Drink water. no, seriously! your skin will be clearer, you’ll be less fatigued, and you’ll even see improvement in your moods. Dehydration affects damn near everything, on account of how we’re mostly made of water.
Also, own at least one stock pot.
Old single socks make great dustrags, just put them on like a glove. old cheap af washclothes are perfect for scrubbing stuff like floors and bathtubs and cooktops. You can throw them in the wash, or if they’re so gross you can’t even, throw them away.
Ammonia fumes remove the horrifying gunk on your gas range cooktop burner covers. Pour 1 cup into a trash bag eith burner covers, and then tie it tightly shut and set it outside your back door overnight. When you remove the burner covers, the baked on brown goo will wash off without scrubbing. Just don’t accidentally make mustard gas.
Cheap shampoo can wash off soap scum easy-peasy. also, you can throw your shower curtain and liner in the tub with hot water and mr clean every once in a while to clean them, instead of buying new ones when they get gross.
If you live alone, and buy gallons of milk on sale, portion it into water bottles and freeze 2/3rds so it doesn’t go off before you can finish it.
Try and get sleep in multiples of 3hrs, so you are more likely to wake up at the end of a sleep cycle instead of in the middle. Even just aiming for multiples of 90 minutes works better. And sleep debt is real, and your body has it’s own idea of what you need and you need to learn to listen to it because it’s got the home court advantage.
It’s OK to throw away or repurpose clothes or towels with stains and holes. No matter how careful you are about taking care of your things, THINGS WEAR OUT. It’s not wasteful. Everything wears out eventually. Don’t let the brain weasels lie to you and make you feel guilty.
Magic Eraser isn’t magic. It’s melamine foam, which becomes the finest abrasive ever when wet, and it sands off the top layer of things, which is awesome when that’s exactly what you need it to do, and not so awesome when it’s not. But you can even use it to polish the silver.
Get your prescription glasses from Zenni.
Be kind to cashiers, restsurant servers, and Customer Service people. If they do a great job, ask to tell their manager or fill out a survey. Also, always tip minimum 20% in cash. Servers usually have to tip the busboys and bar out of their own tips.
Likewise if you’re staying a hotel, tip the housekeeping staff $5 per person per day. Ditto the bellmen. If they pool tips, I usually end up just handing the bell captain a $20 when I arrive. If you’ve ever attended a fannish or doll convention, believe me when I yell you it is the very least you can do in exchange for their hard work.
Unless you’re fearing for your own safety, make eye contact with the homeless people who are begging for money in the street, and don’t walk by them pretending that they don’t exist. Because that is a shitty, shitty thing to do. Even if you have no spare change, acknowledge they are seen and heard and say you’re sorry. If someone is hungry, take them to a 7-11 or Subway and buy them a sandwich. Buy a copy of Streetwise. Choose to be kind, because the world is not kind.
Rather than cranking up the heat in winter, get a heated mattress pad with a timer. Turn it on half an hour before you go to bed. Your body temp drops at night, and you’ll sleep better.