About seven years ago, when I first copied my entire CD collection to my computer, I carried out a series of blind listening tests. And, through those, I discovered that a 192kbs AAC sounded, to both my and my friends’ ears, nearly on par with CD quality audio.

This afternoon, however, with city radio interference causing the music streamed from my Mac to my Airport Express to clip in and out, I defaulted back to listening to the same songs from Ye Olde CDs. And, holy crap, I don’t know if we did those first listening tests on shitty stereo equipment, while exceedingly drunk or high, or simply with a more tech-friendly future-hopeful world outlook. Whatever the reason, we were ridiculously kind to those 192kbs AACs, the ones from which I’ve been listening to all of my music for three-quarters a decade. Because, in short, they sound nowhere, nowhere as good as the same music on CD, at least as played through a pair of Linn Tukan speakers or a pair of Etymotic ER-4P earbuds.

I realize this may soon turn me into the equivalent of the crazy old curmudgeon who still refuses to buy anything but vinyl. And, worse, I’ve yet to work out a way to steal music on CD rather than BitTorrent. But, regardless, for the time being, I’m sticking with it. Like most of the best music of today, it seems the best music listening of today is similarly, firmly, rooted in music’s – and music technology’s – past.

Over the past four years, I’ve gone through six Treos. One, admittedly, I lost while making out drunk in the back of a cab. But the other five, through no fault of my own, and after merely standard smart-phone use, self-destructed in sudden, unexpected, work-derailing ways. So, this time through, when my latest Treo stopped answering incoming phone calls, I decided to look into other options. I may be slow, but eventually I catch on.

For a few weeks, I Googled cellphone reviews obsessively, and even considered leaving behind my long-loved T-Mobile (with whom I’ve been since their Voicestream days), in search of the perfect smartphone. Fortunately, however, the bluebird – or, rather, the BlackBerry – of happiness was in my own backyard, as I eventually settled in on the spanking new T-Mobile BlackBerry Pearl.

During my Treo years, I endured countless ‘refrigerator phone’ jokes, was often forced to reply, “actually, that is a phone in my pocket, and I’m not just happy to see you.” So the Pearl’s form factor alone was nearly enough to convert me. Thinner than a Razr, swankily silver and black, it had a look that, refreshingly, implied ‘indie film hip’ rather than ‘corporate tech support worker not-so-much’. In fact, it didn’t even include a belt clip.

And, it turns out, it works well, too. The phone sounds clear, the email functionality has been far better than the Treo’s, the PDA software syncs cleanly with my Mac, the weird two-letter-to-a-key QWERTY is far, far better than I feared, and the Google Maps application has more than serviceably replaced Vindigo, a piece of software I’d previously assume I couldn’t possibly live without.

Plus, as an added bonus, Jess’ corporate BlackBerry is apparently attached to her like a pacemaker, allowing me to harass her via BlackBerry Messenger IM throughout the day or evening. Which is good, as we’re both inexplicably semi-retarded when we speak to each other via phone.

So, in short, the BlackBerry Pearl = crazy delicious. If you’re carrying any other smartphone, do your dorky self a favor, trade in for one of these suckers, and get as close as you can – while still, frankly, remaining kind of a smartphone-carrying loser – to looking at least passably cool.

Four years ago, I bought a 42 inch plasma TV. At that point, plasmas were still wildly expensive, but Gateway had just inexplicably stepped into the space, and was selling one for literally thousands and thousands of dollars less than any competitor.

Beyond the cheap price, I was able to write off the entire purchase (hooray, running a film company!). So, I picked one up, and for the last four years, a giant flat screen has dominated my living room.

A few weeks back, however, that TV stopped working. It would power on and back off again, cycling endlessly. I called Gateway, who had long since given up on manufacturing TV’s, and was told that the outsourced repair would cost $800, plus parts.

So, in standard idiotic style, realizing I could buy a whole new TV for not much more, and realizing that, despite the impressive size, the TV kind of sucked, I decided to take matters into my own hands.

By now, I have a lot of parts of a 42 inch plasma TV. All strewn across my living room floor. And, when I plug in the largest, screen-containing, chunk, it still endlessly powers on and back off again.

Crap.

[Warning: this entry involves poop.]

Though once the sole province of young diaper-wearers, wet wipes have now crossed over to the adult mainstream, with companies like Charmin and Cottonelle pushing toilet-paper-sized, flushable, adult-targeted wipes.

Obviously, as a guy, my first reaction to this was extended, derisive laughter. But, urged on by a wet-wipe-evangelizing female friend, I took the standard wet-wipe challenge: wipe thoroughly with regular toilet paper, then go back for a wet-wipe pass.

The skid mark so aptly demonstrates how much you’ve been (quite literally) missing in the past, you’ll likely end up, like me, an instant convert.

Like the three-martini lunch, the hip flask has, sadly, fallen out of favor in these sober times. And while, if tastelessly displayed, a flask can say ‘I’m an alcoholic, but an old money alcoholic’, it can also be immensely practical.

For struggling artist types in a city like New York, where bar-owners have the gumption to charge $10 for drinks mixed from Popov vodka, a flask can yield far better drinking at a vastly reduced price. Further, topping off a bar-ordered coke with flasked rum, rather than (correctly) making you look like a cheap bastard, instead gives a hint of luxurious Èlan paired with a mischievous streak of devil-may-care.

It’s outside of bars where flasks really shine, because careless designers the world over seem to have forgotten to install wet bars on commuter trains, in taxi cabs, seat-back in opera houses, or in the bathroom of your girlfriend’s puritanical parents.

A few further tips: when buying a flask, steer clear of anything ‘clever’, decorated, or made from a material other than silver, pewter, stainless steel or leather-bound glass. Also feel free to give flasks liberally as gifts – men love them for their practicality, women for the Bond girl lifestyle they seem to imply. In either case, monogramming is a nice touch.

And, finally, as wisely observed by Tesauro & Mollod in The Modern Gentleman, “carry a flask in a breast or coat pocket; if this in not possible, you are underdressed for flasking.”

Pick one up, and be prepared, wherever you happen to be, when dipsomania next hits.

Dear iPod Owners:

You are idiots. Or, at least 95% of you are. Because 95% of you are still using those little white freebie earbuds that Apple tosses in the box.

And those little white freebie earbuds suck monkey.

I won’t plug the Etymotic ER-4‘s again here; if you’d appreciate them, you probably already own a pair.

Instead, you need something a bit more practical. Something you can haul to the gym, ride with on the subway. Something that seals out the whir of a treadmill or the screech of train tracks. Something sturdy, small, and cheap enough not to break the bank.

And, most importantly, something that sounds so good you’ll kick yourself for every day you wasted listening to those little white freebie monkey-suckers Apple stuck you with.

In short, you want a pair of Shure earbuds.

The cheaper choice is their e2c, which goes for as little as $70 street.

Or, forgo the extra iPod case, armband, dock and car charger on your wish list, using the saved $100 to bump up to the Shute e4c‘s, which CNET’s seasoned reviewers called “simply the best in-ear headphones we’ve ever heard.”

Either way, pick up a pair, and experience actually hearing your music, like it was meant to be heard, for the very first time.

Arthur C. Clarke once observed that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic; Mr. Clean’s Magic Eraser is a case in point.

Because, even as a dyed-in-the-wool tech dork, I have absolutely no clue why the Magic Eraser works. All I know is, holy crap, it does.

About the size of decks of cards, these white squishy squares don’t inspire much confidence out of the box; I wouldn’t even have given them a try, had a free sample not recently appeared in my mailbox.

But, as most of my family and friends can attest, I’ve grown increasingly anal about keeping my house scoured clean. After nearly a year in my current apartment, wear and tear had begun to show in ways that, I assumed, were only arduously reparable: dark streaks left from heavy objects banged up against white walls or dragged across wood floors; scratches in the porcelain of the bathtub and kitchen sink.

All of them resisted a parade of home-cleaning products, from Fantastik and Formula 409 to Scrubbing Bubbles and Orange Glo. None were a match for Mr. Clean and his magic erasing.

Despite it’s super powers, the Magic Eraser is actually one of the easiest cleaning products I’ve ever used: simply rinse it in water, squeeze out the excess, then rub away any stain on pretty much anything at all. No additional cleaning agent, no preparation, just rub.

Why does it work? Is it also secretly eating away layers of my skin in the process? I don’t know, and I don’t care. I’m not one to look gift horses in the mouth, or gift sponges in the whatever is metaphorically equivalent to a mouth on a sponge.

These things are solid gold, though far cheaper ounce-for-ounce. Pick up a two-pack for $2.50, and observe your smile shining back off any previously crud-marred surface.

After another, rather unexpected, trip out West – to lock Cyan’s partnership with animation studio Blur for an indie CG film – I’m back in NYC. And, to keep me on a more regular blogging schedule, I’m kicking off Consumer Whore Week, wherein, over the next seven days, I spill the beans on a number of items you’ll shortly realize you can’t possibly live without.

Gentlemen, start your checkbooks.

This weekend, the first I’d spent in New York in over a month, I set out to wade through the pile of home errands accumulated in my absence. One was a run through Duane Reade, our local drug store, to replace toothpaste and detergent and light bulbs and a basket-and-a-half of other odds and ends.

One item on the list: a new head for my Braun electric toothbrush.

For years, electric toothbrushes, like driving to the gym, struck me as pointlessly lazy. But after my mother forwarded a handful of studies demonstrating how much better electric brushing works than its manual counterpart, I broke down and bought one.

I bought the Braun in June; by July, it was broken. Or, at least, partially broken. While the on/off switch no longer worked, I inadvertently discovered that whacking the thing into the side of the sink still did. Whack once to turn it on; whack again, and it’s back off.

Thrilled as I was by this discovery, I soon realized the turn-on whack also sent toothbrush-top paste flying, usually directly onto the bathroom mirror.

So, obviously, I took to applying the toothpaste directly to my teeth. A nearly flawless solution.

Still, walking down the toothbrush aisle in Duane Reade, I couldn’t help but notice, next to the $9.99 replacement head, a $24.99 replacement of the entire toothbrush – head included. And, for a moment at least, I took the new Braun off the shelf, and considered leaving my sink-whacking, teeth-toothpasting days behind.

Then I realized the $15 difference also just happened to be the precise cost of two six packs of Brooklyn Lager. So, obviously, I put the new Braun back, grabbed the replacement head instead, and headed off to the liquor aisle.

It was the only rational choice.