Speaking of cool climbing gear, if you’re getting any traditional slings for alpine draws, general extensions, or building anchors, it’s hard to beat Mammut’s Contact Slings. They’re made of dyneema, so they’re super strong and slippery, but that’s not why I like them so much. They’re the sling that does the best job of mitigating how the bar tack (where the two ends overlaps and are stitched together) tends to catch on things.

Typical bar tacks are bulky and unconsidered, and their ends often get stuck on carabiners when you’re trying to adjust the sling or extend an alpine draw. The stitching on the Contact slings is small and svelte to begin with, and Mammut covers the bar tack with a little sleeve of fabric which smooths everything out. You’ll still want to avoid getting the bar tack in the middle of any knots you tie, but at least it doesn’t get hung up on carabiners, rocks, or anything.

A byproduct of the Contact Slings being made of dyneema is that they can be much smaller and lighter than a traditional nylon sling, and that’s why I picked up another 120cm one for my rack. The double-length sling from Metolius I’ve been using is nice, but its extra width means takes up more space on my harness and isn’t as good for long extensions. The Contact Sling wraps up extremely small and I hardly notice it on my harness.

A plea to climbing brands worldwide: standardize on a color scheme to distinguish between sling length. When you’re in the middle of a hard climb, it pays dividends to not spend any extra time or brain cycles on determining if you’re grabbing the right tool you need in that moment. It’s a little thing, but it really helps — especially if you’re using someone else’s rack that you’re less familiar with — to not second guess or have to try again. I wish every brand would standard on a single color scheme. Mammut’s would be fine with me:

• Red = 60cm (single shoulder length)
• Blue = 120cm (double-length)
• Yellow = 180cm (triple-length)
• Grayish purple = 240cm (quad-length)

HeyDingus is a blog by Jarrod Blundy about technology, the great outdoors, and other musings. If you like what you see — the blog posts, wallpapers, shortcuts, scripts, or anything — please consider leaving a tip, checking out my store, or just sharing my work. Your support is much appreciated!

I’m always happy to hear from you on social, or by good ol' email.

A weekly list of interesting things I found on the internet, posted on Sundays. Sometimes themed, often not.

1️⃣ This roundup of 20 years of Google searches really brought me back. [🔗 Carmen Ang // visualcapitalist.com]

2️⃣ You’ve probably heard about MKBHD’s review of the Humane Ai Pin already, but if you haven’t watched it yet, you should. I found it to be very fair about the good and bad — there’s just a lot more bad at this point. [🔗 Marques Brownlee // youtube.com]

3️⃣ Greg Pierce, Drafts proprietor and automation wizard, shared a tip on how to deal with all those spam texts without lifting a finger. [🔗 @agiletortise // mastodon.social]

4️⃣ What about physical junk mail? Here’s a ‘chaotic good’ way to cut down on junk mail, and also feel like you’re getting revenge (while maybe also supporting the USPS?). [🔗 @coopmike48 // threads.net]

5️⃣ Or some more official low and no-cost ways to cut down on junk mail per the US government. [🔗 consumer.ftc.gov]

6️⃣ Michael Steeber outdid himself yet again with this retrospective on the Apple Watch launch, retelling how Apple created pop-up shops around the world just for the watch. Many of these temporary shops piloted designs that would later be introduced to the main retail store. [🔗 Michael Steeber // michaelsteeber.substack.com]

7️⃣ Have you ever wanted a compass This app turns your pocket computer into a galactic compass. [🔗 Matt Webb // interconnected.org]

52 Albums Project

Some Nights by Fun. (2012) — #16/52

Whenever I listen to this album, it brings me straight back to freshman year at Central Michigan University where, during orientation week, the entire freshman class — or at least those of us who arrived early for a kick-off week — danced our hearts out to its songs. The drummer from the band, Fun., was an alumnus of CMU, and when this album took off on the charts were all quite proud of them.

While that week was my introduction to the album, it’s stayed in my heavy rotation in the decade-plus since. There’s something about Nate Reuss’s vaguely melancholy yet piercingly sincere voice that has always stuck with me. There’s something about the mixture of rawness within their music and its epic soundstage that just pushes all my right buttons.

Follow along on the 52 Albums Project page where I’m making some playlists for you.

Thanks for reading 7 Things. If you enjoyed these links or have something neat to share, please let me know. And remember that you can get more links to internet nuggets that I’m finding every day by following me @jarrod on the social web.

HeyDingus is a blog by Jarrod Blundy about technology, the great outdoors, and other musings. If you like what you see — the blog posts, wallpapers, shortcuts, scripts, or anything — please consider leaving a tip, checking out my store, or just sharing my work. Your support is much appreciated!

I’m always happy to hear from you on social, or by good ol' email.

The tech podcast that just had its gears oiled!

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Mikah Sargent: What is one of the first delightful things you remember doing on the World Wide Web?

Tinkering with, breaking, and eventually fixing my iServ webmail. Turns out email has always been my love language.

It’s actually quite difficult to remember how I got started with the internet and doing what, but I sure do have that dial-up tone burned into my brain!

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Christina Warren: What was your worst or most disappointing tech product that you’ve ever owned or reviewed?

The one that’s sprung to mind is a recent disappointment. My wife and I received a Roomba as a Christmas gift, which I was pretty psyched for because, in a house with a long-haired dog, cat, and wife, the floors are difficult to keep clean. But between the layout of our furniture and a few rugs, the Roomba just couldn’t handle our home. On every test, it would get stuck. And when I dislodged it, it could never find its own way back home to the charger. Way more trouble than it was worth, so now it’s sat unused for months in a corner of our dining room.

(I will say, although my experience hasn’t been as bad as it sounds like Mike’s has been, I’ve been disappointed by the clarity and comfort issues of the Apple Vision Pro.)

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Dan Moren: How much time do you spend trying to get a tech product to work or troubleshooting a product you have before you throw up your hands?

I’m like a dog with a bone when it comes to troubleshooting. Partly due to a general dislike of dealing with support chats/calls, and partly because I like to be self-sufficient. It always seems like the next little thing will solve all my issues, and I can follow that rabbit hole for a long time before I give up.

For example, I months without cellular capabilities on my Apple Watch because I was sure resetting this or that, restoring, turning the device off and on, or some combination of them would eventually lead to success.

If I get to the point where I do call tech support, I’ve mostly given up and assume the thing will never work again.

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Jason Howell: What’s the oldest piece of working technology that you still use regularly, or semi-regularly, and how did you acquire it?

I don’t have a go-to answer on this one. I guess I don’t hang onto old tech for very long. One thing that comes to mind is a HyperDrive USB-hub/Qi charging gadget that I backed on Kickstarter back in the day. It used to be pretty key to my computing life when I rocked the 12-inch, one-port MacBook. It’s how I plugged in my display, charged the laptop, and connected any peripherals. Nowadays, it’s a sometimes resting zone for my AirPods to charge and very occasionally how I more easily plug in a thumb drive to my Mac mini.

Or maybe my Quip toothbrush. That’s got to have been going for close to a decade now.

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Bonus Topic: What’s your least favorite song by one of your favorite artists?

I’m sure there are better (worse?) examples, but I vividly remember deleting the song “Mama” from my iTunes copy of the seminal The Black Parade album by My Chemical Romance. I just couldn’t handle the sharp-and-dark-yet-polka-like motif in the middle of an otherwise outstanding record.

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Overtime Topic: Are you a regular user or dabbler with emulators?

Pretty much zero, zilch, nada experience with game emulation specifically or other emulation generally. The closest I got was freshman year in college when I brought back my GameBoy Advanced from home after Christmas break so that my roommate and I could play Pokémon together. But that was an original game cartridge played on its original hardware, so…yeah, I don’t think that counts.

I did download Delta from the App Store just so I would have a copy in case it gets taken down, but I don’t have any games to play on it. If I come across those old GameBoy cartridges, I might try to download the ROMs so I could pick up my old Pokémon games yet again, but I doubt I’ll ever get around to it.

It’s been a minute since I’ve been “on the show”. For some reason, I told myself that I would do a post for every single show, so when I got behind and they started piling up, I lost motivation. But this is my blog and I don’t owe anyone anything with it. So I’ll just write these as I can — hopefully often! — and not put so much pressure on keeping up. 🙂 But good to be back.

HeyDingus is a blog by Jarrod Blundy about technology, the great outdoors, and other musings. If you like what you see — the blog posts, wallpapers, shortcuts, scripts, or anything — please consider leaving a tip, checking out my store, or just sharing my work. Your support is much appreciated!

I’m always happy to hear from you on social, or by good ol' email.