineer Josh Wardle and purchased by the New York Times.

Every day, players are greeted with a fresh word puzzle that can only be solved — or not! — using a series of process-of-elimination clues.

If you’re the adventurous type and want to try other versions of the game, there’s Absurdle, Worldle, the 31-word Grand Slam (aka Untrigintordle) — or you might want to try embracing two kinds of nerdery by exploring Wordle clones for specific fandoms.

More on our favorite word game below, along with the answer that brought you here.

Best Wordle starting word?

Step up your game today with our comprehensive guide to the best starting words.

Wordle Archive: Dig in

Just one Wordle a day not doing it for you? Good news. You can also play the whole archive of past Wordles.

Is Wordle getting harder?

If you feel like you’re struggling more with Wordle lately, you’re not alone — but it’s not getting harder. However, there is a Wordle hard mode (yes, we’ve technically been playing in ‘easy mode’ this whole time).

Now that you’re all caught up, without further ado, here’s the moment you’ve been waiting for.

The Wordle word today is…

EPOXY

Mashable will be providing Wordle answers, along with more Wordle updates in the weeks ahead. Stick with us.

Reporting by Caitlin Welsh and Adam Rosenberg contributed to this article.

Space scientists have released the sharpest and most detailed picture of the sun and its outer atmosphere ever taken, revealing the jacket of gases enveloping the star, called the corona.

You’ve heard it since you were a kid: Don’t look at the sun unless you want to go blind. The sun’s brightness and radiation can cause retinal burns, heating and cooking the exposed tissue of the eye. Fortunately, there are high-powered telescopes that can do the dirty work: stare directly into the brightest object in the sky.

The Solar Orbiter, a collaborative mission of the European Space Agency and NASA launched in February 2020, snapped the new picture on March 7. The spacecraft shot it from within the orbit of Mercury, about 47 million miles from the sun.

The photo is a mosaic of 25 individual images layered to create one high-resolution spectacle, showcasing the furiously stewing cauldron of the solar system. The sun’s corona reaches nearly 2 million degrees Fahrenheit.

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• NASA probe speeds through the sun’s atmosphere, captures scorching photo of Mercury

• NASA and ESA have released the closest ever images of the Sun, and they’re mesmerizing

• A billowing arc of plasma erupts from the sun in this first-of-its-kind image

• NASA captures the explosive moment a brilliant solar flare fired out of the sun

To our eyes, the corona is usually hidden by the bright light of the sun’s surface, making it difficult to see without special instruments. That’s one reason why the new photo, released this week, is so exceptional.

The orbiter is studying the sun’s magnetic activity and so-called solar wind, gases flowing off the sun that cause “space weather.” Right now, scientists have a limited ability to forecast space weather, which can disrupt power grids, telecommunications, and GPS systems.

The orbiter is also trying to get to the bottom of what causes the corona’s extreme heat. Despite the corona being far away from the sun’s surface, the outer atmosphere is hundreds of times hotter. This defies most physics: Usually temperature drops as you move farther from a heat source.

NASA is also conducting groundbreaking research on the sun with its Parker Solar Probe. Last year, the probe traveled closer to the searing orb than any spacecraft before, dipping into the corona just 6.5 million miles from the sun’s surface. During the April 2021 flyby, Parker reached 90 to 95 percent of the distance from Earth to the star, and it’s expected to get a heck of a lot closer.

Michael Scott loves a good music moment, and his taste isn’t cheap.

On the latest episode of Stitcher’s Office Ladies podcast, former co-stars Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey chatted all about the Season 6 episode “Murder.” In case you need an episode refresher, Michael has the Scranton branch play a murder-mystery game to distract them from rumors that Dunder Mifflin is filing for bankruptcy.

During the podcast episode, Fischer and Kinsey chatted about everything from that famous Office finger guns meme to yet another memorable music moment in Michael’s office.

Five minutes into “Murder,” Michael is spiraling alone in his office. He’s blasting music to drown out his bankruptcy fears, and once it’s clear his behavior is stressing out his colleagues, Jim walks in and turns off the tune.

The song Michael’s blasting is the 1998 banger “Lullaby” by Shawn Mullins. And apparently it cost a pretty penny to have Michael wallow to (and eventually sing) the catchy lyrics, “Everything is gonna be all right. Rockabye. Rockabye.”

The Office‘s line producer Randy Cordray told Fischer that the show paid $45,000 just to use that song in the episode.

Honestly? Worth it. The song absolutely made the scene.

The Office Ladies podcast has been a delightful source of financial filming tidbits. In past episodes, Fischer and Kinsey revealed that a song from the “Café Disco” episode of The Office cost $40,000, one of Michael’s jokes from “A Benihana Christmas” cost $60,000, and Jim’s gas station proposal to Pam (the most expensive scene in Office history) cost a whopping $250,000 to pull off. Dang.

Be sure to listen to the full podcast episode to hear more behind-the-scenes stories about filming the episode, “Murder.”

You can stream episodes of The Office on Peacock and follow along with the podcast every week on Earwolf, Apple Podcasts, or Stitcher.

The official trailer for upcoming series Killing It has arrived, giving us a better look at Peacock’s comedy about hunting snakes to save the environment. And also for profit. Mostly for profit.

The series follows Craig (The Office‘s Craig Robinson), a homeless, broke security guard who gets refused a $20,000 loan to purchase some land. Fortunately for him, he soon meets Uber driver Jillian (Claudia O’Doherty), an Australian woman who also earns cash by killing invasive Burmese pythons. It just so happens that there’s a $20,000 reward for person who kills the most snakes, prompting Jillian to propose a team-up.

“I’m tough,” she says. “Don’t you hear my rugged Australian accent?”

Be warned: Aside from the copious amounts of animal death, there is a scene involving a nail gun and a hand that may turn off people sensitive to such imagery. Of course, considering Killing It is created by Brooklyn Nine-Nine co-creator Dan Goor and executive producer Luke Del Tredici, it’s all played for laughs.

Killing It arrives on Peacock April 14.

The rug-puller arrests have begun.

The Department of Justice announced Thursday that law enforcement rounded up two men accused of running not one, but two fraudulent non-fungible token projects. The men, both 20 years old, allegedly sold NFTs with a promised raft of benefits to unsuspecting investors before disappearing with the funds and leaving holders out to dry.

At issue were “Frosties” NFTs, still listed on OpenSea, which the DOJ said Ethan Nguyen and Andre Llacuna pitched as guaranteeing exclusive giveaways and “early access to a metaverse game.” Of course, the two men allegedly “abandoned the Frosties NFT project within hours after selling out of Frosties NFTs, deactivated the Frosties website, and transferred approximately $1.1 million in cryptocurrency proceeds from the scheme[.]”

In late 2021, the blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis reported that rug pulls “have emerged as the go-to scam of the DeFi ecosystem, accounting for 37% of all cryptocurrency scam revenue in 2021” for a total of at least $2.8 billion worth of crypto that year alone.

Nguyen and Llacuna are charged with wire fraud, which has a maximum potential sentence of 20 years in prison.

Notably, the two men supposedly operated under a ream of aliases, including such gems as “Frostie,” “Jakefiftyeight,” “Jobo,” “Joboethan,” “Meltfrost,” and “heyandre.”

And, at least according to law enforcement, Nguyen and Llacuna were queued up to run another rug pull expected to garner around $1.5 million in sales. That project, Embers, was scheduled to mint on March 26.

“Each individual Ember is carefully curated from over 150 traits, along with some incredibly rare 1/1s that have traits that can’t be found from any other Ember,” reads the project’s webpage. “Our vision is to create an amazing project that will shed light, joy, love, and creativity! Burn on, Embers!”

Thursday’s arrests make it all the more clear that cryptocurrency history is repeating itself. In 2017, the initial coin offering (ICO) boom drew scores of scammers and celebrity shills who profited off retail investors FOMOing into cryptocurrency. It took some time, but law enforcement and the Securities and Exchange Commission eventually cracked down on those scammers, too.

What we’re seeing now is likely the tip of the Department of Justice’s investigatory iceberg when it comes to NFT scams. Don’t be surprised if Nguyen and Llacuna’s arrests only represent the first of many to come.

Scammers are continuing to weaponize Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine in order to propel their immoral money-making schemes. There have been a slew of scams ranging from fake charity websites hosted on freshly registered domain names to phishing campaigns looking to steal sensitive information from potential donors to Ukraine.

Now, new research from email security firm Cyren looks into just how cryptocurrency fraudsters are utilizing email spam for their latest Ukraine-related fraud.

According to the report, researchers at Cyren have uncovered more than 100,000 emails per day trying to trick targets into donating to Bitcoin or Ethereum wallets setup by the scammers.

Domain names come into play once again with these email scams, as Cyren discovered a “large number” of these emails were spoofing email addresses using domains that were related to Ukraine in order to look “authentic.” However, a “significant number” of especially brazen scammers just used plain old Gmail addresses when trying to defraud their targets. 

In addition, some scam emails directed targets to recently created websites disguised as official charities benefitting the Ukrainian people. With a newly registered URL, often containing the word “Ukraine,” and their scam page setup, fraudsters will then try to direct potential victims via email to the fake charity website. Once on the site, scammers provide the target with a number of cryptocurrency wallets purporting to belong to organizations fundraising for Ukraine. These digital wallets, in fact, belong to the fraudsters.

Many of these emails used common internet marketing strategies, such as a call-to-action and appeal to a potential victim’s emotions right in the email subject line. “Help Ukraine war victims” and “Help Ukraine stop the war! – humanitarian fund raising” are two examples.

When the official Ukraine government Twitter account decided to post it’s now infamous tweet with its Bitcoin and Ethereum addresses, it unintentionally provided these crypto scammers with a blueprint for their schemes. Many of these scammers use that very @Ukraine tweet as a template – of course, with the Ukraine’s legit Bitcoin and Ethereum wallet addresses swapped out for theirs – within their scam emails and on their websites.

Researchers at Cyren found that more than 50 percent of the emails were routed through the U.S. Other popular apparent email origins include Indonesia, Brazil, India, South Africa, and Colombia. Cyren notes that this doesn’t necessarily mean that the emails originated in these countries, but that the server where the email came from is located in that particular place.

Those looking to donate to help the people affected by the ongoing crisis caused by Russia’s war in Ukraine should look for legitimate organizations and official donation links. They definitely should not donate to any cryptocurrency wallet or website address sent to them via unsolicited emails.

There’s a long list of electric SUVs coming out this year.

As more compact SUVs with electric drivetrains become available the choices will be harder to make. It’s not just Tesla but Hyundai, Kia, Nissan, Fisker, Mazda, Toyota…

That’s where the Volvo C40 Recharge comes in with a new type of car from Volvo — completely electric with no gas equivalent. It’s a car made as an EV first and foremost. But it’s still very much a Volvo from its creative analog features, focus on sustainable materials, Google-based infotainment system, and overall aesthetic — even if it doesn’t have a traditional grille in front (there’s no more engine). It still maintains that boxy look we all know as Volvo and continues to carry the Swedish carmaker’s safety reputation. It’s distinct in its design from any other boxy Volvo mostly because of its sloping backside, but it’s not enough to doubt this is a Volvo SUV.

While not a station wagon from Volvo’s glory days, the C40 Recharge is another voluminous car that has a family-friendly vibe. Volvo has leaned into the SUV segment and the C40 Recharge fits right in as a compact, sportier option. It reaches up to 112 mph and with dual motors can handle tougher terrain with all-wheel drive.

Its 226-mile range is not the most competitive battery capacity in an EV (the Tesla Model Y and X SUVs can reach upwards of 300 miles), but it knows its audience. This is for families who need a car to run errands, make it to activities, or go across town for a playdate. More than 200 miles of charge is plenty. Most charging happens at home when not road-tripping. (As much as 80 percent of charging is at home, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.)

While driving a Fjord blue C40 Recharge above the hills of the Palm Springs, California desert earlier this month, I proudly regenerated five miles of range coasting from several thousand feet up. On the way up, signs along the side of the road recommended turning off the AC to help the engine power through, and I felt smug in my battery-powered machine that I knew would recapture the lost energy on the way down.

After a whole day driving around Palm Springs, including a drive-by architecture tour to 10 different homes (it was easy after plugging in the locations into Google Maps) and an emergency trip to a Best Buy, I had well over 30 percent battery left.

Many times throughout the day I found myself riding behind or near another Volvo and the C40 Recharge blended right in. It slips in easily as part of the Volvo family, especially as the Swedish company commits to more and more EVs. The charging port, frunk (front trunk where the engine used to sit in gas-powered Volvos), and new grille will soon become expected features in any Volvo.

The C40 Recharge represents the company’s turn toward electric cars, but it looks like the familiar Volvo vibe isn’t going anywhere.

Four years ago, hundreds of thousands of people marched in Washington, DC, to protest and mourn following the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, during which 17 people were killed. Millions of other Americans joined in solidarity around the country. The collective moment morphed into a student and youth-led organization, March for Our Lives, which is still fighting for stronger gun reform action from political leaders.

In 2022, March for Our Lives is honoring this anniversary with a bold piece of public protest — 1,100 body bags laid out along the National Mall, spelling out the phrase “thoughts and prayers.” It’s an emotive, physical representation of the organizers’ frustration with their political representatives, who continue to balk at passing legal reform, and a not-at-all subtle call-out to the government: This lack of action is killing people.

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Each body bag is meant to represent over 150 deaths since February 2018, which total more than 170,000 people killed by gun violence in the last four years in America, according to the organization. The organizers and participants of Thursday’s demonstration include youth activists, Parkland survivors, and family members. Those on the ground for the demonstration, including youth advisory board members and founding organizers Kelly Choi and Bria Smith, want to make it clear that this is not just an art installation.

“We’re bringing that exposure, that violence we see every day on the streets, that we see in our schools, our churches, and our malls. We are bringing it to politicians who have the luxury to ignore it,” Smith said. “In order to get our politicians to hear us, we have to come down to their streets. They won’t come to our spaces and listen to what we have to say.”

Choi explained this means calling out the meaningless platitudes shared across social media and beyond with every new shooting: “Those words — just saying those words — have caused so much pain and devastation and death all across the country.” 

In the demonstration’s press release, Daud Mumin, college student and board co-chair of March for Our Lives, said the fault of so many gun violence deaths lies explicitly with Congress. “Body bags. That’s what thoughts and prayers get us because these empty words do not stop bullets,” Mumin wrote. “This crisis is completely preventable if only politicians in Washington who have the power to make change took their jobs seriously and actually valued our lives.”

The current presidential administration has yet to enact large scale gun reform. In his State of the Union address on March 1, President Joe Biden announced an initiative to reduce rates of gun violence, focused on supporting local law enforcement and community violence intervention, and simply called on his fellow legislators to enact life-saving gun reform at the congressional level. Many activists, including those with March for Our Lives, thought that was not enough.

“These politicians have created their own divides. So many young people around me are jaded and don’t want to take part in the political process because these politicians made promises that they still aren’t following through on. They just want to use our images. If they want a photo op today, they’ll have to take a picture of these body bags,” Choi said.

On the February anniversary of the Parkland shooting, March for Our Lives and its partners Change the Ref and Guns Down America launched ShockMarket.org, a tracking and advocacy tool that lets visitors monitor how many gun violence deaths have occurred since Biden took office. According to the site, which includes data from the Gun Violence Archive, there’s already been 52,263 gun deaths since Biden took office. The organization is also working toward midterm season, putting pressure on current leaders and galvanizing young voters. “We’ve had a re-shifting of voter culture,” Choi said. “It might sound corny, but we’re making voting cool. Young people are entering these political spectrums, and in the future they’ll possibly be taking these roles from these leaders.”

The organizers hope that the congressional leaders viewing the 1,100 body bags know that activists are not going to back down, and they urge those watching across the country to get involved themselves. March for Our Lives asks everyone to sign their petition calling for immediate legislation requiring background checks on all firearm sales, which will be sent to U.S. Senator and Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who has previously committed himself to commonsense gun reform and authored the original bill requiring background checks. You can read more about the demonstration at marchforourlives.com/thoughtsandprayers.

If you haven’t seen The Batman, you might want to stay away from this deleted scene released by Warner Bros — spoilers ahead.

In an interview with Variety after the film’s release, director Matt Reeves talks about a cameo appearance that was originally meant to be bigger, featuring actor Barry Keoghan at Arkham Asylum. The deleted scene shows Keoghan as the Joker in full makeup (something Reeves’ team thought out carefully), telling Robert Pattinson’s Batman, “It’s almost our anniversary, isn’t it?”

The Batman is visiting his cackling Arkham associate in order to understand and hopefully apprehend the masked serial killer murdering high-profile Gotham residents.

“He’s a nobody, wants to be somebody,” the Joker says. “He feels these people have all wronged him.” He goes on to unpack the Riddler’s psychology with surprising accuracy, and to get under Batman’s skin in ways no one else can.

• ‘The Batman’ Review: A crime-thriller suffocated by PG-13 demands

• ‘The Batman’s politics are deliberately hollow

  The Batman is now in theaters (without this scene).