{"id":96884,"date":"2025-05-13T02:23:11","date_gmt":"2025-05-13T02:23:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/96884\/"},"modified":"2025-05-13T02:23:11","modified_gmt":"2025-05-13T02:23:11","slug":"45-years-ago-carl-sagan-beautifully-explained-the-fourth-dimension-with-just-an-apple","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/96884\/","title":{"rendered":"45 years ago, Carl Sagan beautifully explained the fourth dimension with just an apple."},"content":{"rendered":"

Most adults<\/a> periodically examine their lives to try to figure out where they can save money<\/a>. It might be cutting one of the streaming services <\/a>we’re not using or dialing back the Starbucks <\/a>PSLs. However, the people on the subreddit r\/frugal take saving money to a whole new level.<\/p>\n

A recent thread<\/a> posted by u\/Jskyesthelimit was chock-full of solid gold advice for anyone looking to trim the budget but who doesn’t want to put in a lot of work. (Yeah, yeah \u2014 we all know meal-prepping is effective, but who’s got the time? We’re looking for easy wins, here.)<\/p>\n

The prompt, “What’s the little effortless, stupid thing you do that TECHNICALLY saves you money?”, got some responses and tips you’ve probably never thought of.<\/p>\n

They’re small, they’re silly \u2014 but they do add up.<\/p>\n

1. Spend more time outside<\/p>\n

“if i go outside and play all day, i don’t have consumerist urges to buy stupid shit.” – looney417<\/p>\n

Can’t spend money if you don’t go into a store!<\/p>\n

It’s a good idea to get away from your phone or laptop for a while, too. If you’re not careful, you can buy a hundred dollars worth of junk on Amazon before you even realize what’s happening.<\/p>\n

2. Time your dishwasher runs<\/p>\n

“When our dishwasher is full and ready to be started, I set an alarm on my watch for 9pm. I start the dishwasher when the alarm goes off since the electricity rate goes down after 9pm.” – misterfuss<\/p>\n

\"dishes,A half loaded dishwashervia Nathan Dumloa\/Unsplash<\/p>\n

Did you know that electricity costs more during “peak hours”? Where I live, power can cost up to 4x as much from 2-7pm versus off-peak hours.<\/p>\n

Most people run the dishwasher at night anyway, but you should look up your own local peak hours. Starting the nightly load at 9 instead of 8 every night could actually save you a couple of bucks a month.<\/p>\n

I like that you can program a Google Nest to do this for you. It knows how expensive electricity is at different times, and will manage your supercooling for you.3. Fill a large water bottle at work before you leave.<\/p>\n

u\/MrPerfectionisback swears by this one.<\/p>\n

Getting a gigantic, high-quality water bottle could be a great investment if you’re able to top it off at the office every day and bring your water bill down a smidge.<\/p>\n

4. Use less laundry detergent<\/p>\n

Most of us approach laundry detergent with a “fill ‘er up” attitude. But, usually, you can get away with even just one tablespoon if your clothes aren’t that dirty. and using less will help your clothes last longer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

u\/jbblue48089 also recommends using solid bar shampoo and dish soap, which have a longer lifespan than liquid soaps.<\/p>\n

5. Re-wear clothes (other than socks and underwear)<\/p>\n

Another option from u\/ztreHdrahciR \u2014 don’t wash your clothes at all! At least not right away.<\/p>\n

Chances are you can get a few wears out of jeans or even t-shirts and save on laundry costs, to the tune of a few dollars per year.<\/p>\n

6. Make your own doggie poo bags<\/p>\n

“Use used food bags to pick up the dogs poop.” – bezere<\/p>\n

Poop bags are expensive! You could easily spend $20-50 per year, depending on what brand you use.<\/p>\n

Next time you pack a sandwich for lunch, save that plastic baggie and use it for pick-up duty later on.<\/p>\n

7. Charge your phone at work (or wherever there’s an outlet)<\/p>\n

A good one from u\/runmemymo.<\/p>\n

Never pass up a chance for free electric!<\/p>\n

If you don’t work in an office, just carry your phone charger with you. Lots of restaurants and even public spaces have outlets so you can get a little free juice.<\/p>\n

8. Poo at work (or wherever there’s a bathroom)<\/p>\n

u\/larkfor says they save a ton of money each year on water and toilet paper by doing their business at work or the office.<\/p>\n

Never pass up a chance for free water and toilet paper!<\/p>\n

9. Cut sponges in half<\/p>\n

\"sponge,A yellow soapy sponge.via Pille R. Priske\/Unsplash<\/p>\n

u\/plaincheeseburger recommends turning one sponge into two.<\/p>\n

It will still work exactly the same and last twice as long.<\/p>\n

10. Repair old dog toys<\/p>\n

I love this one from u\/pdxarchitecht!<\/p>\n

My dogs love immediately ripping the stuffing out of new toys, which doesn’t feel like a great value for my money.<\/p>\n

The hack? Put the stuffing back in and add a stitch or two to close it up and save yourself $10 or more.<\/p>\n

11. Twist the stems off of peppers if paying by weight<\/p>\n

This ingenious and petty tip comes from u\/casterix75.<\/p>\n

Not all supermarkets charge by weight for bell peppers (or similar produce), but if they do, why pay for the stem? Twist it off and save yourself a few cents at the checkout.<\/p>\n

12. Save the cold water when running a shower or bath<\/p>\n

An old science teacher taught me this one in high school, recommended in this thread by u\/smartquokka.<\/p>\n

Put a bucket in the shower or bath to collect the cold water while it’s heating up. Use that to water plants, fill the dog bowls, or flush the toilet.<\/p>\n

13. Unplug everything at night<\/p>\n

\"\"\/via Canva\/Photos<\/a><\/p>\n

Many people recommended this \u2014 it’s an r\/frugal staple.<\/p>\n

Appliances on standby still use power, so unplug as many things as possible before going to bed. u\/Larkfor estimates this saves them $10 a month or so on power.<\/p>\n

14. Library card<\/p>\n

Yes. And take advantage of audiobooks, ebooks, and even streaming. My library has many great movies, shows, and lecture series (I love The Great Courses).<\/p>\n

15. Credit card points<\/p>\n

[I] Use my CC that gets rewards points for all purchases and bills that I can.<\/p>\n

My entire family is going in a trip in a few months, and we booked all our flights together, 4.5k of airfare. I very generously offered to put all the airfare on my (2% cash back) card. My entire family paid me back their portion that week, and now I get the $90 in cash back!<\/p>\n

These tips are so small they’re almost microscopic, but you know what? Most of them are so easy you’d barely notice a difference in your lifestyle and routine. And all together, you could save yourself a decent chunk of money every year by making a few simple changes.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thanks to the thrifty people of Reddit for sharing their hacks with the rest of us!<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared last year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Most adults periodically examine their lives to try to figure out where they can save money. It might…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":96885,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3845],"tags":[45292,23755,1662,45288,45289,74,70,45290,45291,3114,16,15,31204,1737],"class_list":{"0":"post-96884","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-physics","8":"tag-4th-dimension","9":"tag-albert-einstein","10":"tag-apple","11":"tag-carl-sagan","12":"tag-dimensions","13":"tag-physics","14":"tag-science","15":"tag-tesseract","16":"tag-theory-of-relativity","17":"tag-time","18":"tag-uk","19":"tag-united-kingdom","20":"tag-viral-videos","21":"tag-youtube"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114498149041792957","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96884\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}