51–60 of 530 posts
Noise-canceling headphones. I recommend Bose QC35 IIs. You don’t realize how loud the world normally is until you take them off.
Books. A few handfuls of them, combined, made a magnitude of a difference in my quality of life. An incredible amount of similar content is available now in video and text form for free, but I think that the same ideas non-book form wouldn't have had the same impact on me.
Apple Airpod Pros -- long battery life, near instant bluetooth tethering. Even other expensive headphones/earbuds (Bose) for instance could not compete with the ease of use, noise cancellation, and comfort. I don't think about headphones anymore, they just work the way they're supposed to.
- Premium (home) office chair
- Electric toothbrush
- Smart lighting with Apple Home support
My preference is stoneware, 12 oz, square-flared bottom, with abstract natural imagery. Pre-warmed before use.
I spent the last 7 years doing dishes by hand due to lack of space in my Appartments. Then recently I found out there are things called "countertop" dishwashers which are half the size of normal ones and fit neatly onto your washing machine.
No longer having to spend 3-4 hours every week on doing the dishes really makes a big difference for me.
I use them for music, movies/TV, watching videos on YouTube including technical ones, and even occasionally video conferencing.
Wearing headphones for more than 30 minutes is fatiguing and uncomfortable for me. Listening to people's voices on tiny laptop or iPad speakers is even more annoying.
Hearing the bass and midrange in people's voices makes them more intelligible, particularly if they have an accent. It's just 100% more pleasant all around.
And this is purely an aesthetic thing, but it's crazy to me that people seem to listen to music through their phone speaker, let alone their laptop speaker... to me it's unrecognizable.
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Most people seem to be using the bluetooth speakers these days, which ~10 years ago were extremely bad IMO. Admittedly I found one that is pretty good recently.
But I still think it's very much worth it to have real speakers with drivers, speaker wire, and an amplifier in your home. (Or a powered speaker, although your options are more limited there, and it's more expensive.)
For traveling the right bluetooth speaker can be alright (there are many bad ones), but after a week of traveling my ears are "relieved" when I get to hear real audio again.
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Also: a single kettlebell for ~$45, which I almost think of as a stretching/circulation device, and a bicycle used for 10+ years.
A dishwasher. I spent the last 7 years doing dishes by hand due to lack of space in my Appartments. Then recently I found out there are things called "countertop" dishwashers which are half the size of normal ones and fit neatly onto your washing machine. No longer having to spend 3-4 hours every week on doing the dishes really makes a big difference for me.
a Dishwasher. Before buying it I would spend 45 minutes every night doing dishes. Now I load the dishwasher in 10 minutes tops and go to bed half an hour earlier! More sleep => better humor in the morning => happier family