Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A better way to tie gym shorts (or any drawstring) [video]

youtube.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 198 posts

Re: A better way to tie gym shorts (or any drawstring) [video]

#171

Post by giardini »

altairprime wrote: post #100
ricardobayes wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It somehow reminded me of this: (How to open a door - Finnish instructional video from 1979) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wof0xPUmW38

I’ve spent decades learning to enter and exit doors more efficiently for motivated to apply the principle of martial arts ‘flowing movements’ to everything and found this video charming and accurate. In a climate with -20C temps outdoors every wall second you have a door open translates to fractions of a firewood heating log, so teaching good door etiquette conserves energy waste. But even where it’s not an environme…

altairprime says ". But I also only tie my shoes once and never again, courtesy of elastic laces,..."

Hell, I only tie my shoes once a week if that! I must be a effing kung fu fool! Still, watching the video and especially reading the comments really made me laugh!

Honestly, such endeavors are likely excessive. Time spent optimizing your body's movement is probably time better used elsewhere. Nonetheless it is your time! And there's always dance, mime, drama, yoga, etc. And there are exceptions, e.g., in the military there's often a need to do something like "move 20 fully-armed men inside a door in 10 seconds" or "get 15 men to awaken, take their morning constitution and dress in 16 minutes."

My father told me the Marines taught them how to do everything, even wipe their ass. I don't know if that was part of inspection.

Re: A better way to tie gym shorts (or any drawstring) [video]

#172

Post by giardini »

someguyiguess wrote: post #67
varenc wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could also say life is too short to waste time retying inferior drawstrings. If learning the knot takes 5 minutes, it seems like it could easily save you time overall.

If you're spending that much time tying drawstrings I think you've got bigger problems.

Maybe he's a "back-door man"!

Re: A better way to tie gym shorts (or any drawstring) [video]

#173

Post by arijun »

saintfire wrote: post #169
arijun wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My problem with it isn't what he calls it, it's that he claims to have invented it. It would be fine if he said, "yes, other people have been using this knot for decades, but I like to call it Ian's knot." Would it bother you if I started re-wrote the Wikipedia article on the hot dog in an attempt to convince everyone I invented it? And if people started believing that?

I read that exact preface on his site before learning and adopting it (the secure knot, specifically, but the preface is on both). https://www.fieggen.com/shoelace/ianknottech.htm

It’s great that he has that caveat, but it’s buried under the “Tech Info” tab. Meanwhile, the header says “yes -- I'm the inventor,” and there is no mention of the knots actual history in the “History” page, only how he “invented” it.

Re: A better way to tie gym shorts (or any drawstring) [video]

#175

Post by jasondigitized »

imglorp wrote: post #107
grimgrin wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got through an entire day yesterday in massively oversized gym shorts, by simply forming a standard loop, and wrapping it _twice_. That extra friction (the second wrap) has worked for years on shoes, boots, and, very large shorts I will not be learning a fancy knot because I have no need

The difference is the Ian Loop is adjustable.

What needs adjusting? My waist size is not dynamic.

Re: A better way to tie gym shorts (or any drawstring) [video]

#176

Post by m463 »

wccrawford wrote: post #45

I did this for a while after seeing that video, but after some of my shorts ended up tightening into a knot that I couldn't get loose easily, I gave up on it. I instead just use the "Ian Knot" that I use to tie my shoes. It's very quick, I already use it all the time anyhow, and it rarely goes wrong. (Sometimes, I think I end up with an end through a loop accidentally, and have to fix it.) Learning this extra knot di…

not the ian secure knot?

Re: A better way to tie gym shorts (or any drawstring) [video]

#177

Post by turbocon »

bccdee wrote: post #98
turbocon wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've spent waaay to much time thinking about this over the past few years and have really gotten into knots. Personally I'd say you need to classify the type of knots you want to learn and pick one knot from each. The classics in my opinion are 1. End loop 2. Mid loop 3. Hitch (opposite of an end loop) 4. adjustable loop 5. Bend (rope to rope) My suggestions in order are # End Loop 1a. Bowline (snap variant) - This i…

An aficionado! Have you heard of the jam hitch (ABOK #1727)? Grossly underdiscussed IMO—I only discovered it earlier this year. It tightens like a zip tie, and (in kitchen twine at least) I've found the string will snap before the loop slips open again. It's quickly become my most-used knot, day to day. I like to tie it with the second turn inside the first (like #1855 as opposed to #1856). https://www.reddit.com/r/k…

O that's really interesting, I've been using a constructor knot for this use case, but that does require more string than this method. Really clever reversal of a midshipmens knot

Re: A better way to tie gym shorts (or any drawstring) [video]

#179

Post by tbossanova »

Austiiiiii wrote: post #105
VBprogrammer wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Knots in general are a harmless and occasionally useful pasttime for many people. In fact I have a length of rope under my desk I will occasionally pick up and practice a few useful knots in just to keep them in my muscle memory. It's similar in many ways to people who solve rubix cubes or play with fidget spinners.

And you never know when they'll come in handy! As a negative proof, I recently found myself trying desperately to remember how to tie a bowline hitch to stake down some garden stakes, and something in the "out of the hole, around the tree, back into the hole" was just not happening for me. Ended up just quadruple knotting and praying.

If you can’t tie a knot, tie a lot

Re: A better way to tie gym shorts (or any drawstring) [video]

#180

Post by altairprime »

giardini wrote: post #171
altairprime wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve spent decades learning to enter and exit doors more efficiently for motivated to apply the principle of martial arts ‘flowing movements’ to everything and found this video charming and accurate. In a climate with -20C temps outdoors every wall second you have a door open translates to fractions of a firewood heating log, so teaching good door etiquette conserves energy waste. But even where it’s not an environme…

altairprime says ". But I also only tie my shoes once and never again, courtesy of elastic laces,..." Hell, I only tie my shoes once a week if that! I must be a effing kung fu fool! Still, watching the video and especially reading the comments really made me laugh! Honestly, such endeavors are likely excessive. Time spent optimizing your body's movement is probably time better used elsewhere. Nonetheless it is your t…

I have something even more useless! After fifteen years of trying to catch things when I drop them, I started catching things when I drop them. I’m not less clumsy now, but there’s no better feeling than dropping something, casually grabbing it out of midair with a conserved-motion movement, and then going back to whatever without an annoying interruption. I’m a bad fit for that particular military but, like, they do understand the effects of drilling in habits until they’re reflexive.

Some hobbies are really excellent for generalists, because you can apply the one learning-training method to any number of bizarre or intentional circumstances that life hands you. I’m currently working on ‘select heavier than average apples with a single toss and catch each at the grocery store’ and, no joke, some guy at the store complimented this. I’m sure they were hitting on me but they noticed. Made my day. It’s the hobby that keeps on giving. (I have so far only dropped one apple and, yes, I bought the poor bruised thing.)

Other fun hobbies in the category: Diagnostic guessing, Balancing stuff, Vehicle operation, Packing efficiently (rather than most compactly), Knots (which are critical to textile and bodily repair both), Folding (or as Calvin might call it, dimensional transmogrification), Echolocation mapping (you can practice while sitting in a cafe).

At the core of this is learning how to learn, and then dedicating yourself to doing that somehow, no matter how pointless whatever hooks your attention might seem to others. I figured out at one point how to alter my visual perception frame rate to slow down and stall, just for a moment, a spinning (on high) ceiling fan’s blades. I can never get them to stand perfectly still but insomnia is cruel and the nights are long, and it’s fun to imagine what my brain is doing to brainwave sync rates across my visual cortex to make this work. (If seizure-prone, maybe don’t try this alone.) Unexpectedly, even this has had a practical value: when a passenger in trains or cars, I can consciously relax my eye muscles now and let the landscape motion blur by rather than saccade-focusing constantly. Hooray!

Every useless hobby skill has an unforeseen opportunity to be valuable :)

Post reply on HN