Gadgets, Gizmos, and Games for Geeks

The Millennium Falcon is best known for its ability to do the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs. But did you know it’s also good for cutting parsnips? Or chopping onions? Or julienning carrots? Well, it is if you pick up this Millennium Falcon cutting board from Promi Design. This $50 cutting board the perfect addition to any Star Wars geek’s kitchen, and would look awesome alongside your X-Wing Fighter knife set and R2-D2 measuring cups.

Since it’s a fictitious creation, nobody really knows what a Kraken looks like. But the one thing we can all agree on is that the thing is a gigantic sea monster, and almost certainly has tentacles that it uses to snatch ships and drag them to the bottom of the ocean.

If there’s one food that I could eat on a whim just about any day or time, it’s pizza. My personal favorite has to be Lou Malnati’s here in Chicago, but I also love a jumbo New York style slice, an ultra-thin Italian brick oven pizza, or one of those crispy 8-corner Detroit slices from Jet’s.

The game Animal Crossing: New Horizons is all the rage with Nintendo Switch players these days. If you’re a fan of the series, then here’s a cool way to store and display your game system. Etsy artist Violet Senpai makes these awesome 3D-printed Animal Crossing island docks, which have been lovingly painted to look like they came right out of the popular world-building game, and look great alongside your Amiibo characters too.

So you spent a pretty penny on a pair of Apple’s pricey AirPods Pro earbuds. You can’t just carry them around in their nondescript white charging case now, can you? You need something special to go with your fancy wireless audio gear, and I think this case definitely meets that criteria. The Portrait Stone case makes your AirPods Pro case look like an ancient stone statues like the ones on Easter Island.

Most spiders are actually good for the environment, wiping out a wide variety of pests, including many that carry diseases. Still they’re pretty creepy looking, and the bigger they are, the scarier these eight-legged insects can be.

Who doesn’t love Baby Yoda? He’s adorable, inquisitive, and a little badass. We also don’t know anything about where he came from or why he has his abilities, which makes him a bit mysterious. Eventually, I’m sure these things will be revealed, and hopefully he’ll continue to be as cute as the day we first laid eyes on him.

A while back, we checked out a silly triceratops that doubled as a taco holder. The same company would go on to create TACOsaurus Rex, and now we have the NACHOsaurus, a snack set inspired by the spiny-backed herbivore known as the stegosaurus. Instead of bony plates along his back, the NACHOsaurus has a spot there for you to fill with your favorite snack food.

An orrery is one of those mechanical representations of the Solar System that rotates scale objects so you can see how they orbit each other. This LEGO orrery has none of that scale BS to deal with, and skips all planets but Earth, the flat center of the galaxy.

If you’re into the steampunk aesthetic, you know that it’s loaded with gears – lots and lots of gears. And if you like gears, you’ll love this wall lamp. The lamp uses a reflector light bulb and a precision-cut sheet of gloss black plexiglas to cast shadows onto the wall. The gigantic gear shadows will make it seem like you’re standing inside of a factory from Modern Times or Metropolis, as your oppressive overlords make you slave away to build their widgets.

The currency of choice in the Mushroom Kingdom is the Gold Coin. But here in the real world, it’s pretty rare that you’ll come across coins made out of anything besides nickel, zinc, copper, or if you’re really lucky, silver.

Well, now that I’ve thoroughly grossed you out with that headline, let me clarify. I’m not talking about poop. No, this article is all about the OTHER kind of stool. You know, the kind they made in Blaine, Missouri in Waiting for Guffman.

If you’ve spent any time over in Japan, you know that those stick-on beauty masks are everywhere. They come in all kinds of designs, from panda bears to Hello Kitty. Now, Star Wars fans can get in on the moisturizing goodness too!

While you could decorate your table with a bowl of fruit (real or fake), I like the idea of this shiny golden pop art banana lamp so much more. It looks so good that it just might attract monkeys into your place, and they could make a mess of the joint. These banana lamps were designed by Belgium’s Studio Job and produced by Seletti.

Over the years, Nintendo has made some great consoles. From the original NES to the Super Nintendo, to the Switch, there are lots of classic systems out there. The GameCube is among my favorites. There was just something so great about the games, the design of the console, and its controller, and it really stepped up Nintendo’s graphical game.

When you see a TIE fighter on fire, it usually means it’s been hit by a Rebel ship and it’s about to explode into a massive fireball. But here’s one case where a flaming TIE fighter will last for a good long time.