I mentioned my Rocketbook on my recent experience fighting to exist. I then realized – I should review this. It’s super useful and people don’t even know it exists. Well I just gave away the gist of my review – I like my Rocketbook. I happen to like it a lot. I use it a LOT. In my job I have a PC rather than a laptop these days, which means when we got to a conference room – I have to *gasp* write things down. I know. So uncool. So low tech. So cliche. I hate using notebooks upon notebooks of paper. I never know what to do with them after the page has been used. Do I use a bookmark? Fold the page I’m on? How do I go back and reference my notes after I made them? More bookmarks? Post-it Notes along the side of the notebook? I hate them and I have for years, but for
Technology
Review: Xiaomi Fitness Tracker & Watch
I had a fitbit long time ago (like first generation fitbit). I ordered a Pebble 2 when they did their Kickstarter. I have a Huawei watch sitting on its charger. I love the data I get from fitness trackers. It tickles the nerdy data-bone in my brain. I wanted a heart rate tracker if I got a new one. I hated the price of most of them – the cheapest fitbit with heart rate tracking is $70 and it really doesn’t do much (the “Inspire” just doesn’t inspire me). Apple watch was outright out since I’m not a big Apple user and it’s ridiculously expensive. There ARE some other brands (Samsung being the other big name and a few like Garmin that made me chuckle). The biggest complaint I have with most of these toys is one thing: size. Especially if the brand wants me to wear it at night, I want something without too much size or weight. I
Tech: Tablet… upgrade?
Within 30 minutes of posting my previous tablet piece, Eli messaged me “you know, there’s an apple store right by my office” He also convinced me to go with wifi-only model, with the promise that if I really, truly miss/need LTE we’ll look at adding a wifi hotspot to our cell phone plan. So that night he brought me home my new ipad mini (there really wasn’t much competition, it was a matter of convincing myself to just bite the bullet). So it’s been two weeks – what do I think? So with the money we saved on the wifi-only option, I got a case and a crayon. The crayon is a very nice stylus. The case does exactly what I want – protect my ipad and give me a real keyboard. Thus far it’s been great, the bluetooth has connected without issue. My only complaint with either is he ability to know how much battery is left (this is
Baby Stuff: Monitor
Baby Monitors are insane. Ridiculous. We were super lucky that some friends gave us their baby monitor to help us get started. It was less than a year old and really has given us a chance to see what is good and bad in a baby monitor. And there are some ridonkulous baby monitors out there in the market. Now, why am I looking at the market? Well, as we’re beginning to transition Remy to his crib (he’s outgrowing the bassinet already) we’ve run into a snag (apparently common with the monitor we were given) where the parental unit battery doesn’t hold a charge and doesn’t want to charge. Quite a few Amazon reviews complain the battery sucks after a year or so. So it goes 2-3 hrs (withOUT video) and is dying. And you have to basically hold the charging cord in to get it to charge. This wasn’t an issue when we really only used the monitor during
Tech: The Tablet Hunt
My tablet is dying. I have finally had to admit it doesn’t hold much charge, the bluetooth keyboards can not manage to stay connected (yes, I have 2 and both of them are in bad shape too). I do NOT want to do this, but Eli is pretty sure my tablet was purchased in 2013 or 2014…. which means it’s well past “expected life” for tech – much less a tablet. Hell, it’s on Google 6.0 and can’t be updated anymore (I could probably jailbreak it and maybe get another version on there, but I’m also afraid this would brick the thing). So I need a new tablet. Unfortunately, there isn’t a tablet on the market I’m excited about. What I have now: To understand what I’ve had for the past ~6 years, it’s a Nexus 7, 32GB version with LTE access through T-mobile. The Big Problem My current tablet is 7″ and has been the perfect size for me.
Review: Early Access Games
There has been a been hullabaloo in the gaming world lately over “Early Access Games.” This is really on the tails of a larger conversation of “unfinished releases” which are more and more common. Just go watch some early reviews of Fallout 76 or Call Of Duty: Black Ops 4 – and their “day-one-patches” which are basically the same size as the game itself. I’ve played a good handful of Early Access games. I always go in knowing they are a gamble. They are promises from the developer that they will finish, but “finishing” a project is a mutable idea. I’ve worked on several projects where the line of “done” moved back and forth for damn good reasons – you run into a hurdle that you just don’t have the time or money or energy to meet the original line. Or you moved the line and then had to move it back again. The bad about Early Access (EA for short)
Review: Adblocking
I have an adblocker. A lot of news sites (mostly news sites) I really like have started doing the “oh no! we see you have an adblocker. Please turn it off so we can get revenue!” like I am doing something wrong or unethical. You want the revenue back? Talk to your ad providers who allow malware to sneak through their ads. I have an adblocker because I got a trojan. I don’t know where either. But a long time (like 5-7 years) ago I was just doing my usual jaunts through a few webpages and I got a trojan on my pc. Fortunately, my antivirus caught it, quarantined it, and removed it. But I was sitting there thinking “I didn’t click on anything.” A co-worker at the time explained how trojans were being hidden on ad-cookies. ADS. So I went and got an adblocker and I’ve used it ever since. And I haven’t had a trojan since. So much like “I
Dream by Day 