There’s 3 things that really stand out for me that I would say made a massive difference to my life:
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Cordless screw driver. Bought the day after building a flat pack bed with a crappy screw.driver that just shredded my hand. Thought it was frivolous at the time, but I’ve used it so much since. It’s light, small enough to fit in my pocket and good for 90% of DIY tasks.
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Tassimo coffee machine. Bought it 9 years ago, use it every day. Nice quick easy coffee. What’s not to like.
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My first DSLR camera. It was a Nikon D50 back in 2005/6 and it sparked my interest in photography to this day. It gave me a hobby I can take lots of places and do it alone or with others. I never loved the D50 camera itself, but I did get some really nice shots with it
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Electric Mountain bike - i am over 50 and had not rode regularly since my teens. I borrowed a MTB from a friend last year and struggled to make any progress until I picked up a secondhand e-MTB. Since then I have been averaging around 150km/week and my stamina has notably improved.
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PC - been a PC guy since 1989 and could not picture life without one. I’m an inveterate tinkerer and have built and rebuilt dozens over the years. I currently have a gaming desktop dual-booting Ubuntu and Win11 and a laptop running Ubuntu plus a couple of servers.
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iPad - for years I was an Android guy but a couple years back I traded a spare laptop to my niece for her iPad (she wanted to learn coding) and was blown away by the user experience. Since then I have gone all in with iPhone, apple watch, and an old Macbook Air.