Welcome to #WeWant, a weekly selection of the stuff OnMilwaukee.com editors and staffers love.
Protect it: Tactical kitchen stuff
I may not be an excellent chef, but I take pride in my grilling skills, and indoors, my ability to put a frozen pizza in the oven is second to none. Once again, our friends at ThinkGeek are speaking the language of the obsessed and incompetent city dad with their homage us urban warriors. The new "Tactical Chef Apron," "Tactical Laser-Guided Pizza Cutter" and "Tactical Lunch Kit" are obviously way over the top, but you won’t be laughing when the zombies attack.
The apron ($29.99) looks perfect for the SWAT Team officer on grilling duty, which offers real a MOLLE system for holding and attaching everything you could need. You can store utensils, condiments and your phone, and get down to work while your neighbors, wife and kids laugh at you.
The pizza cutter ($23.99) is just plain fun. The flashlight and laser slide onto the cuter with a satisfying gun-like click, and the zinc-alloy body really is quite durable. It is, without a doubt, the last pizza cutter you will ever need.
Finally, the lunch kit ($29.99) is as silly as it serious. Made of durable Cordura with waterproof interior padding, it also has back surface MOLLE webbing and two smaller pouches for emergency snacks, condiments or grenades. It comes preloaded with a Tactical Nourishment Pack (resealable snack pouch) and a 12 oz. matte black Thermos. Really. --Andy Tarnoff
Carry it: Kershaw Scallion pocket knife
My everyday carry is minimal, but definitely missing a pocket knife. I don't need a multitool/USB drive/flashlight/can opener/pocket knife; just an edge when I need one. I'm looking hard at the Kershaw Scallion. It has a slim profile, opens quickly, and just might be perfect. -- Nick Barth
Write on it: USB typewriter
As a lover of both laptops and manual typewriters, I must own this. I am curious to know how well it works and if the keys have the same clackity-clack sound as a regular manual typer. (Why wouldn't they, right?) In any case, something tells me this might be the missing link between me and the completion of an epic, screenplay-friendly novel. -- Molly Snyder
Apply it: Neutrogena Beach Defense SPF30
Now that it finally feels like summer is here, I've spent a good amount of my weekends at our gorgeous lakefront and Bradford Beach. I love my time spent there, but am a stickler for sunscreen. My favorite in Neutrogena Beach Defense SPF30 and it is always in my beach bag. My other hint for you this week? Book a chair at Bradford Beach Cabana Company for the day (check Groupon!), no chair to carry along and most of the time they even have chair service from SURG Restaurants. You can thank me later. -- Carolynn Buser
Read it: "Do Not Sell At Any Price" by Amanda Petrusich (Scribner)
A respected music critic catalogs the obsessive desire among a small but devoted group of collectors to find and preserve rare 78s and the threatened music that in most cases can be found nowhere else. Though this is a tribute to brittle shellac and pre-war country blues, it's much more than that. It's a meditation and exploration into the nature of collecting, the thrill of the hunt, the lust for possession and the need to document the stories of the musicians and the music (but is that urge merely a means to justify the thrill and the lust?).
What keeps you reading and glued to every word is that Petrusich herself teeters on the brink. Each time she appears to edge closer to outright fetishization and obsession, she seems to catch herself and pull back, remaining the interested -- but extremely vulnerable -- outsider. We meet a range of interesting people whose lives rotate at 78 rpm, but of deepest interest to the Milwaukee reader, perhaps, is her research of Grafton's Paramount Records and her own SCUBA dive in the Milwaukee River to see if she can uncover remnants of the famed studio and pressing plant. No spoilers here, you have it read it for yourself. -- Bobby Tanzilo
