Health Consumer

Living

Real stories from New Zealanders getting more from retirement.

A lounge corner crowded with healthy houseplants around a sofa, with a large window thrown open to the light

Can houseplants really clean the air? What the NASA study actually found

The claim on every plant-shop chalkboard traces back to one 1989 NASA experiment. The experiment was real. The lounge-room conclusion is not.

2 min read

A steamy bathroom with a relaxed silhouette behind fogged shower glass, a towel on the rail and a frosty winter window

Why the long hot shower leaves winter skin itchy

Hot water is a better solvent than warm water. That is good news for dishes and bad news for the oils holding your skin together.

2 min read

An older man rising from an armchair to stretch in a television-lit living room, with a warm kitchen doorway behind

Stand up for the ad break

The problem is not sitting. It is sitting in one unbroken block. Television already provides the timer.

2 min read

A woman at a kitchen table in afternoon light with a flat white whose long shadow stretches toward the night-blue edge of the frame and a crescent moon

The two o'clock cuppa: how long caffeine really stays with you

A flat white at two in the afternoon is still a quarter of a flat white at midnight. The arithmetic of caffeine's half-life explains a lot of shallow nights.

2 min read

A hot water bottle in a knitted cover resting on an older person's lap beside a cup of tea, with a frosted window behind

Hot water bottles and wheat bags: what warmth is actually doing

The oldest comfort technology in the house has real physiology behind it, and a few safety rules that matter more as skin gets older.

2 min read

View down a warm lamplit hallway to a dim cool blue bedroom with a thick duvet and a window open a crack to the night

Warm house, cool bedroom: the eighteen-degree rule

To fall asleep, the body needs to shed heat. A bedroom kept as warm as the lounge blocks the exit.

2 min read

An open sash window on a winter morning, net curtain stirring, condensation on the lower pane and kettle steam drifting through the warm kitchen behind

The ten-minute airing: why New Zealand homes need to breathe in winter

A household of four puts litres of water into its own air every day. Where that moisture ends up depends on a ten-minute habit that costs nothing.

2 min read