Whether you’re a student heading off to college for the first time or you’re looking for a way to spruce up your cubicle for the fall, there are a few geeky and classy ways you can bring a little life and personality to your living or working space, especially if you have to have them combined. Let’s dive in after the jump.

• Amazon Kindle 3

  

  The Amazon Kindle 3 is Amazon’s most recent version of the wildly popular Kindle e-book reader, and has been highly praised as the best yet. The new Kindle brings a smaller form factor to the device without sacrificing screen size, and makes the device lighter, thinner, more portable, and now even smaller than their competition and smaller than previous Kindles. It’s still available in both Wi-Fi only or Wi-Fi + 3G versions for book downloading from the Amazon store on the go, regardless of where you are, and uses a gorgeous e-ink display that’s low-power and low-drain on the battery and also high contrast so it’s easy on your eyes when reading a novel, even in direct sunlight.

  The new Kindle is, quite bluntly, the best stand-alone dedicated e-book reader in the market, and the web capabilities it does have are pretty solid for what you would expect to do on a device like this. Amazon boasts that the battery will last about a month with regular use, long enough between charges to read reams of blogs, books, and do some book and magazine downloading without having to rush for the charger, and definitely long enough to use the device however you want while you’re traveling without making sure you have it plugged in at night.

  Whether you’re headed back to school and you’re looking for a great way to get digital copies of your textbooks instead of lugging paper copies around, or you just like to read and you want a way to keep your books on a single device instead of on shelves upon shelves, the newest version of the Kindle is a great way to get in on e-books, especially if you haven’t tried an e-reader yet.

• ThinkGeek Multi-Color Animated LED Art Cube

  

  Whether you’re at home, in the office, or in a home office, a few desk accessories never hurt anyone, and the Multi-Color Animated LED Art Cube

from ThinkGeek is a little on the pricey side, but if you’re willing to pay for it you’ll have a desk toy that’s incredible to watch when you’re trying to get a little work done (if you wouldn’t get too distracted by it) or when you’re idly surfing the Web or gaming. For a hundred bucks, you get a dynamic desk accessory that will keep you entertained whether you’re using the computer or not, and when you aren’t, it serves as a nice relaxing light effect in your space. Perfect for dorm rooms and home offices alike.

• Cyber Clean Electronics Cleaning Putty

  

  I saw these guys at CES in Las Vegas, and they were selling the stuff from a booth on the show floor. I didn’t want any at the time, but thought it would be great to have, especially after seeing a demonstration of exactly how effective it is. Thanks to ThinkGeek, you can order the Cyber Clean Electronics Cleaning Putty anytime you want, in any quantity you choose, and say goodbye to dusty and dirty keyboards, mice, and other peripherals forever.

  Personally, I have a brush or two that I use to dust out debris and crumbs or anything else that may get in my keyboard on a regular basis, but it’s not perfect by any stretch and frequently just pushes the dust around in between the keys of my keyboard, or in the grooves of the plastic molding of my mouse. With Electronics Putty, you can actually get the putty down into those grooves, and it’s just tacky enough to pull up loose dirt and dust without sticking itself to your electronics or getting caught in those spaces. Just press it down in between your keys, wait a second, and peel it up – complete with all of the dirt and grime that’s been accumulating between your keys. Then just wash the stuff off, put it back in its tub, and let it dry for the next use.

• Mr. Bento Stainless Lunch Jars

  

  If you have a day full of classes and you know you won’t have a chance to hit a dining hall or cafe until they’re all closed, or if you’re headed off to work and want to brown-bag it instead of spending money on lunch at a restaurant or fast food, the Mr. Bento Stainless Lunch Jar Set is perfect for you. The set comes with four microwave-safe plastic bowls and a stainless steel carrying container that fits them all, even when all four bowls are loaded down with food. The set also comes with a nylon carrying bag so it’s easy to transport.

  Perhaps best of all, the entire set comes with an eating spork! Not only do you get a set of bowls to carry your food, but you get an eating utensil to use when it’s lunchtime. The bowls have seal-able tops, so you can fill them with soups and stews; you don’t have to use it for snack foods and solid items only. The containers are even insulated, so if you’re traveling with a bowl of hot soup and you don’t have access to a microwave, you can trust that it’ll stay hot at least for a few hours. Regardless of whether you just want some snacks to get you through a long day of classes, or you’re the type who doesn’t get to leave their desk at the office for lunch because they’re so busy (like me,) you can appreciate these.

• The Boogie Board LCD Tablet
  

  One of the quirks about living with a roommate or living with roommates in general is that you need a good way to communicate with them and leave them notes occassionally when you know you may not cross paths. If you’re headed back to campus, or you’re sharing space with roomies, or if you just want a way to leave yourself a note or two before you forget something, the Boogie Board LCD Tablet from ThinkGeek is perfect, re-usable, and won’t get dingy or dirty the way that chalkboards and whiteboards do. The Boogie Board is completely paperless, and while it comes with a stylus, you can also write on it using your finger, a stiff brush, a stylus from another peripheral, or just about anything else that’s gentle enough to activate the pressure-sensitive screen on the Boogie Board.

  The pressure sensitive surface also lets you press harder for thicker lines and softer for finer points. Perhaps best of all, when you’re tired of what’s displayed on the Boogie Board, or you’ve done everything on your list, or bought everything on the shopping list, one touch of the button at the top will wipe the slate clean and ready for you to use again, good as new!

That’s it for this month’s Classy Gear segment! Not a lot of high-end gadgets and gear this time around but instead some useful gadgets and gear that won’t break the bank but will help you make a cozier home office, dorm room, or just a cozier office for those of us who aren’t headed back to class but want to reward ourselves with something shiny as if we were. As always, let me know what you think of the products in the round-up this month, and leave a comment if there are any products you’d like to see included in a future Classy Gear segment.

You may or may not know this, but there’s a whole world of coffee that goes beyond the cup of hypersweetened espresso drinks you’ll get at your local Starbuck’s and the oh-so-traditional cup of joe you’ll snag at the convenience store you visit on the way to the office. Granted, that world is vast and deep beyond measure – complete with exceptionally high-priced gadgets and entire kitchen appliance installations designed specifically for the perfect cup of coffee. You don’t need to dive that deep to get an appreciation for what makes a good cup of coffee better than a bad cup of coffee, to know when to go ahead and pour from the pot at the convenience store and when to skip the badly burned and over-warmed pot that’s sitting right next to it.

In this new series, called Stalking the Wild Bean, we’ll take a trip through the world of coffee together. I’ll show you some of my favorite coffee drinking implements, some ways to add flavor to your morning cup without buying coffee that’s been sitting in flavoring for weeks before it gets to the store, a few coffee preparation tips, and perhaps most prominently I’ll try out different flavored and unflavored coffees from roasters near and far. Some of them will be brilliant, some of them will be horrible, but I’ll share all of the results with you.

So let’s get started, shall we? This week we’ll take a look at a relatively new bean, the Papua New Guinea Estate Coffee, to make it onto the virtual shelves of one of my favorite semi-local coffee roasters, Whiff Roasters, based in Lilitz, Pennsylvania.

Whiff Roasters will likely be featured more than once – they have an exceptionally wide variety of coffees, and I order from them regularly for my own coffee supply at home. Even so, some of their blends are hits, and others are clear misses. Don’t worry – this won’t become a plug for them; there are plenty of other online and offline roasters in my area to try, along with grocery store varieties that anyone can get easily anywhere, so don’t worry too much that the coffees I review here will be out of your reach.

Unless otherwise noted, the beans I’m tasting have been on the shelf no longer than 5 days, roasted Vienna style, and sealed in an airtight or vacuum packed container, the way any consumer would get them. I prepare the beans by grinding them on-demand, just after boiling the water for coffee, and then prepare the coffee in a french press. I let the coffee steep a touch longer than advisable (most people will suggest you let coffee steep 3-5 minutes maximum, I like to over-extract my coffee, so keep that in mind when reading my reviews – I’ll try to point it out.) but otherwise consume it the way any normal consumer would. I will, at times, prepare the coffee differently for the sake of comparison, but I’ll note it in the review.

Finally, each blend will be reviewed on five factors: aroma (the smell of the cup as it’s brewed and poured), acidity (the sharpness and acidic notes of the coffee on your tongue), body (the richness and heaviness of the coffee), flavor (the flavor notes and depth of the coffee’s taste), and after-taste (how long the flavor stays with you after swallowing, and what type of flavor that is).

• The Blend: Whiff Roasters Papua New Guinea Estate

  Now then, this is the way Whiff Roasters describes the Papua New Guinea Estate:

  This Estate coffee is located on the rich fertile banks of the Gumanch River in the Waghi Valley of the Western Highlands Province. This was once considered the largest coffee estates in Papua New Guinea. It is known as the Gumanch Estate, The altitude it is grown at is 5500 feet. You will recive a well balanced cup of coffee with fair acidity and good body.

  Whiff Roasters roasts and packages all of its coffee on-site. While I still regret that Whiff Roasters doesn’t put an explicit roast date on their bags, they’ve stated several times that their coffee is vacuum sealed on the same day that the beans are roasted in order to preserve flavor, and they’re shipped so you can be certain that no bag you receive is more than five days old, and that includes shipping time.

  The Papua New Guinea is offered in any roast style you choose, from City to Double French, and you can purchase it ground as fine as you like, although I highly recommend you don’t and you grind as much as you need for a pot yourself immediately prior to use. One pound of Papua New Guinea from Whiff Roasters will run you $9.95 plus shipping, packed in two half-pound bags.

• The Aroma

  The Papua New Guinea has a solid, rich air to it that’s pleasing to the nose without being overpowering. It’s not a “wake you up in the morning from the bedroom” kind of coffee, so don’t expect to be blown away, but when you get your nose into your cup or waft the aroma to you while you stir the french press, you’ll definitely smell it. The aroma is delicate but very present, and hangs in the air a bit while you’re enjoying or preparing your coffee.

  While the aroma is buttery and rich, and overall pleasing enough, it’s definitely not horribly notable. I did pick up a nutshell-like kind of half-citrus-half-cinnamon air off of the coffee immediately after grinding though, which you get fresh upon grinding and adding hot water, but vanishes fairly quickly after steeping. It’s not the kind of aroma that taunts you from your cup while cooling next to you on your desk, but it’s definitely the kind that you enjoy while you’re preparing your coffee. If you were to make this particular bean with drip, you may not notice it until you poured it – in which case you’d be in for a nice surprise when you did.

• The Acidity

  While Whiff Roasters goes out of its way to note the fact that this particular coffee has mild acidity, I found it a little higher than what I would refer to as “mild.” Keep in mind I over-extracted it a bit, and would likely diminish the amount of acid by steeping it for less time – thus coming away with a smoother cup. Even so, the acid was actually pleasant when compared to the body of the coffee, and worked well through the entire taste of the cup, from the moment it touched the tongue all the way to the back-palate and after-taste.

  This coffee isn’t the most acidic I’ve ever tasted, but it’s up there, and the acid is very prominent in its flavor profile. Admittedly though, the body of the coffee would be pretty hollow without it, so I think the acid is only slightly unbalanced for the body of the coffee and it doesn’t come off as bitter in any way, just very acidic. It’s not mouth-puckering acidic, but it’s definitely the first thing you notice when you sip it.

• The Body

  The fact that the acidity is such a large part of the flavor profile sets off the body a little bit. While there are definitely coffees with less body and stronger acidity, or more complex bodies and less acidity, the Papua New Guinea comes off a little one-note in comparison but that note still stands as delicious. It’s a good, strong bodied coffee that stands up to the prominent acidity, but I worry that if I did something to cut the acidity that I might miss out on the balance and get too much of the strong, dark notes of the body over lingering acidity.

  The coffee’s mouthfeel is similar; a little watery, even with a pretty hefty brew, and the body isn’t so deep or heavy that it lingers on the tongue, making it a great morning cup – something you can drink a couple of cups of and not feel like you shouldn’t have eaten so much for breakfast. At the same time, the body is smooth and deep but without really dark thickness that I’ve associated with some darker blends like my old standby, the Kenya AA (which I’ll have to review later for comparison.)

• The Flavor

  The nutshell-like flavor I picked up on the aroma fresh after grinding came back out after the coffee’s been steeped for a bit. You don’t pick it up on the aroma again after water has been added, but it’s definitely there in the flavor profile. You get some of the dryness and spice of a cinnamon-like complexity, and some light high citrus-like notes that you might expect from a walnut or hazelnut shell (if you were to lick one, for some reason.)

  As I’ve noted already, the acidity is a strong part of the flavor profile – even if you brew your coffee as strong as I do, you’ll notice is over the depth of the body, and you have to peek through that acidity to get to some of those notes. The acidity is a touch overwhelming, which is unfortunate because I could tell that there’s a little more complexity that I’m just not getting to in the flavor notes.

• The After-Taste

  The downside of having a flavor profile that’s almost 60/40 acidity to body is that the after-taste is pretty astringent and lasts long on the palate. That’s partially what I mean when I say it’s smooth – as long as you’re drinking it, or if you have the Papua New Guinea paired with food, you won’t notice exactly how astringent the after-taste is, but if you finish your meal before your cup, or you stop drinking and move on to something else, you’ll notice that astringency on your palate for a while.

  It’s not horribly unpleasant for someone like me; I don’t mind that acid, but at the same time, a lot of people – most notable the Dunkin Donuts crowd who insists on the best coffee being the smoothest, even-bodied, and unfortunately forgettable, would hate the lingering after-taste of a coffee like this, and knowing it may overwhelm the acidity with milk, cream, or worse.

  Part of what makes the lingering astringency nice though is the fact that you get some of the most base notes of the coffee along with it – when the high citrius and nutty notes are gone, you do get an earthiness that sticks around, along with a little butter-rum-like undertone, which for my palate is rather pleasant.

• The Verdict

  The Papua New Guinea Estate from Whiff Roasters is probably a foodie’s coffee although it might be too sharp for someone with a more refined palate than mine. It adapts well to being brewed short or long. There’s a variety of techniques you can employ to cut the acidity if you really don’t want it, and while I acknowledge it’s a bit overwhelming and a little unbalanced, I think there would be something fundamental missing from it if you cut it too far.

  At the same time, for the uninitiated, it likely comes off as harsh and thin, and lacking the body that so many other coffees push on our palate. It’s not a deep, dark, black coffee, even though it pours like one. It’s a great breakfast coffee and goes very well with food, especially thick or rich foods that can compliment the natural acidity in the blend.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments whether you’d like more detail on the specific flavors of the coffees I review, or if it would be helpful to assign numeric scores to each blend – I’m willing to do so, but I don’t want anyone to focus too strongly on the actual score and miss some of the complexities.

Also, as always, let me know what I can do to make this series of reviews even better! If you have a favorite roaster or blend, either gourmet or off-the-shelf, let me know in the comments, or send me an e-mail at alanhenry [at] theclassygeek [dot] com.

header image in this post courtesy of Flickr user Jeff Kubina. (Coffee Beans)

I received way more entries than I have prizes to give away, but never fear, I’ll do this (or something like it) again very soon! Thanks to everyone who entered, shared the contest on Twitter, and Liked The Classy Geek on Facebook! Before we get to the winners though, let’s go over the prizes that the winners will receive:

• 3rd Runner Up: HP USB Gift Pack, including 1GB USB Flash Drive, Retractable USB-to-Mini USB Cable, 4-in-1 Card Reader, and Mini USB Mouse!
• 2nd Runner Up: Iron Man and War Machine GelaSkin for the iPod Touch or iPhone!
• Grand Prize Winner: The iMojito iPhone Wallet from Malcolm Fontier (works with other phones too!)

Without further ado, let’s check out who’ll find a shiny prize in their mailbox as soon as the USPS can get it to them! Click the jump to see the winners (and click the photos for larger versions):

• 3rd Runner Up: Loli

  

  Reader and commenter Loli shared her office workspace that, aside from being a very nicely sized cube for an office workspace – much bigger than mine, I think – is personalized in some really unique ways. I particularly liked her cube’s guardian ghoul, the photos framed over her dual-displays, and oddly enough, the massive white and red mug-bowl sitting on her desk. The workspace felt cozy but organized, a place where work actually gets done but isn’t the kind of place you can’t stand looking at every day.

  I also liked the balance ball under the desk instead of a traditional chair, I thought that was a nice touch. Congratulations, Loli!

  

• 2nd Runner Up: Davidd

  

  Davidd lives in Hawaii, and it’s difficult not to be jealous of him just for that fact, but even if you weren’t jealous before, this workspace photo is bound to make you almost rageful at your dull gray cubicle walls. It looks like David is out on his lanai, relaxing with a can of coke and a pair of laptops, each doing a different thing.

  I had said all along to people thinking about entering the workspace contest that your workspace doesn’t have to be the cleanest or the tidiest or the most riddled with gear in order to win, it just needs to be interesting and highly personal, and David’s workspace here definitely fits the bill. Oh what I would give to have a view like that over the top of my laptops every single day!

• GRAND PRIZE WINNER: Syddie

  

  Liz, also known as Syddie, took a bunch of workspace photos for the contest, including some before and after shots of what her desk looked like before she did some tidying and re-organization, and then again afterward. These are the after pics, although the before pics featured her adorable cat (named Francesca) who likes to keep her company while she’s playing World of Warcraft!

  

  Liz’s workspace is riddled with gear, including an XBox 360 off to the side but plugged in to her displays, a hand-built gaming PC in a really nice case, and the whole array connected to a pair of really nice monitors. Now the gear is really nice, but what really won me over about Liz’s workspace is that it looks homey and really cozy – someplace you can spend a several hours hunkered down raiding dungeons on WoW or blowing noobs away on her XBox. The Wind Rider Cub and Gryphon Cub (both World of Warcraft merchandise) are adorable, and the littany of technical books off to the side are telling to Liz’s geekiness as well!

  

  As much as I have a fond eye for technology in a space, I also really like design and furniture, and that solid old desk that Liz is using is one of my favorite things about her workspace – it has two pull-outs on each side that were likely originally designed for taking notes and adding a little workspace when needed but fits a laptop perfectly on the left and a mouse and mousepad perfectly on the right.

  

  I adored this workspace, and I think Liz definitely earned top honors – it’s truly a geek’s haven, and while she’ll be the first one to admit to you that she’s got a lot of tech crammed into a smaller space that she would rather have spread out a bit, I for one really like the way she’s made use of the space she does have.

Congratulations to our winners, and many many thanks to everyone who sent in photos of their desks, both at home and at their offices, in their cubes and in their computer nooks at home.

I’ll feature and use some of your other photos (with credit to you, of course!) in posts in the next several weeks, never fear – so even if you didn’t place in the contest, you very well may see your photo appear in a future Classy Geek post!

What do you think of the winning workspaces? Let us know in the comments!

Part of the mission of The Classy Geek isn’t just to help you with informative articles, guides, multi-part series’, and how-tos, but also to help you – that’s right, all of you, regardless of age, gender, creed, or geekly persuasion – get your act together; to stand on your own two feet and be happier about yourself without sacrificing your geekiness in the process.

I said I was here to help, didn’t I? Well now’s your chance. Have questions you’d like answered on the blog? Maybe you have a hot tip – a killer Vodka that most people probably haven’t heard of, or maybe a great music discovery site that’s perfect for building a special playlist for someone you have a crush on – send your questions and tips my way!

Click on the “Contact” link at the top of the page or just e-mail me at [ alanhenry [at] theclassygeek [dot] com ] to send in your questions, tips, and tricks!

Alternatively, don’t forget to like The Classy Geek on Facebook and start a discussion on our Facebook Fan Page to send in your questions and tips as well!

Among the lineup this month are the admirable Droid X from Motorola, as pictured, which I think was worth noting since last month’s column featured the iPhone 4, regardless of its antenna issues. You’ll also see a carry-all utility that will help you in almost any situation, a keyboard with some high tech features, and more.

Let’s dive in after the jump!

• Eclipse Litetouch Keyboard

  

  The Eclipse Wireless Litetouch Keyboard and the Eclipse Wired Litetouch Keyboard are both products that I’ve been following since their release at CES 2010 in January out in Las Vegas. Eclipse – now a brand owned by MadCatz, a company that makes a variety of computer peripherals and gaming devices – announced the product at CES and claimed it would be available by the end of Q1 2010. Then they said it would be available mid Q2. Now here we are, coming up on the very end of Q2 and the Litetouch is finally starting to make an appearance on store shelves, although it’s still very short of stock.

  I had the opportunity to review a wireless model for a summer keyboard roundup over at Tom’s Guide, and delays aside, Eclipse has a beautiful and high-tech keyboard on their hands with the Litetouch line. It has some pros and cons, but the programmable LCD panel on the right side is a huge benefit for people who love customizing their keyboard, and if you like the quiet, sleek feel of laptop-style scissor keys, this brings them to a desktop with a high-tech edge in the form of the touch-sensitive LCD on the device. It’s definitely an attention-getter as well; as soon as I had the demo unit set up on my desk, I had people dropping by and pointing out how high-tech and unique the keyboard looked, and expressing how cool they thought it looked. The Litetouch models aren’t cheap, but if you have a little extra cash to spend on a geeky peripheral like this, it’s worth the price.

• The Tool Logic Survival Card with Firestarter

  

  The beauty of the Tool Logic Survival Card with Firestarter is exactly as ThinkGeek describes it. With a single utility the size of a credit card that you can slip into your wallet or bag, you have not only a knife and a fire-steel strip that you can use to start a fire in case of emergency but a pen, a pair of tweezers, screwdriver, and even a red LED flashlight. It even has a security whistle that you can sound if that included knife just isn’t working out for you.

  Aside from being a single tool that can do just about anything, it’s slim and trim enough to fit anywhere when it’s not in use, and be ready for action when you need it. There’s nothing classier than looking entirely unassuming and then being able to produce the right tool at the right time from some hidden space on your person, and when it’s no longer needed, return to looking unassuming. That’s how James Bond did it, now so can you.

• Motorola Droid X (Verizon Wireless)

  

  Last month I highlighted the Apple iPhone 4, and this month an Android phone hit the market that’s earned high praise from the smartphone community. The Droid X from Motorola has a glorious 4.3-inch LCD display behind a capacitive touch-screen display, an 8 megapixel camera that also records video in 720p and outputs it using a built-in mini-HDMI port, the ability to turn into a wireless hotspot (at an additional charge) that serves are a portable wireless network for other devices like a laptop or an iPad, and and up to 220 hours of standby battery time.

  By and large, the battery life is apparently epic, and even though it comes with Android 2.1, Verizon Wireless plans to update it to Android 2.2 – Google’s latest iteration of their rapidly rising mobile OS – before the end of summer, and some reports claim that to be as early as the next couple of weeks. The Droid X is actually a pretty large phone, measuring almost 3.5 inches wide and over 5 inches long – a physical size that’s not for everyone. Still, even though the phone is more of a slab than other devices, it’s actually thinner and lighter than most other smartphones of its caliber, including the iPhone 4. It’s currently the device to beat if you’re shopping for an Android phone, and it’s probably one of the first phones (like it’s predecessor, the original Droid by Motorola, which I own and love) that’s seriously challenged the iPhone in smartphone innovation.

• The Booq Mamba Catch

  

  The Booq Mamba Catch is a messenger bag unlike any other – it doesn’t have a flap, and it opens like a clamshell backpack, and has a myriad of pockets and sleeve on the inside and the outside to protect your gear and give you plenty of room to stash all of your stuff. The best part of the Mamba Catch is that you carry it like a briefcase or a messenger bag, but it doesn’t have a flap, and all of the sleeves and pouches on the outside securely zip shut.

  I wrote about the Mamba Catch for Gearlog when it came out, and ever since then I’ve had my eye on one if I ever wanted to replace my primary messenger bag because of its size and style – and it looks perfect for easy access to gear like cameras and business cards when I’m at conventions or shows. Best of all, Booq bags come with their location service, where the company will track the serial number of the bag if it’s ever stolen to make sure it’s not sold or pawned off somewhere.

• The Dodo Case for iPad

  

  If you own an iPad, you have a number of case and carrier options for it, but none of them are quite as attractive and well designed as The Dodo Case – hand crafted and carved from bamboo and faux leather, and inspired by the look and feel of sketchbooks and notebooks like the Moleskine. The Dodo Case folds back and acts like a stand that you can use to watch video on your iPad or rest on its case while you use it. The bamboo is carved specifically to fit the iPad so you can still access all of the buttons and ports on it, and it fits snugly in the case even when in use.

  Perhaps the best thing – something I mentioned when I did a quick review of the Dodo Case elsewhere – is that it’s a sharp measure classier than most other polycarbonate, plastic, or styrene iPad hard and soft cases. It’s truly unique and hand-made in San Francisco by people who actually care about the design and performance of their product. Plus, it’s one of the more unique iPad cases I’ve ever seen.

That wraps up this month’s Classy Gear segment! As always, let me know what you think of the roundup this month, and whether there are any products that you think should be included and featured in a future Classy Gear article!

That doesn’t mean the contest is all sewn up though – there’s still a week left to send in your entries, so make sure you enter today! Submissions close on July 31st, and winners will be announced the following week after judging!

A few people have said “but my workspace isn’t fancy!” – don’t worry about that! It’s not about having a workspace with expensive gear, widescreen monitors, or lots of fancy gadgets or lighting; it’s about seeing where you work or play!

Here’s how to enter:

1. Snap a photo (or a few photos) of your computer setup!
2. Like The Classy Geek on Facebook (assuming you’re on Facebook, that is!)
3. E-mail those photos (compress, zip, or upload them somewhere if they’re huge) and your name at Facebook to me at alanhenry -at- theclassygeek -dot- com!
4. ?????
5. Profit! (Seriously, there’s nothing else you need to do!)

See how this works? A simple and easy way to enter, and a simple and easy way to stay up to speed on new posts from The Classy Geek! And don’t think that liking us on Facebook is just a promo – those of you who like us on Facebook will be treated to special giveaways and events in the future.

The winners of the contest will get one of three prizes, courtesy of GelaSkins and Malcolm Fontier:

• 3rd Runner Up: HP USB Gift Pack, including 1GB USB Flash Drive, Retractable USB-to-Mini USB Cable, 4-in-1 Card Reader, and Mini USB Mouse!
• 2nd Runner Up: Iron Man and War Machine GelaSkin for the iPod Touch or iPhone!
• Grand Prize Winner: The iMojito iPhone Wallet from Malcolm Fontier (works with other phones too!)

If you haven’t sent in a few photos, send them in today!

image in this post courtesy of flickr user jnyemb. (jofalltrades.com Home Office [explored])

In Ties: Revisited, we’ll look at different types of knots, whether or not there’s ever a case for a clip-on tie, different fabric, length, and width styles, and a few ways to make sure you’re getting not just a classy tie, but a tie that will look good, feel good, and last you until it’s out of style and you want to buy something new.

The last time we hit this topic, we talked about a few basic things – colors, patterns, and materials. They’re still important, but a number of you wanted a little more, and who am I to deny it? So let’s pretend we’re headed back to the menswear department or formalwear store one more time – yes yes, I’m happy to help – and we’ll make sure you get something that looks good and feels right at the same time. You don’t have to break the bank to do it, either, some of my best ties are ones I purchased at a standard department store.

Also, don’t forget – there’s still a few weeks left to enter The Classy Geek’s Show Us Your Workspace Contest! Here’s how to win!

So while I’m still of the mindset that the The ThinkGeek 8-bit Tie is awesome and geeky (and perfect for those kind of occasions when you’re dressing like a hipster, trying to be ironic, or you’re hanging out in a casual situation with fellow geeks where it would be appreciated) it’s not ideal for the company holiday party or for a work environment where you have to wear a coat and tie every day, or anywhere else you may be where the people who’ll be observing you have more of an eye for the traditional. I think it’s pretty tough to dispute that.

1. Style: Fabric, Length, and Width

   However, that doesn’t mean your tie needs to be devoid of personality; it should be loud, but loud in the right way – a bold color choice, or an interesting (but not too attention getting) pattern can make for a sharp looking tie.

   First thing’s first though – you really don’t need to break the bank in order to make this happen. I mentioned that you should look for good materials the last time we discussed this, and part of the reason I’m such a huge proponent of silk blends is that depending on the amount of silk in the blend, you can find a tie that feels really elegant and reflects light with sophistication but won’t put you out a ton of money. Additionally, a silk blend means that your tie is easier to clean, less likely to stain, and will likely last longer because the blended silk and polyester or cotton will add a little strength to the weave. That being said, a quick search over at Amazon reveals that even some attractive 100% silk ties won’t run you more than $20-30 USD. I’m not saying steer clear of 100% silk, especially if you find something you really like – they’ll just require more care than blends will.

   Another point brought up in the comments of the last piece worth looking at again are varying styles of length and width for a tie. This is something of a tricky point because length and width are such timely characteristics that it’s difficult to suggest something that will be timeless. For example, back in the 1950s and 60s the preferred style for ties were incredibly long and incredibly thin. Over the past 50 years, the prevailing style has moved from thin, simple wool or cotton solid-color ties (and a pretty heavy lean towards flat-bottomed ties instead of today’s almost entirely prevalent arrow-bottom ties) to more patterned, striped, and varied color ties. Modern ties, especially in the past 20-30 years, have also moved from being very narrow to more broad at the arrow-tip.

   Width of a tie should, frankly, be relative to the width of your torso, I think. I don’t have a hard and fast rule about this, and if anyone does I would love to hear it, but I find that very thin people can get away with thin ties, but they generally don’t want to. Most common tie designs from popular and boutique retailers will suit you in the width department – it’s length that you should pay attention to.

   If you’re planning to wear a coat over your shirt and tie, a handy way to tell if your tie is too short is if you put your coat on over your tie and you can see the end, or the tie starts to widen significantly before the middle button of your coat. That means for most people, your tie is long enough when the widest part comes down to your navel or just below. If it’s far below your belt, well over your zipper, or the widest part of your tie is below the waistline it’s definitely too long. If it’s resting at the end of your sternum, it’s probably too short. Follow?

   The point is to make sure your tie doesn’t fall out of a coat with the middle button fastened, and doesn’t show below that fastened button on your coat. Remember the rule for three-button coats: sometimes, always, never – this means your top button should be buttoned sometimes, the middle button should always be buttoned if you have your coat closed, and the bottom button should never be buttoned, no matter what.

   

2. Knots, Clip-Ons, and Bows

   Let’s get the clip-on argument out of the way right away. Unless your a local TV news anchor, planning to get a quick picture taken with a low-quality camera, or otherwise are putting on a tie but don’t expect to be in front of another human being, there’s no place for a clip-on tie. Part of me is willing to give young kids a break and let them wear clip-ons, but honestly? If your child is old enough to put on a tie, they’re old enough to start learning how to dress themselves, wouldn’t you think? Besides – a kid who can tie a Windsor knot is a kid who’ll never need to look it up on the Internet. Trust me.

   Let’s hit the bow-tie topic as well: bow-ties are very difficult to pull off, and require not just a certain kind of dress but a certain kind of personality. Bow ties scream quirky, eccentric, a little weird – they’re not what I would call classy, but they definitely scream personality. So while I can’t in good conscience recommend a bow-tie for any geek who wants to put themselves in the classy and sophisticated category, I say that if you can pull off a bow-tie (the same way hipsters still manage to pull off super-narrow black ties with flat bottoms) because it works with your look and your personality (usually accompanied by a corduroy blazer, mismatched pants, and sneakers) then by all means go for it – part of being a classy geek is not being afraid to wear your geek on your sleeve if it’s who you are – you should never be ashamed of it! That being said though, it’d better work for you, or else I’m coming after you to take my advice back.

   When it comes to knots, the old standard Windsor knot will suit you in almost every case. It’s also the easiest to learn, and the standard knot used for soldiers in the military and just about every other standard dress affair. If you go to a formalwear store to get fitted for a shirt and buy a matching tie, the tailor or sales associate there will almost surely put you in a shirt and then give you a tie that’s fitted around your neck with a Windsor knot. One of the biggest benefits to a Windsor knot is that once you have it tied at the right length, you can loosen and tighten it as necessary, which means you could very well never have to re-tie that knot ever again, at least until your tie requires cleaning or pressing. Yes, that’s right – keep that tie knotted and put it back on, especially if you wear a tie regularly.

   That being said though, the Windsor knot isn’t the only type of knot out there, and not always the best type of knot for your shirt, even though it’s the most frequently used and works well in any situation. If you have a shirt with buttoned collars or very short collars, you might consider a Four in Hand knot, and if you want a look that’s a bit different from everyone else but a knot that’s still easily done and applicable for almost any situation, a Pratt knot is just a little different from the Windsor but still works well (especially if you like to wear ties with your top button unbuttoned for that “carefully disheveled” look, which I only suggest after the interview has turned into drinks afterward, or that important business meeting has migrated to the bar a few blocks over.)

   Don’t just take it from me, though – if you need a refresher or don’t know how to tie a Windsor knot (or better yet, you’re interested in experimenting with other types of knots) I’ve included the video for how to tie a Windsor knot below, and I strongly suggest you head over to one of my constant bookmarks, Tie-a-Tie.net (even if the owner of the site and I disagree a bit on the proper length of a tie – he likes his longer than I do.)

   
   

3. Other Tips: Longevity and Durability

   Finally, when choosing a tie, you’ll want to make sure that the tie you pick will last you a good long while – and that makes sense; even if you don’t spend a lot on your ties, a little care in selection and a little care in general can make sure that they serve you well for years to come.

   First of all, as commenter “LoserGeek” mentioned in our last article, thrift stores are a perfectly good place to go looking for ties! Just make sure that – the same way as you would if you shopped for a new tie in a department store or a menswear store (as commenter “ek_man” very correctly pointed out!) – that the stitching is tight and firm and shows no sign of pulling loose on examination in the store. In thrift stores this is essentially important, because you’re essentially buying a used tie that at best you can hope has only been worn a handful of times. You’ll still need to get it cleaned before you wear it (especially if it’s all wool or something) so take that into account as well.

   Also, when shopping in thrift stores, keep an eye out for contemporary look and feel. The trouble with thrift stores is that you’ll get a lot of things that are distinctly aged in style, which may work if you’re going for a look that’s a little retro, or your overall appeal is retro-modern; as in, you wear older colors and fabrics with clean lines and a modern look. Otherwise, I’d have to wave you off of the paisley ties of yesteryear. You all should know by now how I feel about paisley.

   Now then, you’re looking for tight stitching, and you want to take my advice above about fabrics – the more you go to all cotton, all wool, or all silk ties, the more delicate they’ll be and the more you suffer the downsides of having a non-synthetic fabric interwoven with those stylish natural fabrics.

   I know synthetics have a bad rap with the designer crowd, and someone who’s willing to pay hundreds of dollars for a tie wouldn’t take one with a single thread of polyester or rayon in theirs, but for those classy geeks living on a budget or who know the meaning of the word “value,” a little synthetics in our ties mean they’ll stick with us longer and can be stored in the closet on a coat hanger instead of in a case or on a special tie holder.

   Speaking of storage, my last big longevity tip is around storage and cleaning. First of all – follow the instructions on the tag. I know, geeks like us don’t feel like we need to read the directions, but when it comes to formalwear, if your rule isn’t “take it to a dry cleaner” exclusively, then you definitely need to RTFM – and I know you know what I mean.

   As for storage, I suggest something like this gorgeous Walnut Tie Hanger if you like the wide style, or if you have more ties than this and want something that’s a little more compact or circular in your closet, maybe this Twirl-a-Tie Tie Rack. If you don’t have nearly enough ties to make either of those worth the purchase, a single plastic (no wire hangers!) hanger should do the trick.

As I’ve said before, you don’t have to take my word or this, and there’s a lot more we can talk about here just on the matter of ties and menswear. I really need to get a classy geek to talk about women’s formalwear too so I don’t alienate all of my female readers (unless you’re all out there bookmarking this to send to your fashion-challenged geeky boyfriends and partners) but for the guys out there, my suggestions here are a starting point, not an end-point.

Go to your local formalwear store, like a JoS. A. Bank or a Men’s Wearhouse or a Casual Male XL and get your measurements taken before you buy anything. Don’t even buy a tie until you make sure you’re wearing dress shirts that comfortably fit your neck, and as soon as you make an investment into a suit or two and a few nice shirts, find yourself a tailor or someone who can make alterations to your body shape that you trust with your clothes, even if it’s a local dry cleaner.

Regardless of all of that now though, hopefully now you have the tools to find a good tie that will last you a good long time, regardless of whether you find it as a formalwear store or you pick up a tie you simply can’t put back down in your local thrift store. Finally. once you get that tie you simply can’t live without, hopefully I’ve given you a few more tools to help you wear it with pride, style, and class.

images in this post courtesy of Flickr user Jerry7171, (072606_16551) and Framed! (a blog). (152.jpg from post Video Game Artwork.)

The trick is to make sure your items are actually nice and not just creepy, they’re placed well so they accentuate your space instead of dominate it, and that the posters and prints on your wall look good, not like you just moved out of your parents’ basement or dorm room into your first place.

I was partially inspired by this post over at Anime Vice, titled How to Hang Anime Posters in Your Room and Still Be Classy, which by itself sounds like a post I would write. In addition to the points well made at Anime Vice, I wanted to add a few more tips that I think are worthwhile for any geek who wants their home to look classy but don’t want to hide their fandoms or resort to hanging art they can’t stand.

We can get into displaying figures, toys, and other prizes of geek culture in another post, but in this post I want to hit a couple of important points about how to hang and display posters, wall scrolls, and art in a way that not only protects your art while showing off your inner geek, but looks good at the same time. Let’s dive in behind the jump.

Also, don’t forget – there’s still a few weeks left to enter The Classy Geek’s Show Us Your Workspace Contest! Here’s how to win!

Moving into your own space is exciting, and while interior decoration isn’t traditionally a very geeky skill to have, it’s one that’s worth having – at least as far as knowing a few things that match and knowing how to put together a coherent look is concerned. Seriously – we all know what it’s like when our World of Warcraft characters’ armor is a dozen different shapes, sizes, and colors, and we all hate it, right? Your apartment should be no exception.

Now over at Anime Vice, poster GodLen takes you through the basics, pick the right kind of image, choose an attractive and classy frame, get it printed, have some fun while you’re waiting for the printer, and then hang it up! It really is that simple, I’ll back him up on that, but that’s not where we’ll finish the discussion.

First of all, GodLen has some great images in his post that will make great wall art if you’re looking for anime posters to take to a printer – this is an excellent point: if you have a digital image, either on your computer or one you’ve found somewhere on the Internet, you should know you can get it blown up, printed, and mailed to you on as heavy or light stock paper as you choose. I did this for a custom World of Warcraft poster I had printed at Kinko’s (using the quintessential Night Elf female image, at that!) and then mounted in a frame with a brushed green background that I painted myself. I gave them the image on a disc, picked the size and type of paper I wanted, and just waited for it to be finished and ready for me to pick up.

Alternatively, you can always buy prints and art from Web stores and poster sites, but GodLen has a good point here too – most pre-printed posters tend to look like posters. That is, they have a relatively campy, fan-ish (at best) or frat-ish (at worst) look to them and not a very artistic or classy look. Be careful when shopping for posters and wall art this way – if you find something you love though, go for it.

The real solution here however, if you don’t want to take images you like to a printer, is to buy art directly from artists! Your favorite Webcomic authors and artists are probably dying to sell more of their work to their fans – check their webpages for stores, and if you don’t see what you like, ask them if they’ll do a print for you, run off a specific image, do commissions, or worst case, give you permission for a single self-made print of a specific strip or piece of art that you like! More often than not, you’ll find they’re willing to work with you – especially if you make it clear you’re willing to pay them for their time, effort, and intellectual property.

Once you have an image that you want to hang, either one that you’ve taken to be printed by a professional printer, affordable print-and-ship company (like Mpix, suggested in the original article,) or even your local Kinko’s, now you have to get it on your wall. if you were going for the dorm room look, you’d probably just stick it to the wall surface with tape, putty, or a few thumbtacks, but we’re trying to be classy here, so we’re going to spend a little money on something that you may have assumed is only for expensive art in an expensive pad: frames.

You don’t have to spend a ton of money on frames, and be wary of online printers and other companies willing to take your images and put them in overwhelming and expensive frames that very well may be pieces of art on their own. For a classy look that won’t take the emphasis off of your print, and for a uniform look across your home that will fit just about any type of print, try a frame with a standard black border, like this 16″ x 20″ black frame
with an acrylic plate, or this 24″ x 36″ simple black frame with a styrene plate.

You could alternatively go for this black wood 24″ x 36″ frame with a Plexiglas window, perfect for higher-end pieces. You can see that there are a number of choices, and if you have an IKEA near you, you can even snag some similar frames to the ones above (although the ones above you can order online.)

You don’t have to spend a lot of money to frame your anime prints, posters, or art from your favorite Webcomic or manga artist; you can see that simple frames with acrylic plates are really affordable, and if you wanted to go with a wood frame with a Plexiglas plate, you can spend a bit more. Even so, I would still recommend a simple plastic frame with an acrylic plate so you can easily hang it, move it, and transport it without worrying about breaking it or cracking the wood. Best of all, they look sleek and contemporary without being ridiculously expensive, even for larger sizes.

Buy a frame that’s right for your piece, by the way – or alternatively, you can buy multiple frames of the same size and mount your pieces in them anyway (as long as they’re at least approximately the right size – no putting an 4″ x 6″ in a 24″ x 36″ frame, okay?) so you can put frames of the same size up in the same area or part of your space even though the art inside may be different sizes.

So now you have your print, you have it printed, and you have it in a size-appropriate frame, now you need to get your pieces onto the wall. If you live in an apartment, you probably want to be wary of putting nails or thumbtacks or anything semi-permanent or potentially damaging in the walls, so I’m a huge fan of 3M Command Adhesive Hooks – mostly because you can buy clear ones that adhere to your walls firmly and they can be removed with minimal effort and little to no damage at all to the wall surface and paint when it’s time to move the piece they’re holding or if you have to move out. Best of all, the adhesive on the mounting hooks is strong enough to hold most pieces firmly to the wall without having to drive a nail into it.

Most frames like these have metal attachments on the back that make them easy to hang, and those attachments are perfect size for these kinds of command hooks. If you have smaller pieces, you can buy smaller Command Hooks for smaller pieces. I can happily say that all of the pieces of art on my walls are held by command hooks and command mounting strips, for the heavier pieces that need a little more anchoring to the walls, like larger frames where a single mounting point isn’t enough to keep it attached to the wall.

You can also use mounting strips to place your art solid and square inside of your frame – a little trick I’ve used is to take the included paper that’s inside the frame when you buy it, turn it over so the white side faces out, and mount your image on that side. If you want a different color for the mounting, a little acrylic paint will give it a little color. When it’s time to move, or you’d like to rearrange your room or space, taking the hooks or mounting strips down is simple and easy, and they’re affordable enough that you can remove them and buy new adhesive strips for your hooks or mounting strips when you need them, and no one will ever know that you had something on your walls.

So now you have some really attractive and unique prints and art, either of anime or of your favorite Webcomic art, or maybe even some pieces from an artist that you really like. You have them mounted nice and even in a frame, and you have them mounted nice and even on your wall. I didn’t get into how to properly hang a piece of art on the wall or mount something in a frame – I’m giving you some credit here; we’re all geeks here: I’m sure you know how to make something level and how to mark a wall before you put something on it. The only thing to remember now is to take care of the pieces, dust them and wipe them down regularly, and make sure they’re hung up in nice, even spaces around your home.

As well as being able to move and remove pieces framed and mounted this way easily, the other benefit to using affordable acrylic frames and command hooks and mounting strips to put your art on the wall is that you can swap out the pieces frequently and use the same frames. If you’re like most geeks, (especially us anime geeks) you have more anime posters and prints than you have space on your walls. Using this method, you can swap them out every so often and change up the look of your home for only a few dollars for the adhesives. Now I know I didn’t hit on wallscrolls in this piece: and that’s for a very simple reason: good ones look great, awful ones look horrid, and you want to use them sparingly, not in place of framed art. They have a distinctly dorm-room

This way, you have a clean, modern, and attractive look in your space, you get to show off some of your favorite art, your space doesn’t look like a dorm room or a frat hours, and best of all, you haven’t betrayed your inner geek to get a grown up and sophisticated look. That’s how you wear your geek on your sleeve and look classy doing it.

images in this post courtesy of NeoGAF forum poster Abel, (Xeno2) OtakuDan, (3011422881_28fd8047e5.jpg and 3012258766_0e193bc0c1.jpg) and Framed! (a blog). (152.jpg from post Video Game Artwork.)

With online grocery delivery services like Fresh Direct, Peapod, Amazon Fresh, and others, in some cases there’s no need to leave the house in order to get your weekly groceries, replenish your depleted pantry, or stock your fridge with the food you need to get through the week. There are some caveats, obviously, but by and large, these services can not only make it easy and convenient for you to get your snacks and munchies, but they can also help you save money and keep you from overbuying at the grocery store through impulse purchases and bait-and-switch sales, and they can even help you lose weight in the process.

I’m not kidding. Let’s take a look at how behind the jump.

Like I said, there are some pretty significant caveats worth mentioning, but shopping for groceries and non-perishables online keeps you stuck laser focused to a list of items that you need to buy, and as you add items to your cart and see your subtotal increasing with each individual can of soup or bag of chips, there’s more of an incentive to make sure your total stays as low as you can make it.

Why Shopping Online Works

When you’re walking through a grocery store, the odds are stacked against you keeping to a grocery list of the essentials and maybe a few treats. Endcaps blaring sales on marked up items, low-stock on items that are on-sale while more expensive items are plentiful on store shelves nearby. You’re taunted by sale stickers, the smell of freshly baking bread, free samples, and a cart, just empty and waiting for you to fill it. Grocery stores themselves are designed to take you on the longest possible route from the front doors of the store to the checkouts, forcing you to make a circuit of the store starting usually with produce and forcing you to walk past aisles upon aisles of foods and goods you’re less likely to need to get to the items that are on most shopper’s grocery lists.

None of those things are necessarily bad – grocery stores use psychology to get us to spend more money, and in turn we have to develop the discipline or the tools to help us stick to our guns (and our budgets) and only buy the things we need as opposed to filling our carts with the things we want.

Thankfully, shopping for groceries online helps us out with that to a large extent. Services like Peapod and Fresh Direct will bring your entire grocery list right to your door; produce, dairy, meats, and all. If you’ve ever used one of these services, you’ll realize that while many of them try to emulate the feeling of browsing aisles in an all-text format, sitting in front of your computer with a list of things you need to buy is very different from walking through a store with a list in your hand.

There’s no “oh, what’s that?” and reaching for the shiny new item on the shelf with “new!” or “low price!” hung from a tag beneath it when you shop online, there’s no rounding an aisle and seeing the paper towels on the endcap that are on sale this week, and even though you don’t really need them you’re tempted to buy them – you’re entirely more likely to add the items you want delivered to your list, check out, and pay your bill.

Granted, most of these services offer you coupons or bargains for “similar items” or other related products to the ones you’re already buying, but as with shopping online anywhere, you’re less likely to fall for suggested or related items than you would be in a brick-and-mortar store.

In essence, you’re entirely more likely to stick to a grocery shopping list and a budget if you shop for groceries online – if for no other reason than the lack of distractions, sales on items you don’t need, attractions that have nothing to do with your list, and bait and switch tactics to get you to buy items you may not need. Shopping online makes it easier to stay on top of the costs of the items you’re adding to your cart, and how much of your list you’ve crossed off – and to make sure that when you have everything from your list in your cart, you stop shopping and check out.

Of course, it ideally takes less time to shop for groceries on a Website than it does to browse the aisles of a grocery store, and it takes less time to check out then it would to stand in line behind a half dozen people, all complaining about the size of the line. It’s also more convenient, in that you can schedule to have your groceries delivered at a certain time of day on a day of your choosing.

If you’re on a diet or trying to lose weight, shopping for groceries online is an excellent way to force you to pay attention to the food that you eat. Since you can often view the nutritional information of the foods that you find online, you can make sure you’re adding food to your cart that’s actually good for you, instead of just food that you may think matches up with the items on your list. You can weigh nutritional information over attractive packaging and beautiful color, and you can have the clarity of thought and presence of mind to buy light versions or healthier versions of the foods you want to buy. Similarly, you don’t wind up overbuying snacks and other foods because they’re there or you’re hungry.

Caveats

Like I said, there are some caveats. For example, before you start shopping for produce, meats, and other products where a careful, selective eye is required in order to ensure quality, you may want to make sure that the grocery store or the delivery people who bring your food to you are reputable and that you trust them. Start with produce that you’re okay experimenting with, like onions, potatoes, carrots, or root vegetables that are a bit more robust and you can tell whether your order was processed by folks who just grabbed the first ones off of the top of the pile, or someone at least tried to get you good produce.

The same applies for meats – once you’re comfortable that the business you’re ordering from provides quality, and you’re sure you have recourse if you think you have sub-standard meats or produce (make sure to check this before starting your orders!) then ease into it until they’ve earned your trust.

Since you’re relinquishing your eyes to convenience and the time to do other things, you’ve got to make sure you won’t be let down. If the delivery services in your area consistently bring you awful cuts of meat and over-ripe produce, then you know you’ll still have to drop in to your local grocer or farmer’s market for produce, and your best bet is to use them for non-perishables, box goods (pastas, cereals, grains), and other off-the-shelf items only.

Conclusions

On the other hand, if they earn your trust – you could have a convenient, affordable, and time-saving way to buy your groceries without having to leave the house unless you choose to.

I know, I know, this kind of technology could be the end of civilization, we’ll never learn to interact with one another again – but let’s be honest, does anyone really have meaningful interactions in the grocery store outside of the movies? Only in Hollywood will boy meet girl in the frozen food section. In the rest of the world, we’re surrounded by crying children, people who leave their carts directly in our path, and judgmental folks who stare into our carts and judge us on the food we’re buying.

I’m suggesting that shopping for groceries online can definitely replace shopping for groceries in store for most needs and for the bulk of your regular shopping needs, especially as more grocery chains and stores expand their online and direct-to-door delivery operations. However, I’m not suggesting that shopping for groceries online should ever replace finding quality ingredients and shopping in stores or markets where your business is appreciated and you get high quality goods: places like farmers markets, small shops, specialty stores, and the like.

When it comes to replenishing your toilet paper and your macaroni and cheese, and when you’re running low on tomatoes or butter, or your body wash and shampoo reserves are dangerously low, taking your grocery list to your computer instead of out the door to your local supermarket can save you money and help you shop smarter, lighter, and the shopping session can end with your groceries brought into your kitchen by a deliveryperson at a time that works for you. And what do you get for the trouble? A fatter wallet, a less stressful week, more time to do the things that matter to you, and hopefully, a thinner waist and more food knowledge in the process.

images in this post courtesy of flickr user busbeytheelder, (DSC_9348) erostrend, (P5274126) and Barbara Bramblett. (VanDykes13)

So true to form, you ask and you shall receive – my expertise is your benefit in helping you inject some class into your geekiness without compromising either. Now then, let’s get the first one going. Each month we’ll highlight a handful of gadgets or gear that are fun, worth having, notable for the month, or incredibly helpful.

Check out this month’s Classy Gear behind the jump, and don’t forget – there’s still time to enter The Show Us Your Workspace Contest, so take some pictures and send them in!

• Silver USB Cufflinks

  

  The Silver USB Cufflinks from ThinkGeek are stylish and classy cufflinks on their own, but the secret that they hold is what makes them geeky as well as classy. You wouldn’t know from looking at them, but one side of them pops off to reveal a 2GB USB flash drive hidden inside.

  The best thing about these cufflinks clearly is the fact that they’re tiny, you can keep your files and data stored on them, and you can even pop the top off and use the drives without having to unbutton your cuffs. Even so, be careful if you work in a cleared facility or in a location where they’re paranoid about USB devices or cell phones – I can’t help you if you get in trouble for an unauthorized USB storage device on your sleeves!

• BuckyBalls Magnetic Building Spheres

  

  One of ThinkGeek’s flagship products are the BuckyBalls Magnetic Building Spheres, which come in an attractive box in an array of metallic colors and allow you to build crazy designs, shapes, or structures using their magnetic powers.

  Granted, the BuckyBalls are also the butt of a number of unfortunate jokes, but that’s no reason to shy away from what’s obviously the ultimate in time-wasting desk toys. A box of these on your desk will keep you busy for hours, or at least give you something to entertain yourself with in meetings. ThinkGeek just updated the BuckyBalls line, offering new “Executive BuckyBalls” (available at the same link) in metallic gold, silver, and black to compliment the original polished chrome.

• Apple iPhone 4

  

  From the “relevant this month” department comes what some people term the “Jesus Phone,” the Apple iPhone 4. Just announced earlier in June and now available for the world to buy, (although they only began shipping this past week and future iPhone owners, hungry with desire, lined up for city blocks outside of their local Apple Stores to get one yesterday) the iPhone 4 represents not only a shift in design and thinking for Apple, but comes on the heels of the release of Apple’s latest version of their mobile operating system, iOS.

  iOS 4 comes on the iPhone 4, and brings features like folders, multitasking, (both of which are Apple’s special implementation of them, so read reviews before you buy) and Face Time – live video calling to other iPhone 4s – to the smartphone market. The iPhone 4 is beautifully thin, comes with an incredibly crisp and sharp display, features an upgraded photo and video camera on the back and a front-facing camera for self-portraits and video calls. If you have a qualifying upgrade or AT&T is a good wireless service provider in your city, the iPhone 4 is worth the purchase or the upgrade from an older device.

• KickStand Adjustable iPhone or iPad Stand

  

  I picked this up from seeing some workstation photos from developer, business owner, and all around Japanese culture guru Danny Choo. He’s using it for his iPad, but the Kickstand Adjustable iPad and iPhone Stand will work just as well for any tablet, smartphone, or even laptop that you want to keep elevated or at a certain angle.

  Looking at the KickStand, it’s not only height-adjustable, but length adjustable as well, and at $29.99, it’s pretty much a steal for people who want a way to comfortably see or use their device without spending a ton of money. The feet and the back of the stand are also covers in a non-slip rubber so you can rest your device on it and actually use it without worrying that it’ll slide across your desk as soon as you touch it.

• The IT Crowd DVDs

  

  I’m one of those people who absolutely loves British comedy in general, but The IT Crowd stands out specifically not because it’s British, but because it’s an amazingly hilarious sitcom centered around geek life, geek culture, and the life of geeks like us who are working in Information Technology. Whether you work in IT or not (although you’ll have a special affinity for the series if you do), you’ll absolutely adore The IT Crowd, and now all three seasons are available in the United States in a collection: The IT Crowd: The Complete Series (Seasons 1, 2 & 3) just in time for you to enjoy the latest season, Season 4 (or Series 4, as they refer to it in the UK), which premieres this week on Channel 4 in the UK.

  The IT Crowd gives you everything: the old standby of an IT office relegated to the basement of a shining, towering office building, the geeky decorations and adornments all over their office, (including cult classic movie, comics, and sci-fi gear, tons of goodies from ThinkGeek, and stickers and items from the EFF) exposing the average computer user at most companies as non-technical and completely befuddled by technology, and even the stereotype of the eccentric CEO that somehow manages to keep the company afloat but not through any actual hard work or determination. It’s a great watch.

There you go! Five geeky and classy items worth picking up and enjoying, or at least adding to your wish lists. Do you have suggestions for Classy Gear? Let me know in the comments; if they’re classy and geeky, they may make it into a future Classy Gear segment!

A lot of us take great pride in our computer setups, or our entertainment setups for that matter, and I want to see yours! To make it worth your while, I’ll give away some prizes while I’m at it to some of the best workstations of the collection!

Here’s all you have to do:

1. Snap a photo (or a few photos) of your computer setup!
2. Become a fan of The Classy Geek on Facebook (assuming you’re on Facebook, that is!)
3. E-mail those photos (compress, zip, or upload them somewhere if they’re huge) and your name at Facebook to me at alanhenry -at- theclassygeek -dot- com!
4. ?????
5. Profit! (Seriously, there’s nothing else you need to do!)

Seriously, that’s it! A trusted panel of classy geeks and I will take a look at the submissions and the three best desktops of the group will win one of these three prizes, courtesy of GelaSkins and Malcolm Fontier:

• 3rd Runner Up: HP USB Gift Pack, including 1GB USB Flash Drive, Retractable USB-to-Mini USB Cable, 4-in-1 Card Reader, and Mini USB Mouse!
• 2nd Runner Up: Iron Man and War Machine GelaSkin for the iPod Touch or iPhone!
• Grand Prize Winner: The iMojito iPhone Wallet from Malcolm Fontier (works with other phones too!)

Full disclosure, the HP gift pack I got as a present at an HP presentation, the GelaSkins were provided in the course of writing a hands-on review of GelaSkins’ new Marvel Collection, and the iMojito Wallet was provided by Malcolm Fontier in the process of writing a hands-on review for our sister site, Gears and Widgets!

That being said though, my review units are your gain! I’ll take workspace submissions through the rest of June and July and close submissions on July 31st, and announce the winner the first week in August.

So what are you waiting for? Pretty up your workspace, set a nice background, grab your camera, and send in your photos!

image in this post courtesy of flickr user jnyemb. (jofalltrades.com Home Office [explored])

You know what I mean – and while the entire myth is far more prevalent among guys (and yes, I understand that this one is going to be heavily geared to the guys in the audience. I generally try to keep these types of articles relatively gender-neutral, because after all, there are plenty of lady geeks out there!) who consider themselves nice, upstanding folks who are just interested in an open and honest relationship with a partner, the truth of the matter? You’re probably not that nice, and you’re not being open and honest with yourself. And if you can’t be open and honest with yourself, any relationship you have is doomed to fail.

Let me help you out: part of it is likely that you’re not as nice as you think you are, especially if you’re busy judgmentally viewing everyone else who’s managed to find a partner in contempt. “What’s he got that I don’t” guys and “Wow, what kind of person is SHE if she’s with him” mumblers need not apply to the “really, we are nice guys” club. The second piece to this puzzle is (and the first isn’t required for this to be the big problem, it can be either, or, or both) is that you’re not being honest with yourself. You’re saying you want an open and honest relationship with someone, but you refuse to admit or acknowledge your feelings – likely to the person you’re interested in by being straightforward about what you’re looking for – in an honest way, of course.

I’m not saying there’s something wrong with you if you find yourself perpetually “friend zoned,” trust me, I used to be the same way – and I’m not saying you’re lying to yourself or being purposefully deceitful about your intentions, but what I am saying is that you can fix both of these problems by being the nice guy you really want to be, and just being upfront and making it clear you’re interested in someone instead of sitting back and waiting for them to “discover” you. It hardly ever works that way, and when it does it’s usually out of last resort or desperation, not out of true appreciation for you and who you are as a person.

Make sense? Let’s dig a little deeper, with the help of an excellent post over at Wired’s Alt Text blog that breaks this down really well, I think.

Writing for Alt Text, Lore Sjöberg points out that if you’re sitting on the wall silently hating the people around you for being engaged in conversation or in general social activity and wondering why no one seems to want to talk to a nice guy like you, truth be told you may not be as nice as you’re making yourself out to be – and that doesn’t make you a horrible person by contrast, it just means you need to open your eyes a bit and understand that it’s a two way street and there’s more going on here – and that the same applies to intimate relationships, not just social events.

At the risk of lifting a bit much from an article that I wholeheartedly suggest you read, Sjöberg had this to say:

Given that nice guys get bedded and/or wedded all the time, you must have a more specific problem than that. Here are some specific behaviors I have witnessed in guys who think they’re “too nice” when actually they’re “unpleasant.” Is this you?

• For some reason, you think “nice” means “completely devoid of sexual energy.” When you’re attracted to someone, you treat her like you’re her brother. Her brother the priest. Her brother the elderly Victorian priest who is actually a large stuffed animal. Then when some guy comes along and does a little thoughtful flirting and actually gets her attention, you think “Man, that guy’s a jerkface.”
• When you say you’re trying to figure out “what women want,” you actually mean you’re trying to figure out what this one specific woman you’re friends with and have had a crush on for three years wants. (That one’s easy, by the way. The answer is “not you.” Now move on.)
• You don’t know many women. Having been passed on by the six or seven ladyfolks you see on a regular basis, you are now ready to assume that all women are deeply broken individuals who don’t know what’s good for them. Somehow you think that treating all women as freely interchangable mentally damaged goods is compatible with being “nice.”
• You’re one of those guys who wishes he lived in the Arthurian era — which is to say an era that never actually existed — and who actually uses the word prithee. You practice some sort of demented Hollywood version of chivalry. When women are creeped out by this, you assume they don’t like nice guys, rather than assuming more accurately that they have no desire to get involved with your little love-LARP.
• You’re not actually nice. Ask yourself this question: All these nice, thoughtful things you do for women you have crushes on, do you do them for your friends whose panties you don’t want to chew off? Do you remember everyone’s favorite pizza topping? Listen to them bitch about work? Tell them when you see something neat on ThinkGeek that you think they’d like? Getting extra attention from someone who’s generally nice is flattering. Sitting under the laserlike niceness focus of someone who’s usually oblivious is actually pretty unnerving.
• Finally, the most common affliction: searing, blinding desperation. There’s a big, inviting grassy area between being a schmuck and being an Alpha Jerk, and it’s called “self-confidence.” It’s nice for picnics! Seriously, if there’s any one thing that’s universally attractive to men, women and intersexed individuals of any and all types, it’s confidence. People like people who like being the people they are. The sort of guys who worry about being “too nice” don’t want to be who they are. They want to be Someone’s Boyfriend, as if that will solve all their personal problems. That’s as off-putting as real, true niceness is attractive.

I’m going to hone in on a couple of these that I think are really important. First, the whole “devoid of sexual energy” part is what leads you into the “friend zone,” my friends. Whether you’re male or female, this is what I’m referring to when I say you’re not being honest with yourself or with the people of the opposite gender that you meet. The fact is that this scenario is a complete and total fantasy: you wind up being nice and warm and loving and the friend that he or she always wanted and that one day they’ll turn to you out of the blue and realize that they’ve always loved you and for some reason up until then they just couldn’t see it.

Guys, ladies? That doesn’t happen. I’m not saying you need to be otherwise – in fact, you shouldn’t be otherwise. There’s just something that’s missing from the fantasy above: intention and stated desire. It dovetails into the last point – self-confidence. You have to be able to be nice, be yourself, and be open about being a genuinely nice person, but you also need to be able to openly express your romantic interest in someone and confidently make the call that you can or cannot be that warm and loving friend regardless of whether they have the same romantic interest in you or not.

That, my friends, is being honest with yourself. If you’re interested in someone, whether they’re a friend or someone you’ve only recently met, your best bets are to be honest, be yourself, be nice, be confident, and be up front about your interest in them when you think the time is right – and let me dash those fantasies: the right time is sooner, not later after the judgment is made that you only want to be their friend.

The specific scenarios that Sjöberg has noted in between the first and the last items in the list are very specific, and I think it goes without saying that if any of those accurately describe you, you’ve really got to do something about that – I mean really guys, “prithee?”

Also, let’s be completely clear about this once and for all: Chivalry is dead, and by that I mean it’s no longer your obligation or your privilege to be chivalrous: the amount to which you’re chivalrous should rely on what you AND your romantic interest think is okay, not just what YOU think you’re supposed to do or what your preconceived notion of right and wrong tells you is okay.

I know! It’s crazy! You mean you should actually communicate with your romantic interest to find out whether he or she is okay with you picking up the tab or opening a door? Madness!

Forgetting that any relationship is a two way street of consent and mutual interest and desire leads you marching into the next scenario: you’re not actually nice. I know a ton of these guys – the ones that whine to their friends about how they always finish last, but if you ask any woman they’ve dated they’re the type who shows no interest in them at best, and at worst they’re actively demeaning and act superior because after all, they know what’s right and wrong.

But the issues that most of us, my fellow geeks, have are the first and the last problems. They think being nice is the same thing as being uninterested, and even if they wanted to show interest they’re lacking the self-confidence to do so, so they sit and lie in wait for happiness and love to fall into their laps instead of taking charge of their own lives and going out for it.

You dig? I know, I know, I’m not guaranteeing success, I’m not saying this is going to work for you all the time, or even at all with the people you’re interested in or that one person you’ve had your eye on for a long time. I’m not even saying you’ll be able to muster the courage to do this, but you’ll know when you’re really interested in someone when you’re willing to take the risk on them, and I’ll tell you what will never work: being that creepy/sexless geek watching from the sidelines while life – and your romantic interests – pass you by.

second image in this post courtesy of flickr user soundlessfall. (holding hands)

With the right gear, you can take your reading, your schoolwork, your gaming, your office work, your personal or professional projects, your surfing, and even your entertainment on the go with you and experience all of it just about anywhere in the world you may happen to roam.

To that point, in our first The Future is Now! column, where we’ll look at some of the ways where the tech in our lives enables us to live better, achieve our dreams, or is just outright awesome, let’s discuss some of the reasons why you should (or maybe you shouldn’t) take some of those “working from home” days and spend them at your favorite coffee shop instead of in your home office, and how you can go about doing that. Let’s also take a look at some of the tech that can enable you to do it without your boss caring that “working remotely” is actually “working from art museum.”

• The Argument for the Anchor

  Let’s get this out of the way first – there are plenty of reasons to have a good, solid, stay-in-one-place beefy desktop computer. Are you an avid PC gamer? The price/performance breakdown between gaming desktops and gaming laptops simply doesn’t make buying a gaming laptop worthwhile, especially considering most of them are heavy, bulky with large screens and loaded down with peripherals, and generally pretty expensive for not being very portable.

  Are you a movie editor or spend a lot of time encoding audio? You’ll probably benefit from a standing desktop with higher-speed optical drives, additional drive bays for drive storage or additional optical drives, and the higher-end processors that are available in desktops to do that audio and video encoding. You’ll also want the largest possible display to work with, and while that’s not really a prohibiting factor when it comes to working with a desktop versus a laptop, you can’t very well lug that 24″ display to the coffee shop and set up there to work, can you? (I know you CAN, but it doesn’t mean you SHOULD. We’re trying to show some class here.)

  Alternatively, maybe you just like the idea of having a workstation that’s on all of the time, remotely accessible, and stays in one place. All perfectly valid arguments – especially the remotely accessible part. Remember, it’s worthwhile to have a good place to keep backups of anything you have on your laptop – if that laptop should go missing, you don’t want to lose your entire music collection or all the photos you’ve ever taken along with it, do you?

  Personally? I’m a cross-platform, semi-portable fiend. My main system is a custom-built desktop that I use for gaming, multimedia, and most of my general use working, writing, surfing and computing at home.

  Even so, you can be sure I usually don’t leave the house without my trusty MacBook Pro in my messenger bag if I need computing power on the go, and that’s whether I’m traveling across the country or I’m travelling across town. I even use my laptop when I’m at home when I want to run apps that I can’t use my desktop for while it’s in use – like full-screen podcast watching while I work on my desktop, for example.

  I haven’t replaced my desktop with a portable machine yet, and I don’t think I will – but when I’m across town or staying with family and I don’t have my laptop, I definitely feel naked – and you will do, once you get used to having computing power with you wherever you go!


• The Case for Portability

  Now that we’ve established that there are some things that you just can’t replace a desktop computer with a laptop for, and now that we’ve established that you don’t have to go into a laptop buying decision with the assumption that you’ll replace your desktop (instead, I’m a huge advocate of a laptop purchase that compliments your desktop experience unless you’re sure you want to – and your use habits allow you to – use a laptop as your primary, everyday computer in any location) let’s talk about some of the ways you can take your computing power with you when you’re ready to work from the coffee shop down the street, or when you really want to take a day trip but you want to make sure you’re still in reasonable touch with the office.

  This is really what it’s all about though – making sure you’re carrying the right tech to keep you in touch with the goings on at the office even if you’re not there. Even if you’ve decided to take a day and “work” from a folding chair on the beach and take an “inverse lunch,” (where you spend an hour or so on the phone and the rest of the day only sporadically in touch) you can still do it with the right gear, assuming your type of work allows you to be present digitally but not present mentally or physically. These kinds of tech-empowered “working days” are perfect for recharging the mental and emotional batteries.

  Full disclosure – much of my work centers around information services, so I can get a full day’s work done by keeping on top of my inbox, responding promptly to requests for information, attending conference calls, and managing projects and issues from in front of a computer screen. Internet access is pretty much all I need to get my work done remotely. So these tips aren’t terribly helpful for someone who actually turns out a specific product at the end of a workday, or who needs a ton of specific apps to get their jobs done.

• The Right Tech for the Right Remote Workday

  Now then, I’m a big fan of “working from bed” if you can get away with it. That is, making use of my smartphone, my laptop, or my iPod Touch to make sure I’m logged in to my email (either via Webmail or directly connected to the mail server) or at least available to my colleagues at the office while I’m catching a couple extra hours of sleep. You can go all out and keep your laptop plugged in and right next to the bed for situations like this, but that’s never good for the whole “roll over, check your messages, go back to sleep” operation.

  For times like this, a smartphone configured to snag your company’s email is a perfect thing to keep on the bedside table. Whether it’s an office-issued Blackberry or your iPhone, it doesn’t really matter, but the important thing is to be able to tell at a glance whether you’re missing something important, and if you’re not, to turn it off and go back to what you were doing – preferably sleeping.

  I’ve even considered getting an iPad for this – an iPad combined with a remote desktop app can drop you into your corporate network pretty quickly and let you work as though you’re actually in the office if your company supports that kind of remote access. Since mine does, it’s a perfect solution for a quick hop into the company network, fire up Outlook via terminal server to make sure I’m not missing any important messages or meetings, and then log back off.

  I’m only being partially facetious about working from bed – I’ve had several days where I’m working from home and allow myself to take a nap or sleep in a couple of hours, just making sure that I don’t miss anything by checking mail from my phone, or taking a conference call where I don’t need to be a leader or super-active participant from my phone under my covers. Yes, it’s slacking, but it’s also using the tech you likely already own to make it as clear and apparent as possible that you’re engaged, aware, and involved, even if what you’re really doing is recharging or relaxing.

  Where the right tech can really help you is if you’ve decided to take in a museum, chaperone your kid’s field trip, or even head out for a picnic or a nice long walk during the day. As long as you have cellular signal and a smartphone, you’re in touch to some degree, but let’s take it to the next level and go back to the topic of laptops. With a laptop or netbook, you can snag a WiFi signal from your coffee shop or the open hotspot next door and log in to check your work e-mail. You can even replace your home office with a nice table by the window in your favorite cafe, or sit outside if you like and you think your battery will last.

  Alternatively, if you don’t have WiFi signal or you don’t want to pay for what are sometimes fee-based hotspots, you can consider tethering your smartphone to your laptop for cellular access, buying a 3G or 4G modem to connect to your laptop, or investing in a cellular-based personal wifi “bubble” like Verizon’s MiFi or Sprint’s Overdrive.

  All of these solutions make sure that your laptop, netbook, iPad, or any other device that’s WiFi capable stays connected no matter where you are. So if you’re at the top of a mountain after a long hike, you can still upload a photo to your friends at Twitter to let them know you’re having a great time (as long as no one from your office follows you) and then subsequently check in with the office to make sure that you haven’t missed anything critical while you’re away.

  The point I’m trying to get to without using too many specific cases is that if you use your technology effectively and intelligently, you can stay in touch with the office – since let’s be honest, we’re all overworked, underpaid, and never get a chance to take the time off that we really want to or know that we and our families deserve – and be away from your desk at the same time. There’s no reason with all of the gear that’s on the market and that I know you already love (or else you wouldn’t be here).


• The Caveats and The Disclaimer

  Now, let’s get this out of the way though – just because you can stay in touch with the office while you’re traveling doesn’t mean you should. Consider this your disclaimer, but nothing ruins a vacation than obsessing over what’s happening at the office while you’re away, and nothing ruins a good day off than dragging yourself into the office – even virtually – just because you know something’s going on.

  I look at technology like this to help you define the line between being “off work” and “working remotely” and then straddle that line as closely as possible and as much as you can honestly and openly get away with where you work. Don’t take an hour-long conference call while you’re “working remotely” and visiting a museum – step outside for that 5 minute check-in, but don’t drone on for an hour while you look at paintings, or while you should be paying attention to your family.

  And remember, this is to help you live your life, work more effectively, and be happier while you do it. Be smart, and don’t let it go too far – don’t let your technology weigh you down and hold you to your work as much as your work already probably does. Don’t let your tech be a way for your work and responsibilities to needle their way into your private life, let it be a way for your private life to needle its way into your office in ways that you entirely control and are comfortable with.

  Whether you’re at a corner cafe loading up on espresso all day and working busily, enjoying your change of scenery and doing a little people watching or you’re lounging in bed with an iPad working in between naps and horrible daytime programming, the gear is here to enable good, positive habits that help you stay on top of your responsibilities without being chained by them.

  Be smart, and don’t let it go too far – don’t let your technology weigh you down and hold you to your work as much as your work already probably does. Don’t let your tech be a way for your work and responsibilities to needle their way into your private life, let it be a way for your private life to needle its way into your office in ways that you entirely control and are comfortable with.

images in this post courtesy of flickr users Johan Larsson (Macbook Pro in bed, titled Apple-esque) and Felix Montino (Droid by Motorola, titled Motorola Milestone)

Part of the mission of The Classy Geek isn’t just to help you with informative articles, guides, multi-part series’, and how-tos, but also to help you – that’s right, all of you, regardless of age, gender, creed, or geekly persuasion – get your act together; to stand on your own two feet and be happier about yourself without sacrificing your geekiness in the process.

I said I was here to help, didn’t I? Well now’s your chance. Have questions you’d like answered on the blog? Maybe you have a hot tip – a killer Vodka that most people probably haven’t heard of, or maybe a great music discovery site that’s perfect for building a special playlist for someone you have a crush on – send your questions and tips my way!

Click on the “Contact” link at the top of the page or just e-mail me at [ alanhenry [at] theclassygeek [dot] com ] to send in your questions, tips, and tricks!

Alternatively, don’t forget to become a fan of The Classy Geek on Facebook and start a discussion on our Facebook Fan Page to send in your questions and tips as well!

Seriously – you don’t have to love meat or be a big “meat and beer” kind of guy to appreciate a good steak, and nothing impresses guests to your tiny little apartment more than serving them a hot, perfectly cooked steak with some fresh vegetables on the side. I know, I know – you’re thinking I must have some kind of grill pan or something to grill a steak and I must have a great kitchen ventilation system to get all of the smoke out. You’d be right that I do have and love my cast-iron grill pan (it stretches across two burners and gives you plenty of room to grill…except indoors) but I don’t use it for steak, and trust me – my kitchen hood is not very good.

This week we’re going to do something a little simple, but it’s going to help you a lot. If you’re anything like me, some things like cooking steak can be pretty intimidating until you have a method to do it; you think you’ll have to have a massive grill, and perfect tools, and learn tons about how much the steak gives to tell if it’s properly cooked inside without poking it to find out, and so on and so on. There is some of that, but trust me, when you finish this article, you’ll be ready to head out and cook your own steak in your own tiny apartment, without the use of a grill of any type and without burning your apartment to the ground.

The first thing you’ll need to know about before you head out to grab yourself a couple of steaks to cook for you and your guest is what the best cut of meat for your purpose is. There are tons of great guides on the web, but I really like this guide to cuts of steak because it includes photos of the meat you’ll see in the store – you can think back to the last one you ate to determine what cut it is.

Like I mentioned, I like the New York Strip – I can get it without the bone in and decently marbled and moderately fatty. It’s worth noting here that when you shop for a steak your should look with one that has decent marbling through the meat (that is, you can see distributions of fat through the meat, which makes for a juicier, tastier cut when it’s cooked.) The New York Strip is perfect for the method of cooking I’m about to describe, and it’s not so huge that it’s a ton of meat – it’s enough that you can have some veggies on the side and have a decently sized meal.

You don’t have to go with the New York Strip; I would just as quickly pick up a Ribeye for the type of cooking I’m about to describe, but probably not any cut that’s bone-in, or a massive cut like a T-Bone or Porterhouse, or something super-expensive like a Filet Mignon or Tenderloin.

As for whether you should pick up an “Angus” or “Grade A” or whatnot – I completely and totally suggest you read this Wikipedia lineup of USDA beef grades. You’ll see different stores label their meats different grades and brands of their own – I say keep an eye out for US Choice and US Prime. They’re the best and the safest, and those labels should shine through the haze of various brand names like “Rancher’s Reserve” and “Nature’s Promise,” that are more store brands and not indicative of the type of beef you’re buying.

Now then. Now you know what kind of steak to pick up and you know how to pick a good one (look for the label, look at the marbling of the meat, and of course, don’t blow the budget) so now you’re ready to head home and cook up your steak. Grab your fancy new cuts of meat, check out, and head out.

When you get home, the first thing you’ll want to do is preheat your oven 450 degrees Fahrenheit, and get out your favorite cast iron pan. What’s that? You don’t have a cast iron pan? You clearly didn’t read my article, Essential Kitchen Tools for Beginners, did you? Get one!

Now while your oven is preheating, make sure that steak is coming up to room temperature. If your steak is at toom temp, it’ll wind up cooking more evenly and will turn out more tender than if you toss a cold steak in a hot pan. If your steak is up to temp, wash it off with some warm water and make sure to pat it as dry as possible with paper towels. Once your steak is washed and dry again, sprinkle liberally with kosher salt and fresh cracked ground pepper. You can use sea salt or pre-ground pepper if you like, I just like the large salt chunks of kosher salt for flavoring meat, and fresh cracked pepper for that big peppery flavor.

A quick aside to the topic of marinades: you can marinate your steak if you want – I’m not one of those people who’s diametrically opposed to it. Toss your steak in a plastic baggie and cover over with a marinade, either homemade or bought from a store, whatever you want to try. I find steaks take well to simpler flavors that help the meat shine through, as opposed to bold and overwhelming marinades that are really made for meats with less intrinsic flavor like chicken or pork. So take it easy, okay? And do yourself a favor – try a steak with just salt and pepper just so you know what you’re missing.

Now then, I’m going to assume you have a cast iron pan, and you’ve got it warming up on the stove. Don’t put oil or butter in it just yet – if you put oil or butter in the pan while it’s cold, it’ll start smoking sooner because it heats up while the pan heats up. If you wait until the pan is searing lava hot, you don’t have to stop heating and start cooking when your oil burns away – you can get an overall hotter pan.

Once your pan is so freaking hot that it itself may start smoking itself, toss in some olive oil and run it around the surface of the pan so it covers the surface. Once you have a good cover and you’re ready, grab that steak that you’ve covered all over with salt and pepper. Toss it in the pan for 2-3 minutes on the first side to get a really good sear on that side of the meat. Use a timer if you’re worried about judging the sear.

Grab your tongs (that’s right, don’t poke the meat with anything sharp!) and turn the steak over to the other side. Sear for another 2-3 minutes. After that, grab the pan with an oven mitt and toss the whole thing into your pre-heated oven for 4-6 minutes, depending on how you want your steak cooked. That time may vary a bit depending on how thick the meat is, by the way.

Now all you have to do is wait. Don’t open the oven, don’t poke the meat, leave it alone until your timer goes off. Go prep your side dishes or something.

Once that timer goes off though, pull your cast iron pan out of the oven and set it off to the side. Let the meat rest for at least 10 minutes; cover it over if you want to, but don’t worry, it’ll keep warm. While the meat is resting, you can finish up your side dishes, but make sure you let the meat rest a bit so it can reabsorb some of the juices that are flowing around inside. If you cut into it now, you’ll wind up with a steak on top of a puddle of juice.

I hear you, “but how will I know if it’s done?” Well, you could do something like poke it with your thumb and, based on the amount of give the steak has, the firmness will tell you how done it is. This guide to the finger test for doneness will help you figure out what the different feelings really mean. As for me though? I like a good medium but don’t freak if its overdone. I play with the cooking time and use trial and error more than I use the actual finger test, but it’s a good tool to keep in your arsenal.

Now then, steak’s done, sides are done, and you’re safe to plate it all up. Pair your steak with a nice wine if you’re feeling fancy or have a soda or glass of iced tea if you’re slumming it around the house. One way or the other though, you’ve got a nice steak on your hands – you’ve picked it yourself, taken it home, cooked it in your own kitchen, and you’ve only used the cooktop to get a nice sear on it, so your apartment shouldn’t be filled with smoke and you shouldn’t be coughing, since the oven did most of the heavy lifting.

Congratulations! It’ll take more time to master it, especially if you’re aiming for a specific doneness or are playing with different cuts and thicknesses of meat, but the important thing is that you’ve done it. Cut into that juicy steak and be proud that you did it all yourself, and you didn’t even have to grill it.

image in this post courtesy of Flickr user The Busy Brain (titled Peppercorn Beef Shoulder Filet Steak)