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jenettWelcome to our second salon discussion thread. Wander in, invite a friend along, and chat! (Not sure what's going on? Here, have a brief FAQ.) The first one went swimmingly! People! Talking! About awesome stuff! Feel free to talk about anything: my topic of the day is just to get us started.
Some of the comments in last week's thread got me thinking about the little stuff we do to make dealing with the world easier for us (lifehacks). And then why. Some stuff I do (briefly, on the theory it might encourage conversation)
1) I am very boring about my clothing. (basically, a black skirt and coloured knit top, or a coloured skirt and a black knit top.) Except for special occasion clothing, it is all cotton, it all goes in the wash together, and I basically only have to think about it when I want to. When I want to be fancier, that's what jewelry is for.
2) I do not have glasses in my house. I have pottery mugs. I am less likely to drop them (yay, handles) and if I do, they break into bigger and much less transparent pieces. (I am not as clumsy as I was during the worst of the medical foo, but, y'know. It's still useful.)
3) I have no idea what I did before a smartphone, which for me is less phone, and more "thing that fills at least a dozen other needs, but is only one thing to keep track of, plus more than enough books to keep even *me* occupied for a while, and oh, yeah, occasionally it makes phone calls.")
4) I periodically write up a document called "The care and feeding of Jenetts (or at least this one)" designed to help people navigate spending time with me. I had hoped to have a sample here but a) the week got away from me a bit and there was other stuff that had to take priority and b) some bits of it need to go under access lock. (For those who can see my locked posts, I expect to finish it by the end of the week.)
Anyway, this includes things like methods of communication, privacy notes, basic health stuff, more in-depth health stuff (with a focus on "Here's what you need to know so we can enjoy time together."), things I like as presents, things I'm really bad at doing, foods I eat and don't eat (and a brief "why" so people can figure out which bits really apply in a given setting), and stuff people should know if they want to visit me.
What stuff do you do? I'm especially curious about anything where you do it and other people look at you and blink and then go "Oh, that's an awesome idea!" (I've had that with my mugs, for example.)
(A word on advice: please don't give it in this discussion unless someone asks for it. A bunch of people I know will read this have Complicated Stuff, and I trust that they have found solutions that work for them for reasons that work for them. That said, if you'd like advice, go ahead and ask for it!)
Music in the background: Last week's salon had a lot to say about the topic of music, and it got me thinking about listening to the stuff that connects us to the universe. So, on my playlist for this week's salon are "One Voice" by the Wailin' Jennys, "All Will Be Well" by Meg Barnhouse, "Brave" by Sarah Bareilles, "Allegria" by Cirque du Soleil and "Give us room to roar" from Ruth Mackenzie's Kalevala: Dream of the Salmon Maiden.
A quick reminder
As noted, the basic thing here is 'leave the conversation better than you found it, or at least not worse'. The FAQ has more help with your choices for comment (DW account, OpenID account, or anonymously) if you need a hand. Or ask, and someone (likely me, but maybe not) will be along to help. We'll work everything else out as we go.
Some of the comments in last week's thread got me thinking about the little stuff we do to make dealing with the world easier for us (lifehacks). And then why. Some stuff I do (briefly, on the theory it might encourage conversation)
1) I am very boring about my clothing. (basically, a black skirt and coloured knit top, or a coloured skirt and a black knit top.) Except for special occasion clothing, it is all cotton, it all goes in the wash together, and I basically only have to think about it when I want to. When I want to be fancier, that's what jewelry is for.
2) I do not have glasses in my house. I have pottery mugs. I am less likely to drop them (yay, handles) and if I do, they break into bigger and much less transparent pieces. (I am not as clumsy as I was during the worst of the medical foo, but, y'know. It's still useful.)
3) I have no idea what I did before a smartphone, which for me is less phone, and more "thing that fills at least a dozen other needs, but is only one thing to keep track of, plus more than enough books to keep even *me* occupied for a while, and oh, yeah, occasionally it makes phone calls.")
4) I periodically write up a document called "The care and feeding of Jenetts (or at least this one)" designed to help people navigate spending time with me. I had hoped to have a sample here but a) the week got away from me a bit and there was other stuff that had to take priority and b) some bits of it need to go under access lock. (For those who can see my locked posts, I expect to finish it by the end of the week.)
Anyway, this includes things like methods of communication, privacy notes, basic health stuff, more in-depth health stuff (with a focus on "Here's what you need to know so we can enjoy time together."), things I like as presents, things I'm really bad at doing, foods I eat and don't eat (and a brief "why" so people can figure out which bits really apply in a given setting), and stuff people should know if they want to visit me.
What stuff do you do? I'm especially curious about anything where you do it and other people look at you and blink and then go "Oh, that's an awesome idea!" (I've had that with my mugs, for example.)
(A word on advice: please don't give it in this discussion unless someone asks for it. A bunch of people I know will read this have Complicated Stuff, and I trust that they have found solutions that work for them for reasons that work for them. That said, if you'd like advice, go ahead and ask for it!)
Music in the background: Last week's salon had a lot to say about the topic of music, and it got me thinking about listening to the stuff that connects us to the universe. So, on my playlist for this week's salon are "One Voice" by the Wailin' Jennys, "All Will Be Well" by Meg Barnhouse, "Brave" by Sarah Bareilles, "Allegria" by Cirque du Soleil and "Give us room to roar" from Ruth Mackenzie's Kalevala: Dream of the Salmon Maiden.
A quick reminder
As noted, the basic thing here is 'leave the conversation better than you found it, or at least not worse'. The FAQ has more help with your choices for comment (DW account, OpenID account, or anonymously) if you need a hand. Or ask, and someone (likely me, but maybe not) will be along to help. We'll work everything else out as we go.
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no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 01:17 pm (UTC)The existence of a care-and-feeding post seems like a marvelous thing to me; would that I could summon the time and mental focus to actually write one. I don't even know off the top of my head what stuff I actually need, much less how to articulate it.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 01:29 pm (UTC)Here, let me quote the beginning of the health stuff, to give an idea.
What does this mean for you?
- I sometimes need to cancel plans (even ones I want very much to do) - especially if they involve me driving. Usually, I know that I will need to a couple of days in advance, or at least have suspicions.
- If you ask me to add something new to my life, I will have to do a lot of poking before I say yes or no. (this can, I understand, look a little odd from the outside.)
- How far or how fast I can walk varies a lot based on several factors. At the moment, I can rely on doing half a mile at a time, am generally managing a mile at once, but more than that is a lot more iffy.
- Travel - and changes in routine in general - wipe me out for at least a week afterwards, and often two or three.
- Jenetts do not work, think, or otherwise function well in temperatures over about 85F. If it is currently over that, the amount of stuff that can reasonably get done in a day is at least half what it would normally be. There are reasons I live in Maine.
The short version of the health stuff:
- I fundamentally don’t trust that my body is going to do what I tell it much of the time. Which sucks, but is a thing. (Most notably my lungs and my stamina, but also focus, executive function, and whether or not I have any interest in eating or food.)
- My lungs are seriously flaky and hyperreactive at times. Breathing is sort of fundamental, but I can’t ever take it for granted.
- My stamina varies a lot, and my life is a constant balancing equation of “If I do X, can I also do Y?”
- I have days where my brain just entirely refuses to function or focus. This is deeply annoying. (I also have the occasional day when retreating to bed is the only thing one can do.)
- There’s a bunch of food things (discussed in ‘food’) that mostly boil down to “I can eat in most restaurants just fine, but if you’re cooking for me, or I’m having more than two meals in a row with you, we should talk about a few things”
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Date: 2013-06-12 01:37 pm (UTC)A big one for me is Opportunity Food. My personal definition of Opportunity Food is "food I can prepare when I can't stand up all that long." Mostly, for me, that's stuff that can be put together cold, or can be microwaved, or can go in the slow cooker while I go lie down again. (I think everybody gets their own definition of Opportunity Food because each person's situation is different. My own definition of Opportunity Food years ago was "stuff I can carry in my bag and have whenever I need it and will keep for weeks, because I will certainly forget it in there.")
One of Mike's lifehacks for dealing with his serious lack of appetite was to watch the Food Channel, which led to all sorts of things, many of which were only tangentially related to food. (It fit into his love of knowing how things were made, too.)
no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 02:07 pm (UTC)There's the stuff that's always in my bag--always--because who knows when I will desperately need it. This is usually stuff like fruit leather and ginger chews.
Then there's the do-ahead stuff. Every once in awhile I will make a big batch of squash chili or a big batch of black bean soup and freeze single-serving portions of it so that I have a hot meal in 3 minutes whenever I want/need one. When we get certain kinds of fresh veggies or fruit, I clean them as soon after buying them as I have the energy/steadiness, so that I can throw them into a salad or, y'know, my mouth without having to have energy/steadiness at the right time.
And then there's the stuff I can buy pre-done and go with it. The seedy bread we both buy at Byerly's, the nice crackers, the nice hummus, the stuff. Kashi makes a thing called Mayan Harvest Bake that is very good Mrissa Chow when Mrissa Chow is hard to come by. (And unlike the original Mrissa Chow--a.k.a. Grape Nuts--it is hot.)
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From:Clothing and other textile goods
Date: 2013-06-12 01:41 pm (UTC)I approach my clothing as a practical issue: I find a brand/style I like and buy several of them at once (usually in each of the acceptable colors), then rotate through them until they wear out.
For shoes, that means a trip to the New Balance outlet to pick up their walking shoes, which work really well for me. For pants, lately that's been LL Bean chinos (flannel-lined in winter, regular in warmer seasons) and shorts. For shirts, a mix of T shirts (usually the ones I get free at work every so often) and comfy long-sleeve shirts (LL Bean again).
I do have Nice Clothes (aka "responsible adult cosplay outfit") for those times and events that need them, and some nicer shirts (polos & button-ups) that I can use as a slight step up from the day-to-day...but yeah, mostly T shirts.
Towels, sheets, and the like tend to get the same treatment: find something usable and buy a few of them. Costco works quite well for this (as well as socks; their house brand athletic socks are really good).
Re: Clothing and other textile goods
Date: 2013-06-12 02:15 pm (UTC)(In case it's handy for anyone else: I'm about a US size 22 or 2X, and I get most of my stuff from Land's End, which has a much better color range in their plus sizes than L.L.Bean (which is annoying, because I can, y'know *drive* to L.L. Bean, and would buy more stuff there if they gave me more options.)
My skirts always have pockets, because I always have to carry my work key at work, and my smart phone in the other. I have been getting them from Deva Lifewear for a long time, but they're currently having material supply issues, so I have two coming from Decent Exposures in the near future, and will gladly report on what I think.)
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Date: 2013-06-12 01:54 pm (UTC)Other lifehacks I have:
*I typically spend at least two nights per week away from home, so a lot of my hacks are geared around that. I keep all my toiletries permanently packed in two washbags, one for stuff that needs to stay dry and one for stuff that doesn't, so I can just toss them in a bag and don't need to pack each item separately when it's time to go. I also keep a small supply of key medication and the teabags I use to help me sleep in my backpack, and I use the same backpack for everything so that I don't need to transfer things between bags.
*I'm terrible, no really, worse than that, really terrible at mornings. I have a recurring appointment on my smartphone with a checklist of the things I need to do to get ready for work, because I know I don't have the brainpower to get everything done in anything like an efficient order otherwise. The appointment reminder goes off right when my morning devotions are due to finish, which also means I don't need a meditation timer ;-) I'm also extremely distractable in my early-morning state, so I watch BBC documentaries while I'm getting ready, because otherwise halfway through getting dressed I won't be able to resist "just quickly checking Twitter", and then it will be at least half an hour later and I will still be in my underwear. I have another checklist for things I need to do when I first get to work.
*I use David Allen's Getting Things Done method to keep on top of my tasks and projects with minimum stress. It's changed my life, and I can't recommend it highly enough.
*I've learned by long experience what kinds of tasks I can fruitfully do at what times, and I don't try to work against that. For instance, small admin-type tasks get done in the mornings, major brainwork in the afternoons. The really hard brainwork gets done on Wednesdays or Thursdays, the merely unpleasant or tedious kind on Mondays or Tuesdays. Dividing things like this also has the advantage of preventing simple routine stuff from getting permanently queued behind the big urgent stuff, which is a problem I often observe in my colleagues (and get frustrated by if the simple stuff in question is something I need in order to move on with some of my own stuff.)
*I keep all my recipes on Delicious, tagged with (amongst other things) the months in which the ingredients are in season. It makes seasonal eating much less of a headache.
I'm sure I have other lifehacks as well, but many of them are so integrated into my routine now that I don't even think of them as hacks any more. I'll try to be mindful over the next few days and see if I can notice any more that might be worth sharing.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 03:41 pm (UTC)I've been using Todoist (http://todoist.com plus there are extensions for browsers, and apps for various portable devices) because the extensions will let me drop in a link to Gmail emails, which turns out to be a Very Important Function in a to do list tool for me. (The other one is being able to manually rearrange tasks without having to relabel/change a priority setting/etc. A lot of my work is "Oh, yeah, I need to do that sometime this month" but I rearrange on a given day based on other things going on.)
(Both home and work stuff currently lives in the same account, which is non-ideal from some perspectives, but good from others. I keep contemplating if I want to shell out the money for a second account just for work.)
Smartphones and tech gear
Date: 2013-06-12 01:59 pm (UTC)warschoiceI live in the DMZ between iOS and Android; I dual-wield both an iPhone and a Nexus (currently a 5 and a 4 respectively), because some things are better suited for (or only available on!) one or the other. I lean iOS for things that are on both, mostly because I have had gear in the Apple ecosystem for many years and it's easier to stay there. Several Google apps are also on iOS anyway (Maps, Search, Voice, etc).
Connectivity on the cheap
T-Mobile has an online-or-WalMart-only $30/month prepaid plan for smartphones: 5GB of high-speed data (and then throttled data instead of overage charges), unlimited texts, 100 minutes of voice (and then 10¢s;/minute). Great for people who own "handheld computers that can sometimes make phone calls".
Must-have iOS apps
Dark Sky gives hyperlocal rain forecasts. (And I really mean hyperlocal, like "at your current location, in 15 minutes there will be heavy rain for 30 minutes followed by light rain for an hour".)
TheTransitApp will show you when the next bus will arrive...at all the nearby stops, for all the relevant routes. If you're in a city where several routes might get you where you want to go, it's nice to be able to see that you can catch the 68 in 9 minutes, or walk half a block and grab the 85 in 3 minutes instead. It's also now fully usable at the free tier, though I'm glad I paid them money when they were still doing the "subscription" model (see more routes, etc if you pay); it's well worth it.
I haven't played with the Google Now functionality on iOS much yet, since I already had it on Android. I suspect it will be slightly less featureful since it won't have all the same OS-level support.
Must-have Android apps
Several of these are built-in on newer versions, but unlike iOS they can be upgraded without a full OS release.
Google Now, if you're willing to make the tradeoff of turning on location reporting, can be amazing: "leave in the next 10 minutes to make it to your appointment, due to traffic". It can also give you some of the functionality of TheTransitApp, showing the next buses at the nearest stop (but not other nearby stops).
Gmail (if you use it), the new Google Keyboard (similar to Swype et al, but free), Maps, etc.
Dashclock, if you're on Jelly Bean but don't like the new lockscreen clock.
Ingress, if you want an incentive to get out and get some exercise. It's basically smartphone capture-the-flag, with a science fiction backstory. It's still an invite-only beta, but I have a few invites if people need them.
Androminion, if you like Dominion and have too much free time.
Re: Smartphones and tech gear
Date: 2013-06-12 02:20 pm (UTC)To be precise: it's one of their "service partners", which in this case, looking at the map overlays, I *think* is Sprint, whose service quality in this neck of the woods is not fantastic. I have Verizon, which is pricier, but has been rock solid reliable for service for me, even when I'm driving in random bits of rural New England (and since I use my phone as a GPS, that part is very handy: the only time I've dropped service is the middle of a couple of the state parks. And when there's only one road, anyway, so it's not like you have to turn anywhere.)
That's the second time Dark Sky's come up in a conversation recently, so... (goes downloads)
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Date: 2013-06-12 02:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 02:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 03:16 pm (UTC)I love lifehacks. I have been trying to figure out mine for a… good long while. +grins+
Stuff I do…
I am fantastically lucky on the topic of clothing, because I can live in jeans and t-shirts unless I need to dress up for an event. I work with glue and crumbling paper and sometimes chemicals all day, dress code does not apply. The jeans give me pockets for phone and wallet, beltloops for my key-carabiner, and generally don't take a lot of thought.
We have glass glasses, pottery mugs, wineglasses, and others in the house for when we're being various levels of formal, but mostly we – and _definitely_ I – drink out of those gigantic plastic things with lids and straws and rubberized grips. Or Coke bottles. We have a cat, and we are mostly clumsy as hell with stupid medical foo on all parts. The lids mean that we don't spend half our evenings mopping the floors – or at least have to mop less!
The biggest thing for the four of us (they can name themselves or not) is that we all have serious communication and memory issues. Therefore, we have whiteboards in the kitchen, a physical calendar in the living room, google Calendar synched with each of our accounts, a locked DW community for 'hey, y'all it's 3am and I'm awake and I'm gonna forget if I don't say this now' or 'hey, y'all, I'm 500+ miles away but y'all need to know this' that also has static reminders of holidays and when one of us is going to be gone. We also use twitter as a slightly more temporary 'ohshit, plans changed, gonna be [x] til [$timeofday]'
Also we each have a googleDoc of 'stuff [x] wants' that is shared with each other and with various others on-request, so that we don't have to try to remember the random mentions from four months ago when we're scrambling for ideas for gifts. That may be one of my favorite things we've done to make life easy for each other.
I've tried at various times to do 'care and feeding' posts, but the urge only strikes when I'm feeling incredibly defensive and then when I read back over it I sound like a total bitch, so I delete it. *wryface*
no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 03:53 pm (UTC)There's also a certain amount, at home, of "If I use a mug that only holds two cups of water, I will lever myself off the couch and out from in front of the computer slightly more often than if my mug holds more, and this is probably good for me."
I hear you on the defensive. I find I do best writing them when everything is going okay but when stuff has been sorta dire recently enough that I remember which bits are currently an issue. I do a lot of editing on them, too.
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Date: 2013-06-12 03:57 pm (UTC)When my previous cat, Athene, died, friends (:waves:) made a donation in her name to their local animal shelter. It was a totally awesome idea, and it made me teary in all the right ways (and still does.)
I got an email this morning that the 24 year old cat of dear friends finally died on Monday (he'd been in slow decline for the last few months: I got to see him when I was in Minnesota in March, and he was obviously showing his age at long last.) And I went off to my local humane center website, and made them a donation, and... yeah.
My budget doesn't always allow me to do it for every cat, but I made a decision then, to do it for cats I've met, or people I'm particularly close to, at the very least.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-13 01:07 am (UTC)an array of thoughts while I wait for the bus
Date: 2013-06-12 04:11 pm (UTC)As for tech, I will happily tell you that Evernote is my external brain. I write both fiction and non in it, I clip anything I might ever want to refer to again into it, I share my to-do lists with my wife in it. It's my Book of Shadows and my Commonplace Book and my Ubiquitous Capture Device. It lives on all of my computers, in the browser of my work computer, on my phone, on my wife's phone, on the tablet.
One day Evernote will get to-dos right (automatic repeating!) but until then my to-do list is Toodledo with a 3rd party Android application.
Reading GTD was a revelation for me and I don't even use most of the system. Ubiquitous capture changed my life, though. All ideas go in Evernote, unless they have deadlines and then they go in Toodledo. That's chores, bills, going to the gym, writing deadlines, appointments, weekend plans and "hey don't forget to look at this" items.
Not having to remember was an amazing freedom from the limitations of my brain. I spend much less time now having "Omg what did I forget?" anxiety.
Re: an array of thoughts while I wait for the bus
Date: 2013-06-12 07:23 pm (UTC)I get funny looks sometimes, but the only way I can keep up with my assignments, projects, work stuff and personal stuff is to keep multiple "guides". At the beginning of each semester or project, I update my physical calendar (with color-coded notes for each class, each job, personal stuff and family stuff). Then there's a "master list" Word doc that goes by week and date, with extended notes on readings, project partners, and related stuff. And there's Toodledo, that's the broken down into single item to-dos ("pack bag for recording session", "eat lunch before recording session", leave 10 minutes early for recording session") with reminder alarms. With my memory issues right now, and with so many things going on, it's the only way I *still* have those jobs and haven't flunked out of school.
Re: an array of thoughts while I wait for the bus
From:Evernote....
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Date: 2013-06-12 04:12 pm (UTC)The other thing I'm considering putting together for my own use, courtesy of a thread on Captain Awkward a few weeks back, is a file of my friends' dietary needs and strong preferences. (Needs include allergies or "must have protein in the morning," strong preferences are things like "dislikes whole tomatoes, but tomato sauce is okay.") That would let me track this for more people than I can easily remember, but I'd still have to ask for updates before making plans. Allergies seldom go away—though my digestive system mysteriously decided it didn't like yogurt with live cultures a few years ago, and equally mysteriously decided it does again, a few months ago—but people may start as well as stop eating meat or keeping kosher.
Ooooh lifehacks
Date: 2013-06-12 05:16 pm (UTC)School bag (pencil case, folders, books, etc.).
Swim bag (with suits, goggles, travel shampoo / lotion, eye drops, hair things).
Soccer bag (specifically designed to hold clothes, cleats, water, BALL, everything).
Work bag (work phone, badge, laptop sleeve, cables).
Gig bag (who knows what my husband has in here, maybe groupie repellent?).
2. Phone apps (Android bias): Synched Google calendars, Our Groceries (synched grocery list = life changing), Any Do, Notes, library app, etc.
3. Pressure cooker. The crock pot has its uses, but the pressure cooker makes quicker (no advanced planning), healthier food -- especially good for meat and/or beans. We have an electric (set it and forget it) cooker, which I recommend for people who don't want to babysit the pressure settings.
4. Standing freezer. If you're going to cook ahead, stock up, premake, etc. you gotta have a place to put it. This frees up the top of our fridge for ice, ice cream, ice packs, and so on.
Re: Ooooh lifehacks
Date: 2013-06-12 05:23 pm (UTC)Pressure cookers sort of intrigue me, but I've decided they're probably a bad fit for me for a number of reasons. (And as I've said elsewhere, having something that *forces* me to break up the prep, the eating, and the cleaning is actually hugely useful to me, where something that cuts down on the time between prep and eating actually often isn't. Bodies still weird.)
For people who think that slow cookers are all "can of cream of whatever" soup, there are actually a lot of great very healthy recipes out there - my usual go to is Crockpot365 (and for people for whom that's relevant, she cooks gluten free.)
One of my current standbys is putting frozen veggies in with a tiny bit of butter or oil (and whatever seasoning.) They cook in about 2 hours on high (i.e. if I put them in when I get home from work at 5ish, they're ready around 7 when I want to eat dinner) and I don't have to pay attention to them at all until I'm ready.
(Combos frequent in my home include green beans, a bit of butter, and almonds, cauliflower with a bit of cheese, or asparagus with a bit of goat cheese.)
Re: Ooooh lifehacks
From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2013-06-12 08:47 pm (UTC) - ExpandRe: Ooooh lifehacks
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From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2013-06-14 05:56 pm (UTC) - ExpandRe: Ooooh lifehacks
From:no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 06:02 pm (UTC)When I must use a glass or a small handled cup/mug I keep my pinkie under the bottom for noting when my hand begins to forget it is holding something. I spill a lot less this way and I usually only encounter it now in places not my home.
Opportunity foods - a plethora of breakfast bars, fresh fruit, and yogurt for when I don't feel like eating. Eggs on hand to boil up a bunch for the same reason and is protein. Chocolate, because it can really lift my mood.
Nook e-reader. Lightweight, droppable without breaking, always keeps my place in various books. My eyes hurt from reading on my smart phone for too long.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 06:26 pm (UTC)I think I need a "care and feeding" list. I need to eat every two or three hours or I am not functional. I am a picky eater, and need protein with most meals. I will have to look for Kind bars and see if I like them. So many of the food bars are either too high carb and low protein, or have dried fruit, which I will not eat.
I avoid freeways, and when I have to take them, I choose my exits (did you know exits is an anagram of exist?) and entrances carefully. I don't use freeways in town unless I have to. (There is no way to get south of the Minnesota River without going on a freeway or freeway-like road, which limits my travel to Burnsville and part south.)
I also love *responsible adult cosplay outfits*.
tangents: how my brain always works
Date: 2013-06-12 08:07 pm (UTC)and it made me think about Stan Jones, a politician in Montana, who has argyria as a result of drinking homemade colloidal silver. THe thinks the skin effects are worth the (purported) health benefits, even if he might not have chosen to have bluish-silvery skin. (Link goes to a BBC article about him specifically, with a picture of his face.)
And it made me think about how sometimes adaptations themselves (adaptations in general, not just homemade colloidal silver) can look like problems to solve. I can't think of a good example off the top of my head, but I'm wondering if anyone has any ideas on how to clearly differentiate "this thing is extra effort for me, and I'd love not to have to do it or to have a better way" from "this thing being done this way is actually important even if it is extra effort"?
Re: tangents: how my brain always works
Date: 2013-06-12 10:31 pm (UTC)I think I look not at whether it's extra effort, but what happens with that extra effort. Cooking a complex meal is 'extra effort' in some sense, but if the process is enjoyable for you, you get to decide to spend the time and energy to do that.
The process gets a lot more murky if you're asking for other people's time and energy, or if the adaptations are so consuming that you can't do other things you need to do or that you say are important to you.
Re: tangents: how my brain always works
From:no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 11:13 pm (UTC)Example: I've thought of cooking plain white rice as easy for years. A few weeks ago, I realized that while it takes some time, physical effort, and at least one stove burner (I'm still learning this electric stove business), it seems to come free, mentally. So if I have no idea of what to cook, I may start a pot of rice, and then think about what can go with that. This seems to save initiation energy, because I don't have to think "start cooking X now," the rice is already on the stove.
I don't know how transferable or generalizable this is. Someone else's version might be "anything can go in a salad." And it takes having some kind of basic, flexible food that is that easy for you. Objectively, a pot of pasta is probably simpler/easier to get right, but in my brain rice is automatic and pasta requires thought.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-12 11:56 pm (UTC)I also have days when food that requires more than two steps is just Not Going To Happen. And apparently for my brain "remove from fridge, dig for label, heat, and eat" is four steps.
(Heating something that is in a clearly labelled package I don't have to think about at all is often okay. Reheating a can of soup is okay. Making tuna fish is too much on those days. Etc.)
(no subject)
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Date: 2013-06-13 01:10 am (UTC)The people who come here a lot know to check the basket because it will sometimes have, for example, books I have bounced off that are going free to a good home, or clean, empty canning jars for people who can.
Morning organization
Date: 2013-06-13 02:32 am (UTC)I have alarms for waking up, for taking my morning antihistamine (sensibly spaced after the wake-up) and for running the squeeze-it-in load of morning laundry. (Not enough laundry for the load? BRILLIANT, I turn the alarm off and am Pleased with one less thing to do.) That's every week day.
Then I flip to my checklist app and, having unchecked the needed items the night before, begin to check them off. Eating breakfast is an item. Brushing my teeth is an item. Getting dressed is an item. I sleep in pants and a t-shirt most nights, and if I forget to run my list, I can and HAVE gone out the door still in those. Which wouldn't be so bad if I weren't frequently using the day before's pants if clean enough (a fact co-workers would likely notice) and wearing a sleep bra (a fact I will notice all day long and be blushing, even if no one else saw, but they probably would).
I _love_ my checklist. Baby needs a refresh on his diapers at day care? It's in there. It's Monday and nap-time blankets have to go in? No need to count on my memory: it's in the list.
If it gives you an idea of how I roll in the mornings, my PURSE is on the list. (My cell phone isn't, but the list is on my cell phone, so I'm already off-list if I'm not holding it.)
Re: Morning organization
Date: 2013-06-13 05:58 pm (UTC)iPhone apps
Date: 2013-06-13 01:05 pm (UTC)AnyList. Allows you to create lists (Grocery lists, to-do lists, packing lists - you can have as many lists as you want, named as you want). Lists have categories - the default categories are grocery related, but you can define category sets for other types. These are check-list/mark-off-items list type lists. You can have favorites/predefined sets of list elements that you can add back to the list one at a time or en masse. So you can have, for example, a "standard" packing list plus a few things you sometimes need listed separately. Preparing for a trip? Bring up your packing list, tell it to add the entire "standard" list, and quickly browse the others (that you previously saved) and add the ones that you recognize as needed this time. Lists can be shared with other users of the app *on a per-list basis*. So my list of gifts to get people is mine alone (so I don't spoil surprises!), but the same grocery list appears in my AnyList and my husband's AnyList and we can each update it as needed. (We also have a shared Honey Do list, because Scott and I are bothered by different things around the house and one of us doesn't even always *notice* what bugs the other. Whoever gets to it first, great...but this way, one of us doesn't spend an hour and a half lovingly fixing something that's the eighth item on the other's priority list, when the top three all could have been addressed in that same time.)
Dropbox. Used to flip files from my computer to my phone, among other things. I use it for its intended purpose, but I take a lot of Coursera courses, and this gives me an easy mechanism to get the videos on to my phone, instead of all the dancing about with iTunes. I can even watch them in the app.
Kindle. I *have* a Kindle, and I prefer to read on it in general. But if it's low on charge, or if I'm in a space limited spot, or I can't carry it with me but have my phone in my pocket, the Kindle app is a *lovely* thing. I like having access to books on my phone. For a long time I didn't have a physical Kindle, and I was able to get by pretty well with just the app.
For a while I used TrackNShare to try to figure out what the patterns were in triggering flares of some of my health issues, but I, uh, sort of kept forgetting to enter data. So make of that what you will. The reporting isn't quite what I want yet either, though I think they're looking at it. There's no overlay of graphs for different things, you can look at them *next* to one another, but you have to mentally do the overlay yourself. But I mention it because I can see it being useful to someone whose brain works a little differently than mine.
Re: iPhone apps
Date: 2013-06-13 01:48 pm (UTC)Mailbox: this is a new mail app, and it only syncs with Gmail currently, but it has one feature I find absurdly useful, which is that you can tell emails to pop up a specified time later (tonight, tomorrow, this weekend, a specific date). I find this absurdly useful, especially when travelling. (You can also archive/delete/postpone by swipe.
Kindle and Bluefire: my ebook reading apps (Kindle for Kindle stuff, Bluefire for everything else.)
Sleep Cycle: One of the sleep tracking apps: I've found it reasonably reliable.
Moves: Pedometer app. I would like to be able to find my Fitbit, but this does something else handy, which is that it gives me consecutive walking patterns - it'll say "At [location]" for ages, and then 10 minutes of walking somewhere else (say, walking home) and I find that very useful for tracking right now. I am both trying to build stamina, *and* using it to remind myself to be gentle if I have a much more active day than usual. (It uses battery life, but fairly moderately: most days by the time I get home, I'm between 75% and 60% depending on what else I've done that day.)
Todoist: syncs with the web app already mentioned.
ShoppingList: the interface sort of annoys me, but it has a budget component, so once I have prices in, it helps me adjust what I want to spend that week. Very handy.
I also have HomeRoutines which I haven't used enough in ages, but it lets you build morning/evening/whenever routines (it is FlyLady without the cutesy stuff, basically) and gives you stars when you complete things.
Anyone have techniques/life hacks to suggest? (Laundry, cooking.)
Date: 2013-06-13 01:18 pm (UTC)1. Laundry. Two adults, two small children (4 and 1.5), both adults work basically full time, and currently we both have long commutes. (Scott's commute varies depending on which client his firm has him working with. Mine is pretty set.) We have a HE washer/dryer pair in the house and all our clothes are machine washable, and unless there's something gross I wash on cold. There's usually a pile of dirty clothes on the floor of our bedroom and in the upstairs hall bath (where the boys sometimes change), but it's often a small pile. The bigger problem is not finding time to FOLD all this stuff...there's usually a pile of clean laundry, often a ridiculous one, on the floor of our closet. I finally gave in and lined the floor with a clean (at the time...probably dusty by now...) sheet, augh. We have plenty of hangers, and JUST enough drawer space, if we actually did the folding.
Two caveats: an obvious hack here is "do it right after it finishes drying". For my morning load of laundry, that's just before we go out the door (we turn it off if it's not done, but it usually is) to work. For my evening load, that's often slightly *after* everyone's in bed. And another obvious hack is "have the four-year-old help fold". He is definitely physically capable of helping with these things. However, emotionally, not so much. Last time I tried that he folded several things (4? 5?) and then flung the rest around. That's really frustrating and causes me more upset than having to dig in a pile of clean laundry for my clothes (or my kitchen towels, or...yeah).
2. Cooking. I want healthy, home-cooked meals, but the shortage of time is terrible, and I *do not enjoy cooking*. I enjoy the result. Not the cooking. But I'd like less preservatives and weird chemicals in our diet, and therefore I am not as happy with premade food as I once was. Personal chef level cooking, while it answers that, is outside my budget. The crockpot helps, but the same few roasts/soups gets old, as does the general *type* of output (and my four year old is especially unfond of it). But the crockpot has to be something that can go all day. If it's a "two hours on high" recipe, it's only useful on weekends/days I'm home. My commute and job mean I leave by about 7 am and get back about 6:30 or 7:00 pm, by which time Scott has fed the boys dinner, usually with the microwave if I didn't leave a crockpot meal going all day (he doesn't like to cook either, otherwise "let Scott do it" would probably be my solution to this). Part of the problem with cooking is the dishes generated! It's helpful if they can go in a dishwasher, that's much more achievable.
Prep time is also a big deal here, since any time I spend cooking is time I am not spending doing other things, including helping with the boys, cleaning the house, washing more laundry that I later will fail to hang up, etc.
Re: Anyone have techniques/life hacks to suggest? (Laundry, cooking.)
Date: 2013-06-13 01:55 pm (UTC)In general, I'd suggest browsing http://crockpot365.blogspot.com for techniques, not just recipes. She does meatballs in there, for example.
I also know people who've had a lot of luck with once a month cooking methods (even just a few meals done that way can adjust the burden a lot.) Or my former housemates used to do one of the equivalents: companies that would set up all the ingredients for you, you come in, make up the dishes, you come home with a bunch, and then you cook as instructed. (They were not *hugely* more expensive than making the same thing at home: no where near personal chef level.)
The search term of use is probably "meal preparation" or "meal preparation service" - the ones I've heard about all have some flexibility re: ingredients and allergens, or just stuff like "I don't like peppers, so I'm leaving them out, and putting in more other seasonings."
no subject
Date: 2013-06-13 04:27 pm (UTC)Computer-related lifehacks:
* the household uses a web-based program (which also has an iOS app at least) called Astrid, which gives us a centralised grocery list, chore list, "I've lost my widget, if you see it please let me know" list, and so on. it has things like 'minor house repairs we need to perform or arrange for' in one list, I made a list of things to do for getting my studio set up, I have an assortment of religion-related tasks as a list for myself, etc. Recently we did a "I'm putting this crate of stuff away here" thing, and I went to Astrid and made a list for it so when we, in six months, are all "Where the fuck are the kids' winter coats?" we have a place to look.
* People say Google calendar is needful for polyamory, which I don't get at all, but it's sure needful for managing the kids. I have a bunch of calendars on my system, separate things which I can turn off and on as need be: a Jewish religious calendar, my Egyptian religious calendar, our "whose night is it to make dinner, whose night it is to change babies" calendar, C's class schedule calendar, a calendar E made which is basically 'I found all these things that are interesting to do, so if we need an Activity here is what's out there', and some personal notes.
I kinda want to babble about THE BOARD but that's a different flavor of easier I think....
no subject
Date: 2013-06-15 07:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-15 04:08 pm (UTC)My memory hack of choice for work (and some recurring home things) is currently Any.Do, which I love because it has a function where it helps me plan out my day. It goes through the day's tasks, and I get to choose when I will take care of them. Having just that little jog, plus the scheduleable reminders, lets me take care of my work in a good order.
Since my brain works differently than Significant Other's, (those of you familiar with data structures: my brain is a queue, zie's is a stack) the Honey Do list gets written down as much as possible. This not only allows me to remember everything that needs to get done, it also allows me to prioritize and plan them so that I can be the most efficient with my time. If zie absolutely needs something done, zie gives it a priority marker. And then, regularly through the day, zie interrupts me with short (and not short) tasks to do. Which would normally make me forget the other things zie wanted, but the written list allows for some amount of continuity. And lessens the annoyance of not getting things done in the most efficient list order.
The only other major potential problem is that I can get very focused on a task, to the point where my time management can get out of joint. Usually, though, I can subvert it by pushing things I know will take more time and thinking to the bottom of the queue, or by breaking the task up and filling the in-between time with something else. So, if transferring files (or flashing a ROM) will take ten minutes, I can usually start the task, go away from it and do other things, and then cycle back to it after the appointed time has elapsed. About the only time I hit serious snags are when troubleshooting is involved, since that requires me to be present and thinking at the same time. And having technology in a non-proper-working state is often distressing for me.
I also have had to hack the relationship a bit, as Sig. Other is very much about wanting to spend as much time with me in proximity as possible, often watching television together. Since I also have an on-line life that I want to keep up with, it has necessitated the purchase and use of tablet computers so that I can be physically present and still able to participate on-line. It does lead to several accusations that I am not paying attention to the television show (which annoys her greatly), but it's a workable compromise for me.
no subject
Date: 2013-08-10 08:02 pm (UTC)Online Task Manager
Date: 2014-04-17 11:46 am (UTC)