A woman looking at her grocery bill.
What’s the average family of four spending on groceries these days?
How much do you spend compared to the average American?
By Tod Perry
For many, the biggest pain point in American life since the COVID-19 pandemic has been the rising cost of everyday necessities: rent, gas, and groceries. There’s been a perfect storm of government spending, tariffs, wars, labor disruptions, and supply-chain problems that have made costs rise with no end in sight.
It’s easy for the average American to look at their bank balance just a week after payday and wonder where all the money went and whether everyone else is feeling the same budget crunch. It’s normal to question whether you are overpaying for groceries or doing what’s necessary to get by.
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Mark Twain shared his advice on critical thinking.
Mark Twain’s timeless advice on how to become a critical thinker is still wise over 100 years later
Twain explained the simple way to improve critical thinking.
Mark Twain is one of the most celebrated authors in American history. Throughout his long career as a writer and lecturer, he instilled his wisdom about life to others through masterpieces (such as The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer) and journal entries alike.
Twain, born Samuel Langhorne Clemens in 1835, consistently put down thoughts and ideas to paper that continue to inspire people today, decades after his death in 1910. His quotes encourage people to steep and mull ideas over in their minds, a skill necessary for critical thinking.
Twain’s works challenged readers to become critical thinkers, and one famous Mark Twain quote on critical thinking remains particularly relevant.
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Not him wearing his Penn State sweater too.😭
Linh Mai was born on Feb. 2 — the first Asian elephant calf at Smithsonian's National Zoo in nearly 25 years. To celebrate her public debut today, April 22, the National Zoo is giving away a one-of-a-kind painting created by her parents: Spike and Nhi Linh. Titled “Our Growing Herd,” this vibrant 16-by-20-inch canvas was created in January 2026 with non-toxic paint as part of the Zoo's elephant enrichment program.
A painting of a woman waking up.
Humans used to have a ‘first sleep’ and ‘second sleep’ at night. Here’s why that changed.
People relished having an extra two hours in the middle of the night to do chores, pray, or hang out with their loved ones.
By Tod Perry
One of the unquestioned pieces of health advice we’ve heard for decades is to get eight hours of sleep every night, with the assumption that it should be as close to consecutive as possible. However, a fascinating discovery by historian Roger Ekirch in the early 1990s found that, as far back as recorded history and up until the Industrial Revolution, human beings slept in two distinct phases every night: “first sleep” and “second sleep.”
The wild thing about Ekirch’s study was that the evidence of biphasic sleep was staring us in the face the whole time; we just turned and looked the other way. Ekirch was researching a book on human nighttime behavior when he came across a 1697 legal document in a London record office. In a deposition by a nine-year-old girl, she revealed that her mother left the house after “first sleep” and was later found dead.
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