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Procedural Knowledge Gaps
I am beginning to suspect that it is surprisingly common for intelligent, competent adults to somehow make it through the world for a few decades while missing some ordinary skill, like mailing a physical letter, folding a fitted sheet, depositing a check, or reading a bus schedule. Since these tasks are often presented atomically - or, worse, embedded implicitly into other instructions - and it is often possible to get around the need for them, this ignorance is not self-correcting. One can Google "how to deposit a check" and similar phrases, but the sorts of instructions that crop up are often misleading, rely on entangled and potentially similarly-deficient knowledge to be understandable, or are not so much instructions as they are tips and tricks and warnings for people who already know the basic procedure. Asking other people is more effective because they can respond to requests for clarification (and physically pointing at stuff is useful too), but embarrassing, since lacking these skills as an adult is stigmatized. (They are rarely even considered skills by people who have had them for a while.)
This seems like a bad situation. And - if I am correct and gaps like these are common - then it is something of a collective action problem to handle gap-filling without undue social drama. Supposedly, we're good at collective action problems, us rationalists, right? So I propose a thread for the purpose here, with the stipulation that all replies to gap announcements are to be constructive attempts at conveying the relevant procedural knowledge. No asking "how did you manage to be X years old without knowing that?" - if the gap-haver wishes to volunteer the information, that is fine, but asking is to be considered poor form.
(And yes, I have one. It's this: how in the world do people go about the supposedly atomic action of investing in the stock market? Here I am, sitting at my computer, and suppose I want a share of Apple - there isn't a button that says "Buy Our Stock" on their website. There goes my one idea. Where do I go and what do I do there?)
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Comments (1477)
I think I have lots of gaps to report, but I'm having lots of trouble trying to write a coherent comment about them... so I'm going to just report this trouble as a gap, for now.
Oh, and I also have lots of trouble even noticing these gaps. I have a habit of avoiding doing things that I haven't already established as "safe". Unfortunately, this often results in gaps continuing to be not detected or corrected.
Anyway, the first gap that comes to mind is... I don't dare to cook anything that involves handling raw meat, because I'm afraid that I lack the knowledge necessary to avoid giving myself food poisoning. Maybe if I tried, I would be able to do it with little or no problem, but I don't dare to try.
Generally, it is mainly chicken that one needs to be careful about, because it is sometimes contaminated with unhealthy bacteria, even when bought "fresh". A general procedure with all meat, and especially chicken, is to wash any surface that raw chicken comes in contact with when you are done preparing it and have started to cook it, then wash any utensils you used that touched the chicken, and wash you hands. To be extra cautious, you can do that for any raw meat. Raw meat should be refrigerated soon after purchase and now allowed to stand uncooked at room temperature for more than the time it takes to prepare it.
Thanks for explaining that! But, um... I still have more questions... What is the procedure for washing the surfaces, the utensils, and my hands? How do I know when the meat is cooked enough to not qualify as raw? And for stir-frying raw meat, do I need to pause the stir-frying process to wash the stir-frying utensils, so that I don't contaminate the cooked food with any raw juices that happen to still be on the utensils?
Salmonella bacteria is killed instantly at 165°F. Cooking small chopped or sliced pieces of meat is hard to do wrong because the surface area to volume ratio is high enough that they will be sterilized even before they start to appear cooked. Make your slices less than 1/2 inch thick and cook them until they start to turn golden brown. As long as the business ends of your utensils are in contact with the food as it cooks they will be sterilized along with it.
Assuming that you already know how to wash things in general, you don't need to do it any differently. Normal washing is good enough because bacteria can't grow without a source of nutrients and moisture, and you need to ingest a fairly substantial amount of bacteria in order to get sick.
This is true, but it probably helps to state explicitly that a) the even for small pieces of meat the inside might not be at 165 F even if the outside is (so make sure that it is hot for a fair bit of time) b) This is more of an issue for larger pieces of meat (luminosity's comment below is relevant).
There's a related issue: if the meat is raw and frozen, life will be much easier if you defrost it before cooking it. Weird things can happen if you try to directly cook large bits of frozen meat. Generally it won't result in health problems, but it does make stuff more likely to be burned in part or simply not taste good.
However, I find it much easier to slice meat for stir-frying which is still partially frozen. (This also speeds the thawing process.) Probably if you use a cleaver or other heavy, extremely sharp type of instrument, no prior thawing would be necessary; but I don't trust myself with those.
We should add that soapy water does not kill the bacteria, but rather makes it impossible for them to adhere to anything, so they get washed down the drain.
For cooking larger pieces of meat than saturn addresses, the way I learnt what was and wasn't needed was simply cooking meat, waiting until the outside looked cooked, then taking a piece out and cutting it in half. You'll be able to see if it's still bloody inside, or if it's chicken you'll be able to see if it's turned white yet. Personally I prefer meat entirely cooked, but depending on your taste pinkish in the middle should be fine.
Doing this over time has given me a good feel for how long to cook meat for my preferences, though even now I still often slice pieces open to be sure.
This is good for getting a feel for how long to cook meat, but it also dries the meat out to some degree as you cook it. This is especially relevant for cooking steak, IMHO. For things like hamburgers, a simple meat thermometer will do the trick (brown both sides and cook until the inside is 165*F). For steak, it's more difficult if you prefer your meat cooked less than medium-well.
For beef, not chicken.
I'm not much of a stir-fryer, but my general method for meat cooking is to have separate utensils for "before cooking" and "during-to-after". So if I put the meat in the pan with a fork, that fork goes to the sink. But the wooden spoon that is cooked with the meat doesn't get washed until I'm done eating, and is usually used as my serving spoon, too. If you are really concerned for safety, you could always use one cooking spoon until the surface of the meat is obviously brown, then switch to a fresh spoon.
If dealing with a low-fat meat (like moose), burger is much easier to cook than other meat, and is still healthy. It is hard to overcook, and easy to tell what's safe, because all the little chunks of meat go from red to dark brown. High fat burger (like cow) is still tasty and easy to cook, but not terribly healthy.
One trick that I will immediately adopt is using an infrared thermometer to check for the 165F that saturn mentioned. Thanks for the info!
Pork and chicken should be cooked all the way through. If you're not sure whether it's done, you can cut it open and have a look.
With beef and lamb, you only need to ensure that the outer surface is cooked - whether you want it cooked all the way through is just a matter of personal taste. However, if it's minced, you should cook it all the way (it has formerly-outer-surfaces in the middle).
You should probably specify how one would actually visually distinguish done from not done. Or maybe not, it sounds like PeerInfinity already understands the basics of cooking. I don't, however. :)
Uncooked meat is semitransparent with a kind of gelatin-like luster. As it cooks, it becomes more opaque and shifts color.
The exact color transitions depend on the kind of meat and whether it's had a chance to oxidize before you start cooking it. Chicken, which as mentioned you need to worry about the most, starts out a pale yellow-pink and cooks to a tannish color. Pork starts out light pink and cooks to a kind of light pinkish-gray; if it goes completely gray you've overcooked it. Beef and lamb start dark red, or dark pink if they've been exposed to the air, and cook to a deep red-brown.
All meat develops a brown crust over time if it's being grilled or pan-fried, but it's the interior color that matters. Another thing to look at is the kind of juice it's dripping; uncooked meat bleeds slightly, a thin reddish fluid, while well-cooked meat oozes gravy-like, clear or brownish liquids. It's safe before it stops bleeding, though.
If you're roasting meat, you can get a thermometer that goes into the meat so you can find out whether the interior has gone up to a safe temperature. Chart of temperatures
Stewing meat (simmering it for an extended period until it falls apart) is another way to be sure it's safe.
Regarding investment, my suggestion (if you work in the US) is to open a basic (because it doesn't periodically charge you fees) E*TRADE account here. They will provide an interface for buying and selling shares of stocks and various other things (ETFs and such; I mention stocks and ETFs because those are the only things I've tried doing anything with). They will charge you $10 for every transaction you make, so unless you're going to be (or become) active/clever enough to make it worthwhile, it makes sense not to trade too frequently.
EDIT: These guys appear to charge less, though they also deal in fewer things (e.g. no bonds).
This is right. But to put it much more generally, and as an exercise in seriously trying to bridge information gaps:
To buy stocks you need what is called a Brokerage account. The way a brokerage account works is that you give money to the Broker to invest for you. (Generally, you will do this by transferring it from an existing bank account.) This money generally gets put into a highly liquid account in your name, such as a money market fund. You can get your money back by instructing your broker to send it back to you.
When you want to buy stocks or other financial investments, you direct your broker to use the money in your brokerage account to buy stocks or other financial investments in your name. Your broker will use the money that is in your account to do this. Your brokerage account now also contains the stock you bought.
When you want to sell stocks, you tell your broker to sell, and the proceeds get put back into your cash-like account.
Brokers make money by charging you a fee each time you buy or sell a stock or other financial investment through them.
There are full-service brokerages and discount brokerages. Full service brokers (such as Merrill Lynch) give you extra help figuring out what you want to do, though they charge a premium. Be aware that since full service brokers do not have a fiduciary duty to their customers to give good advice, they can legally steer you toward investments that pay them a higher commission even if it's not as good for you.
Discount brokerages are usually online-only and charge lower commissions. You don't get any advice, just the ability to buy and sell through their website. E*trade, Scottrade, and Zecco are well-known discount brokers. Some major banks such as Bank of America / Merrill Lynch and Fidelity also offer online brokerage services, as does Vanguard. Many people recommend discount brokerages over full-service ones.
I've had good experience with ShareBuilder.
I feel like it is useful to mention that because of efficient markets (which implies assets are "fairly priced") and the benefits of diversification (lower risk), it's almost always better to buy a low fee mutual fund than any particular stocks or bonds. In particular, Index Funds merely keep a portfolio which tracks a broad market index. These often have very low operating costs, so they are a pretty good way to invest. You can buy these as ETFs, or you can buy them through something like Vanguard.
I think some more detail is called for here too, on mutual funds vs ETFs:
When you buy part of a mutual fund, you are giving your money to professional fund managers to invest for you. Mutual funds are often devoted to a single investment strategy (value, growth, index...) or a specific business sector (energy, health care, high technology), or even a specific kind of investment vehicle (stocks, bonds, commodities...).
You pay the fund managers a small percentage of your assets each year (the number you want to look for here is the "expense ratio"). Something on the order of 1%. Sometimes you also pay a fee when you put your money in or when you take it out; funds that do this are called "load" funds, funds that don't are called "no-load" funds.
When you buy into an ordinary mutual fund, it's a similar process to having a savings account: you send the fund money, they use it to buy financial investments. Mutual funds are generally sold and redeemed at par; each dollar you invest in the fund buys a dollar's worth of investments. When you cash out, each dollar of investments they sell is a dollar that goes back into your pocket.
ETFs are similar to stocks. When you buy shares of an ETF, you're buying a piece of the fund from another investor, not putting money into the fund directly. ETFs are often traded at a discount to net asset value. In other words, you pay less than the market price of the investments the fund owns. But that doesn't necessarily make it a better deal, because of course when you want to cash out, you will probably be selling below par as well.
2 deficits of my own come to mind. I didn't learn the alphabet until middle school or so; I covered up my ignorance by knowing pairs of letters and simply looking it up whenever I needed to sort something. (In middle school I realized how silly this was and studied diligently until I could finally remember the alphabet song. For years after that, whenever I needed to know something, I would mentally sing through the alphabet song until I had my answer.)
Until 2 years ago or so, I didn't know the 12 months of the calendar. I got around this by generating a bunch of month flashcards for Mnemosyne. (The cards should be obvious, but if anyone really doesn't know how that would work, I can post them.) I'm still a little shaky but I more or less know them now.
These 2 methods may not be generally applicable.
I'm curious: Do you generally have unusual trouble with memorizing ordered lists compared to other people? Do you remember when/how you learned to count, for example?
No to both.
Finnish has separate words for the intermediate compass directions, northeast, southeast, southwest and northwest are "koilinen, kaakko, lounas, luode". There's no pattern to the words. I still can't automatically match directions to these words, the only way I remeber them is from having learned to list them along the clock face and working back and forth using that.
Finnish also has separate words for the various types in-law relatives such as 'lanko' or 'käly'. I have no idea which is which. I remember other people in my high school English class complaining about not knowing what the Finnish words mean when discussing in-law vocabulary.
Finnish month names don't come from Latin like the English ones do. Most of them have some common Finnish word as their root, but 'maaliskuu' and 'huhtikuu' for March and April both have nonsensical-sounding root words and are right next to each other, so I still have to think a bit sometimes about which is which.
Hey, I have all of those same problems. Except worse, since I wouldn't know the intermediate directions even if given a moment's thought.
(Going to a Swedish-speaking elementary school is probably partially responsible.)
So it's true: Finnish is so insanely difficult that even the Finns can't speak it! :-)
Which makes their PISA scores and educational practices all the odder, to me.
It's a bit odd how people keep citing the PISA results, but don't seem to ask the follow-up question of why Finns don't seem to be exactly the international science superstars having top academic performance in the world would indicate. For instance, there are about twice the number of Swedes than there are of Finns, but Swedes have 30 Nobel laureates, while Finns have 4, according to Wikipedia. (Ragnar Granit, who emigrated to Sweden, is on both lists, so maybe the numbers should be 29.5 and 3.5 instead.)
It doesn't necessarily bother me. I know that there are some biases in the Nobels (iirc, Literature has a bias towards Scandinavian authors), and there are plenty of other explanations. Perhaps Finland simply has an atrocious higher education system, which may not reflect in PISA scores. Perhaps Finland and Sweden are similar and some of Finland's better scores come from it being smaller and more susceptible to variation (kind of like the smaller school effect). Perhaps their techniques improve the average but squash extreme variation - like potential Nobelists. Without knowing more, I take the PISA at face value.
Now, what would bother me a lot is if a country had very low PISA scores but very many per capita Nobels. (The other way around only bothers me a little.)
Wait; singing the alphabet song is still how I order letters. Is there a more efficient way?
Inquiry seconded. I have a vague sense of whether certain letters appear early or late in the alphabet (I don't need to sing to know that B comes before X) but for any finer-grained distinctions I need the song.
You could memorize the numeric values of the letters (A=1, B=2, ... , Z=26); if you can figure out which number is bigger without counting, you can figure out which letter is later.
Disclaimer: I have not actually done this, because memorizing 26 separate, individually useless items is a pain.
I've never had the need to be very fine in detail, but I've always treated it a an ordered set (much like the numeric values that Benquo suggested, except without as much memorizing). Then I would compare the letter I want with M (being the 13th element, it serves as a useful midpoint), to decide if the element belongs to the first half or the second.
I suppose that doing something similar with the (6th or 7th) letter, and the (19th or 20th) letters could tell you what quadrant of the Alphabet space you were in. So if it comes before F, between F and M, between M and U, or after U, you can focus your attention there. That takes more analysis, but if you are normal in your memorization methods, maybe keeping the alphabet in chunks of 5 to 7 elements could really help your memorization.
Or you could be like Derren Brown, and just use a mnemonic to tie the letters to numbers... searching... he calls them peg words. I use it when jogging to keep track of distance, and he seems to have a way to memorize 52 elements, which could make 26 elements seem pretty trivial.
If you know the alphabet song, the melody naturally (at least to me) separates the alphabet into a few groups: ABCDEFG HIJKLMNOP QRS TUV WX YZ. This may be easier than memorizing divisions.
Today I learnt that the two alphabet songs I was taught in age 7 pre-English aren't at all what American kids learn.
(For the record, the slower one went: ABCDEFG HIJKLMN OPQRSTUV WXYZ, while the faster one was: ABCDE FGHIJ KLMNO PQRST UVWXYZ.)
And now you know what jokes about the letter "elemenopee" are referring to.
The alphabet song I learned (and Elizabeth is probably referring to) is to the tune of "Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star".
Oddly enough, I seem to "just know" this automatically and extremely quickly. On the other hand, I am sometimes at a loss for a while when I have to do mental arithmetic.
For me, after a while, I think of a letter, say, 't', and then know that 'u' comes next. I don't need to sing 'a, b, c d, e...' and wait until I get to 't' to know what comes next. Like indexing into an array rather than iterating through a list, if that comparison makes sense to you.
I had a Hebrew teacher who assigned the following exercise on the first day of class: Memorize the alphabet backwards. Once the pupils knew the alphabet backwards and forwards, we were able to look things up quickly in the dictionary.
I became much more familiar with the Latin alphabet after I performed the following exercise: Type out every two-letter string, in alphabetical order. This was laborious because I didn't know where the keys were on the keyboard; perhaps that contributed to its effectiveness.
A similar method works for developing one's ability at scrabble. The "two letter scrabble words" deck in Anki seems altogether too much like an exhaustive enumeration of permutations.
This is fascinating! I've been told I memorised the alphabet before I was a year old... But it wasn't until I was in college that I finally memorised which hand is called 'left' and which one is 'right'. (Never had an analogous problem with compass directions.)
A possibly related deficit is that I typically think of the wrong word first when I want to name a colour; i.e. for example I want to refer to purple and I have to choke off the impulse to say 'yellow'. And yet I have letter/colour synaesthesia!
Brains are weird.
I don't know how to find research grants that might help fund graduate or even undergraduate education. Not quite "mail an envelope" or even "buy a stock" basic, but still annoying! One of these days I'll call up a bunch of admissions advisors and ask.
Several of my procedural gaps concern cooking, but they don't bother me because I plan to spend as few minutes of my life as possible preparing food. Not how I want to spend my precious time!
Precious time. (Unless you meant "previous time invested in learning".)
Thanks, corrected.
Grant-finding, as far as I know, is a google search issue. There are so many college scholarships that you may want to find a college scholarship database (like this ) to narrow it down.
For graduate school, the big ones that I know of are NSF, DOD, and DOE (for science), Hertz (for applied science), Soros (for immigrants or immigrants' kids), and Ford (if you're black, Hispanic, or Native American.)
Thanks. Know any for graduate school in the humanities?
The only one that comes to mind off the top of my head is the Institute for Humane Studies (which requires the topic of your research to be roughly politically libertarian.) I'm much less familiar with the humanities scholarships, and I think they tend to be smaller-scale and more scattered.
Just don't go.
I agree. The odds are very much against you. And I say this as someone who likes the humanities and admires humanities professors.
If you have incredibly strong evidence in your favor that you're a special case, go for it, though -- but it should be incredibly strong evidence.
It's possible that it's easier to publish a philosophy book than to become a philosophy professor, if you're good at networking. Or to get some attention for your ideas through podcasts, etc., which you're already doing. If your goal is to do and write philosophy, optimize for that -- it's a different goal than becoming a professor.
This is a stronger argument against a doctorate than a Masters degree, but I imagine that the same kinds of considerations apply.
Great link, especially this quote from Part 2:
An incidental note: lack of these sorts of skills can also create ugh fields around the subjects or surrounding subjects.
Quite. Now that I think about it, I suspect this might be causally related to several social anxiety problems.
There are a number of web sites that present such implicit and procedural knowledge. such as: http://www.ehow.com/ http://www.wikihow.com/Main-Page http://www.howcast.com/ http://www.howtodothings.com/
I might be useful to somehow select the most generally useful ones of these in one place.
I haven't come across any of them except eHow. eHow is awful. Useless. Bad. I have ended up there unwittingly from google searches a half dozen times or so. Not once has it answered what I wanted to know. The information on their site is optimised to be written as quickly as possible while getting the best google rank possible, with no thought as to quality of information.
Huh. I use eHow and WikiHow all the time, and always find it incredibly useful.
I believe there should be a subject in school (and text books to go with it) that goes through all the things that adult citizens should know. I believe this was part of what was called Civics but that is dead or changed to something else. The idea is somewhat dated but it included things like how to vote, how to read a train schedule, that different types of insurance actually were, simple first aid, how to find a book in a library and all sorts of things like that. Today it would be a slightly different list. Somewhere between 10 and 14 seems the ideal age to be interested and learn these sort of things.
Civics, at least in my area of the United States, is mainly education about government and ethics. I do believe they may discuss how to vote and other information that would be useful to the democratic process, but nothing like going onto trains. (Although in the United States, this could only ever discuss the subway, and only in certain metropolitan areas - culturally, the elegant train is dead here, which is sad, since I've had much more positive travel experiences on trains than planes.)
Intercity rail is very common here in the northeast.
Ahahahahahahaha where do you live take me with you now. The last time I checked, northern Virginia qualified as the Northeast and the Metro is the only thing like that for miles and miles.
Virginia will always be the south to me. I live in Philadelphia, so for local public transit we have elevated rail, subway, electric trolley bus, light rail, and intercity commuter rail. And then of course there is the high-speed Acela Express connecting the rest of the Northeast Corridor.
"Home Economics" and similar courses teach life skills like cooking, paying bills and doing your taxes.
When I was in middle school, anyone not in band (or sports, I think) took "Family and Consume Science" - FACS. Basically home economics with a spiffy new name. But to be honest, it didn't teach much that was useful. In HS, there was no course like that. Well, maybe an elective.
The question, then, becomes how common useful home ec courses actually are. E.g. I had one of those back in middle school, but it was close to useless. IIRC, it consisted of cooking and sewing; the former half did nothing to actually explain cooking and so was useless to anyone who didn't already understand cooking, while the latter half seemed to successfully teach the basics (at least, I think I understand the basics) but isn't something I've ever really had reason to apply. (I think we also discussed nutrition some, but that was redundant as it was already covered in other classes.)
I agree. I've also long held a different but complementary view: that all establishments should (hopefully, out of the goodness of their hearts) put up signs that basically say, "this is how it works here".
(For example, at a grocery store in the US, the sign would say something like, "This store sells the items you see inside that have a price label by them. To buy something, take it with you to one of the numbered short aisles [registers] toward the exit and place it on the belt. If you need many items, you may want to use one of the baskets or carts provided near this sign. The store employee at the register will tell you how much the item costs, and you can pay with ...")
While most of it would be obvious to everyone and something parents automatically teach, everyone might find some different part of it to be novel. And I suspect that this easily-correctible "double illusion of transparency", in which people don't think such signs would convey anything new, prevents a lot of beneficial activity from happening.
Huh.
Would you similarly endorse putting a link up on the front page that explains that "this website displays user-generated content, both in the form of discrete posts and in the form of comments associated either with a post or another comment. To view a post, click the title under "recent posts." To view comments... etc. etc. etc."?
Maybe not specifically that, but I recall a lot of new users (and regular users, and critics of users...) complaining that they don't know e.g. what kinds of comments are appropriate to post under articles, what the pre-requisites for understanding the material and generally stuff that we might just assume they know.
LW does have a good "about" section, though.
It needs a "how to use the site" section. When the envelope turns red, it means you have a reply or a message. The help link at the bottom of the comment box will tell you how to do formatting, but it's different formatting methods if you post an article.
There may be useful features on the site that haven't crossed my path. Finding them seems to be a semi-random process.
This is particularly helpful for anyone new to the area - immigrants, emigrants, tourists, etc.
Jump-start a stalled car.
I "get around" this by not carrying around jumper cables, so nobody asks me, which is of course absurd.
To my knowledge, this is how it works, but I might be missing a detail or two (never had to do it completely on my own).
1) Start with the car with the dead battery first. Expose the terminals of the battery - usually there are plastic covers to prevent anything from touching the metal terminals. Connect the jumper cables to both of these terminals. Jumper cables have a red side and a black side. You don't have to match red with the positive or negative terminal, but you will have to remember how you matched them. I.e., remember whether red is positive or negative.
2) Now go to the car with the good battery and make sure it's started and running. Connect the jumper cables to the terminals of the battery of that car in the same way that you connected them to the first car. I.e., if the red side was connected to the positive terminal on the first car, do the same on the second car.
3) Wait. It takes a few minutes to recharge a dead battery.
4) Try to start the car with the dead battery. You can do this with the jumper cables still connected. If it doesn't work, return to 3)
5) If it starts, disconnect the jumper cables.
A couple of things: don't touch the metal ends of the cables or the battery terminals. You could be in for a shock.
If the battery of a car dies, it's likely because the alternator, which recharges the battery, went out. Because of this, it's a good idea to give the dead battery a decent charge before disconnecting so that the car you're giving a jump can make it to wherever it's going (hopefully a mechanic!).
edit: and it's not my fault if you use these instructions and get caught in an infinite loop :)
No doubt I'll eventually starve to death, so the loop will halt then if not sooner.
Thanks!
12 volts isn't high enough to produce any sensation under normal circumstances (the only time I've noticed so much as a tingle was after diving in the ocean for an hour)
Touching the ends to each other, however, will send sparks flying.
Indeed, a good reason to do this procedure a safe distance from gas pumps.
If the car still won't start then get a second person to press the accelerator on the other car, with the gear stick in neutral, while the jumper leads are still attached. Then, while the other car is being revved, try again to start the car.
This works because car engines have generators that recharge the battery while the car is running, and pressing the accelerator will increase the voltage to the dead car.
Also, technically "stalled" refers to the situation that the engine died because you forgot to put your foot on the clutch at the traffic lights (or similar). If the car won't start at all then that means the battery is flat.
Assuming you mean jump-starting a car with a drained battery:
The short answer is that you attach the red clamps to the positive terminals and the black clamps to the negative terminals, and then you should be able to start the car normally. Intuitively, you're just hooking up the good battery to the car with the bad battery, via cables. This would also work with just a new battery.
Jumper cable boxes tend to have instructions, which may tell you to do something slightly different.
And exercise general safety - don't stand in front of the engine while someone is starting the car.
In recent years, portable battery boosters have become cheaper, which means you won't need jumper cables at all.
For $50ish, you get a battery in a sealed plastic case, with two "jumper-cable"-type alligator clamps, one red and one black. You flip the on switch, then clip the red onto your battery's positive terminal, and the black onto your battery's negative terminal. Then you start the car. Once the car is running, you remove the black connector, then the red connector, and you're done.
There are at least two advantages over jumper cables. First, you don't need anyone else's car or help. Second, there's 50% less chance of error, since you're connecting only two clamps and not four.
If I am not mistaken, some of the deluxe models have built in protection against putting the clamps on backwards. But I'm not 100% sure about that.
But there are still only two ways to connect the four clamps, since cable color doesn't matter when they're acting purely as cables.
On the other hand more science knowledge is required to be sure of which way they go. "Does '+' go with the other '+'? Wait, no. It's like magnets, the plus goes with the minus... Oh damn. Why is it doing that?" People are less likely to be in doubt when they have a box with wires saying "attach to positive", "attach to negative".
Ah, a good point.
Any suggestions using the yellow pages would be highly appreciated. I never really got the hang of it. In fact, I used to be proudly ignorant of it, announcing to friends and family that I simply could not read the damn thing. This had the negative effect of making me never want to call the pizza place when friends would get together, which made me feel guilty enough that I would offer to pay more than an equal share when splitting the bill. Now that google exists, I find that I really don't need the phone book, but any useful tips would be appreciated.
The yellow pages are organized into categories- each section is a category someone would want to look up phone numbers for, mostly businesses selling similar products. For example: restaurants, plumbers, lawyers. The topics are organized alphabetically.
When you want to look up something specific, like places to order pizza, think of categories that might describe it. There might be a "Restaurants" category, but "pizza delivery" is popular enough that it may have its own section. Once you have a category in mind, find it by searching the book alphabetically; if you need more information about that, maybe gwern can help (see gwern's comment).
Once you have found a relevant section of the yellow pages, you will see a list of names and phone numbers, as well as some paid advertisements, also with names and phone numbers. Every entry in the section is a member of the same category. Then pick one entry and call.
I haven't used the yellow pages in years, but here goes:
They tend to be organized by what sort of business you're looking for. So, "Pizza Delivery" might be a category, which should be in large, bold letters. The listings will have at least a phone number and location; look for places near your location. Call one.
Of course, the better solution these days is to open the Google Maps app on your smart phone, click 'search', type in 'pizza', click on one of the results, and click 'call'.
I don't know if this is true anymore, but the phonebook has several sections:
For a phone book in general:
At the front, is municipal stuff, like city maps and post office information.
Next is a section of 'white pages' where you can find residential home phone numbers listed alphabetically by last name. There are likely to be several people with the name you are looking for and it is socially acceptable to call asking, 'Are you the A. Brown that went to Baker High school in 1995?'
Next are the yellow pages. Other commenters have described how that is organized, but I'll add a couple tips. The alphabetical listings of business names under each category have to fit around paid advertisements, which significantly break up the flow of list. You can either just look at the paid advertisements (they are larger and with boxes and images) or be sure to check for your alphabetized list continuing on both sides of the ads.
Also, it is often difficult to guess the right category. (Will pizza go under 'pizza delivery', 'restaurants' or 'Italian Food'?) You simply have to hunt around. Often, the wrong category will have a tip like, 'See X' if you looked under Y.
the procedure here is how to consistently feel better after a few weeks (vs typical lazy cheap diets)
breakfast, buy:
dump together in bowl and eat. if you don't feel hungry in the morning just do a very small serving at first.
lunch: whatever, avoid sugar/white bread
dinner, buy :
boil, then simmer 20 minutes
yes, this procedure can be improved upon. the advantage of this one is low activation cost as it is about as difficult as the regular bachelor diet of instant foods. if you're trying to eat healthier but can't find the motivation this is a decent compromise.
major thing to avoid besides the obvious: fruit juice and fruit flavored anything. you're subverting your body's desire for actual fruit. fruit juice is no better for you than soda.
I'm guessing this is mostly preaching to the choir here, but if this helps one person it was worth the 5 minutes.
It certainly helps me. I'll probably add that breakfast plan to my diet. The dinner looks like it could use some chicken or beef.
Another easy healthy thing:
Just about any vegetables can be boiled till soft, then put through the blender, salted and peppered to taste, and yield soup (cream is optional). A quartered peeled onion, half a bulb of peeled garlic, and a quartered peeled potato or two, plus a fair amount of peeled and roughly chopped whatever else (cauliflower, broccoli, carrots, parsnips, turnips, fennel, leeks, celery root or stalks, whatever) is a good template. Dump it all in a pot with water or stock. Boil till it'll smoosh against the side of the pot when pressed with a spoon. Blend. Salt & pepper.
Less appetizingly, but probably more nutritiously, most green leafy vegetables can be blended with water or milk and consumed in milkshake form. I'll often take three or four cups (that's a lot) of spinach and blend it with two cups whole milk and chocolate protein powder. This actually tastes good, if not delicious; a portion half that size is probably a solid amount of food for most people. Even without the protein powder or other flavoring, it is drinkable. Lower portions of vegetables give you better taste for less nutrition. Not a great culinary feat, but a very efficient way to improve diet quality, and eating vegetables raw is probably more nutritious than boiling them extensively.
I'm surprised by the amount of cooking posts here so, questioning my own assumptions: is anyone put off doing this because you lack knowledge about preparing vegetables in the "whatever else" class, or picking the "wrong" whatever else foods, or even peeling things/etc.?
I feel silly even asking this ("Don't be so patronising, who wouldn't know how to peel an onion?"), but I'm interested to see if anyone replies.
Peeling onions can be surprisingly confusing. For instance, just under the really papery skin there is sometimes a layer which is partially or entirely thin, greenish, and rubbery. It's not all that pleasant to eat unless it's de-texturized (a puréed soup as described above will do the trick), but unlike the papery bits it's technically food. Keeping it or removing it is a judgment call, but I could imagine finding it an intimidating decision to make if I didn't know. The bits of garlic cloves that attach them to the base of the bulb are in a similar category. (I cut them off.)
I'm confused as to what exactly you're asking here.
Does anyone have a knowledge gap preventing them from cooking Alicorn's "easy" soup?
I noticed myself thinking it was so basic that nobody would, but then wondered that such a thought might be completely wrong (given the overall post topic). Maybe there are people daunted by... not knowing how to prepare common vegetables, for instance.
Well here's what I would say as someone who doesn't understand cooking - certainly, that looks mostly very understandable and straightforward, though I'm not so clear on the exact procedure for boiling. (And pressed with what sort of spoon, if it matters?) Also there's definitely some stuff that I think I can figure out but has not been made explicit (e.g., if I'm guessing correctly, we don't want to include the water when blending, and that should be dumped/strained out first).
But since I don't actually have an underlying understanding of cooking, I'd stil hesitate to actually use it. Because without that, I have no idea what corrections to make if I messed up, etc. If you just follow recipes without understanding, you can only handle the best case.
I would bet yes. Part of the problem is not knowing the tolerance range of the parameters. Like when does the precise timing matter and when does it not.
Regarding the fruit juices, I agree that fruit-flavored mixtures of HFCS and other things generally aren't worth much, but aren't proper fruit juices usually nutritious? (I mean the kinds where the ingredients consist of fruit juices, perhaps water, and nothing else.)
They're still high in sugar relative to how much you are likely to consume, and don't offer the fiber or unprocessed-ness of entire fruit. It would usually be better to either eat a piece of fruit or drink water. (I ignore this advice because I hate water, so when I thirst between meals I drink juice.)
Fruit juices are very bad. They concentrate the sugar content of a lot of fruits into a small mass and volume. For instance apple juice is usually considerably more sugary than Pepsi, with around 11-12 g/100g sugar content, and also with a worse sugar profile, with 66% fructose, compared to HFCS's 55 percent as it is commonly used in soft drinks (note: fructose is the worse sugar). Other fruit juices are usually above 8% sugar too.
exercise:
if you just want a basic level of fitness you don't really need to do anything besides
don't spend precious motivational energy on complex stuff. wait until you've established the exercise habit to start trying new things.
pullups and dips only require one of these
Yeah, that kind of advice is not going to fill any procedural knowledge gaps, sorry.
Previously I've tried "exercise" with fitness machines, aerobic and resistance both, an hour apiece on both, and it doesn't seem to do anything at all. I currently walk a couple of hours every other day. I have no idea whether this does anything (besides exhausting me so much I don't get any work done for the rest of the day, of course). I once read that 40% of the population is "immune to exercise" and I suspect I'm one of the 0.40.
If I have enough money at some point I'll try hiring a fitness trainer, and then getting a larger apartment with an extra bedroom for exercise equipment (and maybe get Lasik so I don't have to wear glasses and use a TV and Dance Dance Revolution) but such expenses are beyond the reach of my current financial balance.
EDIT: Wow, lots of advice here from metabolically privileged folks who don't comprehend the nothing fucking works phenomenon that obtains if you're not metabolically privileged.
.4 of the population unlikely to have evolved? I can't take this too seriously I suppose.
Did you try working on strength first? A lot of cardio is claimed to not be very helpful.
Also, consider a coach or a fellow rationalist with some domain knowledge to work with, it's pretty important to optimize this area (esp. if it puts you out of commission for the rest of the day).
One hack that helped me work throughout the annoyance is reading kindle on a stationary bike. Lost 20 with that trick.
Where did you read that?
(I'd be pretty surprised if that turned out not to be untrue, overstated, or overgeneralized.)
I am hoping it was advice specifically given for wait loss, emphasising that just adding light exercise will not see large results in many cases. As an independent observation it would be terrible.
If the goal in exercise is to lose weight, have you tried replacing carbohydrates with fat in your diet? Forcing yourself to exercise will serve to work up an appetite and make you hungry, but not to lose weight. There is a correlation between exercising and being thin, but the causality is generally perceived the wrong way around. There is also a correlation between exercising and (temporarily) losing weight, but that is confounded by diet changes which typically involving reducing carbohydrate intake.
I've heard you mention Gary Taube's work, but not that you've read it. If you haven't read his book he has a new shorter on which is well worth reading, linked here: http://www.garytaubes.com/2010/12/inanity-of-overeating/ The appendix has specific diet recommendations. Also good are these notes: http://higher-thought.net/complete-notes-to-good-calories-bad-calories/
Yes, the refined carbohydrates are the real killer here. Eat as much meat as you want but no more white bread!
The complete notes are a fantastic summary.
It was only recently that I actually found a type of exercise that does something: doing squats, bench presses, and deadlifts with barbells. By using a lot of weight, you only need to do around 5 sets of 5, and because you're using free weights, a few exercises work your entire body, unlike a weight machine. By increasing the weight each time you work out and doing a small number of high-weight exercises, you can build muscle quickly. It's the only exercise routine I've ever found that I've been able to stick to.
This site gives one example of such a weight lifting program: there are others out there as well.
How does a heterosexual male begin a long-term romantic relationship with a heterosexual female? Be sure to cover such issues as pre-requisites and how to indicate what intentions and when.
[For balance, others can post the dual (which is not necessarily the same) question for the other categories of people.]
If anyone figured out the asexual variant of this, I'd love to know, too. (Gender shouldn't matter that much.)
Alas, asexuality among humans is notorious for making it difficult to form long-term romantic relationships.
When it comes to following protocol it is matters more what it is than what it should be. The various permutations of gender and romantic preference do matter that much. (And looking at things as they are instead of how they 'should be' is probably step one.)
Depending on exactly what you mean by "begin", this question is likely to be way too complicated tor a comment-sized answer. Since there are lots of different ways to do this, depending on local culture, etc., you would pretty much have to write a fairly thick book to get into anything close to the level of detail necessary, while addressing the variety of possible cases.
This is why I didn't ask about cooking... well, minus the "local culture" part (that restricts what food you can obtain, but that's not really the relevant part).
Judging from the comments, cooking seems to be a big area where Less Wrongers feel tentative. I'm really surprised, as I'd think that paying attention to recipes and following the directions carefully would be an activity that analytical types would master quickly.
I like cooking and I do it a lot. I'd be happy to give advice if you can explain what the specific barrier to entry is? Is it understanding the terminology, choosing the equipment, finding reliable recipes...something else?
Duplicate comment?
Alicorn and I aren't the same person, if that's what you're asking!
I didn't see her comment before I started writing mine.
Just a goof on my part, I was thinking in terms of verbatim duplicates. I actually realize, on some level, that reading a post twice -- even several minutes apart! -- doesn't mean it's been posted twice, but didn't quite put this knowledge into action...
My apologies.
I'm pretty sure I could summarize the basics of cooking simple things in a non-book-sized piece of prose. Is there something in particular you wanted to know?
In truth, I don't really have anything to ask right now. This is not due to a lack of knowledge but rather due to a lack of having any sort of handle on the subject. As it happens I've actually gone and gotten a book, one which seems like it actually explains things (Cooking for Geeks, Jeff Potter), but starting a big project like learning to cook isn't something I really have time for right now, probably not till summer. (And then we'll see whether the book is actually as helpful as it looks.)
Though if you want anyway to know where I'm coming from I could repost from elsewhere my rant about what sorts of things I would have to understand to get a grasp on cooking. :P
I recommend the book "Now You're Cooking" -- it's a cookbook explicitly written for people not familiar with cooking techniques.
You have to put yourself in environments where you'll be able to interact with a lot of women. College is in a lot of ways set up perfectly for this: if you're not in college right now, consider joining a class or an activity group. Try to make it one where the gender balance will be in your favor. Book groups are one example--they're wildly tilted towards women (I suspect men just, you know, read books, and don't tend to see the value in sitting around sipping coffee and talking about reading books). But if you like girls who wear glasses, try finding a congenial book group. You'll probably be the only man.
Even better than book groups, though, are dance classes. Swing and rockabilly aren't super trendy anymore, but the scenes still exist in a quieter way, and these classes are great for single men: a) they're filled mostly with women; b) dance is an inherently flirtatious activity, and the physical leading/following dynamic is one that many women find very sexy; c) even if you don't find a date in that class, you'll have learned an attractive skill, and you'll be able to participate in events that will introduce you to more women; and d) physical exercise is good for building both confidence and sexiness. Yoga classes might work too, or if you can find a martial arts practice that attracts significant numbers of women (maybe check out your local aikido classes?).
The SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism) is also a surprisingly good choice for geeks who want to hook up. Wearing princess dresses is enough of a draw for women that the gender balance, while tilted towards men, isn't too awful, and so many relationships get started in the context of SCA events that there's a joke about it. (The joke is that "SCA" actually stands for "Society for Consenting Adults.")
There are of course singles bars or activities like speed-dating that are specifically designed to let you meet single women, so you could try those too. A lot of people find those environments stressful and frustrating, which is why I'd suggest finding a social scene that is not specifically about dating.
Lastly, let all your friends know that you're interested in meeting women. Ask to be introduced to their friends who are single. This is how people used to meet each other and it is still an important avenue to keep open.
You have to ask women out on dates. This part, I know, is hard, and I'm sorry to admit that many women don't even understand how hard it is. You will be rejected and it will suck every time, but this part is a numbers game. You just have to keep doing it until you find the girl who says "yes."
The pre-reqs for asking a girl out are fewer than you might think. It's best if you have already been introduced and have interacted a bit in a friendly manner. When I say a bit, I really mean just that you've spoken a few times. It is far, far more common for geek guys to err wildly in the opposite direction. Don't do this. If you like her, ask her out, and make your intentions unambiguous. The sooner the better.
If you're following my advice and meeting girls in activity classes, you would do this by approaching her just after one of the classes, maybe as she's getting her things together or as she's heading out the door. Make eye contact and smile. Start with a compliment that references the interactions you've had--"Hey, I've really been enjoying dancing with you [or "sparring with you," or, "I really liked what you said about the book"] and I wonder if I could take you out to a movie next week."
Be really clear about the fact that you're asking her for a date. Try not to say something like "I wonder if you'd like to meet for coffee and talk " because she could interpret this as merely a friendly gesture on your part, and you don't want that. A lot of inexperienced guys think they should establish a friendship before they ask a girl out, but you really don't want to sink a lot of time and energy into a girl who is never going to see you "like that." (It is true that established friendships can make a wonderful basis for romance, but never, ever count on that happening.)
Also, propose a specific activity and a specific time. Don't just say "I wonder if you'd go out with me some time" because a) it sounds a little desperate and b) a lot of women have trouble saying "no" directly (we're socialized not to). Leave her a face-saving way to refuse. If she says "I'd love to but I've been really busy with work/school/life recently," that means no. Move on. (If, on the other hand, she says "I'm going to Guatemala next week, but I'll be back by the end of the month, maybe then?" that means yes.)
Dealing with rejection: When you are rejected, try to be gracious about it, even if she is not. Like I said above, a lot of women truly do not understand how much gumption it takes to put yourself out there by making a pass. If she seems annoyed or condescending or whatever, try to shrug it off; just smile and say "okay, no problem" or something along those lines. Do the same thing if she says "I'd rather just be friends." (But for the love of Pete, do not spend a lot of effort trying to actually cultivate a friendship. Moooooove on.)
It does get easier the more you do it. Just remind yourself that it is a numbers game. The worst thing that can happen is not that you ask ten girls out and they all say no. The worst thing is that you ask ten girls, they say no, and then you stop asking. Because whether it was Girl #11 or Girl #83 who would've fallen head over heels for you, you'll never find her now. Keep looking to meet women, and keep asking them out; these are the two steps that lead to relationships.
Troubleshooting: If you do find that you are consistently rejected, there might be something going on with your self-presentation that is offputting to women. Make sure your basic hygiene is good: that you are wearing clean clothes that fit you, that your hair is cut and that you are clean-shaven. (Facial hair is Advanced Fashion for Men: if fashion is not your ballgame, just shave, trust me.) Ask your friends if there's anything going on with your looks or demeanor that might be getting in your way.
If you are overweight, start an exercise regimen, but do not wait until you are at your ideal weight to start asking women on dates. It is perfectly possible for big dudes to find love, they do it all the time. It IS more important to make sure that you wear flattering clothing that fits you well--a baggy, threadbare tee-shirt and Hawaiian shorts may not cut it. Use Google Images to find pictures of some of the heavier celebrities (like Sean Astin, or Seth Rogan before he slimmed down). Check out what they are/were wearing, and use those pictures as a style guide.
You may also be acting in ways that indicate you don't value yourself, which can make women (and other people in general) instinctively shy away. You will probably need the help of people who actually know you to diagnose these kinds of problems and help you fix them.
In general, though, from my observations, most geek guys are able to get dates so long as they go where the women are, and ask them out. The most common mistake by far is simply failing to execute one or both of these crucial steps.
The auto-formatting has changed my #2 to a (duplicate) #1--can anyone tell me how to fix that?
If each list item consists of multiple paragraphs, your source code should look like this:
except replace the "#" characters with spaces.
Alternatively, you can defeat automatic numbered list formatting like this.
Great comment, by the way.
Thank you!
Thanks, this is what an informative answer looks like.
This is not strictly true from my experience. I've had three girlfriends thus far and in all three cases, we were basically just friends who eventually realized we wanted to date one another. Of course, all three were also housemates, so I may be an odd case.
I've tried the "ask women out on dates" approach from time to time, but keep coming back to the impression that I'm the sort of person who just slides into romantic relationships with friends, and that if I want more romantic relationships, I need to make my social circle -- not my circle of acquaintances, but my circle of folks I see on a daily basis -- more generally co-ed (kind of a problem since it's mostly folks I know from Singinst/Less Wrong these days).
Or become bisexual. If anyone posted a procedural comment on how to become bisexual, I would upvote it immediately =)
Within the nearby cluster in personspace: I think Robin Lee Powell has said that he chose to become bisexual, if you want to ask him to elaborate on that process. :)
(I've gotten a bit more bisexual over time, and I occasionally wonder if I actually pushed myself in that direction (since I remember wishing that I could be, as early as 14 or 15), or if that's just the direction I was drifting in anyway and I happened to be open to it in advance. But it's probably hard to tell in retrospect.)
There are a million ways to start, but this is the most formalizable method I have used.
How do you transfer electronic money from one account to another?
Call your bank and ask them if they do it (for free) and, if so, and then how you go about doing it. If your bank does not do it, I don't know what to do next.
My bank does do this: it will transfer money in my account to any account I specify. All I need is the account number and routing number of the account I'm transferring money to. The first time, this can be done over the phone by calling them. They may tell you this can also be done online. There is a substantial delay (~ 3 days) the first time you transfer to a particular account.
Sometimes, if you can't initiate a transfer from the sending account, you can initiate a transfer from the receiving account via ACH. Again, banks' processes differ, so you need to look it up on their website or call or go to a branch office in person.
I use online banking basically since I have an account. It is easy, comfortable and fast. It is still surprising to learn how foreign banking systems seem to lack behind.
How do you buy a used car?
I suppose the short answer is to go to nearby car dealerships and interact with the salespeople - they may have some for sale and, if they do, can probably find one that they think you can afford to buy.
Buying a used car without getting ripped off may be more difficult.
This exchange is a good example of why this post needs clarification on types of knowledge that should be sought here. "how do you buy a used car" is not a simple procedural question that can have a clear answer in a web posting. It's a VERY large set of options with pretty widely varying constraints and preferences. Not unrelatedly, it has a large number of people making a living in helping people do this.
[edit: I retract this, as I've just seen some useful advice on horribly complicated topics. Please ask (and answer!) whatever you think might help. ]
Craigslist has worked for me. Expect to spend some money on repairing the car. Taking it to a mechanic first seems like a big deal but you will need to take it there and you may as well take it there before buying it.
(UK Specific post, not a car person).
tl;dr Find one, optionally pay a company to check it isn't stolen or legally written off, and has no outstanding finance. Agree an amount of money. Sign the vehicle ownership documents, trade those and the car for the money within any applicable laws governing trade in your area. If your car has the required tax and safety certificates, and you have the required license and insurance, drive away, otherwise sort those out next. Cross your fingers and hope it isn't a lemon, but realise that if it is, it is a setback, not the end of the world.
end tl;dr
You decide what you are looking for and/or what you can afford, and search around for ones within your area or however far you are willing to travel. If you are searching yourself then you will look at vehicles on the street with "for sale" signs on them, in local newspapers and advertising boards, on local search sites, or national ones such as Craigslist, Ebay or Autotrader, or at dealers/garages or their websites.
If you are searching with a dealership, you can discuss you requirements with them and they can suggest available cars, possibly distant ones in other garages in their group which they can transport to you. Many official dealerships for car manufacturers run approved used car schemes where they take recent cars (typically 3 years old), service them and then offer better than normal guarantees / warranty extensions, for an extra cost.
When you find one you are interested in, make contact with the seller and arrange to look at the car before buying. It would help here if you know someone you can take along, not just for a second set of eyes looking at the car, but also for a defence against pushy sellers or a second set of eyes checking your behaviour isn't too biased towards/against purchasing. Have a look around in advance in price guides and listings so you know expected prices for that make, model, specification and age. Find a checklist from somewhere online and look for things to check when inspecting a used car, to take with you. You primarily want to make sure it:
I don't think they are under any obligation to give you a test drive, and if you do want one you will need to have the usual driving license and insurance cover to do so. I don't know what you are looking for on a test drive beyond a general "does anything feel, look, sound or act wrong or suspicious" and "is it ergonomically OK".
Before buying, you ought to get a vehicle background check (at a cost) to confirm it isn't stolen, written off, financed with money owing, etc., and you may want to pay a mechanic service to give it an inspection. In the UK, The AA can do both - other companies can too.
(Again UK specific) cars more than 3 years old need MOT certificates (meets basic safety requirements) annually, so make sure the car has one or will have by the time you get it. It will need a tax disc (again, annual) before you can drive it, so if it has one in-date that is good. During the trade you will need to complete a form on the vehicle papers which the seller signs to say they are no longer the owner, and you sign to say you are the new owner, and the seller needs to send it to the DVLA to officially make the car no longer their responsibility.
Optional extra: haggling. You may wish to for the sake of saving money, but you don't have to (notice the societal disapproval of people who pay the asking price). Offer them less, or if buying from a dealer, convince them to give you more into the deal such as a tank of fuel, a free service, etc).
More specific advice: http://www.theaa.com/motoring_advice/buying-advice.html
Wow. That is a very thorough answer. Thanks!
This has been upvoted a lot. Does anyone think I should move it to Main?
Edit: Apparently so. Moved.
Yes.
Yes.
I suggest subtitling it "LW Advice thread" or somesuch... or if you don't wish it to end up being used as such, should add a disclaimer in the article about the scope of questions.
Editing the title will cause it to re-propagate to RSS feeds.
I'd be surprised if there are any of us who don't have some gap in knowledge that a majority of the rest of us found surprising. But really I can't think of any knowledge of this type I'm missing that I can't just look up (rather than ask here) if I realize that I don't have it. (Things of this type I can recall looking up in the past few years: ordering at a bar, dialing international phone numbers, reaching someone at a phone extension, getting a cashier's check from a bank, how to properly wear a suit jacket, how to read facial expressions and make small talk.)
I like wikihow, ehow, and similar sites--and I also find that guides intended for recent immigrants or people with autism are useful for "things everyone is supposed to know".
I recently found myself thinking about this same topic. I have figured some of these out by trial and error, but feel that some formal training would have been useful (others I have not encountered):
How should you interact with a police officer - what are your obligations, your rights, and how should you conduct yourself?
If you want to move from one residence to another, what steps should you take? If you are credentialed in one state and want to move to another, what do you do?
If you get into a minor car accident, what should you do? What about a major one?
What's the best way to quit your job?
How do you vote in an election? A primary? What should you do if you want to run for office?
If you find that someone has died of non-suspicious and natural causes, what steps should you take? Whom should you call?
Voting: all the official info from the US government is here.
I'm a law student. I'll take this one. This applies to the US specifically, though being polite and deferent are probably universal.
In short: TL;DR answer: Be polite, calm, and friendly. If you are guilty of a crime, admit nothing, do not give permission to search anything that would be incriminating, say that you don't want to talk to the officer (unless answering extremely general questions), and, if you are detained, ask to speak with a lawyer. Be more compliant if you are innocent, but if you get the slightest hint that they think you're responsible, stop complying and ask for a lawyer if detained. For more mundane interaction (i.e. speeding tickets) be polite and deferent, and don't confess to anything unless they totally have you nailed. Arguing with cops will very rarely advance your case; save that for court if you care enough to challenge the ticket. More detail follows.
In minor cases (e.g. speeding tickets), you generally want to be polite, deferential, and honest, but probably don't volunteer too much information, except insofar as it's obvious. If you were going 85 and the cop asks why he pulled you over, it's probably wiser to admit you were speeding than to play stupid; in some borderline cases, being honest and likable will get you out of a ticket or into a lesser ticket. Arguing with police officers is generally not going to get you anywhere. If they're wrong about some material fact, you'll probably have to deal with it in court. Being calm, friendly, and deferential (address them as "officer") is often your best chance of avoiding a ticket, and will almost always avoid any escalation. In some cases, crying or explaining yourself may work, but if they don't believe you, it may make things worse. Similarly, if you made some mistake (i.e. did not see the speed limit change) it may be helpful to say as much politely, but again, you won't win an argument.
For more serious offenses (basically, anything criminal greater than a speeding ticket).
Edited to add: Basically, never talk to the police or other similar authorities under any circumstances, except where it can't be avoided, e.g. speeding tickets.
A police officer is either detaining you or they are not. If they are not detaining you, you are free to stop talking with them and leave. If they are detaining you, you have the right to remain silent and the right to an attorney. If you are being detained, and you ask for an attorney, ALL QUESTIONING MUST CEASE. Anytime you hear a story about some guy the police were grilling for eight hours: if he'd asked to speak with an attorney, they'd have had to stop.
In general, if you even think you might be guilty of something, it is best not to try to explain yourself and not to make up excuses. Most criminals don't think they did anything morally wrong. The police will not share your perspective. Especially if you are guilty, you should ask if you are free to go, and if you are not, ask for an attorney. This is advisable even if you are innocent if the crime is significant.
The police CAN legally lie to you in order to exact a confession; this is a rather common tactic. That means they can tell you someone has positively ID'd you, or tell you that your fingerprints have been found, or that your accomplice has turned on you even when these things aren't true.
Of course, if you actually have an accomplice, you should hope you've both credibly committed to cooperating in a prisoner's dilemma. Omega cannot save you now.
You should never give police permission to search anything unless you know that there is nothing incriminating there. If the officer tells you that the law entitles him to do something, and then ask for his permission, you should probably tell him that he does not have your permission, but if what he says about the law is true, you're not going to stop him. Even if the police find incriminating evidence, if they did not have a legal right to search where they were searching (i.e. they lack probable cause), that evidence generally cannot be used against you in criminal proceedings.
If police are questioning you about someone else (who is not a spouse) who may have been involved in a crime, it gets fuzzier. I'm not entirely sure how extensive police power is; ultimately, the state has some capacity to compel your testimony (there's no right not to incriminate others), but this generally doesn't work because someone who doesn't want to testify can generally testify to a lack of memory on whatever issue (as people might do if threatened by the mob).
It's also worth noting that roommates and people living with you can, under certain circumstances, authorize searches of your possessions. They can certainly authorize searches of common areas.
This is endlessly more complicated, but this should be a pretty good overview. You cannot be compelled to say anything incriminating, and if the cops are bargaining with you, that probably means they don't have enough to get you on. Again, if you've done something, or if they think you've done something, you're going to want a lawyer to sort things out. The risk is obviously a lot higher if you're guilty, but you can run into serious risks even if you just seem possibly guilty.
I think your comment got cut off? It was really interesting and I'd like to read the rest of it.
I think you're talking about the U.S., too, and we should probably specify that since obviously laws are different in different countries.
I note that the above advice is applicable in Australia too. I'll add in that if you decided to stop talking stop talking (except under legal advice). You do not want to try to cherry pick which questions you answer. For details see the Australia section on wikipedia.
Fixed. Thank you. Just forgot to finish off the last paragraph. And added a disclaimer about the US.
How do you speak clearly?
I have a bad speaking voice -- my sibilants ("S" sounds) come out mushy. If I record my speaking voice and play it back, even when I'm concentrating on enunciation, I sound... terrible. It's a voice that sounds geeky at best, retarded at worst. A little too high-pitched and monotone, as well. People have been telling me they can't understand what I'm saying all my life.
It's quite likely that I'll give many public presentations throughout my life, so being better at speaking might be worthwhile. I've lost my fear of public speaking (knowing the material well takes care of that) -- I'm just talking about the mechanics of speech. I want to be audible, comprehensible, and not sound like a moron.
Similar: I would find it useful to learn to speak slowly. I have to repeat myself a lot. The trouble is that I lose track of what I'm saying if I try to speak at a normal pace - I cannot seem to focus on speaking slowly and think of things to say at the same time.
I can only speak slowly if I have notes to work from. In normal conversation, including work discussions among 2-10 participants, I tend to rush to get my thoughts out, and that makes it hard for people to follow.
I've found that having a whiteboard helps a lot (a notepad on which I can scribble less so, but still better than nothing). Having to slow down enough to write main points down or sketch out some things seems to make me more comprehensible without losing my train of thought.
(Edited the last few paragraphs to be more useful.)
I actually teach this to college students, to some degree. This is in the context of moderately scripted competitive speech, though.
The first basic trick is to consciously try to speak at half-speed. Once you've done that, halve your speed again. This will at least be close to the right speed.
Another trick is to tell friends or family to rudely (or politely) interrupt you if you speak too fast. This technique can also be helpful for eliminating um, uh, like, y'know, and similar disfluencies. I will write "SLOW" on a piece of paper and hold it up while a student is speaking, for example.
I admit I am surprised that you find speaking slowly more difficult in terms of keeping track of what you are saying. In almost all cases I encounter, people actually speak much more coherently when they speak slower. Either use the extra time to think of what to say, or insert a few judicious pauses for the same effect.
I would say there is a non-negligible chance that your rapid speech comes off as very clear to you, but not to observers. I know that when I get really engaged in an idea, I will often talk rapid-fire in a way that I think makes perfect sense, only to be stopped or slowed down by those around me, whom I've lost completely. My thought process feels a little more muddled when I have to slow down and think about exactly what I'm saying, but this is not because my communication is worse; it's because I actually have to run a mental check to make sure I have a cogent point, rather than simply having a cogent point internally and saying whatever happens to feel right. Rapid-fire speech may create an illusion of transparency, but I'm not familiar with it actually helping people speak better.
Of course, YMMV and I could be totally wrong. But from the couple dozen or so students I've worked with, I never remember hearing a complaint that it is harder to think cogently while speaking slowly, only that it is difficult to remember to speak slowly.
I think the job title of someone who helps with that kind of problem is "speech therapist".
And, for what it's worth, I kind of like your voice...
I found that frequently recording my voice and playing it back immediately afterward helps immensely. Up through the start of my junior year of highschool I did a very poor job with pronunciation in general and what I thought I sounded like, sounded nothing like what I did in fact sound like. I got a portable voice recorder midway through my junior year. I like poetry, so a few times a week I would spend a while (maybe a half hour) in the evenings reading poetry into the recorder and playing it back a stanza at a time. If I didn't like the way it sounded, I would repeat the stanza (or the particular line in that stanza that sounded wrong) until it started sounding right. Within a few months I very much liked the way my voice sounded, and instead of having people telling me I talked funny, I occasionally had people complimenting my enunciation. (As I side effect I also became able to read out loud which was something else I used to have a lot of trouble doing)
If you don't want to go to a speech therapist, a friend with some linguistics training or a voice (singing) teacher may be able to listen and tell you where to put your tongue, etc.
I, too, have a related problem. I have great difficulty controlling my volume. That is largely hereditary (or nurtured by my family environment), but the real problem is that I can't hear when I'm too loud. There are certain triggers (being excited, interrupted, or in the presence of my mother) but they are not really triggers I can avoid, and I can't see a way to fix it. The obvious solution is to have someone tell me when I'm too loud, but being interrupted for that purpose tends to make me involuntarily louder.
I don't think there's any really quick way of dealing with this. I had about 4 years of speech therapy which helped a lot. Note that a speech therapist will generally have lots of things that are tailored to you in particular to help out. For example I have a list of words that I still have trouble with so I make sure to always be ready to use their synonyms when speaking. Unfortunately there really isn't any simple solution to this.
How do you fold a fitted sheet? The time I tried to follow Martha Stewart's instructions I took a wrong turn somewhere, and just ended up with a wadded-up ball of sheet as per usual. And I didn't care enough to unfold and try again. Do you know a different/easier technique?
This one is probably going to be tough to communicate without diagrams. I don't know if my technique is optimal, but it's better than nothing:
At each corner of a fitted sheet, there will generally be a seam that goes a few inches in toward the center of the sheet and then stops. My technique involves holding/pinching the sheet by the inner ends of these seams, which allows you to fold along the relatively straight lines between these seam-corners, instead of using the curved elastic edges as your reference line.
Starting at one of the two narrower ends of the fitted sheet, grab the two seam-corners on your side of the sheet. Grab them from the top, not the bottom, so you can see your hands. Next, for each hand, while holding onto one corner, grab the adjacent free corner and pinch them together. This is your first fold.
Then, holding two adjacent corners in each hand, spread your arms out wide, flap the sheet until it mostly straightens out, and quickly fold the sheet a second time by bringing your hands forward and together. This is your second fold. Use one hand to hold the four seam-corners together, and the other to grab the sheet in the place you folded it.
After this the sheet should have a small enough area to fold like any other soft, mostly flat object, and you don't need to worry about where the natural corners are.
Name the corners A, B, C, and D, clockwise around the sheet with A as the upper left and A-B forming a long side of the sheet.
Tuck corner A into corner B, so the one is nested inside the other. Then, avoiding twisting the sheet, tuck corner D into corner C similarly. Then, tuck corner AB into corner CD. You should now have a rectangle that will lie fairly flat. Fold it up like you would fold a flat thing.
Thanks for the link. I did not know I was folding fitted sheets wrong (generally I take my sheets off the bed, wash them, and put them back on) but Martha Stewart's instructions seem clear and logical.
How do you write a will?
This is a fairly complex legal question. Depending on the size of your estate, you probably want to hire a lawyer. I believe you can find a number of legal services that will do flat-rate wills for (I think) a couple hundred bucks. This is probably most important if you have kids or a lot of assets.
If you don't have kids, and you don't have a lot of assets, or you seriously dislike lawyers, you can put together a will from a pre-made form and get witnesses (who are not beneficiaries) to sign the will, ideally in the presence of a notary public.
Legal documents are often highly technical and vary meaningfully from state to state. Some of this is defensible - you'd be surprised how things can get messed up - and some of it exists to keep lawyers employed. If it's really important - if you are not a mostly asset-free student willing various odds and ends to family - it's probably worth having it done professionally. Five or ten minutes on google searching for estate lawyers in your area will probably do the trick; or you can look for the fixed-rate will deals from bigger businesses that I mentioned earlier.
The following is not legal advice for your situation, despite the occasional use of the second person. Rather, it is general commentary about how wills work. </disclaimer>
There are four good options: (1) do it yourself (2) hire a lawyer ($200 - $3,000) (3) use a legal forms service such as LegalZoom.com ($30 - $100) (4) buy a how-to book from a company like Nolo ($15 - $40)
If you do it yourself, you will need to think about what you own, decide who you would like to get that stuff when you die, and then write your instructions down on a piece of paper. You should then find two adults who are (a) not your relatives, and (b) not mentioned in the will to be your witnesses. Reassure the witnesses that you are sane, thinking clearly, and acting of your own free will. Then sign the will by writing your name in both print and cursive at the bottom. Add today's date. Then have each of your witnesses do the same. Have the witnesses write "witness" next to their signatures. Finally, make two photocopies of the will. Keep one in your desk for handy reference, give one to a friend or family member for publicity, and put the original in a safe deposit box at a bank for safekeeping.
If you decide to hire a lawyer, make sure the lawyer speaks a casual dialect of English in addition to legalese -- a will that no one but lawyers can decipher will irritate your relatives. For free, you should expect to be able to briefly discuss what sort of will you want. After the discussion, insist on a flat fee that will cover drafting (writing), execution (signing) and an uncontested probating (publishing and enforcing) your will. Do not agree to an hourly rate unless there is a firm cap on the number of hours. If your relatives challenge your will, you will probably have to pay additional fees. If you think this is likely, set aside some money in your will to pay the legal expenses associated with publishing and enforcing your will.
Is it actually important that the witnesses be the ones to write "witness"? If so, why?
No, nor that they print their own names. They just have to sign their names and date the signature. It's also a good idea to have each of them initial every (numbered) page of your will; this proves that no pages have been inserted or deleted.
When I first started asking how to write a will, a couple of years ago, the best advice I got was to write the will myself — because this is free — and then reread it in a few months. Repeat this process until I couldn't think of anything to add or change. Then visit a lawyer and have them translate it into legalese.
No. Sorry about that.
I used Quicken Willmaker, which is very easy to use. You can get the basic version for less than twenty bucks on Amazon.
I am in the process of doing this, having realised that the English intestacy laws would not produce a desirable outcome for my circumstances. I went to a lawyer, explained my wishes, and in a week or two I expect to receive a draft. Since my will is a simple one, the cost is (relative to what lawyers cost in general) fairly low: £210.
You can do it yourself, but I decided that it was worth the fee to have someone who knows exactly what they're doing take care of the matter. My lawyers will also be my executors (long may the time be in coming), and will take care of secure storage of the will.
How does one find a lawyer? In my case, I looked on the web for local practices, eyeballed a few of their web sites, and from among those offering general legal services to private individuals, chose based on my general impression. This is probably suboptimal; personal recommendation from friends and colleagues might be a better way to go.
I'm not aware of a gap in my procedural knowledge, but many skills are still fuzzy and basic. The internet serves extreme beginners and specialized experts well, but I've found reference books to be the best resource for the middle ground. Some that have helped me domestically:
Any other quality reference books, perhaps for auto care or personal finance?
Owning up to a particularly fuzzy area: how do you order at a bar? I've been a couple times and managed, but somehow I feel I'm missing something, especially if I extend beyond a beer. Can someone offer a comprehensive account?
I just want to second your cookbook recommendations--Cook's Illustrated especially. Almost all their products are extremely high-quality, and they have a very Less Wrong-friendly stance on cooking, which is to test everything. Before they publish a cookie recipe they'll make like twenty different versions, and have their taste-testers do blind tastings, and they'll publish the one that tastes best.
Alton Brown's "Good Eats" TV show is also probably Less Wrong-friendly because it puts a heavy emphasis on the chemistry and science of cooking.
Alice Waters' "The Art of Simple Food" is another good cookbook for beginners, because it walks you through everything: shopping for ingredients, choosing your pots and pans, the different techniques (i.e. what it means to "mince" an onion versus "dicing" it), prepping for cooking, etc.
I'll take a swing at it- let me know if it's helpful at all.
Ordering at a bar is easiest if you're friendly with the bartender. A jovial attitude, a confession of ignorance, and a vague description of a target drink (ie, "colorful and with rum", or "something delicious") will prompt a short exchange wherein the tender narrows their options down a little. Err towards generous tipping.
Note that I stick to quiet establishments. This probably doesn't work nearly as well in a very busy bar.
Actually, this is something I meant to ask about. Not how much to tip, which has well been covered elsewhere, but how one goes about the actual action of giving someone a tip. (I am generalizing beyond bars here).
It depends on the environment. For some things one just asks explicitly for less change. This works well with taxis. (Say there's an 7$ taxi ride, give a $10 and ask for $1 back). Another option in many contexts is to pay with the tip included and have it included in a way that shows it is obviously a tip based on the denominations in question (for example, if our taxi cost $9 and you hand them $11.25 it is obvious that you intended to tip $2.25)
Things to avoid: Do not give a large bill and say "keep the change" even if this is makes a generous tip or makes precisely the tip you want to give. The standard connotations of this are all negative (including but not limited to that you are rich, can't be bothered to think about change, can't be bothered to think about what is the right size tip, and don't really care much about the person you are tipping). If you only have a single bill it is better to tip less and get some small amount of change back than to say "keep the change." Another related thing to avoid is that when one is asking back for a specific amount of change, some people get annoyed if you ask for bills in specific denominations or specific coins. This seems to vary more by area and specific individual but it seems better to just avoid as an issue.
Wow, this is very much counter to everything I've heard and thought! When I think of someone saying "keep the change," I think of someone who is rich and generous and carefree. It doesn't have any of the negative connotations you suggest. And from the point of view of someone who's worked in service and lived on tips, I would definitely prefer a larger tip accompanied by the words "keep the change" than a smaller tip.
I'd have thought that the big advantage for the server of "keep the change" is that it's one less transaction, so the server spends less time to get a tip.
You tip when you pay, whether you're running a bill or buying drinks one by one.
If you're paying by card, usually the little card-swipey-machine(?) will ask if you want to tip, and how much. Nice and easy.
If you're paying cash, you can drop some into a visible tip jar, or leave a little pile on the bar/table. It's convenient to overpay and then use some or all of your change for this. You don't need to stick around to watch this be picked up. edit: absolutely agree with JoshuaZ- you should wait for your change. After accepting it you don't need to be present when the bartender gets the tip.
Sometimes, more in semi-classy restaurants, a waiter/ess will ask if you want change- if you say no, the difference is tip.
Of course, this depends on where you are. In UK pubs you order your drink - and generally food - at the bar. And you don't tip. Though apparently you can "offer to buy the barkman/maid a drink." Took me a while to get used to this. In fact, tipping in general in the UK is still a bit mysterious to me after living here for a year. The guides say tip your Taxi driver around 10%, but why do they so often seem surprised when I do? As for delivery people, some of them actually refuse a tip, because of rules etc. If all this means that these people get a reasonably good wage and don't need the tips, I'm happy to comply; but it still seems odd to me.
In the UK, the only place where it is considered compulsary to tip is in restaurants, and then usually only ones where you are served at a table (some "gastro"-pubs have table service, in which case one should tip). I don't think tipping taxi drivers is a general thing- I tend to let them keep the change if its sensible, but I don't believe there is a rule. You certainly don't tip delivery people of any kind.
In France tips are usually included within the price of the meal. I found this out after going to Paris and tipping at every place we went to..
I've spent some time in bars, so I think I can handle this one.
1) Observe the bar, some have an area or two "designated" for walkup, others expect you to shoulder your way inbetween people. There is usually an area bounded by two big silver or brass handles. This is so the bartender can get out in a hurry to help the bouncer, and in many bars it's where the waitresses go to get their orders filled. Do Not Go There, you are getting in the way of working folk, and are making other working folk wait longer for THEIR drinks.
2) If it's busy know what you want before you go up there. Save your experimentation and questioning for a slow period. When it doubt "Whiskey, Neat", or "Vodka, neat". If you're having a day "Whiskey, double".
3) If you'd like to run a tab proffer your credit card and ask. Some places don't do it, some don't take credit. Also have some cash Just In Case.
4) If you have a preference (for example I don't drink canadian whiskey straight, and I won't drink a whiskey and coke if they use pepsi. So I ask "do you have pepsi or coke" [1]) ask BEFORE ordering. If you really don't care you will (generally) be asked for a preference. The stuff in "the well" is cheaper, and if you're getting a mixed drink usually only matters for the first, second and third. After that either your bartender is a cheap bastard or you've lost the sublties. If you're drinking it straight, then it matters. Until the 7th or 8th anyway.
5) If you're paying cash HAND THE MONEY TO THE BAR TENDER, the bar is often damp with spilled drinks, assorted other fluids, bits of food (sometimes) and cigeratte ashes. HAND THE MONEY TO THE BAR TENDER. If you want him to keep the change, just walk away, he knows. If you're sitting at the bar and you want him to keep the change just sort of push it back towards his side. He knows.
6) Be friendly, say please and thank you. Bartenders have to deal with lots of shitty customers, don't be one.
[1] Pepsi? In a BAR? What kinda sick fucking joke is THAT?
I've always assumed that this is something inborn instead of learned -- hopefully, that assumption (which come to think of it I've never really questioned) is wrong -- but I have a very hard time orienting myself. When I'm walking up the stairwell in my apartment, I have no idea whether I am walking towards the road, away from the road, or perpendicular to it. I can sit down with a pencil and paper and draw it and figure it out by looking at it from a 'birds eye' perspective. But when I'm standing in a room with opaque walls and trying to imagine what room is on the other side, I just get really confused.
It's both inborn and learned. (Like a musical ear: you get what you get, but you can make it better if you work at it). A bird's eye view is the way to do it, there was an interesting bit on Radiolab recently about languages that rely on dead reckoning, and people keep track of it with a bird's eye map in their heads. If you can figure it out with pencil and paper, do that often. Eventually you will be able to do it without the pencil and paper. If you aren't generally good at mental representations of spatial or visual things, it will take longer.
I'm quite incapable of doing that too. I find the confusion an interesting experience, because the reasoning required seems quite simple --- but I can't do it. I suspect it's a module that's under-developed in me.
I also am bad at visual thinking in general. A simple test for any readers who want to indulge me: close your eyes and think of your kitchen. How would you count how many cupboards do you have in it?
I have to think of what's in the separate cupboards, and do other similar kinds of reasoning. Most people seem to be able to call to mind an accurate picture of the kitchen, and count as though they were standing in it.
I do not know if this is a practical, general or transferable solution, but it worked for me: throughout my childhood I couldn't orient myself, and I finally taught myself at the age of 24.
Start from a place where you can see quite some distance in all (or most) directions. Outside is best. If you can see, but are not within, a downtown core, you're in a good spot. Ditto mountains, or other tall landmarks.
Now ignore those landmarks. They're untrustworthy. If you can see them, they're close enough that sometimes they'll be north and sometimes west and sometimes right on top of you. They can be a good marker for your position, but not for your orientation. You need an orientation marker.
So instead, look in the other direction, the most featureless cardinal direction you can find. Then imagine a huge, fictional geographic element just over the horizon, and tell yourself it's in that direction: living in Edmonton at the time, I used the mantra, "The desert is west."
This is a fictional desert. (Or sea, or taiga, or forest.) It is always west. (Or east, or southeast, or north.) For this process to work, you can't actually pick a real landscape, or it becomes possible to walk around it, at which point your directions are confused again. If you're like me, a fictional landmark will help you orient yourself — but please don't make the mistake of believing it's real.
Now take a few minutes to walk around, keeping the desert in your awareness. Which way are you facing when it's straight ahead? Which way are you facing when it's behind you?
After a remarkably short time, you'll find that you always know where the desert is. And that will tell you where all your directions are. And then you're oriented. And now you can look at that downtown core and notice, "When I am standing at Broadway & Commercial, downtown is to my northwest."
Repeat this process in a few different outdoor locations, and you'll be ready to try it indoors. Just before you walk into a building, note where your imaginary forest is. As you turn corners, keep it in mind. Since the forest is fictional, you've never seen it anyhow; the fact that there are no windows in this university won't matter so much.
Oh, and if you're driving, remember that the centrifugal force you feel is proportional to your speed! The faster you're going, the more quickly you feel as though you're turning — at highway speeds, it takes quite a long time to turn 90 degrees, and a 270-degree cloverleaf seems to go on forever. Unless your city is laid out with perpendicular streets and no freeways, it's a lot easier to orient yourself when you're walking or cycling than when you're driving. On a mountain highway, I'm still lost. I navigate by the sun or use a map.
So…this strategy worked for me. I've never taught it to anybody else; I have no idea which bits of it are necessary and which are superfluous. Although it uses magical thinking, I'll point out that it's easier to imagine a specific, concrete object — like a wide desert just over the horizon — than to imagine an abstract notion like "west." My problem was too much abstraction; this strategy makes the compass real.
Personal hygiene. The internet has eluded me on what is the best method for washing your body. I've always put soap on a washcloth and used that to scrub myself. I used to get really dry skin and I don't know if this was from my method. It seems like there are lots of different techniques---sponges, washcloths, scrubbers, body wash, lotions. What do they do?
How do you keep hair looking nice? Sometimes I use a comb, but it still goes all over the place. I usually keep my hair short to avoid dealing with this.
If you get really dry skin, try using a body wash that's formulated for sensitive skin. Dove makes a good one. Body wash in general is less harsh on your skin than soap.
I personally never use washcloths: I just take the soap or body wash in my hand, build up a lather, then rub it on my body.
Ok- folding a fitted sheet is really fucking hard! I don't think that deserves to be on that list, since it really makes no difference whatsoever in life whether or not you properly fold a fitted sheet, or just kinda bundle it up and stuff it away. Not being able to deposit a check, mail a letter, or read a bus schedule, on the other hand can get you in trouble when you actually need to. Here's to not caring about linen care!
I don't know if anyone can help me with this, but how do I tell the difference between flirting and friendliness? I grew up in pretty much total social isolation from peers, so neither really ever happened, and when they happen now I can't tell which is which. Also, how do you go from talking to someone at the beginning/end of class (or other activity) to actually being the kind of friends who see each other elsewhere and do activities together?
Edit: Thank you, this is good advice. Does anyone have any advice on how to tell with women? I'm bi, and more interested in women, and they are much harder to read than men on the subject, because women's behavior with female friends is often fairly flirty to begin with.
Flirting is tinged with sexuality, either explicit or subtle. Maybe a touch on your arm, a wink, or innuendo. A lot of it is context-dependent, as well: for instance, the exact same words and behavior can be flirting when a guy says it to a girl, but not when a guy says it to a guy (the social default is that everyone is straight; this is different in a gay bar, for instance).
You have to actually be active and ask the person for their phone number, invite them to get coffee, go bowling, whatever. It doesn't always work out -- you may not meet up with 90% of them -- but the other 10% will become your friends.
There often is not any difference at all between flirting and friendliness. People vary very much in their ways. And yet we are supposed to easily tell the difference, with threat of imprisonment for failing.
The main effects I have seen and experienced, is that flirting typically involve more eye contact, and that a lot of people flirt while denying they do it, and refusing to to tell what they would do if they really flirted, and disparaging others for not knowing the difference.
My experience is also that ordinary people are much more direct and clear in the difference between flirting and friendship, while academic people muddle it.
Or without even realising. Several years ago an acquaintance on whom I was developing a crush told me she was aware of this; this puzzled me since I thought I hadn't yet initiated anything like flirting, so I asked how she knew. Then she took my hand and replicated the way in which, a few days before, I had passed her some small object (probably a pen). I didn't realise I was doing it at the time, but in that casual gesture I was prolonging the physical contact a lot more than necessary, and once put on the receiving side it was bloody obvious what was going on.
It can be hard to tell the difference, and it can be easy to mess up when trying to flirt back, but it takes rather more than than simply not telling the difference between flirtation and friendliness for imprisonment. There has to be actual unwelcome steps taken that cross significant lines.
The way the mating dance typically goes is as a series of small escalations. One of the purposes this serves is to let parties make advances without as much risk of everyone seeing them turned down, and lose face. It also lets people make stronger evaluations and back out in the middle gracefully.
Flirtatious talk is not an open invitation for a grabby hands. It is an invitation for further flirtatious talk. It may be an invitation for an invasion of personal space and increasing proximity. This in turn can be invitation for casual, brief, touches on non-sexual body areas. The point of no return, where it's hard to gracefully back out and pretend nothing was happening, is usually the kiss. That's usually done as a slow invasion of space, by the initiator, who must watch for the other to either lean in and take position, or lean and turn away. (or occasionally sit wide-eyed and frozen like a deer in the headlights).
Don't take the example order above too seriously. It's more complicated than a straight progression as laid out here. In addition to varying cultural attachments of these behaviors, all of them can vary continuously from completely innocent to drenched in erotic meaning, and escalation can happen in any of them at a given time. A clasp-and-release on the upper arm is an escalation from not touching, but far below resting a hand on the thigh.
And really, you can talk and ask for clarification from people you're flirting with. Heck, asking "are you flirting with me" is itself a reasonable flirt-and-escalate move. Being explicit can kill the mood for some people, but if you're not actually sure where in this dance you are or which direction it's headed, it's generally safer than risking unwanted boundary crossing.
I should also say that with strangers (in a bar say), this whole thing usually starts earlier with looks at someone punctuated with looks away when you see them looking back.
http://www.wrongplanet.net/ is a community page for asperger/autism people that contains social descriptions on a level that might be helpful. I do not read too much of it, but maybe it is useful.
Just want to throw this one out:
Choosing the right size for a collared shirt (men) : Look at the seams that run from the collar down the neck and along the tops of your shoulders to the beginning of the arms. When you try the shirt on, that seam should reach exactly to the point where your shoulders curve downwards. In this case the shirt will accentuate the broadness of your shoulders.
This would best be done on a wiki of some sort, I think.