From the website:
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This playful optical illusion looks ready to pull a hot pan from the oven but it's actually a sturdy concrete trivet with a cork base.
Handcrafted in Texas in small batches from concrete and recycled glass terrazzo.
12.25"L x 7"W x 1"H.
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$95.
Yet another chapter in my life-long delusion that if only I have the right pair of shoes, running will be transformed from a dull tiring chore to a good time.
Just because it hasn't happened yet over fifty years doesn't mean it won't happen later this week.
Allez!
Wait a sec — what's that music I'm hearing?
Answer here this time tomorrow.
Hint: Smaller than a bread box.
Another: No moving parts.
A second perspective:
"Intertapes is an updating collection of found cassette tapes from around the world. The audio fragments include: voice memos, field recordings, mixtapes, bootlegs, and more."
Think of it as a numbers station on acid.
Free, the way we like it.
More?
There's also a YouTube channel.
Yes, it's been too long since I've had one of these epiphanies.
Just in from my peabrain, the following:
Double-sided Post-its
That's it?
joe, you're saying that's the entirety of your invention?
That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard.
What good is a double-sided Post-it?
Ah.
As Benjamin Franklin remarked in 1783, "What is the use of a newborn baby?"
Or, for that matter, a little device that lets you listen privately to whatever music you like wherever you happen to be?
From the website:
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Avoid the stress of trying to thread a needle with this easy-to-use gadget, which threads both large and thin needles.
Designed to operate with a push of a button.
Does single or double threading.
Colors may vary.
Made in Italy.
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$6.
Confused by latitude and longitude?
I was too for many years until one day while goofing off and doing something close to nothing (but different than the day before) the penny dropped and I figured out a foolproof way to remember which is which.
I'll tell you about it at this time tomorrow.
Just kidding.
Latitude: the lines are flat —they run sideways, flattened out.
Longitude: the lines are long — they're the ones that go up and down, the vertical ones.
There, wasn't that easy?
If you still can't keep them straight let me know and I will cheerfully refund three times what you paid for this tip.
From websites:
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Here's a memorable way to give a little "green" for birthdays, holidays, graduations, and more.
Simply fold this cash dispenser together and tape your bills end-to-end using the easy-peel removable tape that's included.
Then roll the bills loosely and insert in the box for a gift that's fun to give — and receive!
Box is 4"H x 4"W x 4"D; tape is 3/4" x 150" (12.5 feet in case your brain's tired).
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$6 (Money not included).
Created by Matteo Pini who wrote, "Una spremuta d'arancia tutte le mattine assicura il necessario apporto giornaliero di vitamina C."*
Swiss Miss Tina Roth Eisenberg featured it, writing "This is brilliant."
Concur.
*An orange juice every morning ensures the necessary daily intake of vitamin C
That's the short of it.
Anahad O'Conner's New York Times "Really?" feature has the details, and follows.
The Facts: Like a cup of tea for a cough, a batch of ice for a sunburn may seem like the perfect remedy for millions of Americans who will spend a little too much time in the sun this summer.
But many home remedies that seem like common sense are less than helpful, and the old ice-for-a-burn technique is no exception. It can help soothe some initial pain, but in the end it will slow the healing process.
That has been borne out over the years in various studies of simple treatments for minor scalds and sunburns. In one randomized study, 24 healthy volunteers were inflicted with first-degree burns and subjected to different treatments. Those who received a cooling treatment similar to ice did not experience reduced pain or inflammation compared with those who received a placebo treatment.
In another study in the journal Burns, a team of scientists compared easing burns with ice cubes for 10 minutes with other remedies and found that ice caused "the most severe damage." "Using an ice cube immediately after injury," the authors added, "is harmful in some instances."
According to the Mayo Clinic, putting ice on a burn can cause frostbite and damage the skin. For better results, try running cool water over the area and taking a pain reliever. Then cover the area with gauze but no ointment. Most minor burns heal without further treatment, the clinic says.
The Bottom Line: Never use ice to soothe a burn.
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Most important: get the burn under cool running water as soon as possible following the injury — run, don't walk to the faucet.
The first seconds are critical in minimizing tissue trauma and subsequent pain.
I recommend the coldest water you can find running over the burn for a minimum of five minutes — by the clock.
Though the skin may feel cold, the damage continues beneath as a result of the heat previously absorbed when the burn occurred.
Five minutes of running water is better than putting the burned area in a sink or tub or whatever because 1) the water stays colder, and 2) water removes more heat when flowing than still.
Fair warning: prolly few of the 14,131 peeps whose webcams these are know that they're broadcasting live 24/7/365 around the world.
Wait a sec — what's that song I'm hearing?
Answer here this time tomorrow.
Hint: smaller than a bread box.
Another: no moving parts.
A third: not by Josef Albers.
Unlike commercials on conventional TV since forever, Peacock's commercials are accompanied by a small yellow circle in the lower left hand corner of the screen which encloses a second-by-second countdown timer showing exactly how long till the commercial ends.
Perhaps it's the participatory gamification that ensues: I try to precisely unmute the TV at the exact second the commercial ends and the show resumes.
Anything that I can gamify immediately becomes more appealing.
What's vexed me for decades is my inability to figure out a way to gamify my dreaded daily run.
I haven't given up trying and I never will.
Wait a sec — what's that song I'm hearing?
From Dense Discovery:
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InkField treats drawing as an event rather than an image — every stroke, pause, and gesture is recorded and can replayed stroke-by-stroke.
Its ink physics mimic watercolor bleed, dry brush, and salt crystallization.
You can also download anyone's recording from the gallery and paint on top of it, your work branching off theirs.
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I have no idea what all that technical talk above means but I'm sure others will twig.
Long story short: Who hasn't been talking on the phone when all of a sudden the call drops, only for it to connect again after a few seconds of silent dead air?
The other party blithely dismisses the outage, remarking "The call switched to my car's Bluetooth."
Same thing when they arrive and turn off the car and the call goes dead for a few seconds while it switches back to the phone.
Wake up and smell the coffee: That's not a feature — it's a bug.
It's so annoying and it doesn't have to happen.
Turn off your car's Bluetooth when you're not using it — when you get in while talking on the phone put it in a cupholder or the center console, anywhere: you'll hear it just fine and so will the person you're speaking with.
Just because you have a feature doesn't mean it's of benefit.
I just subscribed to this app — you can too!
It's taken China by storm and earlier this year it was #6 on the U.S. iPhone app store.
You could look it up.
Long story short: For $1.99/month you get up to 4 (four) peeps to receive your one-touch daily check-ins — and react with alarm if you miss two days in a row such that they get an alert that you've gone silent.
I've used 2 of my 4 peeps: my brother and the lady across the street.
More on the app here.
I must've seen it mentioned somewhere but I can't recall where.
In keeping with my newly adopted "no spoilers in boj" policy, I offer this link to a review by NPR.
That Mechner created the iconic game "Prince of Persia," released for Apple II in June 1989, was enough to make me want to read his multigenerational family saga.
A few more takes on time:
"If time travel is possible, then there is no such thing as time." — Kurt Gödel
"Time is what prevents everything from happening at once." — John Archibald Wheeler
"Time stays long enough for anyone who will use it." — Leonardo da Vinci
"Time is money." — Benjamin Franklin
"All those moments will be lost in time... like tears in rain." — Roy Batty in 'Blade Runner'
"Time moves slowly but passes quickly." — Alice Walker, 'The Color Purple"
"No man goes before his time. Unless the boss leaves early." — Groucho Marx
"I wasted time, and now doth time waste me." — William Shakespeare, 'Richard II'
These days online typing tutors are a dime a dozen.
I remember fondly my lessons with "Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing," which came on a CD.
Worked great improving my accuracy 30 years after my in-person Introductory Typing course at Sawyer School of Business in L.A.
"Keybr is a smarter-than-average typing tutor that skips the generic lessons and instead uses your keystroke data to generate phonetically plausible practice words targeting your weak points. The tool watches how you type, then adjusts its degree of difficulty to enable you to make as rapid progress as possible."
YouTube description:
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A pineapple grown in Costa Rica can sell for $400 in the U.S. but it's illegal to buy, sell, or even grow in Costa Rica itself.
That's the consequence of a mistake Del Monte made in the 1990s, when it spent 30 years developing the Golden Pineapple, tripled U.S. sales, and then lost control of its creation.
Why? A farmer hired to grow it leaked it, and rival Dole grew the exact same fruit in Honduras.
With the PinkGlow pineapple, a GMO engineered to convert its own lycopene into pink flesh instead of yellow, Del Monte built a legal fortress: patents, registered trademarks, and a biosafety law that turned the Costa Rican government into its enforcement arm.
Wait a sec — what's that song I'm hearing?
