Photo: Annette Shaff (Shutterstock)

The hummingbird feeder I hung on the porch is one of my unexpected joys in life. I originally hung it up because hummingbirds kept dropping in on a certain spot – I’m convinced the previous owners of my house hung a food dispenser there – and popping up every summer demanding that I feed them. So I do.

In addition to the automatic feeders, the garden shop sells bottles of hummingbird food, both clear and red. (Red flowers are known to attract hummingbirds.) But you don’t need either type. It’s easier, cheaper, and better for the birds to make their own.

Even the Audubon Society recommends a homemade syrup instead of the bottled goods, and they also point out that the red coloring is not necessary. It has been speculated that red dye can be bad for hummingbirds, and in any case, it has not been specifically tested for long-term effects on hummingbirds.

People must have tried making hummingbird food out of all sorts of other substances because the Audubon side advises against making it with honey, molasses, or artificial sweeteners. Just sugar water. So, okay, let’s make some sugar water.

How to do it:

1. Add 1/4 cup of sugar to a pint-sized mason jar or similar container.
2. Add 1 cup of cold water or room temperature water.
3. Unscrew the lid and shake.

That’s it – no need to heat it or add any other ingredients. The sugar will dissolve by gently shaking or stirring. (If you are familiar with make simple syrupwhich uses more sugar compared to water and needs a little more help to dissolve everything.)

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Once I’ve made the syrup, I bring the hummingbird feeder in and wash it with hot water. Then I pour in about half the serving – that’s about half a cup of liquid – and put the rest in the fridge for later in the week. Make sure to wash and refill the feeder twice a week to keep your little friends healthy.

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Getting your hands on a good book to read is as easy as clicking “Borrow” on your tablet. If you are slow to enter the world of e-books, you should know that you can download thousands of e-books and their audio counterparts for free from your phone, computer or tablet. This is a quick and easy way to borrow an e-book from your local public library.

How to access an e-library

Depending on where you live, your library may already have a large collection of e-books. For example, the New York Public Library (NYPL) allows New York residents to sign up for a digital library card and try out available titles. You can register online, create a username (usually your email address or membership number) and enter a password. You will then have access to your e-book library via the app Easy E.. Other library systems across the country may have similar programs; Please visit your local library website for more information.

If a digital library card in your area is out of the question, literary website Goodreads also published a short list of e-readers that are great for e-lending in the United States and Canada. Libby’s online reader app makes e-lending easy and links to your e-reader, Kindle or your Kindle app. The Company OverDrive creates Libby to connect public libraries to readers for easy online borrowing; about 90% of the libraries are supposedly connected to OverDrive and Libby, but you can check their website for participating libraries to make sure this resource is available in your area.

How to borrow e-books through Libby

You need a library card to work with Libby. You can either use your existing card information or visit your local library to get a new card. Once you have the card, download the Libby app and follow the simple setup instructions. The app asks you if you have a library card. If you select No, you will be given directions to get a new map in your area. If you select “Yes”, the app asks whether you know your local branch or whether you would like to “guess your branch”. (The app uses your current location to find the nearest branch of the library.) After confirming your branch, you can start borrowing immediately.

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This is how you link your e-reader to your borrowed e-books

When you have sufficiently searched through and found the desired book (or audiobook) via Libby, select “Borrow” below. The app takes you to the checkout page, where you can select a loan period of seven days, 14 days or 21 days (depending on the library).

After you set the loan period, Libby will prompt you to update the notification settings. You can receive notifications when the loan period expires and be notified when books that you have put on hold are now available. You can also choose to be notified when your favorite author has a new title or when the next part in a series you like is available. This feature allows you to keep track of how long you have left to finish your current book and what to check out next. After the loan period expires, the book will no longer be available on your account or device.

Now that you are ready to read, all of your other e-books can access the book in your Kindle library. When you click the title, you’ll see the option to read it on Kindle or an e-reader. If you select Kindle, you will be redirected to sign in to your Amazon Kindle account. Once you’re signed in, the Kindle app will prompt you to send the book to your device. You have the option to choose which of your Kindle devices to use. When you open your e-library on your tablet, Kindle, or iPad, all of your books are in the same place for easy reading.

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While I appreciate anything a smart speaker assistant can help me with, I don’t want to get caught up in long conversations with Alexa. I certainly don’t need her to respond out loud to every request or make suggestions on completely different topics just for asking her to turn off the lights.

Fortunately, there are a few settings you can change on your Amazon Echo to limit the verbosity from Alexa – although you probably can’t rule out unwanted responses entirely. Here are the options to get Alexa to speak less.

How to activate the ‘short mode’ on Alexa

Letter fashion eliminates verbal affirmations like “OK” when you make a request. Instead you will hear a short tone. To enable this setting, open your Alexa app and tap the More Menu. click Settings> Voice responses> Short mode to switch on and off.

You can find that too admittedly creepy whisper mode setting Here. When you turn this on and whisper your questions or commands – let’s say you’re trying not to wake a sleeping person – Alexa whispers back in an unsettling but quiet way.

How to disable purchase suggestions on Alexa

Alexa is also known to follow up simple queries (like asking for a weather report) with suggestions to buy things from Amazon – basically ads. Turns out there is also an attitude for that: Go to in your app Settings> Notifications> Amazon Shopping and deselect the option “Receive personalized recommendations and offers based on your shopping activity”.

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How to turn off the Try it out option

Another quirk of Alexa is her fondness for saying “By the way …” as a preface to the loosely related information she is about to share. Apparently, There isn’t a single setting to turn this off, but you can turn off things to try, which can help cut down some of their chatter. Go to Settings> Notifications> Things to Try and turn off.

How to turn off Alexa ‘ancestors’

When you use Alexa to control smart home devices like lights and thermostats, the Hunches feature (enabled by default) will warn you if something isn’t working as expected. You can find options for this in Settings> Warnings> Settings> Suggestions. You can also turn on Alexa Take care of these issues automatically.

How to set up an Amazon Kids user profile

The most extreme option for turning off unwanted notifications is to use your Amazon Echo with a child account (h / t CNET). The downside is that some other functions are limited – although Alexa can still respond to basic requests, play (not explicit) music, and control your smart home devices.

To turn your Echo into a kid-friendly device, go to equipment In the Alexa app, tap Echo & Alexa and select the device that you want to reconfigure. Tap Amazon children, turn on the bar, and select Set up Amazon Kids. If you’ve already set up a child profile, you can choose it. If not, choose Add child and follow the instructions.

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We live in a kind of golden age of counterfeit meat products. Meat-free foods shaped like meat have flooded the market, making it easier than ever to find Soyrizo at the grocery store or an Impossible burger at Burger King. These products offer vegetarians and vegans something that is easy to grill while grilling, but that doesn’t mean we should be cutting out vegetables altogether.

Relying heavily on these mass-produced meat substitutes is not going to “save the environment” no matter what the counterfeit meat food giants might tell you – check out Alicia Kennedy’s op-ed for In these times on the green washing trend – but more importantly: vegetables are good and taste like meat or eggs if they are prepared correctly, but not as good if they are prepared without care.

You have to add fat to the vegetable – like you already have in a piece of animal protein – to make it so delicious.

The words “carrot dog” may frenzy your average BBQ dad, but a smoked, grilled carrot done with some fat is not just a whimsical hot dog substitute, it’s an intensely flavorful way to enjoy a carrot . (I love a grilled carrot and I love the mood, so the term “carrot dog” doesn’t bother me. I draw the line with “Bread steak, “however.)

And while a given Michelin-starred restaurant tons of creeping press for removing meat, fish and dairy products from the menu, Chef Amanda Cohen has been cooking and serving vegetables in her restaurant Dirt Candy in an incredibly creative and delicious way since 2008. Her broccoli dog is one of her most famous dishes, but other vegetables (like the carrot, beetroot, and mushroom) have also received the dog treat, as well as the pastrami treat and the downright fine mousse treat.

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In short – Chef Cohen thinks much longer and harder about vegetarian dogs (and vegetables in general) than I do, which is why I asked about her to see if she had any tips on making smoked vegetables, be it carrots, broccoli or Cabbage taste fantastic. (Spoiler: It depends on the fat and the surface.)

A smoked carrot may take a few more steps than pork chops, but they’re simple steps that even a novice can cook at home

“The thing about smoking a vegetable versus smoking a piece of animal protein is that vegetables don’t have their own source of fat,” Chef Cohen told me via email. “When you smoke animal protein, it absorbs the smoke and mixes it with the fat, and you get this really delicious, intoxicating product. When you smoke a vegetable, it is not porous. It won’t soak in the smoke. And the smoke itself basically only sticks to the outside. You want a large surface area so you can get the flavor in as many places as possible. But you also need to finish cooking it in a fat. You have to add fat to the vegetables – like you already have in a piece of animal protein – to make them delicious. “

A smoked carrot may take a few more steps than pork chops, but they’re simple steps that even a novice can cook at home. Cohen’s Nashville Hot Carrot Dogs are cooked using a variety of methods to achieve the delicious effect you want.

“We just cook them to make them a little soft and easier to shape,” she explained. “It’s no fun eating a carrot dog in a bun if it has a pointy end. We want the whole thing to be the same size and to have to be able to shape it. And we know from what we do with it that when it is smoked it doesn’t cook enough and that it has to cook too long as a whole carrot. So I have to start this process and move it forward. So we cook it so it’s just tender enough to shape and then we smoke it and then we dip it in batter and deep fry it and we finish it with the hot oil because it’s a Nashville Hot Carrot Dog is. “

If smoking and deep-frying sounds a little too labor-intensive for a barbecue in the garden, don’t worry. Cohens Broccoli Dog Recipe is slightly more accessible to the average home cook, but you can apply these principles to all of your vegetarian grilling and smoking activities as well.

Cut large vegetables into pieces to add surface area, cook more robust products like carrots, and develop flavors through a variety of cooking methods such as: And – perhaps most importantly – always finish your veggies with some fat by sautéing, dipping, or drizzling with butter or some other aromatic oil. It might not be as easy as throwing an Impossible burger on the grill, but if you think of veggies and cook them that way, you’ll become a better cook regardless of your diet.

It’s worth noting, however, that Chef Cohen isn’t against the occasional Impossible or Beyond product, especially if it leads them down a veggie-heavy path. “They eat less meat because they try these different types of products, which hopefully takes on the dark side of eating more vegetables, which is what I care about.”