29JUN2025: A Tiny Mechanical Claw
A beautiful pencil, smart running shoes, a single use camera app, great indie apps, and more!
Happy Sunday, everyone!
This week, I’ve been loving this beautiful, immersive article on the possible health benefits of playing cozy games (thanks to Andrew), trying to figure out how K-Pop Demon Hunters came out so damn good despite the absolutely ridiculous premise, wishing I had the time, skills, and resources to make this Fisher Price / Game Boy retro gaming mash-up for myself, reading a queer literary zine that can only be accessed via the ancient Telnet protocol, and plotting one of my first purchases if I won the lottery.
On to the good stuff!
✏️ Kaweco Pencil - A very dear homie kindly hooked me up with one of these, knowing how much I enjoy a good mechanical pencil. This beautiful brass-bodied tool features a tiny mechanical claw that holds onto a very thick pencil lead, which can be extended or retracted with a satisfying click on the back. The whole thing is a delight to hold, and I love its thick, stubby nature, which makes it both unique and super satisfying to use.
📷 The Last Camera Project for iOS - This is a really clever combination of iPhone photography app and collective art experiment/experience. The premise is that you sign up and join hundreds of thousands (or millions?) of others, each of whom gets to take one photo that gets added to a collection to be revealed at Art Basel in Miami this December. You have to join a waitlist, and you’ll be notified when it’s your turn to take your photo. Once you’ve taken your photo, you can see all the other photos as they get added, which is really cool. I’m eagerly waiting my turn.
📰 Alfread App - I have written about my article-hoarding tendencies: I collect links with every intention of eventually reading them, but most of the time I never do. Alfread looks like a great tool to help me actually start knocking down my read-it-later list. You can save articles directly to Alfread or connect your Pocket or Instapaper accounts. You then set a goal for how many articles you want to read and schedule notifications for when (or where) you want to be reminded to work on your reading list. I’m going to try scheduling some reminders at bedtime for the next week.
👟 Avelo Running Shoe - I’m always wary of highlighting Kickstarter projects, but this is one that I’m particularly excited about, and it’s being done by a team of ex-Nike, Garmin, and Under Armour folks who know how to ship products like this. In short, this is a smart running shoe that tracks not just your pace and distance but also coaches you on your running technique for things like minimizing impact, perfecting your tempo and stride length, etc. As someone who really enjoys running but has to limit it due to repeated injuries from poor technique, I’m excited to give it a try. I backed it on day one.
🎬 Sequel 2.5 for iOS - My favorite app for tracking movies, books, and shows that I am watching or want to watch has just released version 2.5, which I’ve been beta testing for a while now and thoroughly enjoying. Beyond all the tracking features I enjoy and the great design, it’s added features to let you open media in over 50 destinations, ranging from Goodreads and Audible to Letterboxd and IMDb, for when you want to dig in and learn more or share about something you’ve enjoyed. I also particularly appreciate the integration that lets you know if a movie has post-credit scenes you should stick around for (this helped me out when I finally got to see Sinners recently). Love seeing great indie apps like this continue to grow and flourish.
That’s it for this week! Stay cool and kind, everyone!