Em Dashes, Scrub Mommies, & Gaslighting My Flatmate: 2024's Ins, Outs, & Remains

Hasta Cuando — Kali Uchis

Yes, yes, I understand we’re on the cusp of finishing up February, but some of these had to go through trial runs. For those unfamiliar with the concept, this is a list of things that I will choose to do, not do, and keep doing this year, with some commentary and elaboration. Without further ado, here are the Ins, Outs & Remains that I’m committed to doing this year:

Ins:

1. Writing every single thing (class notes, journalling, hypothetical murder plots) in a single slightly Asian-appropriatey Moleskine notebook

   1. Why is an Italian brand celebrating Chinese New Year every single year? Props on them for collabing with actual Asian artists though.

   2. The rationale behind this is that it is much better than having multiple notebooks that you never finish, and the division of mentality you get from that can be done by starting the academic stuff from the back, and the other stuff from the front.

2. (Ab)using my em dashes properly — I’ve been rebuked by two completely separate KI students for using an en dash ( - ) instead of an em dash ( — ) when I’m writing either the Gazette or my uni essays.

   1. For people in London, KI is A-Level Philosophy. It’s a voluntary thing, so I have a theory that the government made it so all the strange smart people are in the same room to increase the birth rate in Singapore and also like lowkey eugenics.

3. Using body oil after showers

   1. I use the Glossier body oil, and it’s honestly really awesome — it’s a spray, not a pump, so it’s a lot less messy. It also dries down INSANELY fast, so you don’t get the sensory overload oily feeling, which is something I’m very particular about.

4. Gaslighting my flatmate into thinking I’ve adopted a cat

   1. If you’re reading this, sorry Jingkai. I waved goodbye to him, walked out of my flat, and then 15 minutes later on the bus to dinner with Rebecca I started playing cat sounds on my Alexa.

   2. 

   3. The name of the game is that at some point he will get used to the cat sounds getting played, and when I get a real cat that meows when I’m gone he will simply write it off as me pranking him again.

   4. Just kidding! Or not. Either way, my Spotify Wrapped is gonna be cooked.

5. Scrub Mommies & The Pink Stuff

   1. It’s really surprising when things that go viral work out, but I really cannot recommend these two things more. The Pink Stuff is a baking soda-based cleaner, which makes cleaning a lot less gross and annoying especially in the kitchen because it smells nice, is a paste (sensorily it just feels better and cleaner than a water-based spray) and it’s pink.

   2. The Scrub Mommy is like 9 pounds for a 3-pack, but it lasts much longer than regular sponges + it has one side for tougher stains and one side for suds. Also, I’ve found the use-its-mouth-to-clean-utensils function extremely helpful and fast when you’re busy + it gets cleaner than regular sponges when you wash it after use.

Out:

1. Not being okay with being alone

   1. I’ve never had a big problem with being physically alone (eating lunch alone, watching a movie alone, going for coffee alone etc). But we have all been conditioned to think that there is something bad about being single or that there’s a ticking timer on when you eventually get cast out into dying-alone pool. Recently, I’ve actually managed to entirely unlearn that sort of mentality (I guess something just clicked in my brain) & I genuinely prefer this now (no copium!!).

2. Trying to learn auditor-ally

   1. I actually despise watching anything without subtitles, because my audio processing is just horrendous unless I’m in a direct dialogue (hence, visual aids like slides really help for me).

   2. Podcasts are just white noise to me.

   3. Hence, finding ways to work around my own learning methods is obviously more effective than me just sitting in class and not being able to learn. Vice versa, if you find that you learn the best through audio, you could adapt to text-to-voice learning instead.

3. Egg drop soup

   1. I always unintentionally do this because I want to add an egg to my instant noodles, but I add it in a bit too early and my soup is still hot and now its egg drop soup and there’s bits of eggs everywhere and my life is going down the drain.

   2. Egg drop soup is just so weird like why would you want bits of weird loose boiled eggs in your soup, mucking it up? Borderline psychotic.

4. Moral quandaries

   1. Unfortunately I recently realised that I’ve been pulling a “Chidi From the Good Place”, where I’m so subconsciously concerned with the metaphorical Trolley Problems of the daily life (this is ironic because it’s not like there will ever be a literal trolley) that I just end up with metaphorical tummyaches and inaction.

   2. Weird problem. To avoid, this, don’t go on Twitter or read about effective altruism.

5. 24 consecutive hours in the Maughan Library

   1. Self-explanatory.

Remains:

1. Doing the NYT Trio every single day

   1. Wordle, Mini Crosswod, Connections, in that order. You know how it is.

2. Iced Americano

   1. It is the perfect drink to save money because the truth is it is both cold and incredibly bitter, two things that contribute to the fact that it has the exact same taste profile regardless of bean quality, artisan pulling method (I actually don’t know anything about coffee) for the amateur tongue.

   2. Hence, the Pret subscription would more than suffice for your daily caffeine needs (especially if you’re function over form).

3. Hyper-literate pretentiously verbose humour

   1. Appropriately — my flatmate used the word quagmire recently, which frankly disturbed me more than it should.

   2. Think Moira Rose in Schitt’s Creek — “Be careful, John, lest you suffer vertigo from the dizzying heights of the moral ground”, “sadly, I won’t be able to squire you for today’s wedding venue peregrination”, etc

   3. Speaking of, I noted down in my aforementioned “Everything Notebook” when my Game Theory lecturer used the word “defenestrated” in real life, which was jarring but still enjoyable.

4. Body neutrality

   1. Your body doesn’t have to be beautiful or perfect or look a certain way, it really just has to work.

   2. This also applies to other people’s bodies.

5. Filling up my walls with all sort of prints from FreePrints

   1. I’m essentially turning my room into a Pinterest board — the wall near my head is filled with cute coloured motivational / introspective graphics, the wall to my right is a collection of writing I really like, including excerpts from this phenomenal review about the stars of the Wong Kar Wai universe by some of my favourite authors (including Amanda Lee Koe and the author of Interior Chinatown, Charles Yu), and then I have a wall of prints from my travels as well as some film stills / posters I adore.