Bad christmas gifts

If you are going somewhere that is notorious for bad christmas gifts, be sure to fly. Then bring only a small carry on bag and inform everyone ahead of time that you won't have any space to bring things home. No more terrible christmas sweaters from grandma.

Super Soakers

Buy real guns instead of super soakers.  You don't have to pump (most) real guns.  Plus people don't shoot back when you use a real gun.

Start up

Start a company that is a non profit that people would contribute money towards. Then issue refund checks that are mailed in envelopes that look like spam. Most people will tear up or throw away their checks and you will have a nice profit to pay your employees i.e. yourself.

Sign at the dotted line

Start a business that requires a release waiver.  Put all the important information in really small print so that it looks like the dotted line at the bottom of the page.  You can get them to sign over anything you want.

Shifting blame

Tell someone you will be available for meetings to set up a project. Then on the morning of the meeting tell them you are out of the office until the day before the deadline. This way you know the project will miss the deadline and you can absolve yourself of responsibility because you were out of the office.

Software Customer

Hire a company to write software for you.  Then don't respond to emails, phone calls, or show up to meetings.  Then when the project runs long proceed to blame them for all the shortcomings.   As long as your position is high enough in your company no one will question that it is the contractor's fault.

Leaning Back

Wear multiple hats (most particularly cowboy hats) stacked on top of each other when flying on an airplane.  Anyone who is on a cross country or overseas flight will not want to sit behind you.  This way you can lean your chair back without getting kicked constantly, prepare for a nice peaceful sleep.

Arriving early

Always tell people it will take you 30 minutes longer to get somewhere than it actually takes. This way you are always early and look punctual, when you do run late you will look perfectly on time.

I don't know if all the airlines flying to st louis do this on purpose, but they are very reliably 30 minutes early.

More flight room

When flying on an open seating airline like southwest, bring a bunch of items a baby would need on a flight. Things like a stuffed animal, a small blanket, etc. Place them out on the seat next to you no one will want to sit there and you can have extra space.

Running a cab company

Start a cab company.  When you pick up people with foreign accents automatically take them to the wrong location and then just say that you misheard them.  Then deliver them to the correct location and still charge the full total.

This one brought to you in part by the shady cab system in London.

Flight hacks

When flying always carry a set of earbuds even if you don't have an mp3 player. That way if you really don't want to talk to the person next to you, you can just put them in.  They will either think you are listening to music or crazy enough that they shouldn't speak with you.

Credit Card Companies

Create a credit card company specifically designed to appeal to traveling customers.  Then lock down accounts when people leave the state or country where they reside.  Have your help center designed to immediately unlock the card so that you can claim a very high percentage of successful help center calls.

Thank you very much traveling credit card.  I'm glad I got you in the first place.

Fist Fights

If you know you are going to get in a fight ahead of time be sure to rub habanero pepper all over your cheeks.  This way even if you lose the fight, when the person who hits you rubs their eyes or touches their own facial wounds later they will experience the fiery burn of revenge.

Repentance

Live your life however you want committing all of the seven sins.  Be greedy and take from others, be envious of those that have more than you, etc.  Then at "the end" all you have to do is repent and you will be forgiven.  Maybe all those cats on wall street figured they could have it work out this way.  Too bad the court system doesn't allow you to just repent.

Faking Conversation

Memorize a few buzz words for all the major sports.  This way when people are talking about sports you can drop a few words in here and there so that no one will question your awesomeness.  The easiest way of course to do this is to actually play some sports video games.  Just another excuse to play some games.

Taking advantage of the little guy

Form an internet company that profits from the advertisements that other people post on their website.  Then once they start to make real money close their account and take all their profits.  Design the account recovery process to be extremely complex and time consuming so you can sit and make money on the interest accrued.

This post brought to you by AdSense.

Bringing down the House

Learn to count cards, then shave your head.  Go to a casino and win lots of money; eventually they will ban you from the casino.  Return to the casino once you have grown back all your hair, and in a completely different wardrobe.  Repeat your process of winning lots of money with your new “identity”.

City planning

When planning a city plant trees in front of all your stop signs and red lights. Then make sure you get 10 percent as the city planner of all tickets given. This one was inspired by my visit to Boston it has some great foliage and some awful signage.

Keeping your stuff in the right location

If you keep anything that is a pitcher or resembles a pitcher in your office be sure to label it with your name.  This way when the office happy hour happens no one will take it home to use for their own personal benefit.

Managing overly needy clients/customers

When dealing with clients or customers that don't understand that cell phones in the work place are for emergencies only make sure to give them a number managed by a service like Google Voice rather than your direct line.  This way you can filter their calls based on the time of day, and screen them to see if they are time critical.

Late night pizza

While waiting for the bus order pizza from a place that is on the way home. Get off the bus and pick up your pizza then get on the next bus. Your late night drinking munchies will be satisfied and you won't have to sacrifice any precious gaming time to get that pizza.

Supporting new investments

Pick a company that develops mediocre software and become an initial investor.  Then declare that this new software is the corporate standard at your existing company.  Once everyone at your company is using this software, switch companies to a new company and declare it as the corporate standard at your new company.  Repeat until your initial investment has turned into a handsome profit.  Don't worry, after a couple of years no one will remember that it was your fault they have to use some crummy software.

Life Hacking

When trying to come up with new life hacks just steal someone else's idea and pass it off as your own.  All you have to do is rephrase it slightly and everyone will think that you are original and have great ideas.  A little plagiarism saves you time that can be properly allocated elsewhere (gaming obviously).

Job Offers and Sports

Special edition today for the USA women's world cup futbol (or soccer for those in the USA) team.  Go USA Ladies!

When considering two or more similar job offers, consider the intagible qualities of sports fans.  You should take the offer where the new supervisor(s) are sports fans of all the different sports that you like to watch.  In doing this, your boss will encourage you to watch those sporting events that occur during the work day when there are time zone differences (World Cup, Olympics, NCAA Basketball tournament, etc.).  Plus, then you also have something to talk about with your boss and the potential of getting free or discounted tickets from them.

This song is for you France (censored of course so that I don't violate license agreements of the blog)
If I had the wings of eagle...
If I had the bum of a crow...
I would fly over France and poop on those basterds below...
POOOP ON POOOP ON POOOP ON THOSE BASTERDS BELOOOW!
POOOP ON POOOP ON POOOP ON THOSE BASTERDS BELOOOW!

Softening a deadline

Always be sure to ask your client a lot of very detailed questions at the beginning of the project.  Most likely they won't be able to supply you with all the answers.  Then when your deadline is encroaching for whatever reason you can inform them that you are still waiting on the answers to your questions.  The client will understand that the deadline needs to be moved and won't be upset because they will realize that the responsibility falls on them for not supplying you with enough information.

Grocery stores

You should line up all your items with the bar codes facing forward. This makes checking out faster even if the store clerk is terrible. You can save many minutes of frustration.  You will also be able to get back to your gaming faster; don't forget to use your chopsticks with those chips.

Dodging taxes

If you live in a state or county that charges for car tax and are thinking about buying a new car here is what you need to do.  Have one of your family members in a nearby county or state that has no car tax buy the car.  They keep the car registered in their name at their address and then you don't have to pay any car tax.  You can save thousands of dollars over the course of multiple years by doing this.  Who cares if you are technically dodging taxes that you should be paying.

Business Cards

Use all those pesky extra business cards as video game controller cleaners and keyboard cleaners.  Any good gamer should have enough keyboards and controllers to handle the hundreds (or thousands) of extra cards laying around.  Plus, you are saving the environment by putting them to a good use.

Improved final results

If you ever get sucked into doing any sort of construction project, make a gigantic mess when doing the demolition and the prep work.  Then wait until all the new work is complete to clean everything up.  Even if you didn't do a good job it will look amazing just because everything is clean again.

Todays post inspired by some personal work.  I bid you farewell staircase of old.

Hydration

Hydration is an important part of life, but so is precious gaming time.  To optimize both you should drink more water during your work day.  You save money on water you would pay for at home, the work day is then sufficiently broken up by bathroom breaks.  Then 45 minutes before leaving work stop drinking water.  The extra water you have consumed during the day should be enough to get you through the rest of the night.  You won't have to pause your gaming to get water or go to the bathroom.

Avoiding working vacations

If you are expected to be working on vacation.  All you have to do is pack your company phone into a backpack and "accidentally" fall into a stream, pool, ocean, etc.  The phone won't bother you for the rest of your vacation, and you can enjoy your time off.

Travel and Opportunity Cost

You should take the train instead of driving when you’re traveling for work. Even though you get money back from expensing mileage, you’re losing money from fixing your car. Plus, when else is it so appropriate for you to get paid for playing games.

Exploiting people who believe

This one goes out to you Harold Camping.  First establish a religious group that is losely affiliated with one of the major religions.  Second convince all the people in said group that the world is going to end in the relatively near future (5-7 years).  Third establish multiple local businesses that would profit from people attempting to warn others of impending doom: radio stations to sell air time, billboards to rent, car detail shops for doomsday custom paint jobs, etc.  Fourth convince all the people in the religious group that they should spend all their money preparing to warn others they will subsequently vacate all of their bank accounts and support all of your businesses.  Wait a year or two after the supposed doomsday has occured and admit you made a grave calculation error and that doomsday is actually 5-7 years later than you initially said, repeat.

Less work more games

To optimize the amount of work you do, you should hire a personal intern for a very cheap hourly wage.  Have this person perform all of your remedial tasks like expense reports, formatting design documentation based on your meeting notes, etc.  While they are doing this you can be playing games and still getting paid because of the difference in their hourly wage and your hourly wage.  You can then take the minimal time to check their taskwork before submitting it and still get all the credit for their work.

Saving money on sunscreen

When going outside in the summer for sustained durations, don't put on sunscreen. Instead, just cover yourself with more clothes, that way you save money by not having to buy sunscreen, plus you'll sweat more to help you lose that extra weight you've been dying to get rid of so you can look good in a bathing suit.  You will only be wearing that exposing bathing suit to indoor pools of course.

Signing Cards

When you’re signing a card for a birthday or anniversary or graduation or whatever, use a quote from Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. The knowledge imparted in this book is applicable to all parts of life, and definitely isn't off topic if you are signing a thank you card.

Avoiding future meetings

To avoid a future meeting, just tell everyone that you approve of what they are doing as long as they fix whatever should be fixed in the future.  Everyone doing the work will say they have your approval, and then if they screw it up you can blame them because you told them to fix whatever needed to be fixed.

Experience

Getting cold sores is not a bad thing; the opposite sex will see that you probably have lots of relations, and are therefore experienced.

The Best Way to Shut Down a Company

If there is a company you truly don't like either because they do evil things or are a major competitor of yours then use this strategy to bring them down.  First acquire a job at said company.  Start regularly bringing in tasty snacks and setting them on the lunch/breakroom table.  Then once it has been established that there is a trusty food source in the office, insert lots of exlax (or other more potent ingredients) into your treats.  This will stop all operations in this place for a day or more depending on what special ingredient you use.

Better drinks for a cheaper price

If you are forced to buy a drink at a bar because you didn't use the open bar pre game trick, the use this strategy:

Stand awkwardly next to the bar waiting for someone to order a drink and leave a really good tip in cash.  Then inject yourself as the next order in line, the bar tender will be in a good mood and pour you a stronger drink because of the tip the last person left.  This way you can tip your normal amounts and still get the drinks of a high tipping high roller.

Photography on vacation

When taking pictures on vacation try to take pictures from angles that everyone else uses.  That way if you mess up your picture you can just take someone else's perfect picture off of the web and claim it as your own.  Then everyone will think you are an awesome photographer, and you won't have to worry about whether or not your shot came out well.

Bar Concepts

Someone should open a bar that has a holiday drink special every day of the year.  On other holidays people pay inordinate amounts of money for crappy drink specials that no one really likes.  So why not have a place that is like that every day of the year?  Plus, then you can secretely laugh at everyone who is drinking terrible drinks and paying you for that privilege.

Contract Work

When on a fixed price project, try to accelerate your client to near
light speeds at the expense of creating a good design. That way, you have more time to finish your project. The opposite holds true for Time and Materials projects.

Hotel Internet

When staying at a hotel you should always opt for the budget hotels that have internet.  Nicer hotels have more people that use the internet for work or other purposes.  Generally, at budget hotels people tend not to have their own technology to take advantage of the internet and therefore slow down the speed.   At a budget hotel it is likely that they didn't pay anyone to properly set up their network; this means you can probably modify the router settings to  prioritize your personal network traffic using all the default administrative passwords.  When making a choice between high speed internet vs lower speed internet and a lack of bed bugs, it is obvious that the internet speeds and your gaming life and health take priority over your real life and health.

Home Theatre

To save money when considering a home theatre set up, just buy a boarded up house.  This will save on cost and effort for creating a dark room to optimize projector picture quality.  You will also likely save money on the cost of your house.

Pre Sliced bagels

When eating a presliced bagel, be sure to cut it in half again like so ( | ).  When you cut a bagel in half, you give another person a sandwich, and you can then sandwich yourself (please no innapropriate comments on the phrase sandwich yourself).

Saving Money in Relationships

If you are considering dating someone you should hold off until after Christmas and Valentine's Day.  By doing this, you avoid having to buy presents, flowers, chocolate and various other knick knack's.  Then once these holidays are over you should start pursuing your interest so you have at least another 10 months until it is present time.  This is the one opportunity in a relationship you would have to save a couple hundred bucks so you should take it.

Beating Jet Lag

The best way to beat jet lag is to starve yourself for 20 hours prior to when you need to go to bed in your new timezone.  This causes your body to go into survival mode and reset its circadian rhythms.  You will sleep like a baby in your new time zone, and thwart the airline industry for trying to charge obscene amounts of money for food on a flight.

Leaving a Legacy as a Man

To make sure your genes live on, go to a sperm bank. You pass on a lot of genes, and the world will be that much more awesome because there will be a lot of you running around in a few years.  There will also be a lot more people that agree with your point of view as a result so you can save time and energy convincing people to participate in the activities that you enjoy.

Practicing

Don't practice stupid things you don't have to.

Example: Have someone else pretie your ties. That way, you get better tied ties, and you don't have to waste time practicing silly things when you could be gaming.

Open Bars

In order to save money on an open bar tab.  Everyone should go to the liquor store before and sneak in one bottle.  Then whoever has to pay the final tab at the end doesn't get stuck with such a high bill.  Most people might not think this is necessary; they have clearly never had to pay the open bar bill.

Personal appearances #1: Hair

Everyone should shave their head for aerodynamics. Plus, in the summer, you're a lot cooler.  Stylish haircuts are not a necessity in a life hacked world.

Parental life hack #2

Make sure you have godparents and backup godparents selected. That way, if the first set dies, you have the second set ready to go.