In her "Time to…" column for the Inquirer, Eva Monheim of Temple's Department of Landscape Architecture and Horticulture offered timely design and maintenance tips for gardens and homes. Her advice for November: Trim evergreen hedges, make a checklist for trees and shrubs that need pruning and create indoor arrangements around doorways. Monheim also explained how to build a "cold frame" from hay bales to protect a winter garden from the wind.

Breakup songs play a powerful role in post-breakup healing. "We get the sense of universality, meaning we're not the only ones who feel this way," said Kenneth Scott Aigen, associate professor of music therapy at Temple's Boyer College of Music and Dance. Unlike mere words, which express one emotion at a time, music — through melody, tone, harmony and the emotion in the voice — captures the jumble of sadness, anger and loss all at once, he said.

Texting to track your calories may help peel off pounds. College students who used cell phones to monitor calories and physical activity and received personalized feedback about how they were doing dropped significantly more weight than those who didn't, according to new research from Temple's Center for Obesity Research and Education (CORE). "Cellphones are a powerful intervention tool for weight loss," said lead author Melissa Napolitano. CORE Director Gary Foster says dieters often say they need to be held accountable. Text messaging "tries to replicate the interaction with a health care professional," he said. "There is someone on the other end."

According to a new study by Temple's Fox School of Business, mothers are taking cues on what fashion and beauty products to buy from their teenage daughters. Glamour editor in chief Cindy Levy and psychotherapist Robi Ludwig joined "The Today Show" to continue the national discussion on the "consumer doppelganger effect," Fox marketing professor Ayalla Ruvio's term for one person's intentional mimicry of another. On a live appearance on NBC 10, Ruvio explained daughters' reactions to their mothers' copycat behavior: "They do like the fact that the mothers look younger, but they were like, 'I wish they could do that in a different way.'"

Research by Temple marketing professor Ayalla Ruvio was featured in a quiz question on National Public Radio's "Wait, Wait ...Don't Tell Me!" Host Peter Sagal had fun with the findings. "A new study in the Journal of Consumer Behavior finds more and more mothers dressing like their teenage daughters, in a misguided attempt to look and feel younger. The study has not yet determined which party this trend embarrasses more," said Sagal.