An oversized poncho cape from the local Goodwill. It was woven in different shades of blue and while I’d never wear it outside, I’ve used it as a wearable blanket at home for a few years now.

I found out it was actually hand made, and costs 300+ USD from the original shop. Bonus points, I feel like a wizard when I wear it

Got a bidet as a joke gift for Christmas a few years ago, it has been an absolute game changer. Hate pooping anywhere but home now, I actually feel clean, and use much less toilet paper.

Bed sheet suspenders. Dumb problem, stupidly cheap, horribly made, and ABSOLUTELY fixed the friggin sheets being yanked off the corner of the bed twice a night by my tumble-dry-medium sleeper of a spouse.

When they finally broke after almost 2 years I sewed some that’ll last 10 years and I don’t regret them at all.

A burr grinder for coffee beans. I thought coffee snobs were full of shit. I was wrong.

Scooter. Not an electric one. I had a thought once “hey I did ride one in childhood, maybe it can be a bit of nostalgic fun from time to time”. Got myself the cheapest Chinese thing I could find, “no point investing too much into a fad”.

Turned out a scooter is absolute peak urban mobility. Short distances become much shorter. Mid-long distances become short. Granted, for a longer trip somehow the time gains diminish, probably because it’s not as efficient as a bike. But a scooter isn’t a long-hauler. It’s there to zip through an empty mall. It’s there to be folded up in a second and brought into a bus or a shop without being a hassle. It’s like 3-4 kg, not too fast for sidewalks but fast enough for bike roads, extremely easy to stop, doubles as a cart when carrying bags of groceries home.

The chinese one broke after 1 season because I was riding it everywhere. Then I got myself one from a better company, I chose it for small weight and portability. It’s technically children’s thing but I’m well below weight tolerance and also smol so it’s easy to handle. It’s already like a 5th year and whenever it’s not raining or too cold I ride it for shopping, errands, leisure walks, to work… Almost daily.

Bug zapper flyswatter. Like you can buy at Harbor Freight for a few bucks. It might not be a terribly effective solution to the overall fly population, but in terms of grim-bloody-vengeance-per-dollar, it’s one of the best investments I’ve ever made.

Custom-made ear plugs. Even if you only wear ear plugs occasionally (I do when in a noisy hotel, or when a neighbor goes a bit too crazy), they are so worth having.

Basically you go to an audiologist and they put something kinda liquid in each of your ears to take a mold of your ear canals. A couple of weeks later, you have plastic earplugs that have the exact shape of your inner ears.

Upsides: • They work, always. I would typically use wax or silicon disposable ear plugs before that, and sometimes in the middle of the night they might move and let the sound in; those don’t. Also, foam disposable ear plugs don’t stay in my ear, don’t ask me why. • They never hurt. Since disposable ear plugs get shoved into your inner ear until they take the shape, they continuously push against the walls of your ear canals. I would often feel kinda bruised after using them for a long time. • They are crazy comfortable. Put your ear on a pillow, and you barely feel them at all. • But do they block too much sound? That’s up to you. Basically, you choose the level of noise you want to keep out, which I believe is achieved by using different kinds of plastic.

They’re not a trivial purchase (I think mine cost $150), but then you use them for decades, so it’s definitely worth it. It was a stupid purchase in my case, because I bought them on a whim out of anger against my neighbor’s party one night; but they’ve followed me everywhere since!

An ebike: I don’t even really drive anymore most of the time and it beats the hell out of being stuck in traffic. Getting around is fun again.

I always enjoyed cycling and still ride my MTB, but for getting around town quickly, ebikes are hard to beat.

A 3D-Printer, I thought I just play around with it and get bored, but you discover so many things that you can do!

The handle on the fridge broke? Print new ones. Need a Flowerpot? Just print one. The router needs a wallmount? I have one ready in a few Hours.

Also I can watch it print for hours, very fascinating and calming.

I needed a “lap desk” or something to put my laptop on, but I wanted it to be low-profile and I could only find a wooden cutting board. Now wooden cutting boards are the only thing I use as lap desks because most actual lap desks I find are super bulky.

A set of small neodymium magnets. Didn’t have a plan, only they looked “super cool and strong wow”.

Used for:

• Locating needles in the carpet.
• Fishing keychains out from behind sofas, gap between garden deck and house, and so many other places.
• Makeshift fix for an old cabinet door that tended to glide open.
• Holding nails and screws while fixin’ stuff.
• Attaching a soda bottle to the office lamp in a way that is easy to undo while still pissing off HR.
• Slapping it on a screwdriver to make it magnetic.
• Fidget toy.
• Regular ol’ fridge magnet.

Mechanical keyboard. Almost had no money back then, but wanted to treat myself. It costed 100$, and I regretted it the next morning. Felt like shit, but it was so cool to type on.

After 5 years, this metal-frame keyboard managed to survive many outside gigs, long travels, literal war, and it’s still with me. And I still love typing on it. Sometimes I code just to type. You can guess why I don’t use code completion tools.

Pizza bag. A really good one

Didn’t think it would be a big deal but it’s a game changer for takeout pizza. Hell, it’s usually warmer than deliveries since I don’t make any other stops

Massive difference even for a place 8 minutes away, and gets me warm great pizza for the places 20 or so away

A Raspberry Pi. I bought it out of a whim and now I use it as a portable desktop computer, I can use Alpine Linux with my files and my setup on virtually any system that doesn’t whitelist MAC addresses.

Especially handy when your university has contracts with Microsoft so you aren’t supposed to use competitive software, I feel like I’m breaking the law.

A while ago someone posted a picture on Reddit of an old cast iron rotary food grater/slicer and asked “what is this thing?”. A bunch of people said it was for grating things like cheese or slicing vegetables. Some people posted the original French or Italian names of it, which was difficult to find. Someone said look up “Rotary grater” and they’re all over Amazon for dirt cheap. I bought a cheap plastic one for like $20, figuring I’d use it a few times and forget about it.

I use the damn thing multiple times a week for grating blocks of cheese. It can grate a 1 pound block of cheese in like 30 seconds, 2-3 rotations usually gives me more than enough cheese for myself. It’s so much easier to use than a box grater, and no possibility of destroying your finger tips or knuckles!