The Brooks Review

Over this holiday break my iPad Pro setup changed. I had no intention of switching my setup, but a generous gift of an 11” iPad Pro upended my thinking. As I’ve written in the past, there was no real need for me to upgrade my iPad hardware, but that’s not to say that the new devices aren’t very nice.

So what happened next was simple, I decided to proceed with the 11” iPad Pro which had the base 64gb of storage (this is how I know first hand this is actually enough storage). I used that setup for a week and a half and sold off all my other iPads. And then, I changed my mind and swapped the 11” for a 12.9” model and since I was swapping I went ahead and increased the storage size for peace of mind down the road. So what I want to talk about this week is threefold: the 11” iPad size, the new 12.9” footprint, and some accessories I have added to my stable.

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I wrote a series of posts a while ago about my quest for finding better clothing for travel. That morphed into finding better clothing for everyday and all of that morphed into my launching a new site with my pal Steve, called Everyday Wear.

Continue reading: A Quick Update on Performance Clothing

If there was one knife I spent all of 2018 wanting, it was this knife: the Benchmade Proper. This is a fantastic looking knife and a bit of a modern take on an older knife style.

I’ve been using this knife now for about three weeks and I have fallen in love with it. It is fantastic, so let’s dive in.

Continue reading: Benchmade Proper 319

I am going all out for the snack pick this week, and I have to warn you that this might send you back in time a bit. This week I have a gluten free snack pick, which is always nice and inclusive. So this week it’s Mike and Ike Original Fruits.

Continue reading: Snack Pick of the Week – 1/14/19

I’ve long struggled with how to layout and ‘design’ my desk area. There’s two competing “best” ways to go about this: looks and ergonomics. And these are nearly mutually exclusive (you can’t have a beautiful desk which is also perfectly ergonomic), but I also have come to realize that I have been thinking about this all wrong. And, contrary to popular opinion, that the iPad is not the ergonomic nightmare most think it is.

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I have been seeing these pouches for quite some time now and figured it was about time I give one a try to see what the hype is all about. These are a heavy polymer substance (feels like soft non-sticky rubber) and have a single zipper across the top which is a weatherproof zipper with an oversized zipper pull. At each top corner there’s an eyelet to help with clipping the pouches to something.

Continue reading: Magpul DAKA Pouch

Since I am a day late this week, we have some ground to make up for. Thus, the easily forgotten, but always satisfying Keebler Deluxe Graham’s are the snack pick for the week.

Continue reading: Snack Pick of the Week: 1/8/19

It’s been a while since I wrote a full iPad Productivity Report, so for the new year I am back at it. This will be the first of many to come over the next couple of months as some big rethinks are in the works for me with my iPad Pro setup(s). Today I want to address a few things I am playing with: font management, space needs, Notion, and Vellum. And then at the end I want to touch on a few upcoming things with my setup.

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I see a lot of comments/tweets/posts about people who get a new GORUCK GR1 bag, and then are not exactly sure what they should do with it from there (other than use it). This post walks you through how I take on a new GORUCK bag and the steps I take to make it mine.

Continue reading: So You Bought a GR1, Now What?

This week brings us a new year and there’s only one way you should be ushering in a new year with your snacks. That’s by eating Entenmann’s Softees donuts, the variety pack which you buy for the cinnamon sugar donuts, but suffer through eating the others.

Continue reading: Snack Pick of the Week: 12/31/18

At the end of October, I started a little experiment. I stopped sleeping with my electronic devices in the same room as me. Specifically, that means my iPhone, and iPad(s). There’s a lot of research/studies/hypotheses around the impact devices have on our health, but there is one thing I believe in all those: the blue light from the devices is terrible for you at night.

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I reviewed a lot of products this year, and one thing I am always sensitive to is not leading people on a never ending chase towards ‘new and shiny’ for no reason other than it is ‘new and shiny.’ It’s the reason I try to keep my “best page” (for members) up to date: so that members always have a sense of what I find to be the best, no matter what I may be using/reviewing/writing about at any given time. To wrap up 2018, here’s a look back at the items I think were the best new items of the year, as well as other notables which fall into the best.

Continue reading: Best of 2018

Shortbread, specifically my grandfathers. Unfortunately I am not going to share his recipe, but I will give away one tip in it “butter, lots and lots of butter”. Nothing says the holidays to me like good shortbread cookies.

Continue reading: Snack Pick of the Week — 12/24/18

The snack pick for this week is an all time favorite of mine, Marie Biscuits, the round delicious tea time biscuits you always find in places you duck into in order to kill time. They are delicious, and of course you can snag them on Amazon.

Continue reading: Snack Pick of the Week: 12/17/18

Note: Tom Bihn sent me this bag for the purposes of this review.

Some time ago Tom Bihn released the Guide’s Pack, which looked like an old school hiking backpack, but with some modern treatments. The limiting factor with that pack, is that despite being quite good, it is far more at home in the woods than in the airport or city. That’s where this Shadow Guide comes in, the same basic design, but rethought to work better as a city and travel backpack.

Continue reading: Tom Bihn’s Shadow Guide