The Electjet Apollo Ultra USB portable charger is about the same size as my iPhone 12 Mini and twice as thick. It’s 10,000 mAh is pretty typical of power banks of its size. What sets it apart is how insanely fast it recharges. When I plug in the included AC charger, it goes from 0 to 100% charge in less than 25 minutes. (Other chargers I’ve had take 5 hours or more). It’s $139 on Indiegogo. — MF

I’ve been watching a lot of new streaming science fiction recently. My favorite shows, ranked in order of my enjoyment. — KK

• Dune (HBO) — Part 1. Perfect in all dimensions. Best world-building since Star Wars.

• The Expanse (Amazon) — Six seasons of an epic saga, with well-done characters and worlds.

• For All Mankind (Apple+) — Super fantastic counterfactual history of what if the Russians won the race to the Moon.

• Westworld (HBO) — Excellent cautionary tale of our relations with human-like robots. Already a classic.

• Ascension (Amazon) — Plenty of unexpected plot twists in story of 100-year ship to the stars.

• Silent Sea (Netflix) — Korean drama on Moon base.

• Station Eleven (HBO) — What if mostly actors survive a dystopia? Odd, perplexing, slow, but in a good way.

• Book of Boba Fett (Disney+) — Continuation of the Mandalorian space western, with shoot outs.

• Altered Carbon (Netflix) — Unlikely scenario, but rich, fun exploration of downloading personalities.

• Wandavision (Disney+) — Part of the Marvel universe. Amusing premise and very creative meta levels and format.

• Foundation (Apple+) — Based on classic book. Liked the beginning but I couldn’t finish it because it became too implausible.

Send your future self a letter. Might be a prediction, a goal, or a letter about something that happened today you dont want to forget. For 20 years Future Me has been forwarding letters into the future for free. You’ll most likely forget you wrote one and getting a note years from now will be a wonderful surprise. Thank you, today you. — KK

Just a fun, single purpose website. Click to relax and listen to ethereal sound of water and music. Zone out on the ripples. It is definitely relaxing. — CD

I’m the kind of person who fidgets a lot while having a conversation, but when I do a jigsaw puzzle with other people, it’s easy for me to chat and assemble the puzzle at the same time. My wife and I been putting this 1000-piece Edward Gorey puzzle together as a way to catch up for a few minutes each night before going to bed. I also work on the puzzle during conference calls. — MF

I have been using this Yapp Reminders app (iOS) for a few months now to send me “gentle” and “random” reminders throughout the day. You can create whatever message you would like to appear as a notification. Mine is a reminder to pull away from the screens and connect with something outside of myself. I have the notification setting switched to “softer reminder sounds” which sounds like a soft gong calling for me to pause and reflect. — CD

A decade ago I made a huge 470-page book of the best tools available. This Cool Tools book was a catalog of possibilities. Each of the thousands of items featured enable a new possibility that you may have never considered doing before, such as keeping bees, building your own home, or starting a consulting busines. Cool Tools has been long out of print, so I finally made a digital version of it. The full-sized PDF of Cool Tools can be downloaded on Gumroad for $3.99. Good news for those outside the US where the price of the original book plus shipping was discouraging. It also serves as a very searchable version for those with the giant physical book. — KK

I use Google Maps (and Apple Maps) a lot when I’m walking around in an unfamiliar place. Instead of holding the phone in one hand and dragging and pinching-to-zoom with the other hand, I learned I can do everything with one hand. I hold the phone in my left hand and use my thumb to drag. And if I want to zoom in or out, I tap twice with my thumb, leaving my thumb on the display after the second tap, and then slide my thumb up or down to zoom. — MF

“The number of people born in Antarctica (11) is fewer than the number of people who have walked on the Moon (12).” That’s just one of 52 surprising things blogger Jason Kottke included in his year-end post. Here’s another: “Cannabis delivery isn’t legal in Maine, so this enterprising online shop employs ‘psychics’ to ‘find a wide selection of your lost weed and drop it off at your home.’” — MF

Stanford creativity expert Sarah Stein Greenberg contributed this short write-up on brain exercises to flex your creative muscles. What stood out to me was Seeing where she suggests finding a photograph capturing scenes of life with multiple subjects and lots of details and answer the following questions: What’s going on in the picture? What do you see that makes you say that? What else do you see? What do you see that makes you say that? — and then repeat, over and over again form multiple perspectives. The other 2 exercises are Shadowing and Studying the solution that already exists. Read the full article here. — CD

Every evening for the past 20 years I do a short dip in our hot tub just outside our bedroom doors. The totality of my maintenance for the hot tub consists of adding one bromide tablet per week. That is all I do. Having tried different tabs over the years, the best ones are Clorox Spa Brominating Tablets. They give consistent clarity and have the least smell. The water is almost odorless. — KK

Clive Thompson created this search tool for weird old books in an attempt to rewild our attention. It only finds books one at a time and in the public domain, which you can download. I found this 1901 copy of Studies of Trees in Winter, which is actually a book I came across in a Berkeley library years ago and have been searching for. I also discovered this — definitely weird — rare manuscript titled The Complex Vision by poet/philosopher John Cowper Powys. I love tools like these that help me break free from the same old internet loop. — CD

To maximize your life enjoyment, you should die with no money left over. Spend your money while you can get the most experiences from it, not when you are old. Give away what you are going to give away (to kids or charity) while you can enjoy and direct it, and when it makes the most difference to the receiver. That’s the well-reasoned, persuasive argument of this book, Die with Zero. (The message is similar to Die Broke, a book that I have recommended in the past, but Die with Zero is much better in its explanation, and practical advice on how to balance your account to zero.) Everyone should consider this positively affirming strategy. It’s been life-changing for me. — KK

ColorKu is a nice looking wooden game board, with holes that hold colored wooden marbles in nine different colors. Game play is just like Sudoku, but this version makes it fun to play with others. It comes with about 100 starting problems, but you can use any Sudoku problems by assigning each color a number. I gave this to my sister for her birthday and she loves it, too. — MF

Recomendo reader Andrew Denny says, “I really love the YouTube Channel of Big Clive, a soft-spoken Scotsman. He tears down cheap electronic products — often really cheap no-name stuff from ebay — to explain how they work. I have no idea about electronics at all, but I love watching it and I’m gradually learning.” I’ve been watching Big Clive videos for a couple of years, myself. — MF

I just returned from visiting my grandmother in Mexico, and aside from my packing cubes which makes my suitcase manageable, this technique of folding all of my outfits together helped me get dressed quickly in the mornings without mulling over what to wear or pulling everything out of their cubes. — CD

Stargazing apps on your phone are magic. They work like AR-augmented reality — overlaying the night sky with outlines of constellations, star and planet names, paths of the moon, and even satellite, comet and asteroid sightings. The apps are uncannily accurate, and easy to understand. There are free apps and expensive subscriptions, but I use Star Walk 2 which cost $3. It’s the best $3 space investment I’ve ever made. — KK

I feel like a weight has been lifted after reading What if we just stopped being so available? (The Atlantic, possible paywall). Joe Pinsker rants about the expectations of prompt responses and how we should all stop apologizing for failing to meet them. He says, “For one thing, having multiple obligations and priorities means that we are, all of us, in a perpetual state of delay on something, and apologizing for that fact feels like having to apologize for your standard mode of being.” He spoke with communication experts who suggest alternatives for “Sorry for my delay,” like “Thank you for your patience” or “I wanted to make sure I thought carefully about your good questions.” But I agree with Pinsker who prefers to omit an apology or expectation altogether and instead just write your message as if you’re responding right away, because content is more important than speed. This article is a much needed absolution. We all have the right to disconnect. — CD

I started running a few months ago and needed running socks. These six-packs of Saucony Socks are just what I needed. They are slightly cushioned and have arch compression. As an added bonus, they are too weird-looking for my wife or daughters to be tempted to swipe. — MF

US residents can order 4 free at-home covid tests to be mailed by the US Post Office to their home. One set per household. Order from this US Post Office site, which is well designed and takes 10 seconds. — KK