Month: April 2019

April 02, 2019 at 12:46PM by CWC After a particularly grueling sweat sesh (looking at you, SLT), you’re pretty much guaranteed to wake up the next morning with sore muscles. And, if I’m being honest, I kind of like that feeling, because it’s how I know whatever workout I did was actually working. Instead, though, you may be dealing with inflamed muscles, which is technically something different than sore ones. They tend to happen post-workout or after repetitive use,  and are an important part of the muscle building process. “Muscle tissue breaks down and ‘microtears’ in the muscle occur, and this is part of the rebuilding process and how muscles become stronger,” explains Austin Martinez, director of education for StretchLab. “These ‘microtears’ create an inflammatory process that is actually needed and beneficial.” However, inflammation can also occur due to injury, which is decidedly not beneficial to getting stronger. “This occurs because the above outlined process becomes ineffective,” says Martinez. “When the muscle breakdown process outpaces the muscle rebuilding process, then injury occurs.” Soreness, on the other hand, is more common and is usually correlated with post-workout. “Common signs are muscle fatigue, tenderness, and lack of mobility,” says Martinez. “Soreness is beneficial and part of the muscle rebuilding process. Inflammation pertaining to injury is different, and you will notice increased pain, redness, and potentially swelling.” The more you use certain muscles in your daily activities, the more likely they are to become inflamed. “Smaller muscles in the shoulder, such as a the

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April 02, 2019 at 11:06AM by CWC Despite mastering makeup and skin-care tricks heralded by pros around the Internet, I’ve never managed to figure out how to fix my own hair. When I attempt a blow dry, I wind up with a frazzled, frizzy mess that frankly isn’t for public consumption. But at the hands of an actual stylist, my hair’s shiny, with nothing more than the help of a few styling products and some hot air. Since I sadly don’t have unlimited funds to spend at DryBar, but still want to look like a healthy-haired pony on a regular basis, I decided it was time to learn how to blow dry my own hair. Before you laugh (because, yes, even I’ll admit it’s kind of ridiculous), just think about how much time and money, one (ahem: me) might save by mastering a professional-level blowout. So for the sake of my mission, I hit up the new IGK Salon in Soho to take a blowdrying lesson. No, this is not an actual class that they offer, but rather the case of me begging Aaron Grenia, the salon’s founder, to teach me his magician-like ways. After nearly two hours together and a few burnt fingers on my part, I felt like a true blow dry pro. Here’s what I learned. Steal these blowdrying secrets from the pro 1. It actually begins with the towel dry: Before you actually blow dry your hair, you need to get the excess moisture out of your

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April 02, 2019 at 10:15AM by CWC If your finger is currently hovering over the “send” button while you frantically proofread your latest work correspondence, get ready for an announcement you didn’t know you’ve been waiting for. Gmail is rolling out a new feature that’ll allow you to (wait for it) schedule emails for a later date and time without needing to use a third-party app, like Boomerang. And as someone who struggles with email anxiety, this feels like the first time the service is finally doing me a solid. (The platform turns 15 years old this month, and it spent 10 of those years low-key ruining my life.) In 2009, I was informed that MGAnimePrincess, my AOL screen name, was maybe an unprofessional moniker to appear on college applications. But once I traded it in for a more poised (and more lackluster) address, email was never the same. No longer would I delight in the chime of “You’ve got mail,” promising kind correspondence from some long-distance friend or chain mail appealing to true love or death (no middle ground), because with Gmail, things were all business, all the time. Enter my email anxiety: After college applications gave way to job applications, Gmail became increasingly overwhelming. Composing the a message to, say, a prospective employer is scary in its own right, but hitting send? Forget about it. It’s straight-up terrifying because there’s no going back. So I often engaged in a procrastination-bolstering tango with the send button, which usually went

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April 02, 2019 at 08:27AM by CWC Buying anything with a “dry clean only” label on it is basically my worst nightmare. As someone who’s pretty low-maintenance (and—don’t @ me—rarely separates whites and colors in the wash), you can probably imagine the last thing I want to do is take something to the dry cleaners. No thank you. But lucky for me and anyone else who likes to keep their laundry day simple, that rule doesn’t necessarily have to be followed 100 percent of the time. While you’ll probably always get the best results following your garment’s label to a T, there are exceptions. Brian Sansoni of The American Cleaning Institute told Real Simple that while velvet, silk, and leather always require a trip to the dry cleaner because they don’t hold up in the rough washing machine cycle—or water in general—there are some items you can hand-wash instead. “Nylon, polyester, and spandex hold up well to delicate cycles or hand-washing, in water slightly above room temperature,” he says. “Nylon, polyester, and spandex hold up well to delicate cycles or hand-washing, in water slightly above room temperature.” —Brian Sansoni of The American Cleaning Institute And if you want to cut down on hand-washing as much as possible, there’s another hack you can use to keep your dry-clean-only items looking good as new. “You can also find in-dryer kits, like Dryel, that help freshen a wide variety of dry-clean-only garments,” Sansoni says. “They eliminate odors, including perspiration and stale tobacco smells, and

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April 02, 2019 at 08:19AM by CWC The battle of the grocery stores is on. When it comes to low prices on all your refrigerator and pantry staples, Trader Joe’s is usually the best place to find them. You can fill your cart with fresh produce, freezer essentials, and even beauty products and still easily stick to your budget. While Whole Foods hasn’t exactly been able to compete in the past, a major drop in prices is showing a rivalry could be just beginning. Starting tomorrow, you can expect to see the grocer drop prices on hundreds of its products. According to a press release, it’s Amazon’s and Whole Foods’ biggest investment in lowering prices yet since the online giant bought the organic grocery in June 2017. Not only will there be lower prices on fresh produce, but there will also be double the number of Prime member deals available, like an additional 10 percent off hundreds of sale items throughout the store. “When Whole Foods Market joined the Amazon family, we set out to make healthy and organic food more accessible,” Jeff Wilke, CEO of Amazon Worldwide Consumer, said in the release. The grocer says prices will be cut by an average of 20 percent on select items—mostly the “high-quality, peak-of-season produce,” including large yellow mangoes for $1 each, organic bunched rainbow chard for $1.99 each, and mixed-medley cherry tomatoes at $3.49 for 12 ounces. And throughout the next few months, you’ll see 300 Prime member deals available on

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