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Being Mindful of Expiration Dates

January 20, 2012 · 3 comments

One of my ongoing goals for myself is to be mindful of expiration dates in effort to a) help keep the clutter under control and b) make sure I’m not buying more than I can use of things.

This week I’ve been taking a heavy hand to my health and beauty products to make sure that what I have on hand is fresh enough to be safe and worthy of using on myself. In the past I’ve been a bit of a hoarder and a junkie when it comes to stockpiling bajillions of cosmetics, lotions, shampoos, and such – not only are my bathroom cabinets full of the stuff but I also had some drawers in a dresser and a small linen closet in the hall almost completely devoted to the stuff.

I checked over each and every item to decide whether or not to keep it. And I probably ended up discarding about two thirds of what I previously owned.

I started by checking over each product for a printed expiration date to make some easy headway.

Next I checked for period after opening symbols which look like little open containers typically with a number of months that product is good for after opening printed on it. If it had a period after opening symbol on it and I remembered when I purchased the item (or could easily search my Gmail for an order confirmation), I calculated the approximate date until it would expire and then made a label with my label maker to stick on the product so that I wouldn’t have to look it up again. I discarded any items I couldn’t remember purchasing or that were past their estimated expiration dates.

For everything that was left, I went through the remaining items and plugged lot numbers or batch codes into this cosmetic calculator to see when they were manufactured and what the estimated shelf life was. After calculating estimated expiration dates based on that information, I stuck date labels to those items as well.

There were very few product categories where I was left with not a single item remaining but I did massively simplify my collection. I did need to restock on a few basics like eye makeup remover (couldn’t remember when I bought it and want to be particularly careful with things I putting on or near my eyes), eyeliner, foundation, concealer, and lip balm (yes I had one in pretty much every room of the house and I’m slightly disgusted to know that some were 5 or more years old – but I’d rather fix the situation than continue to use those). As I bought my replacement products, I affixed an expiration date label to each of those items too.

The plan now to make sure I keep my products fresh and focus on quality over quantity is to buy just one of each type of product and make sure that it’s of the best quality. Makeup items are something I rarely, rarely use up so I expect I’ll only be replacing those items as they expire (I’m down from seemingly hundreds of everything to one eyeliner, one eyeshadow, 2 blushes, a small handful of lipglosses). For other products like shampoo and body wash, I’ll buy a single new bottle each time I open my last bottle on hand.

I’d rather have one really nice lipbalm or bottle of shampoo than 20 cheap ones that expire before I finish them up and I think it’s a healthier plan too.

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Let’s Talk About Secure Passwords

January 16, 2012 · 5 comments

In light of the recent Zappos hacking incident, you should probably be thinking about updating your passwords around the web. Hackers gained access to the account data of 24 million customer accounts. They didn’t get your credit card data but they likely got your username, password, name, and address and if you use that same info on other websites, those hackers could gain access to your account info on those other websites too.

Shame on me because my own Zappos password was the same basic, lowercase letters only, word found in the dictionary password that I’d been using for more than 10 years. At some point, websites started requiring a minimum of 8 characters and then at least one number and then at least one uppercase letter so over the years I developed standard passwords that I used for everything that met those criteria as well. But then there were some websites that had more complicated criteria and when I created a password that met those criteria I could never remember what it was because it wasn’t one of my defaults.

So I had to start writing my passwords down. I just use a simple .txt file on my computer; by the time you’re sitting in my house and at my desk you’ve got access to any of my information you might want or need anyway so I’m not overly concerned with protecting that file.

And once we’re at the point where we’re writing our passwords down (which you probably want to be doing anyway in case you suddenly have some sort of massive brain trauma or die or something), we might as well get really random with our passwords. I’ve heard it said that the only secure password is a password you can’t remember.

About a month ago I started updating all of my passwords across the web with passwords randomly created by a password generator – I’m using PassMaker which is a free app I downloaded from the Apple App Store [affiliate link].

I can set it to exactly fit the criteria of whatever the website I’m creating a password for requires – some allow symbols, some don’t, some require a minimum length and some have a maximum length. Generate my password. Paste it along with my username and any other important info into my passwords file. And then once I’m sure I’ve pasted the correct password into my file also paste it into where the website asks me to enter my new password.

Make it a priority to update every unsecure password you find yourself using for at least the next week.

Once you’ve got your passwords updated, you might also consider printing a copy, putting it somewhere safe, and letting someone you trust know where that is and under what circumstances they should access your accounts.

Do you have any tips or techniques for creating and keeping track of secure passwords?

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Link Love: Evernote, Growth and Goal Setting, and Your Information Diet

January 6, 2012 · 0 comments

Lately I’ve been reading up on Evernote:

Letting my morbid curiosity get the best of me with other people’s New Years resolutions and goal setting strategies:

And changing how I read my emails and social media to make sure I’m consuming quality over quantity:

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Things I’d Love To Do in 2012

December 27, 2011 · 5 comments

I’m not making New Year’s resolutions this year because a) I never stick to them and b) I like having room to let things change and evolve.

So inspired by this post at Be More with Less, this is my list of things I’d love to do in 2012 that is subject to adjustment throughout the year.

  1. Try yoga again.
  2. Go on vacation and completely unplug (this is a must for my honeymoon in August but my fiance and I will probably do a long weekend in the spring for me to practice).
  3. Read a book a week or more.
  4. Walk Lucky more. Get my fiance to go with us more of those times.
  5. Make homemade bread every week.
  6. Focus on quality over quantity. In how I spend my time and my money.
  7. Declutter something every day. Regularly list those items on eBay or donate to Goodwill (in which case be sure to get a tax receipt).
  8. Eat more fruits and vegetables. Ideally at least one with each meal.

Are you making New Year’s resolutions or doing any other sort of goal setting right now? Tell me about it or link me to a post you’ve written on the topic.

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