Personally speaking, there is absolutely no worse place for me to drink my coffee than at my computer. Sadder still? That’s the place I will always need a cup most.
Though intended as a sipping beverage, one can only drink coffee so leisurely. Its ever-escaping warmth always leaves a sense of urgency to finish it before it goes stone cold. But when I’m seeing paradise by my monitor’s light, every other concern just escapes me. Before I know it, distraction has robbed my body of some hot Colombian lovin’ and left me chilled, bitter fail in a cup.
Fortunately, as I’m learning every single day, there are few things a standard USB port can’t fix. This 5.5″ x 3.5″ USB beverage cooler and warmer with 3.5-foot cable will fit at even a cluttered dump of a workspace. More importantly, flip a single switch on the back and swap between keeping a hot drink steaming at 120°F to 140°F to keep you going, or a cool beverage chilly at 55°F for when you feel you need to be slowin’. Even at its hottest temperatures, this USB drink warmer won’t burn disposable paper cups, making it Starbucks-ready at such a portable and convenient size.
It’s the coaster that science intended.
Down the hatch, morning after morning, goes my favorite breakfast cereal – half of which turns into a soggy fail-mush by the time I eat my way down the bowl. On top of that, at least a cup or so of milk ultimately flows down the drain. I suppose it beats the slovenly alternative, though. My five year old inner being is one thing, but the nearly 30 year old Sleepless One just feels his dignity slip a little at chug-a-lugging the leftover milk and crumbs. So could a hands-on experience with a Geek Gems favorite save my love affair with cereal, while whittling down my grocery budget?
I dug the Obol cereal bowl from the first time we featured it here. A bowl in which I could separate my milk and cereal, keeping my breakfast crunchy as I scoop-and-swoop what I needed into the milk a single bite at a time? Simple! Perfect! Useful! Where, oh where had this been all my life?
I was already impressed before the first milk drops coated the bowl’s bottom. The durable white plastic dish is molded with this C-shaped, textured white handhold in the base, making it so very simple to cradle comfortably to one’s body while reclining. It’s also a necessity, as the bowl is wide enough across that palming it would be a bit cumbersome. The shallower of the Obol’s two recesses holds what amounts to a perfect portion-controlling single measuring cup of any dry cereal. The divider between cereal and milk gives way via something shaped a little like a built-in curved playground slide to the deeper pool for the milk. And here’s where things go from “awesome” to “pretty damn awesome”.
I will nearly guarantee from personal experience that anybody could finish a dry cup of cereal using as little as a half pint of milk and pour practically nothing down the drain. Think of what cup after cup of wasted milk would’ve ultimately added up to over a week or a month. Another half-gallon? A full gallon? That couple bucks doesn’t seem like much this shopping trip, but over a year, that savings shall keep your treasure troves of Fruity Pebbles running over. Your only problem will be what you’re to do with all those extra prizes from the bottoms of all those extra boxes of cereal you can suddenly stockpile, you Seinfeldian saver, you!
I own few kitchen implements and gadgets that each day I truly relish using, and the Obol cereal bowl is useful enough to be favored among the few, right alongside my ESPN Sportszone “Chalice of Colombian Caffeination”. For casual users and cereal connoisseurs alike, the Obol gets two solid thumbs-up!
Wine connoisseurs enjoy the very finest beverage-enjoyment innovations. Give true vino-philes and sommeliers their deserved due: their fervent fascinations with the meticulous details that make and define a fine wine have made fruitful their pursuits of ways to better enjoy one of the world’s oldest adult libations.
From the time Jesus re-stocked the bar at a dry wedding, necessity has been the mother of invention. We’ve seen aerators that will enhance a low-quality, cheap wine’s flavor noticeably; electric corkscrews, and manual ones that resemble deformed drill presses; I’ve even found an infrared wine thermometer and single bottle wine cellar with customizable temperature and humidity settings. Few aficionados take enjoying their passions to heart quite as wine lovers do.
And oh, the troubles this Instant Wine Bottle Chiller solves. I’m no sommelier, but I do love good wine. Unfortunately, it’s proven every time I want a chilled Chardonnay or white port that forethought might never be my strongest suit. I rarely have something chilled when I want it, and by the time a hastily refrigerated bottle would finally cool to the perfectly chilled temperature, oftentimes I just don’t desire a glass any longer.
Sure, I could start making a habit of always having a bottle gettin’ chilly in the fridge – or I could just toss this wine bottle chiller spout in a freezer for six hours before using, and instantly cool a room temperature wine up to 15°F with a single pour. The thermos-like shell will keep the internal stainless steel pouring tube cold enough to chill an entire bottle, and covering the spout’s air inlet with a thumb will slow the flow, keeping the wine chilling longer inside the spout before it exits into the glass.
My sweet tooth doesn’t often gain a foothold – but when it does, I catch myself lamenting being caught without a handy emergency fix. My freezer tells my dietary sensibilities’ story: meat with sides of meat. Chicken, fish, beef and game leave precious little room for much else. Besides, on tight a budget, spending extra on tubs of ice cream and boxes of popsicles I won’t dig into but once every couple months or so and can’t even store makes precious little sense.
But still, what a fellow would give at times like that for a quick, no-muss fix … oh, and as long as I’m getting greedy, how about something reasonably healthy, too?
The Zoku Popsicle Maker will freeze three tasty, custom treats in about ten minutes, as long as it’s been primed in the freezer at least 24 hours before. From there, the three die-cast aluminum molds will freeze fresh fruit, juice, pudding or any other filling or ingredient smoother and with fewer ice crystals than anything you could pull from a grocer’s freezer.
And just because I’ve known nary an adult who every so often doesn’t have to compromise with an inner moppet, I have to wonder what a delicious White Russian-pop could taste like. Or if I could stop at just one …
Doughnuts make such curious little snacks. They’re the alpha impulse-nosh food. So few ever really venture forth on an errand specifically seeking the lone pastry most people consume in one sitting; that’s probably why they’re so well-suited for convenience stores and quick, in-and-out eateries where people can get a snack and be on their way in a hurry. We’re almost never looking for them, but we want one when we see one.
But sometimes, we do. Coffee’s poured on a Sunday morning, the comfy sweats have been donned, the DVR awaits and suddenly, THIS MAN NEEDS COFFEE AND CRULLERS, STAT! Alas, nobody delivers doughnuts – and as we’ve well established, driving around the corner for a lone sweet treat uses gas that costs more itself these days than my snack. Doughnuts, like this conundrum itself, are a perfect, vicious circle. One vicious, tasty, irresistible circle.
This Sunbeam Doughnut Maker not only bakes the dunkable, frostable morsels, it actually prepares them healthier than most state fairs and even some swanky bakeries! Whereas they’re so often fried in more fat and grease than you probably care to ponder, the Sunbeam Doughnut Maker bakes up to five doughnuts in the style of a George Foreman Grill on its non-stick surface in about five minutes. From there, it’s your world. Frost them, sprinkle them, sugar them, glaze them, or just scarf your delicious home-baked doughnuts straight down.
Best of all, with so many people exploring gluten-free, vegan and dairy-free lifestyles, this is your chance to continue embracing one of the ultimate indulgent sweets with your own preferred tweaks and treats. Doughnuts needn’t mean the death of a diet ever again! [Source]
USB Beverage Cup Warmer & Cooler ($19.95)
