French Knitting with Reclaimed Plastic Yarn

How could you possibly resist a blog entry with a title like this? Anyway, Mike over at Atomic Shrimp shows how to do something a bit more creative with that mound of plastic shopping bags that you've been saving to reuse. If you're like me, just reusing them to throw something out doesn't seem to cut it.

Kids love to knit using the French bobbin technique, and I have no idea why it seems to be something that we outgrow. It's a pity really because it truly is a lot of fun.

I don't think I would be as ambitious to take on this for an initial project but it at least shows what is possible to generate ideas.

Cheers...

Awaken Your Inner ChessMaster

[ from LifeHacker ]

Whether you'd like to increase your mental health or just relax after a stressful day in the salt mines, there aren't many games more classic than chess. Over at tips and tricks blog MakeUseOf, they have rounded up a variety of ways you can both play and sharpen your chess game. One offering there is a beautifully rendered flash-based and free for download chess game called FlashChessIII. If you're concerned that all the playing in the world won't make you any better, they have a variety of resources listed for helping you not just play but increase your grasp of the game. Our favorite was Chess Problems, a site which generates "puzzles" based on chess board setups ranging from simple to extremely complicated. After some practice at Chess Problems you won't find yourself often staring down a chess board without a clue what your next move will be. If you're absolutely brand new to the game, make sure to check out a beginner's guide to getting good at chess.

The Best Online Sources to Learn and Play Chess [MakeUseOf]

(We included Chess in our look at Strategy games back in 2006)

Cheers...

So Much for "No Copies"

Two brothers in Wisconsin recently bowled perfect 300 games whilst playing for the same team in the same game.

Ed and Tom Shircel are both decent bowlers with a combined 10 perfect games to their credit, but they never imagined anything like this.

Cheers...

From Boredom to Board Room

Matthew Baldwin's 2008 Good Gift Game round-up is worth a look - some great games and fun reviews!

Board games make great gifts, so great, in fact, that every year Matt assembles a top ten list of Good Gift Games (G3s), titles that even those who don�t typically play games will love playing. In doing so, he primarily looks for those that meet three criteria:

• Easy to learn, with rules that can be explained in less than five minutes
• Entertaining enough that even the guy who comes in dead last has a great time playing
• Quick, lacking downtime, and requiring an hour or less to complete

My most likely to buy? TZAAR and The Hanging Gardens

Cheers...

FoodScapes: Amazing Photo Art You Can Eat

London based photographer Carl Warner was apparently never scolded to stop playing with his food - or perhaps he was and this is the result. Using food as the medium, he constructs landscape photos that generate the double-take effect followed by the obligatory "How did he do that?"

Consider this fishscape which features rocks made of oyster shells and crab claws, boats made of marrows and asparagus, and a shining, silvery, slippery sea of fish.Carl admits that there is some wasted food in the process, but most goes to feeding the crew, family and friends.

Cheers...

Let's Do The Time Warp...

No, not the dance from The Rocky Horror Show, I mean the new show Time Warp on Discovery.

Jeff and crew use high speed cameras and super slow motion to analyze what really happens during everyday events. Like being in a car accident, blending fruit in a blender or shooting all kinds of stuff and watching it explode.

Check out a sample of raw footage here...(I'm fond of the egg and the propeller)

Cheers...

It's Only A Model...

...but it looks cool, is fun to make and it's free. PaperGuitar.com let's you download, print out, cut out and assemble your favorite guitars.

Right now the most popular is this Gretsch 7594 White Falcon.

Gives new meaning to paper, scissors, ROCK!

Cheers...

This is your Brain on Light

We used to do this in the driveway on Independence Day with sparklers or when out camping with our cheesy flashlights. Of course when produced by German artists Cenci Goepel and Jens Warnecke who actually have some talent and imagination, the results are stunningly beautiful.
They call it Lightmark.

Cheers...

Psst - wanna buy some Uranium?

Seriously, when was the last time you heard that. Check out United Nuclear, a kind of homegrown Edmund Scientific that offers everything a maker could ever want to purchase for that special project.

Or for when you accidently knock over your trusty radiometer.

Oh and another thing, they're actually one company that's relocating to Michigan.

Cheers...

Latest Mashup: Simpsons & Legos

So take the opening credits from an iconic animated series depicted by a classic building toy filmed in stop action and of course you will get...

"The Simpsons Legos Style"




Cheers, Homer...

It's Gotta Be The Shirt...

Call them t-shirts or tees, there are a lot of cool shirts out there to be had. In my day, we had to flip through pages of the novelty catalog or hang out at the half-clothing half-tobacco pipe shop to get unconventional tees. Or spend two week's minimum wage on a concert tee.

One of the coolest synergy stories I've read in a while was an article in Inc. about a couple guys who started Threadless. Basically, people submit their own custom designs, everyone votes on the most popular, and then that one is sold in limited quantity and then retired. Genius.

Some of the other offerings on the net include Funny T-Shirts from BustedTees and Snorg Tees.

My favorite from Snorg: "My Butt Hurts"

A couple of emerging ideas (which means I can't go there yet) are from these guys. Maybe I tripped on the Swedish avatar dress-up thing. It sounds naughty.

A new partnership between Swedish avatar dress-up site Stardoll and German t-shirt commerce site Spreadshirt allows users to take virtual clothes they create or see online and get them made into the real thing. Users will be able to take logos or graphics from popular labels in the Stardoll world and get them emblazoned on real-life t-shirts, hats and other items.

Cheers...

Hello, I love you, let me pick out your name...

And when I do, I want to know how popular it is now or may have been in the past. In order to aid me in my quest, I shall employ The Baby Name Voyager. This app lets me view letter by letter, how common or unique, fresh or old-school the name I have chosen may be. For example, names beginning with the letter "F" are in steep decline; while those beginning with "I" dropped off from their peak in the 1890's to a low in the 1960's. A quick ramp up in the 1970's and 1980's and then a huge spike in the 1990's. If you want to see a name that should be on the the endangered given names list, checkout Lester.

Something else revealing is if you were born when your name was most popular. Makes you wonder how creative your parents were or if they followed the herd :)

Cheers...

10 Questions for...

Time magazine has a cool feature where they choose 10 questions from ordinary people to ask extraordinary people. In addition, they have podcast versions and visual retrospectives of the people being highlighted.

Here's one from January and Woody Allen.

Cheers...

Komatsu...where are you?

I dusted off another childhood memory this week by attempting to track down a Japanese short film from when I was very young. I remembered it from the CBS Children's Film Festival back in the 60's. We watched the show hosted by Kukla, Fran & Ollie every Sunday afternoon and this particular film, "Skinny and Fatty" conveyed a strong message about how to treat others. There are comments left at various sites by people like me who have a vivid recollection of this film. At the end, the chubby boy is trying to find his friend and keeps calling out, "Komatsu...where are you?" I am always reminded of it whenever we drive to Chicago - we pass a heavy equipment dealer that has several Komatsu backhoes on display.

Read more about the film from others and even where you can buy a copy of it on VHS.

Cheers...

UPDATE: Found a short clip on YouTube...

Frampton Comes Alive!

Tonight I've decided, after listening to it for the 3rd time this week, that Peter Frampton's all-time best-selling live album is on my top 10 list of albums or at least 1 of my desert island discs.

(It also gains minor synchronicity points for being released on my birthday...)

I just wanted to let you know.

Cheers...

SimChurch

So I was part of a discussion the other night where the idea of applying Systems Theory to church was presented. I couldn't help but think of one of my favorite PC games, SimCity. Most people are familiar with the hit series The Sims which it spawned or maybe some of the other simulations like SimEarth, SimAnt, SimCoaster, etc., but I was considering the prospect of a version of a SimChurch.

Here's how I imagined it:

You start off with choosing the basics; Deity, Religion, Size, Location.

From there, you start customizing your church with options such as:

Elements:
o Red wine and bread
o Red juice and crackers
o Grape soda and tortilla chips

Baptism:
o Infant sprinkling
o Adult immersion
o Running through the sprinkler in t-shirt and gym shorts

Musical Instruments:
o Organ
o Piano
o Guitar -Electric -Acoustic
o Drums
o Bells
o Zither

Musical Style:
o Traditional Hymns
o Contemporary Music
o Gospel Choir
o Ska Band
o Jazz Fusion

Number of Services:
o 1 Sunday, 1 mid-week
o 2 Sunday, 1 mid-week
o 3 Sunday, 1 mid-week, 1 Saturday night
o 2 Sunday in winter, 1 in summer

Welcoming of:
o Everyone that God created
o Most everyone (with obvious exceptions)
o Everyone who looks and/or acts just like us

Once you start the simulation and people start showing up, you can introduce "scenarios" like:

o Nursery volunteers give toddlers cases of Twinkies and Red Bull
o Pancakes and Porn breakfast runs out of pancakes
o Motorcyle club takes over the chapel for their hangout
o Senior pastor gives sermon entirely in Gaelic gibberish
o Deacons strike oil on the property digging up dead bushes

I really didn't think this was an original idea of mine and I found a few examples on the net where people have had some fun with this concept:

Amazon sells MegaChurch PC Game

SimChurch Beta

Fantasy Church

Cheers...

Waking from my R.E.M. slumber

Back in the late 80's, early 90's, before things like iPods and filesharing and streaming and all of the ways we enjoy music these days, I had a stack of R.E.M. CD's (compact discs for anyone born in the 90's) on top of my living room player and one or two in the car at all times. For whatever reason, I lost interest after 1992's "Automatic for the People."

The R.E.M. song that plays in my head at random times is "(Don't Go Back To) Rockville"

Michael and the boys are back with "Accelerate", being released next week, but you can stream the entire album for free here.

And be sure to watch them perform on the plaza outside The Today Show studio Tuesday morning, April 1.

Cheers...

Cool but Creepy

This is called a motion potrait - crazy graphics of a woman's face set in motion.

Cool.

Then you move your mouse.

Creepy.

Reminds me of the paintings on the wall in Scooby-Doo or Harry Potter.

Cheers...

Stone Skipping Record

Russell Byars of Franklin, Pennsylvania has set a new world's record of skipping a stone 51 times (11 more than the old record set in 2002.) And, he did it on his very first attempt. Videographers captured the event and Guinness officials confirmed it (brilliant!)

When asked about his secret skill, he replied, "You know what, I really don't know." Thankfully he uses his gift for good, not evil.



Cheers...

Latest Productivity Black Hole

As one of my colleague's referred to them, Yahoo's new Widgets are "ridiculously cool!" Download the engine and then pick up a few more of the Widgets from the gallery. One of the guys responsible for most of the coolest ones is Arlo Rose. You can check out his blog at mouselabs.

Enjoy!

Optical Illusions

Here's a guy who draws scenes on the sidewalk that you would swear are 3 dimensional...

Cheers...

Theo Jansen is a Dutch artist who creates new forms of art and nature with his wind-powered creatures that walk the beach. You can check them out at Strandbeest.

I was at a friend's house last week watching the Peter Gabriel concert DVD "Growing Up Live" and he rolled around the stage in one of these. I always wondered who would ever buy one - and now I know.

Looking for the latest and greatest games for your GameCube? Here's a listing from metacritic.com ranked by review score.