Archive for the ‘Distraction of the Day’ Category

Jem Stansfield is a British scientist that answered the question: How much can a Vacuum really suck?

Using 2 modified Vacuum cleaners, Jem built giant suction cups that could hold his weight. Once he strapped it to his back, he was able to climb a wall in Essex up to 30 feet.

“I came across the idea for the vacuum cleaners when I was doing a challenge to make superhuman powers out of junk. I worked out the vacuum cleaners could support my weight,” – Interview from the Telegraph

Spiderman? Wouldn’t he be more like Doctor Octopus? After all, Doc-Oc had the special arms to climb walls. Unfortunately, Jem only has 2 arms, so that would make him Doc-Oc divided by 4.

It might also make him the next “Bill Nye – Science Guy”. He is planning his next feat – driving a car from London to Manchester using Coffee Beans for fuel. Juan Valdez would be proud.

One of my favorite sites for finding great dorky stuff is Like Cool.

A sweet weblog with pictures and video of some of the coolest stuff out there!

From gadgets to home stuff to Entertainment, if it screams awesome to you, it is here!

Looking for a cool clock? Want to see what Darth Vader was oriinally going to look like? DJ Cassette tape scratcher? Yeah, they got it!

Another great site for cool is Epic Win! If you have seen ‘Failblog’ then this, my friend, is the yin to it’s yang!

Just a couple of fun sites for web-surfing, time-wasting fun!

I was stopping by likecool.com, when I came across these two items that just have no business together in a Dorkazine article, but hell, I’m lazy… consider this a short list for Valentine’s day gifts!

First up, the controller T-shirt. I saw this, and was reminded of ‘Sheldonshirts.com‘. The picture is of a woman, ’cause the joysticks are… well… it’s a great dork t-shirt, and does come in a man’s version as well. (I don’t know how! Sheesh!)

MaryJane is selling this shirt for about $42. Pricey you say? Well, it seems this is the only place to get it. I have tried finding it elsewhere myself, but came up empty handed.

I added the next item to this duo simply because it remined me of an earlier Dorkazine post. The Realtime Canvas Clock At first glance looks like a image, but it is a real clock on a canvas frame, which has a clock mechanism built into it. So, it’s a 2D clock with a 3D mechanism.

Great idea for someone who wants a fun conversation piece in that small flat! Perfect for when you invite over that gamer-geek girl, who you are giving the controller shirt to!

Facebook users have found a way to top the sharing your bra color meme, which I really could not participate in anyway: Celebrity Doppelganger Week.

It all started when some IT person put it to Facebookers to find their celebrity lookalike. The thing went viral immediatly, with folks replacing their profile picture with famous people they most resembled. The website MyHeritage.com became the go-to site for research, if you were unaware you looked like anyone. It even caused them to crash, from the flood of requests.

According to My Heritage, the celebrity that closest resembles me is- David Schwimmer.

Now, when this started, I was hesitant to upload a picture of him, since there are copyright laws about using celebrity pictures, and Facebook’s terms forbid it. I abstained from posting one, as a result. However, this idea intrigued me. What would the results be of my Bitstrips Avatar?

Well, the answer is– Desmond Llewelyn!

The man who played the ingenious ‘Q’ from the James Bond movies is my Doppelganger! Well, at least my cartoon version’s double!

You should try this! Get a Bitstrips account, make your avatar, and see who it closest resembles! I think you will be amazed!

Remember Fridays? The ABC weekly late-night live comedy show, which aired on… wait for it… Fridays!

From 1980 to 1982, it was a welcome relief to the stale ‘Saturday Night Live’. The show was originally 70 minutes in its first season, but was expanded to 90 minutes in season two.

Like SNL, each week Fridays featured music acts and, in the second season, celebrity guest hosts. (You may have heard about the Andy Kaufman debacle!) Also fake newscasts and spoofs of television shows and commercials.

Fridays veered into dangerous territories, with skits about drugs (again, the the Andy Kaufman debacle!) sex, and physical violence. The production values for musical segments were higher, using coloured concert style lighting, as opposed to SNL’s flat white illumination, thus appealing to the MTV crowd.

Fridays had a host of memorable sketches, like SNL:

“Drugs ‘R’ Us” aka “The Crazed Pharmacist”
“Nat E. Dred” – Catchphrase: (Is it turmeric? No no NO no, gimme ganja! Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!)
“Battle Boy” (My favorite!)
“Dick”
“Pitkinville, Montana”
“Latin DJ”
“The Three Stooges”
“Live and Be Well”
“Howdy Doody”
“Pastor James Babbit”
“Dancing Chickens”
“The Golden Boys”
“The Monster”

The series ended in 1982. First, ABC decided to expand Nightline to five nights a week, which moved Fridays to air at midnight instead of 11:30. Now, by the end of its first season in 1981, Fridays was outperforming Saturday Night Live in the ratings. The later time slot hurt the show, and Saturday Night Live had performed a major cast and crew overhaul to combat it’s new nemesis.

ABC tried to save the show by putting it on in prime time. The episode was scheduled against CBS powerhouse Dallas, which did nothing to help the show’s moribund ratings. The series was promptly canceled.

Now, 28 years later, DVDs abound from SNL, including some of those early 80′s tragic years. Yet, Fridays remains seemingly unearthed. Why is this?

The answer is really surprising. Apparently Micheal Richards is the only cast member who has the right to approve any home video release. He had that written into his contract. So far, he has not signed off on a DVD release, though some clips of him and Larry David on Fridays appear on the ‘Seinfeld’ Season 3 and 5 DVD’s.

After learning this, I headed for Facebook, and started the ‘Tell Micheal Richards to approve the release of ‘Fridays’ on DVD!’ group!

If, like me, you would love to relive those awesome Fridays moments again, join the group, and lets get our Fridays!

Last weekend I finally signed up for Netflix. Soon after, a friend suggested I watch a movie on their instant queue called ‘The Gamers: Dorkness Rising’. The premise sounded good, so I gave it 105 minutes of my time.

Now, this was a 2008 straight to video movie, but I feel compelled to give you my review of it.

First, the premise- Kevin Lodge wants his gaming group to finish their D&D adventure, but they’re more interested in seducing barmaids, mooning their enemies, and setting random villagers on fire. Desperate to rein in his players, Lodge adds two characters into the mix: a non-player character controlled by Lodge, and a newbie, and, as the press reads, ‘the rarest gamer of all — a girl!’

The movie itself was pretty clunky. It missed on the opportunity to have the newbie girl bring order to the chaos. The DM tries to micromanage his world, and despite advice to let it unfold naturally, he adds a character of his own, to try and guide his players. The girl, Joanna, is the ex-girlfriend of Cass, a rulebook know-it-all who is determined to beat this quest, despite being horribly inept. The seeds are sewn for her to usurp Cass, as she comes to the table with a character she created. Much to the surprise of the other gamers, her fighter is successful. However, her character never seems to deliver. Eventually the crew does finish the quest, but the ending is quite unsatisfying.

There are some good bits to this movie though, especially for gamers. One is where the character of the bard keeps getting killed, and replaced by a stack of replacement bards his gamer created. For this, it gives one a good aspect of how surreal the playing of D&D is.

A good editor could easily have made this a more flowing adventure, albeit a much shorter movie. If you have a Netflix account, or can find this for rent somewhere, it has it’s moments.

Would you get upset if you were Re-gifted? Re-Gifting is taking a gift you were given and giving it to someone else. Sometimes a Re-Gift is also known as a “White Elephant“. This dates back to Southeast Asian monarchs.

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Rules for RE-Gifting

• RE-Gift only if you would want to receive the item – Unless meant as a joke.
• RE-Gift it outside your normal circles.
• Make sure you remember who gave you the gift so you don’t RE-Gift it back.
• Quality of a RE-Gift is important
• Remove all markings
• If asked, honesty is the best policy

There was a ture Urban Legend about brothers-in-law (Roy and Larry) who RE-Gifted Moleskin pants. They did it for 25 years, back and forth. Only difference is the idea around the wrapping. Creativity was the key. One year the pants were encased in a 1974 Gremlin. The packaging got more creative, but the game ended apbruptly in 1989 when the packaging – an elaborate glass sculpture – went awry and the pants were turned to ash.

Transformer Learning Center

So today I went with my brother to Surplus With A Purpose (SWAP) - a surplus resale store. Government agencies, Universities and other companies contract with SWAP to pick up old equipment. Computers to office furniture. Cubical walls, office chairs, rolling carts, computers, monitors, and – Transformer Learning Centers.  It’s all here.

There were a lot of cool items this week, such as the Transformer Learning Center. It is a device for people to test and learn transformers and circuits. The H-TTC-PIL-1 was a common learning center for it’s time. It would be perfect for a movie set, or a tinkerer. At $35, it’s a steal.

Darkroom Door

If you are a photographer, you might know what this is. It’s a darkroom door. Simply put, it’s a revolving door to keep light out. That way you could move around without having to cover all your equipment if you had to walk out the door.

This item was also $35, but someone had already put a claim on it. He planned to put it on his son’s bedroom. What a cool idea – revolving door to the bedroom. Very Sci-Fi.

Centrifuge

Do you need a Centrifuge? Well for $25 you can get one here. Be able to separate those chemicals quick and easy.

I didn’t check the power specs on this thing. I can tell you it’s the size of a dryer. Therefore, it may have to live in your basement, but you will be able to work with the motion of circular (RCF).

Infant Ventalator

Got a child that needs to be ventilated? Well, for $75 you can get the Infant Ventilator. the IV-1008 will be great for children that need help in breathing.

While you may not want to hook up your kid to this, it would once again be a cool set device. You could add it to the basement pile of junk you don’t need. Then again, if that is the case, then just donate $75 to me and I’ll give you more cool ideas.

ph Meter

If you don’t have a lot of money, that’s O.K. How about getting yourself a ph meter? This device can tell you the ph levels of  your water, or your sweat.

The best part is it has older dials, so if you want to put it into a Star Trek parody, it will fit right in.

There were a lot more cool items at SWAP, but these items definitely showed promise. I didn’t get anything, just some computer equipment. But if I wanted to put together a cool lab, I know where to go to get pieces for it.

Scientists have shown off an effect not unlike that of the “phasers” in the show Star Trek – but- hold yer tricorder there, Trekfan! it only works on tiny worms called nematodes.

The worms were fed a molecule that, when exposed to ultraviolet (UV) light, changes its shape. Then they exposed to UV light, and they exhibited paralysis.

When the worms were again exposed to visible light, they regained their ability to move.

So, no handheld phasers yet, but maybe someday…

Meanwhile, keep practicing that Vulcan neck pinch there, sport!

Related articles

• Star Trek tricorder jumble sale discovery (guardian.co.uk)
• R2-D2 Located in Star Trek 2009 (geeksaresexy.net)

Today is National Eyebrow day. The reason why is because on this day back in 1890, Julius Henry Marx was born. Don’t know who that is? He is better known as “Groucho” Marx.

The Marx brothers are my favorite comedy trio. I’ve always loved “Thinking mans” comedy as oppose to slapstick comedy. There is a place for the slapstick comedy, but I like to be challenged.

Marx passed away on August 19, 1977 – 3 days after Elvis Presley.

So wear your glasses and mustache with pride! And here are a few quotes for you in the meantime:

A man’s only as old as the woman he feels.

Before I speak, I have something important to say.

Humor is reason gone mad.

Humor is reason gone mad.

I don’t care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members.

Marry me and I’ll never look at another horse!

Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.

Ever want to talk like that cute little garbage can from Star Wars?

The R2D2 translator is your new found friend! Just type in the fun message, and hear what our busy little droid says! You can even save it as an MP3, and put it on your phone! How cool is that?!

Now, if we could just get a Yoda translator, all the universe would be in sync!