So I kind of impulsively bought a Steam Deck OLED this weekend, I hadn’t really done much research and I haven’t really played any games in about 15 years.
Now I have to wait for it to be delivered and, I’m worried this is something I’ll use a few times and forget about it.
What’s something you impulsively bought and fell in love with?
I bought an E-Bike, the impulsive bit was not getting a normal bike.
I kinda just figured it would be fun, and probably useful for some longer trips through the city. It ended up being one of the most empowering things I’ve ever owned, I have a pretty nasty health condition with lots of really bad fatigue and I live in a hilly area. I was able to look after myself to a whole new level, it was in almost every way a mobility aid for me, it made it possible for me to get supplies and meds on bad days it was a game changer.
Anyway it got stolen a couple of weeks ago so that’s cool
Sounds awesome (except the stealing part)!
My local government is pushing for people to bike more instead of driving, but if you have a decent-looking bike it will be stolen. Bike theft is so bad that there is a satirical movement to oppose biking until the bike theft situation has been dealt with.
Yeah my current bike is literally just an abandoned bike that I repaired, so I doubt anyone’s gonna want to steal it. If I get another E-Bike I’ll be a lot more particular about where and when I leave it, and use multiple locks
Bread maker. A guy I worked with said he loved his and I just bought one with no research. It’s my favorite specialized appliance next to my popcorn machine.
Serious question. What exactly does it do to save time? My wife treats making bread like boiling an egg. Something you can do quickly and easily whenever you need it. So I’m wondering which part of it can be simplified.
It depends entirely on the type of bread. Soda bread/biscuits/etc. can be as simple as mix and bake, but yeast breads usually require multiple steps over the course of a couple of hours. Usually something along the lines of:
- Mix ingredients
- Knead thoroughly for several minutes
- Let rise for ~1 hour
- Press the dough flat again and knead again
- Let rise again
- Bake
- Let cool
The intermittent rise periods are what allows the loaf to expand and gives the center its fluffy texture. It’s not a terribly difficult process, just requires intermittent attention over a fairly long period of time. You may have heard talk about bakers starting their job very early in the morning; people traditionally wanted fresh bread in the morning, and it takes several hours to actually make (even if most of that time is just waiting), so bakers need to start several hours early.
A bread maker turns the long process into basically just “put in all the ingredients and press go”. It still takes a while, but doesn’t require any attention once it’s started. You can also just put the stuff in at night and have it start on a timer so it’s ready in the morning.
Zojirushi bread makers are amazing
And rice makers!
Yes! I also have the rice cooker. Probably the two most used kitchen gadgets I have!
We bought the machine with most functions that could make the smallest breads. Freshly baked bread 2-3 times a week. We fight to get the 1st slices ofthe bread.
I have power tools. I had like 7 batteries for them. I saw that they offered a USB adapter so I could charge my cell phones. $20. I quickly stopped using wall warts and standard battery packs. 5 amp hours, hot swappable, always a battery in the charger so I could never run out of power. Power tool batteries are built to higher specs than typical cell phone chargers so they didn’t die after 10 chargers. The batteries are rugged so a drop doesn’t destroy them.
My tools were stolen. I replaced all my Makita with Harbor Freight Hercules brand, their premium brand. Half the cost of Makita and actually better designed in a lot of areas. I quickly bought the USB adapter because I could never live without it again.
If you have power tools and always use them, I’m a handyman, then a USB adapter is a must.
A $1 grand piano off of eBay. I had been looking around on stuff like FB Marketplace for a “real” piano after learning with a really basic keyboard for a while, and happened across a gorgeous 6’1" grand piano on eBay. It was reasonably close, the ad said it was in good working order, and they took very detailed pictures of basically every single flaw in the case. I called up a piano mover, and had them pick it up from the church, sight unseen. I was so worried that I’d made a mistake, given that the moving was still about $400, but I got insanely lucky, with a beautiful looking and sounding piano worth about $5k for basically just the cost of moving it.
Haunted piano?
So far, no ghosts yet! Only haunted by the vague odor of the church it was in before, so it kind of smells like an old lady’s house, but it’s going away pretty quickly.
What an amazing story! Its always amazing the stuff you can find second hand 😁
Even $5k is extremely cheap for a good 6’1" grand piano in good condition.
I went on the low side since it’s not in perfect shape and is an older (1985) Young-Chang built Wurlitzer. It was a church piano so it has some bushing wear in the keys, but still very playable, and had a broken string on D2 that was an easy $50 fix. I think after moving, tuning, the string, and eventually rebushing it in the next year or so, I’ll have about $900-1000 into it all said and done. Still definitely a pretty inexpensive piano overall, but understandable why they might not have wanted to put money into something that was probably a donation to begin with.
Right as Covid quarantimes hit, I found a deal on an old decommissioned Bird electric scooter for like $250. Snapped it up immediately. I have gotten SO MUCH use out of that thing just running out to grab takeout to save on delivery fees. I’ll also use it to commute to work nowadays when I’m too lazy to walk (I am lucky enough to live only a couple miles from my office) and don’t feel like biking. It’s probably paid for itself several times over at this point.
Literally the same, what a great impulse purchase.
You’ll love it!
I plan on replacing my laptop with it as well
Hi-Point .45 carbine, total impulse buy but it scratched several itches.
For those that don’t know, Hi-Points are stupid cheap and stupid looking guns. But everyone says they work great, so I was Hi-curious, if you will. The design makes me think they took a gang of skilled engineers, showed them pictures of guns, and said, “Make one.” Everything about the assembly is bizarre, no idea how to take it apart.
Stumbled on this thing for $300. Love me some .45, wanted a PCC (short rifle that shoots pistol rounds) and it’s white, looks like a Stormtrooper rifle! True to their rep, it won’t misfire, even with the cheapest remanufactured ammo. Taking it out today, it’s a hoot. God help me if it ever needs cleaned.
I bought their 9 mil a while back and when I got it I took it out to the range to test fire it. Some decent Winchester ammo, fired through the first clip fine.
Loaded up the second clip fired five shots, misfire, turned the gun to the side about 30° and downward with my finger off the trigger and the gun clicked and fired at the ground.
That was the scariest shit. If I hadn’t had the small modicum of trigger and pointing discipline that I have I could have shot someone without pulling the trigger.
I never fired that gun again, and I am now radically against hipoint weaponry
Honestly, steam deck lol
It’s an odd form factor that people don’t really have much experience with, hence they don’t really know how useful it’ll be to them. To be fair to myself, I had been holding back on purchasing one until maybe a year after the initial launch, so I think I would personally describe my experience as a leap of faith.
In any case, it turns out to be a great little thing. There’s a lot of games in my backlog that don’t feel “desktop-y,” and therefore I’ve never played them, if that makes sense. But with a handheld form factor, now I have more motivation to go through those games. Emulation on the steam deck has also been great, for a similar reason. And sometimes I just want to be in bed than on my desktop. Or sometimes I’m just on the bus or waiting for something.
I think SteamOS also taught me how usable Linux was, and that’s been pretty instrumental in getting me to minimize my Windows dependence
Same, it’s the holy grail of gaming, such a great device that keeps getting better.
My wife and I have our own separate ones. It’s such a blast and we also got gog/itch working on them.
Emudeck is fun too.
Are you using a controller friendly front end for gog/itch? I haven’t found anything that’s comfortable for using them
My collection is small enough that I just hook into steam. You can add non steam executables so then you can use your controller. You can even set up mappings. If you find a more all in one setup let me know.
Heroic launcher supports gog
This makes me feel so much better! Its kind of one of my thoughts, playing the steam deck in bed, those evenings where you don’t really want to do much but also aren’t fully ready to go to sleep!
You’ve definitely given me some reassurance 🙂
Steam Deck is definitely one of the best purchases I’ve ever made. And I don’t play a ton of games these days.
You have made a solid impulse buy. I love my steam deck as does my wife. If you get a dock you can also use it as a regular laptop too.
I bought the official dock and have struggled a bit with it. It sometimes doesn’t recognize my TV and has other connectivity issues that seem to only be solved by repeatedly restarting it. I had an extra HooToo adapter lying around at work and holy crap that thing is such an awesome adapter for cheap that connects to the TV or my monitors and peripherals so easy and I’ve never had issues.
Portable projector. I don’t have a TV in my room, but I use the projector all the time. I can point it on the ceiling or the walls. I can connect my hard drive to it, or stream to it. It even has access to apps so I can log into, say, YouTube directly on the device. I love it. It’s was something I kept saying I didn’t need (and it’s true, I would have survived), but it’s been a swell experience.
There are so many you have to tell us which one you like.
A cheap beginner bass guitar. I was like man will I play bass even? I’m a drummer mainly but I also play a decent amount of piano bc my main drum things are drum set and marimba and I played synth for 1 season in drum corp. I got a bass because I wanted to actually try playing bass parts for songs instead of clicking them in. It does sound better (well, eventually it did) but it’s just really fun to play. Like I had also bought a $100 used guitar and I just find playing that a chore. I can play a few songs but I’m a permanent beginner and have no real interest in growing. The bass though? I play that like an hour a day and it’s actually cutting into my drum and piano time
What bass did you end up buying? I’m thinking about getting an inexpensive one to add variety to my beginner/intermediate guitar skills. Some days I just want to play quarter notes along with songs I like.
Ibanez gsr200. Got it used locally for $150 in really good shape, basically never played. But new they’re like $200. Yamaha tsr/trbx was the other option I was looking at, similar price range. Both had pretty excellent reviews as long as you kept in mind they’re beginner basses but they’re very solid.
I did go to a shop and played them both before buying. Pretty comparable. Main differences were Yamaha was a bit heavier and Yamaha has 24 frets vs 22 on the Ibanez. The Ibanez is also not a passive bass, it has a bass boost circuit. It’s the smaller 4th knob on the front of the bass. This means the bass needs a 9v battery which some people may not like. Also means you can give the sound a bit of texture/growl when you want, or you can just leave it off for a clean tone.
I do like Yamaha gear a lot, my primary workstation/synth is a Yamaha and it’s been a workhorse for me since literally 2007, played almost daily and been on several tours. I also have a Yamaha marimba I got cheap from one of the corps I marched in like 09 or so and it’s held up great despite the fact that it was certainly abused in its former life, played hard, and toured constantly (plus I still play it regularly). But the Ibanez was a sweet deal and I didn’t want to spend too much (as you can see I’ve already spent way too goddamn much on music gear in my life)
Also shoutout to rocksmith, which has been so awesome
I’d recommend a P-bass clone. If you get serious enough about it you could drop in a legitimate pickup, which are passive – no 9v.
As someone who has taught a lot of beginner students, Ive seen more kids quit due to having a crappy instrument than due to any lack of desire or ability.
You probably got a good beginner, and a crappy guitar that makes it a chore.
A good setup MIGHT be able to save the guitar.
My guess is that if you are comfortable learning bass and marimba, you can handle guitar. You just need one thats playable!
I genuinely think I just can’t get into guitar. I played piano from 4 years old, I played drums from 4th grade, i played marimba and synth in wgi and dci, so playing for long hours and practicing hours on end is not something I’m not accustomed to, but for whatever reason I just can’t get into guitar.
For posterity my guitar is an epiphone les Paul clone. I don’t remember the exact model off hand. You are certainly correct that it’s crappy, it literally cost me $100 (back in like 2014 or so), but I think it’s serviceable, at least
Meta Quest 3. I had been saving for a Valve Index but I was getting impatient. Turns out it was an amazing buy and (for me personally) having an untethered headset was more important than I realized. My computer room is small but my living room has plenty of space. Plus the Steam Link app works so well nowadays I can still play Steam VR games but wirelessly anywhere in my house. Pretty awesome deal for something that costed half the price.
A donation to PragerU
Eww
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Steam deck.
Espresso machine. I was spending 8 bucks a day on lattes, and now I make them myself and stopped going to the cafe every morning, saving time and money. I also think it’s a fun morning ritual to grind the beans, measure everything, tamp, distribute, steam the milk, etc.
Btw I also impulsively bought a Steam Deck and use it way more than I thought, it’s amazing and you’ll love it!
Sounds like you’re doing a lot of steaming!
Espresso machines rock. I got one to cut costs, and I’m really happy with being able to make an Americano in a minute or two.
Aren’t they prohibitively expensive? What’s the ROI timeframe and drink number going to be?
I got a relatively inexpensive espresso machine for like $100 with the main downside being it’s not very tall (so putting a mug under it is out). It’s been perfectly fine for like 8 years, though. I’m sure for $500+, I’d get a slightly better espresso but I’ve found buying good coffee beans and grinding them fresh — basically getting the other steps right — makes more of a difference than the machine.
I imagine the expensive machines are more foolproof or consistent or flexible? But it was just me making espresso before work basically every day. It didn’t take long for me to get the timing and stuff down. (I have a De’Longhi one, for the curious, but I don’t necessarily want to steer anyone to that particular brand since it’s been so long. The brand might be owned by some Private Equity firm or something called like “Guangzhou Plastic Manufacturing Concern” and the quality parts were replaced by lead pipes with arsenic in them.)
A Moka pot is a cheap and easy way to make espresso. I got mine for less than $5. Of course a fancy espresso machine is going to make higher quality espresso, but for the price you can’t go wrong with a Moka pot
I got a Breville Dual-Temp for $350 CAD on sale, but you can spend less. You can always spend more if you want, but that’s where I top out.
I’m not sure about ROI. I guess I’ve had it three years, so that’s like $.33/day, but I don’t track what I spend on consumables.
Nice to both. What do you find yourself playing on your steamdeck?
Its great for acade-y and mindless games, I’ve been digging Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor, Dredge, Balatro, Dave the Diver, and Talos Principle
I freaking love drg survivor game is so fun
Aside from smaller titles I’ve e been using it for sea of thieves, monster hunter world, and ffxiv with good results even though that last one took a fair bit of fiddling with. Impressed with it.
