Time Efficient 5k speed training (Bonus: 30 minutes of Audiobook)
After a 12 week training program, I ran a 18:54 (sub 19) 5k for the first time in my life. Bonus: I weighed 186lbs, it was 80F+ degrees outside, and I had been multitasking by listening to nonfiction audiobooks for almost all of the training program. Now my resting heart rate is under 50!
If you want a 5k training program that makes you faster, your cardio significantly better, without wasting time, this is the program for you.
Some personal background
The thing I’m most proud of, I didn’t change my lifestyle for it, I worked it into my regular workout schedule.
At the start of 2025 I made a New Year’s Resolution to do 30 minutes of combined cardio + (nonfiction) audiobook per day. Health benefits, energy benefits, and more knowledge.
I didn’t need to run fast. One of the purposes of the combined 30 minute audiobook + cardio was to not care about speed, as I tend to have more willpower than physical ability… and I seem to injure myself.
By the start of summer, I decided I wanted to further improve my cardio for health reasons. Enter: The Speed Day.
The Routine
- 1 Speed Day Per Week
- 1 Distance Day Per Week
- 3-5 Easy Days Per Week
Attached is the routine in a spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1LbSnZhED202-CJIyUAzuSnFcc8o0y5dkZyJydMCAbpE/edit?usp=sharing
To determine your times use this website: https://vdoto2.com/calculator
More details and tips below.
The Efficiency
I cannot make claims this is the most pure Efficient 5k running plan, there is science missing here. This is no Pi= C/D perfection here. However the running coach who made this routine combined their college athlete level experience with my requirements of 30 minutes of cardio per day. The engineer in me says: If it meets spec, good enough.
To make this as Efficient as possible, I did the following:
- Audiobooks during all easy days, distance days, and during speed day warmups and cooldowns.
- This was typically done as a break from work. I’d use this when stuck on a problem or exhaustion.
- I would go to our local run club for 1 easy day/week, listening to audiobooks in the car, and socializing/networking/meeting people at the event.
Only 1 speed day per week meant only sacrificing ~15-20 minutes of audiobook time. Distance days were longer than the desired 30 minutes, but I still listened to audiobooks, and once you get into running, having 1 distance day per week is normal.
The Speed Days
These are the important days. The rest of the week, you can casually mess around and not care about your times.
If possible, I’d wait until the weather was nice. This is the only workout that matters, so I would typically look for the best day between Tuesday and Thursday(and rarely Monday or Friday). The rest of the days get filled in with easy days.
If the weather was too hot and sunny, I’d do my 1 mile warmup to the shady part of my route. Even if you have to run under hot conditions, your workout is going to push your cardio. You are always winning on speed days, even if you can’t quite hit the time due to weather.
I hesitate to tell you the following because I didn’t know I was allowed to fail on speed days. There were 8 x 600m repeats that I would successfully do 5, then the last 3 were painful struggles that I would fail on. Not even the shame of failure could get me to move faster. I thought I had 0 chance of completing my goal. But… Apparently it didn’t matter. Pushing myself hard was the workout.
I broke tradition and would alternate fast and slightly less fast. While conventional wisdom says to have a consistent speed, I break tradition here. My reasoning is that doing the same form means lactic acid is going to build up for the entire workout. If you alternate between two forms, it gives your muscles a break. Admittedly these were both fast, but one was super fast, and the other was a recovery fast. Coach disagrees with me here.
Eating
A constant fight me and my running coach had was over food.
A 185lb person is going to use more energy than a 135lb runner. I insisted that I needed to lose 15lbs. Coach insisted I needed to fuel.
I relented and ate.
My compromise was after the 12 week plan, I’d cut 10-15lbs and retry when the weather was 20 degrees colder. To my shock, I still hit my goal.
As a fun fact, this whole thing has me inventing a new type of competition. Momentum race. Whoever has the highest weight * average speed wins. More details Here.
Easy Days
Easy days are super fun. There are basically no expectations. I was running at 9 or 10 minute mile pace (my 5k pace was under 6:06).
3-5 days a week, you will be running easy. This means you could take a day off cardio. I personally didn’t due to my 30min/day goal, and I think this helps with habits for psychological reasons.
I would listen to my audiobook and take voice to text notes while running.
At least 1+ easy day per week, I’d stationary bike. This is important to mention. You should be giving your body time to repair. Do not run 7 days a week.
A tip on these easy days: Feel good, get blood flowing to your legs. After a speed day, my legs would feel wrecked. There is something that feels good about running with different forms. While most of my easy days would be mindless, I’d occasionally feel good changing up my form:
- Running on my tip toes.
- Running with high knees.
- Running fast for a few seconds before slowing down. (I believe people call this ‘Strides’)
- And of course, normal mindless running.
Distance Days
These were typically easy, but I have a caveat.
After the middle of the routine, the coach gave me 2 different distance days to alternate. Easy and progressively difficult. Easy is just like the easy days above.
Progressive distance days started at 9 minute mile pace and would reduce down to 7:30 pace by the last mile. For 9 miles, this means reducing by 10 seconds per mile.
Injury/Pain
Less running and more rest. This means more stationary bike days(or whatever cardio). You can eliminate distance days if necessary.
At one point, I took 1 week off speed days to recover.
I nearly always run the day after a speed day or distance day. I’m a believer in getting blood flowing.
Hot tubs or hot showers with stretching may help as well.
Admittedly as the race day was approaching, my knees were not 100%. However I knew I had less than 10 days left, the last week was easy, and after the race, I could take it easy.
Race Day
Other people like to sign up for races. I like picking the best day, time, and location for me. In this case, I waited until the sun went down and I was feeling good.
Of course eat good/carbs. Maybe some caffeine before the run.
Here is the big tip: Go for your goal.
If you had the goal, do it. Know your pace and keep to it. I accidentally ran faster on my first mile, and was happy to know I had a little bit of wiggle room. If I compromised on the run, I would have ran a slow first mile and had 0 chance of recovery.
The training plan you have been working on for 12 weeks and struggling was built for you to struggle. You are likely capable of hitting your goal. This was all built in.
Don’t compromise.
Race day tips from Coach
Do not go into the run thinking you will fail, or you definitely will.
Go into the run and grit out the pace for as long as you can.
You can do this.
Race day adrenaline is legit.
Clothing and Equipment
Shoes
I had 2-3 shoes to cycle between. An old pair, a new pair, and speed shoes.
My speedy shoes force you on the front of your feet and would feel weird running on the back. This is your race day shoes. They were purple and sparkly, forcing me to run fast or be embarrassed haha.
My new shoes were typically worn most of the easy runs and most of the distance runs. Especially when going to social running events. They looked nice.
My old shoes were a nice change. You can imagine slightly different angles mean different muscle use and different muscle wear and tear. I’d wear these ~1 time per week if I remembered.
Clothing
On sunny speed days days: white shirts. It reflects the sun. I specifically cut a tshirt from sleeve to waist to allow breathing. It looked silly, but it does reflect the heat, and it does allow breathing.
Nothing special on shorts or socks.
Tight underwear, to prevent chafing.
In the winter, before starting this routine I’d wear the following: Shirt, Hoodie, neck gater, sunglasses, one tight underwear, one loose underwear, sweatpants. I’d also run on trails when the road froze over.
Smart Watch
Cheap Garmin.
Halfway through I got the Strava app.
Hypee
This program can work for you too.
You will improve your cardio health. You will have some vanity numbers to show off to friends. You will be faster!
You can do this.
Power Efficiency – Increase your Power Dynamic with little cost
‘I didn’t invent the laws of nature, I just follow them.’
Like it or not, Power (as a macro effect) is a real thing that determines outcomes of interactions. It cannot be avoided and even if you pretend it doesn’t exist, you are subjected to its effects.
Power Illiteracy is a real thing, and hopefully from this article alone you will benefit from this dynamic of the world. Everyone has their own theory on Power, I think its simplification of a few effects.
Power explained
“The POWER of a Man, (to take it Universally,) is his present means, to obtain some future apparent Good.” – Hobbes
Imagine a case where a smart well dressed person is having a conversation with a super smart person with bedhead and rags on. This is a conversation among equals, where each side must take their turn and test boundaries. Now imagine this same super smart person is equally as well dressed. This is no longer a conversation among equals, there is a superior and an inferior. The superior now decides the topics, can interrupt, decide norms and ethics of the conversation. All because they changed their clothes and styled their hair.
That is an example as Hobbes would say Power of Form(Beauty).
In the modern era, much power comes from Economic sources. Its a ‘good enough’ short cut to say Money = Power. Outside of politics and fame, there are few ways to get substantial power other than money. However we can use Form(Beauty), economic/social efficiencies, to give you more power.
Instant Power Increases
Look Better
Look Better
Stand up taller, fix your posture.
Don’t think about personal examples of this truth too long, it’s painful. There are stories of diplomats getting shorter chairs than their hosts to make their hosts appear taller. Standing up taller and fixing your posture can be the difference between among equals and or among superiors and inferiors.
It is worth checking your appearance before a major meeting or encounter. If you can think of any instant things you can do to look better, you should do it.
Sound Better, Be Charismatic.
I’m no expert here. The boldest claim I will make is that you shouldn’t say ‘Um’ or any variants. “Thank before you speak.” If that is even possible.
I’ve also heard a random person on the internet say: “Talk Lower and Slower”
Can you understand the general idea here? Sound better. It increases your relative power to the other person.
(Give yourself a bit of a break, these simple rules are insanely difficult in the momentary nature of interactions. Practice makes perfect.)
Sleep Less
Me and Dr. Mandy Kirk have been doing biphasic sleep for almost a decade. 6 hours of nighttime sleep and a 20 minute nap. Alternatively, I’ve found 4 hours nighttime and 2 hours daytime nap has worked with my family’s lifestyle. We have 4 kids.
Be Intentional
Its easy to get into autopilot and do easy, low value activities. A simple todo list can spark a memory of an easy, high value task that can be done while you are drinking a morning coffee.
On a similar note, I’ve found fun, high value activities on my todo list that got me running first thing in the morning.
The goal here is to be intentional and organized at least a little.
Increase Your Power In 5 Minutes
Change your Clothes
I know sweatpants and a zip up are soo nice to feel, but I don’t make the rules.
I might dread the stiffness of a dress shirt, but I’ve seen the difference it makes as mentioned in the opening example.
I’d like to lend one more example. For the second time in my life, I was meeting my Kid’s teacher. This time it was for an extra privilege, asking to attempt to test out of a grade. I had considered wearing jeans and a shirt, but decided that regardless of the length of time we were talking, it was the event that was important. Not only did the janitor think I was important enough to let into the school early, but I also had that teacher’s full attention. These little factors may be something subtle, but the totality can be the difference between Among Equals or between Superiors/Inferiors.
Change your hair
Bed head is obvious in my life. I need to shower, or at least spend a few minutes wetting then styling my hair.
Sometimes I will add water and styling product + blow dry in about 60 seconds. Its a hack job, but most of the time, its better than nothing.
Changing your clothes + doing your hair is a combo that I cannot recommend enough. Its bizarre how different people will treat you.
Increase Your Relative Power in Hours
Money and appearance increase your absolute power, however your power is most often relative in value. For instance, I might have lots of money, but I’m not really powerful to a plumber when I have an emergency issue.
The suggestion is to diversify and give yourself more options. I’ve written other articles about how getting 3 prices give you a decent statistical average. For high stakes items I got for 5-6 quotes.
On a similar note, I’ve had to hire people for jobs and I’ve decided I prefer having departments of part time workers over a single full time worker. Diversifies.
I have 4 kids, if one of them refuses dinner, I can give it to the other 3. They are well aware of this and act accordingly.
Negotiation Tips
When using this power, you have two options: Unilateral actions and bilateral negotiation.
Unilateral Actions
These are relationship hurting, but it can accomplish your will.
Fait accompli, meaning, ‘Its already been done’. This is when you just do whatever you want and deal with the fallout. If you are the stronger power, this should go uncontested. If you are among equals, it will hurt your relationship significantly. If you are the lesser power, it might not work at all.
Consider changing the topic in a conversation. When you do it, ‘it is done’. However, if you are a lesser power, the greater power may revert back to the topic without skipping a beat.
Bilateral
This is your classic negotiation. My advice here is to find some mutual ground to base off. You shouldn’t expect the other side to completely capitulate or change their desires. You shouldn’t personally value ‘atmospherics’ like useless titles, but rather tangible goals. Beware of people who are not at the negotiating table claiming you can get 100% of what you want with no compromise, these people do not have buy-in, and get to enjoy moral high grounds without sacrificing anything.
Moral Coating
Instead of merely making demands, its best to explain Why you deserve your outcome. When being selfish, you can make claims that your survival is important. When working with a greater power, you can make claims of equality and fairness. Whatever you choose, find an overlap in Values that your adversary and bystanders would agree upon.
Should you use Power?
While every interaction involves a power dynamic, it doesn’t mean you should be using Unilateral tactics because you can. One aspect of power is ‘likeability’, and by using unilateral tactics, you reduce this. Alternatively, spending money to achieve your will, means potentially less money in the future.
Even if you do not plan on any active use of Power, these laws of nature affect you regardless. Other people will be using them, and its best for your own sake to be aware and optimize in your best interest.
Pleasure Duration Per Calorie: Get the most pleasure for the least pain
The Epicurean Philosophers advocated for reducing pain and increasing pleasure. I had this in mind when choosing between my kid’s Halloween candy. I could have a candy bar(100 Calories) or sucker(60 Calories). I would finish the candy bar before we even got to the next house. I chose the sucker and it gave over an hour of pleasure, and I didn’t even finish it.
This study aims to find optimal solutions. After completing this study, my nighttime snacks have completely changed. They are less calorie and way sweeter than previous.
Objective Data
It is impossible to get objective pleasure data at this time.
To simplify this problem, we start by looking at only 2 objective measurements: Duration of Food Consumption and Calories.
This next data does not consider pleasure intensity, only the “Duration of Pleasure(s) per Calorie”:
The conclusion here is to eat foods as slow as possible, but the foods more generally:
- Suckers
- Vegetables
- Fruit
Adding in Subjective Data
Do you agree with this statement? “A 5/10 pleasure and a 6/10 pleasure are more similar in intensity than a 9/10 pleasure and 10/10 pleasure.”
Because we don’t actually have pleasure measurements and the scale doesn’t seem to match a linear understanding of pleasure, I used an exponential base 10 to multiply by Duration/Calorie for the next comparison. You can also find Linear, Exponential(base 2) and Exponential(base 10) sortable at this link here.
Exponential(10^Pleasure Intensity)*Pleasure Duration/Calories:
My knee jerk conclusion was: “If you are going to treat yourself, treat yourself”, but that was too simple and doesn’t actually solve the original problem.
My thought was to combine the two pieces of data and select items that showed up on both lists.
Data Based Conclusions: Suckers, Coffee, and Tea
From this brief study of favorite foods, Suckers, Coffee, and Tea came out as most Efficient Pleasure Per Pain.
Give these conclusions, what happens next?
Instead of munching on Apples and Oranges at night, have a sucker? I believe it. I eat healthy the rest of the day, if I’m looking for something in the evening, its not typically for nutrition.
I believe its not recommended more than a few cups of coffee a day. However if you have diluted coffee or interesting teas, you could ‘Chain-drink-coffee’ all day. I can attest to this being a constant source of joy. Its probably the caffeine more than the taste, but I find myself excited watching the coffee brew and happy to burn my mouth on it. Pleasure Per Pain, its hard to beat coffee when you have a caffeine addiction.
Eat Your Food Different For Extra Pleasure
“How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop?” Licking food is different than swallowing it. It is time we highlight different consumption methods.
Opening an orange into its peals is going to give you extra length over shoving the entire thing in your mouth. I have cut up candy bars into tiny bites to extend it, I justify as it gives more surface area.
Having a stick on Hard Candy/Suckers allows you to rest your taste-buds for later. You can coat/dip Hard Candy/Suckers in citric acid for a different experience.
You can make your own hard candy, this novelty might be interesting on its own, I’ve had fun making ‘craft caramels’. 1 tbsp sugar + 1/4tsp milk is ~60 calories and I can play with this for 30-60 minutes.
Final Thoughts
While I think Coffee/Tea + Suckers are interesting takeaways, I want to emphasize the general idea here: The ability to enjoy a food is independent of its caloric value. You can find more and less optimal foods.
Next time you are going for a snack where nutrition wasn’t the primary concern, ask yourself: Do you want pleasure? Is this the most Efficient Pleasure Per Pain?
Using ChatGPT4 to Save Time
Some ideas on how to utilize AI to save time.
As a note, this is only tested on ChatGPT4. One time ChatGPT4 was down and I ended up going to Google’s Gemini to do the work, it was alright.
Food
Want to start eating healthy or a specific diet, but not sure what to buy? Ask
I am *insert Keto/Vegetarian/Gluten Free/Low FODMAP*, what can I buy at *insert restaurant*
I am *insert Keto/Vegetarian/Gluten Free/Low FODMAP*, what should I buy at the grocery store this week?
I am *insert Keto/Vegetarian/Gluten Free/Low FODMAP*, what snacks that don’t require refrigeration can I buy?
Ask ChatGPT how to modify a recipe according to whatever you want. I will warn you, this is probably best for seasoned cooks because it can occasionally give bad advice like add way too much soy sauce (or at least that seems far too much to me).
It wins far more than it loses.
Ask it for recipes (No endless scrolling of cooking spam articles!). Include dietary restrictions. Tell it to add extra vegetables. Ask what to do if you are out of an ingredient. Replace expensive/seasonal ingredients.
Party Planning
In moments I can ask:
Give 10 different cuisines I can *insert cook/cater* from and give 3 possible examples of what specific foods and quantities will be needed for *insert number of kids and number of adults*.
It gives a bunch of ideas, no brainstorming time needed.
Then ask:
I want the theme to be *insert theme*, what are 20 extremely easy, fast, and simple ways to decorate?
Finally, whenever a crisis happens, ask ChatGPT for advice, there might be a simple solution.
Watching/Answering Children’s Questions
My kids ask a lot of questions, and since ChatGPT can understand phonetically spelled words, my 4 year old can ask ChatGPT questions. It’s similar to a Google/Siri thing, but there’s a higher level of detail in output. I specifically have a bot that tells ChatGPT that they will be talking to a 4-year-old who spells things phonetically and that the answers should have simple words.
Law Questions
While this isn’t for high stakes things, I feel comfortable asking ChatGPT about low stakes legal questions. I’ll often read some document and not understand a sentence. I could just ignore the problem and sign anyway. I could pay a lawyer $100-$200 to read it. I could ask ChatGPT and confirm my understanding with further reading. The nice part is that ChatGPT is awake at 4am when I am working, my lawyer isn’t awake until 8am and my $100 question is small fries to them.
Medical Corruption
Avoid unnecessary medical procedures, ask ChatGPT before you are billed and waste time on unnecessary treatment. As an example, I had a stomach bug and the nurse was pretty pushy about an x-ray. I told ChatGPT about my symptoms and it thought the x-ray was unnecessary. An anti-biotic later, I feel great. No x-ray needed. (I then listened to this nurse go down the room and ask everyone if they wanted x-rays for any condition imaginable).
Car Repair
Confirm that what your mechanic is saying is true. Ask ChatGPT to confirm everything from diagnosis, pricing, etc…
Bots
You could turn all of these questions into ‘Bots’. Bots are literally copypasting your question/prompt/command before you send your new question. You could do this manually by… copypasting your question/prompt/command before sending your question. For instance:
Always copypaste this:
“You are a master chef and come up with ultra healthy recipes that are filling, high in protein, high in nutrients, and easy to cook. Come up with simple recipes I can make up at home”.
Then type whatever you want after before hitting send.
“I want 3 meals that only require a few ingredients from the grocery store”
Then you get a customized answer.
The ‘bot’ thing, is saving the pre-prompt in the ChatGPT4 system… Yeah, they copypaste for you. Its actually kind of nice 🙂
Final thoughts and tips
I often reply to AI with: “That was a 2/10 answer, give me a 10/10 answer” or “Be realistic, not idealistic”. These really do work, the technical term is called Chain of Thought.
Application is up to you. You will get better at asking AI questions.
Weight Loss Per Day – Fasting, Exercise, and more compared
I don’t think anyone will be surprised to see “Not Eating” + “Doing Exercise” is the fastest way to lose weight. However the noteworthy comparison is the Efficiency of weight loss. This can be used to limit the pain needed to lose weight.
There are plenty of websites about fasting for multiple days, look into those or the Electrolyte loss + Refeeding Syndrome can kill you.
Data and Findings
Fasting with exercise wins, this is easier said than done if you’ve fasted for a few days. I’ve been able to run ~1 mile and walk 2-3 miles during a 5 day fast. This is approx 300+ calories.
Something interesting here. The extra exercise is gives you the same weight loss per day as if you never fasted, however the absolute when fasting is higher. Its easy to dismiss this as obvious, but if you ever found yourself buying an extra item because it was Buy One Get One Half Off and you ended up spending 50% more money than you expected. My point being: If you are going to be suffering during a fasting day anyway or its urgent to lose weight, you could add an extra 300+ calories in exercise.
This also highlights how insignificant some exercise is. 1 hour of causal walking burns ~300 calories max. It is quite time intensive to burn calories this way. Meanwhile if you could run 6 or 13 miles, you could be burning 800 or 1700 calories in a day. These stacked with a caloric deficit can get decently high in weight loss per day.
Personal Application
If you can handle fasting, it clearly shows to be the best. I will do this a few times a year for ~2-3 days to lose weight but not get into ketosis. Being obsessed with Efficiency, I admittedly will do sometimes a 1 mile run then take the kids ~2 miles round trip to the park.
More regularly, I’ll eat 1 large-ish meal and 0-1 smaller meal/snacks through the day. Then I’ll do some cardio, often 6 miles. 1500 calories eaten, ~800 calories burned. 1800 Caloric deficit! Lose a half pound in 1 day!
This is semi-reasonable to do this and similar all week. Swapping 6 mile runs for biking to let muscles rest won’t burn as many calories, but it will give you a break and still burn extra.
Final Thoughts and Long Term
I consider losing weight a temporary condition. I don’t plan to live like this forever. I plan to lose the weight and stay some-what around that weight.
If I gain 5-15lbs in a year, I can lose this weight in weeks. This can beat some of the mental difficulties with weight loss. We are often inspired for the first ~2 months of a new lifestyle before the excitement is gone.
Apply this law of nature and sprint at weight loss for 2 months before taking a break and eating normal. When you are excited to take on another round of weight loss, you are ready to begin.
Kitchen Inventory, never run out of ingredients when its time to cook using Push/Pull
Can’t make the meal you wanted to? Ever run out of an ingredient and you only discovered it while cooking?
Industrial Engineers have solved this problem because shutting down the production line costs somewhere in the thousands or tens of thousands of dollars per minute. Running out of inventory is preventable. This application will prevent you from kitchen inventory mistakes, saving you time, money, and frustration.
Summary
There are two types of systems. A push system is when you plan ahead, predicting how much inventory(groceries) you need. A pull system is when you buy more inventory(groceries) as you are running out.
In our kitchen, we will use a hybrid system as most factories implement. Bulk items use a pull system, only buying more of an item when it gets low. Ingredients that are used in only a specific recipe will use a push system, and will be planned before going to the grocery store.
You likely already do this to some extent, but occasionally mistakes happen. Suddenly run out of a spice and you have another recipe containing it later this week? Industrial Engineers have found ways to error proof this.
Push System: Make the meals you want to eat
This may be obvious, but according to some anecdotes, some people buy groceries based on feeling.
Decide what meals you will eat until your next grocery trip, we write ours down on a physical calendar. At this point, go through the recipes and write what ingredients you need for these meals.
Some possible ways to make this faster are to create weekly templates. Suppose you have 4 weeks of ideas, you can type/write the ingredients for each week, and print/scan a copy. We did this in the original Efficiency Is Everything – In Cooking cookbook, click here.
Pull System: Never run out of ingredients mid-week
How often do you check to see if you are running low on a bulk item like Sugar/Rice/Flour/Spices? If you check weekly, you are wasting time. If you never check, you are going to run out of inventory.
For a pull system to work, you need to figure out how much is the maximum quantity you will need of the ingredient between grocery trips. For instance, I will not need more than 20 cups of rice per week, so I will make sure the systems will cue/trigger me to add the ingredient to my list when we go below 20 cups of rice in the inventory.
Here are some pull systems:
0 effort, possible spoilage, 2 bin system: You buy 2 containers of this bulk food. When one container runs out, buy another. Simple, no effort. You run the risk of spoilage, and the inventory takes up some extra space. In the example, the two bags of rice must have at least 20 cups of rice. If you want to save time, this is the best system.
Some effort, draw a line: Take a pen/marker, draw on the container a line that will visually remind you to buy more of the product. You could also do this with storage containers and mark a line that indicates when to re-buy. This doesn’t take up extra space but does take a moment to draw a line.
More effort, save 1 week worth of food in a backup container: Figure out the maximum need between grocery sessions. Put that amount in a backup container separate from your bulk container. When you run out of your bulk container, put it on your grocery list. You now can go into your separate container to last the rest of the week
Next Steps
If you aren’t already using a push system, its a good habit to begin. I especially recommend the premade weeks. The pull system is easy enough that you shouldn’t have trouble implementing it.
If you have a partner, make sure they understand the two systems, they might have further ideas on how to improve it.
The goal is to continuously improve your home processes, if something doesn’t work, change it.
Cleaning Chemistry : 8 Different Ways To Clean
This is my summary of all the cleaning methods I am aware of. This article is important because the first 10 results on google often recommended mixing vinegar and baking soda, aka making water and a salt. Here I will go through the options I use for cleaning the hardest things.
Note: I thought I was going to invent my own piranha solution that wasn’t so dangerous. As a note piranha solutions are not recommended in a lab environment, let alone your kitchen.
Warning
For high appearance items, its best to do a test run on a low appearance area. For instance, before you put bleach on the front of your wood cabinet, try it on the inside back corner made of the same material that rarely sees the light of day. If after a few hours it looks fine, you are probably safe.
Its also best to start with diluted or weaker substances before pulling out the strong stuff.
If you are about to try something new, I’d google it. For instance, wood dye is soluble in a non-polar substance- meaning dyed wood will be ruined with acetone. The following are to give you ideas for impossible to remove substances.
Summary
- Heat
- Physical Scrubbing
- Acid
- Base
- Non Polar Solvents
- Soaps
- Detergents
- Oxidizers
- Reducers
I should include water on the list, but its a bit obvious to go into detail. Boiling water is a favorite, but I’ll often use hot water from the tap.
It typically helps to clean as soon as a surface gets dirty. Things get deeper into crevasses, they might chemically react, and they will dry.
Heat
Hot stuff makes things softer and more liquid. I continue to be surprised at how easy hot water ~140F can clean something vs cold water 50F. The difference is as simple as changing the temperature of your faucet.
There are some other options, the hottest easily available is using an oven. My gas oven can get to 500F, although I hear some ovens have an oven cleaning setting that gets to 800F. Before you turn on your oven cleaning setting you should take note of what you are trying to clean, if it can handle those temperatures, and that maybe a lower setting might do the job.
If you need heat to clean something that cannot be put into an oven, boiling water can help. If the surface cannot touch water, a blow dryer or heat gun can make a hot surface.
Physical Scrubbing
This is typically a double edged sword. Yes you can use steel wool, but it might damage the surface you are trying to clean. Even a soft sponge may take off tiny bits of Teflon on a pan.
My rule is to typically use water, soap, and the softest cotton rag before I put a sponge on anything that is delicate.
There is a rule of thumb I don’t recommend, to only use weaker substances to scrub than the material you are scrubbing on. For instance, use a sponge on metal, use a rag on wood. I don’t totally buy this. A sharp plastic edge and some elbow grease/strong muscles can damage a metal surface. If I use a sponge, I make sure everything is water hot, soaked, and then lightly scrub before I start putting additional force into it.
Warning 2
We are getting into the ‘last resort’ territory. The following may react with surfaces in an undesirable fashion. Do a test surface.
Soaps
The idea behind soaps is that you can have an fat/oil/non polar substance attach to a soap and have soap attach to water. Then you can rinse the surface with water and that will wash everything bonded to the soap away.
Detergents
Typically these contain a soap, but what makes them different is that have a surfactant. Surfactants make water ‘wetter’, and reduce the surface tension of a liquid. This both forces molecules around, but it also lets substances get into tinier crevasses.
Non Polar Solvants
If water can dissolve polar substances like table salt, a non polar substance may help dissolve/mix with a nonpolar substance. You may see these casually described as Solvents. (Water is also a solvent, but its polar, these are not the same.) Isopropyl alcohol, mineral spirits, and if you have none of the above handy, glycerin.
Using soap/detergent after is a great 1-2 punch as soap will bind as described above.
Warning 3
You are about to chemically react things here. Before it was about physical removal and dissolving, but now there is going to be a chemical reaction.
Acid
The idea here is that by bombarding an substance with Hydrogen ions, its going to react into something that isn’t as sticky or will dissolve in water.
Cooking vinegar is an easy first stop. Oxalic acid is the stronger, ‘bar keepers friend’. And you can get all the way to sulfuric acid at the hardware store.
The concentration is a critical aspect here. Diluting an acid wont make it as strong.
Mixing an acid with a base(vinegar and baking soda) creates regular boring water and a salt. Its totally stupid, don’t do it.
Base
If you hear people talking about alkaline, they are talking about hydroxide ions. If Acids have lots of extra Hydrogen ions(+1 charge), bases have lots of hydroxide ions(-1 charge). Doing an acid cleaning, then washing away the acid with water, and a base cleaning, is a 1-2 punch that effects many substances.
On the less harsh end is Baking soda and water. On the strong end, NaOH ‘Lye’. All available at the hardware store.
Reducers
This bombards your surface with electrons.
Some common types are Ascorbic Acid and Oxalic Acid (as mentioned in the Acid section, this is the main ingredient in barkeepers friend).
As with the Acid and Base sections, make sure your surface has no other chemical on it, because it might interfere with a reducing reaction.
Oxidizers
“HI ITS MICHAEL KIRK HERE WITH OXYCL” Yeah that one. This is typically seen as household bleach. Bleach isn’t a single chemical, but rather the generic term for something that oxides. This is the opposite of a reducer, oxidizers suck electrons from whatever surface you apply it to.
Chlorine based bleach(typically used for whitening), peroxide based bleach(Commonly called color safe bleach), and hydrogen peroxide are common.
Conclusion
Test less critical locations of whatever you are cleaning. Start with gentle suggestions before harsh. If you see progress using a method, you can continue by repeating, or trying a different substance in that same category. Google might help too, or maybe you will find a ‘mix vinegar and baking soda’ SEO blogger that will waste your time. On a similar note, its a shame this website isn’t the first link when you search ‘save money on food’- the top results suck.
Daycare or stay at home? There is a third way.
I recently saw someone say ‘We did the math and sending the kid to daycare would be break even’. When I inquired further, it turned out ‘break even’ meant they could have profited $12,000/year. Nothing wrong with being a stay at home parent, but a profit of $12k is not close to break even.
Disclaimer, we send our kids to daycare, expect pro-daycare bias.
If you are reading this and have an agenda, to prove that whatever you are currently doing is the best: Just do that. This article’s purpose is to be rational from a monetary perspective. If you are afraid daycare is going to teach your kid bad habits, money won’t change that feeling.
The options
Here are your options to consider
- Quit your job, become a stay at home parent
- Send your kids to daycare or pay for a nanny
- Watch kids in rotation with neighbors, family, and friends
While there is a monetary value to each option, there are some intangibles that should be considered.
Stay at home pros and cons
During coronavirus, I ‘lived the dream’. Me and my 1 year old spent every day together, I built bridges and towers with his megablocks, we went outside, and… quickly this wore off and his fuss drove me to putting on baby phonics and count to 100 videos.
We typically see our stay at home mom friends have a Disney movie on TV in the background of our snapchats.
Recently I got a taste of the stay at home life as I had coronavirus and I watched my kids all day. I think stay at home is fun in bursts, and it may be fun when the kids are a bit older and can play more independently or tell you what they need.
Pros:
- See all the milestones first hand
- Micromanage their education
- No concerns of child predators
Cons:
- Might get old
- You may use TV as a crutch. Otherwise spend lots of time planning activities.
- No growing your resume
- No profit or benefit to external society
- Less socialization for both you(coworkers) and your kids(other kids)
Daycare
I won’t put ‘daycare costs money’ as a con, because daycare allows me to work and make profit.
To calculate if daycare is profitable, find out the cost of daycare. 5 days a week is approx $15,000 per child per year in my area. Then find your after tax earnings (as an estimate take your yearly income and multiply by 0.7). Do yearly after tax income – cost of daycare. If your number is positive, daycare is not ‘break even’, it’s profitable. Consider that the experience you gain from working will pay dividends as well.
Example outputs, assuming 15k/child/yr, a tax burden of 30%. This doesn’t include daycare tax deductions, which were $8,000 per kid in 2021 and only $3,000 per kid in 2022.
1 kid x 15,000= 15,000, after tax income to profit $21,000
2 kids x 15,000= 30,000, after tax income to profit $42,000
3 kids x 15,000 = 45,000 , after tax income to profit $65,000
Enter your yearly cost of daycare:
Enter your yearly post-tax income:
Gain/Loss =
To add qualities, here are pros and cons:
Pros:
- We grow our resume, the extra experience is worth ~30% pay bump every 2-3 years.
- Socialization, me and the kids are probably deep down an introvert. Daycare has been a savior to our oldest
- I get a break from watching the kids, this way I see them 40 hours a week instead of 95 hours a week.
- Meet parents of people who can also afford daycare. Social club!
- Having a break from your kids makes you appreciate them more
Cons:
- You still need to drive to drop off and pick up your kids
- You don’t spend 24/7 with your kid. This is mentioned above as a Pro, your call.
The Third Way – Friends, Family, and Neighbors.
We use this to some extent, for 2 days a week, we have our parents watch the kids. There are pros and cons. Grandparents spoil the kids, but they get that 1 on 1 attention that they wouldn’t get from daycare. I also enjoy having our parents over, I like those days as much as the weekend. It also reduces our daycare bills slightly.
I’ve been offered support from friends and neighbors as well, mostly in the form of trading days of watching kids. This would require finessing around work schedules, so we end up using daycare instead. However, my job is flexible enough to do something like this. I’ve personally been impressed enough by my kid’s socialization at daycare that I don’t think I’d trade it for $20,000/yr… Hmm… when I put it that way, maybe I do need to consider ‘The Third Way’.
Conclusion
If you want to be a stay at home parent, why are you reading this article? You know in your heart what you want.
If you want to make profit and have 1 parent with a flexible schedule, you may be able to set up a system of friends, family, and neighbors to watch your kids.
If you want to make profit, do the math to figure out if daycare is a profitable choice. Even a slight profit will pay dividends with a stronger resume. On a similar note, make sure you are using rational decision making when choosing jobs, benefits disguise how low a job actually pays.
What can you do while watching tv? (or audiobooks)
Watching TV can be either a full focus, mentally intense activity or the TV is background noise. A show like LOST, where missing 15 seconds could make you completely not understand anything is full focus. Re-runs of The Office can be background noise. (Don’t watch LOST, save your time)
You can swap ‘Watch TV’ with listening to audiobooks for these.
From “highest TV” focused to “mostly activity” focused:
- Light Exercise- Walk loops around the house, treadmill walk/run, stationary bike, hula-hoop
- Stretch
- Massage- Foam roller, tennis ball
- Feed Animals
- Clean
- Practice Musical Instruments
- Crochet/Knit/etc..
- Cook, cut peaches, prep, full blown meal cooking
- Hard Exercise- Abs, pushups, Jump rope, high intensity interval training.
Light Exercise
A casual stroll on a stationary bike or treadmill walk/light jog is nearly mindless. Your head can still fully face the TV at all times. You burn calories, condition yourself, and hit that recommended 30 minutes of exercise per day that everyone talks about. This wouldn’t be my only exercise, I’d definitely want 2-3 days per week of much more intense workouts, but 30 minutes of easy cardio keep you loose and burn calories.
As a note, the faster I run on the treadmill or more intense I go on the stationary bike, the louder I need to make the TV. Closed Captions help.
Stretch
This may be a bit more intense than light exercise as some stretching causes you to look away from the TV. Changing positions or counting require mental activity that isn’t focusing on the show for a few seconds. I wouldn’t let this deter you. Most shows have redundancies to clear up confusion.
Do remember there is a difference between Active/Dynamic and Passive/Static stretching. You may find Passive/Static is better for watching an intense show.
Thank you to my wife, a Doctor of Physical Therapy, for correcting my terminology in this article.
Massage
This is basically on the same tier as Stretching, with slightly less looking at the TV if you use a foam roller/tennis ball.
Similar to Stretching, you can do Dynamic massage where you are moving back and forth. You can also do Static stretching. Each has different physiological effects, I personally do both.
Feed Animals
This is typically quick and mindless enough to continue to focus on whatever you are watching.
Clean
We are now approaching the point where you can ‘miss something’. Cleaning a single room with a TV in it would be rare. However, transporting objects from one room to another is a common activity during cleaning, your back will face the TV and you may leave the room entirely. You may be able to coordinate this in a way where you never leave the room, or are doing things like dusting/picking up kids toys/folding laundry. You can likely empty and load the dishwasher while watching TV and miss little, as long as you can see and hear the TV. This is one of the few cases where sound becomes an issue.
Musical Instruments
We have crossed over into the ‘I’m doing an activity, and the TV is in the background’.
Back when I used to watch (Detroit Lions) sports, I would have a guitar in my lap and practice a difficult technique or finger position. For a difficult technique, you are focused on pulling off the technique and learning from your mistakes. You are doing trail and error, seeing if you can figure out something new that works. If the crowd/announcer goes wild, you can watch the replay. You can also stop practicing when teams are close to scoring or it’s the end of the game.
The best way for me to watch sports is if I’m doing something else productive or visiting friends(which is also productive).
Crochet/Knit/etc…
When you know… you know..
The first time I learned how to crochet, it was a full 100% intense activity. Today, I can mindlessly make many different toys with a mere occasional reference to remind myself the order of operations. My favorite are making simple snowballs. At this point, no reference needed. My wife knits blankets.
Cooking
Cooking gives you long breaks but also critical moments of full focus. After stirring tomato sauce, you might have 5-50 minutes before needing to do anything else. Or you might be frying potatoes/cooking crepes/toasting a quesadilla and 30 seconds of inattention causes your food to burn. Or maybe you are cutting vegetables and can listen to the dialogue of a show.
I wouldn’t put anything attention intense on, but you can always jump back a few minutes if you missed something on TV and are done with time critical cooking.
This one can really go both ways. This year we were processing ~1000 peaches from our peach tree and had to get rid of gross spots and the pits. That was pretty mindless, even if our eyes weren’t fully on the TV.
Hard Exercise
This is really reserved for TV shows that don’t matter. The news and sports come to mind. You can generally get the gist of what is going on from a quick glance.
There is another downside. I don’t think your workout will be at the intensity you could achieve. Intense hype music before a heavy lift will get me to do more reps than if I was listening to a non-fiction podcast/audiobook. My 2-3/week hard workouts are to achieve progress, and I’d be disappointed if I didn’t achieve my goal because I needed to watch TV. However, any workout is better than no workout. You decide.
Conclusion
You are watching TV for enjoyment. Finding any secondary benefit provides an ROI that would otherwise be 0. Find something you find either physically or mentally mindless that works for you.
Productive Sickness (feat. k0v1d nint33n)
Being sick sucks, and if my cocktail of 500mg Acetaminophen, 200mg ibuprofen, and 120mg pseudoephedrine (plus any caffeine for caffeine users) doesn’t get me feeling better than ever:
Lower your expectations and have a backup plan.
The early stages of a sickness
You may have some warning shots, your spouse/kid/friends you hung out with are suddenly sick. Some article I once read said that taking vitamins before you are sick might help. I have, but I still get sick.
Create some reasonable expectations for when you are sick. Survive work? If its just a cold, sure. Fever? Get caught up on some TV/youtube. Get something done at home… ugh probably not, but bonus- and celebrate that win.
Make Money
You might be able to grind out the 9-5 job on cruise control and make money. That is a pretty good win considering the circumstances.
If you work in-person, your social responsibility is to stay home. But with work from home and masks being socially acceptable, it might be alright to continue working.
Passive Productivity
Non-fiction is the gold standard.
Despite getting an engineering degree, I never quite understood the difference between voltage and current until I was sick. Sure I could calculate each, but I didn’t really ‘get it’. I queued up 5 videos about voltage and current and by the end of video 2, I understood the difference between voltage and current.
Watching videos on topics you want to learn about is a great way to spend your sick sulking. You sack around, not moving more than a finger, and you brain consumes new knowledge. This is why I wrote this article – you might not be mentally and physically able to accomplish greatness, but you can knockout lesser things that you haven’t had the time for.
Mentally Active Productivity but Physically Beat
Depending on your state, you might be might be able to think somewhat clearly. You can read books and articles that you have set aside.
Physically Active Productive, but Mentally Beat
I had this happen a few times during k0v1d nint33n. I felt good enough to be a normal human, but I had a terrible headache. This gave me an opportunity to lift weights, following my workout plan. It also allowed me to clean the house and do yard work, living life on cruise control.
Plan
The point I’m making here is to use what you have available and know what tasks are available to you. Evaluate your current state and do whatever feels best but also accomplishes your goals.
I once read a quote that said something like “If you only do work when you feel good, you wont accomplish much.” I don’t think this person was talking about illness, but I like the idea to a lesser degree. Give yourself a break, but do it in a way that also knocks out your never ending to-do list.
Want an excuse to browse that website that rhymes with interest? Do it, but do it so you can solve a future problem.
Did your friend recommend watching some movie and you’d hate to tell them ‘no thanks, your tastes suck, I don’t have time for that.” Do it while sick.
You have a few hours when you know you are about to become sick, this is your time to plan. Visualize how you are going to be lying on the couch, visualize what you are going to watch. Make your productivity inevitable.