UTK Special 12/15/21
Gift List '21
I had a call with a gambling company offering another deal to put their name in front of you. I’ve got no issue with gambling, but I think you all see plenty of those ads and affiliate income needs scale to be worthwhile rather than just the usual annoying. But it did get me thinking. I know no one asked for this, but here’s 10 things that I really like. None of these are ads and I’m not even doing affiliate links; these are just things that I think might trigger an idea if you’re still looking for holiday gifts. I’m doing these mostly in order of price:
Of course you should pre-order The Science of Baseball for everyone! It’s coming out in late February or early March and I’ll be honest, I haven’t figured out how to do signed copies. I’d gladly do it, if I could figure it out. I tried a local book store and I don’t think I’m big enough to make it worth it for them. Anyway, the book will be good and available whereever you buy books. I used the Amazon link because it has the cool book quotes on it from cool people who you should trust, since they’ve read it! I mean, what’s easier than pre-ordering a book, printing out the listing, and handing it to someone in an envelope on the holiday?
I’m kind of sick of “plus” being the designator for another streaming service you have to pay for. I’m no Craig Elsten (who’s Crossing Streams podcast is great), but I watched more Apple TV+ than anything else. Ted Lasso is the big one, but shows like For All Mankind, Foundation, and Home Before Dark are all great watches. At five bucks a month, it’s cheaper than most and while there’s not the huge catalog, I’ll take the quality of Apple over the quantity of Netflix if I were forced to choose.
If you’re only going to buy one baseball book this year, buy mine. If you’re going to buy two, the one I’m most excited about is Craig Calcaterra’s. I haven’t read it, but it looks like an offshoot of Kavitha Davidson’s book from a few back - which was great and deserves a read - but I know Craig will have his own unique take on it as well. He also got a blurb from Mike Duncan, and I’m jealous of that, even though I like my blurbs better. I have his book pre-ordered and normally I only do that for John Sandford books.
Running out of coffee is not an option. Sure, you can watch it, grab some next time you stop by the grocery store or order it from a cool online roaster, but Bottomless does all of that for you. They send you a small scale and you store your coffee on it. They watch to see how fast you go through it and it learns when it needs to pre-order from their list of roasters. After a couple years, it’s really really good at knowing not only when to order, but which coffees I’ll like. “Never be out of coffee” is a big win and it makes a great gift. You’ll ask yourself why there’s not a Bottomless for everything.
BUCKAROO BANZAI VERSUS THE WORLD CRIME LEAGUE
Buckaroo Banzai is one of my favorite films and it holds up well. At the end, there’s a teaser for a sequel that never happened and it took until 2021 for the writers to put out a book based on the idea. This is a high quality book, so don’t let the price fool you and it’s a book, not a graphic novel. If you ever wonder what happened after the Eighth Dimension, this is a must.
BALCONES and IRONROOT REPUBLIC TEXAS WHISKEY
Whiskey is getting expensive. You used to be able to walk into any store and get a bottle of Blanton’s for fifty bucks. Now, you can’t find Blanton’s and it would take a hundred bucks or more. However, the Texas wizards at Balcones have figured out how to make a really, really good whiskey faster. The problem is you can’t age something faster, so a four year old whiskey or a 12 year old Scotch can’t suddenly make more from 2009. Young whiskeys are usually bad, or at least sharp edged, but Balcones is not. It’s some of the best I’ve had. I’m a big fan of Baby Blue, which can be found for forty bucks. If you can find it, Ironroot Republic, another Texas distiller, has what might be the best American Whiskey I’ve ever had. I wish it were available in Indiana, because I would have it over even Balcones, or at least rotate them.
I used to be in one of the shave clubs. It was cheaper and razors are just nuts. Five blades? Seems a bit much, like the price. Downside of the shave clubs is they got bought out by the same people they were trying to displace and now it’s just a bunch of blades. I saw someone mention Henson online, I looked, and while initially expensive, I don’t have to buy razors for a while. It uses the old double edged single blade razors like your grandpa probably used, but they built a better razor. Don’t ask me how it works, but the aluminum shape makes it nearly impossible to cut yourself. It looks good, it feels good, and it works better, plus it’s cheaper in the long run. That’s win-win and their story is pretty nice too.
Another coffee gift and another one where you’ll think, no I don’t need this. A heated mug? It’s a luxury, but how much would it be worth to you to stop burning yourself when you take that first sip too quickly? Better, what would it be worth to never reach over, forgetting how long you’ve been working, and have cold coffee? The Ember Mug (or travel mug) does that. It makes drinking coffee incrementally better, day after day. I’ve had mine a couple years and drinking coffee without it isn’t the same now.
I love my Chucks and I wear them a lot. If I’m not wearing Chucks, then I’m wearing Atoms. They have a unique fitting experience and they sell them in quarter sizes. They’ll send you a bunch of shoes the first time - say you normally wear an 11, they’ll send that and a 10 3/4 and an 11 1/4. Lots of people have feet that are different sizes and you can mix and match. They’re comfortable, stylish, and they fit really, really well. I have two pair and they look great with anything. I’m never giving up Chucks, but if I could get my name on the side of Atoms, it’d be tempting.
This is not cheap, but it’s cheap compared to options like Canada Goose. Baseball in Indiana often means standing out at Grand Park in February as the wind whips in to the open dugouts. I had a great Columbia jacket, but it wasn’t cutting it as the wind was cutting in to me. My research led me to micro brand Askov Finlayson, out of Minnesota. They not only know cold, but have a nice mission and were started by the son of the former Target CEO and Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton. Good pedigree. It’s a great jacket, a wall against cold, wind, and rain, and after a full year, I think it will last a long time. If you want to go higher tech, Vollebak has some of the coolest clothes around, but the prices will choke you.
And have you seen this? Wow.
Just a note that the former governor is Mark Dayton (not Hudson). His family owned the Dayton's department stores which started Target.