Do You Really Know How to Cross the Street and Other Life Hacks

Common sense, anyone with common sense knows, is not necessarily common. Here are 10 life hacks that may seem obvious after you read them, but elude many, many people.

1. Don't cross the street while you are using a cell phone.

If you can walk and chew gum at the same time, you should be able to cross the street and use a cell phone at the same time, right?

No, you shouldn't. People who cross the street while using a cell phone are at risk for falls and collisions with other pedestrians and passing cars due to a phenomenon known as inattention blindness. When you walk and chew gum you are engaged in one thinking activity and one non-thinking activity. When you cross the street and use a cell phone you are performing two thinking activities, which can leave you oblivious to dangers all around you. If you use a cell phone while crossing an intersection your will either (1) take longer to cross the intersection, which exposes you to greater risk of accidents or (2) fail to notice objects in your way.

2. If you want to avoid getting hypothermia, stay dry, and out of the wind.

Well, that seems obvious, doesn't it? But every year several thousand people ignore the laws of thermodynamics and die of hypothermia. Here are some basics to keep in mind:

• Liquids transmit heat better than solids. Any kind of liquid on the surface of your body, including sweat or melted ice, drains your body of heat. If you possibly can, wear undergarments that wick moisture away from your skin.
• Heat is transferred more rapidly from a body in motion. If you get wet and cold, don't move around if you don't have to. The more you move, the colder you will get.

• Never eat ice to fight dehydration if you can possibly avoid it. Phase changes, such as solid ice to liquid water or liquid water to water vapor, take large amounts of energy. If you eat ice, it's your body heat that will warm it up in your stomach. It's always better to drink melt water than to eat ice.

3. Don't take selfies in dangerous places.

In 2015, there were roughly 50 percent more deaths while taking selfies than there were deaths from shark attacks. Want to take a picture of yourself with that precipitous drop to the Grand Canyon at your back? Get a friend or a bystander to snap the photo? Don't take a selfie. Want a dramatic shot of yourself standing next to the minimal-containment tiger cage? Ditto. And you probably shouldn't take a selfie of yourself and an anaconda, either, although the last photo you take just may go viral.

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4. Never underestimate the symptoms of a heart attack.

We all know the classic signs of a heart attack: Crushing chest pain, clutching at the chest or left arm, gasping for breath. However, a majority of women and many men don't have any of the classic signs of heart attack. Sometimes you might just feel like you were breathing through a sheet, or feel vaguely queasy like something was pressing down on your stomach, or maybe you are really, really tired. Don't skip going to the emergency room just because you don't have the symptoms you are "supposed" to have.

More Commonsense Life Hacks

Some of the following life hacks seem supremely obvious, but aren't.

5. Learn how to predict a punch in the face.

In a situation in which a fist fight is destined to break out, your opponent may jut out his (or her) jaw just before swinging in a way to break yours. The jutting jaw is a primal sign of territoriality. It's the sort of thing that is triggered by the limbic system, the "reptilian brain." It's not something that the person doing the swinging thinks about, but it's something a calmer person can use as a signal to duck.

6. If you are about to get punched in the mouth, remember, you have teeth.

Gentle readers who are very seldom involved in fist fights are advised that you can in fact bite the hand that hits you. Let's hope you have no real need for this information.

7. Don't run away from an angry dog.

Especially if you are old and a bit on the fat and juicy side like me, don't run away from angry dogs. A dog that simply wants you to keep your distance will bark in a continuous tone and probably will prick its ears. It's wise to to stay back. If a dog charges you, don't accommodate its prey instinct by running. Dogs instinctively chase their prey. If you don't want to be that prey, don't run. You probably couldn't outrun the dog, anyway.

Don't smile at an angry dog, because showing your teeth could be interpreted as aggression. Do take higher ground to show your dominance, but be aware that a determined dog may simply follow you to your perch on a car or in a tree. If all else fails, wave an article of clothing at the dog to distract its attention away from your tender, available flesh. If the dog has bitten you, don't pull that part of your body away from it. Let it think it has won.

8. If you choose to get high or drunk, don't get high or drunk with strangers.

Engage in these activities only with trusted friends. You are vulnerable to police information, theft, assault, and worse when you are intellectually disabled around people you do not know. And even if your mother never told you to avoid hiring freelance sex workers in foreign countries, it's still a good idea. More than one patron has woken up the next morning pantsless, lacking wallet and passport, the possessor of a new, exotic infection.

READ Are You An Impulsive, Reckless Drunk? You Probably Suffer From A Gene Mutation

9. Don’t feed wild animals.

And as a corollary, don’t separate young animals from their mothers. Feeding wild animals, for example, bears, encourages them to come back looking for more. When the next visitor doesn’t have food to offer them, the next visitor may become the meal the wild animal seeks.

Don’t rescue baby animals you are not prepared to raise. Your scent can imprint the animal so that its mother rejects it, and without your constant help, it will die.

10. Even if there isn’t a sign warning you of danger, don’t assume a location is safe.

Every year in Costa Rica dozens of tourists get minor burns by venturing to close to beautiful blue lakes of sulfuric acid (which would dissolve you instantly if you plunged in) or fascinating plumes of gaseous sulfur where there are no warning signs. Although the doctor who treats you will probably not refer to you as “estúpido,” at least not to your face, you will gain no sympathy for not exercising the good sense to turn around when you starting feeling your face burning. Turn around, don’t become a headline about the tourist who jumped into the boiling lake of acid.