Fran

Worth checking whether your cooker runs hot as well. If low on your machine is really a gentle simmer rather than the 85 to 90C it should be, everything overcooks faster than the recipe expects. Water test it for four hours and see what you have.

Survived a bad week without a decision is a much better test than any number of days.

Counting decision points rather than habits reframes my list. Gym and journalling are two new decisions, an earlier bedtime is a third, and the running was one. No wonder four collapsed together.

I fermented six kilos of fat supermarket cucumbers once because they were cheap. Every single one went hollow and slimy inside while still looking fine, and I found out afterwards that big waxed cucumbers are the wrong fruit for this entirely. Six kilos in the compost and a very quiet week.

I over-did it. Twice a week with a physical scrub for about two months because it felt productive. Ended up with a tender scalp, more oil than before, and a couple of small sore spots that took weeks to settle.

Once a fortnight at most, and never on skin that's already sore. Whatever the barrier does elsewhere on your body, it does on your head too, and you can absolutely wreck it.

Put it back. Do not repot, do not feed.

The thing that catches everyone out is how fast light falls off indoors. Right at the glass on a bright day you might have 8000 to 10000 lux. Four feet back and off to one side is commonly 800 to 1500. That is not a trim, that is most of the plant's income gone, and a fig responds by shedding the leaves it can no longer pay for, which are always the lowest and most shaded.

Get any lux meter app and take a reading at the old spot and the new one at the same time of day. Nobody believes this until they see the two numbers side by side.

The second half of the problem is that a litre every ten days was correct at the window and is too much where it is now, because a plant with less light uses less water. So it is losing leaves and sitting wetter at the same time. Move it back, keep the watering the same, and expect the dropping to stop within two to three weeks. The leaves it already lost will not regrow on those nodes.

Do not machine wash leather, ever. For leather it is a damp cloth, a proper leather cleaner and then a conditioner, and for the inside a fabric spray and a long air out. I ruined a pair of leather gloves learning this and they came out stiff and a size smaller.

This loop is the real trap. The tiredness that justifies the drink is partly caused by the drink, and you cannot see it from inside the loop.

Replace the ritual, not the substance. My three o'clock thing was never really about caffeine, it was about standing up, leaving the desk and having ten minutes where nobody could ask me anything. Now it is a cold sparkling water and a walk round the block, same time, same length. The caffeine went without a fight once the ritual survived.

Worth adding that meat can go through a phase where it seems to get tougher around the middle of the cook before it relaxes. If you check at hour six and panic, you will pull it at exactly the wrong moment.

Good filter. The two writers I trust most have both published posts telling people not to buy an entire category, and one of them lost a sponsorship over it.

Two other things that add water without you noticing. Frozen meat or vegetables put in straight from the freezer contribute a surprising amount, and a tin of tomatoes is mostly liquid. Try tomato paste plus a tin of drained chopped tomatoes instead of the tin as it comes, and you get more flavour and less water in one move.

The pot weight trick is underrated for anything that hates wet feet. Lift it right after a full watering, lift it again a week later, and you calibrate faster than any moisture meter will manage.

The mushroom slice test is the single most useful diagnostic in this hobby. Cheap, fast, and it answers the question you cannot answer by staring at the glass at 9pm.

This is the reason my large one is in the loft. Lovely machine, but I stopped reaching for it because getting it out was a two handed job that needed clear counter space first.

Drying immediately genuinely is the biggest single change. My draining rack was doing more damage than the water was.

True, with one warning. Once it is that rootbound, water runs straight down the sides and out without wetting the middle. Bottom water it in a bowl for twenty minutes if you go this route.

The tomatoes. Acid slows bean skins from softening, and a tin of tomatoes from the start will keep beans chalky for hours past when they should have been done.

The fix is order of operations. Cook the beans in plain water or stock with the onion until they are properly tender, which for soaked pintos is usually four to six hours on low, then add the tomatoes and anything else acidic and give it another hour to marry. You get soft beans and the same finished dish.

Salt is more argued about. In my experience salting from the start is fine and may even help the skins, but acid is not up for debate, it genuinely slows things down.

And do not move it or bump the counter. Every knock shakes crystals loose from the stick into the solution, where they become new seeds. We ended up putting ours on a shelf the kids could see but not reach, which solved both problems at once.