A perfect example of what I am absolutely NOT loyal to...
I will freely admit that I am a brand whore. There’s no way around it, and there’s nothing surprising about it for anyone who knows me. I don’t like certain brands just for the sake of liking a brand, however. They have to genuinely prove themselves to me as a quality product, and provide me with some sort of benefit that I can’t find elsewhere. They have to actually earn my loyalty; once they’ve accomplished that, however, I remain fairly loyal.
Having said that, I did build my own version of a fruit-flavoured computer, because that particular brand has fallen behind; so while I remain loyal, I certainly don’t have unfailing loyalty. But there are a few brands that I’m loyal to… somewhat reluctantly. One of those is President’s Choice. It’s a no-name brand sold by a huge chain of grocery stores here in Canada, and they sell everything from cookies to clothes to cookware to coffee makers. And virtually every piece I’ve ever bought — and I’ve bought a lot — from PC has ended up being absolutely excellent for a fraction of the price. I have two PC stainless-steel coffee makers (originally, one for home, one for work) that work better than any others I’ve ever bought, have been going strong for about 5 years now, and cost me less than 1/10 what my mother paid for her almost-identical brand-name coffee maker.
What brand are you loyal to, albeit somewhat reluctantly?
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Quiksilver Jeans. I have to buy them online, as there aren't surf shops in KY, at an expense of over $50/pair. But they are so comfortable and last for years, even with daily use out on the construction jobsite.
I was loyal to Joe Boxer brand boxers until they tied the knot with Kmart and let QA slip. It's been difficult to find 3 panel boxers but Tommy Hilfiger is fitting the bill for now.
I only buy REEF sandals as they offer the most arch support of any brand that I've found. But slide-ins only cuz I don't like thongs.
And I only wear fitted New Era baseball hats.
I don't get much support with my thongs either…
I avoid the thong sandals because I don't like the way my socks scrunch up when I wear them.
I switched to black socks with my sandals and the scrunching was reduced by 78.3%.
OH! Sandals. Yes. That's… uh… that's what I meant too.
Maybe I should switch to toe socks?
Why stop at socks?
<img src="http://birthdayshoes.com/media/blogs/bdayshoes/Vibram_Five_Fingers/bikila800.jpg" width=500>
I've heard those are incredibly comfortable but have yet to try any on.
Bah, I don't care for thongs either. They want to ride up until they're nearly in my armpits, and then they chafe the hell out of the delicate divide of my gluteus maximus. They get all knotted up in the wash, too. No, I am a boxers only man.
I agree with you wholeheartedly on that PC affiliation, they truly do make amazing quality products for less than their competitors.
That said, there are only two companies I can think of that I would sign myself over to indefinately (provided they continue to produce good products). The first one is for ski jackets, I love Orage jackets. I've never been disappointed with them and will continue to use them. The second is Ford, I know they had some lousy products in the 90's but world wide they've had class leaders and the commitment to racing is fantastic. Who else has had a win in every major and minor motorsport beyond Ford?
Lululemon
Their clothes are expensive but no other company designs yoga pants that make your ass look as fantastic as Lululemon does.
I thumbs upped you because every guy here should for that statement but I disagree slightly. My gf's sister got her a fitting for a pair of athletic pants that fit far better than a pair of Lululemon or TNA pants ever could. If I remembered the name of them I'd tell you but unfortunatly every time she puts them on all the blood rushes from my head and I fail to think straight.
I'm not familiar wth that brand. Please post a pic.
Directly from their Facebook page, here's one of their employees. I like shopping at Lululemon. Correction, I like CaffieneFuelled shopping at Lululemon:
<img src="http://a7.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/7820_146885741009_57985481009_3225135_3570501_n.jpg" width="600">
Hand tools, Craftsman
Power tools, DeWalt
Audio equipment, Bose, Marantz
Domestic Beer, Anheuser Busch (gonna catch crap for that)
Imported beer, Spaten and Hacker-Schorr
Dogs, Beagle (from a shelter)
Jeans, Levi's
That said, I'm more of a sale whore.
I agree with the hand tools, power tools and rescued pet.
In general I agree. However, you've listed one brand that is on my banned list for the inferiority of their products. Care to guess which one?
Going out on a limb, Anheuser Busch? Michelob Amber Bock is one of my all time faves.
American beer* is a lot like sex in a canoe.
It's fucking close to water.
*excluding craft beer
They know their target market.. Try an Amber Bock.
Yes. A few years back I commented to a brewmaster aquaintance that all of their products taste "off" to me. He said that I'm likely tasting rice, which they use as a cost-effective additive to barley. I've since sworn them off, which sometimes puts me at odds with my fellow Missourans.
Its what Jim Koch is talking about in the commercials when he talks about adjuncts. I think most major brewers use adjuncts of some kind or another. Not only for cost but for taste reasons. Corona and similar Mexican beers use corn. Those are really the only beers I don't care for.
Around here in NJ, lots of people hate on Budweiser. Maybe because the brewery is right by Newark Airport. They say it gives them worse hangovers. I've never had that problem. Heck, I can drink Genesee Bock and feel ok.
In general I've also found that people like to hate on whatever cheap beer they drank in College. For me it is Old Milwaukee and Piels since I went to school in Bethlehem PA.
I've gone upscale since my high school/college brew but still enjoy a Rainier or an Oly every once in a while.
'No highs, no lows, it must be Bose'. Try Klipsch, or old JBL monitors if you can find them and afford them.
[youtube wiu_IX14wLI&feature=youtu.be http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wiu_IX14wLI&feature=youtu.be youtube]
I work so damn close to A-B in STL that I can smell hops when I walk out my office door.
For hand tools I suggest SnapOn rather than craftsman, and on power tools, Dewalt is indeed a very good maker, and I own many of their tools, but for certain things I've found that Makita, Hitashi, and even Bosch can provide a better tool. I'm saying to not to become brand blind on your tool purchases because you can miss some great stuff. I do lots of tool shopping and reasearch.
Just trying to be helpful here.
I'd suggest SnapOn too, if my budget allowed it.
Oh yeah, you don't just go out and buy a box of SnapOn tools unless you're richer than Creoses. I bought my stuff over the course of a decade.
I usually try to stick with Colorado-made beer, which usually ends up being from Boulder Beer Co.
I will stand beside you in poor taste and approve of Michelobe. Damn good stuff.
At least you didn't say Budweiser, mmm rice…
My hometown is Ontario, California. Those of you who have ever read the light bezel of your Maglite will know that this is where your Maglite was manufactured. So, it would seem natural that I would be a brand whore for Maglite. However, I did go through a phase a few years ago where I tried to break away from those sturdy, aircraft aluminum flashlights. I tried knockoffs from Energizer and some generic crap. And nothing stood up to the quality of the original. The Energizer flashlight lasted exactly one camping trip where it was dropped from all of 2 feet and never worked again. One of the generics literally disintegrated in my hand while working on the house. So, it was back to Maglite I went. Now, all four of my main flashlights (home, garage, toolbox, car) are Maglites, and I won't be bothering with anything else.
I have four also.
Solitare. It fits in the underlug of my S&W Performance Center 629 Hunter Classic. Unscrew the extra weights and it slides right in. Of course it has never been used that way other than as a parlor trick.
Mini Maglite AA Xenon. It resides in the glove compartment of my car and probably gets used more than all other flashlights I own combined. Since its acquisition, I have purchased many small bargain LED flashlights. While they are great from a brightness and battery life use, their best feature is the ability to not care when a kid looses them. When the Mini Maglite breaks (ha ha) I will be tempted to replace it with a Mini Maglite LED.
Maglite 2 D White Star. My first. It is so battle scarred it could run in the 24 hours of Lemons for flashlights. The chrome on the reflector is shot though.
Maglite 6 D White Star. I. Love. This. Flashlight. It costs too much to feed though. I wish they made a LED conversion. I bet it would rival a Q-Beam. At a weapon, it has no rival.
Yes, Ontario used to have a nice raceway. I think it's a housing tract now, dammit. And yes, Maglites are hard to beat.
I agree completely. I used a 4 cell Maglite when I was a cabdriver to spot addresses in the dark, and have had one ever since. I lost that one (actually, it got stolen), replaced it with another 4 cell, with the LED bulb. It lasted four years, bulb and all, using it daily for mine tours or exploring underground. Replaced the switch once. It was battered as hell but still worked fine when It fell out of my back pack while ascending up a rope in a 600 foot shaft. If and when I go back down that shaft, I'll probably find it lodged somewhere and I'll bet it still works. I replaced it with another four cell, and I also have an LED 3 cell, which is way brighter than the incandescent 4 cell. I want to get the Xenon bulb for the 4 cell, but they're hard to find here in the sticks. Maglites are the best going. Oh, I also have a two cell Brinkmann LED, but that's a backup.
Going up a rope in a 600 foot mineshaft? I think you landed on your head one too many times when you were jumping out of airplanes. Deep holes in pitch black places give me the willies.
Craftsman. Like the tools but Sears is depressing.
Chrysler. I've spent a lifetime laughing at them, only to have two (and until recently, three, – four if you count Alfa) of their vehicles in my driveway. Not a fan of their cars, but nobody does bargain priced trucks, minivans and offroaders better.
You think shopping there is depressing? I tried working there part time for 6 months. Selling washers and dryers. Horrible experience but it taught me a lot about working retail.
The most habitually-depressed guy I know works at the local 'Hometown' (read: appliances and lawnmowers) Sears, for what that's worth. He's a friend of a friend, so I at least say howdy when I bring in a socket with a cracked wall.
Man, I think 90% of my calorie intake between 1983 and 1993 was made up of PC Decadent cookies. Unfortunately, I live in a Sobeys dominated area, so PC brands are out.
As for the brands I am loyal to? At one point my vehicle fleet consisted of a Protege5, 2 RX-7's, and a B2000. I'm definitely a Mazda guy, even if I can't quite bring myself to buying a Mazda5.
I would like for us to be a Mazda family. The lady would like a 3 or a 5, and I could see myself happily in a 6 wagon, with an MX-5 for the weekend track adventures. My Comanche will live out in the barn.
I was ready to continue on my all-mazda-all-the-time path, but the cancellation of the 6 wagon meant I'm not likely to upgrade the P5 with a Mazda when the time comes. The B2000 gave way to a Pathfinder, which now needs to be upgraded to 3-rows. but I just don't love the Mazda5 enough.
There is some potential that the CX-5 will earn my dollars back when the Protege finally expires. However, it will need AWD and a 6 speed manual, and should have Skyactive if I'm really going to consider it.
<img src="http://www.tuvei.com/wp-content/uploads/2012-mazda-cx5-1.jpg" width=500>
When's that coming out? It's a crossover I don't hate – I'd better go lie down.
Early 2012 supposedly, and is supposed to be the first totally "Skyactive" vehicle, which may mean start/stop as well.
I was a Honda car guy for a long time. It seemed they could do no wrong. However, that has changed in the last six years or so, since Honda seems to have lost sight of its mission and has become increasingly beige.
Tools: I'll jump on the Craftsman bandwagon. I'd love to go Snap-On, but as my tools are not my living, I can think of smarter ways to spend my money.
Cell phones: I'm partial to Samsung, for reasons I can't explain. I've just had good luck with their products. Same for most other consumer electronics. If the Samsung model is reasonably price-competitive, that's what I'll buy.
Digital Cameras: Canon all the way.
Audio: I lust after McIntosh, but use JBL and Yamaha stuff that's older than me.
Jeans: Levi's. My dad wore 501's when I was growing up, and I always made fun of him. Guess what my favorite pair is now?
Pens: Pilot G-2, in either .38 or .5 size.
Pencils: Dixon Ticonderoga
The .38 G-2 is like writing instrument sex! What an awesome pen. I would have more of them, but I'm pretty hard on pens, so I stick with the .5. Writing with a .7 feels like I'm using a crayon. I'd rather use a giant permanent marker than write with a 1.0.
Yes, I'm a pen snob. Besides, the Pilot pens are a great value for the quality.
I've been handing out unwanted advice in this thread, so I guess I better put up a target too. Ahem.
Mechanical Hand tools: SnapOn. I worked for several car dealerships when I was younger, and that's when I bought mine. They're the best that I've found.
Woodworking tools: Too long to include here. If you really want to talk about woodworking tools, we should probably start a new topic. I can be extremely tedious on this subject.
Mobiles: Don't own one.
Cameras: Canon. I have a lot of old SLR stuff from when I did a lot of photography, recently got a little PowerShot SX130 that puts it all to shame.
Audio: JBL. I have a pair of old L300 monitors that I just had rebuilt. They play loud and clear for this deaf old bastard. Amplifiers and other hardware, it depends. All the brands I used to buy are gone. Bose sucks out loud.
Pens: I make my own, and they're damned good. Be nice to me and I might make you a set.
Drafting pencils: Pentel until I can find something better.
Jeans: Levi's and Duluth Trading.
T-shirts: Duluth Trading Longtail Ts. Great shirts.
Vehicles: Everythings a Chevy right now. Sigh.
Computers: whatever works and doesn't die.
Appliances: LG. We've been having good luck with these ever since KitchenAid was bought by Whirlpool.
Shampoo: Trevor Sorby
Cat food: Science Diet
That should be enough. Fire away.
Wait… you make your own pens too? Do tell!
On the JBL note, I've been very happy with the L40's I inherited from my dad when he went the Bose route. His Yamaha receiver/tuner has a faulty right channel, so I've been tempted to hook up the 70's Kenwood preamp/HK amp combo I got from my grandfolks and see how that goes.
Yeah, I got started making them 5 or 6 years ago because it looked like fun, and it is. I usually make them around Xmas time, but sometimes people want a presentation set in a box and I do those whenever. I posted a couple of pictures of my popular pen types on Flickr if you want to go look. I make a lot more types and styles, but those are the only pictures I have on hand. Also, I posted more box pictures.
Do try the HK hardware, they used to make some good stuff, once upon a time. With age, the capacitors have a tendency to dry out, so you may or may not have a working set.
Fascinating. What do you use for the actual writing-instrument bits?
There are companies that sell different types and sizes of innards as kits, and you use your own material for the outside. There's a huge number of kits available, from the very thin styles up to big, fancy fountain pens, and many different finishes. My favorite finish is black titanium. Most kits are of good quality, but some are better than others.
Here is the place where I buy a lot of my kits. http://www.pennstateind.com/
I've posted before about my love for fountain pens. They're all I use at work, and at least once a day, I have a customer remark that something feels classier about having their purchase contract written up with a fountain pen.
That's funny… When I sold cars, I brought a fountain pen in to work one day, and the customer took one look at it and said "do you have a real pen?"
I should have stuck it in his eye. He didn't buy anything anyway.
Nah, you wouldn't want to get your pen dirty or damage the nib.
I've found that people who use fountain pens have a deep love for that kind of writing instrument. I've only made a couple fountain pens, but they were well received. I'd post pictures but I can't find them on my wife's computer. She's the one who takes most of the pictures of my stuff. Anyway, one was in blue box elder burl and the other was in big leaf maple burl. Quite pretty.
Is the blue color a stain/varnish you put on, or is that the natural wood color?
The wood I use is dyed, so it's blue all the way through, and then it's stabilized by forcing a liquid resin into all of the water channels of the wood using very high pressure and heat. This makes the wood very dense and stable so that it won't be affected by humidity, and makes it waterproof and very tough. I buy my materials from a company that specializes in this process, although I wish I could do it on my own wood. Well, you can send them wood to be stabilized, but it's way too expensive on a small scale.
You really should write a series of articles on your woodworking… I bet they'd be a hit.
Like "Sub-lethal Woodworking with the Professor" or something? Seriously though, I've been sitting here thinking about how I would approach that, and I don't know where I would start. I'll have to think about it some more, pretend that I'm a teacher or something.
"Sub-lethal Woodworking with the Professor" would be a most excellent title. Make it like a build thread – take some pictures of your equipment (not that equipment) and the stock you start from, talk about some of the procedures involved, and show some finished product. I would subscribe to that newsletter.
Well, I'm afraid that that isn't going to happen. Things like that are really outside the scope of this blog, if you stop and think about it. There are woodworking blogs that do that sort of thing, and do a better job of it than I could.
I really do appreciate your interest in my work. I might be able to do single subject articles in the future, like insights into sharpening, and differences between tool steels, like carbon steel, HS steel and carbide tipped tooling, stuff more in line with technology in general.
I still like that title I came up with.
I suppose that would probably fit better with the blog – tech that used to be the only way to do it, now used by solely by hobbyists and artisans.
SnapOn makes nice stuff but the problem that I have with them is that they only swing by the shop every couple of weeks so for having something replaced Craftsman is the ticket .
I can never get them to swing by the garage here at home.
Wow, business must be good for them. Back in my day (hah!) the tool trucks would come by once a week like clockwork, and would make special trips if you called them. Each brand would come by on a different day, too.
I enjoy Pentel's GraphGear 1000. I have two at the office; 2H and HB.
Yeah, that's what I'm using too, but just the HB for now. I really like them, I just wish that they had more mass to them. I've been looking at other drafting pencils online that are supposed made of brass, but I'm hesitant about dropping ~$100 for a pencil without trying it first.
Isn't the Science Diet kind of crunchy?
I guess. The cats like it, and who am I to question my lords and masters?
Are we really giving you a pass on having a preferred brand of Shampoo? Damn we're good people.
Also, if you don't currently own a mobile, you can't go wrong with this:
<img src="http://www.supercoolbaby.com/pictures/monkey-tree-M.jpg" width=500>
Who doesn't like monkeys?
I don't like monkeys. They're smelly, noisy, and they throw dung at you, nearly as bad as Philadelphia Flyers fans.
Pardon my archaic language. They were called mobile phones before they were cell phones. I'm old.
No worries, thought you might be an ex-pat Brit actually.
Nah, I just talk funny.
One can buy throw-away calculators (solar-powered, even) for a dollar at the dollar shops, or splurge and spend five bucks for a multifunction scientific model. But when I would buy a calculator for my engineering duties, back in the 1980s, only Hewlett Packard would be considered. HP-41c for programmable, do-everything capability (and accessories!); HP-12c for a more compact financial-oriented robot assistant , and its HP-11c scientific stablemate for going where I didn't need or want to take the HP-41c.
As a company, HP no longer gets my respect like it did twenty-five years ago… Luckily (and as I predicted), all three of those HP calculators still function perfectly, so I haven't had to buy another since.
I'm one of those weirdos (yeah, I know, shocking) who really likes the HP-28S, even though that series is usually shunned both by fans of the earlier and by fans of the later HPs. I bought mine brand-new and it still works fine, of course, twenty-odd years later.
Me too. I still have my HP programmers calculator (somewhere) and it's been a workhorse. I can't remember RPN though, so I can't program it anymore. Boo-freaking-hoo.
My HP 33s is a great calculator, but I long for the HP 48 series. My what great calculators they are. I literally wept when they ended production in the early 2000s.
Vehicles: Dodge, but if there were going to be a Jeep pickup I would then know what my Dakota's replacement will be. I started out a Ford guy, but the last two times I've been ready to buy something it turned out the Mopar was the vehicle in the segment that was closest to what I wanted.
Consumer electronics: Sony for smaller stuff; been a while since I bought anything big.
Computers: Apple
Musical instruments: Yamaha (my uncle used to be a marketing VP there, and my cousin works for them in the keyboard division now)
Mobile phone: Apple
Shop equipment: Craftsman and/or Stanley, but I also like S-K if I happen to find it.
Soft drink: Coca-Cola Zero
Jeans: Arizona
Beer: Is this where I admit that I like PBR, and that most of my past expenditure on beer was on Miller Lite? (Though if I had to pick a favorite it'd be between Amber Bock and 1554)
Bicycle: Trek
Shampoo: Prell
Tires: Bridgestone/Firestone
I will never change the brand of my underwear as long as SAXX keeps making them . If you buy a pair your junk will never stick to your leg again they are the greatest .
For hand tools you can't go wrong with Craftsman although sometime I wish they weren't so thick .
Vehicles I tend to not stray away from Ford
Snowmobiles it's Polaris or nothing
Pants are either Carhart or Wangler they just don't die
Shirts and socks are whatever the wife brings home for me , usually the shirts are cheap because I kill them with grease and oil
The SAXX drawers are really worth $25 apiece?
Totally worth it I own six pairs
At the risk of beating a dead horse from CaffeineFuelled above… the men's Lululemon underwear are similarly fantastic, and also worth every penny. I only have one pair, but they're the pair that gets pulled from the underwear drawer first, every time, after laundry day.
Yes, we're here on AtomicToasters talking about our underwear. Did it just get weird?
I'll show you mine if you show me yours…
What do you mean, "just"?
kleenex: Kleenex
zamboni: Zamboni
xerox machine: Xerox
plexiglas: Plexiglas
Boy, you really go for the obscure stuff.
Who makes your saran wrap?
Glad actually.
You left out Frigidaire (archaic) and Hoover (UK).
Last night I was sitting in the jaccuzzi eating popsicles I had just removed from my styrofoam thermos. I was listening to muzak playing through my dolby surround system, when suddenly I noticed some velcro was becoming detached from my speedos. I tried to scotch tape it back together, but eventually had to resort to super glue, which I applied with a q-tip. It was a bandaid fix.
Later, when I headed back inside the house, I stubbed my toe on a phillips screw protruding from the astroturf, so I took some aspirin.
I really like your post hope to read more from you.
Regard,
Epoyjun