Society will continue telling you the opposite for the rest of your life, but it’s perfectly fine to not have or want kids. In the time I would have spent raising children, I’ve cultivated a huge network of close, lifelong friends, a satisfying career, a great volunteer position, and a wonderful relationship with my…

“Family” should really be labelled “Children.” If your partner works a decent amount too, you’re probably a source of mutual support for each other rather than a time/attention suck. And unless you have 5 high-maintenance siblings, family doesn’t take up THAT much time — I’d lump them together with “friends,”…

Yes, which is why I was looking at a page of humidifier reviews... we have one now but it’s on its last legs.

I found it interesting that there was no discussion of accuracy. I’ve tried multiple running apps, and they all vary widely in terms of tracking my route/distance. Sometimes I’ve even run two apps at once so I can split the difference between how far they say I went. I’d love an app that accurately recorded my…

El Niño helped, but we’re still in the middle of a historic drought....

I’ve been wanting to buy a new humidifier, but our bedroom is small, and the one that’s recommended (Crane Owl) doesn’t exactly... go with our decor? I wish they’d done an alternate recommendation for a less, um, ostentatious (?) design.

There’s an important caveat that I find often gets left out of these articles: SOME women are able to suppress their periods. I’m not one of them. I have tried multiple methods with the result generally being that I don’t get a traditional period but have continuous spotting — enough that I have to wear a pantyliner…

I’m also tired of the assumption that anyone with any sort of illness, mental or otherwise, is solely a “burden” on those around them. I have found that being part of the support system for a loved one has enriched my life in ways I never expected, taught me important life skills, and deepened my relationship with the…

That cat looks exactly like Nicole Richie, not Clare Danes. I can’t believe how the tabloids can get their stories so twisted.

If you’re having trouble getting enough protein, here’s what I eat just as an example (I try to eat a high-protein diet):

Thank you for calling out the St. Lucia result — it’s much farther, and therefore more expensive to get to, than Kauai. On Cheap Tickets’ own site, a flight out of SFO for a one-week trip in late June are around $950 round-trip versus $700 for Kauai.

Ultimately, which is a better financial bet is unknowable because it requires knowing when you’ll die. If you die young, renting may have been a better decision in retrospect. If, like my parents, you pay off your mortgage in full and then proceed to live in your home rent-free for another 10 or 20 years, buying will…

I had my procedure 9 years ago and I have two points: (1) My nighttime vision has gotten worse over the past 9 years and (2) my mother has terrible night vision and I’m 41, so it’s entirely possible that this was a function of aging/heredity and is unrelated to the surgery. The fact that it didn’t happen immediately…

Nine years later, I’m still very happy with my Lasik! The only thing I tell people now is that for me, it hurt A LOT for a day or so. I felt like someone had taken sand and rubbed it forcibly into my eyes (maybe that’s what you meant by sandman)? All in all, 100% worth it, though. I also went to the best doctor in my…

Honey, you might be done with your round of first weddings, but in not that many years you’ll be kicking off the next round by entering into your own second marriage, and your friends will soon be following suit. The good news is, weddings for second marriages are usually a lot more fun because nobody is pretending…

I’m pretty sure most people would have read that as a commentary about social plans. It’s a recognized phenomenon nowadays that people will tend to reply “maybe” to an invitation (especially in the days of evites and facebook invites where the entire guest list can see who has responded) because it’s seen as less of a…

That’s a lot if you don’t have children (and don’t plan to have them). For my partner and I, we just eyeballed what we would want the other person not to have to worry about if one of us died. The biggest issue for us was making the mortgage payments, which neither of us could afford to do alone. So we took out…

No, I’m not interested in screwing over everyone else for my own benefit. I’m a CA native and it’s very sad what Prop 13 has done to our school system and our state as a whole.

Part of my daily gratitude practice includes keeping a notebook on my nightstand, where, every night before bed, I write down at least 5 things I was grateful for that day. Can be something new that happened (I had a productive day at work) or just something I was reminded of to be particularly grateful for that day…

Same. In SF, we are paying what works out to more than A THOUSAND DOLLARS a month on our modest, 3-bedroom house. Californians can blame Prop. 13 for that one — new homebuyers end up paying way more than our fair share. Be sure you know what you’ll be out of pocket for taxes and figure it in to your budget.