For many years, Sonoma County was the kid-brother of wine country. Napa County's elite wineries, trendy restaurants, and globally-known brand long overshadowed Sonoma's charms.

But Sonoma County, which stretches across nine cities and three times the land area of Napa County, is stealing visitors thanks to its laidback atmosphere and affordability. In 2016, travelers spent a total of $1.9 billion in Sonoma County, compared to $1.3 billion in Napa County, according to an annual economic impact report. The area attracts approximately double the three million visitors who come to Napa County every year.

Comparing the two is like apples and oranges — or Pinot Grigio and Merlot, if you prefer — because they vary so much in size. A wine blogger put it best when he said, "Napa Valley is a wine Disneyland, while Sonoma Valley is a wine region." 

With the harvest season nearly upon us, I visited Sonoma and Napa to figure out which offers the best experience for first-timers in wine country. In both areas, I visited two to three wineries and tried a Chardonnay and a house specialty at each.

Here's how it went.

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Full disclosure: I am not a wine connoisseur. But driving from San Francisco to Napa County on a recent weekday, I felt giddy. It's essentially a boozy amusement park for grown-ups.

There is the city of Napa and the county of Napa, considered the holy grail of wine country. It's home to more than 400 wineries, with many packed side-to-side along State Route 29.

Napa County rose to the top of wine tourism lists in 1976, when a Chardonnay from local winery Chateau Montelena trounced nine other Chardonnays in a blind tasting in Paris.

The wine competition, known as the 1976 Judgment of Paris, changed the way connoisseurs around the world perceived the young Napa County region. It suddenly rivaled top-dog France.

With its rise in the wine industry, Napa County has also become a tourism destination. The region boasts the only three Michelin-starred restaurant in wine country (The French Laundry), golf courses, resorts and spas, and some of the most coveted wine grapes anywhere.

Andrew Zimmern, the host of "Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern" on the Travel Channel, is spending his new season traveling around the US searching for interesting foods to try. In this video, Zimmern shares his thoughts on what he thinks the next food trend in America will be. Following is a transcript of the video.

I think Filipino food is… you know, I've been calling it for 5 years. It's just going to keep getting more and more popular.

We've been obsessed over the last 3 or 4 decades in America with appropriating foods of different ethnicities. Chinese food had its explosive moment in the sun when we discovered regional Chinese cooking in the ‘70s and ‘80s. Thai food … you know, Japanese food. 

People forget that in early 1970s there were 3 sushi bars in New York City. Three. Three. Think about that. Now, there is sushi in... I've eaten it — there is sushi at gas stations in Middle America. All of that in the last 40 years —  that's incredible.

I think Filipino food is … you know, I've been calling it for 5 years. It's just going to keep getting more and more popular simply because of the variety of ingredients and European techniques that are found in that food.

Their use of acidity, the quality of their food has the best of Asian cuisine and the best of sort of what happens when really good Asian food ... island Asian food brushes up against Spanish culture. The Spanish had colonized the Philippines for almost 500 years at one point. So, the influences are heartfelt.

I think people are going to get into pre-colonial foods. We're in love with pre-colonial foods from Mexico right now. It’s a huge trend. And I think all of that stuff is going to dribble down, and I think it's going to help re-establish some diversity in our food system and hopefully get us out of the supermarket a couple times a week.

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Resale listings of Ivanka Trump's clothing are surging, according to a new report. 

Fashion resale website Thredup, which allows people to sell their used clothing, said users have listed 111% more Ivanka Trump-branded items in the first five months of 2017 compared to the same period last year, Fortune reports. 

That far outpaces the increase in total listings on the site, which were up 20% over the same time period.

At the same time, stores that accept donated goods, including one Goodwill location, have also noticed a surge in Ivanka Trump-branded products arriving at the store.

One Goodwill employee told Fortune that he's seen an uptick in donations at a location in San Francisco, though a spokesperson for the national organization said it hasn't seen evidence that it's a nationwide trend. Goodwill doesn't track sales of individual brands.

Fortune checked with other charitable stores in the New York City area and several confirmed increases in donated Trump products. 

Ivanka Trump's brand has said, however, that sales of its products have increased even in the period since several department stores dropped the line of women's clothing, shoes, and handbags earlier this year.

The brand is now opening its first brick-and-mortar store in Trump Tower in New York City. Until now, the brand sold all its products through wholesale distribution to department stores and websites.

SEE ALSO: Ivanka Trump is opening a store in defiance of Nordstrom

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NOW WATCH: What this symbol on the back of your hair gel actually means

After the horrific events in Charlottesville on Saturday that left three dead, 19 injured and the nation in shock over the violence of racist hate groups, Facebook deleted blog posts from a well-known white supremacist blog.

On Wednesday, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said "we've always taken down any post that promotes or celebrates hate crimes or acts of terrorism -- including what happened in Charlottesville. With the potential for more rallies, we're watching the situation closely and will take down threats of physical harm."

He also expressed his personal frustration. "I know a lot of us have been asking where this hate comes from. As a Jew, it's something I've wondered much of my life. It's a disgrace that we still need to say that neo-Nazis and white supremacists are wrong -- as if this is somehow not obvious."

Ever since Donald Trump won the 2016 election last November, people have been questioning Facebook's role in politics, and its role in creating the ideological echo chambers that divide us.

Zuckerberg seems to be taking that criticism to heart, traveling across the country, meeting with people on all sides of the political spectrum and hiring a whole bunch of political strategists. If he's not running for office (which he says he isn't), then these actions appear to be his way of understanding the echo chamber, even if he hasn't solved it yet

Here's Zuckerberg's full post.

We aren't born hating each other. We aren't born with such extreme views. We may not be able to solve every problem, but we all have a responsibility to do what we can. I believe we can do something about the parts of our culture that teach a person to hate someone else.

It's important that Facebook is a place where people with different views can share their ideas. Debate is part of a healthy society. But when someone tries to silence others or attacks them based on who they are or what they believe, that hurts us all and is unacceptable.

There is no place for hate in our community. That's why we've always taken down any post that promotes or celebrates hate crimes or acts of terrorism -- including what happened in Charlottesville. With the potential for more rallies, we're watching the situation closely and will take down threats of physical harm. We won't always be perfect, but you have my commitment that we'll keep working to make Facebook a place where everyone can feel safe.

The last few days have been hard to process. I know a lot of us have been asking where this hate comes from. As a Jew, it's something I've wondered much of my life. It's a disgrace that we still need to say that neo-Nazis and white supremacists are wrong -- as if this is somehow not obvious. My thoughts are with the victims of hate around the world, and everyone who has the courage to stand up to it every day.

There may always be some evil in the world, and maybe we can't do anything about that. But there's too much polarization in our culture, and we can do something about that. There's not enough balance, nuance, and depth in our public discourse, and I believe we can do something about that. We need to bring people closer together, and I know we can make progress at that. 

SEE ALSO: Facebook shut down an anonymous group used by its Trump-supporting employees after people started harassing one another

SEE ALSO: A male employee claims he was fired after reporting sexual harassment at a $4 billion startup

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NOW WATCH: These popular devices keep a recording of everything you ask them — here's how to find it and delete it

If you've ever wondered what it would be like to grow up in a completely different society, there's a fun way to find out using Google Earth. With the latest update to Google's "This is Home" project, you can take a look into twenty-two "traditional" homes around the world.

Using the Street View feature, you can step inside a fascinating assortment of dwellings, from mud huts to farmhouses. It's an eye-opening experience that lets you look around the house, study the various objects and furniture, and read all about the people who live there.

Some of the images offer insight into people's struggle to maintain their traditional homes and lifestyles amid environmental, political and, economical challenges while others give a history lesson on places you probably don't know much about. The virtual tour is great for anyone with an itch to travel, and it makes a great learning experience for children who are curious about how other fellow Earthlings live. 

And the best part is, you don't need to buy a plane ticket to visit. 

Check out some of the world's most remarkable homes: 

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Siyava, Rajasthan, India

This home belongs to Tej Bai and her family. They are part of the Garasia tribe, and their home was built in traditional Garasia style with local materials.

Uros Titimarka, Peru

These homes float on the island of Uros Titimarka in Lake Titicaca. People have been living on the lake's 87 islands for hundreds of years, and didn't come into contact with the modern world until the mid-1960s.

Wadi Rum, Jordan

This is the home of Nasser Awwad Nasser Al Zalabiyah and his family. The area is one of the first protected regions in Jordan that allowed its original inhabitants to stay on their lands. A drought dried up all but four of the areas 40 natural springs, and homes like this are becoming rare as people are forced to move into more modern houses.

It was the summer of hell, and I needed some relief.

To take a break from the swamp that New York City becomes in the summer, I took a week-long trip to the sunny paradise of London for a well-deserved vacation.

OK, fine. London may not be that sunny, but it is a transportation paradise. When comparing it to New York, anyway, London seems like a city that actually cares about its public transportation. Its trains run often, its buses have a priority network, and there's even a congestion charge for private cars driving in the city center, which feeds money back into the transportation projects.

Things are not so great in New York right now. The state and city are in an interminable battle to escape blame for the crumbling infrastructure that millions of New Yorkers rely on every day. But some fixes being suggested now, like congestion charging, have already been at work in London for years.

I decided my vacation would be a good opportunity to see how London's public transportation system works. Not once did I get stuck in a tunnel or even have to wait longer than four minutes for a train — and with countdown clocks at every station, I always knew when the next train was coming. I also never had to detour because of track work, which is done overnight in London.

I think it's best summarized in the status update you hear over the PA system every so often in the Underground: "There is good service on all London Underground lines." You definitely don't hear that every day in New York.

While New York often uses the age of its system as an excuse, I saw how London overcame its ancient architecture — some of which dates back to the mid-19th century — to build a modern transportation system. Honestly, it felt strange to be in a city where the denizens didn't constantly gripe about how long it took to get wherever they were.

Here's a sample journey I made, which I think highlights what makes London so much easier to get around.

SEE ALSO: One of New York's most iconic shopping districts is dying

After making a few quick east-west trips on the Underground, I decided to put it to the test by going some distance. I was going to visit a friend in a northern part of London. This was a bit of a trip: about five miles through the city center, or a 40-minute drive according to Google Maps.

To get to Stoke Newington from Waterloo via transit, I could have taken a bus. As nice as the buses are in London, that didn't seem appealing. Another option was to take the Underground as well as the Overground. It said it would take me 40 minutes — not bad!

The Overground operates a lot like a normal subway, with some elements of a commuter rail. The trains are wider but shorter, and they travel mostly above ground on the outskirts of the city. I was worried about how easy it would be to catch one, but I decided to take my chances.

Nearly every journey on London transportation starts with an Oyster card. I started mine at Waterloo station with the plan to take the Victoria line eastbound. In London, you pay a fare that fluctuates according to the zones you travel through. Since I didn't leave Zone 1, I still paid less than £3, even though I went on two separate systems.

A £5 deposit gets you an Oyster card to use for as long as you need — it never expires. You can also turn it in and receive a refund for the £5 you paid, plus any remaining balance on it.

In the United States, unrest seems to be growing by the day.

Over the weekend, a white supremacist plowed through a crowd of counter-protestors in Charlottesville, Virginia. Several cities, like Baltimore, Maryland, New Orleans, Louisiana, and Lexington, Kentucky are removing confederate monuments, despite rallies from white nationalists to preserve them.

Mass shootings in 2017 are outpacing those in previous years as well, with over 150 attacks so far. In the past few months, there have been instances of domestic terrorism and racially motivated violence, including shootings and firebombs at churches, on the streets, at mosques, and even at a Congressional baseball practice.

There have also been dozens of demonstrations from various sides of the ideological spectrum.

All these factors can affect the well-being of those who live in cities, according to a new report from The Economist Intelligence Unit. On Wednesday, the group released its annual "Global Liveability Index," which ranked 140 cities worldwide by how "livable" they are, considering five key areas: economic stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education, and infrastructure. 

Those that score best tend to be mid-sized cities in wealthier countries with a relatively low population density. These factors can encourage a range of recreational activities without leading to high crime levels and overburdened infrastructure (e.g. roads, subways, housing).

The report notes that some US cities have declined in score, partly due to civil unrest linked to terrorism-related violence and President Trump's policies.

The US cities that ranked the highest are below:

SEE ALSO: Mesmerizing time-lapses show how crowded Chinese cities have become

10. Los Angeles, California

Overall global rank: 47

9. Atlanta, Georgia

Overall global rank: 47

8. Seattle, Washington

Overall global rank: 45

Next month, Apple is widely expected to launch a new iPhone. It's supposed to be a stunner.

Where will Apple CEO Tim Cook hold up the latest iPhone for the first time in public? It could be at a big space in San Francisco, like last year's iPhone event.

Or it could be at the underground 1,000-seat Steve Jobs Theatre on Apple's new $5 billion Apple Park campus, which looks nearly ready for its close-up in the latest video from drone videographer Matthew Roberts. 

The beautifully-shot clip shows Apple putting the finishing touches on the building's landscape. It may be one of the last Apple Park drone videos from this pilot as construction wraps up, Roberts said in an email.

Take a look: 

SEE ALSO: Some employees are rumored to hate the open floor plan at Apple's new $5 billion campus

Apple Park's main building is nicknamed the "spaceship," and it certainly looks like one from a distance.

Construction workers on the project agree.

More snaps from inside Apple Park here. 

Here is the Steve Jobs Theatre from a distance.

A private island in New York featuring a house based on Frank Lloyd Wright's designs is on sale for $14,920,000. The iconic architect designed the home on Petra Island, located 47 miles from Manhattan.

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Etsy, the online marketplace where creative entrepreneurs can set up storefronts to sell their own products, launched in 2005 with the goal of creating an online retail space that would build a more fulfilling and lasting world.

So it's no surprise that its 200,000-square-foot headquarters in the Dumbo neighborhood of Brooklyn would be filled with toxin-free paint, salvaged wood, and furnishings purchased from Etsy sellers. In August, the eco-friendly office was recognized with an Excellence Award from the Center for Active Design. It was one of seven international winners. 

The roughly 500 employees that work in the Brooklyn office are free to roam the nine-floor complex, finding a comfy spot to set up camp and work remotely away from their desks.

Last summer, we got a tour of the refurbished building the Etsy team calls home — scroll ahead for the photos.

SEE ALSO: We visited Amazon's chaotic jobs fair and found a troubling insight about the American economy

In 2016, Etsy moved from a 106,000-square-foot space to its new headquarters in Dumbo. The new space is a two-building setup that's nearly twice as big, at around 200,000 square feet.

Etsy signed a 10-year lease on the nine-story building.

Before the big move, the company sent surveys to its employees, asking them to name their preferences and needs for the future office. Quiet spaces such as this one were big on the list of requests.

A fringe political group that led the call for California to break away from the union after the election of President Donald Trump has relaunched with new leadership.

The Yes California Independence Campaign went dark in April after its self-appointed leader, Louis Marinelli, announced he was abandoning the movement and settling permanently in Russia. The news was not that surprising. Marinelli set up a makeshift embassy (which he said would be used to promote the secessionist movement) in Moscow last December.

Earlier this week, the former vice president of the campaign, Marcus Ruiz Evans, announced in an email that he's picking up where Marinelli left off as president of Yes California. Among his first actions, Evans shuttered the group's unofficial embassy and cultural center in Moscow.

"Although well intentioned, it was a distraction, a point of contention, and a source of division among supporters of California independence. It needed to close and now it is closed," Evans said of the embassy in a statement.

Marinelli will stay on as member of the group's advisory board, but will not be an officer.

Yes California's links to Russia have been well documented. "Calexit" started trending on Twitter in the hours after the results of the 2016 presidential election were announced. Before then, the PAC received favorable attention from news outlets backed by the Kremlin. Marinelli attended a conference in Moscow dedicated to the right of secession last September.

Russia has a long-standing tradition of encouraging foreign fringe groups like California separatists in order to exploit tensions in the West — a position that prompted critics and some members to reject Yes California. In a page on the Yes California website that has since been taken down, the group denied accepting any financial support from the Russian government. 

Evans, a resident of Fresno, California, told Business Insider that Yes California is moving "full speed ahead" without the controversial ties to Russia holding it back.

The group's immediate goal is file a ballot measure with the Attorney General's Office, allowing Californians to voice their support for a secession in a 2018 special election.

Still, a state holds no right to secede under federal law. Californians would need to pass an amendment to the US Constitution, which requires a favorable vote from the three-fourths of the other 49 states. A state has not seceded from the union since the 1860s, and those 11 southern states rejoined after the American Civil War. An actual Calexit is very unlikely.

Amid violent protests in Charlottesville, Virginia, and growing discontent with the Trump administration, Evans is optimistic about a California secession movement's prospects.

"It's ridiculous but it represents why California needs to have an exit plan in place. Things are going to get worse in this country before they get better and this campaign all along has been about California disconnecting itself from a sinking Titanic," he said.

SEE ALSO: Californians are calling for a split from the US — but one secessionist group has odd ties to Russia

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NOW WATCH: People in California are calling for a 'Calexit' after Trump’s victory

• It's normal for relationships to have some degree of conflict
• But psychological research has found behaviors that weaken a partnership over time
• Below, find nine of the most common — and what to do instead

Every romantic relationship goes through ups and downs. Even if you just had a massive fight about who stained the living-room couch with coffee (we know: It wasn't you), it's not the end of the world.

That said, certain behavior patterns can weaken a partnership over time, leaving one or both people wanting out.

Psychological literature is rife with examples of such behaviors. Below, we've rounded up nine of the most common.

Note: If you recognize one or more of these patterns in your relationship, that doesn't necessarily mean you're headed for Splitsville. Use this opportunity to take a step back, take a deep breath, and see what you can do to work it out.

SEE ALSO: A marriage therapist says there are 4 good reasons to leave a relationship — and a really bad one

Distancing yourself from your partner

A 2016 study, published in the journal Couple and Family Psychology: Research and Practice, found there's a deadly combination of characteristics that predict relationship dissatisfaction: sensitivity to rejection and the tendency to cut your partner off emotionally.

People who are really worried about getting hurt might distance themselves from their partners, which ends up making the relationship less satisfying in the long run. In other words, they effectively create what they fear.

If this sounds like you, try telling your partner about your fears. You might be surprised to learn that they share some of those concerns, and you can work through them together.

Closing yourself off to new experiences

A growing body of research suggests that couples who try new things together are happier in their relationship.

The inverse might be true, too: Writing in Psychology Today, clinical psychologist Lisa Firestone says when you stop being open to developing shared new interests, it can hurt the relationship and create resentment between partners.

So take up your partner's offer to try a new restaurant or go hiking instead of spending Saturday at the movies — at least once in a while.

Hiding your finances

Nearly two in five Americans in one poll for the National Endowment for Financial Education said they've lied to their partner about money (financial infidelity), which can lead to fights, distrust, and in some cases divorce.

The problem is that money isn't just about numbers — it can symbolize power and love. So insecurity about what your partner's doing with his or her money means insecurity about the relationship in general.

Before you decide to combine (or even partially combine) finances with your partner, it helps to have a conversation about budgeting and your financial histories, and to come up with guidelines for making big individual purchases.

Just a few short blocks from the New York Stock Exchange, another Wall Street institution sits at its centuries-long perch at the triangular intersection of William and Beaver streets.

Delmonico's is widely considered to be one of the very first sit down restaurants in America, born at a time when New York offered little more than taverns and oyster cellars. Culinary mainstays like eggs benedict and baked Alaska were invented in their kitchen.

While Delmonico's is (rightly) renowned for its steak offerings, Executive Chef Billy Oliva tipped us off to several decadent items that aren't on the printed menu. Skip the dining room and head straight to the bar to ask the bartender for these secret items like a $100 grilled cheese or a $50 cookie.

Delmonico's is celebrating its 180th anniversary in September in style, offering a 180-day dry aged steak for a whopping $380.

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The Super Soaker was a game changer when came to squirt guns and summer fun. And you have Lonnie Johnson to thank for it.

The man behind one of the most popular toys of all time is an engineer who has worked for Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the Air Force, and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Now he's working on a few other inventions that he hopes will change the world. Following is a transcript of the video.

The whole idea was to be able to shoot a very, very high pressure stream of water a very long distance.

"Oh Buffy..."

I'm Lonnie Johnson. I'm an inventor. The invention that most people know me for is the Super Soaker water gun.

My career started actually when I was in high school. I built a robot that won a regional science fair at the University of Alabama. I went on to work at Oak Ridge National Laboratory as a research engineer on high temperature nuclear reactors. Air Force Weapons Laboratory on advanced spacecraft that used nuclear power sources. Then to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory working on the Galileo spacecraft as a power systems engineer.

When I was at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory back in the early '80s is when I first got the idea. The Super Soaker was based on some engineering principles that I applied. I was actually working on another invention which was a heat pump that would use water as a working fluid instead of Freon.

And I shot the stream of water across the bathroom using some nozzles that I made, and I thought to myself, "Geez, if I were to develop a new type of water gun, that was a performance water gun,it could really do well.

"That's not pressure. This is pressure!"

Initially I wanted to manufacture the gun myself, but when I went to a plastics injection molding manufacturing company and talked to them about the parts that I needed, what I needed to have made it, it turned out it was going to cost about $200,000 to get the first thousand guns produced. And I thought to myself, I was an officer in the military the time, I didn't have $200,000 in cash laying around.

I decide to come to New York, present my ideas at Toy Fair, try to find a manufacturer that I could work with. And it was there that I met the people at Larami. 

They invited me to come to their headquarters in Philadelphia. It took 2 weeks to build the gun. And as soon as it was finished, I call the guy up at Laramie, because I didn't want him to forget my conversation. I got my suitcase and went in, and of course I had my prototypes in the suitcase.

I opened it up, and they ask to see what I had, and showed them the gun. They said, "Well, does it work? How well does it work?" So I pumped it up and shot it across the conference room, and the president of the company said, "Wow!" And that was it.

I knew I captured their imagination, and the rest is history.

"Soaking wet!"

I knew the gun worked well, and I knew it would be successful. I did not realize how successful it would be. It became the number one selling toy in the world.

Actually, the first year, it was called "Drencher." It was not called a Super Soaker. Someone claimed the name "Drencher" and wanted us to pay royalties on that, and so we changed the name. That's when we came up with the name of Super Soaker.

The guns were literally blowing off the shelves by word of mouth. We couldn't keep up with the demand.

People would say, "You know, Johnson, you're really lucky." And I thought, it's just a lot of hard work. It took 10 years from the idea to major success.

I started my own business, and built my company, my research company, with the proceeds from that invention. I don't really talk about how much money that I made from the invention. But I think it is fair to say that just about all of it is going into the research that I'm conducting. So it's going back into the company to develop some of the energy technology that I'm focused on.

I am a nuclear engineer. I'm working on advanced energy technology. I have a new type of the engine that converts heat into electricity, and I've also developed a new type of battery that's all ceramic, without liquid electrolyte. 

The other toy gun that was on the market and enjoying major success was these Nerf dart guns.

"It's Nerf, or nothing."

And I wanted to have that part of the market too. So I started developing Nerf dart guns, and I developed guns that outperformed the guns that Hasbro had on the market at the time. And eventually ended up doing a deal with Hasbro to license my dart guns.

And at that point, I literally was the king of all toy guns.

So now to have another success in the consumer space would really be cool . So that would mean, if I could pull that off, that would mean that lightning will it struck three times.

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Probiotics — pricey supplements designed to support the trillions of bacteria blossoming in our guts — have become a big business, with a market that is projected to exceed $57 billion in the next five years.

"Probiotics are probably the single most important new food category to emerge in the last 20 years," Scott Bass, the head of the Global Life Sciences team at law firm Sidley Austin LLP and an adviser for the FDA on its first dietary supplement website, told Business Insider.

The idea behind the pills is simple: foster the growth of beneficial bacteria in the gut and curb the growth of the bad bacteria to improve digestion, boost the immune system, and even lower rates of certain diseases.

Putting that idea into practice, however, has proven a bit more complicated than some scientists initially envisioned. So far, the effects of existing probiotic supplements have been all over the map — sometimes they help, but most of the time, they don't. Nevertheless, supplement-makers continue to advertise their pills as beneficial for everything from weight loss to treating lactose intolerance.

The problem is that while most probiotic formulas contain tens of millions of beneficial bacteria, like Lactobacillus acidophilus, fewer than a hundred or so of those bacteria actually make it into your gut.

"Thirty billion Lactobacillus sounds good, but after going through the stomach acid, only about 43 of them survive," Ian Orme, a distinguished professor of microbiology and pathology at Colorado State University, told Business Insider.

These "good" bacteria are supposed to replace the "bad" bacteria (like Bifodobacteria) and help you feel better.

"In other words these 43 or so bacteria politely ask the million or so anaerobic Bifidobacteria to please leave," said Orme. "Yeah, sure."

There are some specific incidences where the research suggests that the pills could actually help.

A rigorous 2014 review of probiotics research concluded that the supplements could be especially helpful for newborns with intensive needs. Adding "good" bacteria to the guts of infants at risk of developing the life-threatening gut disease necrotizing enterocolitis, for example, significantly reduced the chances that they'd come down with the disease.

More recently, researchers have been experimenting with supplements called synbiotics, which combine a probiotic bacterial strain with what's called a prebiotic — essentially a type of sugar designed to feed the beneficial bacteria and help it thrive in the gut.

The idea is that the pre- and the pro-biotic work together to provide a combined benefit — while the probiotic settles in and pushes out the "bad" bacteria, the prebiotic hangs around and acts as its food supply, ensuring that the supplement sticks around and does its job.

Just this month, as part of the first large-scale clinical trial of its kind, researchers working in rural India found that newborns who were given a synbiotic were at a substantially lower risk of developing sepsis, a potentially fatal condition characterized by severe infection.

Some small studies have suggested that synbiotics could provide benefits to a range of other conditions influenced by the gut microbiome as well, including obesity, diabetes, and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, but larger-scale clinical trials focusing on each of those conditions are needed.

For now though, if you see a probiotic — or a synbiotic — for sale at your local health-foods store, know that the existing research backing up its claims is limited.

SEE ALSO: The $37 billion supplement industry is barely regulated — and it's allowing dangerous products to slip through the cracks

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NOW WATCH: An exercise scientist reveals the exercise regime that will burn the most fat

Bean Boot mania, it seems, will not abate any time soon.

This year, however, there is some good news for fans of the unique rubber boot that is celebrated for its weatherproof qualities.

L.L. Bean last year said they made 3,000 pairs a day and surpassed 600,000 pairs sold — a new record. Over the past two years, the factories in Maine that make the boots have been working nearly 24/7 — three shifts, six days a week — in an attempt to meet holiday demand.

The waiting list has stretched to the tens of thousands in previous years, but this year all boot models are still on hand as of August. It's still early, but L.L. Bean has produced a greater variety of the boot than in previous seasons, including a number of "small batch" models, so it's possible some boots won't sell out this year.

L.L. Bean is estimating they'll sell 750,000 bean boots this year, and in 2018 the company is hoping that number balloons to 1 million, according to the AP.

To ensure demand is met L.L. Bean pulled off the wraps of a third manufacturing facility on Thursday — a 106,000-square-foot facility in Lewiston, Maine. The company will hire 160 new works to man the facility.

Part of the reason for the backlog is the shoe's "it" status, combined with its laborious manufacturing process — which, for many of the boot's components, is still done by hand.

"We realize we could outsource, but that will never happen," McKeever told Bloomberg two years ago. "The boots have been hand-sewn in Maine by our own skilled boot workers, and they always will be."

So why are the 100-year-old boots so popular? There are a few reasons:

• Legacy products are hot right now. Consumers — especially millennials — connect to the product's history and bulletproof track record. The Bean Boot dates back to 1911, when brand founder Leon Leonwood Bean sold his Maine Hunting Shoe, which the Bean Boot descended from.
• A slightly goofy aesthetic is back in style. The all-American boots fall into the still-going-strong "normcore" trend that's popular among young urbanites. It's also a super-distinctive style that everyone can and will recognize on your foot.
• The boots are an incredible value. The most basic model is only $120, and it comes with L.L. Bean's unconditional satisfaction guarantee, meaning you can return the boots at any time for virtually any reason.
• Speaking of bulletproof, that's exactly what Bean Boots are. They're known to be completely flawless from a functionality perspective. Many owners see the boots perform for decades without requiring replacement.

After all, the fact that the boots are still hand-sewn in Maine at a reasonable price point is precisely the reason they're in such high demand. Though the scarcity may be sending some customers to less in-demand brands, it certainly hasn't hurt the Bean Boot, NPD Group chief retail analyst Marshal Cohen told the Boston Globe.

"It adds to the lore and the beauty of getting the boot," Cohen said. "It's the smartest strategy you can possibly employ."

SEE ALSO: I tested L.L. Bean's legendary return policy by returning 4-year-old shoes

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NOW WATCH: Here's why people love these L.L.Bean boots that sell out every winter

Brad Stulberg, coauthor of "Peak Performance: Elevate your Game, Avoid Burnout and Thrive with the New Science of Success" shares how you can stop feeling exhausted after work every day. Following is a transcript of the video.

Sleep is just so important so I'd start there, that to me is the lowest-hanging fruit. If you're not getting between seven to nine hours of sleep, I'd really make that a priority. 

Second to sleep, I think that particularly if the work that you do involves your mind, not your body, exercise is a wonderful tool. It allows you to get in touch with a more physical sense of yourself, which I think, in it of itself, is very powerful but there is also lots of research that shows that exercise helps with a lot of the things that are driving people crazy about work. So things like anxiety, things like willpower, those can all be boosted by regular exercise.

Another thing that is very interesting to me is this notion of "social ties" and what I call "social recovery". So just hanging out with a group of people that you enjoy spending time with, not necessarily talking about work and things that are stressing you out, that defeats the purpose, but hanging out, having a good time has actually been shown to change our biochemistry and give us those same hormones that again promote growth and promote recovery. 

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In 1975, a young Michael Dweck and his buddy heard the rumor that the Rolling Stones would be recording at Andy Warhol's place in Montauk, a small town on the corner of Long Island farthest from New York City. The two packed up the car and drove out with high hopes of meeting Mick Jagger and Keith Richards.

What Dweck discovered instead was a beautiful surf town that would serve as his muse for years to come. 

As a professional photographer, it was natural for Dweck to begin documenting the surf culture of Montauk when he officially moved there in 2002. His images, captured in the summer of 2002, were published in the book "The End: Montauk, NY."

In celebration of its 10th anniversary last year, the book was republished in a box set with a $3,000 price tag.

Ahead, see a selection of work from the book, as well as Dweck's recounting of the stories behind his favorite place. 

SEE ALSO: Tinder threw a Hamptons party on 'billionaire's row' that ended when police showed up — here's what it was like

Dweck grew up on Long Island and visited Montauk often as a teen. His photography has long been inspired by beach culture.

In the foreword of his book, Dweck described himself as an "outsider" in Montauk. "It wasn't that the locals were mean (although some were)," he wrote. "They just had a good thing going and they weren't keen on sharing it with the whole world."

Dweck became a true local when he moved there in 2002.

• Divorce rates in the US are at an all-time low
• Everyone's relationship is different, and so is every divorce
• Research has shown certain factors make a divorce more likely
• Don't take the findings as a prediction for your own relationship

In 2015, the US divorce rate hit a 40-year low.

According to data from Bowling Green State University, there were 16.9 divorces for every 1,000 women that year.

To determine the factors that make divorce more likely and the effects — positive and negative — of ending your marriage, we dug into years of research on the predictors and consequences of marital dissolution. Below, we've highlighted some of the most intriguing findings.

Keep in mind that all these studies offer general takeaways about modern relationships — no one can predict with 100% accuracy what will happen to yours.

SEE ALSO: 7 ways to ruin your relationship for good

Couples may be most likely to divorce in March and August.

2016 research from the University of Washington, presented at the American Sociological Association, found that March and August bring spikes in divorce filings.

The researchers say it's meaningful that March and August follow holiday or vacation periods. In the paper, they suggest that holidays represent something like "optimism cycles" — we see them as a chance to start anew in our relationships, only to find that the same problems exist once they're over.

The researchers also suspect that oftentimes our holiday experiences can be stressful and disappointing, laying bare the real issues in our marriage. As soon as they're over, we're ready to call it quits.

Married people who watch porn may be more likely to divorce.

A 2017 study, published in the Journal of Sex Research, found that married people who start watching pornography are about twice as likely to get divorced as those who don't.

The study involved about 2,000 participants over the course of nearly a decade. It found that the effect was stronger for women, who were about three times as likely to get divorced if they started watching porn during the study period.

But, as Elizabeth Nolan Brown points out on Reason, it's possible that taking up a porn habit may signal that something else is going wrong in your relationship. Maybe you're dissatisfied with your sex life or maybe you and your partner aren't communicating well.

In other words, it might not be the porn, per se, that's causing marital problems. It might be a symptom of other underlying issues.

Couples who marry in their late 20s may be less likely to divorce.

Research led by Nicholas Wolfinger, a professor at the University of Utah, found that contrary to a long-held belief, waiting longer to wed doesn't necessarily predict a stronger marriage.

Instead, as Wolfinger wrote on the Institute for Family Studies blog in 2015, the best time to marry seems to be between the early 20s and early 30s. If you wait until you're older than 32, your chances of divorce start to creep up (though they're still not as high as if you get married in your teens).

As Wolfinger wrote, "For almost everyone, the late twenties seems to be the best time to tie the knot."

Jeremy Gardner was returning from a safari in South Africa — where he flew out to attend AfrikaBurn, a regional Burning Man festival — when he came into cell service. He checked Twitter, where he follows other bitcoin watchers, to see how his investments were doing.

"I saw that bitcoin had broken like $2,500 — all the crypto assets had exploded in value," Gardner told Business Insider. "And all of a sudden, my net worth in five days had doubled in value. That, to me, was nuts."

Created in 2008, bitcoin is a new kind of payment system that allows people to buy things and send money with anonymity. There are no banks or middlemen. Transactions are recorded on a digital ledger called a blockchain.

Cryptocurrencies (of which bitcoin is the most popular) have been on a tear in 2017. Bitcoin surged in value from about $200 per coin in 2015 to above $4,000 in August.

People like Gardner buys assets, called tokens, with the expectation that their value will go higher. At age 25, Gardner is a self-made millionaire.

"By dedicating my life to crypto assets and blockchain technology, I've made more money than I would have ever expected to make in my entire life — by a long shot," he said.

He dropped out of college (twice), works part time at a venture-capital firm that invests in cryptocurrency-related companies (for a $0 salary), and travels the world evangelizing bitcoin.

In 2013, a friend offered to buy Gardner some bitcoin in exchange for cash. He'd been following the controversy around Silk Road, an online marketplace that allowed people to use bitcoin mostly for "buying drugs off the internet and speculation," according to Gardner.

It piqued his curiosity, and he bought in, turning his gains back into cash as fast as he could.

"There was this realization that I could — with just an internet connection— exchange value with anyone in the world who also has an internet connection," he said. "No longer did I have to rely on a centralized intermediary, a troll under the bridge, such as a bank or a government."

He turned most of his savings and stock holdings into cryptocurrency investments. Over a few months, Gardner became a true believer, branding himself a "bitcoin booster" on Twitter. In 2014, he founded the Blockchain Education Network, a network of cryptocurrency clubs at universities around the world.

Over the past few years, Gardner has planted himself firmly at the center of the global cryptocurrency community. In 2013, he launched a startup, Augur, a market-forecasting tool that runs on blockchain. The company raised $5.3 million in a crowdfunding campaign in 2015.

Today, he works a "fairly full-time gig" at Blockchain Capital, helping the firm source new investments in cryptocurrency-related companies and then advising those companies. His role as an entrepreneur-in-residence does not pay, but he receives "carry," a share of the profits that the firm makes on investments. He's also working on another startup in stealth mode.

As the value of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies rises, Gardner's net worth has climbed. He declined to share how much money he has made investing in digital currencies.

"For me, the price increases are kind of like 'told you so' moments. Like, I knew this was going to happen," Gardner said. "It's obviously cool when it happens very quickly, but every time it goes up really quickly, I expect it to go down very quickly ... I'm in this for the long term."

His investment gains subsidize his living in San Francisco, where he shares a three-story house with a half-dozen other tech entrepreneurs. The home, known among tenants as the Crypto Castle, is a landing pad for people working in cryptocurrency-related technologies.

"Over a half-dozen people in the time they've lived in my house have become millionaires as a result of crypto," Gardner said.

He travels most weekends in a month to cities like New York, Los Angeles, Miami, and Hong Kong. When asked what his biggest living expense is, Gardner said, "Alcohol."

"As I've seen my wealth grow, it's important to me that I give back to this industry that's given me so much," he added. "So when we go to conferences, I'll bring a bunch of people out and buy bottles at the club, pay for dinner and stuff."

Gardner said coming into wealth had created a new set of challenges. His investments are split into several cryptocurrencies, so he has to pay closer attention to where his money is and how it's managed, he said. He no longer attends networking events for cryptocurrency entrepreneurs because he will be bombarded with pitches and made uncomfortable.

There's most likely a bubble in the market for cryptocurrencies, and some speculate it could burst. Gardner is stockpiling cash so he can buy up tokens when that happens.

Gardner believes mainstream adoption is only a matter of time. He expects bitcoin will reach a value of $10,000 per coin in the next five to 10 years.

"We've been told that it's going to die so many times. And yet here it is, stronger than ever. I think there's a certain sense of vindication if you were investing in this technology and people were calling you stupid for a long time," Gardner said. "We've gone from a point where the success of blockchain was unlikely or infinitesimally small and is now guaranteed."

SEE ALSO: Inside the Crypto Castle, where young bitcoin entrepreneurs party and plot the future of money

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NOW WATCH: What you need to know about bitcoin after the split