[HN Gopher] How to avoid losing items? Holding pens
___________________________________________________________________
How to avoid losing items? Holding pens
Author : surprisetalk
Score : 367 points
Date : 2024-08-11 23:47 UTC (23 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (blog.alexwendland.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (blog.alexwendland.com)
| m463 wrote:
| I think that's a clever idea.
|
| I've also really found it helpful to put things in plain sight.
|
| The best example of this is shallow toolchest drawers where you
| can for example open one and see all your screwdrivers.
|
| The worst is the back of the refrigerator, where things go to
| turn into science experiments. I can kind of see why those super-
| expensive 48" wide (but shallow) subzero fridges sell for so
| much.
| doubled112 wrote:
| I think the freezer on the bottom setup makes sense too. I
| spend more time looking in the fridge, move it to eye level.
|
| I still don't think my wife understands the struggle that the
| top shelf is completely invisible when I open the fridge door
| unless I get way down.
| ghaff wrote:
| Just went from a side-by-side to a French Door. (I admittedly
| have an upright freezer in my basement.) This seems so much
| better than what I had. The freezer drawers are shallow and
| much easier to see stuff I might want in the near-term than
| with the side by side.
|
| It is fairly deep and that takes some discipline for the
| refrigerator but I've been good with that so far. Not that
| many locations where things can disappear. We'll see how long
| the discipline lasts. It "feels" like a bigger fridge/freezer
| even though I think the volumes are about the same.
| vundercind wrote:
| Counter-depth fridges are the way to go. All we lost when we
| switched was the space where stuff was slowly going bad.
| ghaff wrote:
| I went back and forth. I do have a lot of condiments for
| ethnic cooking and so forth that have pretty good
| refrigerator lives for a home kitchen. I think the real trick
| is to keep leftovers and genuinely perishable stuff towards
| the front.
| tonymet wrote:
| Best cleaning / organizational tip I've learned : everything out
| of place goes into a tote. Every day shuttle the tote around the
| house to deposit the items in their rightful place. This reduces
| reorganizing to linear time
| hn_user82179 wrote:
| What kind/size of tote do you use? I just finished cleaning and
| realized how much easier it'd be if I did something like this -
| 'sorted go-backs'
| clumsysmurf wrote:
| I like Akro bins, or some "system" that I can always expand
| easily in the future like Sterilite stackers (I've gotten 1
| or 2 every year for about a decade).
|
| https://www.sterilite.com/product-
| page.html?product=14723V06...
| madamelic wrote:
| Going to sound facetious for a second: whatever size works
| for you and the space.
|
| It's more just what works for the space and flow. For
| instance, I have identical milkcrate size boxes at the bottom
| and top of the stairs. Why? So I can exchange them
| interchangably and they are easy to drop stuff into as I
| pass. I take the bottom of the stairs upstairs to sort and I
| take the top of the stairs downstairs then just toss the bin
| back to the closest spot so I don't have to climb stairs...
| lowest energy possible.
|
| In another case, I have a small-ish tub for assorted wires.
| The workflow is I have a big box of wires that are sorted
| into baggies, I pull a wire out, I use it, I put it in the
| small bin, then I sort the small bin back into baggies in one
| go. It fits on my shelf and the intention was to prevent it
| from becoming unsorted wires... which it unfortunately has
| because I can't keep it up.
|
| So really, it's just whatever works best for the situation,
| area, what it will contain, etc so you just have to find what
| works best for your situation.
| fnord77 wrote:
| I've seen smallish, stiff cloth baskets with handles at Daiso
| that would be suitable
| tonymet wrote:
| Plastic bins of assorted sizes , from jewelry box to shoe box
| Brajeshwar wrote:
| Ha! Similar idea to mine, but I use an open-wide-shallow
| basket/bin instead. My saying to my family is, "Everything has
| a place to go." The ones that don't go in their place quickly
| enough land in the basket/bin.
|
| Now, during the weekend cleanup chores, the items are
| preferably placed in the right places.
|
| Growing up lacking access to good stationery, I kinda get
| anxious and panicked and tend to over-buy stationery items for
| my kids and mine. So, I have a pretty large basket container
| just for the stationery.
| davchana wrote:
| Ask me. 100+ journals. 10 packets of 10 pen packets. Colorful
| index cards. A5 files. Cube notepads. Postit notes. Notepads,
| yellow, white, a5,letter,legal.
| treetalker wrote:
| Yeah, but where does the tote live? It's mobile and might not
| be where I need it when I need it. Then I go looking for it,
| and all of a sudden I have two problems and have difficulty
| getting back to what I was doing in the first place. :-)
| daemonologist wrote:
| I'm afraid the only remaining option is to wear a backpack
| 24/7 and reenact your favorite inventory management RPG.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| You know how RPGs that don't let you stack same items in
| the inventory suck? They're too close to real life.
| m463 wrote:
| did I feed the cows?
| prmoustache wrote:
| stop, you are triggering my Dora the explorer PTSD.
| dan353hehe wrote:
| That's simple enough. Just get a second tote for holding your
| first tote! Then you just have to keep track of the second
| one to be able to locate the first one.
| fmbb wrote:
| It's still linear time with one basket per room, you just have
| to maybe visit each room twice.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| This is how I ended up with three _boxes_ ful of infrequently
| used items that were supposed to find their place for a year
| now... : /.
| graftak wrote:
| We throw everything out (to thrift stores if possible) after
| a year of no use. Has bitten us almost never and when it has
| it's usually something useless to someone else too (cheap to
| replace).
| lostlogin wrote:
| This seems like the 'cable storage' problem many people I
| know suffer from.
|
| All spare cable go in a place. You never use them. But if
| you throw away that mini dvi cable or that display port
| one, you'll need it tomorrow.
| foobarian wrote:
| We have a problem getting rid of stuff in this way because
| we have hoarding tendencies. For every item you consider
| removing, you think up new ways in which you might need it
| in the future, or you say you will have a yard sale and
| make a little bit of money back, neither of which are
| realistic.
|
| I think the problem is further exacerbated for people
| growing up in scarcity, so they are used to frugal
| operations, and are unable to cope with modern day flood of
| goods. Our parents are a good example, they save plastic
| grocery bags, all boxes, all original containers even for
| e.g. a coffee maker. "Just in case we will sell it one
| day".
|
| I don't know what to do :-) Maybe we should write a
| will/set aside a fund to pay a junk removal company to come
| before our kids get ahold of the mess, so they don't
| inherit the burden.
| notfed wrote:
| This is similar to how---let's be honest---most of us manage
| our OS desktop files.
| jen729w wrote:
| When I lived with a mate we each had a drawer in the kitchen.
| This place had weirdly deep drawers, two of, stacked. Perfect
| for this.
|
| If I saw his junk lying around, it went in his drawer. Far more
| often if he saw my junk lying around, it went in my drawer.
|
| 'Where's _thing?_ ' Probably in my drawer.
| prmoustache wrote:
| It is nice until you start having fragile stuff like
| sunglasses in the drawer.
| jen729w wrote:
| Your fault for leaving them out!
|
| Although we were respectful of each other's stuff. We were
| best mates so it worked out.
| madamelic wrote:
| I drove my spouse crazy with this because I'd put his stuff
| in a pile in the same place every time.
|
| He'd get annoyed with me because I moved his keys from the
| microwave and put in next to the rest of the keys. Apparently
| that was his spot for his keys.
|
| The way I 'fixed' this is I got a little basket for his keys
| and now he gets after me because I leave my keys on my desk.
|
| One other thing that would cause turmoil was mail. We would
| get mail in then dump it on the counter. I would sort it into
| piles but apparently the pile was an efficient storage
| method. Now we have inboxes right next to the door, even our
| dog has one for all of her stuff because before we'd place
| her leash wherever she wandered off to when she walked
| inside.
| m463 wrote:
| can you go around the house _filling_ the tote? :)
| tonymet wrote:
| that too. pickup and deposit are in the same complexity
| layer8 wrote:
| It may be linear in the number of items, but not in the number
| of rightful places (you'd have to sort the items by rightful
| place first). Deciding on each rightful place also tends to not
| be constant-time.
| foobarian wrote:
| On the bright side, at least the rightful places are
| presumably still in Euclidean space so there are efficient
| solutions for the optimal traversal paths.
| tonymet wrote:
| over time your items will develop a home.
| prmoustache wrote:
| And how do you manage to force yourself to do that last daily
| part? Most people who struggle with storing stuff in a
| dedicated storage also struggle with routines.
| notfed wrote:
| Yeah, "just clear the tote out daily" is a a huge
| understatement. Though, I think this plan better than never
| cleaning at all.
| tonymet wrote:
| start with weekly and work forward. It varies for me too.
| depending on how cluttered your house gets you may get by
| with a different routine.
| P_I_Staker wrote:
| I've done this. The problem I find is having to fold my clothes
| and re-orginize every tote 10-15 times a day, as the totes are
| rotating around the various pettestals.
|
| I'ts definity a case of "house eats you". You know what I mean.
| taneq wrote:
| Ah yes, that fifth step is the trick...
| ghaff wrote:
| I'd argue mostly.
|
| I do have a few bins mostly related to financial information
| like statements and bills--which I'll probably never need to
| look at given online access to many things--but that are
| probably good to keep around for a while before chucking them.
| flicken wrote:
| For that, you can use "spike filing". Place everything
| incoming you might need on top of a spike (or on top of a
| pile or in the front of a folder). The automatically sorts by
| traverse chronological order, making it easy to both retrieve
| old documents and to know the age so you can discard older
| ones.
|
| https://www.enotesnepal.com/class-11/notes/business-
| studies/...
| Mistletoe wrote:
| Thought this solution was going to be holding a pen in your
| hand...
| pixelatedindex wrote:
| Glad to know I'm not the only one who read the title this way!
| whartung wrote:
| Quite. I've lost several Fisher Bullet Pens. They're tiny, and
| smooth. They fall out of pockets very well.
|
| You'd think I'd learn and stop buying black ones as well. Talk
| about stealth pens.
| 1123581321 wrote:
| I went through a phase where I sort of did this. I kept
| forgetting or misplacing one thing when I left the house. So I
| started assigning myself one extra small thing to bring with
| me. It may just have been the attention I was paying, but it
| helped!
| fuzztester wrote:
| solutions can't hold anything, they dont have hands.
|
| i thought it was going to be about how to hold a pen.
| kleiba wrote:
| Of course, point 5 is the weakest link in this approach.
| Brajeshwar wrote:
| Please try this -- add a recurring weekly calendar item,
| "Chore: Clean up Holding Pen." It can be a SAT/SUN around 8AM
| in the morning. ;-)
| bdjsiqoocwk wrote:
| Not sure I want to take advice from someone who keeps their keys
| on their back pocket.
| ghaff wrote:
| I used to be bad with keys. Now, in addition to having an
| AirTag on them, I have a hook for them right by the front door
| which I pretty much use religiously. I do have to go searching
| for my iPhone sometimes but not my keys.
| bdjsiqoocwk wrote:
| I used to not have keys because I was too small. Then when I
| was about 8 or so my parents gave me keys and told me to put
| them in my pocket every time I leave the house. So I do. It's
| not difficult stuff.
|
| Saying "I'm bad with keys" has to be such a low expectation
| of one self I can't even comprehend. Like those people who
| say "I'm bad with maths", but even worse.
| ghaff wrote:
| I certainly don't if I don't need them like I'm not driving
| my car. Someone else may be driving. I'm just walking my
| house. (I have a keyless entry system.) I basically only
| need my keys if I'm getting in my car when, yes, they
| generally go in a pants pocket or fanny pack.
|
| What I did used to do was be careless in tossing them
| somewhere random when I came back into the house when I did
| take them. I now have a keyhook by the door I consistently
| use. But, sure, be condescending. I'm sure it will serve
| you well.
| pacifika wrote:
| My coat is the only place for my keys so I can't leave without
| them.
| bigfudge wrote:
| I tried this trick too, but What if it's sunny/too hot for a
| coat?
| pacifika wrote:
| Maybe you use an alternative like something to clip on a
| belt?
| rigrassm wrote:
| Hello from Houston! I personally use a small backpack that
| I leave my keys, wallet, extra charging cords and a
| dedicated set of diabetes things and anything that comes
| out of that bag goes straight back when I'm fine with it.
| Works pretty well
| tombert wrote:
| I just end up buying enough of the item to be within arms reach
| of nearly anywhere I'm likely to use it.
|
| I used to never be able to find a screwdriver when I needed it,
| so now I have seven screwdrivers: three regular ratcheting, three
| stubby ratcheting, and a ratcheting one that lives in my pocket.
| I keep a regular ratcheting on my desk, in my living room, and in
| my bedroom, which are the only places I would realistically ever
| use these things.
|
| As a result there's really no reason for me to lose it; it's
| already contained into the area that it already lives.
|
| I do this with a lot of stuff now. Separate chargers for my
| laptop for my desk and my bed, separate iPhone chargers, and a
| bunch of other stuff.
| ghaff wrote:
| Yeah.
|
| You can't do it with everything but, for example, I tend to
| have a stocked travel kit that I don't need to raid (for the
| most part) for everyday charging gear. My laptops live where
| they live and I'll bring their chargers with them; they
| basically don't move unless I'm traveling. My office has some
| tools and my garage has some tools. I may need to raid one or
| the other but not for routine stuff.
|
| I certainly don't need to bring a downstairs charger upstairs
| to charge my iPhone at night.
| tombert wrote:
| Yep, I keep a laptop USB-C charger in my backpack, so I don't
| have to unplug things and move things.
|
| As you said, you can't do this for everything; some things
| are too expensive or take too much room to have a million
| duplicates of, but I don't feel like I lose those things as
| much.
|
| The things I feel like I loose are generally relatively
| inexpensive, like pens or scissors or screwdrivers. I got
| lasik so I don't need them anymore, but i used to have 10 of
| the $7.95 pairs of glasses spread out everywhere as well, in
| case I lost a contact lens at work or something.
|
| Aliexpress is kind of a godsend for me. A lot of tools on
| there in particular are shockingly good.
| jon-wood wrote:
| USB-C has been a game changer for charging. I'm now able to
| keep a charger that will work for almost everything I own
| everywhere I might need one. One at my desk, one in my bag,
| one by the TV, one by the bed. Next step is strapping a set
| of adapters to each of those cables.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| https://what-if.xkcd.com/imgs/a/90/ygg_ask.png
| ta988 wrote:
| https://what-if.xkcd.com/90/
| fnord77 wrote:
| my car keys cost $350 each
| tombert wrote:
| Yeah I mentioned in a sibling comment that there are things
| that are too expensive to have a bunch of, so you can't do it
| for everything, just relatively cheap "I can never seem to
| find X when I need it..." stuff.
| fire_lake wrote:
| Perfect example of anti-progress in the modern world.
| lostlogin wrote:
| My parents had a Mark 2 Ford Escort. My mum came home in
| someone else's car once, as it looked similar and the key
| worked in it.
|
| Mazda 323's used to open each other too, and also Ford
| Lazers. These problems don't seem to happen anymore, but at
| some cost.
| EricE wrote:
| I hope to be buried with my old, dumb cars :p
| jeffparsons wrote:
| I applied this rule to tape measures, because I found I never
| had one when I needed one, e.g., out in the car. So my new rule
| became: if you can't easily find a tape measure when you need
| one, buy another one at your earliest convenience.
|
| Now I have one in my work bag, at least one in the car, one in
| my main toolbox, a few hiding around other places in the
| garage, one in the kitchen, probably one upstairs, on in my
| desk drawer, etc.
|
| No regrets. Life is better now.
| tombert wrote:
| I did the same thing when Dollar Tree started stocking tape
| measures for $1.25. I figured that they'll be accurate enough
| and I do need to measure stuff a lot, so I have ended up
| buying four.
|
| I also have a keychain one that lives on my house keys, which
| has come in handy a few times (even if it is limited to 6
| feet).
| ateng wrote:
| I applied this rule to microfibre cloth for my glasses. I
| bulk buy 100 of these online and place one each in every
| jacket I have, plus a few more around drawers at my home
| khafra wrote:
| A decade ago, I bought a bucket of 25 nail clippers. My wife
| was initially skeptical, but over the next few years, grew to
| appreciate the low demands of the system: Need a nail clipper?
| Go to the bucket. See a nail clipper in a weird place? Put it
| in the bucket, if you feel like it and have the time.
| Otherwise, don't worry about it. There'll be one in the bucket
| when you need it.
| LordGrey wrote:
| My ex-wife was constantly losing nail clippers. My solution
| was to buy a box of 50 of them and put them _everywhere_.
| petesergeant wrote:
| I do this for pens. I bought 25 4-color Bics, stuck them in a
| glass at the center of the house. Very useful
| andruby wrote:
| I'm happy to read that I'm not the only one. I love those
| 4-color Bics. I somehow need to buy a new box every other
| year or so.
|
| The whole household uses them
| beAbU wrote:
| I always lost my guitar picks while in school and going
| through my guitar phase. Eventually I bought a whole box of
| them and scattered them throughout my room. Less than a week
| later I couldn't find any. Some items, like guitar picks and
| bobby pins are just cursed out the factory it seems.
| m463 wrote:
| I have a copy of little kit several places:
|
| It contains:
|
| - sharpie
|
| - pen: https://amazon.com/dp/B005Y0T8C2
|
| - postit full-stick notes pad
|
| - cutter of all: https://amazon.com/dp/B000VYOISU
|
| - opener of all the things: https://amazon.com/dp/B0017DGTSG
|
| - diagonal cutter - any decent, but I like klein:
| https://amazon.com/dp/B0000302W8
|
| at first I questioned myself duplicating stuff. Was I being a
| hoarder? But honestly, it has paid off 1000x
| tombert wrote:
| I have to fight against my hoarding tendencies, but I figure
| that for small stuff, the likelihood of getting so much that
| it's a problem is unlikely. Even if I had 100 screwdrivers
| and 100 tape measures, that would be a bit odd, but it's not
| enough for a reality show to make an episode about me.
|
| The stuff you have there is all pretty small and not terribly
| expensive, so I don't think it's very hoard-ey.
|
| I _did_ have to get rid of a lot of my computer equipment
| that I was hoarding...rack mount servers are sort of
| addictive because they 're inexpensive and powerful, so I had
| a bunch of them taking up way too much room in my basement.
| I've given all of them away to friends and coworkers and
| replaced them with a few tiny gaming PCs.
| consf wrote:
| It sounds like a thorough approach, but having so many items
| might lead to clutter. But if it workd for you - it is good
| fnord77 wrote:
| My holding pen would just end up overflowing with stuff.
| sublinear wrote:
| I have such a hard time relating to this in the same way I get
| deeply annoyed by sloppy code from coworkers. Any advice?
| anon35 wrote:
| Try to keep in mind that your attention to detail is almost
| certainly perceived by them to be fastidious, and that quietly
| your seniormost colleagues and leaders may well muse: "Man, if
| only sublinear would loosen their standards, just imagine how
| much faster we'd proceed". Put another way: the fact that you
| can't relate to OPs problem is because you're hardwired to
| solve it (putting things in their place) continuously, likely
| without exception, which means you're paying a different cost.
| Try to think of _that_ cost when you bristle at their
| solutions.
| sublinear wrote:
| I enjoy thinking about this perspective, but at the end of
| the day it's not slower in the long run to be meticulous.
| Quite the opposite.
| maxbond wrote:
| I think it's less that being meticulous is time consuming
| than that, in the same way that things have different
| values to different people, things can have different
| costs. I feel like if I didn't put things in convenient
| places that may be difficult to find later, I'd end up
| doing a lot of backtracking in the present.
|
| Eg, I misplace my wireless headphones a lot. Something
| comes up that demands my full attention, so I take off my
| headphones. My headphones live at my desk.
|
| If I walk to my desk, I'm likely to forget what I needed to
| do - there's lots of stuff demanding my attention on my
| desk, after all. Someone could also engage me in
| conversation on my way. Much of the time I'll return to my
| original task without issue, sometimes I'll get distracted
| for 15 minutes, sometimes I'll get distracted for an hour.
|
| It's a lot cheaper to just put down my headphones. Or maybe
| it's more accurate to think of it as less risky.
| lazyasciiart wrote:
| "Meticulous" is basically defined as "the upper end of the
| right level of care about detail." What you call meticulous
| others might call unnecessarily pedantic, or obsessive.
| What they call meticulous, you might find sloppy.
| petesergeant wrote:
| Exactly that, it's the No True Scotsman fallacy.
| cromulent wrote:
| I'm in the process of coming to terms with how neurologically
| diverse people are.
|
| Some people are completely comfortable with being late, or
| having smudged glasses, or driving erratically - it does not
| bother them in the slightest.
|
| Their world is completely different to mine, and it's not that
| they don't care about the sloppy code or that they are too lazy
| to polish it - they don't even see it.
|
| Humans are surprisingly diverse in how their brains work.
| mturmon wrote:
| Some sympathetic reading about ADHD might help. And think about
| who in your life might have it in some degree. That person who
| leaves the cabinet doors open, or who has 500 tabs on their
| browser. Don't pathologize it.
| treetalker wrote:
| My approach is to have separate "take-off" points near the
| entrance/exit of each room.
|
| Example: If I'm in my home office and find that some things need
| to go to the living room and some to the kitchen, I simply queue
| them to take off instead of taking a trip every time I realize an
| item needs to go. Then when I take a coffee break, I'll grab all
| the items; drop the living-room items off on the way to the
| kitchen, and drop the kitchen items off when I arrive. I get my
| coffee; grab anything queued up on the kitchen take-off point
| that can be dropped off on the way, and drop them off on my way
| back.
|
| As it works out, everything is almost always where it ought to
| be; and when it's not, I know where it will be instead.
|
| The key is that I always check the take-off point every time I
| leave a room.
| bubblebeard wrote:
| I might just steal this idea from you. Having a partner who
| "organize through chaos" (which I maintain is not an actual
| system) there are constantly treasure troves of knick-knacks
| everywhere, usually hiding important items. No matter how often
| I try to organize it's always messy, I think this might be the
| answer. Thank you!
| loopdoend wrote:
| A place for everything and everything in its place...
| pipes wrote:
| Ah yes, same here, my wife stacks stuff in any available free
| space, anywhere in the house.
| Aeolun wrote:
| It's fine for stuff that has a fixed spot in the kitchen or
| bathroom, but documents, mail, jewelry or any kind of tech
| just disappears everywhere.
| bubblebeard wrote:
| Quite so. It's always an adventure when sorting through
| these stacks. Never know what one might find.
| duderific wrote:
| We have "piles" everywhere. Woe to you if you move or
| rearrange a pile...
| phaelanx wrote:
| Long time lurker, first time posting because I love this
| concept and this is is how I (ADHD type) get stuff done
| without getting distracted.
|
| I've always thought it was the same as the bubble sort
| algorithm we were taught in uni.
|
| Take something one step towards where it belongs, and pick up
| anything going in the same direction you are.
|
| Repeat that a few times and everything gets where it belongs.
| Not the most optimal algorithm (it's a bubble sort after all)
| but it helps.
| pacifika wrote:
| It's interesting because it contradicts the advice to only move
| an item once (avoiding clutter)
| aaron695 wrote:
| > contradicts the advice to only move an item once
|
| This would have to be wrong.
|
| This would ban laundry hampers, dirty clothes would go
| straight into the machine.
|
| I think the rule would be if you pick up the item from the
| "take-off" point it goes away.
|
| You have to be able queue things before the clean. OP isn't
| cleaning, they are constructing the queue. You would be allow
| to move from queue to queue I guess, but you'd have to make
| sure there can't be a topographical loop.
| leokennis wrote:
| This is a good idea, as is the idea in the article. The basic
| requisite however is a desire to not lose stuff. My wife always
| loses track of her EarPods. My oldest kid always loses his
| pocket knife.
|
| I could have 20 holding pens in the house and they'd still lose
| their stuff, since the idea that you have to exert even a minor
| amount of effort <now> by putting stuff in its place to save
| yourself much more searching effort <later>, is either lost on
| them, or they just greatly value the present over the future.
|
| I do not even get annoyed about it anymore - just like I do not
| get annoyed that it turns dark at night. My stuff is always in
| its place, and before we leave the house they will spend 10
| minutes finding theirs.
| Aeolun wrote:
| I lose my shit all the time (everything that doesn't have a
| fixed location anyway), which is why everything that
| regularly comes with me is now in it's own specialized bags.
| There's a work bag, a 'going out with kids' bag, etc.
|
| I still remember the last time I lost my keys, which is like
| 26 years ago, when I was 10. But I still identify as that kid
| that always lost their keys xD
| xattt wrote:
| A few thoughts on keys:
|
| I am consciously trying to whittle down my keychain to
| reduce the chance of temporary losing access to things. I
| have a keypad door lock so I'be been able to get rid of my
| front door key.
|
| However, I found that decreasing the use of something can
| increase the chance of losing it, because you're not
| "touching" it all the time and not aware of its location.
|
| I have an Airtag, but wish that it could be integrated into
| the car keyfob to whittle down the size even more.
| madamelic wrote:
| This reason is precisely why I got an implanted RFID
| chip. When I lived in apartments, I would _constantly_
| lose my door fob. It's much more difficult to lose the
| chip if it is part of you ;)
|
| (I wouldn't recommend embedding an Airtag though, ha)
| ghaff wrote:
| Probably I'm just old but I'm very aware of an electronic
| device being a single point of failure. (I realize the
| car's keyfob is that--and have been meaning to
| investigate the practicality of keeping a spare key in
| the car in a faraday bag.) I do keep a physical door key
| on my keyring even with a keypad door lock and have one
| somewhere on my property as well.
| NorthOf33rd wrote:
| This is just good marriage (and general relationship) advice.
| Bluestein wrote:
| Just curious: The "33rd" in your username is the parallel,
| a given 33rd _street_ somewhere, none of the above ...
| moduspol wrote:
| The "ding" sound from "Find my iPhone" is pretty commonly
| heard in my house... but not from my phone.
| ghaff wrote:
| The problem I find is that, other than my iPhone, the
| reason I often can't find an iDevice is that I haven't used
| it recently and have no idea where I left it. Unless it was
| attached to a charging cable it probably isn't in a
| position to ding or otherwise be found.
| mewpmewp2 wrote:
| It is easy to say to do this, but in reality what happens is
| I am deep in my thoughts and all of it happens on autopilot.
| I consciously understand it would save me time to put them
| correctly away, but there is just nothing triggering me to do
| it. If I had a very intelligent watch that dinged me every
| time I'm supposed to do it, I would do it. The tech is not
| there yet though.
|
| I think it's the multiple processes going on in the brain,
| where there's a process that will scan for danger, and this
| same track is able to break out of the deep thought process.
| I have to assume this same process just doesn't see those
| points as something that should interrupt the deep thought
| process.
|
| The same process with any novel activity will be much more
| sensitive, but as I do more of the same activity it will
| consider it a safe activity. The more I do something, the
| more I would be on autopilot allowing the deep thought
| process to go on.
|
| For example when I am in a new place, after moving or
| whatever reason, it is easier in the beginning for me to stay
| organized because the process is still sensitive and is more
| careful, but the more I get complacent the less I will be
| thinking about where to put the things and the deep thought
| track will be fully prioritised.
| mauvehaus wrote:
| My wife and I are very similar to you and your wife. I will
| note that on the rare occasion when I misplace something,
| I've found that it's efficient to just enlist her help
| finding it immediately. She is much better practiced than I
| am at finding things where they don't belong.
| chrisweekly wrote:
| A tip that's helped me: when you finally find the thing you
| misplaced, and are done with it, don't put it back where you
| found it, put it in the place where you first looked.
| glitchc wrote:
| Clever!
| inimino wrote:
| This reminds me of a rule I have for naming things in code
| (functions, variables, etc).
|
| Say you add a function, and then the first time you call
| that function, you call it by a different name. Don't fix
| the function call to match the original name, but instead
| go back and change the name to match how you tried to call
| it. The state of mind you are in when you called the
| function is a better guide to naming than the state of mind
| you were in when you implemented it.
| kayodelycaon wrote:
| I really do not like the assumption people don't do something
| because they don't want to it.
|
| I really want to make the system work reliably but I can't.
| I've spent 30+ years trying to make things work. They just
| don't.
|
| It works when I have planned to do things ahead of time, but
| I can't get my brain to remember to do it when interrupted,
| the attention shift doesn't trigger "callbacks" or "publish
| events". This is a fundamental prerequisite to make this
| work.
|
| People's who can do this will have difficulty not
| understanding people who can't.
|
| This same problem applies to "thinking before I speak". I
| can't do that. People think I can because I don't make the
| same mistakes by rote learning what not to say in specific
| situations. I can't anticipate new mistakes or generalize
| previous ones.
| mapt wrote:
| This is not an effort or desire-mediated performance, it is a
| focus-mediated performance. Some people find that cognitively
| more difficult than others.
|
| If you are the type of person to intensively multitask, to
| occupy your short-term memory with different trains of
| thought in a holding pattern, you will tend to sacrifice
| command skills - if your memory is already busy reading and
| writing on all available channels, it isn't going to pop up
| "You have something in the oven" or "You were holding a pen a
| minute ago and you set it down on the second tier of the
| brown bookshelf" or "You need to get the kid from school".
| The internet & smartphone era has unlocked a degree of
| hyperstimulus that can veer into the pathological for those
| of us with our brains wired a certain way.
|
| This is also a thing if you're doing things at a 'normal'
| degree of focus but your memory is impaired (number of
| operational channels reduced) in some other fashion, through
| age-related cognitive decline or some types of medication or
| chronic sleep deprivation or a TBI.
|
| This is the ADD trait. We are chronically late to important
| events, we lose things all the time, we frequently accumulate
| a thousand browser tabs, we jump from thing to thing as they
| come up. Forming subconscious routines is difficult, and when
| we do it, we often allocate them only the barest muscle
| memory - I lock my car regardless of whether it's already
| locked or should be locked (bringing in groceries) because my
| macro for leaving the car is to lock it. There are pros and
| there are cons to this cognitive style. But it's certainly
| not a matter of DESIRE to do things or CARELESSNESS.
|
| What helps? I find:
|
| * Writing things down, especially notes.txt
|
| * Snapping pictures of things as easier form of notes
|
| * Scheduled phone reminders
|
| * Getting sufficient sleep
|
| * Getting more than sufficient sleep - leaving an extra hour
| in bed to think about things, plan your day
|
| * "Bookmark all tabs"
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| > Snapping pictures of things as easier form of notes
|
| How do you get a hold of the picture later?
|
| I've tried doing this, but I have a hard time finding the
| pictures if I haven't quickly moved the information to
| textual form.
| ekanes wrote:
| I'm not the person you're asking, but do the same thing,
| and for me I can usually find it visually by scrolling
| through "all photos" if it's recent, and sometimes using
| search in the photos app.
| mhb wrote:
| Do you use those 10 minutes to learn a new language or
| something?
| leokennis wrote:
| Usually I spend those 10 minutes helping them search for
| their stuff :-) My main interest is the lack of stress
| because I know where my stuff is.
| Sander_Marechal wrote:
| I do the same. I use the stairs as take-off points. I regularly
| go up and down anyway, so I take whatever is on the stairs and
| put it away, or put it on the next floor stairs if it needs to
| go to the attic. Now if I could only get my wife to do this
| too. She will put items on the stairs but always forget to take
| them up or down and walk right past them :-D
| m463 wrote:
| my take-off point for outside my house is on top of the car
| keys.
| pards wrote:
| These "take off" points remind me of a great parody
|
| Whoa, it's halfway there
|
| Whoa,leave it on the stairs!
|
| https://youtu.be/ZKW-USW5uTo
| xtiansimon wrote:
| Ha! This is how I manage files between my desktop and home
| directory's subfolders. Don't have time to sort? Drop into the
| parent directory, and sort it later.
| rigrassm wrote:
| Thanks for sharing, I'm definitely going to be giving this a
| try!
| consf wrote:
| It's actually both practical and efficient. And it's important
| not to neglect take-off point
| normie3000 wrote:
| I do this. The take-off points are generally where I will trip
| over the items. It infuriates my wife.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| One take-off point I've used is putting things in/on top of my
| shoes.
|
| That way I can't leave the house without dealing with them
| digging wrote:
| A related pro-tip I learned from catering, which I now use
| often for leftovers, potlucks, gifts, etc. If you have things
| in the fridge you need to take with you when you leave your
| current location, put your keys in the fridge with them!
| dmckeon wrote:
| Also related: if you place anything on top of your car -
| coffee, wallet, briefcase - putting your keys with it makes
| it hard to forget & drive off.
| notfed wrote:
| Or blocking the door!
| lacrosse_tannin wrote:
| I will almost always ignore the box/take-off. I pile stuff up
| by my office door that needs to go out to the garage. That spot
| always has tools piled up. A tote probably would help.
|
| Also, there's design trick to make things look better. If you
| put 3 or 4 things onto a dish or textile or something, they
| magically convert from clutter to intentional. I don't know if
| a plastic sterlite works for this though.
| paulpauper wrote:
| Anyone else misread this to mean holding a pen .. like a
| ballpoint pen
| refurb wrote:
| My solution, from years of living out of a suitcase traveling for
| work, was "everything has a place".
|
| Need a pen? It's in the first pocket of the backpack. When done,
| it goes back there. Need a charging cable, in the zipper pouch on
| the outside. When I unplug it, it only goes back there - no where
| else.
|
| The other that helps when it comes to leaving stuff behind in a
| hotel room is a designated space - say on the desk. Anything
| removed from baggage - clothes, pens, computer, passport -
| doesn't go anywhere but the desk. Then when you need to leave the
| room, you don't need to search the room, only clear the desk.
| flysand7 wrote:
| At one point I put the RFID card I use to access the building i
| work at into the left pocket of my jacket instead of right
| pocket. I don't remember why but that day I was thoroughly
| convinced I forgot it at home. During lunchtime break I went
| back to my home only to find out it's not there...
|
| Since then I keep the card in my left pocket.
|
| The advice of having a specific place for every thing is good,
| but sometimes you mess up. I think I have ADHD so most of the
| time I don't pay any attention to where I leave things, I guess
| developing good habits is good whatever that is. Putting things
| in specific places is I guess one of such habits
| EGreg wrote:
| How would holding a pen prevent you from losing things?
| theqwxas wrote:
| In this article, the meaning of _pen_ as in an enclosure, a
| cage, a tray, a box, a container [0]. A holding pen in this
| case means a holding tray, a holding box, i.e., a container for
| holding things. A pen (cage, tray) for holding things.
|
| [0] https://www.thesaurus.com/browse/pen
| ggm wrote:
| But if you don't lose things, how do future archeologists find
| them?
| placebo wrote:
| I would continuously lose ballpoint pens. At one point I thought
| the solution was to buy an expensive ball point pen as that would
| make me more aware of not losing it, but the effect was that it
| would just take a bit longer. I finally settled on buying many
| cheap pens. One humorous thought that I was curious about was
| that since I never found any pens (either my own or those lost by
| others), was it the case that there are people who find pens in
| the same way I lose them or do they just vanish into another
| dimension...
| margalabargala wrote:
| I take this strategy of buying many of a thing to scatter all
| over with a few things. I've found it very effective.
|
| In particular, I live in a sunny area at high elevation where
| sun protection is a big deal; finding out that one's only tube
| of sunscreen is lost or empty could have serious consequences
| on an outdoor activity day.
|
| Tubes of sunscreen and sunglasses distributed to all vehicles,
| all backpacks, and all house entrances have ensured no sunburns
| in the family the last two years.
| a_e_k wrote:
| Interesting. For contrast, switching to the one-good-pen
| approach was what finally did the trick for me. These days, I
| find I'm more likely to run out of ink than lose my pen. To
| each their own!
| dcminter wrote:
| "Somewhere in the cosmos, he said, along with all the planets
| inhabited by humanoids, reptiloids, fishoids, walking treeoids
| and superintelligent shades of the color blue, there was also a
| planet entirely given over to ballpoint life forms. And it was
| to this planet that unattended ballpoints would make their way,
| slipping away quietly through wormholes in space to a world
| where they knew they could enjoy a uniquely ballpointoid
| lifestyle, responding to highly ballpoint-oriented stimuli, and
| generally leading the ballpoint equivalent of the good life."
| -- Douglas Adams, The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy
| lazyasciiart wrote:
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1322240/
| placebo wrote:
| Haha, awesome, thank you.
|
| "We propose a somewhat more speculative theory (with
| apologies to Douglas Adams and Veet Voojagig). Somewhere in
| the cosmos, along with all the planets inhabited by
| humanoids, reptiloids, walking treeoids, and superintelligent
| shades of the colour blue, a planet is entirely given over to
| spoon life-forms. Unattended spoons make their way to this
| planet, slipping away through space to a world where they
| enjoy a uniquely spoonoid lifestyle, responding to highly
| spoon oriented stimuli, and generally leading the spoon
| equivalent of the good life"
|
| I knew it! :-)
| aquafox wrote:
| I never lost a single sock during or after washing. Why? Because
| I care (they are expensive cycling socks) and I go after each
| sock immediately when putting them on the drying rack. So where
| are they? 1) Entangled with one of the other wet clothing items.
| (60% of cases) 2) Lost on the way between laundry machine and
| drying rack (20% of cases) 3) Still in the laundry drum (20% of
| cases).
| bubblebeard wrote:
| I see your point, I'm a neat freak who cares about most things
| I possess. Trouble is, we don't always have time to be this
| neat. For example, I'm standing in my laundry room rolling up
| socks when suddenly someone calls from upstairs. I go into my
| hallway, still working on a pair of socks, and discover it's my
| partner calling me because our son just defecated on the floor
| of the tiny bathroom upstairs. I throw the socks on the first
| available surface and run to help, focusing on the new problem
| at hand, and now the socks are lost. This exact situation is on
| the extreme side of course. It's more common for me personally
| to put down a glass/cup to assist someone with a minor yet to
| them seemingly important task and then proceed to search for my
| lost bevrage.
| luguenth wrote:
| A german kids show investigated this and made a video about
| it[1]. Here you can see the 4th option of what can happen.
|
| [1] https://youtu.be/-sYZEOftpw4?si=T4btvhTJpfSzA9q2&t=35
| NeoTar wrote:
| Isn't there a fourth failure case - that they have failed to
| make it into the drum in the first place? Maybe not a huge
| issue for yourself, but can occur in my workflow.
|
| This is the one which annoys me most, and so I have to have a
| 'staging area' for unpaired socks which are awaiting their
| unwashed partners.
| maxglute wrote:
| Big fan of these frosted file boxes for this purpose.
|
| Throw transiet shit in, have a sense of what's inside without
| looking too messy.
|
| https://muji.ca/products/pp-file-box-standard-wide-1-2
| canjobear wrote:
| I believe this is called a "junk drawer"
| wodie wrote:
| I like the tip from Adam Savage on where to put new things:
| Quickly think about where you would search first for this item.
| The first thought that comes to mind is where you store it. Next
| time you look for the item it is right where you would search
| first.
| atoav wrote:
| This is good advice. But I'd like to extend it to: and if the
| place you first would look for sucks consider making a better
| one. E.g. if your stapler goes missing a lot and clutters your
| desk, relabel an easy to access drawer to "desk stuff" and put
| it in there. Put all other small things that fit the
| description in there. Return desk stuff into the desk stuff
| drawer.
|
| Should you now have a hundred pens, consider breaking them out
| into a pens and markers drawer etc.
|
| This is really not rocket science, but you need to care a bit
| about the fact that you now became the official bouncer for the
| _desk stuff_ drawer and you should not let other stuff into it.
| And when you find a stapler in the kitchen, you take it and put
| it in the one place that makes sense: the desk stuff drawer.
|
| And you can create many such drawers, and with a certain amount
| of things you will have to. And yeah, consider adding literal
| labels.
| lazyasciiart wrote:
| This breaks down when there are two of you with different
| places you would search first.
| kodt wrote:
| Exactly, I can always remember where something is or should
| go if I made the initial decision of where to store it. But
| if my spouse decides on a new organizational system, even if
| explained to me, I can't seem to recall it when I need it!
| prmoustache wrote:
| That is the best way to end up with a giant mess on that tiny
| piece of furniture you have next to the front door.
|
| That is what happened to me.
| sundvor wrote:
| From the title I thought, how is holding a pen all day going to
| stop me from forgetting where I put things down? Lol.
|
| This is at times my personal hell. I'm of the type who uses the
| "find my phone" feature about ten times a day and _needs_ Tile
| trackers for my keys - and wallet. If only a tracker existed that
| was small enough to attach to my two pairs of prescription
| glasses.
|
| I'll have a think about designated putting things down areas, but
| I'd likely just forget.
|
| (I see that https://findorbit.com/products/orbit-glasses-x exists
| but that's for Apples only).
| pokstad wrote:
| So basically a junk drawer.
| bluSCALE4 wrote:
| This is a recipe for disaster.
| RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
| Also AirTags. My keys, wallet, backpack, briefcase all have
| AirTags.
|
| As long as I can find my phone, I am good.
| treflop wrote:
| I used to lose stuff and I also grew up in a hoarder house.
|
| I ended up having a place for everything as mentioned in the
| article.
|
| In the last 10 years, I have not actually lost a single thing.
| I'm actually pretty proud of myself. I also haven't lost a single
| sock, which is really where it matters.
|
| (I do match up my socks every time right after I do laundry tho.)
|
| There was one time I couldn't find a tool and I was afraid I was
| gonna break my streak... but I did eventually find it.
| graposaymaname wrote:
| More intrigued about the socks part, how did you solve it? I've
| lost enough to understand that there's something clearly wrong
| about the way I deal with them.
| loopdoend wrote:
| Socks can end up stuck in a pair of shorts (if you mix
| laundry) only to fall out somewhere in the streets if you're
| not paying attention.
| treflop wrote:
| Yeppp.
|
| That's why I started checking. If you don't catch it early,
| you're not going to find it.
|
| Sometimes it also just gets stuck in some clothes and it
| doesn't fall out on its own too. If I'm missing a sock, I
| give my clothes the ol' shake.
| Terr_ wrote:
| Sounds like an argument for one of those mesh laundry bags,
| so that the laundry load is mixed (multiple categories)
| without being mixed (individual items interspersed).
|
| I have an "unpaired socks stay in the laundry-room" policy
| which covers most cases, but it won't help if one of them
| exfiltrates within another piece of clothing.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| How do you get from drying to storing to picking and
| wearing a pair of shorts without noticing there's a sock
| stuck inside? I could maybe buy it in case of some loose
| long pants, but with shorts, you can literally see the
| entire inside surface when you're lifting them to wear.
| OJFord wrote:
| Wait, there are people who _don 't_ 'mix' laundry like
| shorts with socks?! For what purpose? Obviously racial
| segregation and anything needing a different temp or other
| setting, but ceteris paribus a shorts wash and a socks
| wash?
| wiether wrote:
| I am intrigued about people losing socks because it never
| happened to me.
|
| My guess is that people using a dryer are probably more prone
| to be victims of this.
|
| How I do things is: - put dirty clothes in the dirty clothes
| bag as soon as I undress - put clothes by type in a laundry
| bag before washing them - hanging clean clothes to dry
|
| The last part is probably the most important, because if you
| hang an odd number of socks, you know there's an issue so
| you'll look for the missing one. And the laundry bags will
| avoid you having socks stuck in pants/trousers.
| soco wrote:
| After yesterday's laundry I counted the mismatched socks:
| 22. I have no frickin idea where could one misplace
| _twenty-two_ socks but well here I am.
| alfiedotwtf wrote:
| I solved my socks issue once and for-all when I moved out of
| home - I bought 10 pairs of the exact same sock so that you
| can never mix a pair up by mistake. Over the years as they
| either get holes or stretch to much, I replace it with a new
| pair of the exactly item
| Freak_NL wrote:
| Getting short on socks? By another 10-pack of the same
| brand/colour. If you only ever wear one type of socks, this
| is just sensible. My socks are always in order, and there
| will be at most one sock not paired with another.
|
| Unfortunately, this only works where the feet have stopped
| growing, and where the choice of fashion makes this
| feasible. Mostly, that's adult men with standard black or
| otherwise dark socks. My young son loves brightly patterned
| and colourful socks with variation (as befits a five year
| old), but keeping those paired is challenging.
| treetalker wrote:
| This is the Way.
|
| I have one kind of gym sock and one kind of dress sock. I
| never need to pair socks; each type goes into a box in my
| dresser or closet.
|
| Similarly, I never fold gym shorts, gym shirts, or
| underwear. (Who cares?) Each gets stuffed in a general area
| of a drawer. The time savings substantially outweighs the
| inefficient use of space.
|
| My usual t-shirts (32deg from Costco -- super comfortable)
| are generally wrinkle-free and likewise just get stuffed in
| a bin.
|
| 95% of the time my outfits are grab-and-go and require
| minimal laundry effort.
| alfiedotwtf wrote:
| Grab-and-go? I like the sound of that.
|
| My wife pointed out to me early this year that I have a
| uniform which I didn't actually notice until then - the
| same jeans (multiple pairs of the same style in black and
| blue), and only one style of t-shirt but in 3 colours
| (it's a lie - I have 2 styles of t-shirt).
|
| It might sound boring to some, but there's no better
| feeling to me than to not even have to think when getting
| dressed - it's a FILO Queue!
| ccozan wrote:
| I solved the problem by buying one single sort of black socks
| and one single sort of white socks. No need to pair them:
| just pink any random of the same color.
| powersnail wrote:
| It always boggles my mind that losing socks in the laundry is
| such a common phenomenon. A socket is either collected, or
| left in the machine. There's nowhere else it could go. It's
| not like a tape measure or a pen that carried around house
| and could be put somewhere without you consciously
| registering it. Maybe some washing machines have really
| strange geometry that is prone to conceal socks?
| consf wrote:
| Congratulations on maintaining your streak!
| silisili wrote:
| It's just a bandaid. When I was growing up, the 'holding pen' was
| the top of the dishwasher, and it lived in a constant state of
| entropy. The mail and bits were piled into a mountain that would
| fall when bumped into.
|
| The solution is simple: deal with things when they come. Stop
| putting everything off until 'later.'
| duckmysick wrote:
| That's what the point number five is about: "Is cleaned out
| regularly--ideally daily, at most weekly--, so that it doesn't
| become a storage area."
|
| > deal with things when they come
|
| Sometimes it's not practical. You can't deal with everything in
| the morning because you will be late for work or school. You
| have to push certain things later and it's ok - as long as
| "later" is something specific like 6 PM every weekday.
| silisili wrote:
| I get that, but we had the same 'plan' but often failed to do
| so for the a lot of the same reasons we don't often deal with
| things the first time. I guess if you can make sure to stay
| on top of it better, it wouldn't be so bad
| SoftTalker wrote:
| If you can't deal with the mail until 6pm, don't bring it in
| from the letterbox until 6pm. The key is to reduce the number
| of times you have to touch the thing. Ideally to one time.
| Any strategy of "putting stuff in a pile to deal with later"
| just results in piles of stuff unless you are very
| disciplined. And if you're disiplined, you deal with stuff as
| it comes not later.
| dools wrote:
| > 2.) instances where we don't have time to take the item to it's
| assigned place (e.g., because it's in another room).
|
| One of the most important things I took away from the life
| changing magic of tidying up is that, unless you live in Scrooge
| mcducks mansion, the chances that you genuinely don't have enough
| time to put something back where it belongs are very remote.
|
| EDIT: I actually wrote down my thoughts about this
| https://www.benkophone.com/2018/12/20/theres-nothing-magical...
| matrix2003 wrote:
| I found the guy without a toddler.
|
| I airtag everything now. Either the toddler moves it, or I
| chuck my keys somewhere during a defcon 1 situation. They have
| been a big help, personally.
| dools wrote:
| I've got a 12 and a 14 year old, they were toddlers once! But
| admittedly I didn't read the life changing magic of tidying
| up until they were 3 and 5 so maybe out of toddler stage.
|
| However when my wife gave birth to our second child is when I
| realised that if we didn't marshall our stuff properly we
| could never leave the house. It was around the same time as I
| dispensed with about 6 trailer loads of stuff we had accrued
| in the first couple of years of parent hood, so even before I
| read the book I had started to form some of the same ideas
| around throwing shit out and always "resetting" everything
| (things like restocking the nappy bag when you arrive home,
| doing the dishes before starting cooking etc.)
|
| Also:
|
| > They have been a big help, personally
|
| I agree. Having kids has been a bigger driver of personal
| development than I ever could have imagined.
| wiether wrote:
| Personal anecdote : I grew up in a regular flat where I
| couldn't find stuff because my family members were not careful
| about things. During my holidays as a kid, I used to spend a
| few weeks at my uncle's place, which was a _Scrooge mcducks
| mansion_ (I could sleep in a different room every day for the
| whole duration of my stay without sleeping twice in the same
| one) and it was a wonder of organization.
|
| Everything had a specific spot allocated, everything was
| labelled and there were several inventory books.
|
| As a kid it was absolutely fantastic : it was better than a
| store because they had stuff that I never seen before and it
| was free to use.
|
| Thanks to that I then adopted a similar strategy myself (short
| of the inventory books) even though I live in a small flat. The
| amount of time I save with this and the peace of mind...
|
| Whereas when I'm at peoples' place and they have to go through
| their whole home to find two batteries. A complete waste of
| time, energy and lots of useless stress. In the end they'll
| prefer going to the store to buy new batteries, even though
| they _know_ they have them somewhere. Absolutely insane to me!
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| The conclusion seems to be: keeping things in order is easy
| (or easier) if you have lots and lots of free space.
|
| Which might be true, as there's a lot of things in life that
| gets much easier when you have surplus of space (a major
| reason people leave their city apartments and build or buy
| houses on the outskirts) - in general, having a large surplus
| of resources, such as food, water, time or money, tends to
| _improve_ efficiency. Over-provisioning for the win.
|
| Anecdotally, this checks out for me too - the smaller the
| home (relative to number of people in it), the messier it
| seems to be.
|
| Perhaps the reason is the same as why computers slow down
| when low on memory or storage space - when you're running low
| on space, any random spot you pick is likely already taken,
| and storing anything requires you to first rearrange stuff
| already there. Which, for humans, means you likely won't do
| it and just drop the thing in the first free spot you can
| find.
| dools wrote:
| > The conclusion seems to be: keeping things in order is
| easy (or easier) if you have lots and lots of free space.
|
| Or less stuff, which is also one of the key points in the
| aforementioned book.
| fmajid wrote:
| Keep a basket with handle for this purpose, the kind used in
| supermarkets. Makes it easy to transport the items back to their
| proper home.
|
| I use the Reisenthel baskets, available in a wide variety of
| colors:
| https://www.reisenthel.com/en/shopping/categories/shopping-b...
| Modified3019 wrote:
| My solution is to just keep buying more until I reach
| environmental saturation. This is why I have _at least_ six
| measuring tapes.
| sscarduzio wrote:
| Any beautifully reasonable, clever, optimal strategy for this
| kind of home-human interaction would meet the sledgehammer of my
| utterly unreasonable order freak partner (way before having any
| opportunity to explain any reasoning about it).
|
| Good to see at least someone is able to enjoy even reasoning
| about these little things.
| jakepage91 wrote:
| Is there even a need for a holding pen if there is an order
| freak in the house?
| gleenn wrote:
| I love physical algorithms and data structures in every day life.
| My little computer science brain is simple but if I can remember
| small tricks, particularly with the arrangement of everyday
| things, I find joy somehow. A couple of my favorites are like if
| I need to remember to do something in the groggy morning, I put
| either my wallet or keys wrapped around something weird. When I
| awaken and go to find those items, I am awoken to the specific
| thing to remember to do or bring. I never forget my wallet (very
| fortunately for me), so if I find a large paper or pen or
| something very odd in the fold which would absolutely never
| belong there under normal circumstances, then it triggers the
| reminder. It also helps that I usually just forget the memory
| /trigger/, not the actual memory of what to donor bring. Another
| simple one is I rotate a couple supplements. How do I recall
| which to take? I stack them. I always put the one I /should/ take
| next on top. The way I remember this is I fall back to a base
| case: say I forget my little trick, well, I tell myself to grab
| the top one. So either I remember my trick, or I do the simple
| thing and just grab the top one. Either way I have at least made
| it through today with the correct one. Then I put it on the
| bottom and am primed for being forgetful tomorrow. I am still
| working on arranging shirts in a fifo queue in my closet on the
| rack. Or more clever, I put it back on the top and treat the rack
| as sort of a heap data structure, things worn recently are always
| to the left. If I want to wear it not so much, I put it deeper
| down the line. Then when searching I always start from the top
| (left for me) and know I probably wore a lot of these items
| recently. This also helps because I tend to wear only a fraction
| of my shirts, usually my favorites. Again, they are towards the
| left so they are easier to find.
| fire_lake wrote:
| I put things in my shoes. Then I remember when it's time to
| leave!
| beAbU wrote:
| When I sleep in unfamiliar surroundings, I always put my
| loose items, watch, ring, sunglasses, wallet, phone (called
| EDC these days?) in my shoes. That way I'm guaranteed to not
| misplace them and forget them the next morning.
| twic wrote:
| I think I also do most of these. Clothes in FIFO queues, except
| I have three queues for T-shirts, for best, decent, and doing
| housework quality. Stick a post-it note on my glasses or shoes
| to remind me to do something. Or use a weird item to jog my
| memory if I don't have a post-it to hand. Leave medication out
| on the bathroom sink if I need to use it the next morning.
| Leave the bedroom wastepaperbasket on the bed if the bins need
| to go out later. And the takeoff points someone else suggested
| - things to go downstairs pile up at the top of the stairs,
| things to go to he kitchen pile up on the cupboard by the
| kitchen door, etc.
|
| On clothes, I suggest a FIFO order, then occasionally garbage
| collect from the out end to identify clothes you haven't worn
| in a long time and keep skipping over when it's time to dress.
| Get rid of them or move them into cold storage.
| coldpie wrote:
| > A couple of my favorites are like if I need to remember to do
| something in the groggy morning, I put either my wallet or keys
| wrapped around something weird. When I awaken and go to find
| those items, I am awoken to the specific thing to remember to
| do or bring.
|
| Oh man I love this technique. I use it all the time. One
| morning when I was running late and had to fly out the door or
| else miss the bus, I threw the toothbrush I just finished using
| in the middle of the floor in front of the door as I ran
| through through the room. Got home 10 hours later and "why TF
| is my toothbrush in the middle of the living room? ... Oh yeah
| I need to pay the eye doctor bill." Works great, I love it.
| cranium wrote:
| Designing intentionally how you organize everyday stuff is
| difficult but way worth the effort - it's one of those things you
| regret not doing earlier. Eg. key holder, grocery list 1) with
| its dedicated pen attached by a string, 2) next to the fridge
| (strings are nice to keep scissors in their place, too), ...
| alfiedotwtf wrote:
| Getting Things Done's "In-Tray" but for real life items.
|
| As for take-off points, I use the doorway of every room I'm
| currently in... seems counterintuitive, but by dumping things in
| a doorway, you're deliberately making it annoying to leave the
| room, so when you do need to leave the room, pick it up and
| either pack it away right now or dump it in /that/ room's In-
| Tray.
|
| So each room effectively has an In-Tray and an Out-Tray, but
| instead of yet another physical item you need to buy or at least
| take up space, the doorway will always be there!
| andai wrote:
| The sequel Making It All Work mentions a tidying strategy of
| first putting everything that's out of place into a big
| "bucket" (e.g. laundry hamper), then dealing with them one by
| one.
| rigrassm wrote:
| You underestimate my brain's super human ability to justify
| leaving that stuff right where it is until "later" which
| actually means never but for some reason I accept it lol. Oddly
| enough, this only applies to things that I personally leave in
| stupid places.
|
| If I work on my PC or server hardware at the dining room table
| I will end up with random components/tools/hardware left there
| after I finish and my brain will tell me "This is fine, we have
| something else to do right this second!"
|
| If one of my kids leaves something like a bag of chips on the
| table right next to that pile of stuff I left behind, my brain
| will blow a gasket and make having the remediation of the chip
| bags misplacement by the offender as the super most toppest
| priority to address right this very second.
|
| So under your system I'd end up with all my stuff in my house's
| doorways and 2 annoyed teenagers who will probably extract
| revenge by "cleaning up" my doorways and since they are
| teenagers and share DNA with me, not a single one of those
| items will find it's way to it's proper place! ADHD is an
| adventure for sure lol.
| alfiedotwtf wrote:
| Having OCD, it's always great when posts like these appear,
| because you get to see everyone else who has OCD share their
| highly-optimised systems of organisation so you can update your
| personal methods.
|
| It's almost like these type of posts are Emacs posts and the
| entire comment section is full of people sharing their unit.el
| snippets :)
| nytesky wrote:
| We tried this but holding pens became eventual long term storage
| for abandoned property. I like the tote idea.
| nytesky wrote:
| So did no one that this was a mindfulness exercise where you
| constantly hold a writing pen?
|
| I don't know if I imagined if it help train memory or just write
| down where you put things...
| kqr wrote:
| I'm extremely forgetful so for me, things either exist in their
| rightful place or I will have to buy a new one. Given that trade-
| off, I don't mind traveling to a separate room to put things in
| its right place.
|
| The issue is when other family members borrow the thing and then
| just set it down where they happened to be when they were
| finished with it...
| MathMonkeyMan wrote:
| I imagined this would be an article about getting into the habit
| of keeping items in your hand so that you don't place them down
| somewhere and forget.
|
| But it's an article about choosing one place where you put
| miscellaneous things that usually belong somewhere else.
| wiredfool wrote:
| One of the small wins in my life was actually using up a Bic
| Crystal pen, without losing or breaking it. Took maybe a
| decade, as I don't really write that much anymore, but it
| lasted through 3 or 4 moves and some commuting.
| anonu wrote:
| > so the activation energy to use a holding pen is approximately
| the same as placing the item down randomly.
|
| I think this is where the algorithm falls down. The cost
| differential is actually huge.
| boesboes wrote:
| Great idea, i have a 'etagere's and bowls on each surface
| basically. Most of the time i know where stuff is, if not i know
| fairly certain in which 'pen' it is. It also really helps to be
| conscious of where you put something. What i mean is, if you put
| the thing in the box, look at it and how it 'looks' in the box.
| +300 to memory of that item ;)
|
| I only started really loosing things since my girlfriend moved in
| as now she moves stuff around a lot. And we have a lot more stuff
| lying around
| Metacelsus wrote:
| Funny, from reading the title I thought this would be about
| holding a pen while walking between rooms.
| yeneek wrote:
| My home is too small for me to have such a problem.
| mprovost wrote:
| The TikTok ADHD community commonly refers to these as "doom
| boxes" (or "piles") which reflects both the sense of dread that
| they instill, while also being an acronym for "didn't organize,
| only moved".
| ta988 wrote:
| TikTok and ADHD...
| Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote:
| Funny, when I read the title I thought it was some mental trick
| that involved holding a pen.
|
| The actual idea of 'holding pens' is a good one. However, only if
| the contents get sorted, otherwise they will just fill up with
| clutter. I know people for whom this idea would lead to excuse to
| not put things away, they'd just put them in the holding pen and
| do it later. Later never comes.
| jdhzzz wrote:
| Same here. I came away wondering if I had fallen for click
| bait.
|
| I try to stare hard at the thing I wish to put down for at
| least a count of two. That usually brings me "into the moment"
| and I put it where it belongs. I don't always remember to do
| it, but it works when I do.
|
| The worst for me are my clip on sunglasses. I take them off
| when going inside and don't wish them in my pants pocket where
| they will get broken. Consequently, I tend to set them down
| "wherever" and lose track of them. Particularly when conditions
| change, e.g. dusk, when I go back out and they are no longer
| needed. Shirt pockets would resolve that issue, but I'm not
| going to change my my entire wardrobe to resolve this issue.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| Reminds me of this classic bit:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oHBG3ABUJU
| zuckerma wrote:
| Great idea.
| ineedaj0b wrote:
| My solution is own less stuff. I own maybe 30ish items total.
|
| I also have a fantastic memory, so I remember where other people
| leave things but if people had less things it's easier to
| remember.
| codazoda wrote:
| I've had trouble getting this to work but I do have one addition
| that might help people who can make this work or partially work.
|
| I have a closet full of clear plastic shoe boxes with labels on
| them. Labels like First Aid, Remotes, Ribbons, Pens/Pencils, etc.
|
| When you need to put something away, put it in the shoe box.
|
| Often, someone will say, "Where's the lighter?" and I'll respond,
| "in the closet". Happens nearly daily now.
|
| The problem I have is that sometimes I'm too tired to put my
| thing in the holding pen. For keys, we have a key holder. But
| sometimes I don't realize I have keys in my pocket until bed time
| and I just empty them onto my night stand. Even walking across
| the room feels like too much. "I'll put them away tomorrow", I
| think to myself.
|
| In any case, it's a helpful set of routines, I just find I don't
| ALWAYS stick to it.
| neilv wrote:
| In my otherwise minimal-cruft apartment, I have a shelf of 18
| of those clear plastic shoeboxes, labelmakered with what goes
| in each.
|
| The majority is computer parts and cables (e.g., "USB Cables",
| "USB and Other Chargers", "Video Cables").
|
| Every few years, I go through and cull (e.g., give away enough
| misc. apartment repair screws/etc. that what I keep fits into
| one shoebox rather than two, and give away those old-technology
| cables that I'm 99% sure I'll never need, while keeping 2 VGA
| cables that I still use for servers).
|
| The Sterilite clear plastic shoeboxes are sold at some stores
| for about a dollar each.
| glitchc wrote:
| And when the holding pen overflows, pandemonium ensues.
| consf wrote:
| I struggled for a long time to remember what I lost last (I don't
| have many things, so I don't lose them often). An umbrella. I
| left it at the bus stop. I hope it helped someone.
| leashless wrote:
| https://www.westonboxes.com/ I recently discovered these.
| Lifechanging in two ways:
|
| * you can put them on their ends and they don't fall over, which
| is ideal for storage on shelves
|
| * translucent so you can see what's inside
|
| Pull off the shelf, open up, rummage / sort / process (with extra
| space in the lid if needed) then pour everything back into the
| main storage from the lid and reshelve.
|
| It's amazing how being able to shelve on their sides (rather than
| in a stack) changes things.
| cnees wrote:
| Why would holding a pen stop me from losing things? Seems like
| I'd just end up losing the pen too. Ooooooh, a holding pen.
| jxramos wrote:
| Brilliant, a dedicated staging area in the physical world for
| temporary short term storage. Love it.
| thrwaway1985882 wrote:
| My biggest problem has always been forgetting things when I leave
| the house. I was _constantly_ leaving for work, only to turn
| around because my wife called and said "you forgot your badge,
| you forgot your wallet", etc.
|
| What changed this was a trick I learned from working IT in a
| large manufacturing company. We got to walk the line and learn
| from our customers, and one thing they had at critical stations
| were poka-yoke(0) trays. Think a molded plastic tray filled with
| exactly all of the things the operator needed to do their
| assembly, the bolts and nuts and fixtures and what not. So if you
| were attaching a pulley to a shaft you had a spot that held one
| pulley, one for a set screw, etc., and the spot was designed for
| only the right size screw so if it too long or too short you knew
| you had a problem. On each assembly the operator knew if their
| tray wasn't full when they started assembling or if it had extra
| parts in it there was a problem, and when they ended assembly if
| the tray wasn't empty something wasn't done properly.
|
| One day I had the epiphany that this might just work for me, so I
| decided to make my own: I bought some craft foam and a plastic
| tray, and traced/cut spots in the foam for everything I needed
| for work - my keys, badge, watch, etc. Then every day when I came
| home my work things went into the poka-yoke, and I forced myself
| to not leave the entryway until it was completely full ... so no
| more "oh guess my wallet is in the car", I had to go get it and
| put it in. Every morning when I was leaving for work I'd empty
| it. My mornings went from ten+ minutes of me cursing and
| searching for my keys to... nothing.
|
| (0): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poka-yoke
| renewiltord wrote:
| I airtagged my keys and my wallet. I have an Apple Watch and an
| iPhone. These are the things I need. The watch to find the phone.
| The phone to find the other things. Everything else I just give
| to memory or my wife's memory since it's never urgent.
| eschneider wrote:
| When I come home, I take off my hat and then I put all my
| 'leaving home stuff', keys, wallet, glasses, and put them in my
| hat. Done.
| marcusverus wrote:
| 1) Items which are too transient/unimportant to have memorable
| assigned place.
|
| A single spot seems easily preferable to half-a-dozen 'holding
| pens' spread throughout the house. Have a junk drawer for long-
| term miscellaneous storage, an inbox for action items (mail to
| read, that broken toy you need to fix, etc).
|
| 2) Instances where we don't have time to take the item to it's
| assigned place
|
| It takes, what, 20 seconds to walk into another room and back?
| How often is this truly a matter of "can't" as opposed to "don't
| want to"? Note that you're not actually saving the 20 seconds,
| because you're going to have to walk all over your house later,
| cleaning out your storage pens and returning them all over the
| house.
|
| IMO, having a place for everything and ensuring that everything
| is where it belongs (mise en place) is the ultimate efficiency
| boost. If you still struggle with this, the ideal solution
| (beyond "just put it back when you're done, bro") is Ben
| Franklin's method, which was assigning 5-10 minutes at the end of
| each day, just before bed, to "putting things in their places".
| Visiting your work space, your bathroom, your car, etc, returning
| things to their rightful places, and generally putting things in
| order in preparation for the next day. Nothing will make future-
| you love current-you more!
| foobarian wrote:
| > IMO, having a place for everything and ensuring that
| everything is where it belongs (mise en place) is the ultimate
| efficiency boost
|
| I will add that not having something in the first place is
| another excellent efficiency boost.
| FrustratedMonky wrote:
| Am I overlooking something, or is this just "have a junk drawer
| in every room".
| lkbm wrote:
| Junk drawers accumulate homeless items. This is for temporarily
| holding items which you will move to a different, correct
| location either daily or weekly.
| powersnail wrote:
| My algorithm is like this:
|
| 1. Everything has a place;
|
| 2. If something is out of place, I put it back to the place;
|
| 3. If I cannot put it back at the moment, I put it in my pocket,
| and goes to 2 after current task is done;
|
| 4. If I cannot put it in my pocket, I put it near me in some
| salient way, and goes to 2 after current task is done;
|
| 5. If something is constantly out-of-place, rethink the
| designated place for that item.
|
| Step 4 is dependent on the fact that the space is well-organized
| in the first place, such that I could put item in a way that is
| salient and jarring to future me. If I'm surrounded by a mess, it
| probably wouldn't work. For example, I often perch something that
| I have to carry to my room in the middle of the kitchen island
| while I'm chopping and cooking. It works because the surface is
| almost always empty. If the kitchen island is already crowded,
| this wouldn't have worked.
|
| But I think the real secret to how to get the system working, is
| to do step 2 as much as I could, and avoid step 3 & 4 if at all
| possible. It's the realization that moving an item to the right
| place takes less than 20 seconds, only 19 seconds longer than
| putting it in my pocket. (This of course predicated on the fact
| that I live in a small apartment rather than a big house.)
| skydhash wrote:
| I have pretty much the same algorithm, except that I do have
| misc boxes for the stuff I don't need right now, but I may need
| later. Those boxes appears after a cleaning spree (1 per room).
| After a week or so, the items inside will get their proper
| place based on usage patterns (whatever is left inside goes
| back to long-term storage).
|
| Small items need proper attention. Anything smaller than my
| hand get organized on the spot.
| JTbane wrote:
| >>> 5. Is cleaned out regularly--ideally daily, at most weekly--,
| so that it doesn't become a storage area.
|
| The problem is once I clean out the "holding pens" the items are
| lost again.
| kazinator wrote:
| How to fix the mental problem of placement amnesia, though?
|
| For instance, when I'm working on something with many parts,
| involving multiple tools, even though I haven't moved from the
| work spot, I misplace tools right there and then, spending time
| looking for them. Where are those pliers? Oh, somehow they ended
| up under this thing, oops.
|
| I blame years of computer use. In computer applications, we also
| have tools. But all we ever do is pick up the tools (in a GUI, or
| otherwise activate the tools in other paradigms, like invoking
| them by name in a command line or programming language). We never
| have to worry about returning these virtual tools into their
| original place. Computers train the habit of picking up tools,
| working with them and then forgetting about them when done.
| chrisbrandow wrote:
| I like this idea, but I wonder if the people (like me) most
| likely to benefit from this idea are precisely the people that
| would turn the holding pen into an undifferentiated trash bin in
| the same way that any empty surface gets filled over time.
| doctorhandshake wrote:
| I like to say - my wife is like Marie Kondo except when she's
| done with something, she thanks it and puts it in a bowl by the
| front door.
| unbalancedevh wrote:
| I think the solution to this is to follow rule #5 in TFA: Is
| cleaned out regularly--ideally daily, at most weekly--, so that
| it doesn't become a storage area.
| fudged71 wrote:
| With ADHD, time blindness, and object permanence, I have been
| thinking about a sort of design that would put specific things in
| eyesight in certain walking paths and only when going in certain
| directions. So things to go up the stairs would be visible in a
| box only when going up, with some kind of hood, for example. The
| same idea for going into and out of rooms. I don't think I've
| seen this strategy discussed anywhere before
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| This doesn't help people who have a "one item stack", which
| occasionally describes me. If I'm holding something, and I find
| something else I need, I'll just put the one thing down to pick
| the other thing up. If I'm interrupted, there's a chance that
| I'll leave the original article right wherever this happened.
|
| This is how the TV remote control ends up in the freezer, for
| example.
| wakasaka wrote:
| The best way to avoid losing items is not having them at all. If
| I need to do something that requires tools, I'll pay for the
| service or rent/borrow the tools.
|
| No one will give you back the time you spend organizing things.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Buying the tools for the job is usually much cheaper than
| hiring a contractor to do the job.
|
| For example, hiring a contractor to blow the leaves off your
| driveway a single time costs more than a leaf blower, and it
| takes 5 min to blow off your driveway, less time than it takes
| to pay the bill.
| meindnoch wrote:
| Oh, ok. I thought it's going to be about how to hold your pens
| properly, to avoid losing them.
| jsdwarf wrote:
| My trick is to make the objects "stand out". Black headphones,
| smartphones, keys etc are easily overlooked in work bag pockets
| or when placed on other dark surfaces.
|
| I've greatly improved the "retrieval interval" of my phone since
| I've put it in a mint-green case instead of the standard black
| one. Same goes for my bluetooth headphone case, on which I
| applied reflective stickers.
|
| Another trick is to group related objects. My office key card is
| in the cover of my work smart phone, so I have to look out for
| one item less each morning.
| WalterBright wrote:
| I attached brightly colored ribbons to my keys. Finding the
| keys now takes far, far less time. I feel stupid not thinking
| of this decades ago.
|
| I got the idea from reading a survival book, which recommended
| taping things like the knife with brightly colored tape, so you
| can find it when you drop it in the leaves. I accidentally
| threw my keys in the woods when I meant to just throw a stick.
| It took 3-4 hours of searching to find them, even in a 10x10
| area (because it was years of layers of leaves).
| digging wrote:
| > Another trick is to group related objects.
|
| Once I started _always_ putting my wallet and keys down
| together, no matter what, I basically never lost either of them
| again.
| baxtr wrote:
| Good idea. An image would have helped tremendously.
| emsign wrote:
| What if those holding pens are the rooms?
| lencastre wrote:
| I understand it, I like it, I'll use it! Thanks!
| beryilma wrote:
| I lose things extremely rarely so much so that I distinctly
| remember the only two things I've lost in the last 5 years or
| more. My rule is simple: put the item back to its designated
| place the moment you are done with it.
|
| One of those two things are the faucet o-rings that I've placed
| somewhere near the faucet itself thinking that "it should be easy
| to find them here", rather than putting them in my usual tool
| bag. They are still "missing" to this day. I will probably find
| them when we move.
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