Those strange amazons

Amazon is not a very strong presence in my life. It is the place all the lucky people in the US order all their things with ludicrously fast shipping included in their subscription. Amazon is not present in Sweden, so no fast shipping for us. They are, however, in both the UK and Germany, which means I do buy from them sometimes much like any other online store. There is shipping of course, but the advantage of being within the EU means no customs (big thing), reasonably fast delivery (medium thing) and reasonable shipping fees (thing).

What landed me on the amazonian shores this time was Ipad stands. After thinking about Ipad ergonomy yesterday I started dreaming of a stand looking like an old Imac G4 - a spherical base with the tablet attached to an adjustable and perfectly weighted arm. It would be a beauty to have on any desk. Turned out several people have converted actual Imac G4:s into Ipad stands, but - perhaps unsurprisingly - nobody was making and selling anything similar as a product. It got me looking at what was out there though, and I soon ran into the Spider monkey. It looked exciting, extremely adjustable as well as usable even on beds, couches and other softer, more relaxed places.

I was not intending to buy right away, but I did look around for places selling it. Nothing in Sweden, darn. Byt hey, let me see if Amazon UK has it. Sure enough, they had it, and the price seemed reasonable enough at 50 pounds. I signed in, mainly to see what kind of shipping they would apply. Not only was the shipping very decent, Amazon also insisted on slapping on a discount. A 50 pound discount, to be specific.

At that point, it became very difficult not to purchase, so I overcame the temptation by giving in to it. The monkey should arrive in a week, and hopes are high.

Slacking up

I have reached a milestone. I have joined enough Slack groups to nicely fill the sidebar on my Macbook in my most used resolution.

Finally, now perhaps I can log out of some of them?

Either that, or provoke the ones with least interesting icons to up their game …