The dishes don't stand a chance against you now.
Your mission
Three Chores, Three Games
Turn three tasks you do at least three times a week into games with rules and three prize levels, play them for one full week, then tell a friend or housemate your best result.
Bonus challenge: Talk someone into playing the same three games and compare top scores on Sunday.
Pick the three most boring jobs in your week and turn them into games you want to play. You'll give each one rules, a prize and sometimes a dice roll, then play all week. Rope in a friend or housemate and compare wins on Sunday.
The dishes come back. So does the commute, the laundry pile, the same loop around the grocery store. This week you get to put rules on three of them and play instead of plod. Spend a few days noticing what keeps repeating, then pick your worst three and give each a game: collect something, race your own clock, let a dice roll choose your route, or hunt one new thing to notice. All you need is a notebook and a pen, and the first game can start tonight. Then it's you against your own best score, with someone to brag to. Short on game ideas? Borrow a few side quests to try when you're bored.
The dishes still have to be done. But when drying them is a race against your own best time, or the grocery run becomes a hunt for one ingredient you've never cooked with, you stop waiting for the hour to be over. The boring parts of the week are the ones nobody has claimed yet, so you may as well claim them.
Top gear to make this quest great.
Pull it off
Writing your games and wins by hand sticks better, and pocket-size means it's with you when a round starts.
Real dice give you genuine surprise, and rolling before you set off makes the game feel official.
Your reminders go on the dish rack, the key hook and the coat pocket so you remember to play.
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Good news: you can start tonight with what's already in a drawer. Essentials: a pocket notebook you'll actually carry, a pen, and a few sticky notes for reminders where you switch to autopilot. Handy extras: a set of polyhedral dice (d4 through d20) if you like letting chance pick your route, and a free habit app like Habitica if a climbing streak on your phone keeps you playing. If a game sends you out to take photos, stay on public sidewalks and ask before shooting anything on private property.
A good quest stays a good story. These are general notes; your gear's manual, the venue's rules and local law come first.
You can't make a game out of something you haven't noticed. Over the next week, jot down every task that keeps coming back: dishes, commute, laundry, dog walk, the wait at the bus stop. Add roughly how long it takes, how often it happens, and a 1 to 10 score for how much it bugs you. Ten minutes of scribbling, spread out.
Read back the week and circle anything you do three or more times weekly that scored 6 or higher. Those are your contenders. Choose exactly three: enough to feel like a game, few enough that you'll keep playing. Announce them to whoever you live with, because a game somebody else knows about is a game you actually show up for.
Now the good part. Give each task one of four styles: Collection (gather something, like a photo of every odd door on your walk), Time Trial (beat your own clock), Randomizer (dice pick a detail), or Discovery (find one new sound, smell, texture, color, movement or temperature). Then set three prize levels: an easy win, a solid win, and one worth bragging about.
Stick a note where you flip to autopilot: the dish rack, the key hook, your coat pocket. Then play all three games this week. Dishes, but against the clock. The grocery loop, but hunting one thing you've never bought. Afterwards, two minutes in the notebook is enough to mark what you got, no essay required.
By the second week the same route gets stale, so give chance a turn. Roll a d6 for which aisle you explore first, or a d20 for how many blocks you detour on the walk home. Always roll before you set off, never while driving. A d4 for small calls, a d20 when you want the game to get a bit ridiculous.
Come Sunday, compare notes with your housemate, friend or whoever's been listening to you talk about the dish-rack time trial all week. Call out your best score, show the photos you collected, name the strangest thing you noticed. Any game that bored you gets dropped without guilt, and the ones that made you grin get a rematch next week.
You just took the three dullest jobs in your week and gave them rules, prizes and a Sunday scoreboard. Tell someone your best score and dare them to beat it.
You bring the curiosity. We've found the tools.
Pull it off
Writing your games and wins by hand sticks better, and pocket-size means it's with you when a round starts.
Real dice give you genuine surprise, and rolling before you set off makes the game feel official.
Complete set of gaming dice (d4, d6, d8, d10, d12, d20) in metal or resin
Get on Amazon · $18.99 — Polyhedral dice set with carrying pouchwhat to look for & our pick →
Your reminders go on the dish rack, the key hook and the coat pocket so you remember to play.
Get on Amazon · $6.99 — Sticky notesdetails & deals →
Only if a climbing streak on your phone keeps you playing; the free tier does everything these games need.
Gamified habit tracking apps with RPG elements and accountability features
what to look for & our pick →RELATED GEAR GUIDE
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Where this one naturally leads next.
Let the dice decide. You just have to go.
Grab a friend, a handful of dice and a stack of index cards, and build a little machine that decides your free afternoons for you. Then roll it. Whatever comes up, you go do it, with one silly rule attached and ten minutes to figure out the plan.
Your commute is now a quest. Your coffee run? Boss battle.
Transform mundane routines into XP-earning adventures. Learn to build your own life gamification system with quests, rewards, and progression tracking.
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