I was getting ready to take a trip and started packing up my GR1 for travel. I had been using it as my bag for rucking as well. And then I noticed it.
That smell.
Category: Articles
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Stop Messing About With Crap
A running theme on this site is how absurd some of my searches get when it comes to the cost of the single items I often find to be “the best”. A lot of people don’t see the point in spending $300 on a backpack, or $200 on a pair of pants, or even $30 for one pair of socks.
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iPad Productivity Report — 12/4/17
Circling back to iPad sizes, and an annoyance with Workflow to watch out for.
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Finding a New Watch
As I recently noted in my Apple Watch thoughts post, I am not a fan of wearing my Apple Watch — even when I work out. I noted in my Rucking post that I occasionally wear the Apple Watch for tracking my mile times, however I’ve moved to using Gaia GPS on my iPhone for that purpose and now I don’t use my Apple Watch at all.
For me, there’s nothing more appealing than putting a lovely mechanical watch on my wrist. I wear one almost all day long — typically only removing my watch when I shower. I have many reasons for this, but I tend to think you either already understand why you would do this, or you never will understand it — so I’ll leave it at that.
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iPad Productivity Report — 11/27/17
This week I look into iPads in classrooms, as well as my own note taking shifts *away* from the iPad, and give a quick nod to a new writing typeface and a new writing theme I am trying.
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iPad Productivity Report — 11/20/17
This week: how to avoid embarrassment when you are showing someone else something on your iPad screen, a quick reminder about a very hidden feature, and a tip on personal hotspots.
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iPad Productivity Report — 11/13/17
This week I take a dive into why iPads make for a less distracting operating system — and how I leverage the tools offered by iOS to make it even less annoying.
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State of Bags: The Best Choices to Make
*In lieu of the normal iPad Productivity Report, I present to you my “state of bags” report.*
Over the past year, I’ve tested and reviewed a bunch of new bags. This often leaves readers wondering: yeah but which one should *I* get? I hope to clear that up with this post, as these are the best choices you can make for a range of activities.
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Year of Gear: October 2016 – October 2017
This year has been a big year on gear reviewing side of things, as I’ve poured through a lot of stuff to try and find things worth owning. Below, are some of the very best things I found and reviewed this year:
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Tote Bags for Grocery Shopping
There was a recent change in local laws, this change means that grocery stores can no longer give patrons plastic bags, and they must charge $0.05 for each paper bag. The goal is to push people to use reusable bags, and for most, the 5 cent charge per paper bag is inconsequential but a little annoying.
But it pissed me off, naturally.
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iPad Productivity Report — 10/30/17
This week, a short note about dictation as a primary means of input.
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Rucking Gear
Since I posted about my Rucking workouts, I figured I should also post about the gear I use when I ruck. My list is still evolving, but I’ll go over what I use now and generally why I have that item.
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iPad Productivity Report — 10/23/17
A potpourri of thoughts this week from journaling, iPad mini, keyboard sharing, and even a tip for a change. Plus, as a huge bonus, I got to use the word potpourri twice.
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Thinking More About Apple Watch
Like many I had the first Apple Watch model and quickly fell to love it, then I hated, then I liked it, and now I am back to being rather ambivalent towards it. It seems that if you regularly used a watch *before* the Apple Watch, that you are much more prone to having mixed feelings about it. Whereas, generally, those who had no watch before the Apple Watch tend to like the watch much better.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this, especially with the impact of a new version of Apple Watch with LTE coming out. This solves a lot of the shortcomings, but doesn’t fundamentally change the value proposition for those who like “normal” watches.
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Rucking as a Workout
A eight months ago, I made a decision to start working out five times per week. Being the nerd I am, I started by trying many different work out apps on my phone, and they all sucked. Working out in your house is boring and lame was my conclusion. I started looking at local gyms, but since I don’t ever have any reason to drive somewhere during the day (I work from home) that seemed laughable at best.
There is a very large and nice wooded state park a short five minute walk from my front door. So I started to do short hikes in there on the rugged and hilly terrain. At first this was a casual walk, then I added a backpack since it was a good way to test them for my reviews. Then I added a bit of weight to get a better work out and quickly realized: well this is rucking.
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First Look: Meridian Dress Shirt from Bluffworks
Currently on Kickstarter for a few more days, the Meridian Dress Shirt is billed as the ultimate travel shirt. It boasts the standard set of travel dress shirt features: multi-day wear (because it is odor resistant), wrinkle free, breathable, and comfortable. Bluffworks sent me a non-final press sample, which arrived just a few hours before I left for a weekend trip. Here’s my initial thoughts on this new shirt.
I tested this shirt by wearing it while loading my car for the weekend, driving two hours and forty-five minutes, and then unloading the car. I hung it up, and put it back on a couple days later to again load the car, drive the car, and unload the car. Then I wore it for half a day at work (I got too warm with my t-shirt under it) and lastly I wadded it up and stuck it at the bottom of a pile of stinky clothes for the night. So basically, I abused the shirt pretty well in the short time I’ve had it.
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iPad Productivity Report — 10/16/17
An update on my file storage search, and thoughts on cellular iPads and FaceID for iPads. Also a quick question about a possible new member feature.
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Triple Aught Design’s Admin Panel
When I picked up the Triple Aught Design Azimuth backpack, I also snagged an Admin Panel to try and help organize the otherwise organizationaless Azimuth. It was almost an afterthought of a purchase for me, at $35 it’s hard to put too much consideration and I often just try stuff out at that price. I purchased it because it has a clip and rail system that is designed to work in Triple Aught Design packs (I can’t test this, but I suspect it might work in Outlier packs too).
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iPad Productivity Report — 10/9/17
This week, I want to tackle three areas: home screen layouts on iOS 11, those weird clipboard managers, and what to do when you have a shit ton of files to deal with. Let’s get started, this seems ambitious.
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Triple Aught Design Azimuth Backpack
One of the things I am constantly trying to find is a bag to be my “dad bag” — I’ve mentioned my high standards for such a bag before, but want to recap specifically what I am looking for:
- Something 10-20L in size.
- Something which can be packed down to fit inside a GR1/GR2.
- Something which can carry my kids coats in the winter.
- Something which is comfortable to carry all day.
The GORUCK Bullet Ruck 10L, is as close as I have ever come, but it’s hard if not impossible to bring it with you. The Outlier Quadzip came tantalizingly close, but the high price, and some framesheet discomfort left me to sell it too.