7 ms·

Yeah, when we stop moving, it's so easy to start hoarding. I lived in Mexico for 10 years with just two duffelbags of clothes and essentials. I could carry bo

Yeah, when we stop moving, it's so easy to start hoarding. I lived in Mexico for 10 years with just two duffelbags of clothes and essentials. I could carry both on a plane unchecked and be anywhere with nothing left behind, and I loved it. Now I look around me in my apartment I share with my girlfriend and have things I wouldn't have even conceived of, like a gaming PC with two monitors (for what??) and a closet full of clothes as if I don't wear the same 5 things.

TimorousBestie 1y ago
> like a gaming PC with two monitors (for what??) There’s nothing like the pleasure of idling in a pointless MMO on one screen while half-watching youtube autoplay on the other. Alternate Monster with White Claw and you’ve got peak hedonism.
- riversflow 1y ago
  You missed the geekbar and the penjamim. For max effect also put on a twitch streamer in a different game, listen to imported pop music or edm, and idle in a discord. Oh and have a collection of fidget toys on your desk.
- Mr_Eri_Atlov 1y ago
  My ideal is 3 monitors One in the middle for a game One to the right for a video One to the left with systems stats and an RSS feed
- jimbokun 1y ago
  To each his own. This sounds terrible to me. Now bouncing between multiple Champions League games in the middle of an afternoon with easy access to good espresso…
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
LeifCarrotson 1y ago
I met a family who had just moved to Wisconson from Italy last week. The four of them (Mom, Dad, ~14yo son, and ~12yo daughter) packed everything they were going to bring with them into a backpack and two checked bags each. Incredible! What would you pick? I have a garage and a shed (OK, fine, it's a 24x36 barn) and a basement and a home office that barely contain the enormous quantity of my stuff at home. And yet I honestly think the highlight of this summer was waking up to the sunrise on one of the remotest parts of the Appalachian trail through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, with no possessions that wouldn't fit in a 22L ultralight backpack - including several of the same items as this guy's kit. On the one hand, most of the stuff is replaceable, "fungible" if you like, rather than sentimental. On the other, I keep it because I like to have certain capabilities, like cooking and auto repair and home building - I can't fit a tablesaw or pressure washer or food processor in a backpack; I've got a rack of 24 giant totes in the garage with painting supplies and plumbing supplies and bike parts and specialty auto repair tool cases and on and on that each occupy more volume than the one backpack this guy lives out of. I also recognize that this is a colossally inefficient way to allocate things among a group of people: I'm not going to pay a painter $1500 to do a crappy job to repaint my bathroom when I can do it myself with far greater quality for $100 in paint and a couple hundred bucks worth of tools in a giant tote, and neither are most of my neighbors, but this means that a sizeable fraction of people in the neighborhood live around our own personal totes of painting supplies. If I was going to pay someone else to build and repair and maintain and clean the house/apartment/condo/hotel that I live in (when I'm not in a tent, that's only about 5% of my time), and to take care of the cars and bikes that I ride in and on, and to cook the variety of food that I eat, and on and on, I would have a lot less stuff. If I bought tools to do these tasks that I would use once and then sell/give/throw them away...that would be unaffordable for me. One of the lessons that my Dad passed down to me is to never buy a thing unless you have the resources in time, price of consumables, tools, and space to clean it, maintain it, fix it, and store it - those are real costs beyond the sticker price of a new toy. Where does the money come from that allows one to sleep in hotels, ride in rental cars, travel in airports, and eat in restaurants for years on end?
- Arainach 1y ago
  >Where does the money come from that allows one to sleep in hotels, ride in rental cars, travel in airports, and eat in restaurants for years on end? If you keep your standards modest, the math isn't as bad as it intuitively seems. A $100 hotel per night is the equivalent of a $3000 mortgage/rent. And if you're living out of one bag you don't necessarily need that and probably have cheaper options like hostels (or tent camping) available. If you're working a software job or have worked such jobs long enough to have a few million in assets gathering interest, the cost of living isn't prohibitive.
exe34 1y ago
I have a load of crap I've accumulated over the years, but I try to regularly look at and consider everything, with the aim of simply imagining life without it. I'm reasonably confident that I could get rid of most of it without missing it much if I had to - but for now I'm still holding on to them in case they become useful again. It currently costs me less to keep them than to replace them in the future.
mr_toad 1y ago
You can’t even carry one duffel bag unchecked on a budget airline anymore, unless its a very small one. Some of the cheaper airlines even charge extra for overhead luggage.
- hombre_fatal 1y ago
  That might be true for domestic US flights, which I don't have experience with, but every airline between US and Mexico, or inside Mexico, has an option for 1x carry-on and 1x "personal item" where the personal item just needs to somewhat fit under the seat in front of you. This goes for Mexico's budget airline Viva Aerobus too.
tdeck 1y ago
I'm assuming you didn't cook much if at all during that time?
- hombre_fatal 1y ago
  I cooked. Everywhere I've lived had a pot, pan, cutting board, knife, etc. And I'm sure I bought some so-cheap-its-disposable kitchenware from time to time.
  - tdeck 1y ago
    Makes sense, I was thinking even a minimal kitchen setup is about a full duffel bag worth.

TimorousBestie 1y ago

> like a gaming PC with two monitors (for what??) There’s nothing like the pleasure of idling in a pointless MMO on one screen while half-watching youtube autoplay on the other. Alternate Monster with White Claw and you’ve got peak hedonism.

riversflow 1y ago
You missed the geekbar and the penjamim. For max effect also put on a twitch streamer in a different game, listen to imported pop music or edm, and idle in a discord. Oh and have a collection of fidget toys on your desk.
Mr_Eri_Atlov 1y ago
My ideal is 3 monitors One in the middle for a game One to the right for a video One to the left with systems stats and an RSS feed
jimbokun 1y ago
To each his own. This sounds terrible to me. Now bouncing between multiple Champions League games in the middle of an afternoon with easy access to good espresso…
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

LeifCarrotson 1y ago

I met a family who had just moved to Wisconson from Italy last week. The four of them (Mom, Dad, ~14yo son, and ~12yo daughter) packed everything they were going to bring with them into a backpack and two checked bags each. Incredible! What would you pick? I have a garage and a shed (OK, fine, it's a 24x36 barn) and a basement and a home office that barely contain the enormous quantity of my stuff at home. And yet I honestly think the highlight of this summer was waking up to the sunrise on one of the remotest parts of the Appalachian trail through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, with no possessions that wouldn't fit in a 22L ultralight backpack - including several of the same items as this guy's kit. On the one hand, most of the stuff is replaceable, "fungible" if you like, rather than sentimental. On the other, I keep it because I like to have certain capabilities, like cooking and auto repair and home building - I can't fit a tablesaw or pressure washer or food processor in a backpack; I've got a rack of 24 giant totes in the garage with painting supplies and plumbing supplies and bike parts and specialty auto repair tool cases and on and on that each occupy more volume than the one backpack this guy lives out of. I also recognize that this is a colossally inefficient way to allocate things among a group of people: I'm not going to pay a painter $1500 to do a crappy job to repaint my bathroom when I can do it myself with far greater quality for $100 in paint and a couple hundred bucks worth of tools in a giant tote, and neither are most of my neighbors, but this means that a sizeable fraction of people in the neighborhood live around our own personal totes of painting supplies. If I was going to pay someone else to build and repair and maintain and clean the house/apartment/condo/hotel that I live in (when I'm not in a tent, that's only about 5% of my time), and to take care of the cars and bikes that I ride in and on, and to cook the variety of food that I eat, and on and on, I would have a lot less stuff. If I bought tools to do these tasks that I would use once and then sell/give/throw them away...that would be unaffordable for me. One of the lessons that my Dad passed down to me is to never buy a thing unless you have the resources in time, price of consumables, tools, and space to clean it, maintain it, fix it, and store it - those are real costs beyond the sticker price of a new toy. Where does the money come from that allows one to sleep in hotels, ride in rental cars, travel in airports, and eat in restaurants for years on end?

Arainach 1y ago
>Where does the money come from that allows one to sleep in hotels, ride in rental cars, travel in airports, and eat in restaurants for years on end? If you keep your standards modest, the math isn't as bad as it intuitively seems. A $100 hotel per night is the equivalent of a $3000 mortgage/rent. And if you're living out of one bag you don't necessarily need that and probably have cheaper options like hostels (or tent camping) available. If you're working a software job or have worked such jobs long enough to have a few million in assets gathering interest, the cost of living isn't prohibitive.

exe34 1y ago

I have a load of crap I've accumulated over the years, but I try to regularly look at and consider everything, with the aim of simply imagining life without it. I'm reasonably confident that I could get rid of most of it without missing it much if I had to - but for now I'm still holding on to them in case they become useful again. It currently costs me less to keep them than to replace them in the future.

mr_toad 1y ago

You can’t even carry one duffel bag unchecked on a budget airline anymore, unless its a very small one. Some of the cheaper airlines even charge extra for overhead luggage.

hombre_fatal 1y ago
That might be true for domestic US flights, which I don't have experience with, but every airline between US and Mexico, or inside Mexico, has an option for 1x carry-on and 1x "personal item" where the personal item just needs to somewhat fit under the seat in front of you. This goes for Mexico's budget airline Viva Aerobus too.

tdeck 1y ago

I'm assuming you didn't cook much if at all during that time?

hombre_fatal 1y ago
I cooked. Everywhere I've lived had a pot, pan, cutting board, knife, etc. And I'm sure I bought some so-cheap-its-disposable kitchenware from time to time.
- tdeck 1y ago
  Makes sense, I was thinking even a minimal kitchen setup is about a full duffel bag worth.