These unconventional tricks let you squeeze extra utility out of everyday items: by installing a free VNC app on your phone you can remotely control a laptop or smart‑home devices without any extra hardware, while a simple soda‑can reflector—just a cut‑open can with a USB Wi‑Fi dongle tucked inside—can nudge your wireless signal a few percent farther into stubborn corners. A thick rubber band wrapped around your phone and a table edge creates a makeshift stabilizer that dampens shake for smoother video, and in Gmail you can add “expire:1d” to a subject line to have the message self‑destruct after a day. Writing a short phrase on the bottom of a work mug gives you a memorable “mug‑password” that you combine with the current date for a unique login token. When speed‑reading PDFs, sliding a ruler under each line forces your eyes to move faster, and any unwanted spoiler can be instantly erased by highlighting the text, opening the browser’s dev tools (Ctrl + Shift + C), and deleting the highlighted node. Old CDs become retro‑style coasters when you glue a thin layer of silicone sealant on one side, and a small square of sticky note placed on a screen corner acts as a tiny magnifier for hard‑to‑tap icons. Finally, loading a lightweight Linux distro onto a spare USB stick gives you a portable boot‑key you can use to rescue any computer that won’t start.
