The One Thing Mindy Kaling Says Everyone Should Buy Before They Need It

Across the country, the class of 2018 is graduating, and there’s a whole crop of famous faces on deck to fill their heads with words of wisdom. Last weekend, Mindy Kaling returned to New Hampshire and her alma mater, Dartmouth, to give the new grads a dose of her helpful and hilarious advice. While her whole speech is worth a listen, there’s one particular nugget of truth we emphatically agree with.

After talking about how cold New Hampshire is in January, how Google didn’t exist when she was in undergrad, and making a requisite Dr. Seuss reference (“Did you know he was the editor of the Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern?”), she dives in to the “part of the speech where I am supposed to tell you something uplifting, like ‘follow your dreams.'”

While she discounts this as an ineffective way to actually make changes (“If all it took to make your life great was hearing amazing advice, then everyone who watched TED Talks would be a millionaire.”), we think this piece is something everyone who’s moving into their first home should heed.

This might be the most important—buy a toilet plunger. Trust me on this. Don’t wait until you need a plunger to buy a plunger.

I’m long past my first post-college apartment, but I made this mistake as recently as a few years ago when I moved to a new place. Thankfully, I was saved by a dollar store across the street, but waiting for that Amazon delivery would’ve been rough.

Should you realize your bathroom is currently plunger-less, this OXO one is $23 and highly rated on Amazon. Do that, and then watch the rest of Mindy’s address:

And while we’re at it, here are all your burning questions about plungers that we’ve tackled, like how to clean them, the right way to use them, and how to unclog a toilet without one, in case you don’t take Mindy’s sage advice.