Now, as of Wednesday, thousands of people are willingly admitting to having crushes on a variety of cartoon characters, half of which are animals, and some that are Pokemon. She was wrong about one thing: It clearly wasn’t a stupid question. In the day or so since she hit send, thousands of people have answered it, and their responses are revealing, to say the least. Lots of people had crushes on characters whose animators, in the Betty Boop tradition, took advantage of the flexibility of the medium to draw imagined bodies that are literally impossibly attractive....

According to Reuters, the timeline on when experts are expecting the Pfizer vaccinations will be available for kids can be relatively soon. “The timeline is based on the expectation that Pfizer, which developed the shot with Germany’s BioNTech, will have enough data from clinical trials to seek emergency use authorization (EUA) for that age group from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) towards the end of this month, the sources said....

Prenatal genetic testing can also give parents and doctors a heads up. Having the information in advance that a baby has a 25 percent chance of developing Cystic fibrosis, allows doctors to test for it as part of the baby’s newborn screening. With Cystic fibrosis, early identification and treatment are key to controlling many of the symptoms, enabling children to live longer, healthier lives. Essentially, genetic testing during pregnancy gives you more information about medical decisions you may have to make in the future....

Most parents aren’t going to spring for a professional potty-trainer. To justify the spend you have to be — among other things — wealthy. But many people have money and many of those moneyed people are looking for a way to fast-forward through a messy, difficult process. Samantha Allen, who incorporated NYC Potty Training in June 2014, offers exactly that. Allen says that her client list has grown steadily despite the fact that she charges between $3000 and $3300 for two-day consulting and advising stints and hundreds for text sessions....

What is the Quadrantid meteor shower? Quadrantid meteor showers happen each year, and while it might not be as well-known as other meteor showers, it’s still something to mark on the calendar and catch – if you can. These meteor showers aren’t as noticeable in the sky as something like the Orionids; however, they can produce fireballs with glowing trails that shoot across the sky. The Quadrantid meteor shower happens when debris from an object – like an asteroid or a dead comet – gets close to the Earth....

But, beyond the fact that Raffi’s music is just good, Raffi himself is also legitimately a super ethical musician. Here’s one amazing example: Raffi has specifically avoided playing big venues. Why? Well, in the fourth Fatherly’s podcast Finding Raffi, he reveals why he turned down playing big arenas like Madison Square Garden. Speaking on the podcast, Raffi mentions that he rejected playing MSG because he didn’t want to make his fans suffer....

According the U.S. Census Bureau, 5.4 percent of households in the United States reported homeschooling their kids between April 23 through May 5 of 2020. But by September 30 to October 12, that number had risen all the way to 11.1 percent. On the one hand, this rise in homeschooling seems pretty obvious due to the pandemic. After all, the majority of schooling was done at-home anyway, so it makes sense that more parents would opt to homeschool their kids rather than have them endure the many headaches that come with remote learning....

Deciding to bring up “that friend” to your wife — the one who, say, ignores you, is mean to you, or does what you perceive to be weird and shady things — is no easy decision. For one, you just might be misreading the situation. For another, your wife might feel offended and such conversations are never easy. This is to say that, there are some things to ask yourself before you even bring it up as well as things to do in the moment that will make the interaction much easier....

— I remember reading Gary Paulsen’s Hatchet for the first time in 1992. I was 11 and Hatchet, which was a Newbery Medal honoree in 1988, was five. The book was a global phenomenon on the verge of classic status. I was not, but I knew a good thing when I read one. I carried it around for weeks. Cracking it again decades later, I was struck by my own sentimentality about the novel....

The news isn’t completely out of nowhere. Many of the features in the iPod Touch are currently available on our iPhones – including music – so most of our music listening can seamlessly transition there. But there was something handy, and elegant about having an iPod when we needed just our music. The iPod is smaller and lighter, plus a whole lot cheaper than our iPhone. It will be hard to say “goodbye” to the perfect workout tool....

The following list is by no means a complete discography of Lanegan and his various projects, but we do think these albums represent an essential primer to his brilliance. Screaming Trees: Dust Pearl Jam, eat your heart out. This album is a classic for a reason. Mark Lanegan: Whiskey for the Holy Ghost This album is exactly what the title sounds like, and exactly the kind of album to honor Lanegan’s passing....

Back in 2018, Fatherly spoke to Taylor at length about the creation of his multimedia character Gustafer Yellowgold, and why aspects of that project were (and were not) similar to Harry Nilsson’s The Point. For Taylor, the key wasn’t to make a “concept album” that just happened to be appropriate for kids but to actually make music that was for kids. “There’s no musical difference between what Nilsson is doing on The Point and what he’s doing on any of his other records,” Taylor joked....

According to Hello!, a 6-year-old girl wanted to celebrate her birthday in style. So she asked her mom to send a birthday invitation to 9-year-old Prince George. Of course, the mom probably knew there was no way the young royal would be able to attend. But the birthday girl’s mom was still surprised to receive a response from Prince William and Kate. Surprised, the mom of the anonymous birthday girl shared the Cambridges’ response to the birthday invite on Twitter....

But lately, mornings have become heavier, weighted by the worry of school shootings. Our beloved home of Nashville isn’t all that far from the most recent tragedy. Now, as I drop my kids off, I’m filled with sadness, empathy, fear, and anxiety. The morning goodbye from the car line has taken on a different meaning. My kids are young. Fox is almost 4 years old and Rona, almost 20 months....

“A lot of the younger guys just enjoy happy hour a little too much,” Brahmbhatt says. He suspects that, although women often get a reputation for having overactive bladders, men likely experience as many issues but tend to underreport symptoms. Still, most men don’t appreciate wake-up calls from their bladders. If you’re one of them, here are six ways to stop peeing so much at night. Stop Drinking Liquids Three Hours Before Bed When you drink liquids three hours before bedtime, your kidneys are going to start filtering that while you sleep, creating more urine, and eventually compelling you to pee....

Parents of kids under 18 will receive anywhere from $3,000 to $3,600 per child for the duration of the program, breaking out into monthly installments, with one half given out monthly and the other half at tax time, starting in July.But one question that remains about the program is how single parents who share custody are supposed to deal with the credit. Can parents who share custody each claim the tax credit?...

Battle Bars Newcomer Battle Bars was inspired by the eating habits of military guys stationed in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria. While deployed, founder Ian Sparks noticed he and his men would chow down on protein bars, which both didn’t taste great and were packed with ingredients only a chemist could decipher. His company’s offerings, including the debut flavor of Blueberry Blue Falcon (Navy shorthand for a particularly bad kind of serviceman) and subsequent releases, are comprised of easy-to-pronounce components like whey protein, coconut, real blueberries, and more....

Although the sketch mostly focuses on people who are seemingly childless, trying to explain to their parents why they can’t come home for the holidays, the spirit applies to all of us. Our parents, and aunts, uncles and cousins will not, and should not, make us feel weird about not wanting to travel during a huge surge in COVID cases. And yet, it does feel like affection and love is being held hostage in some families if you don’t break with what Anthony Fauci is telling us to do: Don’t travel for the holidays!...

This summer, my three-year-old daughter and I were exploring downtown Asbury Park, NJ late on a hot August afternoon. We were outside a bar when her voice rang out electrified with panic. “Potty, daddy! Potty!” We slipped inside to use the bathroom and discovered that the bar was empty and pleasantly air-conditioned. We went from bathroom to the bar, where I had a crisp, ice-cold lager and she had a club soda which she, like always, called “bubble water....

Much will be written about the impressive way in which the various actors (specifically Robert De Niro) have been de-aged for various time periods with the use of really top-notch CGI technology. And while it is true that this stuff is very cool, it’s also not why the movie is worth watching. True, the special effects do allow us to hop-skip-and-jump through time kind of like a mobster version of Vonnegut’s great novel Slaughterhouse-Five, but it’s mostly the fluidness of the writing and the confidence of the filmmaking that carries you through....