The quest for the perfect pen never ends. Right now, my favorite pens to journal with are these Uni-ball Vision Elite Rollerball Pens Bold Point in Assorted Colors ($13, 5pk). I only use them for journaling because the ink just glides out so effortlessly in such a deep, rich color that I am able to write pages and pages in cursive without ever having to lift up my pen. I alternate colors on different days and when I flip through the pages, I feel like I am looking at a garden with so many different flowers. — CD

The superpower of this inexpensive Luigi sink plunger is that it can push a much greater volume of water than a toilet plunger. Use it to create a tight seal with the sink drain, press it down, and lift up with force to suck out the gunk clogging the pipe. — MF

My dog Pablo and I have been taking random walking journeys using the Randonautica app. Each day before our walk, I use the app to generate a point (anomalies or blind spots) within whatever radius I choose, and then google maps will direct us there. One of the tenets of randonauting is that you are testing “the theory of quantum randomization and the possibility to change a life path or shift into a new, better space and time.” To be honest, I don’t really understand how it works, but what has changed is that my walks have become more meaningful to me. Pablo is enjoying all the new plants and flowers he gets to smell, and I set an intention before all my walks and stay open for answers from the Universe. — CD

I am convinced that China will make more of a difference in the coming decades than the US will, so I am eager to increase my understanding and awareness of what is happening there. To that end, I pay for The Wire China newsletter and magazine ($19/month), which is a daily feed of news about China in English. It may be more China than most readers want, but I find it a necessary counterbalance to all the US-centric stuff I otherwise get. It’s the best single source of China news, and aimed at those doing business in China. — KK

I love this fantastic phone app that identifies bird songs. Merlin does a remarkably great job identifying birds from their sounds, even when they are far away, and even when more than one bird is singing. It works all over the world but you need to load in the library for your geographical area. It’s the Shazam for birds. And it’s free for Android or iOS. — KK

My wife bought me a dartboard for Christmas last year and we play darts a few times a week now. She got a high quality dartboard — a Winmau Diamond Plus Tournament Bristle Dartboard — and it’s much better than the cheap dartboards I had as a kid. The darts rarely bounce out, and the board has held up well, showing little signs of use. — MF

I recently found myself at a mall trying on $100+ sunglasses when I had the realization that I did not want to be doing that or spending that much money on sunglasses ever again. My husband had been raving about Carfia’s $20 and below polarized sunglasses, so I bought myself a women’s pair for $13 and I love they way they look on me, and how the polarized lenses make the outside world look clear and sharp. — CD

All paying New York Times subscribers can gift an article behind the Times’ paywall to others so they can read it for free. Subscribers can gift up to 10 articles per month. This includes posting gifted articles on Twitter or Facebook, so followers are not blocked when you share a great piece. The gifted article does not count against reader’s free monthly allotment. To gift an article, look for the “wrapped gift package” button in the row of badges at the top and bottom of an article to get the link. I wish all paid publications would do this. — KK

Science documentaries are hard to make right. They are either too boring, or too superficial. This new science documentary is just perfect: The Edge of All We Know is the astounding story of trying to take a picture of a black hole, which is inherently unseeable. The doc takes the most abstract subject possible and makes it thrilling by following groups competing to create the best image and then negotiating to merge all their results together into one picture. Along the way you get a pretty good idea of what we think black holes are. It streams on Netflix. — KK

The After Life Experience is an interactive website that will walk you through the process of figuring out which memory from your life to date you would choose to spend eternity reliving. The “Facilitation” process will ask you a series of questions like, “When was a moment you felt your most authentic self?” or “on a brilliant adventure?” or “in awe of something so much bigger than you?” or “knew you were in love?” and on and on until you’ve decided on your forever memory. You can then choose to record it and share it on the website. I spent thirty minutes listening to a stream of stranger’s share the moments in which they chose to spend eternity. I cried a lot. There was a woman who lost her son seconds after giving birth and spent the night holding him in a hospital bed. She said it was her event horizon and in that moment there was no past or future. This was the moment she realized that the question of “Where do we go to when we die?” is actually the same question as “Where were we before we came into being?” — CD

One Time Secret offers an alternative to sharing passwords or credit card numbers via text message with your friends or family. To use it, enter the text you want to into the form and click “Create a secret link.” The site will create a unique link, like this: https://onetimesecret.com/secret/h5mwuomihrdz7ptv3qrphkdv6s8rag4. Share that link with your friend. Once it is viewed, it gets deleted, so you can’t share it with a group of friends. If no one visits the link in seven days, it gets deleted. Of course, you have to trust the people behind One Time Secret, which has been in operation for 8 years. — MF

Imitone is a $25 application (still in Beta) that uses your voice to control a synthesized instrument, like a saxophone, guitar, or keyboards. I’ve been having a lot of fun whistling, humming and singing to make music with in Garageband. It’s available for Mac and Windows. — MF

I use this Online Shipping Calculator when I want to find the cheapest and/or fastest way to ship a package. If you type in your package dimensions, weight and the FROM and TO city, you can compare online shipping rates from USPS, UPS, and FedEx. The prices are not exact, but close enough to help you choose the best shipper. [If you have a better online rate comparison tool to recommend, please let me know] — CD

Food is a revealing lens. I really enjoyed discovering what influences African-American food had on the US in the excellent 4-part Netflix series High on the Hog. Subtitled “How African American Cuisine Transformed America,” it tracks foods from West Africa on their way to the early White House, and into the middle of America. It’s a big, sophisticated story I was ignorant of and another nuanced way to see the power and extent of African-American culture in a form everyone can connect with: food. Perfect watching for Juneteenth! — KK

I’m an advocate for journalling because it’s the best tool for self-discovery. I have a dream journal, meditation/poetry journal and a daily (brain dump) journal — most of them are blank books. But by-far the easiest diary to maintain is a guided journal called Moon Lists: Questions and Rituals for Self Reflection. I write in it only once a week coinciding with each new phase of the moon. It enhances my self-awareness, sparks gratitude and encourages me to be more intentional about my goals and dreams. It’s an 18-month journal, and I’m only 4 months in. I’m really looking forward to this finished relic of introspection. — CD

I’ve been using Puracy laundry stain remover for a year and am now on my third bottle of the stuff. For bad stains, I’ll spray a lot of the liquid into the fabric and let it set for a couple of days. I haven’t come across a stain it won’t remove. — MF

It’s super easy to get Amazon to donate money to your favorite non-profit. Go to Amazon Smile (smile.amazon.com) and designate your choice of charity. From now on as you shop on Amazon, they will automatically donate a small percent of your purchase amount, at no extra cost to you. In just the last quarter alone, we (Amazon and I) gave $295 to the Long Now Foundation, my chosen charity. The money came from Amazon’s side of the account not mine. — KK

I bought this $20 Cartman 39-Piece Tool Set for a young relative moving out on their own. It has everything you would need to handle 99% of the simple repair jobs around an apartment. — MF

Four Note Boards is an online app and private text tool where you can paste and drag text around into one of four boxes. It’s perfect for when you need to compare blocks of text. I used it to compare and select poems for the new issue of Phantom Kangaroo. It’s simple and allows you to think multi-dimensionally. — CD

Poetry is my true love. The imagery of poetry and abstract concepts ignite new connections in my brain. A creation of mine is Phantom Kangaroo — an online and print poetry journal. Over the last decade I have published 300+ poems by poets who write about the surreal, supernatural and occult. I chose these subjects because the otherworldly is what awakens me. This year, I stitched together issues 1 through 23 and published them in a hardcover anthology that you can thumb through whenever you need to break out of the mundane. Issue 24 is free to read online and features a creepy rhyming poem about cats, canonization of women, and incarnating into a body that feels like kiwi. Check it out here. — CD