Small Dog Gift Giving Guide: Dana's Holiday Picks

Chill Pill Mobile Speakers: I know a lot of people already know about these speakers, but, come on, how can they not be the number one item?! I was blown away by how great these little speakers sound and how easy they are to carry with you…and best of all they don’t need batteries!

Hammerhead Stylus for iPad/iPhone/iPod touch: Okay, at first I was thinking, “Why do I need a stylus?” I mean, I haven’t used one since my Palm V back in the early 2000s!  But after using this stylus, I am hooked, especially on the iPad for taking meeting notes.

Apple TV: It amazes me how many people are not aware of Apple TV. This has to be the most overlooked product coming out of Cupertino. The current generation of Apple TV is only a bit bigger than a hockey puck but packs a punch. Mirroring your iPad 2 or iPhone 4S onto your TV and home sharing your music and movies from iTunes are great, and the built-in Netflix, VUDU, YouTube and Flickr apps rock. For $99.99, how can you go wrong?

Doggy Bag: I know you are thinking, “Is this guy nuts? He works for a tech company and is suggesting plastic dogs.”  Yes, it’s true I may be nuts (my kids think so), but this item is THE perfect stocking stuffer. You put this in the kids’ stockings and it will keep them busy for hours.

Editor’s note: We’ll be featuring Small Dog staffers’ holiday wish lists and gift recommendations here through the end of the week. Stop by often to find out what we think would make great presents this holiday season! Some items may take up to 10 days to ship, so be sure to order early. Our holiday shipping schedule is available at smalldog.com/shipping. SR

Similar Posts

  • Dogs & Socks

    Anyone whose had a dog has probably experienced their dog playing with their socks. Some may have even experienced the dog EATING socks—that’s…

  • Using the iPhone as a Remote

    We all know how cool the iPhone is going to be, but there’s one thing I would like to see the phone do….

  • Bocce Time!

    The bocce seasons has yet gotten underway at Small Dog this year! You may think why in the world are they playing bocce…

  • RSS Feeds

    I started using a RSS reader recently when I was faced with far too many blogs to check per day for a fitness project I’ve been a part of. Checking close to 20 blogs every day meant opening the domain, remembering if I read that article, then going on to the next one. It ended up resulting in too many bookmark folders in my browser’s bookmark bar. Then opening all of them at once resulted in a lot of memory being used by my web browser.

    I then remembered a little icon I’ve see before. There should be one at the top of this page. This means that an RSS feed is available for the blog or article website you’re reading.

    What’s an RSS feed? RSS (usually) stands for “Really Simple Syndication.” This means you can have your article without all the ads and spam that cover some web pages. All you need to do is find the URL, or address, for the feed you’re looking for. For Google BlogSpot blogs, this means using a special link in conjunction with the blog name. For other websites, they may need to provide it for you.

    For example, take the New York Times. I would have to check this website every day, along with all the other news sites I read. What if I’m more interested in just receiving the new articles? Or even a specific category of articles? If you’d rather check the articles in this manner, you could check and see if they offer an RSS feed (most sites do now). I just searched Google for “nytimes rss” and immediately was given one of their own pages, listing their RSS feed addresses.

    What program should you use for a RSS reader? I’ve tried a couple on the Mac, and I’ve settled on Shrook for the moment. It’s very simple to use, and has an iTunes-like interface. It’s a light program too, that doesn’t take up too much space or memory. If you leave it running, it will automatically check for updates every 30 minutes and alert you with a badge on the dock icon when there are new articles or blogs.

    But wait! There’s more! If you prefer to keep all your updates in one place, Apple Mail can also check RSS feeds for you! Just click the little + in the lower left of the Mail window and select “Add RSS Feeds…”.

    The iPad now has some pretty nifty ones, with nice touch interfaces, like Reeder.

    Just about all devices have access to RSS feeds now, and with just spending a few minutes of your time adding the RSS links you read on a regular basis, you can save yourself a lot more time in the long run.