I’ve been searching online for some trinket/budget gifts but couldn’t find anything interesting. The person I have in mind for the gift is in his 60’s, into tech and a geek, although the gift doesn’t necessarily need to cater to his geeky side.
I’m just dropping the question here since Lemmy has a solid geek/tech userbase, and maybe some of you have better ideas than me.
TIA
Some people consolidate on things in their 60s after retirement and don’t necessarily want more things. If this person has shown signs of that - then something disposable like food/snacks/sweets.
Homemade cookies, pumpkin bread, lasagna, flowers, handmade Christmas cards are great
This is true, I can gift a bottle of wine if all else fails
What’s their opinion on puzzles and such? There are some fun wooden gizmos with gears and what have you
His opinion is that they’re cool but in reality he’s too smart for them. I’ve gifted him stuff like that in the past and he solved them in seconds. I’ve also seen him crack gizmo puzzles in other people’s homes to the astonishment of the owner.
I could look into those “guide the ball in a maze” type, which require motor skills and not just thinking. I was hoping to find something funny though, but no luck so far.
One gift I’ve been giving out that’s pretty popular is an automatic foam soap dispenser. It’s a nice little quality of life improvement and since you add water to the soap to make it foamy, soap lasts a lot longer too.
There are a bunch on Amazon. I would find one that you like the look of and make sure it charges with USB C.
- a fake analog clock (AliExpress)
- a silly door note like “behold, engineers in their natural habitat”
- a set of hex wrenches
- an empty box, but there’s a game gift code on the inside, or an envelope :p
- a pack of sticky notes labelled “floppy storage medium” or “offline, airgapped, ultra reliable, infinite battery… password manager”
- fancy coffee (for those late night coding sessions)
… and every time I have to think of a gift, I can’t :p
I’e got more ideas but this post is getting long
What is your budget?
<$10
Arduino board or similar with a basic start kit?
I think he’s got plenty of boards already, he’s a bit of a hardware scavenger, but thanks for the suggestion anyway
An idea that I had was I went to an import store and got my sister a small tea set with Japanese writing on it talking about sweet rolls. A small novelty item that I would never find in my hometown. It cost me about $3 so perhaps you can find something unique like that.
This and the other comment suggesting snacks gives me the idea of maybe imported snacks, that would be a novelty for sure
My go-to is the biggest pack of AA or AAA batteries you can fit in your budget. They’re always handy.
Maru?
I make cookies or canned jams, jellies, candied jalapeños. Edible so they will not clutter forever.
