how-to

Zac Efron Is Apparently Something of a Bra Opening Expert

Neetzan Zimmerman · 04/12/12 10:47AM

Zac Efron's legendary bra-unhooking skills are put to the test during an interview with Australian radio hosts Mel and Matty, who challenge the Lucky One star to demonstrate his signature single-handed flick technique.

How to Get Some Guy to Marry You

Hamilton Nolan · 03/22/12 01:22PM

A new government report says that 38% of American women aged 15-44 have never ever been married, not even once. What is wrong with them? Something. Nobody likes them? Apparently. Anyhow. They're not as hopeless as everyone thinks!

How to Write a New York Times Weather Story

Hamilton Nolan · 03/21/12 09:34AM

Whenever the first snow falls, or the first hot day of summer strikes, or when the heat gives way to autumn's crisp air, or when the chill of winter finally breaks for spring, or just when there isn't shit happening in the world, the Paper of Record published one of its trademark "weather stories." This is not simply a report on the day's weather; it is a report on the day's weather masquerading as a news story.

The Perfect New York Times Magazine 'Lives' Essay

Hamilton Nolan · 03/09/12 04:46PM

Have you always dreamed of writing one of those "Lives" essays that appear on the back page of the New York Times Magazine? Yes? Jesus. Our readers used to be cool. Anyhow. The point is, the magazine's 1,384,674 editors are now sharing tips about how to write an essay that doesn't make them want to roll their M.F.A. diploma into a big old cocaine-and-rat-poison blunt, due to despair. The perfect "Lives" essay is now within your grasp!

How to Get Into a Good College Now

Hamilton Nolan · 03/08/12 10:55AM

Not long ago, getting into college involved nothing more than a fair-to-middling G.P.A., an essay about reading to the blind, and your parents' checkbook. Things are a bit more complicated now. College budgets are being slashed. Competition is intense. So intense that kids are starting the "college hunt" in ninth grade. Are you really prepared? You're about to be.

How to Win In the Machiavellian Workplace

Hamilton Nolan · 02/29/12 01:00PM

Work. You can either conquer it, or let it conquer you. Amirite? Don't let it conquer you. Conquer it. Yes. Conquering it is preferable. Having survived four full years at Gawker Media—eight-time winner of Forbes Magazine's prestigious "Most Unstable Workplace" award—I have picked up some prudent methods of survival. Don't just work—flourish™.

How to Walk

Hamilton Nolan · 02/14/12 11:09AM

Wacky hippies in the wacky hippie enclave of Denver are encouraging their fellow moonbeam-gazing residents of Marijuanaville to do something a little strange: walk places. On their feet. What's more: even you, The Average American, can get involved in this quirky newfangled hobby. But how?

How to Tell Whether You're Being Hugged or Stabbed

Hamilton Nolan · 01/30/12 10:02AM

To the Windy City, where a man's painful dilemma may redeem itself by serving as a teaching experience for us all. The Chicago Tribune reports the harrowing nightmare of friendship gone awry: "A 24-year-old man is hospitalized after being stabbed outside of a Wrigleyville dance bar early this morning by a man who seemingly was about to give the victim a hug."

How to Win the Class War

Hamilton Nolan · 01/12/12 02:00PM

America has entered a bold new era of internal mistrust: a new Pew survey officially shows that class conflict has surpassed both racial conflict and immigrant-native conflict as "the greatest source of tension in American society." Well—are you just going to stand there and let them get away with that?

How to Stop Smoking For Real

Hamilton Nolan · 01/10/12 11:58AM

Just as you suspected, nicotine gum and nicotine patches are a crock, a sham, a mockery, a sucker's bet, a shuck and jive, a switcheroo, and a false hope. They do not work. A new study confirms that they are for shit, unless your goal is to make the inside of your lip taste like a Kool soaked in Listerine. Want to really stop smoking? We have done it. More or less. Here's how.

How to Talk to Real Live Women

Hamilton Nolan · 01/06/12 01:06PM

We know how it is. You were raised completely by the internet, your entire personality is an online creation, and though you're suave on IM, the prospect of chatting up a girl in person is a strange and terrifying prospect. Some of you have been reduced to paying hundreds of dollars to professional wingpersons to help you approach women in public. Fret not, lovelorn computer aliens. Help is here.

How to Wrap the Perfect Present

Brian Moylan · 12/19/11 04:00PM

Right now everyone is scurrying around and throwing elbows trying to get their last minute Christmas shopping done at an overcrowded mall. But what happens when you get all your gifts home? You have to make sure the packages look just as good as what's inside. Here are some simple tricks to wrap the perfect present.

10 Tips to Survive Your Office Holiday Party

Brian Moylan · 12/05/11 05:10PM

Sure, lots of people are cutting back and not throwing extravagant bashes for Christmas and those other winter events this year, but almost every company is going to have some sort of Holiday Party. Here are some rules to get you through yours and not get you fired.

Comment of the Day: A Wall Street Comparison You Can Set Your Watch To

Leah Beckmann · 11/30/11 06:45PM

Today we learned that poor Morgan Stanley has, for the first time in its rich and miserable little life, become the big girl at prom that nobody wants to dance with. As far as recruiting goes, Wall Street has been relegated to a deep dark corner of the uncool-niverse. It has become your Teva sporting, fanny pack wearing, fart joke making dad. And none of the pretty Yalies want to hang! What other comparisons can we make here? One commenter knows:

How Can We Make Wall Street Recruiting 'Cool' Again?

Hamilton Nolan · 11/30/11 03:10PM

Add this to the list of Wall Street's problems: kids these days don't think banks are "cool" any more, for some reason. (Kids. You know?) The NYT says that even Yale kids are protesting when Morgan Stanley comes to campus to recruit their peers who know how to pick out a decent suit, which is probably... the best thing Yalies have ever done.

How to Be a High-Powered Literary Agent, by a Crazy Person

Hamilton Nolan · 11/28/11 03:31PM

Earlier today, our office receptionist got a call from a secretive man demanding my phone number, though he wouldn't say why. (She thought he sounded angry, though perhaps he was just excited.) He settled for my email address, and sent the following message:

Your New York City Subway Survival Guide

Hamilton Nolan · 11/15/11 03:43PM

In its infinite wisdom, the New York City Transit system has decided to stop shutting down the subways for repairs every weekend, and start shutting down the subways for repairs every weeknight. How will this affect you, the straphanger, and the "new breed" of trained subway thieves that prowl the trains to prey on you? Allow us to help you make sense of the new, improved New York Subway system.