No one cares what you had for lunch

Spending $1 or less on food every day for a month

Participant: Evan

Hypothesis: That you can survive in America on a food budget of $30 per month.

Summary: You can do it. It's just not any fun. Q&A here.

In total, Evan spent $27.28 on food in November. He calculated it saved him $212.22, which is what he donated to a food bank at the end of the experiment. He also lost 18 pounds. And ate a lot of rice.

Diet coke + mentos = human experiment

Participant: Paul Robinett

Hypothesis: Diet coke and mentos mixed together create a fountain. Diet coke and mentos mixed together INSIDE somebody's mouth will create... really funny television.

Summary: See it yourself in this YouTube clip.



And if you're wondering what really happened there at the end? Here's the follow-up:

Home is where your soggy sleeping bag is

Living for a year in a ditch

Participant: Original Ditch Monkey

Hypothesis: (1) If he lived in the woods for six weeks, people might be so impressed they would donate lots of money to the Woodland Trust. (2) If he could do it for six weeks, he could do it for a year. (3) If he could do it for a year in the tame forests of England, he could do it in the Amazon jungle.

Summary: Ditch Monkey experimented with living in the woods without any creature comforts, but continued commuting during the day to his office job in London. The six week version of the experiment went so well (after he got used to being snuffled at by badgers, soaked with rain, and hassled by glue-sniffers), that he decided to extend it for an entire year. The whole thing is documented on his blog. He is currently trying to raise funds to go and do the whole thing again... in the Amazon Rainforest.

We, although people keep dropping out so its only me, are going to live in the jungle for a year; sleep in hammocks, catch fish, cook over an open fire, survive off the land that sort of thing. How hard can it be?

There is such a thing as a free lunch

The $39 experiment

Participant: Tom Locke

Hypothesis: That writing random begging letters to companies might persuade them to send him free products.

Summary: Tom had a $39 roll of stamps, and he decided to see if he could grow this investment by writing to companies and asking for free stuff. So he sent letters like this one:

Dear Sir or Madam:
I have to tell you – I love your chicken. It's the best fried chicken around. The breading... I could eat a bucket full of just the breading. Breading and skin. That's the ticket! Anyway, your chicken is outstanding. If I weren't afraid of being arrested, I'd go to KFC to lick other people's fingers – that's how much I like your chicken. Please send me a coupon for a free chicken, so that I do not have to resort to licking strangers' fingers. Thank you in advance,
Tom Locke, fried chicken enthusiast

From 100 such letters, he got free stuff from 35 companies, at a total value of $275. He then auctioned the stuff online, and donated the proceeds to the American Heart Association.

Sweet enough already

Sugarfree for 30 days (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

Participant: StyleyGeek

Hypothesis: That cutting refined sugar out of her diet for 30 days would rid her of her psychological and physical addiction to desserts.

Summary: To hear her write about it, you would think she had discovered the key to eternal life. After a week or so of cravings, relapses, mental fog and tiredness, StyleyGeek adjusted to her sugar-freedom and has experienced the following benefits:

1. loss of junk food cravings
2. wanting to eat only when hungry
3. food tastes better
4. stable energy levels
5. unexpected weight loss

Do you really catch more flies with honey?

Testing a variety of pretty-coloured pest control substances.

Participants: L. Prism* and T. H. Morgan Cat, Institute of Pissing About.

Hypothesis: That you will catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

Summary: This study really speaks for itself. Especially the conclusions:

An indication of the flies' social standing can perhaps be gleaned from their preference for balsamic over cider vinegar, and brandy over Malibu, although this result is only marginally significant (pooled posh v common, p=0.06, binomial test). It should also be noted that even vinegar drew considerably fewer visits than the bin, and furthermore, at no point did any fly get stuck and die. We conclude that culinary seasonings make an ineffective substitute for conventional insecticide treatment.

Do you need your beauty sleep?

How to become an early riser

Participant: Steve Pavlina

Hypothesis: That becoming an early riser is just a matter of will power and clever tricks

Summary: Steve is a master of the weird-ass yet mysteriously practical experiment. In this series of posts (1, 2 and 3), he documents the way he turned himself from a night-owl to a morning person. In short, his strategy is this:

1. rehearse setting your alarm, lying down and getting up the second it goes off
2. use self-talk to tell yourself there is no arguing with the alarm clock
3. go to bed whenever you are tired
4. get up at the same time every day, including weekends

And simple as it sounds, it really works. I gave this a 30-day-trial myself, and it cured me entirely of my need (or even desire) to sleep to midday. Whether getting up that early is something you want to do to yourself—well that's a different question.