You've heard about "life hacks," right? Using things in unconventional ways to make some of life's annoyances or problems go away. The internet is full of life hacks. Some of them useful, some useless, some completely random and some quite funny.
We stumbled upon a video that's supposed to help us with some common car-related inconveniences or issues. We weren't that convinced, so we chose to debunk them, instead of just telling you about them.
Putting muffin cups in your car's cup holders keeps them clean. Hmm... really? What about crumbs slipping around the outside of the muffin cups? It's not like they form any sort of seal with the cup holder. As anyone who's ever owned a car for more than one month will tell you, crumbs, dust, bits of... things will get everywhere. Everywhere!
The second one is supposed to help if more than one person drives your car. Use duct tape (uuu, duct tape!) to mark the position of the driver's seat so you can more easily revert back to your comfortable setting. Does that actually annoy anyone or just the guys in the video? Is it that much of an effort to slide the seat back or forth? It's even less of an effort when your car has electric seats.
Next: how to keep your pizza level on your way home. Because, apparently, simply placing it on the passenger seat wouldn't work. The pizza would tilt. Very dangerous! We get what they're trying to say: the toppings might "migrate." But, for one, the angle isn't that acute. Secondly, using their "hack" of placing some water bottles underneath the pizza to level it puts the very precious cargo in danger of falling out of the seat when braking. The slight tilt would actually help prevent that.
The fourth one advocates using a laundry basket when you have too many grocery bags so you can haul all of them to the house in one trip. That's just ridiculous. There's no such thing as "too many bags." Whether there are four bags or forty, laundry basket or no laundry basket, it will always take just one trip.
Here's one that's actually helpful. The small gas pump icon on the fuel gauge sometimes has an arrow next to it. The arrow points to the side of the car on which the gas cap is located. This isn't really a hack, just a tip.
The sixth hack is the only one that's actually a hack. Silly, but a hack nonetheless. It involves hanging a piece of string from a beam or from the ceiling of your garage and taping a tennis ball to the other end. This way you'll know where to stop when you park your car. Then again, parking sensors! They've been around for a while and can even be retrofitted to cars that didn't originally come equipped with such fancy technology. Sure, sensors are more expensive than a piece of string and a tennis ball, but on the upside, you can use them anywhere.
The last one is, again, not a hack. It's a tip. A very old one, but that doesn't make it less useful. It's quite cool actually. You know how every key fob has a limited range? Well, if you hold the remote against your chin, it will extend that range considerably. It works because your head acts as a conductor and boosts the wireless signal. Isn't science just awesome?
Google News