Sometimes, buy an extra

Duplicates can make life more efficient

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.
Good Morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Today's tip is to buy an extra if having an
extra would make life easier. In a recent episode, we
talked about knowing your burn rate. This is the speed

(00:27):
at which you use up household items. By knowing how
long a gallon of milk, a jar of peanut butter,
or a bottle of laundry detergent lasts, you can make
more efficient shopping trips. Of course, there's more to efficiency
than just volume. Sometimes we choose to use or not
use things based on how convenient they are. So rather

(00:48):
than be penny wise and pound foolish, better to get
us spare and make life a little easier. I think
of this every summer as we load up on sunscreen. Theoretically,
putting a giant, economy sized bottle in the mud room
should be fine. That's generally where we exit the house,
but not always, and so to increase the chances that

(01:12):
people actually wear sunscreen, we buy copious bottles and stash
them all over the place by the back door, for instance,
to make it easier to go in the back yard
pool on the back porch in case people got outside
without seeing the bottle by the back door. In each
car in case people get where they're going and remember
that they need sunscreen, and of course in kid camp

(01:35):
bags and my purse. I've been doing this with other
things too. We could get by with fewer booster seats,
but that would mean that we were always carrying them
back and forth and hunting for them when we're trying
to leave. My baby likes white noise while he sleeps.
He sometimes sleeps in a crib in my bedroom and
sometimes in his. We'd been moving the white noise machine

(01:58):
back and forth. When I realized that this was massive
headache to engineer with a sleepy, fuzzy baby, I bought
a second machine. Problem solved. You might do this with
favorite items of clothing too. If you find yourself wearing
something over and over again, go ahead and get a
second copy before the company stopped making it. If the

(02:19):
company has stopped making it, you might be able to
find a second hand version in good shape through a
company like thread Up. And if you wear certain items
of clothing in different places, you might want to buy
a spare in that case too, having an extra pair
of sneakers in your car means you can go for
an impromptu walk. Having a fully stocked jim bag at

(02:39):
your office means you can work out at lunch. It
sounds like buying an extra might make life more cluttered,
but sometimes the opposite happens. We bought an extra laundry
hamper to put on the first floor of the house.
Now people are marginally less inclined to leave dirty laundry
lying all over the place when they're too lazy carry

(03:00):
it up to the second floor laundry room. In any case,
if you find yourself carrying something from room to room
or car to car, from home to your office, or
if you're constantly saying, hey, where's the consider buying an
extra A little bit of money might save you a
lot of hassle. In the meantime. This is Laura. Thanks

(03:21):
for listening, and here's to making the most of our time. Hey, everybody,
I'd love to hear from you. You can send me
your tips, your questions, or anything else. Just connect with
me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at Before Breakfast pod

(03:43):
that's b E the number four then breakfast p o D.
You can also shoot me an email at Before Breakfast
podcast at iHeart media dot com that before Breakfast is
spelled out with all the letters. Thanks so much, I
look forward to staying in touch. Before Breakfast is a

(04:05):
production of I heart Radio. For more podcasts from i
heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.