Lifehack Ideas December 2014

This might not be a hack, but it is useful information.

“The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.

Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.

But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.

This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socioeconomic unfairness.”

Along these lines, I asked reddit last week for ideas of things that you can buy which will cost more upfront, but would eventually pay for themselves. My stipulation for the post was that they had to make the money back within one year, didn't require much more time or skill, and would have to be backed up with a calculation. YMMV based on your habits and climate, but here's what made the cut:

• Switching from disposable razors to safety razors
• Buying a weight set off craigslist and ditching a gym membership
• Buying a chest freezer off craigslist and buying meat only in bulk or when on sale
• Buying the tools for any home project rather than paying someone to fix it
• Buying a cable modem rather than renting it (or ditching cable and using a chromecast paired with internet services)
• Switching to a programmable thermostat
• Buying an electric mattress pad and turning the heat down 10deg in the winter
• Insulating your home
• Switching to a low-flow shower nozzle
• Keeping an herb garden/indoor plant rather than buying fresh herbs
• Using a menstrual cup rather than tampons
• Using cloth diapers rather than disposable ones
• Buying a washing machine rather than going to a laundrymat
• Buying a smartphone off-contract and getting a cheaper plan
• Using a breadmaker rather than buying store bread
• Homebrewing rather than buying beer (probably the most questionable ROI here because of the time and beer consumption needed)
• Buying a haircut kit and cutting your own hair
• Brewing your own coffee instead of buying it
• If you smoke, rolling your own cigarettes or switching to an e-cig

The meta life-hack here is to make personal questions engaging and use the internet to source ideas.

[not sure if this strictly qualifies as a lifehack, but it seems to be in the general ballpark]

I have been practising a slightly modified version of alternate-day intermittent fasting since mid-January this year. Basically, every second day, I eat a small breakfast and then nothing until midnight (or at least I try to, in practice I sometimes have a snack at 10-11 pm). There seems to be some evidence that this is good for human health, and I have found it to be rather low-cost - I am still able to do moderately strenuous physical activity on fasting days (namely cycling from university to my home, which is half an hour away and mostly uphill), and do not get particularly hungry either (although I sometimes desire certain foods, hence the snacking). All in all, this seems like the sort of thing that is worth trying.

(I doubt this is original)

To help yourself do something regularly on a computer, put a direct link on your bookmarks bar.

Example: you want to keep a diary. Write it in a Google doc document and put the direct link to it in your bookmarks bar, so that one click is all it takes to open it. Not in your bookmarks somewhere else, not in a shortcut on the desktop (your browser is open all the time anyway), not a separate fancy diary-keeping software, but just one click in a place that's always in front of you. If you're like me, that'll help a lot.

Perhaps anti-intuitively, the difference in results is huge even between "one click in the bookmarks bar" and "one click to open a folder in the bookmarks bar and one click on the right link in that folder".

P.S. Alerts are also good, but this method helps where alerts aren't helpful. You want to train yourself to write a quick review of every book once you finish it. There's no way to set an alert to go off when you turn the last page in Kindle. But put a link on your bookmarks bar.

I choreograph my morning routines to a specific playlist. I know what I'm supposed to be doing during each specific song, and I get things done on time without distractions. I started in highschool when I would occasionally miss the bus and I never missed the bus after I started.

I love these posts and would love to see this become a monthly post. Not enough to write it in future but enough to upvote it whenever I see it.

I wrote up some anecdotal ideas on improving sleep quality. Based on my personal experiences, so definitely could be "broscience".

Read Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography to see some examples of lifehacks in the 18th Century, including dietary experiments, time management and behavior modification.

Not for everyone, but: if you have small kids and are chronically at sea what game to play, buy a durable map of the world (that can be rolled out on the floor) for children, with cute pictures of animals, popular characters, atmospheric phenomena etc. Bonus points if there is enough space to put your own stickers on it, then you can have a stash for a rainy day/sickness. Put the rolled map in a corner where it is out of the way but easy to notice. When you suffer imagination collapse, take it out, think of the kid's favorite story character and set him wandering. Semiactive game, not for just before bed.

ETA: my son started playing with it sometime after 2.5 yr, simply 'driving' toy cars across the map. Then, we began learning what different pictures mean. We'd go to South America for tomatoes, etc. After that, when he had learned several objects, we introduced 'repetition'. On the next day after rolling out the map, I'd tell him how the Kitten woke his Owner asking for breakfast. 'What do you want to eat?' 'Mt. Kilimanjaro!' 'Ooh, trouble. It's in Africa, we'd have to take a plane. And it is not tasty - there are all those rocks.' 'Then I want to eat an iceberg.' 'Ooh, trouble. An iceberg is a large piece of ice in the sea near the Pole. It's cold, you'll get sick. And it is still too far away - we'd have to take a train.' [a couple more iterations, but it's better to change the 'foods' day after day then to make the game too long.] 'Then I want - OATMEAL!' [cue in triumphant parental grin and waggling eyebrows.] 'Wonderful! Let's make it!' They go into the kitchen, the Kitten sits down at the table and the Owner stands beside the stove. (This part I use to teach him spelling.) The Kitten reads out the recipe (nouns only), like 'w-a-t-e-r', the Owner does something with the named thing. [...] They eat. Finis.

After a few times, start encouraging the kid to tell you what 'Kilimanjaro', 'iceberg', ... mean and why you can't eat them. When you roll out the map, find new things to 'want for breakfast.' Show him a real cookbook with colourful illustrations and let him be 'the Kitten' - might help if you have to do something in the kitchen - so he can 'read you the recipe' while you are busy.

...just don't expect it to work as Porridge Propaganda.

(The Kitten and Owner are Findus and Pettersson. Lovely books. After we started playing with the map, fanfiction just... evolved. Now they travel all around the world.)

Get in the habit of smiling. Smile when you are greeting someone, smile at the cashier when they ring up your groceries, smile to yourself when you are alone.

As far as I understand it, the physical act of smiling (for whatever reason) improves your mood. Personally, I've tried to make it a point to smile whenever it occurs to me, and I've found that it generally improves my day. In particular, I find myself feeling more positive and optimistic.