Entertainment
Meet Our Team!
It’s not even April yet, but it’s already been a big year for Cup of Jo. This month, we welcomed Jannelle back from parental leave (and the WILD birth of her third baby!). And our wonderful long-time contributor, Kelsey Miller, has officially joined the team as a senior editor. We had a bittersweet farewell with Maureen after seven wonderful years with us, and our new partnerships director is none other than my friend, Alison Piepmeyer! Since we have a new team full of familiar faces, we’d love to come out from behind the scenes to introduce ourselves…
Joanna Goddard
Founder & Editor
A former magazine writer, I started Cup of Jo in 2007 as a weekend hobby but then developed it into a large-scale daily website, featuring a diverse array of writers and photographers. In 2023, I also launched Big Salad, our weekly newsletter about style, design, and relationships, which is the #1 fashion/beauty publication on Substack. I live in Brooklyn with my two chatty boys.
Go-to breakfast drink: Cinnamon tea made at home; or a walk with my neighborhood dad friend to get a coffee.
Childhood nickname: My dad still calls me Fofans, inspired by that “banana fana fo-fana” song. My siblings and cousins call me Jo. Now anytime someone else calls me “Jo,” I instantly feel close to them.
Favorite after-work activity: Hanging out with my two hilarious boys. The preteen/teen years have been my favorite so far. They can be moody, of course, but they also make me laugh and watch Derry Girls, share smart observations about life, and still want bedtime chats and cuddles.
Celebrity crush: Andy Samberg in Palm Springs. I’d gladly be stuck in a time loop.
Book that changed my life: When I read The Catcher in the Rye in high school, I saw Holden Caufield as a sexy bad boy. He grew up in Manhattan! He smoked! But when I reread it as a forty-something mom, my heart ached for the lost, lonely 16-year-old. I realized how much our perspectives can change, depending on our own lived experiences and life stages. I always try to keep that in mind.
Kelsey Miller
Senior Editor
Kelsey is a culture writer, and the author of three books, including her memoir, Big Girl, and the bestselling pop-culture history book, I’ll Be There For You. Her first novel, Old Money, was published in 2025. Among other things, she often writes about the impact of diet culture and the evolution of the body positive movement. She loves Polish cinema, weird history, and a long swim. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and daughter.
Go-to weekday breakfast: On a good day, jammy eggs and buttered sourdough toast. On a typical day, my daughter Margot’s leftovers.
Childhood nickname: Wunkin. My dad made it up when I was born — it’s a combination of “wunderkind” and “pumpkin” (I had jaundice!).
Favorite after-work activity: Once a week, a couple school-mom friends and I take our kids to Shake Shack for dinner. It’s a mid-week breather; everyone gets some social time, and no one has to do dinner when we get home.
Celebrity crush: Bowen Yang. I KNOW.
Book that changed my life: Holidays on Ice, by David Sedaris. Specifically, the essay, Santaland Diaries. My high-school English teacher had us read it aloud in class the day before winter break, and we were all in tears with laughter. We were astonished by how funny it was — it seemed impossible. It was one of the moments that showed me how powerful good writing can be.
Alison Piepmeyer
Partnerships Director
Alison has spent 20 years in marketing, working with brands and influencers, and running her social media agency. She and her family relocated from the West Coast to New York in 2021. She loves a good audiobook and will always say yes to hosting a bagel brunch. She lives with her husband Zach, son Linus, and daughter Georgie. (Also, remember her week of outfits and house tour?)
Go-to weekday breakfast: I love a bowl of Trader Joe’s goat yogurt, with muesli, chia seeds, and a handful of berries.
Childhood nickname: Ali
Favorite after-work activity: Watch crappy reality shows (like The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives!).
Celebrity crush: Michael B. Jordan. When he won his Oscar, I turned to my husband and said, ‘WOW, that man is attractive.’
Book that changed my life: I’m not usually a self-help girlie, but Mindset really got me. It shifted how I think about failure, criticism, and growth — and honestly, it’s helped me parent better than any actual parenting book I’ve read.
Christine Pride
Race Matters Columnist
Christine is a writer, editor and french fry enthusiast. She worked in publishing for 20 years before leaping to “the other side” to write novels. She’s written two with Jo Piazza: We Are Not Like Them, and You Were Always Mine. Her solo debut, All The Men I’ve Loved Again, was published in 2025. She also writes the newsletter, Book Forward. Christine lives in Harlem, New York.
Go-to weekday breakfast: I don’t eat breakfast! It’s not intentional; I just never get hungry until noon.
Childhood nickname: My family calls me Christie.
Favorite after-work activity: Watch all the TV. And I mean all of it.
Celebrity crush: Girl: Tracee Ellis Ross. Guy: Rege-Jean Page — he had me at Bridgerton.
Book that changed my life: My own first novel, We Are Not Like Them. It changed the course of my career and my whole life.
Jannelle Sanchez
Senior Editor
Jannelle has always loved talking to people and hearing their stories. After graduating with a journalism degree, she wrote on the marketing teams of various tech companies, before joining Cup of Jo in 2021. Jannelle lives in the Bay Area with her husband and three children.
Go-to weekday breakfast: Coffee (with a splash of half-and-half and a teaspoon of sugar!), and toast with butter and strawberry jam.
Childhood nickname: Growing up, my whole extended family called me Jannelley (Janelle-eee) — and still do to this day. Sometimes when a stranger reads my name aloud, they’ll pronounce it “Jannelley,” and I instantly feel like a four-year-old.
Favorite after-work activity: A week ago, my five-year-old daughter Ella and I planted some Cup of Sun seeds, and now we love watering the garden and seeing new sprouts pop up each day.
Celebrity crush: Jess Mariano from Gilmore Girls. He knows how to yearn and writes notes in the margins!
Book that changed my life: Little Women. It was the first classic book I read as a kid, and I return to it every few years. It’s taught me so much about girlhood, family, friendships, and love.
Kaitlyn Teer
Senior Newsletter Editor
Kaitlyn is the senior editor for Big Salad, where she interviews writers like Barbara Kingsolver, Catherine Newman, and Roxane Gay. Her essay collection, Little Apocalypses: Essays on Motherhood, Climate Change, and Hope at the End of the World debuts next month. She lives in Washington State with her husband and two kids.
Go-to weekday breakfast: Peanut butter toast — ideally freshly ground peanut butter, the gloppier the better.
Childhood nickname: I go by Kaitlyn professionally but nearly everyone who knows me outside of work calls me Kaity. Having said that, the Cup of Jo team typically refers to me by my initials, KT, which sound just like ‘Kaity.’ So, wherever I go, there I am!
Favorite after-work activity: I joke that I’m going to crush it in retirement because my favorite things to do are either outdoorsy adventures, like birding and mountain biking, or chill solo hobbies, like knitting and working on my vegetable garden.
Celebrity crush: Cillian Murphy, specifically when he’s doing press junkets. An interviewer once asked for his thoughts about the disappointed Cillian Murphy meme, and he said he didn’t know what a meme was.
Book that changed my life: Annie Dillard’s A Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. It’s a stunning example of how an ordinary place, like a neighborhood creek, comes alive when you approach it with curiosity and attention. Whenever I pick it up, I notice something different.
That’s our team! We’re all thrilled to be here with you. xoxo
P.S. 10 lessons I’ve learned in my career, and the best career advice I ever got.
Entertainment
NYT Pips hints, answers for March 25, 2026
Welcome to your guide to Pips, the latest game in the New York Times catalogue.
Released in August 2025, the Pips puts a unique spin on dominoes, creating a fun single-player experience that could become your next daily gaming habit.
Currently, if you’re stuck, the game only offers to reveal the entire puzzle, forcing you to move onto the next difficulty level and start over. However, we have you covered! Below are piecemeal answers that will serve as hints so that you can find your way through each difficulty level.
How to play Pips
If you’ve ever played dominoes, you’ll have a passing familiarity for how Pips is played. As we’ve shared in our previous hints stories for Pips, the tiles, like dominoes, are placed vertically or horizontally and connect with each other. The main difference between a traditional game of dominoes and Pips is the color-coded conditions you have to address. The touching tiles don’t necessarily have to match.
The conditions you have to meet are specific to the color-coded spaces. For example, if it provides a single number, every side of a tile in that space must add up to the number provided. It is possible – and common – for only half a tile to be within a color-coded space.
Here are common examples you’ll run into across the difficulty levels:
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Number: All the pips in this space must add up to the number.
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Equal: Every domino half in this space must be the same number of pips.
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Not Equal: Every domino half in this space must have a completely different number of pips.
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Less than: Every domino half in this space must add up to less than the number.
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Greater than: Every domino half in this space must add up to more than the number.
If an area does not have any color coding, it means there are no conditions on the portions of dominoes within those spaces.
Easy difficulty hints, answers for March 25 Pips
Equal (2): Everything in this space must be equal to 2. The answer is 2-2, placed horizontally; 2-5, placed horizontally.
Number (5): Everything in this space must add up to 5. The answer is 2-5, placed horizontally.
Number (6): Everything in this space must add up to 6. The answer is 6-3, placed vertically.
Number (14): Everything in this space must add up to 14. The answer is 5-5, placed horizontally; 4-4, placed horizontally.
Equal (4): Everything in this space must be equal to 4. The answer is 0-4, placed vertically; 4-4, placed horizontally.
Medium difficulty hints, answers for March 25 Pips
Number (2): Everything in this space must add up to 2. The answer is 2-6, placed horizontally.
Mashable Top Stories
Equal (6): Everything in this space must be equal to 6. The answer is 2-6, placed horizontally; 5-6, placed horizontally; 6-1, placed horizontally.
Number (0): Everything in this space must add up to 0. The answer is 5-0, placed vertically.
Equal (5): Everything in this space must be equal to 5. The answer is 5-0, placed vertically; 5-6, placed horizontally; 5-3, placed vertically.
Equal (1): Everything in this orange space must be equal to 1. The answer is 6-1, placed horizontally; 3-1, placed horizontally.
Equal (3): Everything in this space must be equal to 5. The answer is 5-3, placed vertically; 3-3, placed horizontally; 3-1, placed horizontally.
Number (1): Everything in this space must add up to 1. The answer is 1-0, placed horizontally.
Hard difficulty hints, answers for March 25 Pips
Number (5): Everything in this space must add up to 5. The answer is 4-0, placed vertically; 1-2, placed horizontally.
Number (8): Everything in this space must add up to 8. The answer is 1-2, placed horizontally; 6-6, placed horizontally.
Equal (0): Everything in this space must be equal to 0. The answer is 4-0, placed vertically; 0-6, placed vertically; 0-2, placed horizontally.
Less than (3): Everything in this space must be less than 3. The answer is 0-2, placed horizontally.
Number (7): Everything in this space must add up to 7. The answer is 6-6, placed horizontally; 1-3, placed vertically.
Equal (6): Everything in this space must be equal to 6. The answer is 0-3, placed vertically; 6-5, placed vertically; 6-4, placed horizontally.
Greater than (3): Everything in this space must be greater than 3. The answer is 6-4, placed horizontally.
Number (6): Everything in this space must add up to 6. The answer is -3, placed vertically; 3-0, placed vertically.
Number (5): Everything in this space must add up to 5. The answer is 6-5, placed vertically.
Number (0): Everything in this space must add up to 0. The answer is 0-5, placed horizontally.
Equal (5): Everything in this space must be equal to 5. The answer is 0-5, placed horizontally; 5-5, placed horizontally.
Number (6): Everything in this space must add up to 6. The answer is 3-0, placed vertically; 4-2, placed vertically.
If you’re looking for more puzzles, Mashable’s got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.
Entertainment
We found the best MacBook deals during Amazons Big Spring Sale — including the MacBook Neo
Amazon’s third annual Big Spring Sale runs from March 25 to 31, and the opening day of the sale already features deals on must-have tech — including flagship Apple products. Apple just refreshed and expanded its MacBook lineup earlier this month, and some of the new Apple laptops are already on sale.
The colorful new MacBook Neo with Touch ID is a whopping — wait for it — $9 off. (Don’t forget about the Apple Store’s $100 education discount.) Of course, there are better deals to be had.
Amazon’s biggest discount thus far is going to a 15-inch M4 model with 24GB of RAM and 512GB of storage, which is now $300 off — its lowest price ever. You can also score 13-inch M4 MacBook Airs starting at $899. Remember: Apple has discontinued the M4 MacBooks, so once supplies dry up, they’ll only be available on the refurbished market.
The brand-new M5 MacBook Airs and M5 Pro/Max MacBook Pros are all $50 off for the Big Spring Sale, and that’s probably going to be as cheap as they get for now. (The then-new M4 models got the same discount last year.) Look for better deals in a couple of months come Prime Day.
This is just day one of the Big Spring Sale, and Mashable will be keeping track of all the latest MacBook price drops. Check back to be the first to know about the top Apple deals.
Note: Deals marked with a 🔥 have dropped to a record-low price.
Mashable Deals
Best MacBook Air deal
$949
at Amazon
$1,199
Save $250
Why we like it
The 13-inch M4 MacBook Air may be a last-gen laptop, but it’s still an incredibly capable ultraportable, now $250 off for its lowest-ever price. It’s faster than much pricier Windows laptops, and it has the same 12MP Center Stage webcam, Liquid Retina display, and 18-hour battery life as its new M5 counterpart. This particular model is also well future-proofed amid the ongoing RAM crunch — thanks, AI.
Read Mashable’s full review of the Apple MacBook Air (M4).
MacBook Neo deals
More MacBook Air deals
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Apple MacBook Air, 13-inch (M4, 16GB RAM, 256GB SSD) — $899
$1,199(save $250) -
Apple MacBook Air, 13-inch (M4, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD) — $949
$1,199(save $250) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 15-inch (M4, 16GB RAM, 256GB SSD) — $949
$1,199(save $250) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 13-inch (M4, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD) — $949
$1,199(save $250) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 13-inch (M5, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD) — $1,049
$1,099(save $50) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 15-inch (M4, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD) — $1,099
$1,299(save $200) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 13-inch (M4, 24GB RAM, 512GB SSD) — $1,149
$1,399(save $250) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 13-inch (M5, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD) — $1,249
$1,299(save $50) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 15-inch (M5, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD) — $1,249
$1,299(save $50) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 13-inch (M5, 24GB RAM, 1TB SSD) — $1,449.99
$1,499(save $49.01) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 15-inch (M5, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD) — $1,449.99
$1,499(save $49.01) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Air, 15-inch (M5, 24GB RAM, 1TB SSD) — $1,649.99
$1,699(save $49.01) 🔥
MacBook Pro deals
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Apple MacBook Pro, 14-inch (M5, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD) — $1,649
$1,699(save $50) -
Apple MacBook Pro, 14-inch (M4 Pro, 24GB RAM, 512GB SSD) — $1,799
$1,999(save $200) -
Apple MacBook Pro, 14-inch (M5, 24GB RAM, 1TB SSD) — $1,799
$1,899(save $100) -
Apple MacBook Pro, 14-inch (M5 Pro, 24GB RAM, 1TB SSD) — $2,149
$2,199(save $50) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Pro, 14-inch (M5 Pro with 15-core CPU/16-core GPU, 24GB RAM, 2TB SSD) — $2,549.99
$2,599(save $49.01) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Pro, 16-inch (M5 Pro, 24GB RAM, 1TB SSD) — $2,649
$2,699(save $50) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Pro, 14-inch (M5 Pro with 18-core CPU/20-core GPU, 24GB RAM, 2TB SSD) — $2,749.99
$2,799(save $49.01) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Pro, 16-inch (M5 Pro, 48GB RAM, 1TB SSD) — $3,049
$3,099(save $50) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Pro, 14-inch (M5 Max, 36GB RAM, 2TB SSD) — $3,549.99
$3,599(save $49.01) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Pro, 16-inch (M5 Max, 36GB RAM, 2TB SSD) — $3,849
$3,899(save $50) 🔥 -
Apple MacBook Pro, 16-inch (M5 Max, 48GB RAM, 2TB SSD) — $4,349.99
$4,399(save $49.01) 🔥
Entertainment
Amazon Big Spring Sale 2026: Tablet deals are in full bloom with savings on the latest iPad Air
Best Big Spring Sale Tablet Deals
Amazon’s Big Spring Sale kicks off on March 25. The seasonal sale, which runs through March 31, focuses on seasonal transition items – think cleaning supplies to freshen up your home and camping supples to get outdoors. However, it wouldn’t be a sale without tech deals, too.
Ahead of the sale, we’ve spotted early savings on tablets, good timing considering Apple just dropped a brand new tablet. The Apple iPad Air with M4 chip just dropped this month, and the good news is, it’s already on sale. But if iPads aren’t your thing don’t worry, there are plenty of other tablet deals to shop.
Here are all the best tablet deals to shop ahead of Amazon’s Big Spring Sale.
Best Tablet Deal
$559
at Amazon
$599
Save $40
Read our full review of the Apple iPad Air (M4).
Apple’s latest iPad drop is the iPad Air with M4 chip. It’s one of the retailers speediest, most efficient tablets, scoring 13,176 on the Geekbench 6 test, which puts it ahead of most laptops. When Apple released the new iPad Air, they didn’t raise the price, keeping the midrange tablet at $599. However, it already receive a price cut at Amazon.
Ahead of the Big Spring Sale, get the Apple iPad Air with M4 chip for just $559. While that’s only $40 in savings and less than 10% off its list price, it’s still a great deal considering it’s a brand new tablet.
So while we might like this deal best, if you want some bigger savings, there are plenty more deals to shop.
More tablet deals
iPads
Mashable Deals
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Apple iPad, 11-inch (A16 chip, 128GB, WiFi) — $299
$349(save $150) -
Apple iPad Air, 11-inch (M4 chip, 256GB, WiFi) — $649.99
$699(save $49.01) -
Apple iPad Air, 11-inch (M3 chip, 1TB, WiFi) — $979
$1,099(save $120) -
Apple iPad Pro, 13-inch (M5 chip, 256GB, WiFi) — $1,199
$1,299(save $100) -
Apple iPad Pro, 13-inch (M4 chip, 512GB, WiFi) — $1,299.99
$1,499(save $199.01)
Android
Kids tablet
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