I bought two of these handheld binoculars ($23) for an upcoming Rolling Stones concert my wife and I are going to. They are small and light enough that I could put them in a daypack and not know they are there. The optics are excellent, especially for the price. — MF

Whenever I’m watching TV and a song catches my ear, I often don’t have the chance to ask Siri what it is. Tunefind is great for that, because the next day I can just look up whatever show I was watching and listen to clips of all the songs that were played during that episode. Once I find the song, I can be redirected to listen on Spotify or search for the song on Youtube. — CD

Reminder: Your local Home Depot or other big box building store rents an amazing array of tools. Not just carpet shampooers, but carpet dryers, concrete cutting saws, pipe locators, ditch diggers, stump grinders, wallpaper removers, cherry pickers — all kinds of tools you will use only once in your life. Check out their selection. It’s a great way to try out a tool. My rule is if I want to rent a tool a second time, it’s worth buying. Last year I rented an electric power-washer. This year, I bought one. — KK

I live close to the Art Director’s Guild headquarters in Los Angeles, which has weekly evening figure drawing classes. My daughter and I go there occasionally, but I recently discovered a site called Line of Action that has a useful figure drawing practice system. It shows you a series of figure models posing for specified periods of time, just like a real figure drawing session. The hands-and-feet tool is especially useful (and challenging) for me. — MF

When researching a product online, type in the item in Google and then add “vs”. Google will auto-complete with the most popular, and highly rated, alternatives, and the top link will educate you quickly. Then “vs” autocomplete the new item and you’ll have a good sense of the field. — KK

If you use Dropbox, installing the Dropbox Chrome extension is a timesaver. I no longer have to search for files in subfolders to copy and paste share links. With the extension, I can access all my folders and recent files and attach them in a message without having to leave Gmail. If someone sends me a dropbox link, I can download it directly to my computer without being redirected to another window — all these saved clicks add up! — CD

My art student daughter has been using these spiral-bound Canson Mix Media 7x10 drawing pads. I started buying them for myself, too. The heavy paper easily handles ink pens, watercolor, and Copic markers, and has a nice texture for pencils. A 60-sheet notebook is only $7. — MF

“Pyt” is now in my vocabulary thanks to this Fast Company article. It doesn’t have an English translation, but Danes use it as an interjection to frustrations or mishaps. It means something like “Oh, well,” and is used as a reset button to accept the situation and refocus rather than react. I like it because it sounds like a cute short curse word. — CD

Two notable Bollywood films give you that special dose of outlandish song, dance and rom-com drama that you expect with a Bollywood extravaganza, plus they advance a vital social cause. And they will give you deep insight into today’s India. Both films are about a maverick who takes it upon himself to undo an entrenched detrimental Indian custom. Interestingly, the same Bollywood super-star, Akshay Kumar, plays the protagonist in both films, which are based on true stories. Toilet: A Love Story is the movie version of a real guy who tried to put toilets in his home against the wishes of the village, and his wife is pressured to divorce him for this affront, and how this became a national campaign. Padman is the true story of a guy trying to get Indian village women to use sanitary pads instead of being quarantined outside during menstruation. He invents a way to make the pads cheaply, which he tests on himself. (!!!) His wife also divorces him. But all ends well in both films — it’s Bollywood! There is a third film, a straight documentary about the real Padman, called Period. End of Sentence. This won an Oscar this year for a documentary short. Quite inspirational. All three films can be streamed on Netflix with English subtitles. The first two are painless entryways into Bollywood. — KK

My wife bought this set of 6 cool-looking large white stone coasters with cork backings ($19). They have attractive black patterns that appear to be hand-painted. The stone is absorbent, so they soak up condensation. — MF

Sanuk Yoga Slings are made from recycled yoga mats and are unbelievably comfortable to walk around in. The thong sandals have stretchy fabric straps that you can pull around your ankle so that they never fall off. I gave a pair to my mother-in-law, who was born and raised in Hawaii and maybe the ultimate authority on flip-flops, and she loves them. — CD

The best way I’ve found to understand a very technical or scientific paper is to search YouTube for someone to explain it. The ideal is to find a journal club report. Journal clubs are informal groups who share the task of explaining an interesting paper to each other. Each member rotates in picking a paper to explain to their peers. This is 100 times better than having the author explain it, because authors assume too much prior knowledge. It is better to have a newbie who just figured it out. If you are lucky, a journal club will video their reports and post. Search YouTube with the paper’s title or topic and add the term “journal club.” — KK

Wordstotime.com is a quick way to calculate how many minutes it would take to read a specific number of words out loud. I recently needed to fill up at least 8 minutes of talk time for an audio recording, so I started with this website and aimed for 1,250 words as I typed. — CD

Anyone can accidentally kill a bicyclist if you open your car door at the wrong time. Learn the “dutch reach” method (Holland is a serious bike country) to open your door mindfully and save a life. — KK

Everambient is a $2 iPhone app that plays algorithmically generated ambient music. I’ve been listening to it all day while I work. Check out samples here. — MF

This ThorFire is the brightest, cheapest ($15), smallest, lightest LED flashlight that runs on a single AA (rechargeable) battery. Rugged, made of metal, it will stand up on its end. I have them everywhere. — KK

I’ve stumbled upon these ten little drawings of happiness practices all over the internet, and they still make me happy. I like learning untranslatable words that stretch the imagination. My favorite from this set is the idea of forest bathing. — CD

If you have an iPhone, Narwhal is the best app to access Reddit. It’s snappy, and highly customizable and much easier to use than Reddit’s own app. — MF

I love reading The Sunday Soother by Catherine Andrews — a newsletter about practical spirituality. Each week she shares her thoughts and processes for slowing down and creating more meaning in life, as well as articles, books, beauty products, recipes and more. It’s like getting an intimate letter from a friend. Each email is a tool for self-reflection. Her last two issues were dedicated to grief and ambiguous loss — which I learned is a particular type of loss that lacks a definition and closure. She solicited stories from her readers and here is what was shared. — CD

The fantastic documentary Free Solo deserves all praise it has received, including its recent Oscar. The film follows one guy’s attempt to climb the vertical face of Yosemite’s El Capitan without ropes. A single slip he dies. I could barely watch it, it was that crazy good. As the climber’s friend put it: this demands an Olympic gold medal performance, except here, if you don’t get the gold, you die. The film has suspense, drama, emotion, and explores maniacal obsession and perfection. Five stars. Now streamable. — KK