The Brooks Review

When I snagged the Ferrosi pants for hiking, I knew I would need to grab a belt of some sort. The common style for hiking is a simple nylon web belt, but I went for something different in the Arcade Adventure Belt. This is a basically an elastic strap with a buckle. What’s neat about this is that it retains a lot of comfort, while allowing you to tighten the belt if you need to support your pants a little more.

Continue reading: Arcade Belt

This week: collaborating on ideas, and on editing — the iPad only excels in one of these two areas.

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When I switched from the Apple Airport routers, to a Netgear Nighthawk I was damned happy. It had good range and never failed me — I stopped even thinking about my WiFi network. But then Netgear failed to keep me safe, and lost my trust.

Continue reading: AmpliFi

If you read this site, then you know what Apple announced about the iPhone 8 and X models. But did you catch how they described the cameras? With the standard and plus model iPhones, it’s always been a “yeah the Plus has a bigger camera”, which allows us to do something like: optical image stabilization, and then later, dual cameras. Apple always side stepped the which camera is better debate, by not saying one was better than the other, but rather that since one was larger they could add more features. But the truth was always that the Plus had the objectively, and subjectively, better camera. Hands down.

Continue reading: A Unique Marketing Problem for Apple

This is a highly touted knife, and one which I always stayed away from for two reasons:

1. It’s large.
2. I thought it was right hand only.

When I found out that they made a left handed model (though only with black scales and in S30V steel), and coupled with my desire for a larger backup blade, I snagged one. I fully understand now why this knife is so well loved by everyone — it’s a fantastic knife.

But, I doubt I’ll keep it. Let’s dive into this knife…

Continue reading: Spyderco Paramilitary 2

This week: I take a look at iOS 11 Spaces and how it has grown on me; website support on iPads; and ask for your help on some iPad woes I’ve been having.

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Over the years I’ve referenced what bags I carry when I am out and about with the kids, when they were in diapers I called this my diaper bag, and now that they are out of diapers, but still not self-sufficient, it’s my dad bag. (Some of the older posts: here, here, and here.) The biggest struggle is not which bag, but what size bag you want to use for this purpose, and as the kids get older, I’ve found the decision is not any easier.

(Yes you can get buy without a dad bag, but then you rob yourself of two things: fewer tears, and getting to carry a great bag. So that’s pure madness.)

For those on Reddit, you might find me lurking around many subs and commenting here and there on posts, and I recently have been seeing many posts on this very topic, and frequently still get emails about this. I thought it was about time to write this all down and codify it for more people. So here’s my thoughts on how to choose a good dad bag for yourself, as well as what I use.

Continue reading: The Bag Advice: Dad / Diaper Bag

This week I take a look at how students and developers can drive the change towards greater iPad-only adoption. Then I dive into the hot topic of iPad ergonomics.

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Originally, I was going to post these as separate reviews, but I think they work best together. So be warned that this is three reviews of three knives, all of the same heritage from Bradford Knives.

Bradford’s Guardian line of fixed blades knives are available in four sizes, here I look at the 3, 4, and 5 series of knives. These range from a small everyday blade to larger survival blades. Each of the three blades are among the best fixed blade knives I’ve ever used.

Continue reading: Bradford Guardian Knives

Ok, hang on now. I know you’ve stuck with me through reading about a lot of random shit, and this seems like yet another. But, this is actually not about anything healthy for you as a person, as much as it is about my beloved Merino Wool shirts. You see, most non-natural deodorants tend to clog up the fabric on merino near the arm pits, and thus reduce performance.

So after a lot of reading and research, it seems that using a natural, non-bar, deodorant causes your merino to not only last longer, but perform better. And that’s a way better selling point if you ask me. But I also don’t want to stink, so in the name of science I’ve tried a few natural deodorants which perform well with Merino to see if they can actually — you know — keep the stink at bay.

Continue reading: Natural Deodorants

Diving into the Apple Pencil, picture-in-picture on iOS 11, and lastly why doesn’t my iPad pause audio when I get a call? So yeah, lots of nitpicking of iOS this week.

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For the majority of the life of this site, I’ve been a staunch OmniFocus user. Detailed and meticulously maintained systems for doing. I didn’t have, nor did I want, a list — I wanted platform from which I launched my projects.

That’s a fancy way of saying I scheduled time — I made tasks — for managing all my other time and my other tasks.

Continue reading: Things 3

Let me start by saying: these bikes are for young kids and they are really expensive. But, there’s a reason I am writing about them: they are absurdly good.

I think my daughter was 3 or 4 when we got her a bike. It was a Hello Kitty bike we snagged from Target, a while later we got my youngest a bike at 3, a Minnie Mouse bike from Target. These run somewhere around $100. They are heavy and basically like the bikes I had growing up. In other words, they are what I think of, when I think of “kids bike”.

Continue reading: Woom Bikes

I snagged an ENO Billow Air Lounger from REI during a sale, and took it with me camping with 5 young kids and three dads. I wanted to snag a hammock, but then I realized how potentially dangerous that would be as I had visions of kids flipping out of a hammock on the trip, so I stuck with this — it’s basically a ground hammock.

Continue reading: Eno Billow Air Lounge

This week I update you on my search for a 1Password replacement and talk about what Files.app really means for iOS. Or at least what it should mean.

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