NotebookLM is getting an upgrade this week

⚡️ 3-second tech genius: Quickly mute and unmute on Zoom by holding down the space bar.

🔌 Tame your cords: Got a mess of loose cables around your desk? Velcro cable ties are a quick fix to clean things up. Plus, they make those dangling cords way less tempting for nosy pets with a chewing habit. Bonus: They’re super cheap. Here’s a pack of 60 for $7. Sweet!

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Check your laptop battery: On Windows, get a detailed report that includes usage, capacity and battery life estimates. Open the command prompt by hitting the Start menu, then typing in cmd or cmd⁠.⁠exe in the Run command box. Press Enter. Now, smarty-pants, type or paste in the following: powercfg /batteryreport

Cmd + spacebar: This Mac shortcut opens Spotlight, an incredibly powerful tool for finding documents quickly, opening apps or searching the web right from your desktop.

🛍️ Get paid to shop: Apps like Fetch and Ibotta let you earn cash back and gift cards by snapping pics of your receipts. Use them at places like Amazon, Walmart and hundreds more.

Safe Wi-Fi anywhere: Using public Wi-Fi is risky no matter where you go. It doesn’t make a difference if you stay at a five-star luxury hotel, have lunch at your hometown diner or you’re at the airport. The easy way to protect yourself? Turn on a VPN.

🌙 Need a bedtime story for the kids? It’s tough to get creative at 8 p.m. when your brain’s fried from a long day. No worries, just use a chatbot to tell the tale. I like to include the child’s age, interests and a theme. For example: “Can you make up a bedtime story for a 5-year-old boy about a brave knight?” Voilà, no stress to impress.

⚡️3-second tech genius: Track a flight instantly by typing the flight number into Google (like Delta 123) to see the live status and arrival time.