Life Hacks 101 - #002

**Yusef** (0:00)
If you consider the time that takes to put your shoe on, with a shoehorn, and then without a shoehorn, and the amount of skin that you lose on the back of your thumb as well, trying to thumb you...

**Chris Williamson** (0:11)
Thumb it in, trying to thumb it in. Does a shoehorn help you thumb it in?

**Yusef** (0:15)
So much better.

**Chris Williamson** (0:16)
Really?

**Yusef** (0:16)
Yeah, don't even need a thumb for it.

**Chris Williamson** (0:33)
Speaking of which, Yusef and Jonny from Propane Fitness are here today.

**Yusef** (0:39)
I was smelling my armpit. I was just thinking when you introduced me.

**Chris Williamson** (0:43)
It's fine, it's fine. That's really not the worst thing you've ever done in a podcast, is it? So yeah, we're talking about life hacks today. Those of us who are addicted to trying to make our lives more efficient and optimal. We're going to try and come up with some interesting resources that we use that have made our lives a little bit more efficient. I think that we all come from different kinds of backgrounds with what we need and what we choose to use, but then there's a lot of stuff that we've crossed over with as well. So it will be a combination of workflow tools, apps for your mobile phone, strategies that we use for making your life more efficient, and then probably quite a bit of stuff that none of us realised that the other ones did, and then we're going to just mock each other about it. I'm especially excited to write your list. Who would like to open up the first resource?
Right, Scobie, you're going to go first.

**Yusef** (1:42)
Okay. Well, I'm just going to begin very basic and just say Apple products. This was Jonny's as well. Because Apple contains a suite of syncing. But the problem is, you're roped in. As soon as you begin, you get a MacBook, but you have to then get an iPhone. You get an iPhone, you have to get a MacBook. Otherwise, you're in this sync nightmare between an Android or a PC device and then something.

**Jonny** (2:06)
I'm uncomfortable with you looking at the camera.

**Yusef** (2:08)
Okay.

**Chris Williamson** (2:09)
I quite like it.

**Jonny** (2:10)
It makes me uncomfortable.

**Chris Williamson** (2:12)
Right.

**Yusef** (2:13)
Sorry, guys.

**Jonny** (2:14)
It's just how I feel.

**Yusef** (2:15)
Jonny's uncomfortable.

**Jonny** (2:16)
Well, because it's then, you're over there and I'm like, well, do I go there and then back at you when I reply, and then back at the camera?

**Yusef** (2:24)
I think nod and smile at me and then look at the camera.

**Chris Williamson** (2:26)
And gesture to the camera, yeah. Imagine that you're all in Shearer doing the Saturday afternoon football. Okay. Talking in to camera, but you're gesturing to the lads. The lads.

**Jonny** (2:38)
So the point Yusef just made.

**Chris Williamson** (2:39)
Yeah, the lads are just... I think it's a round table. Okay, continue.

**Yusef** (2:45)
This is such a rocky start to a podcast.

**Jonny** (2:48)
Or the smoothest start we've ever done.

**Chris Williamson** (2:50)
Maybe.

**Yusef** (2:51)
So yeah, Apple products. The main things that I use them for, the main things I use the capture tools for. So iCal, reminders and Siri. So hold on Siri, remind me in 10 minutes, whatever, and you have at least either a section of reminders or a note or something. That's just your immediate capture. That's stuff that while you're on the go, you just capture things that may need to be done later, and then certain point in the day later, you go in bulk and take all of those things into capture and allocate them to a specific time in your calendar.

**Chris Williamson** (3:23)
So that's David Allen's getting things done, right?

**Yusef** (3:25)
Exactly.

**Chris Williamson** (3:25)
Get it out of your head, get it down on paper as fast as possible.

**Yusef** (3:27)
Yeah, exactly. So get it out of your head. Don't let your mind hold these ideas. Because often what happens is you've got something you think, oh, I need to fix that nail in the fence, which was his example. And then for the rest of the day, even if you forget what the thing you had to do is, you've still got this general stress thought of like, oh, I need to do the thing. There's something I've got to do.

**Chris Williamson** (3:46)
There's something that's left, yeah.

**Yusef** (3:48)
And then you're having a terrible time.

**Chris Williamson** (3:49)
No, I agree. Yeah, I think Apple products are fantastic. Like being able to sync, just stuff like your notes, making a note on your phone and then it appearing on your laptop. Let's think 10 years ago, 15 years ago, the phones weren't a thing, but that syncing also wasn't a thing. And then when we do, when you first get, it's just such a game changer. I don't understand how people don't live, having an iMessage, WhatsApp, Web, you know what I mean?