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Lumifer comments on Low Hanging fruit for buying a better life - Less Wrong Discussion
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Upgrading barely-satisfactory household goods to better versions. Many such goods are bequeathed or obtained when the user can't afford better, and never replaced once they're in a position to do so.
Example #1: laundry apparatus. When I was younger and poorer I bought the cheapest laundry basket and airer I could get. They weren't very good, but I laboured with them for over a decade because they were satisfactory. A replacement set in my 30s cost me less than I would even notice spending, and vastly improved my laundry workflow and throughput.
Example #2: kitchen knives. It's alarming to me how many people think a bread knife and one other miscellaneous sharp knife constitutes a fully-equipped kitchen. If you spend any appreciable amount of time preparing food, and you only own one straight-edged kitchen knife you don't know the name of, you're almost certainly making life harder for yourself. Buy an inexpensive 5-piece block set and experiment with each type of knife on different foodstuffs.
You mean "one other miscellaneous dull knife", right? X-D
I am starting to think about bringing a pocket knife sharpener on trips...
You don't need sharpeners. Most mugs of decent quality have their stoneware exposed at the bottom. And this is a very good sharpener. You don't need steel. Your dull knife will be sharp (enough) within seconds.
Hah, good idea. I wouldn't do this to any knife I care about, but we are talking about pretty bad knives here.
That's pragmatics. Most kitchen work I do requires no really sharp knives Also I have children to take care of. Significantly sharp knives are a risk. But getting a plain old kitchen knife up to speed to cut meat is a real solution here.
Sharp knives are safer than dull ones.
If you have internalized the concept of what a sharp edge is and if you are using said knive to cut things.
If, on the other hand, you are a child, no or a very dull knife is the best option.
OK, fair point.
That's an oft-repeated adage, but, having used both dull and scary-sharp knives, I'm not sure it's true.
Once you've cut the top off your first finger... you learn to grow much more cautious about using them ;)
What's the procedure for sharpening a knife with the bottom of a mug? Do you just drag the side of the knife along it a few times?
Yeah, you basically just run the edge across the exposed ceramic. The angle the edge makes with the sharpening surface is important, though. There's no single bevel angle that works for all knives; sharper angles cut more cleanly but are less durable and can't handle as much force, so a sushi knife needs a different bevel than a machete. Whatever angle you choose should be consistent all the way through.
Unless the knife is old or very dull, you're probably best off trying to match the factory angle. An easy way of doing this is to run a Sharpie along the beveled part of the blade and then check it after a couple of strokes; you're looking for the smallest angle that'll take the ink off all the way to the edge.
I don't think the bottom of a mug is capable of enough precision to make the Sharpie trick worthwhile (or even (=flat) enough to talk about choosing bevel angles), but here is more info about knife sharpening than most people need :-)
It's never going to give you as consistent an angle as a water stone is, certainly. But I'd still expect a difference if you tried to bevel one knife to 30 degrees and the next to 12.
You may be right about the Sharpie trick.