Vacation isn't cheap — particularly if you're traveling to Cape Cod, a popular East Coast vacation spot that also happens to be one of the most expensive US summer destinations.

But when you're a regular, you eventually find the freebies, bargains, and things worth spending money on.

My family has been going to Cape Cod since 1952, when my great-great-grandmother Lyla Flagler retired in Falmouth. She was the town's oldest citizen when she died at 101, and it was her hope that my family would continue coming out to the Cape.

We've been doing just that, spending summertime in Cotuit, Massachusetts, since before I can remember.

I rounded up 13 affordable places on the Cape that I think are must-see's. While this is far from a comprehensive list, it's a good starting point based on the 23 summers I've spent there.

Spend a summer evening eating Crackerjacks and hot dogs at the ballpark. Cape Cod has a highly competitive collegiate summer league, and games are played nearly every night from June to August. We root for the Cotuit Kettleers, but there are nine other teams scattered across the Cape. The best part about summer baseball on the Cape: Admission is free!

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Check out the full 2016 schedule.

Stop by the legendary Four Seas Ice Cream in Centerville for a pint of ice cream (by far the best deal at only $5!) and side of the rich hot fudge. It's a cash-only joint, but there's an ATM in the parking lot. If that doesn't satisfy your sweet tooth, head over to the 1856 Country Store, a penny candy spot right around the corner.

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Check out the full list of Four Seas flavors (I recommend peppermint stick).

Take a day trip to Provincetown, a town at the very tip of Cape Cod. The water is gorgeous, the narrow, cobble-stoned streets are lively, and restaurant options are endless. If you're up for an adventure, you can always catch a whale watching boat and spend a few hours scouring the sea for marine life.

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Learn more about whale watching in Provincetown here and here.

The Business Insider 100: The Creators is a testament to businesses and leaders who have pushed the envelope and made customers, employees, and society a priority in addition to shareholders. 

Though success is often defined by wealth, the leaders on our Creators list have achieved great heights through innovative products, care for their customers and employees, and respect for the rest of the world. 

Read on to see how 40 of these visionaries approach success, business, and making an impact on society — in their own words.

SEE ALSO: BI 100: The Creators

DON'T MISS: 105 inspirational quotes from the most successful people in the world

"The antidote to inequality is equality. The question is how do you achieve equality? I believe that for business, which is where I can speak, we have to shift from shareholder maximization to stakeholder maximization. And when we only focus on our shareholders, that's when it becomes very limiting and that's when we can draw fire from other stakeholders."— Marc Benioff, Salesforce

Source.

"We can all be as groovy as we want to be, but the ultimate form of sustainability is being able to keep the doors open. ... Having that vision that has a deeply embedded purpose to it helps to ground you, and having that commitment to making sure that the literal sustainability of the company goes forward — you need that combination."— Kim Jordan, New Belgium Brewing Company

Source.

"Obviously everyone wants to be successful, but I want to be looked back on as being very innovative, very trusted and ethical and ultimately making a big difference in the world."— Sergey Brin, Google

Source.

Before air travel became commonplace, cruise ships were the only way to travel vast distances.

If you had the money, these ships (which you would spend weeks and months on) were the epitome of class and luxury.

Sure, nowadays cruise ships boast planetariums and zip lines, but what these floating malls lack is the elegance of yesteryear.

Take a look at these stunning pictures of cruise ships in their glory days.

Ocean travel used to be a luxurious affair.

If you could afford the upper decks, that is.

Ships were built with painstaking attention to detail, and meant to resemble the finest hotels on dry land.

Breaking: This is a miserable presidential election.

The tone has gotten ugly in ways that are painful and difficult to watch. It's hard to imagine it not impacting the national mood. And a Harris poll commissioned by the American Psychological Association confirms it: 52% of US adults "report the 2016 election is a very or somewhat significant source of stress."

The effect appears powerful among Democrats, Republicans, males, females, the young, and the old. At least we can all agree on this, it seems: We're very stressed out about this election. 

The only demographic factor that makes a major difference in stress levels: Engagement with social media. Fifty-four percent of social media users say the election is a stressor in their lives, while a still-large 45% of non-users say the same.

Stress isn't a joke. It measurably shortens your life. Here are some tips the APA offers for dealing with it:

SEE ALSO: Scientists figured out when bragging can help you, and when you should stay humble

Turn off the TV and Facebook; read "just enough to stay informed."

"If the 24-hour news cycle of claims and counterclaims from the candidates is causing you stress," the APA writes, "limit your media consumption. Read just enough to stay informed. Turn off the newsfeed or take a digital break. Take some time for yourself, go for a walk, or spend time with friends and family doing things that you enjoy."

Stay away from pointless arguments.

"Avoid getting into discussions about the election if you think they have the potential to escalate to conflict. Be cognizant of the frequency with which you’re discussing the election with friends, family members or coworkers,"writes the APA.

Focus on making a positive impact on the world.

"Stress and anxiety about what might happen is not productive. Channel your concerns to make a positive difference on issues you care about. Consider volunteering in your community, advocating for an issue you support or joining a local group. Remember that in addition to the presidential election, there are state and local elections taking place in many parts of the country, providing more opportunities for civic involvement."

Americans are searching for weed more than ever, according to Google trends.

What are they searching for, when, and where? Let’s find out.

SEE ALSO: Americans have radically changed the views on weed in the past 25 years

DON'T MISS: Google reveals the biggest stars on 'Game of Thrones'

Interest in cannabis is rising in the US (note: we’re looking at all weed-related searches here, as grouped by Google machine learning).

Interest is highest in Colorado, Washington, Maine, Michigan, and Alaska. It’s lowest in Utah.

Not California? If you go to the metro level, Eureka, Calif. comes out far on top, with Chico-Redding, Calif. in fourth. (Roanoke-Lynchburg, Va. is last).

The United States has a $18 trillion economy, which makes it the world’s largest by GDP.

To show its tremendous size, we previously published a visualization of the global economy that carved the world’s economic production into slices based on each country’s contribution to GDP. While this visualization helps to show how large the U.S. economy is in comparison to other nations, it still doesn’t seem to tell the full story.

After all, the United States is geographically vast and diverse, and population is spread out and unevenly distributed. This means production and innovation are both concentrated in some areas of the country, while other parts are clearly more rural.

How can we account for these differences to get a more accurate view of the U.S. economic engine?

Luckily, Mark J. Perry from AEI’s Carpe Diem blog has done some heavy lifting here to help us better understand the size and scope of America’s economy activity.

Here’s three maps that will make you think:

The first map redraws state borders to make seven “mega-states” that each have individual economies the size of major countries. California, for example, has an economy the size of France. The whole Northeast has an economy the size of Japan, and so on.

But even states are very diverse in geography – for example, Arizona has 6.7 million people, but more than two-thirds of those people live in the Phoenix metro area.

The second map compares the economies of metropolitan areas with entire countries. As you can see, the aforementioned Phoenix metro area has similar economic output to Portugal.

Meanwhile, the whole corridor from New York through to Washington, D.C. is as big as Canada, Iran, Czech Republic, and Sweden combined.

The final map builds on this idea, showing that half of America’s economic output comes just from a selection of metropolitan areas. The other half of America’s $18 trillion economy is based in the large swaths of land in between, including thousands of rural areas, villages, towns, and cities.

The American McMansion is officially a dying breed of architectural design, which is good news for those who consider the unnecessarily massive, and disproportionate homes an eyesore.

The blog Worst of McMansions, also known as McMansion Hell by its URL, has taken on the daunting task of chronicling these monstrosities and helping the general public understand exactly what makes these homes so hidious.

The anonymous author, who simply goes by "Kate," studied architectural acoustics and has been writing about architecture for six years. We've asked "Kate" to gather what she considers to be the ugliest McMansions built in the last five years. Below is her list, accompanied by her own commentary in quotes.

20. Loudoun Co, VA

"Huzzah! Money can actually buy taste! Loudoun County, the wealthiest county in the country, is at the very bottom of the Top 20 List, with this cheap, remarkably boring tract home."

19. Hunterdon Co, NJ

"Another tract house hub, as evidenced by this dated, low-budget estate."

18. Prince William Co, VA

"Tract house or cult compound? You decide!"

No matter what, the major Hollywood blockbusters are always going to dominate the conversation.

After all, films like Finding Dory, Captain America: Civil War and Zootopia attracted such broad audiences this year that all three Disney-owned properties managed to crack the $1 billion mark worldwide. Although those films were largely lauded by critics and fans, there is a growing disparity between releases that sit atop the box office charts and those that frequent critics’ lists.

Sometimes, this is the result of a film’s subject material just being too bizarre or offbeat to earn the attention of the masses or perhaps it’s simply because the distributor lacks the marketing budget to effectively build up anticipation.

Whatever the case may be, we’re turning our attention to the 2016 films that many of you may have missed so far this year. First, a few ground rules: We’re including both major studio releases that underperformed at the box office and indie darlings that failed to break into the mainstream. More specifically, qualifying films must have received at least a limited theatrical run in 2016 and grossed less than $50 million domestically. Now, let’s the spotlight on these under-seen gems.

Here are the 17 best movies of 2016 you haven’t seen:

SEE ALSO: The 10 best movies since 2000, according to critics

17. "Swiss Army Man"

Starting things off, we have a film that may very well be among the most divisive films of the year. Soon after its premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, Swiss Army Manbecame known as Paul Dano and Daniel Radcliffe’s “farting corpse movie” and elicited such a mixed reaction from the crowd there that some viewers walked out of the screening. However, for those that do appreciate the film’s twisted sense of humor and darkly powerful third-act twist, Swiss Army Man offers a distinct viewing experience that invites viewers to unravel the subtext in search of even deeper layers of meaning.

Filmmakers Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert — credited as simply “Daniels” — make an incredibly ambitious debut here, and the film features what many are calling Radcliffe’s best performance to date. If there’s one role we never thought we’d see the former Harry Potter take on, it’s that of a flatulent corpse. That certainly should count for something.

16. "Don't Think Twice"

Comedian Mike Birbiglia wrote, directed and stars in this comedy-drama centering on a New York-based improv troupe that begins to crumble when one of the comics (Keegan-Michael Key) is selected to join the cast of a Saturday Night Live-esque sketch show. Gillian Jacobs, Kate Micucci, Tami Sagher and Chris Gethard round out the main cast of Don’t Think Twice and riff off of each other beautifully as this all-too-common scenario plays out.

Praised for its hilarious script and poignant subject matter, the film has received universal praise from critics for balancing its delicate tone and capturing the fragile dynamic between performers and friends all striving to “make it big.” Prior to Don’t Think Twice, Birbiglia’s only directorial credit was the 2012 indie comedy Sleepwalk with Me, but given the unanimous love for his latest film, we’re betting it won’t take long for him to step behind the camera again.

15. "Hail, Caesar!"

Joel and Ethan Coen are routinely cited as two of the best filmmakers working today. Much like their early hit Barton Fink (which is also connected to the fictional Capitol Pictures), Hail, Caesar! examines the life of those in the movie business, albeit from the perspective of a studio fixer (Josh Brolin) tasked with locating the leading man (George Clooney) of an upcoming Roman-set epic.

Part screwball comedy and part genuine satire of the Hollywood system, Hail, Caesar! unites a large group of gifted actors — including Ralph Fiennes, Scarlett Johansson, Jonah Hill, Channing Tatum, Tilda Swinton and Frances McDormand — to play one outlandish character after another. Moreover, it introduced the world to Alden Ehrenreich, the young actor who nabbed the role of Han Solo in the upcoming Star Wars spinoff film. It might not be one of the Coens’ finest hours at the box office, earning just $30 million domestically, but it was enough for Hail, Caesar! to become a modest hit during its theatrical run.

In November 2015, Rebecca Greene spent two weeks working nonstop on a big undertaking: revamping Handy's culture. 

Handy launched in 2012 with a simple promise: busy professionals could book home cleaning services from an app, and the company would match that demand with workers who wanted to clean houses.

Greene, vice president of growth at the home-cleaning startup, joined in 2014 and quickly rose through the ranks to become one of the first women on Handy's executive team in summer 2015. She had watched the company grow rapidly and secure millions in funding.

But the company had some well-publicized customer satisfaction glitches, and internally it was a mess. 

Several former employees who spoke with Business Insider described a hard-partying workplace that evolved into a workaholic culture. The company didn't have an HR department. And some of Handy's cleaners were disgruntled at being classified as independent contractors, yet forced to adhere to strict rules.

It was time for a change. 

"There’s one thing when you’re trying to build a company and it’s another thing when you’re trying to build an org and a culture," Greene told Business Insider. "When I joined Handy, it was much more about the business opportunity and how are we going to accomplish the business goals, and a lot less about, ‘Wait a second, how is the org going to run? How are the people going to feel? How are we going to motivate them to get to this vision?’"

Greene's work produced a culture deck that's more than 90 slides long (duplicated below).

At the same time, the company paused its rapid growth, taking more than six months to focus on unit economics, improving the customer experience, and improving how it gets workers on board. Handy points to this as something of a turning point for the company: its first foray into defining what Handy stands for, changing its image from a hard-partying startup to a more mature company, and working to build a more sustainable business. 

A high-pressure, all-work environment

Greene started working on Handy's culture at a seminal time for the company. Handy had just raised its Series C, a $50 million round that put the company's valuation around $500 million. Handy was operating in 28 cities in the US and three more internationally, had activated more than 50,000 professional cleaners on its platform, and had well over 100 employees. 

But there were some big challenges to overcome. 

Handy has long been hounded by complaints about its customer service — the company began outsourcing its customer service centers to Missouri and Florida in 2014 — and was sued by two of its professionals for labor violations in 2014. Handy is also now facing a lawsuit in Washington, DC, over how it vets its pros and its process of automatically enrolling customers in repeat cleanings. 

In October 2014, a woman named Amanda Tomas wrote about her experience interviewing at "the service economy startup from hell"— Handy. Tomas' account describes a disorganized and frantic atmosphere, where racist and sexual jokes were encouraged and employees showed up drunk.

About a year later, Slate's Alison Griswold took a close look at Handy, uncovering infighting, a company that had seemingly grown too quickly, and a culture that was both "elitist and boorish." 

Business Insider spoke with six former Handy employees, all of whom wished to remain anonymous. 

A former customer experience employee who worked at Handy until the fall of 2014, well before the company's culture revamp, described grueling hours, low pay, and a company that desperately needed a human resources department. 

"The company seemed to think that happy hours were an easy (and cheap) way to make us happy without paying us more," the employee wrote in an email. "Imagine if you're underpaid and overworked and the person responsible is like, 'How about unlimited alcohol?' That doesn't really fix the issue, but it helps."

The same employee said working at Handy was a good experience overall, but that the pressure to perform grew over time. 

"At first, there was not a lot of pressure because we weren't under the gun from investors," the employee explained. "But as the rounds of funding grew, so did the expectations."

A former Handy engineer who left in the winter of 2015 described a pressure cooker environment.

"The company has evolved a lot from the days of lewd jokes and excessive parties," this person said, describing a new culture of "all work, no sleep" that was "way too strenuous for heavy partying."

Another engineer who worked at the company until 2016 described something similar:

"Starting this year, happy hours and team-building events began silently vanishing from calendars and being replaced with mock-fun, engineering-exclusive events such as work 'hackathons' or 'bug bash' events," the former employee wrote. "The frat boy partying culture was essentially replaced by a conservative good ol' boys culture that lacked any sense of fun."

Several former employees also told Business Insider that they were asked to monitor their fellow employees and provide feedback to their superiors. 

But other insiders dismiss some of these claims as overblown. One former employee in the engineering department who was let go from Handy this year described the changes as "not very popular, but needed."

"I think most of the decisions management made were the right ones for Handy," the former employee wrote. "A lot of young employees...don't understand that startups are not families, but high-performance sports teams where people come and go depending on the strategy and the competition."

Pausing expansion

Handy's cofounder and CEO Oisin Hanrahan acknowledges that the company has had culture issues in the past, but says things have improved.

"We’ve really, in the last few years, invested a lot in bringing in folks to focus on HR and people operations and really help us build that out," Hanrahan told Business Insider. "Should we have spent more time on thinking about culture early on? Yeah, absolutely."

Hanrahan points to several initiatives that have improved company culture since the early days, including the culture deck, regular retreats, and hiring a top HR person. 

But the biggest change may be the decision to slow down.

After its Series C, Handy took a pause on expanding to new cities, slowing the rapid pace it had been sustaining since its inception in 2012. That decision was a hard one, Greene says. 

"It sounds so obvious to say, ‘Oh yeah, you grew a lot, you’re kind of winning from a competitive standpoint, you’ve just raised a bunch of money, it’s low pressure, go make the customer experience much, much better,’" she said. "For me, it was hard personally to see all the day-to-day growth metrics that you used to look at and be motivated by constantly, you now have to think about a different set of longer-term growth metrics."

Hanrahan says that Handy decided to slow down to focus on making the unit economics of the business better. "We definitely made mistakes, particularly around just how challenging it is to build certain parts of the business, whether that was operations or customer service," he said.

"Once we had gotten to a world where we had shown ourselves to be a leader in the category in the cities we were in, we started to shift focus and we started to say, 'OK, let’s really think about unit economics."

Since November, the company has focused on automating customer service, tightening up its teams, building the self-service capabilities, and automating the process to onboard new professionals. 

Now, Handy is ready to shift focus again: away from unit economics and toward profitability. Handy says it's growth margin positive in all 28 of its cities.

"We would love to see Handy become profitable next year," Hanrahan said. "We’re really excited about the place we’ve put Handy in. We’re really excited that we’ve got strong retention on the customer side, we’ve got great unit economics. I think the next few months are just going to be about continuing to drive toward that goal of profitability."

Here's the culture deck that Handy began distributing in late 2015:

My very first car was a 1997 Subaru Forester and all it came with was a simple turn key that both started the car and unlocked the door.

But keys have come a long way since even my early driving days. Some automakers have ditched the classic key altogether for high-tech fobs, while others are giving classic keys an aesthetic upgrade.

Here are some of our favorites:

SEE ALSO: RANKED: The 15 best car innovations of 2016 so far

The BMW 7-series' key has a full-color touch screen.

It's only suiting that a car as high-tech as the BMW 7-series would come with a key fob to match it.

It comes with four buttons to lock and unlock the car, pop open the trunk, and panic. But it also comes with a full-color 2.2-inch touch screen that lets you swipe to see information like whether all the doors are locked and your current fuel range.

You can also use the key to control the climate in the car and toggle the lights. But by far the coolest part is that you can use it to park the car remotely.

Tesla's Model S key can be used to summon the car.

Tesla's key fob was actually designed to look like a mini Tesla Model S

In addition to locking and unlocking the car doors, the Tesla key can be used to tell the car to pull forward and backward, all from a semi-remote distance and without anyone inside of the car.

Koenigsegg's shield fob looks like something a superhero would carry.

When locking and unlocking the doors of a Koenigsegg, you'll need something that can make as big of a statement as the car itself. 

Koenigsegg's metal shield key doesn't have any hugely crazy special features, but what it can give you is the sense of authority and a firm reminder that you drive an insane Swedish supercar. 

If driving one of these insane supercars doesn't give you the thrill or feel of power you were looking for, holding this awesome shield key fob just might.

When I reviewed the mesh WiFi system from startup Eero back in May, I was instantly impressed. Unlike many so-called WiFi range extenders, multiple Eero routers cover my whole home in good, speedy, reliable WiFi.

But now there's a new kid on the block. It's called Orbi, it comes to you from WiFi veteran Netgear. Orbi spreads faster and more consistent WiFi speeds than the Eero throughout my home.

At first glance, it seems like the Orbi is set to dethrone Eero as king of the routers because of its sheer performance, but a few important factors reel the Orbi back into a more humble position.

SEE ALSO: This clever router will solve all your WiFi problems

Netgear's Orbi WiFi mesh router works in much the same way as the Eero.

You connect the main Orbi unit to your modem, then wirelessly connect multiple Orbi satellite units to that main unit that's connected to your modem. It works just like a regular WiFi router and range extenders, which have been around for years.

But unlike a regular WiFi range extender, the Orbi satellites don't cut your speeds in half. On top of that, the transition between Orbi units as you walk around your home is much smoother than it is with a regular WiFi extender. So, for example, your Skype call won't be interrupted as much — if at all — if you move around your home while your device connects to different Orbis.

However, the Orbi differentiates itself from the Eero in one key way: It creates its own dedicated connection between each Orbi unit to transmit internet data.

The Orbi is a "tri-band" router, which means it has three bands. Two of those bands are the usual 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands you connect your devices to.

The third band is a dedicated connection for the Orbi units to transmit internet data streams between each other, which Netgear claims won't clog up the regular 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands you connect to and makes for faster, more reliable speeds.

The third private Orbi band also addresses a potential issue with loss of internet speeds that Eero users might face if they use a lot of units (around five or more). That means your internet speeds won't be as affected if you use a large number of Orbi units.

To test Netgear's claims, I tested the standard Orbi two-pack against the Eero two-pack in exactly the same places around my home.

The Orbi only comes in a single or two-pack option. The two-pack I tested costs $400 and comes with one base unit and one satellite unit.

The Eero two-pack is $350, and also comes with two units. 

The future of mobility is an exciting frontier that everyone in the automotive world is trying to explore. As a result, companies have taken creative and odd approaches to meet the challenge.

Earlier this year, Toyota gave me the chance to test out their i-Road concept. The i-Road is one of Toyota proposed solutions to solving urban transportation.

To be honest, most of the prospective future mobility offerings I've seen thus far have either been impractical, boring to drive — or just flat out strange.

When it comes to cars, I'm a traditionalist. I love the visceral experience that a great drive can engender. The sound of the engine, the shifting of the gears, and the feedback from the steering. In the right car, it all comes together to create perfection. Although speed is often a fun aspect of a great car, it isn't entirely necessary — you can chase some thrills without eye-tearing 0-60 acceleration.

So it was with a bit of apprehension that I tried out Toyota's i-Road concept. 

In one of the large halls of New York's Javits Center, I got my first look at one of Toyota's "urban mobility solutions."

At first sight, the three-wheeled i-Road is anything but boring. It's not quite what I would call a "car," but it's so much more than an electric scooter with a canopy. What the design allowed Toyota to do was combine the small, nimble characteristics of a scooter with the wet-weather capabilities and driving stability of a small city car. 

After taking some photos of the car, I jumped in for test drive on the twisting indoor course Toyota set up.

SEE ALSO: We drove the most important car McLaren has ever made

With a single headlight, the three-wheeled, electric i-Road looks unlike anything on the road today.

When it comes to future mobility, more conventional solutions like the Chevrolet Bolt EV or ...

... the BMW i8 hybrid sports cars are more in my wheelhouse.

Bobby Neel Adams was 36 when he noticed how much he resembled a picture of himself at age 6. He was inspired to create a composite image, splicing a new photo of himself with the image of him as a kid.

This was back in 1989, so he couldn't use modern techniques.

"In the darkroom I sized up both images to the same proportions and made prints," Adams wrote in an email. "Once these photographs were dry I tore the most recent portrait and laid it on top of the school photo, gluing it down the rubber cement."

Adams continued using the same method for dozens of works in his "Age Map" series. Since then, he has explored other strange techniques, including splicing photos of couples and family members and, most recently, posing dead creatures in beautifully haunting scenes (currently showing in Brooklyn).

Adams shared a set from "Age Maps" below.

SEE ALSO: 10 photo visualizations that reveal hidden worlds

DON'T MISS: Here's how people judge you based on your face

Lorna at 7 and 25

Sally at 14 and 62

Chris at 12 and 45

It is no secret that big-time college sports is a big-money business, and last year no school made more money from its athletics program than Texas A&M University.

In all, there are now 24 schools that make at least $100 million annually from their athletic department, according to data collected from USA Today and the U.S. Department of Education. That is up from 20 a year ago and 13 in 2014.

Here are the 25 schools that make the most revenue off of college sports and where most of the money comes from, including football, men's basketball, and women's basketball revenue, the three sports that typically generate the most money.

25. UCLA — $96.9 million

1-year change: +12.1%

5-year change: +56.6%

Donations: $16.8 million

Licensing/Rights fees: $42.5 million

3-year avg. football revenue: $36.9 million

3-year avg. men's basketball revenue: $12.3 million

3-year avg. women's basketball revenue: $1.8 million

24. Nebraska — $102.2 million

1-year change: +7.8%

5-year change: +39.0%

Donations: $19.7 million

Licensing/Rights fees: $40.7 million

3-year avg. football revenue: $58.9 million

3-year avg. men's basketball revenue: $8.4 million

3-year avg. women's basketball revenue: $1.3 million

23. Washington — $103.5 million

1-year change: +3.3%

5-year change: +61.7%

Donations: $22.8 million

Licensing/Rights fees: $45.9 million

3-year avg. football revenue: $63.7 million

3-year avg. men's basketball revenue: $9.8 million

3-year avg. women's basketball revenue: $1.2 million

The world we see with our eyes is just one view of reality, but microscopes can bring a smaller, practically invisible universe within reach.

Photographs taken through the lenses of a high-power 'scope can reveal lifeforms and objects no person has ever seen.

They also highlight beautiful, artistic, and often shocking details in common objects, like soap bubbles, dried coffee, flowers, and butterfly tongues:

The Nikon Small World contest celebrates the most amazing microscope photos from around the world, and 2016's competition was as amazing as any of the years before it: more than 2,000 entries from 70 countries. (I was a judge for the 40th year of the contest.)

Nikon will release the winners on Wednesday, October 19, via its Instagram account, @NikonInstruments.

Until then, soak in the finalists below — and cast a vote for your favorite.

SEE ALSO: The 20 most incredible microscope photos of 2015

DON'T MISS: 25 of the most iconic images of Earth ever taken from space

Red speckled jewel beetle

Eyes of a jumping spider

Slime mold

I was recently visited by a good friend I went to university with.

He’s still in the field of architecture, and it was the first time we’d seen each other since I’d given up on the industry in favor of entrepreneurship.

During his visit we talked a lot about the Architecture industry as a whole, our biggest problems with it, and why I ultimately decided it wasn’t what I wanted.

I described moments at my job when I was working on designs for a high-end luxury apartment in the Lower East Side and thinking, “If I stay in this job, I will never be able to live like this.”

Not that I dreamt of luxury penthouses and a $70,000 custom millwork closet (yes, this happened), but I did dream of financial freedom and travel, as well as working for myself.

I started a side project, Calm The Ham, which after 18 months of work was making decent money, especially compared to the $40,000 I was making at my job (which does not stretch far living in New York City).

I was only able to work on Calm the Ham on weeknights and weekends, which slowly became harder and harder as I juggled this new life. In the 6 months prior to quitting my more stable job, I kept thinking what if I had the time and resources to make my newer venture full-time.

What could I create if it was my only focus?

Then the negative thoughts would kick in. I don’t have an MBA. I never took a business studies class in high school. What do I know about running and growing a business? I wasn’t about to quit my job, join an MBA program, and then start a business. I didn’t have the time, patience, or money for that.

I needed to learn the basic principles of business, both running and growing one.

I made a reading list for myself of all the business books I had heard about from people I admired or that had been recommended to me personally. I spent $237.91 on 22 books, a hefty investment for me at the time and got reading. 

SEE ALSO: 14 books Mark Zuckerberg thinks everyone should read

Personal Mindset & Inspiration: 'Awaken The Giant Within' by Tony Robbins

An inspirational book by Tony Robbins. Difficult to drill down to one lesson I’ve learned but essentially this book has the potential to change your life.

Find it on Amazon >>

'Outliers' by Malcolm Gladwell

Understanding the true stories of success and how people have thrived. Malcolm Gladwell presents the idea of it taking 10,000 hours to master a skill. I loved the great anecdotes of how hard work and luck (family background, birthplace, or even birth date) can play equally into success.

Find it on Amazon >>

'The Tipping Point' by Malcolm Gladwell

Malcolm Gladwell explores the moment when a trend or idea reaches the magic “tipping point” when it spreads like wildfire.

Find it on Amazon >>

When Jason Pockett joined the TSA in 2010, he said his intentions weren't wholly altruistic.

"In all honesty, what brought me to the TSA was the health insurance and the pay," Pocket told Business Insider.

"I didn't know what TSA really was other than airport security. But once I got there I realized the importance of the job."

Before joining the US Transportation Safety Administration as a transportation security officer, or TSO, Pockett was a youth pastor at a church. He spent two years working as a TSO in California before joining the TSA Academy team at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) in Glynco, Georgia, as a training instructor.

"When I came to TSA, saw what they were about, and realized the importance of what they have to do with protecting the nation — making sure airplanes stay in the air — it clicked with me and it became that career," Pockett said. "It made it so I wanted to be here to ensure the safety of all the traveling public."

In July, Business Insider visited FLETC and spoke with academy instructors and recruits to learn more about what it's really like to join the TSA as an officer, and then we followed up with the agency's head recruiter for more details.

Here's what they told us.

SEE ALSO: 'You're at war': I went inside the new TSA Academy, where officers learn to detect bombs, spot weapons, and find out why failure isn't an option

DON'T MISS: Finally! Watch TSA agents line up and go through security as they role-play passengers in training

Who are the TSA?

Willie Gilbreath, a retired veteran from Grand Rapids, Michigan, and incoming TSO, told Business Insider that his perception of the TSA was pretty vague before joining. "I didn't know a lot about it. Going through the airport, I wasn't really paying attention to those people. I was like everyone else. I wanted to get through as fast as possible.

"But now that I'm into the process and I'm starting to learn some of the procedures and some of the things that we're looking for, I understand why it takes a little bit longer. Now, my perception is, I'd rather take a little bit longer and be safe than to rush through the process and have something go wrong or have something slip through."

Gilbreath said he found his TSO job through a veterans' website. "The job popped up and I said, 'Wow, an opportunity to get a job with the federal government. I better jump on this.'"

Diane Brundidge, the executive director of recruitment and hiring at the TSA, said it's helpful if applicants have done similar work, like security at a non-federalized airport or security work in the government. Many TSOs have law-enforcement, military, or security background, and 17% of TSOs are veterans.

Gilbreath said he's able to apply some of the skills he has as a veteran to the job of a TSO. In the military, he said you learn "the skills to assess a situation and to actually have the discernment to understand a threat. You learn how to actually guard and protect.

"The only thing about this job is you've got to learn how to serve the public, too," he added. "That's the aspect I'm going to have to work on, because in the military it's a little bit different. It's more protection than service. This is service and protection."

Finding the right people

All the incoming TSOs Business Insider spoke with said they had heard about the job through an online job site.

"I always wanted to do something important to me — I always wanted to help someone," said Carmen Guzman, and incoming TSO from Stockton, California. "When I was looking online, I came across TSA. I was pretty curious, so I started looking into more information about that and how they wanted to protect people when they flew."

Internet job listings aren't the only way the TSA recruits.

"We really satisfy ourselves at the length we go to advertise," Brundidge said.

Among other places, the TSA recruits at colleges, universities, military bases, and military-transition assistance programs. It advertises on college listserves and on the side of buses. "We target it to the area that we're in. If we're in Martha's Vineyard, we'll put it on the side of a boat ... We're very astute to what gets attention, and based on the number of applications we receive, we know it's working."

Brundidge said the TSA received more than 200,000 applications in 2015.

Getting the job

"We're hiring constantly," Brundidge said. "There are 100 or so job-opportunity announcements open at any given time, and we always have people in our 'ready pool' ready to hire."

The TSA ramps up its hiring efforts before anticipated surges and converts people from part-time to full-time during busy periods.

From its pool of applications, the TSA will first invite some people to take its computer-based test. Applicants are tested on things such as imaging, color-blindness, and English proficiency.

From there, applicants go through airport assessments, which is sort of like a job interview. That's followed by a medical exam and pre-hire background checks, where the TSA will take fingerprints, perform a criminal background check, and check to see if applicants are on the terrorist watch list, among other things.

If all goes well, applicants then go into the "ready pool," and, once there is a job vacancy, the TSA will present a tentative job offer, where they'll be invited to participate in job training.

The starting salary ranges from about $15 to $22 an hour, and both full-time and part-time employees get benefits.

"I would love to, personally, raise that salary, but that's legislature," Brundidge added.

Somehow a three-minute recording made 11 years ago is now the cause of the biggest scandal of Donald Trump's 2016 presidential run and the potential end of Billy Bush's TV hosting career.

A lot can be said in three minutes.

On the leaked tape, Trump, who was newly married to Melania Trump at the time, could be heard boasting of trying to sleep with a married woman. Trump made the comments while riding on a bus with Bush, who could be heard egging him on.

"Access Hollywood" identified the woman Trump said he had tried to sleep with as Nancy O'Dell, a current "Entertainment Tonight" host. She and Bush hosted "Access Hollywood" at the time the tape was made.

Trump also bragged that he could grope women and kiss them without consent because of his celebrity status. All the while, Bush was right there affirming Trump's statements.

So it looked particularly bad for Bush when the two arrived at the "Days of Our Lives" studio, where Trump was set to do a cameo on the soap opera, and were greeted by actress Arianne Zucker. Not only did Trump and Bush ogle her through the window, but Bush insisted that she hug Trump and then him.

How did the tape escape years of being hidden away to becoming a bombshell of the election year? Here's a look at how it went down:

SEE ALSO: Billy Bush is reportedly leaving NBC after vulgar Donald Trump tape leak

DON'T MISS: Trevor Noah angrily rips apart Donald Trump's 'locker room' excuse for vulgar tape: It's a 'crime'

August 2016: The New York Post reported that Billy Bush, while covering the Rio Olympics, bragged about having a "tape of Trump being a real dog." NBC staffers overheard, and that's reportedly how the search for the tape started.

Source: New York Post

Monday, October 3: NBC News says this is the day it first heard of the tape. It and "Access Hollywood" began working on separate stories about the recording.

Source: CNN

Tuesday, October 4: NBC News reportedly forwarded the video to its legal department for review, where it remained for two to three days.

Source: Politico

Winter has definitely arrived for "Game of Thrones" and its fans, and they're bummed.

Not only has it been months since the show's sixth season aired, but the show's seventh season will be arriving later than usual. The producers had to start production later this year in order to catch the — you guessed it — winter season in real life.

So what now? What could fill the void "Thrones" has left behind in our lives and TV schedules?

Business Insider worked with Taykey, an advertising technology company that can pinpoint specific audiences and analyze what's trending for them, to discover which shows hardcore "Game of Thrones" fans talk about when they're not talking about "Thrones."

Here are the seven most talked-about shows among "Thrones" fans, according to Taykey:

SEE ALSO: The 37 most shocking deaths we've seen on 'Game of Thrones'

DON'T MISS: George R.R. Martin has 'thousands of pages' ready for a 'Game of Thrones' prequel

"DC's Legends of Tomorrow" (The CW)

This crew of superheroes travel back and forth in time to protect the current timeline from a host of threats.

"Orphan Black" (BBC America)

After witnessing the murder of someone who looks exactly like her, Sarah assumes the woman's life. She'll soon learn that she's a clone and there are others. Plus, someone is trying to kill her and the other clones.

"American Horror Story" (FX)

From Ryan Murphy, this anthology series has a different setting and story each season. Some of the cast members do return as new characters on different seasons.

It's not easy to be a good driver. I've been driving for decades, behind the wheel in many, many different vehicles, and I'm constantly trying to figure out if my skills are up to snuff.

But it's even harder to be a good defensive driver.

You all know what defensive driving is: It's based on the notion that the roadways are inherently dangerous places, and you as the mindful driver must be vigilant about threats so that you can avoid trouble.

It used to be easier to embrace defensive driving. We had far fewer technological distractions in our cars, and vehicles were less isolating. You could feel the road, the engine, the brakes. The physics that you were exposed to — operating a shell of metal and glass, carrying a tankful of a highly explosive and flammable substance for fuel, hurtling down a freeway at 60 mph — were in your face.

Advancements in the automobile, from noise isolation to airbags, have made it easier to tune out.

But defensive driving hasn't gone away. Here are seven good ways to get better at it:

SEE ALSO: Here's why you don't need to run your car on premium gas

Use your eyes.

Driving is visual — in fact, it's one of the most visually demanding activities a person can engage it.

You have, in every modern car, three mirrors. Use them obsessively. As you drive, your central focus should be on the road ahead of you, but you should also constantly scan your mirrors.

I try to retain a short-term mental picture of the activity around me. Where is that semitruck? That pickup? That guy on the motorcycle? That dude who's driving 20 miles over the speed limit? By doing this, you can file away your fellow motorists and their vehicle types and run a sort of background predictive algorithm so that you can better manage your own on-road decision-making.

Know your vehicle.

I'm fortunate that I get to sample a lot of different cars, trucks, and SUVs.

But as a result, I'm also deeply aware of the capabilities of different vehicles. I'm not going to drive a Honda Accord the same way I would a Porsche 911 or Ferrari 488 GTB.

Your car is a package. The engine, transmissions, brakes, and tires combine to form a whole. If you have mass-market brakes and regular old radials, you shouldn't be blasting around like you have a trackworthy sports car that was engineered to go hard.

You should also be aware of the safety features that your car has on board. For example, a lot of newer vehicles will warn you of other vehicles on your flanks, let you know if you're nodding off, and then buzz the steering wheel if you're slipping out of your lane.

Don't tailgate.

The No. 1 problem I see in everyday driving, particularly in the traffic-clogged Northeast, is tailgating.

On a highway, you want a lot of distance between you and the car in front on you. At highway speeds, you will need the space to execute evasive maneuvers to avoid an accident, or engage the antilock brakes in your cars to prevent rear-ending the vehicle ahead of you.

So how much space? I like at least a semitruck length, which is about three car lengths. In stop-and-go traffic, where rear-ending is common, I sometimes keep at least a couple of car lengths between me and the other person. I catch criticism for this, but I've also seen horrific accidents happen right in front of me on several occasions. I want a big margin for error.