Skip to main content
Thanks to quirks in the Gregorian calendar, this year's installment of my annual Last-Minute Gift Guide for Stoners actually offers ample time for shopping. Two whole days, in fact! It's a Christmas miracle!
Draplin Design Co. Pill Box ($3.99) at DDC Pop-Up Shop
Prolific Midwestern émigré Aaron Draplin is most widely renowned for building a mini-empire on the stapled backs of Field Notes. More recently, he's become the designer du jour of the proletariat, churning out an entire pop-up's worth of posters, prints and items both contemporary and nostalgic. The Pill Box, for instance, is a little plastic disc that flips open to store a good gram or so of bud or ibuprofen.
A gram of cannabis ($8-$12)
Just go to the store, buy some, then jam it in your pillbox!
Star Wars Battlefront for PS4, Xbox One and PC ($59.99)
Sure, you could hit the cinema and passively partake in America's pre-eminent post-Jar Jar-ian take on Arthurian legend with other people. Or you could slap Star Wars Battlefront into your gaming console of choice and experience semi-firsthand what it means to become chaff in the galactic gristmill.
While twitchy teen gamers are still known to pwn, Battlefront is more Goldeneye than Call of Duty, catering to thrill-seekers looking to fire blasters alongside Han Solo among redwoods on Endor more than obsessive gamers. Even if you're bound to die over and over and over, there's an inherent thrill in piloting A-wings directly into the ground, or scampering for cover from thermal detonators and the beady eye of a rocket-packed Boba Fett.
Journey3 Pipe ($49.99)
I picked up one of these simple, elegant innovations midsummer, and it immediately became my sole method of mobile cannabis consumption. The pipe is a tidy summation of mechanical ingenuity that alleviates nearly every headache induced by standard pipes.
The pipe disassembles in a jiff for cleaning with olive oil, and three weighty segments of polished zinc alloy link together lengthwise on a magnetic hinge. The pipe rolls open with a twist, revealing a shallow loading bowl (my one complaint), and snaps shut with an airtight seal, conserving uncombusted flower. The mouthpiece resembles a wider, more compact USB drive that never clogs.
But the Journey3's most nifty, proprietary "filter gap technology" downshifts the smoke into a cool, easy draw devoid of burning flower. I'm not smart enough to explain why the Journey3 works so well, it just does. It's as though a robot craftsman traveled backward from the future, handed me the finest easy-carry apparatus ever invented, and blooped: "Here is the perfect pipe. Yes, it resembles my penis."
Klhip Ultimate Clipper ($75)
Has anyone else noticed fingernail clippers don't work anymore? At worst, standard nail clippers merely mash my talons into clipper-shaped scars. At best, they leave a jagged edge that eliminates my ability to provide gentle back scratches. Perhaps this is due to the rising cost of quality steel or a decline in competent manufacturing, or maybe three decades of too-frequent fast-food protein have mutated my keratin production.
Whatever the case, I went in search of the best fingernail clipper available, and stumbled upon the Klhip Ultimate Clipper, a newly designed nail trimmer that retails for $75. "Seventy-five bucks!? That's bananas!" I cried at my computer screen. But that night I lay in bed, wondering what mysteries the $75 nail clipper beheld. And since I couldn't talk anyone else into being my proverbial canary in a coal mine, I bought the Klhip Ultimate Clipper the next time I was drunk and sad.
Now, let me say right now that the Klhip Ultimate Clipper is the best nail-clipping experience I've ever had, with clear visibility and ease of use. The design is utilitarian and delightfully tactile, even if lacking the standard's classic elegance. Function is hugely upgraded, and precision lines come easy. Is better nail clipping worth 60 extra dollars? No. But my point here is nail clippers should work like they used to.
Willamette Week