Author: NY TIMES

Meet the Millers, George and Roxanne, proprietors of the world’s largest collection of mechanical puzzles: physical objects that a puzzler holds and manipulates while seeking a solution. In total, the Miller collection — an accumulation of collections, and collections of collections — amounts to more than 80,000 puzzles. It comprises some five thousand Rubik’s Cubes, including a 2-by-2-by-2 rendering of Darth Vader’s head. And there are more than 7,000 wooden burr puzzles, such as the interlocking, polyhedral creations by Stewart Coffin, a Massachusetts puzzle maker; they evoke a hybrid of a pine cone and a snowflake and are Mr. Miller’s…

One thing I love about editing the Ask Well column is the camaraderie of it. Every week we answer a health question: Why am I so congested all the time? (I’ve wondered that, too!) Why does my sleep get worse as I age? (I’m right there with you.) Is my coffee habit in need of an intervention? (Pour me another while we figure it out.)When I survey our inbox, I’m amazed at what comes in — questions that cover the joys, agonies, confusions and vulnerabilities of being a person. And luckily for us all, we get to seek out the…

Rodrigo realizes that, in its first throes, “Love Is Embarrassing.” (It is.) On that throbbing track, she admits the hold “some weird second-string loser” has on her. On another, “Get Him Back,” she jokingly lays out a conflicted revenge plot as the bridge drops to a whisper: “I wanna kiss his face, with an uppercut,” she confesses. “I wanna meet his mom — just to tell her her son sucks.” She’s cataloging her humiliations, but she’s laughing at them, too.She refuses to wallow for long, and I’m convinced this is partly what gives the album its buoyancy. (It’s an approach…

The Israeli military warned on Friday that it was stepping up operations in the southern Gaza Strip, where hundreds of thousands of people had fled to safety, while hospital officials said Israel bombed an area in the south where it had ordered civilians to seek shelter.At least 18 people were killed and dozens of others injured near Kuwait Specialty Hospital, according to hospital staff members, who said the strike had hit a house in Rafah, near the border with Egypt.In what an Israeli defense official described as an “essential” stage in the war to eliminate Hamas, the military carried out…

South Africa accused Israel of genocide on Friday in the International Court of Justice and asked the U.N. court to order a halt to fighting in the embattled Gaza Strip, saying that Israel was trying to “destroy Palestinians in Gaza.”Israel’s Foreign Ministry dismissed the claim as “lacking a factual and a legal basis” and described the filing as a “despicable and contemptuous exploitation of the Court.” Israel has often said it is at war with Hamas, not the civilians of Gaza.South Africa has been one of the most vocal critics of Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza. In early November,…

In the days after Hamas militants killed about 1,200 people on October 7, Yarden Garzon struggled to eat or sleep. The war breaking out between Israel and the Gaza Strip distraught her as she watched the news in Bloomington, Indiana, where she is a second-year guard. Arden, who was born and raised in Israel, worries about her friends, family and country. “I think I was more nervous than my mom,” Garzon said. “The first week was really scary.”Garzon’s parents are half a world away from her, at home in Ra’anana, Israel, an affluent suburb north of Tel Aviv and about…

Some tiny homes seem so ideal that it’s tempting to avoid changing them, even when life demands otherwise. That’s how Pam Austin felt when her family began outgrowing the 450-square-foot log cabin she owns on Guemes Island, off the coast of Washington.In 2000, Ms. Austin and her now ex-husband bought the little house, which sits on a beachfront lot, as a getaway from their primary home in Seattle. At the time, Ms. Austin, 72, said, “it was charming, but in bad shape” — overrun by mice and riddled with mildew.The structure had been built on another island in the early…

If you were planning on watching the final season of “Jack Ryan” or eight seasons of “House” without commercials on Amazon Prime next year, get ready to dig a little deeper into your pockets.In September, Amazon announced it would soon add advertisements to Prime Video, its streaming service, and this week announced when that change would go into effect: Jan 29. Customers wanting to avoid the ads would have to pay an extra $2.99 a month.Less than a decade ago, the streaming era took off on the promise of letting users cut the cord from expensive cable bills and enjoy…

Neri Diaz thought he was ready for a crucial juncture in California’s ambitious plans, closely watched in other states and around the world, to phase out diesel-powered trucks.His company, Harbor Pride Logistics, acquired 14 electric trucks this year to work alongside 32 diesel vehicles, in anticipation of a rule that says diesel rigs can no longer be added to the list of vehicles approved to move goods in and out of California’s ports. But in August the manufacturer of Mr. Diaz’s electric vehicles, Nikola, took back the trucks as part of a recall, saying it would return them in the…

Since the height of the pandemic, there has been a cultural shift in the way we talk about mental health. It’s as though the years of isolation and uncertainty helped us understand how vital our emotional needs were to our overall well-being.Now that we’re paying more attention to our inner lives, it’s also essential that we take action. Fortunately, there are a number of things that everyone can do to nourish their mental health and find moments of joy.Here are some of our favorite tips from the past year as we prepare to enter 2024.1. Try a proven way to…