At the beginning of 2017, the New England Patriots completed a historic comeback against the Atlanta Falcons. As the sports media world exploded with every reaction and hot take possible following the Falcons’ collapse, one voice was glaringly missing. At the time, Katie Nolan was the host of Garbage Time with Katie Nolan, a late night sports and culture show on Fox Sports 1. Over the approximately two years that she hosted the show, the New England-born personality did not necessarily have great ratings but had become a loud enough voice that the show won a Sports Emmy in 2016.

Even though her hometown New England Patriots had won the Super Bowl in dramatic fashion and she likely had plenty to say on the matter, Garbage Time disappeared from the Fox Sports 1 lineup. Fox eventually announced that her show would be reworked. However, Nolan sat idly waiting to get back to work. Following seven months without working, Nolan left Fox for ESPN. Fans of Katie were excited to have her back in the fold, but many were confused as to why it took so long to get her back on the air.

In a recent episode of Richard Deitsch’s Sports Illustrated Media Podcast, Nolan opened up about her departure from Fox and her subsequent jump to the worldwide leader.

Fox was dealing with the dismissal of Fox Sports President Jamie Horowitz at the time Nolan was trying to get back to work. She explained why she left to Deitsch.

“I’m starting to get really disoriented about who I was, what mattered, if I was worth it, if I was ever going to work again. It started to get really irrationally dark for me for a while. So I talked to (Eric) Shanks and said, ‘You’ve got a lot on your plate obviously, you’re doing the jobs of multiple people now, given what happened, and I know I’m not going to be your top priority, and I understand that, but you have to let me go. I just have to get back to work.’ And he wasn’t like, ‘Go ahead, bye,’ he was like, ‘We would love to keep you, and I don’t want to let you go, but I hear you, I understand you, and if what you’re saying is that this is really what you want, then we’ll let you go.’ It was really, really tough. It was probably one of the toughest conversations that I’ve had, but to be honest I was pretty proud of myself that I had the guts.”

From paperclips to chopsticks, anything can come in handy when you need to find a solution to annoying daily little problems. All it takes is a little out-of-the-box thinking and some imagination to come up with the right trick.

Cats can be nice and fluffy creatures. With that being said, cats have a certain penchant for destroying innocent plants. Sometimes, no matter what you do, they’ll just sneak past your line of defense and raise havoc. To prevent the premature destruction of your favorite pots, just stick toothpicks in the soil surrounding the plant.

With so many electronic devices plugged in, it’s no wonder that your already over-cluttered writing desk looks like NASA’s control room. But luckily, a simple stationery item might just save your workspace from becoming a total disaster. We’re pretty certain, by the way, that even NASA scientists have yet to figure this one out on their own.

Just use a binder clip to run your cables through it. What’s even better is that you can attach it to almost anything: — from your pen holder to your three-tier letter organizer.

Ever wondered where all those bobby pins go? Every girl knows that she needs to stock up on these because they get lost easily, somewhere in the void. This essential item is surely the one thing no woman can go without (unless a messy hairy is a non-issue).

These precious little bad-hair-day-savers, however, tend to go off wandering on their own. To avoid it, just stick a magnet to the inner part of your drawer. The magnet will magically (it’s called physics) attract all the bobby pins to it.

If you’re a food connoisseur or just a budding chef, you better skip this tip (there will be no more caveats from this point on, you’ve been kindly forewarned). For the rest of us, the frozen meals heaters, we offer this useful (and tasty!) cooking tip that works best with breaded items.

After you defrost nuggets or bread in the microwave, move it to the toaster for a quick finish. This would give it a nice crunchy taste. Now, has anyone seen the ketchup bottle?

Music buffs or even just anyone who can’t do without their earphones might easily identify with this problem — how to tell which earphone goes into what ear? Every time you get yourself organized before leaving the house you spend an additional five minutes figuring out which one is left and which one is right.

There’s no simple way to solve this one, oh wait, there actually is. Normally, earphones are painted the same color. How about simply switching one rubber bud with a different color?

Forks are perhaps the most underrated utensil (as you shall come to see further down this article, so stay tuned for more). Imagine this — you’re about to have a really important zoom meeting but alas, you have nothing to use to adjust the angle of your laptop.

No panic! We have a solution just for you. Take two forks and place them under your laptop. Now, you can sit comfortably without worrying about looking weird, unless you forgot to comb your hair. Quick! To the bathroom!

Part of being a responsible adult is to buy your own groceries, which often involves going to the supermarket and ferrying them back to your apartment — by train, bus, hot air balloon, or another means of transportation. We’re kidding, of course, but buses are definitely part of that voyage for some people.

Since groceries can be heavy, and you only got one pair of hands, this can be a really tiresome task. Just use a strap from an old satchel. Fasten it on both sides of the grocery bag and voilà!

Almost any phone user has encountered this problem. You plug the charger in but the cable is too short, leaving your phone hanging between the floor and the ceiling — as if it’s literally hanging by a thread. Well, the obvious solution (duh!) is to use a longer cable.

But, for those of you who are unwilling to spend additional money (that’s totally understandable, iPhone cables are super expensive!), just use a hair tie. Put it around your phone and charger, securing them both in place.

Got a really important meeting but you just realized that you never bothered to get yourself an iron? We get it — you got used to the fact that your mom irons your collared shirts. Well, we recommend that you do it yourself from now on, especially if you are an adult.

But, anyway, we have something that could help get rid of those creases if you don’t have an iron on hand. And in case you’re worried, no starching is involved. Boil water in a pot (preferably, with a handle) and slide the pot over your shirt just as you would an iron.

We mentioned groceries earlier. Now, it’s time for you to learn what you need to do to get them in case you have no spare change to unhook a shopping cart. So, you made it all the way to the supermarket (hurray!) only to find out that you have no spare coins to take a shopping cart.

Instead of standing there gawking, rummage through your pockets. What is this? Oh, the keys to your home. Use the round side of the key instead of a coin — and don’t forget the milk!

While we absolutely don’t recommend transporting any sort of liquids using your car (this could end badly). But if you really have to, there’s a proper way of doing it. Let’s pretend that you thought it would be a good idea to bring chicken soup, or any kind of soup for that matter, to family dinner.

Just taking a pot full of soup in your backseat may not be the brightest idea. Tying rubber bands around its handles and lid, crosswise, ensures that the soup will actually stay in the pot.

Earlier we explained how binder clips helped save one of NASA’s shuttle launches (not really!), but binder clips (definitely our most favorite stationery item) can do a lot more than just that. If you are the type of person who likes to use things to their last, you’re going to like this life hack.

Use a binder clip to clamp out the remaining toothpaste. Instead of trying to use all your might to force that toothpaste out of the tube, just let the binder clip do all the work.

Let’s be honest — those who go to Asian restaurants tend to sneak out a pair or two of disposable chopsticks. While we won’t ask you to declare to the customs officers how many of those you have illegally smuggled out of restaurants, we might suggest what else you can do with them — other than eating homemade Pad Thai.

In case your steel door latch just broke down (bear with us), you can just stick in a pair of chopsticks. Yeah, that should keep burglars away, or just your kids.

A peanut butter sandwich always sounds like a good idea, especially when it comes with jelly! Getting that butter out of the jar, however, is less fun. That stubborn creamy paste never comes out easily.

This is extremely true if most of it is concentrated at the bottom because scooping it out is a real mess. The solution is quite simple, when you buy a new jar of peanut butter, just flick it over and store it upside down. This would cause the oil to separate from the peanut butter itself.

Getting out a splinter that is stuck under your skin can be an extremely painful experience, especially if the area around it is swollen. Doctors normally would recommend using tweezers or a needle to get the splinter out.

This procedure would obviously hurt but it will get the job done. However, there’s another way. We haven’t tried it ourselves (we tend to stay away from coarse surfaces), but wrap a banana peel around the area and give it a day or two. The splinter will come out… maybe.

So you have decided to repaint all the rooms in your house, or even just some of them. While you are debating between deep violet red, dandelion yellow, or just white, we recommend that you give a little thought as to what you are going to do about all those paint-stained clothes.

Some paints can be pretty stubborn and no washing machine is up for the task (at least the ones we are familiar with). Make sure you mix some white vinegar with water and rub it on the clothes before throwing them in the wash.

While mayonnaise has a place of honor in the Russian cuisine (but much less so in the American), this weird white condiment also has other uses — non-culinary uses, that is. Surprisingly enough, most Americans don’t actually like consuming mayonnaise. We can relate.

After all, mayonnaise is an… acquired taste, so to say. So, if you’re not going to eat it, just know that it can be used to remove water and heat stains from wooden surfaces. Just gloss some mayo over the stain and it’s going to be good as (almost) new.

Remember those kindergarten days, when you used crayons to draw on almost any surface and get your mommy really angry? You’d be surprised to know that crayons have other uses too, other than drawing on the walls of your living room.

In case there’s a power shortage and you’re stuck at home without electricity, and you have no candles, you can light up a few crayons. Yes — you read that correctly. Just light the tip of the crayon and you’ve got yourself a burning candle.

Ginger is mostly associated with Christmas time (at least in our world), but it could be associated with some recommended home remedies. You know, the kind your grandmother has been secreting for years and using it from time to time whenever you get sick.

The downside? If you cut a fresh piece of ginger root and put it in your mouth, you are likely not to enjoy its acrid taste. Luckily, there’s nothing that white sugar can’t fix — candied ginger is as good as a fresh one.

Apparently, we have all been using earphones wrong. And no, this isn’t just about happily sticking them in your ears and hitting that play button, blasting Rihanna at full volume (we admit, though, that it is really fun).

In case you’re using non-wireless earphones, you may just want to put the earphone cables behind your ear. This will prevent them from dangling around or falling out when you’re jogging in the park. The alternative of course is to use wireless headphones.

While most of us rarely need to sew our clothes, there are some who still do it. In fact, mending socks is still a common thing to do. Why bother throwing them away if you can just patch up that little hole?

Although it has been ages since we participated in embroidery lessons (do kids these days still have them?), we still have a few tricks up our sleeve (a patched one). Passing a thread through the eye of the needle is hard. So, just rub the needle against the thread.

Studying for finals is not a fun experience — unless you’re some sort of a genius. Since most of us are not, however, we often have to find crazy and weird ways to improve our chances of passing these grueling exams.

In fact, there’s an easy way to harness all that brainpower so it’s easier for you to remember the material. Use scented erasers when studying for your tests. The human brain closely associates smells with memories. Smelling mathematical equations is easier than solving them, no?

Ever since the invention of sellotape, people have struggled with finding its sticky end when they need to use it again. For some miraculous reason, the tip of the tape always seems to melt back into the roll itself.

While there’s no scientific explanation to this problem, there’s something that we can do to help those who are in distress. Placing a simple paperclip on the sticky end will ensure that you’ll never lose sight of the tip again!

We bet you never thought to use a pair of pliers in place of a corkscrew or bottle opener, huh? Well, thanks to us, you now have another use for this tool!

Sure — we recommend making your life as easy as possible and just buying yourself a bottle opener. But in case you ever find yourself without a corkscrew, just stick a screw or a nail into the cork and use a pair of pliers to pull the cork out. Drink up!

You can get burns from almost anything, but mostly from heat and chemical sources. You wouldn’t imagine, however, that your hands might get severely irritated and have a burning sensation if you cut a large amount of jalapeno peppers.

While we like ours pickled or just as a pizza topping, someone still needs to cut them. So, if you aren’t using disposable gloves when dealing with that n(t)asty pepper, you better rinse them in olive oil (or any cooking oil) after you are done chopping them.

There’s nothing like the iconic cylindrical package of Pringles potato-based crisps to improve any house party. What’s even better is that they come in several different flavors. We personally prefer sour cream and onion.

Their only downside (apart from containing large amounts of salt and trans fats) is that they are extremely fragile. So, the next time you are trying to pry them out, fold a piece of paper and push it between the crisps and the container. Now, slide the paper out nice and slowly. Let’s get this party started!

Vinegar, which was previously featured in this article, is definitely a multipurpose liquid. Earlier, we suggested using it to remove paint stains from your clothes. But this magical liquid can do so much more than just remove stubborn paint stains.

We don’t know how it works exactly (we have a vague idea), but it certainly works like magic. If you want your faucet to be shiny again, fill a plastic bag with vinegar and water, wrap it around the showerhead or faucet, and leave it overnight. It will shine like a diamond.

We’ve already praised forks a few times throughout this article. It’s time we say a few nice things about spoons, too. Just like their three-pronged counterparts, spoons can come to the rescue in certain situations.

Ever tried opening a well-sealed jar? Some suggest using a towel or tapping on the lid to relieve some of the pressure inside. There’s a much simpler way of doing it and all you need is a regular tablespoon. Just put the tip of the spoon under the lid and lift, releasing some of the air inside.

It seems like knowing how to fold sheets is something that mothers simply know how to do. We assume that they are taught how to fold bedsheets in the Mom Academy (there has to be a place like that, no?).

We also believe that the trick should be taught to singles, too. Just put each of your hands inside the opposite edges of the sheets, fold corner to corner, and voilà!

Going on a trip is real fun, especially when you bring food along and you’re not the one who has to carry the cooler. The annoying downside of bringing a cooler (apart from having to carry it) is that you need to put something in it to make sure the food stays refrigerated.

Regular ice packs may sound like the go-to solution, but they usually drip tons of water as they melt. Instead, we offer you a hassle-free solution — a frozen saturated sponge in a plastic container bag.

Socks have a known reputation for disappearing while doing laundry. You were certain that you had put two pairs of socks in the hamper but only one came back. The sock has just disappeared into the void. So, what should you do with that other single sock?

Instead of throwing it away, we have a mind-blowing solution. Put that spare sock on the end of your vacuum cleaner the next time you use it. This will help you find small objects that you’ve lost or misplaced, like earrings.

We’ve already lamented about the infinite amount of electrical cords that we all get tangled in at one point or another. And while we offered a solution for the cables that work for your desk, we seemed to have neglected those that are scattered between random drawers.

Instead of letting them slowly corrode, use an old shoebox and a bunch of toilet paper tubes to organize all your spare cables. Think of it as a hive, just without the bees and the honey. Just neatly rolled cables.

There’s no easy way to clean a keyboard. Keyboards have a tendency to accumulate dust, breadcrumbs, traces of your last dinner, and a whole lot of grime. What’s even more annoying is that, with all the recent technological advancements, we have yet to find an effective way to clean it (unless you count a keyboard vacuum cleaner).

If you’re not into spending extra dollars on expensive gadgets, use a sticky side of a sticky note to clean your keyboard. Just move it between the buttons.

Apparently, vinegar is not only an all-purpose cleaner that’s good for removing paint stains, but it can also make your life a lot easier when cooking eggs. We’ve all faced this annoying problem of trying to unpeel the shell from the egg after making hard-boiled eggs.

The result is often the same — you lose half the egg in the process. Just add a little vinegar while boiling the eggs. This is likely to cause the shell to separate more easily.

We’re not afraid to admit that we absolutely adore forks. They have countless other uses besides just being a utensil for your food. They’re actually quite useful in solving many first world problems (just read through some of the things we wrote here).

Forks can also be used to remove carpet dents. Place the prongs in the middle of the dent and just tweak it a little to separate the fibers. You can also put ice cubes on the dent before straightening it.

Moving to a new apartment is an exciting thing. The less exciting part about it, however, is having to pack all your stuff and transport it to your new place. Just imagine having to take all your clothes from the closet and folding each and every single item separately.

What a nightmare! Or you could just use garbage bags. Just put one around a stack of clothes and tie it up tightly. This is all about bagging and tagging. You got the idea.

So, you decided to stick a new picture or the latest employee of the month award on your bedroom wall, but then comes the hard part — hammering the nail. If you’re not really good with your hands, then there’s a good chance that you’re going to bash your fingers at least a couple of times in the process.

What you could do instead is use a clothespin to steady the nail while you are hitting it with that hammer.

Strawberries are delicious, no doubt. The annoying part is having to pluck their green stems before biting into them, unless you believe in literally following the whole natural approach to foods. In case you don’t, and you just want to enjoy your strawberries without any additional natural flavors, just push a straw through that berry.

Get it? It’s a straw-berry — meaning that you literally need to take a straw and use it to take out that stem before you can have your way with them.

Cars need synthetic oil so they can run smoothly. In fact, it’s recommended to change the car’s oil routinely to avoid unpleasant surprises while driving on the highway. You wouldn’t want to find yourself stuck in the middle of nowhere just because you forgot to change your oil.

If worse comes to worst and you find yourself in need of oil, make sure to keep a spare funnel or a screwdriver in the trunk of your car. Apparently, a screwdriver might be used as a funnel too!

Being someone who uses cosmetic products on a daily basis is hard, and it doesn’t matter if you’re a man or a woman. Having to carry various cosmetic products, mostly creams, in your bag can be a bit of a hassle. This is especially true when you’re traveling abroad and every ounce of your luggage counts.

Instead of carrying 10 different cosmetics bottles, just put the creams you need in the lens containers. You won’t even notice that they’re there, but they will certainly come in handy.

No matter how big your closet is, it will never have enough space to hold all your clothes, especially those that are in need of hanging. Instead of folding them, piling them up, or just donating them (and don’t get us wrong, we love donating stuff), use soda tabs.

Just put the tab on the bottom part of the hanger’s metal wire and pass the duck-shaped part of the next hanger through the other side of the tab. So, next time you buy a pack, make sure you keep those soda tabs.

Screws are not the only tools that can be used as a substitute for funnels (you might have started thinking that actual funnels are rare). Truth is, most people are just lazy and don’t bother going to the nearest hardware store to get a proper funnel.

For those people exactly, we are offering the following tip. Use a dustpan instead of a funnel when you need to fill up a large bucket with water. Place the pan under the faucet, with the handle facing outwards towards the bucket. Turn the water on and get filling!

Some recipes tend to be very specific about which part of the egg you need to use when preparing a dish. An egg is an egg in our eyes — and aren’t you supposed to use all of it anyway?

In any case, if you are really particular about how you cook your eggs, we suggest you use a bottle to suck out the yolk. This will leave you just with the white. This neat and hassle-free trick will help you perfectly cook what you need.

Trying to properly paint a room may not be as easy as you think. Sure — you just dip the brush in a little bit of paint and spread it all over the wall, leaving droplets of paint on the floor, on your clothes, and even on your face.

It gets the job done but leaves an (ugly) trail behind it. Want to avoid that? Just put a rubberband over that paint can and use it to wipe your brush before you start painting.

Since we’re in the cooking business already (just check out some of the previous stuff we wrote about in this article), we have another useful kitchen-related life hack. Onions don’t go down without a fight — that’s why we cry every time we cut them (they actually release chemicals that make you cry).

However, since onions are an essential part of many dishes, we suggest that you use a wet knife when cutting them. This won’t stop you from crying completely, but it will make your eyes a little drier.