You know those little tips and tricks that help make your everyday life a little easier? A lot of people call them “life hacks”, but I don’t think that’s the most appropriate term. While I don’t know any hackers personally, I think computer hacking is not nearly as easy as they make it out to be in the movies.
That’s why I always thought those little tips and tricks were closer to “cheat codes” than hacks. When my kids were little, they would spend hours and hours playing games on the original PlayStation, and many of those games had cheat codes you could unlock that would make the game easier or give you some sort of advantage. (Do games still have cheat codes? I’ll have to ask my kids.)
In today’s blog post, I’ll share some of my favorite “cheat codes” for real life. Just like the video game cheat codes my kids used to use, knowing these tips is an advantage that can make your everyday life easier. (And if you have a favorite tip or trick like this you’d like to share, swap your cheat codes in the comments at the bottom of this post.)
8 Hacks That Feel Like Cheat Codes for Real Life
1. Sunday Sandwich Prep
Save yourself time and stress during your work week by making all your lunch sandwiches on Sunday night! The key is to take the bread out of the equation to prevent it from getting soggy. Instead, just assemble the inside of your sandwich.
Grab a few slices of cheese, some deli meats and your condiments like mayo and mustard. Layer your meat and condiments between two slices of cheese, then pop it all into a sandwich bag and put it in your freezer. Repeat for all the sandwiches you eat that week.
Then on your way to work in the morning, grab a bag of ready-made sandwich filling from the freezer. Grab a couple of slices of bread, put it all in your lunchbox and you’re good to go.
2. Ignore previews
Some DVDs and Blu-rays will play previews or commercials before your movie starts. But you can skip them by pressing a few buttons on your remote! Just press Stop, Stop again, then Play to skip the ads and go straight to the movie. (And if double-pressing the stop button doesn’t work, try triple-pressing it. That usually does the trick.)
3. Keep your night vision
It takes time for your eyes to adjust to both light and dark depending on the environment. This can be a problem at night when you only need to turn on the light for a moment to find something! But you can maintain your “night vision” by keeping one eye closed while you turn on the lights. Once you turn it off, your eyes will have a much easier time adjusting back to the darkness.
4. Execute perfect high fives
Have you ever been to a high five and completely missed it? What a shame! But there’s an easy way to nail those high fives every time—just keep your eyes on the other person’s elbow. I don’t quite understand how this works, but it absolutely does. No more humiliating high five do-overs!
5. Heat up your butter knife
Next time you’re making yourself toast, put your butter knife on your toasted bread right after it comes out of the toaster. The heat from the toast will warm your butter knife and help it cut through butter like… well, butter! It will also make the butter easier to spread.
6. Prevent lid leakage
Every disposable coffee cup has a seam where the paper overlaps, and if it lines up correctly (well, more as wrong) with a lid, it will leak as soon as you drink it. Instead, position the lid so that the hole you drink from is on the opposite side of the cup as the seam. It’s a one-second fix that will help you enjoy your coffee without leaks and dribbles.
7. Avoid dry-erase disasters
Where there is a white board, there is someone who will accidentally write on that white board with a permanent marker. But instead of messing around with ineffective cleaners, there’s a much easier way to remove permanent marker from a dry-erase board.
Just write on top of the permanent marker with a dry-erase marker. After that, you can use the standard Dry-erase eraser Dry-erase markers to erase both And A permanent marker at the same time.
Related: 19 Easy Ways to Remove Permanent Marker from Anything
8. Cure your hiccups
No one knows exactly what causes hiccups, but everyone knows that they are really annoying. To get rid of it, expel all the air from your lungs, then inhale as slowly as possible until your lungs are full.
Hold your breath as long as possible, then let all that air out as slowly as possible. That’s usually all it takes to get rid of a run-of-the-mill case of hiccups!
What is your favorite cheat code for real life?
