My main take in this area is that reading HN/Reddit actively makes it harder to get the business done. Certain phone games seem way better.

My more general hypothesis is that generally reading interesting stuff is too engaging, and the brain needs to relax "just right".

I accomplish this brain offload in the shower. I’ve found some of my best solutions as shower thought.

Back in the day, old newspapers were used as toilet paper. It was a ceremony for my late cousin to cut the newspapers into blocks and neatly pack them in the outdoor toilet. You’d have a choice of some water from a bottle, and the old newspapers. A company of a few flies and no light. But when you went in there while the sun was out, reading whatever was on the cutouts was the obvious thing to do. Not just stare at the cracks in the wooden door in front of you.

I guess my diet/physiology must be different from y'all? I might be sitting down for 1 minute tops.

From an evolutionary perspective, this is a super vulnerable moment and are in a state of hyper vigilance.

There's also showering. (But I've taken to playing music in the shower with a waterproof boombox. Bluetooth'd from my phone, of course.)

And of course, sleeping. ;)

But there is something to this. Intuitive ideas come to you in the quiet moments.

But then how would I take the photo I need to feed my AI-powered fecal analysis agent?

Please sanitize your phone's back side each weekend. 70% ethanol or isopropyl alcohol works reasonably, although it won't kill everything.

There were (and still are?) bathroom reader books.

My parents leave copies of The New Yorker, Newsweek, and Nat Geo in their bathroom.

For those interested in some of the science behind the idea of “being bored is good”: the google-phrase you are looking for is “default mode network”.