There was a time when tablets threatened to end up as phones you couldn’t make calls on. But things have changed. Tablets have been reinvented and offer a lot more, whether you use it for work, rest, play or Netflix. As a result, finding the best one for your needs is going to mean putting in some work and doing a bit of research. Or you could just read the stuff below. 

Spend what you need

Remember when there were only a few tablets to choose from and you had to be JK Rowling to afford any of them? Not anymore. There are so many options available today and at JB Hi-Fi you’ll find one no matter what your budget. Having all the big brands on the market guarantees quality and choice Read more…

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A cancer patient on his way to his last chemotherapy treatment won $200,000 from a scratch-off lottery ticket.  

Ronnie Foster, a retiree in Pink Hill, North Carolina, stopped by a convenience store on his way to the hospital and bought a $1 scratch-off. He won $5. 

Then, he tested his luck again by paying for two $5 scratch-offs. The first didn’t have any prizes, but the second scratch-off revealed a $200,000 jackpot. 

“I saw all those zeroes and I froze,” Foster told the North Carolina Education Lottery, the state-run organization that distributes winnings. “I didn’t believe it until I gave it to the clerk at the counter to scan. When it showed, ‘Go to lottery headquarters,’ I started shaking. I couldn’t believe it.”  Read more…

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Meet Cinderblock, a very large cat who went viral for channeling all of us in her show of annoyance at having to get on a treadmill. 

Cinderblock is eight years old and currently resides at Northshore Veterinary Hospital in Bellingham, Wash. where she’s been given, literally, a new life. 

CNN reports that Cinderblock’s previous owner couldn’t care for the cat anymore due to health issues and brought the cat in to be euthanized. 

But Britta Kiffney, a vet at Northshore, said she “couldn’t do it” and asked have Cinderblock given to her. And now Kiffney and other Northshore staff are working on getting the feline in better shape since, as Kiffney says, the cat is “morbidly obese.”  Read more…

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Emilia Clarke, the Mother of Dragons herself, celebrated her birthday on Saturday by sharing an eyebrow-raising photo with her two Game of Thrones paramours.  

Clark posted a photo of her and her dour nephew/lover Kit Harrington (Jon Snow), with a mighty Jason Momoa (Khal Drogo) sandwiched in between. 

It’s a glorious photo that is sure to launch a million fanfic stories.  Read more…

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Witches in Oregon and California’s central coast flocked to the water for annual charity paddleboarding events. 

Donning their hats and swapping out broomsticks for oars, coastal witches and warlocks gathered for a “ghoulish morning on the water” on Saturday, according to one event site.

The event has been going on for six years in Morro Bay, California, but its timing was kept secret until 2019. 

Annette Ausseresses, one of the first witch paddlers, told local news station KSBY that she and her coven originally started the event to celebrate Halloween. 

“Since then, we’ve seen the idea really take off and now there are Witches and Warlock Paddles happening from coast to coast,” she said. “So, we decided to add a donation component and make it public this year.”  Read more…

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Apple wants you to know that if you’re still using an iPhone 5, you really, really need to hurry up and update your iOS. Otherwise you might lose a lot of features and turn your iPhone into a fancy paperweight. 

Per Engadget, Apple is worried enough that the company has taken to sending out full screen alerts and even posting a big note on its support website to remind iPhone owners that they’ll need to upgrade their iOS to at least version 10.3.4 by Nov. 3. 

It all has to do with that GPS rollover issue that hit old devices back in April and Apple patched back in July with the aforementioned iOS update. Apple wasn’t alone; plenty of other GPS-utilizing devices were affected by the issue.  Read more…

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It’s easy to forget we live in a modern world where preposterously expensive technology is flying somewhere above our heads at all times. Until one comes crashing down in your backyard, that is.

That’s what happened in Michigan on Saturday morning. Local residents Nancy and Dan Mumby-Welke heard a crash outside, and when they went to investigate they discovered a Samsung-branded machine that had seemingly fallen out of the sky, according to Facebook post from the Gratiot County Herald, shared by Nancy on Facebook.

The machine apparently belongs to Samsung Europe, and is part of a “SpaceSelfie” ad campaign for Galaxy S10 5G that offers people a chance to “get their face in space.” It’s not exactly a satellite, though, as some reports have mentioned. Read more…

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.Sunday’s Google Doodle paid homage to renowned poet Sylvia Plath on what would have been her 87th birthday. 

Born Oct. 27, 1932 in Boston, Plath is most remembered for how her writing dealt with her mental illness. It’s a theme that echoes through her most celebrated works, like her novel The Bell Jar and Ariel, a posthumously published collection of poems that included “Lady Lazarus,” which is among her most well-known poems. 

Plath took her own life on Feb. 11, 1963, a death that, for a while, overshadowed her life and works. Many biographical sketches simply focus on the dissolution of her marriage with famed writer Ted Hughes over an affair as the impetus behind her death. Read more…

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TL;DR: The award-winning Sony Bravia AG9 4K OLED TV (65-inch) is on sale in the PCMag Shop for $3,099 — a total savings of $900 after code SAVE400.

Black Friday ain’t just Friday anymore.

Unfortunately, the deals pause for no one. As pissed as you are that consumerism is interrupting your annual tradition of stuffing yourself with stuffing, you’re pretty much forced to participate in the Thursday sales to avoid the big ticket items selling out.

If you’re in the market for a high-end 65-inch TV, PCMag has a deal that’ll let you skip that mess all together. Sony’s OLED Master Series line nabbed double awards at CES, and you can snag the 65-inch model for $3,099 when you use code SAVE400. To put it in perspective, that’s $400 lower than its lowest price ever at Amazon. (Editor’s note: PCMag is owned by Mashable’s publisher, Ziff Davis.) Read more…

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Augmented reality has the potential to change how we see the world — or, I guess if you want to get technical, the way companies show ads to us. 

The latest example of this breakthrough is courtesy of Google’s Pixel 4. The new smartphone, released Oct. 24, comes complete with a Google Lens-enabled AR surprise. As Android Police reports, when users point their new phone at the back of the Pixel 4 box, they are treated with an ad for Google’s Instagram account. 

“Welcome to #teampixel,” reads the animated ad. “Tap to join the global community @googlepixel.”

According to Android Police, tapping any of the photos displayed in the AR slideshow will take you to the Google Pixel Instagram account.  Read more…

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