• Supersense, a strange cafe/photo-booth/recording studio/store in Vienna, sells "smell memory kits"
• The kits are the brainchild of Norwegian "smell expert" Sissel Tolaas who has created a library of 7,000 smells
• Each kit contains several "abstract" smells that you can smell when something important happens so that you can remember it later

Supersense, a shop located in Vienna's Leopoldstadt neighborhood, is a little hard to categorize.

It's a gourmet cafe, a recording studio, a photo-booth, and a printing press all wrapped up into one, with a collection of weird and vintage items sprinkled throughout. It's the kind of place you can get lost in for an afternoon, as I did recently on a trip to Austria.

But the shop's most interesting item is its "smell memory kit." 

Ever sniffed the scent of burning charcoal and been instantly transported to that barbecue in the park when you were 10 and hit the winning single in the family softball game?

That's the idea behind the smell memory kits.

The kits were developed by Sissel Tolaas, a Norwegian artist and researcher who is well-known as a "smell expert."

In her studio lab, she uses her background in chemical science to create and recreate smells. Tolaas has created a library of over 7,000 smells stored in glass jars that range from dog poop and burning garbage to flowers and coffee. In recent years she's worked on creating "smellscapes" — what you might smell on a street in New York City or Cape Town, South Africa.

For a museum show in Germany last year about World War I, she recreated the smell of mustard gas to evoke the era. Attendees quickly got sick from the stench.

For the kits, Tolaas created "abstract" smells — essentially smells you've never been exposed to before and therefore have no connection to a memory. Each kit contains several abstract smell vials.

When something happens that you want to remember — a spontaneous night out where everything goes your way, or a gorgeous hike in the mountains — you break the vial and smell away.

From that point on, according to Supersense, that memory will be linked to that scent. 

There's science to back up Tolaas's idea. Numerous studies have shown that smells trigger "more vivid emotional memories and are better at inducing that feeling of 'being brought back in time' than images," according to Amanda White, a research technologist at Penn State College of Medicine. 

Some researchers, according to White, have found that memories triggered by smell are linked to more brain activity than the word the smell is referring to. For example, the scent of a rose evokes a much stronger response than simply the word "rose." 

The same appears to hold true for negative memories. One study published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry in 2003 documented three case studies where smells triggered post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms and memories.

Indeed, many psychiatrists have brought in Tolaas to help their patients process suppressed memories by creating smells that trigger remembering, Wired UK reported in 2010.

“We have a case at the moment in Berlin where a boy had seen someone killed by an ashtray,” Tolaas told Wired UK at the time. “I made 50 variations of ‘ashtray’ and on variation 20 this boy was able to remember who did it.”

SEE ALSO: This ordinary-looking coffee shop is a secret hipster paradise that sells $300 life-size photos and 200 smell vials you can sniff at your leisure

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: 15 things you didn't know your iPhone headphones could do

For those of us who are content with a white robe and complimentary toiletries, the following list of hotel amenities may come as a massive shock.

These hotels are regarded as some of the most luxurious places to stay in the world, and here, good service is not just about breakfast in bed or a turndown in the evening. 

From personalized firework displays to ski trips with Olympic champions, here is a selection of the craziest amenities you can enjoy during your next stay.

Talia Avakian contributed reporting to an earlier version of this article.

SEE ALSO: The 22 best apps for business travelers

The Lodge at Sea Island (Georgia): Butler service

You don't need to dread packing anymore. The Lodge at Sea Island has a 24-hour butler service who will do everything for you.

From packing your suitcase when you leave, to laying out milk and cookies at night or running you a rose petal bath, butlers are on hand to help with your every need. Their services are available to all guests who stay at the hotel, and the cost is included in the price of the room.

Hard Rock hotels: Fender guitars

The "Sound of Your Stay" program, which is available at any of Hard Rock Hotels' 23 hotels and 11 casinos, includes free rentals of a Fender guitar with a Mustang floor amplifier and Nixon headphones so you can rock out in your room.

You can also get exclusively curated playlists and DJ mixing systems sent to your room.

The Ritz-Carlton, New Orleans (Louisiana): Recovery concierge

Nursing a bad hangover? Well you're in luck — during Mardi Gras, The Ritz-Carlton in New Orleans offers a recovery concierge who can help nurse you back to health.

From fixing you a Bloody Mary to delivering you a smoothie, this concierge can help make your stay all the more comfortable and hangover-free. 

Before there was Instagram to catalog your life in artsy and flattering filters, there was the joy of the instant camera, or the Polaroid camera.

Instant cameras are a type of camera relying on film that develops on the spot to deliver an image you can take home with you right away. First brought to market in the late 1940s, Polaroid cameras were the original consumer-friendly cameras, easy enough your grandmother could figure it out.

The world's largest Polaroid camera is in Supersense, a cafe/recording studio/photo booth/printing press in Vienna, Austria that is indebted to all things vintage and analog. 

Have a look: 

Supersense was founded by Florian Kaps, an Austrian artist and Polaroid-fanatic.

A vintage Viennese creation, the massive Polaroid camera is only one of seven left in the world. It takes instant photos that are 20x24 inches in size.

Kaps will take your portrait with the camera for $300 a shot.

Snapchat cofounder and CEO Evan Spiegel and his wife Miranda Kerr are expecting their first child, the couple announced in November.

Spiegel is one of the richest millennial billionaires in America, with a fortune around $3.4 billion. He married Kerr, an Australian supermodel and owner of cosmetics line Kora Organics, back in May. The 34-year-old is wealthy in her own right, with an estimated net worth of $45 million.

Like any good power couple, Spiegel and Kerr purportedly share interests in each others' endeavors. He's graced the cover of Vogue Italy, and she's active on Snapchat and has come to the defense of the company— and her husband — in interviews.

Here's how the newlyweds spend their billions.

SEE ALSO: How Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, makes and spends his $20 billion fortune

DON'T MISS: Meet 7 of the world's richest power couples, who have a combined fortune of over $260 billion

Spiegel and Kerr began dating during the summer of 2015 after first meeting at a dinner for Louis Vuitton the year before.

Source: The Sydney Morning Herald

In July 2016, Spiegel proposed to Kerr with a a 1.75 to 2.5 carat diamond that cost an estimated $75,000 to $100,000.

Source: E! News

A few months before the engagement, the couple purchased a 7,164-square-foot home in Brentwood, a wealthy Los Angeles neighborhood, for $12 million. The home was previously owned by Harrison Ford and has a gym, pool, and guest house.

Source: Business Insider

• Miranda Kerr and Snap CEO Evan Spiegel are pregnant with their first child. 
• The couple got married last May after dating for two years.
• Kerr also has a 6-year-old son with actor Orlando Bloom. 

Model Miranda Kerr and Snap CEO Evan Spiegel are expecting a baby. 

People broke the news that Kerr is pregnant with her second child, Spiegel's first. Kerr was previously married to actor Orlando Bloom and the two have a 6-year-old son, Flynn.

"Miranda, Evan and Flynn are looking forward to welcoming the newest member of their family," a representative for Kerr said in a statement to People. 

Kerr and Spiegel got married at their home in Brentwood, California, in May. The pair began dating nearly two years ago and a whirlwind romance followed, leading up to their engagement last year. 

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: I won't trade in my iPhone 6s for an iPhone X or iPhone 8 — here's why

• Millennials are raising kids differently than any other generation before them.
• For example, they get parenting advice online and aren't committed to marrying before they have kids.
• We rounded up the defining features of millennials' parenting style, according to experts.

A whopping 82% of babies born each year are placed in the arms of millennial mothers. And they're in for a wild ride.

Millennial moms and dads are doing things differently from any other generation before them. Below, Business Insider has collected some of the defining traits of millennials' parenting style, according to researchers and other experts.

Read on to find out how 20- and 30-something parents are shaking things up.

SEE ALSO: Science says parents of successful kids have 17 things in common

Millennials turn to the internet — not just family and friends — for parenting advice

An article in The New York Times suggests that millennial parents ("parennials," if you will) are turning to Google, chat rooms, and apps for all kinds of parenting advice. As one expert told The Times, "Google is the new grandparent, the new neighbor, the new nanny."

That expert also said, "The good news is that parents know more about child development than ever before." The bad news is it can be overwhelming — and sometimes disempowering.

Millennials are documenting their kids' lives on social media

That same New York Times article mentions that many millennial parents are giving their kids personal hashtags and YouTube channels.

And a poll conducted by TIME and Survey Monkey found that just 19% of millennial parents have never shared a photo of their kids on social media, compared to 30% of Gen X parents and 53% of Baby Boomer parents.

Still, some parents approach their kids' social media presence with a different attitude: They're terrified. One parent in the New York Times article only posts pictures of her child walking away. She's both worried for her child's safety and worried that her child will "become a meme."

Millennials are relatively confident in their parenting skills

A Pew Research Center survey found that 57% of millennial moms say they are doing a very good job as a parent, compared to 48% of Gen X moms and 41% of Baby Boomer moms. (Interestingly, fathers in all age groups gave themselves lower marks.)

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Forward, a futuristic doctor's office that charges a $150 monthly fee and doesn't take insurance, is expanding beyond San Francisco to Los Angeles, with plans to go nationwide.

Launched in January, Forward is the product of several dozen veterans of Google, Facebook, Uber, and Palantir, who got together to reinvent the doctor's office for the 21st century. Its flagship location in San Francisco looks like an Apple Store meets "Westworld," complete with state-of-the-art diagnostics tools and an AI system that listens and takes notes for doctors.

Forward has raised a reported $100 million from investors including Ashton Kutcher, Kevin Durant, Matthew McConaughey, Alphabet's Eric Schmidt, and Salesforce's Marc Benioff.

In addition to the new outpost in Los Angeles, Forward has launched a mobile doctor's office built on an 18-foot-long trailer bed. The truck is expected to roll through additional cities.

I toured Forward's location in San Francisco earlier this year. Here's what it was like.

SEE ALSO: After trying One Medical, I could never use a regular doctor again

This is how Silicon Valley does the doctor's office.

In 2015, Aoun was riding his bike to Google's offices in Menlo Park — where he worked on artificial intelligence and ran the special projects division at Alphabet — when he got a call.

"Don't freak out, but I'm having a heart attack," his thirty-something relative said over the sounds of sirens blaring. "I'm in an ambulance on my way to the hospital. So what do I do?"

After months of doctor appointments, phone calls with billing offices and insurance companies, and countless hours spent on Google trying to figure out what all the jargon meant, Aoun became frustrated by how difficult the healthcare system was to navigate.

"Doctors are kind of awesome. They're incredibly smart. They're crazy well-educated. They mean well," Aoun told Business Insider. "But the problem is, they're totally set up for failure."

"It's kind of not their fault as much as, I would actually argue, it's my fault," he said. "[If I'm] representing the engineering community, we totally dropped the ball."

His relative's near-death experience was an eye-opener, Aoun told Business Insider. He set out to make the healthcare system more predictable, consistent, and convenient.

He assembled a team of some of the most brilliant minds in Silicon Valley, including one of his cofounders, Ilya Abyzov, an early Uber employee who helped launch UberX.

Founded in 2016, Forward makes over every touch point in healthcare. The company's engineers built things like diagnostics tools and a mobile app that patients use to book appointments. The technology creates a better user experience for members and their doctors, according to Aaliya Yaqub, a Forward physician and Facebook Health Center alumna.

Forward's vision has made an impression on venture capitalists. Its investors include Khosla Ventures, Peter Thiel's Founders Fund, Eric Schmidt, and Marc Benioff.

Forward's flagship location, which opened January 17, mimics the look and feel of an Apple Store. When members arrive, they sign in on an iPad at the reception desk.

• Senate Republicans added an amendment to the Trump-backed GOP tax plan that would cut craft brewers' excise tax in half. 
• The craft-beer industry has been fighting to cut taxes for years. 
• According to a craft-beer industry leader, this would be "monumental" if passed. 

The GOP tax plan could slash a tax on craft beer in half. 

The long list of changes that Senate Republicans made to their tax plan Tuesday night includes an amendment that reduces craft brewers' excise tax from $7 per barrel to just $3.50 per barrel on their first 60,000 barrels.

That effectively halves almost every American craft brewers' tax rate, dropping to 22.6 cents a gallon from roughly 58 cents a gallon. 

"If that amendment ... were to become law, it would be monumental for small and independent craft brewers," Bob Pease, the CEO of the Brewers Association, told Business Insider. 

The amendment would also cut excise taxes for bigger brewers from $18 a barrel to $16 a barrel.

Originally, Pease said, craft brewers pushed for tax reduction exclusively for small, independent brewers, but they found more congressional support when Big Beer also had something to gain. 

Craft brewers have been fighting for this change for years. The amendment added on Tuesday is a variation on legislation that was introduced previously but hadn't yet passed, despite garnering support from the majority of US senators. 

However, don't expect prices on your favorite beers to drop just because they're paying less in taxes. According to Pease, craft brewers see this as a way to reinvest more money into their businesses, rather than reduce beer prices. 

"When small and independent brewers make more beer, they hire more workers," Pease said. "Our members, our segment have created 130,000 jobs in the last 25 years."

SEE ALSO: Here are all the changes Amazon is making to Whole Foods

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: We visited the 'McDonald's of Russia' that's trying to take over America — here's what it was like

Someday, I might hail a flying Uber car or climb aboard the Hyperloop for transportation from San Francisco to Los Angeles. In the meantime, a sleepaway bus offers a good alternative.

Founded in 2016, Cabin (formerly known as SleepBus) recently launched a chartered bus service between SF and LA that allows passengers to fall asleep in one city and wake up in the next — for about $100 one-way. The logistics are a no-brainer: Get in, grab a bunk, and snooze.

The flat rate makes it more affordable than flying and potentially more convenient than driving, but only if you can handle the tight quarters and 23 passengers aboard the double-decker bus.

Last weekend, I had the chance to try Cabin on a return trip from LA to SF. Here's how it went.

SEE ALSO: Audi is taking on Enterprise and Hertz with a rental service that delivers luxury cars to your door — here's what it's like

Los Angeles is my own personal "Carmageddon." I don't make it down there as much as I would like, because the six-hour drive is inconvenient and traffic can be very stressful.

Of course, I could fly. But it's not cheap and often takes just as long. A round trip flight booked about a month in advance will set you back at least $100, after tax and fees.

Then I discovered Cabin. Entrepreneurs Tom Currier and Gaetano Crupi started the company in 2016 when they saw a need for better budget travel between cities.

• Social media star Jake Paul has reportedly bought a new mansion in Calabasas, CA.
• It covers 15,000 square feet over 3.5 acres, and he paid $6.9 million for it.
• Paul had previously stirred up controversy by annoying his neighbors.

20-year-old social media star Jake Paul has a habit of annoying his neighbors, so anyone who lives near his new, $6.9 million mansion in Calabasas should be on high alert.

Before Paul reportedly bought it, the home had been listed for $7.395 million, according to the Los Angeles Times. 

Paul, who became famous by making short videos on the now-defunct social media platform Vine, has built a following of over 11 million subscribers on YouTube. He also acts on the Disney Channel show "Bizaardvark" and started a management company for social media personalities.

After he claimed that his neighbors tried to kill him in July, it makes sense that Paul would be looking for a new home. 

Here's what his new, 15,000-square-foot mansion looks like. 

SEE ALSO: 6 things to know about Jake Paul – the viral video star who's at war with his neighbors

The mansion sits on a total of 3.5 acres of land.

Source: Open Listings

Built in 1990, the house features incredibly high ceilings and large rooms.

The entrance leads to a spiral staircase that rises three stories.

The last year has been huge for Serena Williams and Alexis Ohanian. 

Since last December, the tennis superstar and the Reddit cofounder, respectively, found out they were expecting a child, got engaged, and are about to get married.

But things weren't always perfect. In fact, when they first met, Williams tried to get Ohanian to go away by telling him there was a rat nearby. 

In the July cover story of Vanity Fair, writer Buzz Bissinger got the inside look at their love story. That, along with Instagram sleuthing, helped us compile the story of Ohanian and Williams' whirlwind romance. 

Here's how this power couple from opposite worlds fell in love. 

SEE ALSO: Reddit's founder thought people in Silicon Valley were the hardest workers — until he met his fiancée, Serena Williams

The pair met in May 2015 at the Hotel Cavalieri Hilton in Rome, when Ohanian sat down at the table next to Williams' outside by the pool, according to Vanity Fair. Williams and her friends tried to get him to leave by telling him there was a rat at his table. When it didn't work, they invited him to join them.

Source: Vanity Fair

Williams had never heard of Reddit before, and Ohanian had never watched Williams play tennis, but he agreed to come to the match later that day. He knew so little about the sport that the first photo he shared publicly of Williams shows her committing a foot fault.

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Source: Instagram, Vanity Fair

When they met, Ohanian had just gotten out of a five-year relationship with his college sweetheart, microbiologist Sabriya Stukes.

Source: The New York Times, Vanity Fair

• Google is famous for throwing tons of perks at its employees.

• The tech giant's company benefits currently have a 4.6 out of 5 star rating on Glassdoor.

• Current and former Googlers especially praise the free food and 401k plan.

Google pulls out all the stops when it comes to attracting top talent.

Current and former employees have taken to job site Glassdoor to discuss some of their favorite perks. Overall, reviewers gave the company's benefits a 4.6 out of 5 stars. Employees praised everything from the company's parental leave policy to the tons of free meals they get at work.

Here are some of the perks Googlers mentioned on Glassdoor:

SEE ALSO: 11 insane perks Amazon is offering its newest employees

DON'T MISS: 30 incredible perks companies like IKEA, Facebook, and Goldman Sachs offer their employees

First year engineers get 15 days of paid time off — that jumps to 20 days after three years and 25 days after five years. And anyone can take an unpaid three month leave of absence.

New mothers get paid leave up to 22 weeks, while fathers and adoptive parents get between seven and 12 weeks of paid leave. One senior software engineer wrote the benefit "...helps create an understanding that any team member might go on leave now and again, and that this is expected and normal and okay."

Source: Glassdoor

Google offers a 50% 401k match up to $8,250.

Source: Glassdoor

• Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk was interviewed for an intensely candid Rolling Stone profile.

• He discussed his views on relationships and loneliness.

• Musk has been married twice, and recently split from his girlfriend actress Amber Heard.

Elon Musk got candid about his personal life in a recent, in-depth Rolling Stone interview.

He spoke of his recent breakup with ex-girlfriend Amber Heard, expressing his heartbreak over their parting.

It's an usual move for Musk, who said in 2010 that he would "rather stick a fork in my hand than write about my personal life."

The CEO of Tesla and SpaceX went on to discuss how difficult it is for him to meet people, saying he is looking for a long-term relationship — and a soul mate. Musk even asked interviewer Neil Strauss if there was anyone Strauss thought he should date.

"If I'm not in love, if I'm not with a long-term companion, I cannot be happy," he told Rolling Stone. "I will never be happy without having someone. Going to sleep alone kills me. It's not like I don't know what that feels like: Being in a big empty house, and the footsteps echoing through the hallway, no one there – and no one on the pillow next to you. F--. How do you make yourself happy in a situation like that?"

Here's a look at some of the tech titan's past relationships:

SEE ALSO: A look inside the marriage of world's richest couple, Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos — who met at work, were engaged in 3 months, and own more land than almost anyone else in America

DON'T MISS: A look at the demanding schedule of Elon Musk, who works in 5-minute slots, skips breakfast, and largely avoids emails

Musk told Rolling Stone he's struggled with loneliness since childhood. "When I was a child, there's one thing I said," Musk said. "'I never want to be alone.'"

Source: Rolling Stone, Business Insider

Musk met his first wife, Justine Wilson, at Queen's University in Ontario. Writing in Marie Claire, Justine — who uses Musk's last name — recalled Musk invited her out for ice cream.

Source: Marie Claire

She decided to stay in to study, but he showed up with "two chocolate-chip ice cream cones dripping down his hands." Musk transferred to Wharton, but kept sending Justine roses. They went their separate ways, but reconnected as Musk started working on his first startup and Justine started working on her first novel after graduation.

Source: Marie Claire

President Donald Trump has spent the last 10 months meeting numerous world leaders, and he's (almost) never shied away from greeting them with a handshake — often in over-the-top, awkward ways.

Trump, who reportedly is a huge germaphobe, once called handshakes "barbaric," citing fears that handshakes could transmit the flu and a host of other diseases. But as president, shaking hands is unavoidable, and Trump has developed his own signature approach to it on the international stage.

Here are 12 of the most satisfyingly awkward handshakes Trump has exchanged with world leaders:

SEE ALSO: A body language expert breaks down 6 of Trump's handshakes

DON'T MISS: Trump and Macron had an awkward, white-knuckled handshake — and the internet went nuts

Trump just got back from the Philippines, where he attended the ASEAN summit with other regional leaders. Everyone on stage was instructed to do the "ASEAN-way" handshake, and apparently Trump, Vietnam's Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc, and Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte had a bit of trouble with it at first.

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Trump's first handshake with a world leader after being elected was with none other than President Barack Obama. While the handshake itself was pretty normal, the lack of eye contact and the obvious tension between the two made for an awkward interaction.

Word spread quickly about Trump's bizarrely long and domineering handshaking style soon after he took office. Here, Trump ensnared Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in a marathon 19-second handshake.

Abe's perplexed expression in the handshake's aftermath spread online and on TV talks shows like wildfire.

• Restaurant reservation website OpenTable just announced its list of the 100 best restaurants for group dining.
• 20 of those restaurants are located in New York City.
• The list was determined by the frequency with which users marked restaurants as being "great for groups."

Nothing can ruin an extended family gathering like slow service or messed-up orders at a restaurant that has trouble accommodating large parties. With the holidays near, it will be even more important that diners find restaurants that won't leave their families restless.

Reservation website OpenTable just released its 2017 list of the 100 best restaurants for group dining in the United States. The list was generated from over 10 million user reviews, and restaurants were chosen based on the percentage of reviews that included the "great for groups" designation. You can see the full list here.

New York City topped the list with 20 restaurants. Here are the ones that made the cut. 

SEE ALSO: These are the 10 highest-grossing restaurants in America

ABC Kitchen

The vegetarian-friendly restaurant sources many of its ingredients locally and makes sure that none are produced with pesticides or GMOs.

Balthazar

Located in SoHo, Balthazar is known for baking its own bread and pastries.

Beauty & Essex

This restaurant's Lower East Side location includes a fully functioning pawn shop, which customers pass through before reaching the dining area.

• Spanx is now selling "arm tights."
• People on Twitter are baffled and annoyed by the product. 
• However, there seems to have been a demand for "Spanx for arms." 

Spanx is now selling "arm tights." 

The new line launched in late September and does what traditional Spanx do — smush any excess fat together, suction it in, and smooth it out — but for your arms instead of your thighs. The crop top "tights" are priced from $30 to $34 on Spanx's website. 

Arm tights had a relatively quiet launch. However, now that Spanx is advertising the semi-sheer sausage casings for your arms to a greater degree, the backlash has begun. 

Spanx did not respond to our request for comment, but to be completely honest, we were baffled by this invention. Who would want to shrink-wrap two more appendages in semi-see-through Spanx just as sweater season was starting? 

However, before Spanx announced its "arm tights," people were singing a different tune. 

In late September, a quick search on Twitter to gauge the general reaction to arm tights didn't turn up much regarding the new product, but there were seemingly endless inquiries as to whether there were Spanx made for arms. 

Spanx obviously knew that there was enough demand to weather any backlash when the company filed a patent for "arm tights" on April 20, 2017.

Spanx founder Sara Blakely has made a fortune by giving women what they want: a comfortable way to address one of their biggest bodily insecurities. Now, it looks like Spanx is targeting another one.

SEE ALSO: Here are all the changes Amazon is making to Whole Foods

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Here's the meaning behind all of those obscure IKEA product names

When there's drinking involved, your bad habits tend to be amplified.

As one bartender told Business Insider, "We are people too. How would you feel if we came to your job and did the things you do to us?"

If you have any sympathy for your bartender, you'd make an effort to do better.

To help you out, we asked bartenders everywhere to share the annoying things they wish customers would stop doing, and more than 30 were happy to chime in.

Here are 19 things you may not have even known you were doing wrong this whole time.

SEE ALSO: A bartender says there's a disgusting reason to order beer or wine over cocktails

DON'T MISS: Bartenders reveal what customers' drink orders say about them

Clicking or snapping your fingers at them

"Say excuse me, politely putting your hand up without waving it in the air. Just wait your turn. We see you, I promise. Never snap your fingers."

Yelling at bartenders to get a drink made right away

"You're not the only customer in the bar, so we'll get to you when we get to you, especially if its busy."

Waving to get the bartender's attention

"The finger wave must have originated in the 7th circle of hell."

"We see you. No need to wave or do weird hand gestures."

• The holiday season is the busiest time of the year for stores.
• Black Friday, the weekend before Christmas, and the days right before Christmas are the busiest times. 
• December 13 is the least-crowded day for stores during the holiday season.

For many shoppers, dread sets in at the thought of having to brave the holiday-shopping crowds. 

Black Friday crowds and the before-Christmas rush are top of mind during any mall trip in mid-December. For shoppers looking to avoid crowds, InMarket has data on the most- and least-crowded days in stores. 

InMarket uses Bluetooth beacons to connect with shoppers' smartphones, and because of that they have store traffic data from 50 million consumers from last year's holiday shopping period. For customers looking for a calm in the storm, December 13 seems to be the best day to shop in stores — assuming this year looks anything like last year.

December 13 is smack in the middle of the month. Too late for early shoppers and too early for those who wait until the past minute, the date lands in a happy middle period. Call it the calm before the storm.

The data also shows that conventional wisdom holds true, as Black Friday, the weekend before Christmas, and the day right before Christmas end up being the busiest in stores.

SEE ALSO: How to know if you're getting a good deal on Black Friday

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: We went inside a Shake Shack kitchen and they showed us how to make their famous burgers

• Travel + Leisure named Canada its "destination of the year. "
• Canada has many beautiful cities and national parks worth visiting.
• The country made entrance to its parks free for all of 2017. 

Canada is calling.

On Thursday, Travel + Leisure magazine named Canada its "destination of the year."

"The country has ... distinguished itself during a particularly divisive time as a welcome unifier of communities and cultures," Editor in Chief Nathan Lump said in a statement. "It also delivers on some of the key attributes most appreciated by global travelers today—unspoiled natural environments, dynamic cities, creative food and art scenes.”

One reason: the Canadian government has made it free to visit any of the country's more than 200 national parks, historic sites, and marine conservation areas for all of 2017, in honor of its 150th anniversary of confederation.

Another reason is that the weak Canadian dollar makes it an especially economical destination for American travelers.

The timing is appropriate. Just after the US presidential election last November, many Americans were looking for ways to move to Canada and become citizens. The Government of Canada's immigration website even crashed as the US election results came in.

So whether you're leaving your home country for good or just looking to get away for a while, here are 16 things to do in the Great White North.

SEE ALSO: This travel expert says he never leaves home without a Rolex — but it's not just to tell time

With a population of about 2.6 million, Toronto is Canada's largest city, with world-class restaurants, museums, universities and historic districts.

Dine on inventive small plates at Chef Lorenzo Loseto's George Restaurant, one of the best restaurants in Toronto. Menu highlights include an ahi tuna wrapped in sweet potato and a Cornish hen served with goat cheese and broccoli.

If skiing is your hobby of choice, Whistler in British Columbia has some of the best slopes in the world.