I bought cast iron pan which I think is the best ever purchase I made.
without a ton of thought, and other than my current house:
-
travel, in general. recently a trip to sail out of svalbard down to norway. it’s another world up there
-
an inexpensive handtruck is one of the most useful tools i have
-
a ‘prosumer’ grade espresso machine and a grinder is used and loved every single day
-
Steam Deck - I know I’m not supposed to promote a specific product (change SD to a handheld gaming device if you must), but after my son was born, moved to a different country and changed jobs my life was rather hectic. I had no time to play videogames at all, which was my go-to method to unwind since I was a little kid. As an almost 40 years old responsible adult I can now still enjoy gaming in bite sized bursts, in bed, instead of scrolling through social media or watching mindless videos. The best thing is I can be next to my SO while she does something else I can work through my backlog.
- Bidet
- Leatherman Micra pocketknife - all I need for most things
- Ebike with a front platform - helps transport
- Acoustic Bike with trunk bag - a trunk bag has a surprisingly large amount of space
- Ortlieb panniers - add to the bikes only on an as needed basis
- Instant Pot - it does miracles with legumes, meats, and a large variety of other dishes
- Instant brand Air fryer - we’re working w/o a vent right now so we got this to provide an oven replacement
- IKEA wardrobe - configured and used as a pantry
- Large (40L) backpack with good suspension - great for all sorts of travel
The original Guild Wars released in 2005. Damn that was an awesome purchase. Insane number of hours for the money spent.
Soldering Iron, the amount of money you will save from fixing your own stuff is ridiculous.
How much will I save from burning my hand… again
But genuinely, that’s rad, I’m happy it’s working out for you lol. Stay safe :)
- Kettle barbecue
- Charcoal pit + rotisserie
- Air fryer
- Small benchtop induction cooker
The top two have resulted in some of the tastiest meat I’ve ever cooked. I chucked away my gas barbecue recently. The bottom two are just way more efficient (and environmentally friendly, with my solar) for small meals, rather than the natural gas hob and/or big electric oven.
Foodie alert! Haha but I love my little kettle barbeque
Edit: nevermind, I saw induction and thought convection.
A decent blender. Not anything industrial like a Vitamix, it’s a Magimix which was about half as much but still durable and has replaceable parts. It’s fine for what I need and is lasting much longer than the pile of crap I had before.
Vacuum pack bags for clothes is another one. I like to keep my wardrobe seasonal but I don’t have much space, so packing it down helps.
Also anything reusable: PTFE/silicone baking sheets, rechargeable batteries, reloadable floss handles. All of these have saved recurring purchases, money over time and reduced waste (which made me feel good.)
These are some items which I have purchased. which I’ve gotten alot of practicality and enjoyment out of
-
oculus quest 2
-
alliexpress h61 lga 1155 motherboard
-
aoc gm500 mouse
-
stadia midnight blue controller
-
i7 3770
-
macbook air 2012 4gb
They’ve served me well especially that little old but still gold quadcore and the motherboard highly recommend it to anyone looking to build a gaming beast would combo well with 16gb,rx 570
-
Noise cancelling headphones. My work requires a lot of air travel and I have trouble with loud noises in general. I bought a pair a year or so ago for just under $70 and it’s as good or better than the more expensive one ($150 refurbished) I got in 2017. It also has a mode to let the external sound through if someone is trying to talk to you.
It really does eliminate some of the annoyance of air travel.
May I ask which model you got?
Soundcore Q30.
I’m like 85% certain mine are responsible for my tinnitus, so I’d have to rate mine as worst purchase of all time.
That’s awful! I’ve heard that tinnitus is an absolute misery.
Off the top of my head no particular order:
- Proper mop bucket like heavy duty on wheels. Mopping takes minutes now, nothing has worn out in years, very little waste.
- Proper broom, not plastic. Got tired of all the waste from plastic ones wearing out so quickly. I got one of these and it is an amazing buy it for life kind of thing.
- Bidet
- An IDGAF pocket knife. All those times when I was young and just needed a vaguely knife-shaped piece of metal but dad was like “don’t hammer that knife into that rock you’ll damage the blade” or “don’t hammer that knife into the can of beans” or “don’t hammer that knife into the deer skull you found” well now IDGAF. Sturdy, cheap, doesn’t matter it it holds an edge or stays clean.
- A Dremel. I don’t have a lot of space and this thing is great for cutting random things I don’t have real tools for.
- Respirator and impact goggles. Originally bought for going to protests but I’ve found they’re just fantastic around the house. Don’t want to breath in murder chemical while cleaning an oven? Or microplastics from sawing your latest art project in half? What about “This Dremel blade might explode if I use it like this and I don’t want to lose my eyes”?
- Yak tracks, they work. I’m getting too old to fall on ice and walk it off.
- The right shoes for the job. Walking shoes, climbing shoes, hiking boots, brown leather heels for construction work, eight inch black leather stilletos for getting attention, blue suede boots for getting attention, six inch pink platform boots for getting attention, blue gogo boots for getting attention. They’re all crucial to my day to day.
- Cats. They keep the sad away, works great.
- Jars everywhere. You can store spices, leftovers, paperclips, q tips, an array of rocks for making minis, paints, pepper ferments. They are so versatile and easy to clean I have maybe 150 or so of them currently.
- Air fryer. Didn’t think I’d like it but I’m a convert now they’re great.
- A growing collection of glues. I don’t know why but the ability to properly fuse shit together unlocks so many possibilities. This is a new discovery for me.
- A growing collection of solvents. Like the reverse of glue the ability to clean things in specific ways is great.
- Metal wire shelves. They’re versatile, sturdy, relatively cheap, easy to break down and transport if you’ve been averaging a move a year for ten years.
- A small sewing kit. Great for small repairs. I’ve added years to some of my dresses by catching weak points early and doing 10 minute fixes.
- Proper electric toothbrush. Even the fanciest ones are cheaper than dental work.
- Lastly, a bin of compost in your living room because you live in a city and don’t have much access to dirt. Feed it very slowly so it doesn’t rot. Keep roly polies in there, they’re cute, and springtails to prevent mold, they’re also cute. When you feel sad about living in a cement and steel environment just crack that thing open and pretend you’re looking at a forest floor. Dig around a little see how the worms are doing. Bother your nesting partner by grabbing fistfuls of it and loudly exclaiming “dirt smells great today really earthy!”
Edit to add, how could I forget this? I just got home and in my entryway there is an 18 unit locker like the kind you would find during a Bed Bath going out of business sale and they’re getting rid of everything including the employee lockers in back, you know the ones. I’m poly so each of my partners and my nesting partner’s partners get to pick their own locker to keep overnight supplies in. There are unclaimed lockers for guests to store small things, and some that are effectively house mandatory junk drawers. Also serves as a lost and found when like partners leave phone chargers or whatever else behind. Great purchase.
Small foldable bathtub. When I say small, I mean still big enough to drown myself if I wanted to.
Along with that I also bought a suction cup phone holder for cars that I put on the wall. Hands free YouTube videos while soaking in almost boiling water.
40 bucks total for a simple but nice comfort
stand mixer. i make bread like no ones business. and a warm coat (i bought one at a hardware store lol) and nice warm boots.
adult bib.
Context?
Why not just a napkin
Kuru brand shoes. I’m on my feet for 12 hours shifts and I actually have zero foot pain, they’re amazing. Also I have extremely high arches, and the Kuru Quantums are the first shoes I’ve ever owned in my entire life that I don’t have to add orthotic arch supports.
I buy a new pair twice a year.
Do checkout this brand “bata”. I was told that these are better than kuru.
Thanks, I’ll avoid them like the fuckin plague if they only last six months!
They really named their shoe brand after the disease you get from eating human brain?
3d printer. I can make custom things that just can’t be bought fairly easily.
My washing machine’s motor went out while it was full of water. I designed and printed an adapter that let me manually run the pump that drains the washer off of a cordless drill and successfully drained the washer. (Actually, the adapter broke in the middle, but I had the foresight to print a few spares. It only took a couple to drain the whole washer.)
A lot of the other stuff I print is custom wall mounts for things. A Raspberry Pi NAS that hangs on the wall, a mount for a SAD lamp, a mount for my Nintendo Switch Joycon charging base, etc.
Where did you buy your 3d printer and how much does it generally cost to get one?
I personally use and recommend a Prusa i3, which I bought the kit for directly from Prusa for for mine. It’s a bit more expensive than something like an ender but strikes the best balance for price to performance and reliability - Not super cheap at $700 but but definitely worth it in my experience from the quality and lack of trouble alone
Prices can vary wildly depending on how simple or advanced you go. A classic, tried-and-true Ender 3 can be found for $100 in some places, and something like a Bambu X1 Carbon can go for $1,400.
If you’re just starting out and don’t want to invest most of your free time to tweaking and maintaining a bare ones printer, look into something like the Bambu P1P. Not top end, definitely not low end, and does a lot of the tedium for you so you can go right into enjoying 3D printing.
Oh wow! I wasn’t expecting them to go as cheap as $100. I’m definitely getting one then, thanks!
Just be aware that these $100 printers are great if you want a HOBBY. If all you want out of a 3d printer is a tool to print things, plan to spend more.
The cheap ones need a lot of time tinkering and you’ll easily spend more time printing parts for the printer than printing anything else.
Atoro’s answer is pretty much what my response would be, but I figured I’d add a little more here.
I have an Ender 3 Pro that IIRC I spent about $250 on and an Ender 3 V2 Neo for about $285 (both made by the company “Creality”). I’m a huge fan of both and would recommend Creality any time. Most of Creality printers are really solid performers but without a ton of upgradeability or bells and whistles. In other words, really good beginner printers but also with limited upgradeability. They’re quite “plug and play” in the sense that you can unbox it, assemble it (the instructions are simple and straightforward), and and be printing in like 2 hours. You will for sure have to learn how to maintain your printer (replace a nozzle, configure the z-probe offset, etc), but there are so many resources for that and the processes aren’t terribly complex.
If you want any fancy features (multiple extruders so you can print complex things with multiple colors, faster printing, support for harder-to-print materials like HDPE, really high resolution, etc), there are of course options out there.
In general, I’d say before getting a printer, definitely spend some time doing research first. If you haven’t learned at least the basics, it’s easy to end up with a printer that’s hard to use or whatever.
I said I have two printers; I lied. I have three, but the third one is half-disassembled gathering dust on a shelf. I got my first printer second-hand and immediately fucked it over to the point of unrepairability. Lol. It wasn’t all a loss. I did learn a ton trying to fix it. But I do wish I’d done more research before I bought one.
There are tons of videos on YouTube that are great primers on the basics of 3d printing. They’ll have you salivating about all the cool things a 3d printer will let you do as well. And if you have issues with your printer, there are lots of communities to ask for help. And my experience has been that even maintenance info doesn’t need to be learned before you get the printer. It’ll chug along for quite a while before it starts needing maintenance.
Beyond that, the only thing I can think to say is that when I upgraded to a printer that had automatic bed leveling with a z-probe, I immediately decided I’d never mess with a printer that didn’t have it. It seems at first blush like it’s probably non-essential, but my experience has been that without a z-probe, you can’t use but a small portion of your print bed, which limits what you can do with your printer quite a bit.
If you do decide to embark on 3d printing, all the luck to you! I’ve found it extremely rewarding!
