The Brooks Review

When I initially reviewed the Stuart & Lau Cary briefcase, I mentioned how it was, in a lot of ways, a modern take on the classic Filson Original Briefcase. Modern materials, layout and everything else.

As time has worn on I have come to the conclusion that the Cary is better, but the Filson has my heart.

Continue reading: Stuart & Lau Cary vs Filson Original Briefcase

This week: a smattering of thoughts on the parts of remote work no one talks about, screen time usefulness, iPadOS gestures, coincidences, and my pitch for you to wear better pants.

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I picked this watch up on Reddit for a really low price, and decided to give it a whirl as my go to weekend watch. I’ve had it I for about a month, and am moving on, but not because of any flaws with the watch itself. It’s pretty neat, and a heck of a deal.

Continue reading: Spinnaker Fleuss

I have been looking for a watch to compliment my others — something to wear 95% of the time from office to home. Simple, versatile, and basically what is referred to as a ‘tool watch’ — I always wanted to stay under $700. So I ended up getting this Armida A6, an homage to the Rolex Explorer which is currently very popular. The watch is fantastic, but it’s its own thing and ultimately, sadly, it doesn’t fit the bill for what I want.

Continue reading: Armida A6

This week: full iPad segregation, self-improvement the glorified hobby, Speedmaster wearers amirite, iconic watches, and Justin Blanton is blogging again.

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I’ve been needing to review this knife for a while. This is especially bad since I love Benchmade knifes and think they are one of the best knife companies out there — eat your hearts out Spyderco fans, Benchmade is superior. I’ll give you a simple reason: most Benchmade knives are ambidextrous, most Spyderco knives are made for right handed people.

Anyways, the ‘mini-grip’ as it is known is often heralded as one of the better, if not best, everyday carry knife options out there. It’s versatile, inexpensive (relatively), and well made. Let’s see how it stacks up…

Continue reading: Benchmade Mini-Griptillian

Many have been asking me to compare Tom Bihn’s new bag against the GR1 and the CPL 24 I recently reviewed, but those 1:1 comparisons can make it hard to remain in perspective of all the bags out there. So I think a better way to look at this is in the common context of use cases and what is best for those. I’ve broken this down to four categories, and let’s talk about which is best for each before we wrap up with an overall look at things. I’ve also limited this to just the Synik 22/30, CPL 24, and GR1 21/26 as those are the best backpacks on the market currently.¹

Continue reading: Synik vs GR1 vs CPL 24

1. Prove me wrong, seriously. ↩

This week: toggling Bluetooth, vibrating to keystrokes, what is harmful, a potpourri of computing notes, and 10 things about Houston.

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This week: why I no longer trust The Wirecutter, socks for sock less shoes, my thoughts on paper and pen note taking, Keyboard Maestro 9, iOS 13 thing I love, and Gruber wakes up.

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Note: Tom Bihn sent me these bags to gather early feedback, and allow me time to review them fully.

For almost a decade, Tom Bihn’s Synapse lineup of backpacks have found themselves among the top performers for true backpack nerds. I had my father review it last year and I posted my review a while later, but despite the fact that those are all recent posts — it’s been around.

The chief request of Tom Bihn over all those years of success with the Synapse has been: to make it a clam shell opening. You see with backpacks there’s three camps of people: those whose prefer top-loading backpacks (roughly what the Synapse is, but more Shadow Guide), those who prefer a full opening clam shell like the GORUCK GR1, and of course there are those with no preference who don’t actually qualify as backpack nerds. The Synapse always sat a bit in the middle, never quite satisfying any one group, but roughly working for every group. In that way it was clever.

Continue reading: Tom Bihn’s New Synik 22 and 30

This week: a reckoning for activity trackers, yep, iOS 13 reactions, iPad OS thoughts, my iPad workflow update, and lax enforcement.

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This week: where does my iPad usage stand, what is an expert, social media and moderating it, anxiety driven apps, and a touch of Silicon Valley ‘disruption’.

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As members are aware, I recently ordered a Whoop 3.0 activity tracker. This marks the first time I am dipping my toes back into activity trackers since I gave up my Apple Watch. So it is worth talking about what my hopes are, before we dive into this device/service and ultimately wrap up with general thoughts on activity trackers all together.

Continue reading: Whoop and Activity Trackers

This week: lack of swearing now, EDC cult, Amazon is testing my trust, Instagram is shady, and watches watches watches.

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We can blame this one on Postmates, but really it was only the straw that broke the camels back for me. Uber Eats, Door Dash, Postmates, Grubhub — all of them are completely shit services which are actually pretty sketchy and worrisome, so I am done with them.

Continue reading: I’m Done With Food Delivery Services