Text guides
Start with the thing
you need done.
A useful request gives someone enough detail to help. Find an example, change the details, and use the checks to decide whether the answer is any good.
pingpong SMS is invite-only. You can use these examples with your current assistant while you wait.
Food and meals
Make a meal plan that accounts for the food you have, the people eating and the time before dinner.
- Batch cook when your freezer is small
- Put a complicated recipe into a workable order
- Plan dinner for people who eat different things
- Split a grocery list between two stores
- Plan dinners around what is already in your kitchen
- Plan packed lunches without a microwave
- Organize a potluck without six bags of chips
- Adapt a recipe to the pan you own
- Choose a restaurant without a twenty-message debate
- Turn leftovers into a different meal
Travel planning
Work through connections, packing and arrival details before you leave. Check the final plan against your bookings.
- Make a realistic plan for arrival day
- Compare flight itineraries beyond the ticket price
- Plan a day trip around the last journey home
- Ask a hotel the questions the listing leaves out
- Pack for the days you have actually planned
- Decide whether a stopover leaves time to go into town
- Make a rainy-day backup for a trip
- Prepare for a rental-car pickup
- Share a trip plan people can read on a phone
- Build a trip budget from the bookings you already have
Moving house
Turn a move into specific jobs, from measuring furniture to handing over the old keys.
- Build your own change-of-address checklist
- Decide what to keep before paying to move it
- Pack a first-night box for a move
- Check whether furniture will fit through the doorway
- Compare moving quotes on the same terms
- Make box labels that survive moving day
- Keep a pet out of moving-day traffic
- Build a room-by-room moving inventory
- Plan the photos to take before handing back keys
- Organize utility handovers for a move
Home upkeep
Keep track of household work and prepare useful questions for the people who maintain your home.
- Turn an appliance manual into a care checklist
- Ask better questions about a contractor estimate
- Organize a household photo inventory
- Make a home-maintenance calendar from the manuals
- Write instructions for a house sitter
- Prepare a shopping list for painting one room
- Compare repair and replacement for an appliance
- Describe a household fault before a repair visit
- Plan a seasonal clothing changeover
- Divide cleaning jobs in a shared house
Shopping decisions
Compare the details that affect whether a purchase will fit, arrive on time and cost what you expect.
- Compare home internet packages
- Choose laptop requirements before shopping
- Compare phone plans using your actual usage
- Compare used camera listings
- Make a gift shortlist that fits the person
- Prepare an online return
- Find the right replacement part number
- Check whether an order can arrive before an event
- Measure for a sofa before ordering it
- Choose a registry gift without buying a duplicate
Hosting and events
Plan the practical parts of getting people together: invitations, food, timing and a way home.
- Make a birthday-party run sheet
- Time a dinner party around one oven
- Ask for missing RSVPs without sounding annoyed
- Divide event jobs into volunteer shifts
- Write arrival instructions guests can follow
- Work out what to rent for an event
- Make a rain plan for a small event
- Write a useful travel note for wedding guests
- Outline a wedding speech around one real story
- Plan a reunion with room for people to opt out
Family logistics
Write down who is doing what so school days, visits and shared responsibilities take fewer messages.
- Compare after-school activities against the week
- Prepare a babysitter handoff
- Coordinate a shared family gift
- Organize visits for a relative who wants help
- Agree on practical house rules for a shared holiday
- Plan a family photo-sorting project
- Work out sleeping arrangements for a family visit
- Turn a school trip letter into a packing list
- Map out a school week's logistics
- Resolve conflicts in a family calendar
Life with pets
Prepare instructions, appointments and travel questions for the people who help care for your animals.
- Compare boarding options for your dog
- Write an introduction for a new dog walker
- Draft a clear lost-pet notice
- Prepare the house for a new pet
- Make a backup plan for pet care
- Organize pet expenses for the year
- Prepare questions about changing pet food
- Write a pet-sitter handoff from your routine
- Ask a travel provider about taking a pet
- Prepare questions for a vet appointment
Getting around
Compare routes and prepare for appointments, pickups and everyday journeys.
- Arrange an airport pickup without guessing the meeting point
- Describe a bike problem to a repair shop
- Prepare a brief for a car service appointment
- Organize a weekly carpool schedule
- Compare commute routes for your actual work hours
- Plan charging checks before an electric-car trip
- Compare parking options for an event
- Plan your first journey on an unfamiliar transit system
- Plan driving stops for a road trip
- Check the details before buying a train ticket
Time outside
Make a practical plan for a walk, garden project or weekend outing, with room to change course.
- Plan balcony containers around the space you have
- Plan the practical parts of a beach day
- Check camping equipment before leaving
- Make a simple plan for a community garden plot
- Choose garden jobs for one free weekend
- Research a walking route before choosing it
- Pack for a day at an outdoor event
- Check a park route for a stroller outing
- Plan a picnic you can carry on public transport
- Plan a walk for people with different walking limits
Work coordination
Give meetings, handoffs and decisions a clear next step without adding another long thread.
- Write a decision log entry from agreed facts
- Write a handoff before taking time off
- Turn a long work thread into a meeting agenda
- Cancel an unnecessary meeting with a useful update
- Extract actions from meeting notes
- Plan a new colleague's first week
- Explain a project delay without hiding the facts
- Prepare questions for a project kickoff
- Write a weekly update people can scan
- Plan a workshop with a clear output
Freelance and small business
Draft the messages and checklists that keep client work moving. Review terms and commitments yourself.
- Ask the missing questions in a client brief
- Turn client feedback into a revision list
- Prepare a client handoff checklist
- Plan a freelance week around committed deadlines
- Write a polite invoice follow-up
- Outline a portfolio case study from real work
- List the assumptions behind a project estimate
- Check a proposal for missing scope details
- Draft customer FAQs from questions you actually receive
- Prepare questions for a new supplier
Everyday writing
Find the words for a specific reader, whether you are asking for help or explaining a change.
- Write an apology with a concrete next step
- Ask for an introduction without putting someone on the spot
- Organize a complaint into facts and a request
- Decline an invitation without a long excuse
- Explain a change of plan clearly
- Rewrite an announcement in plain language
- Write a follow-up that says what you need
- Shorten an email without dropping the request
- Write a thank-you note with a real detail
- Ask someone for a recommendation
Learning and study
Build practice around what you need to understand, with ways to check your work.
- Compare courses using their syllabuses
- Find where a math solution went wrong
- Make flashcards from a set of definitions
- Practice a specific conversation in another language
- Plan practice for one unfamiliar software feature
- Make a practice quiz from your own notes
- Rehearse questions after a presentation
- Turn reading notes into questions worth discussing
- Fit skill practice into short sessions
- Make a study plan from the exam topics
Technology at home
Collect the details needed to troubleshoot a device, compare a setup or explain a problem to support.
- Make a checklist for checking your backups
- Work out what you need from cloud storage
- Write a support ticket from an error message
- Make a cable list for a home-office setup
- Prepare a new-device setup checklist
- Plan a phone-storage cleanup
- Prepare a printer troubleshooting brief
- Inventory the software subscriptions you use
- Check your setup before an important video call
- Describe a Wi-Fi problem to support
Paperwork and records
Organize documents and questions before you contact the organization that can actually change a record.
- Turn application instructions into a checklist
- Prepare documents for an administrative appointment
- Compare two versions of a document
- Follow up on a document you requested
- Choose a naming system for scanned documents
- Turn receipts into an expense summary
- Make an index of household records
- Make a routine for sorting household mail
- Draft a request to correct your name on a record
- Organize receipts and warranty records
Community and volunteering
Coordinate practical jobs for a group while keeping contact details and permissions with the people involved.
- Prepare book-club questions from the reading
- Outline a club newsletter from confirmed updates
- Summarize a community meeting for people who missed it
- Write a short community survey
- Plan sorting for a donation drive
- Get an accurate headcount for a group outing
- Plan a neighborhood cleanup
- Organize a shared-equipment borrowing log
- Write a handoff for the next volunteer
- Make a volunteer signup people can understand
Personal admin
Sort out small unfinished tasks with a clear request, a record of the answer and a next action.
- Review whether to renew a membership
- Draft a request to reschedule an appointment
- Arrange to return something you borrowed
- Keep gift receipts organized without spoiling surprises
- Make a methodical plan to look for a lost item
- Tell people about a change in contact details
- Collect details before calling customer service
- Review upcoming subscription renewals
- Sort a pile of unfinished personal tasks
- Put weekend errands in a sensible order
Creative projects
Get help with the next concrete step in a hobby project, from a scene outline to an exhibition label.
- Plan a craft-fair table layout
- Find a small next step in an unfinished creative project
- Draft a label for something you made
- Make a materials list for a hobby project
- Plan a music practice session around a difficult passage
- Make a photo-walk shot list
- Outline a podcast episode around one question
- Organize a personal recipe notebook
- Outline the next scene in a short story
- Write a short script for footage you already have
Plans that fit your needs
State the access, energy and communication needs that a generic plan often misses.
- Keep accessibility arrangements with travel confirmations
- Prepare a note about communication preferences
- Turn instructions into a readable large-print checklist
- Plan errands around a limited energy budget
- Ask about captions before a meeting
- Explain a form's wording in plain language
- Ask for a quieter setting for a meeting
- Check sensory details before an outing
- Ask a venue about the access details you need
- Ask for instructions in writing