We all love life hacks. They make our lives just a little bit easier. They make chores quicker. There are hundreds of ingenious hacks out there. Just Google ‘best life hacks’ and you won’t be disappointed. We’ve collected some of our favorite ones here to whet your appetite.
Folding Pull-Over Shirts
We all have a closet full of t-shirts, sweatshirts, and polo shirts and they’re a pain in the butt to fold. Some people wad them up and toss them in a drawer. Some people hang them because it is easier than folding. But what about going on trips when you have to pack your clothes in a suitcase? This quick easy folding hack will have you jumping for joy and volunteering to fold every pull-over shirt in the house.
Dicing A Whole Watermelon In Two Minutes With No Mess
Who doesn’t love watermelon? The best watermelons are the juiciest – but they make a MESS of the counter because the juice never stays on the cutting board. Watch this method and you will wonder why you never thought of this. This guy not only dices a watermelon without a mess, he does it in less than two minutes. Two things they don’t mention in this video – when he is doing the side cuts, he leaves a small part uncut to keep the rind together in the bowl shape. The other thing is the type of knife – you need a very sharp and slightly flexible knife. This same technique with a little modification works on quarter watermelon chunks also – so don’t be afraid to purchase those if you have a smaller family. If you have kids this will be a play date lifesaver!
Toilet Paper Roll Cord Storage Caddy
In this day and age, we all have too many cords. A quick and easy way to store them is as simple as a shoe box and empty toilet paper rolls. The cords roll up neatly and can be tucked inside the tubes and the tubes can be placed upright in a shoe box for easy access to all your cords. Leaving the cord ends visible at the top of the tubes makes selection easy. It also makes it easy to pack up your electronics for a family trip and keeps all the cords in one handy, easy to pack box. Never arrive at your destination without a charging cord again!
Quick And Easy Pancake Batter Dispenser
We all have squeeze bottles of ketchup. When they’re empty we usually buy a new one and toss the old one into the recycles, right? Stop doing that. Wash them out and use them to mix and pour pancake batter. Going camping? Put the dry mix in the bottle and pack it. Add water the morning you want pancakes, shake well, and have the best camp breakfast ever! Who needs the expensive shake and pour mixes? This is one of my favorites. I keep the pre-measured dispensers in the cabinet. I mark mine with a Sharpie permanent marker so I can refill them with dry mix easily and I don’t have to measure water – just pour to the fill line.
Right Or Left Exit?
If you aren’t lucky enough to have a talking GPS that tells you whether your upcoming exit is a right or left exit, there is another way to tell. We don’t guarantee that they do this in every state, but on the interstate highways at least, it should be nationwide. The signs denoting the exit number are usually smaller, and attached separately (in case they decide to renumber them I guess). But the placement of them is what you should be looking at. If they are placed to the far right, the upcoming exit will be on the right. If they appear on the far left of the larger sign, the upcoming exit will be on the left. This can be a valuable piece of knowledge if you’re in the wrong lane on a six lane highway. It will give you extra time to safely maneuver across all lanes without throwing you into a driving panic and a mad dash cutting off potential road rage idiots that will follow you off the exit… OK, sorry, didn’t mean to get carried away there. Drive safely, and pay attention to which side those signs are mounted on.
Free And Low Cost Books And College Text Books
Free eBooks for your reading enjoyment or text books for many college courses are available, free or at least inexpensive, online — you just have to know where to go. There are several sites available, some with fees, most without. Some you have to sign in to use, some you don’t. We’ve listed seven below that require no sign in:
- 2020ok.com – The site opens on a list of available subject areas, with links for eBooks and Free Training Courses. Some are listed with downloadable Exam Study Guides and PDF versions of the complete books. The formatting of this database style site can be daunting and confusing, but the search bar will help you in narrowing down your search, especially if you have a specific title to type in.
- Eknigu.com – This is an aggregated site that links out to numerous sites carrying eBooks, text books for sale, and pretty much everything you might need to continue your education. It is also for sale, if you’re in the market for that sort of thing.
- FreeTextBooks.com – Offers a unique way to handle your college text books. From their website: “FreeTextbooks saves students 50% every year on textbooks through our app and growing student network. We’re in the business of not just saving students money, but launching student entrepreneurs into the world who’ll find jobs they love.” They have an online app that connects you to real life representatives that visit your campus, with representatives across the nation.
- TextBookNova.com – A gateway portal to Amazon with aggregated posts to texts available at the online retailer. The site opens on a simple search screen that allows you to search by title, author, ISBN, keyword, or to browse by category. It is simple to use and produced exactly what I was looking for.
- Gutenberg.org – From their website: “Project Gutenberg offers over 53,000 free ebooks: choose among free epub books, free kindle books, download them or read them online.” It is a simple and straight-forward site that offers many search options. The site is maintained on donations, so they ask that if you find it useful you help them with a small donation to keep things running.
- FeedUrBrain.com – An online forum-style site with a little bit of everything. Posts are user-supplied, so rights of use might fall into a murky gray area. We didn’t have time to explore a great deal here, but there appears to be a ton of information packed into a fairly easy-to-use site.
- ManyBooks.net – This site boasts over “33,000 Free eBooks” with an easy search function.
If you’re pressed for time, you can find out how long it will take you to read a book by taking a simple reading test at How Long to Read This. The site starts you off by choosing a book. Then you have to do a little reading test which is based on a passage from your selected book. Once you finish the test, the site calculates the approximate reading time for that book. Each result is different, so you might get a response of four hours for a 400 page book written at a high school reading level, while Trump would would get two months.
Happy Hack Hunting!
We hope you enjoyed our selection of the best life hacks. In case it wasn’t evident even though it was mentioned a few times – I travel a lot, so of course, my selection of favorites reflect that. Anything to make packing and traveling easier is for me! Here are a few sites where we found these and many other of the best life hacks:
Disclaimer: We selected our best life hacks from several sources. We identified where we found them, but that might be the original source. Because of the vastness of the internet, it is pretty near impossible to credit the original authors. If you saw your life hack here and would like us to update the credit for it – please let us know. We will gladly credit you.
