Recomendo is my weekly newsletter that gives you 6 brief personal recommendations of cool stuff. It has almost 10,000 subscribers. You can subscribe here.
p>Ten dollar watch:
I wear a watch, not as expensive jewelry, but as a clock I find easier to inspect than a phone. I have four requirements for a watch: 1) Bold, easy to read numbers on an analog face. 2) Easy band. 3) Long battery. 4) Dirt cheap. The cheapest analog-faced wrist watch I’ve found is the Casio MQ24. It costs $(removed) I’ve worn most of the cheap ones (Swatch, Timex) and this one lasts the longest. (What usually gives out first on these cheapies is the winding stem for changing the time.) — Kevin Kelly
Health:
GUM Soft-Picks do a better job than toothpicks or floss for cleaning food and plaque from between my teeth. The soft green brush pushes out all the gunk without hurting. I buy the version that comes with the travel cases. — Mark Frauenfelder
Contacts without prescription:
I recently went to the optometrist and got a new prescription for contacts, but for the last 7+ years I’ve been ordering my contacts without one from 1-Save-On-Lens. I’ve never had an issue. I ended up buying my new contacts through the same site because it was cheaper than what my optometrist wanted to charge me. — Claudia Dawson
Travel tip:
If you lose or forget to bring a cable, adapter or charger check with your hotel. Most hotels now have a drawer full of cables, adapters and chargers others have left behind, and probably have the one you are missing. You can often claim it after borrowing it. — KK
Learning:
If you’re wondering what you’re made of, BBC’s The Making of Me and You will tell you in a very fascinating way. Just put in your info and you’ll find out things like what your body is worth in dollars, how much bodily fluids you’ve produced so far, and if you’re DNA has enough data to max out a 1GB USB stick — mine doesn’t. — CD
YouTube tool:
Sometimes I want to watch a YouTube video one frame at a time. This website lets you enter any YouTube or Vimeo URL and it will display the video with buttons that advance or reverse the video one frame at a time. — MF