Some product reviews

Here is a chronicling of some items I purchased recently:

ALLSOP Mouse pad - For many years I've been using a mouse pad with a wrist-rest on it. In fact it's been the same one, so it's nasty and gross and needs replacing. The new one has a feature called "memory foam". This is code for "if you use the wrist-rest for more than half an hour, it squashes down under your wrist and no longer provides enough support". Awful.

Belkin WaveRest Keyboard Wrist Support - I wanted to replace my rusty roller-based wrist-wrest and the only one they had in Staples that wasn't some retarded hot/cold gel pack was this one. It's not high enough, my wrists sink down into the gel, it doesn't fit on my (admittedly a little weird) IKEA Jerker desk the way my old one did. Awful.

APC 650VA - After 11 days of rain and thunderstorms and power brownouts, I finally invested in a UPS / battery backup for the Linux box in the basement. It seems to work great and the forecast is coincidentally showing sunny weather for the rest of the week. Great!