Martini Blender
Martini Blender
Originally uploaded by karmakazesal.
For people who their martini, not shaken, not stirred...but blended. I've never seen anything like this in a bar. Heck, I've only seen the Boston style shakers in bars and not the metal cup with a strainer cap that most stores sell as cocktail shakers.
IDIOTAROD NYC
A nod to Mr. Gone for pointing out that the IDIOTAROD is in a few weeks.
When I was ten or eleven I saw Ben Hur on a tiny black and white TV. The chariot race convinced the reptile parts of my brain that Charlton Heston was the coolest person on earth.
Within a week some friends and I started going to the local super market and re-enacting the chariot races with stolen borrowed shopping carts. One guy would be the rider and stand in the cart holding a jump rope or something similar. The other guy would wrap the rope around his waist and be the horse. We would run around the parking area of the supermarket until they chased us away. Or someone needed a tetanus shot.
I call that period in my life the stupid years. When someone suggests riding your bicycle down a flight of stairs, you think cool. In the mind of an eleven year old boy the word cool is a synonym for potentially life threatening. It is also the time when your obsession with candy, toys and cartoons hasn't fully switched into an obsession for girls, cars and music. And for some reason, you think Ninjas are really cool. I think that is the true spirit of the Idiotarod.
The Soup Man
The Soup Man
Originally uploaded by karmakazesal.
The Soup shop put up this card board Soupman in a blind spot. I walked down the stairs, turned and saw this freaky guy _right there_
Everything you know about absinthe is wrong
Perhaps you already have your own absinthe story. You drank it in New Orleans one foggy night, too full of fumes to remember much aside from the cloudy green swirl of the drink as water drip-dropped into the glass. You smuggled a cheap bottle back from Spain and brought it out at cocktail parties like a magic trick. You tried it at a party where someone mixed a batch in the back room, and it was caustic stuff, as mean as moonshine. You sipped it in an gloomy underground Czech bar, where everyone looked like spies, and the bartender lit the sugar cube aflame.From Salon.com Life | Everything you know about absinthe is wrong
...
Absinthe may not cause hallucinations, but its buzz has been likened to a kind of "waking drunk," in which inhibitions are lowered but synapses fire faster, the perfect companion for a lively barside debate.
Turns out my Absinthe stories are all cliché now. With that said, a great article on Absinthe. And the most honest description of the effects.
flying squirrel suit and upside down helicopter
Jeb Corliss wants to fly, not the way the Wright brothers wanted to fly, but the way we do in our dreams. He wants to jump from a helicopter and land without using a parachute.From Flying Humans, Hoping to Land With No Chute - New York Times
I thought jumping out of a plane in a flying squirrel suit was crazy. Let alone gliding yards above the tree line. And then I saw the PAM Lifting Vehicle a giant upside down helicopter where the victim pilot rides just above the spinning blades.
Shark Attacks Let's GoDigital Reporter
Hmmm...lose my camera or lose my arm? Goodbye camera kit. The second thing to learn from this: always have a backup camera. You'll never know when you will need to take a shot and have your main camera unavailable. Or eaten.
The Burger King and The Tomato Serfs
In 2005, Florida tomato pickers gained their first significant pay raise since the late 1970s when Taco Bell ended a consumer boycott by agreeing to pay an extra penny per pound for its tomatoes, with the extra cent going directly to the farm workers. Last April, McDonald’s agreed to a similar arrangement, increasing the wages of its tomato pickers to about 77 cents per bucket. But Burger King, whose headquarters are in Florida, has adamantly refused to pay the extra penny — and its refusal has encouraged tomato growers to cancel the deals already struck with Taco Bell and McDonald’s.From NYT
When I read this some things popped out at me. Why fight this much for the extra penny, especially if all your major competitors would also pay that penny? And why would Burger King object to its competitors paying more for the same commodity they purchase? The one answer that I kept coming back to was that to pay that extra penny is to legitimize the consumer boycott that forced the buyers to pay that extra penny.
It is interesting to note that the workers didn't strike. They didn't sue. They didn't form a union. They didn't go begging for public money. They instead went to the market and used market forces to persuade the companies. And it worked. Perhaps too well.
To stretch the metaphor, the Burger King is not going to accept the terms of an economic Magna Carta from the Tomato Serfs without a fight.
Culture Speeds Up Human Evolution
Homo sapiens sapiens has spread across the globe and increased vastly in numbers over the past 50,000 years or so from an estimated five million in 9000 B.C. to roughly 6.5 billion today. More people means more opportunity for mutations to creep into the basic human genome and new research confirms that in the past 10,000 years a host of changes to everything from digestion to bones has been taking place.From Culture Speeds Up Human Evolution: Scientific American
"We found very many human genes undergoing selection," says anthropologist Gregory Cochran of the University of Utah, a member of the team that analyzed the 3.9 million genes showing the most variation. "Most are very recent, so much so that the rate of human evolution over the past few thousand years is far greater than it has been over the past few million years."
My first thought, isn't this the plot device used by both Heros and The X-Men? My second thought, what is the ID spin on this? My third thought, does this reopen any of the discredited eugenic arguments?
U.S. Made Toys
This is the place to find classic toys, fun games, and unique gifts for all ages. Celebrating our 5th year in business! We specialize in products that are made in the USA.From U.S. Made Toys
See also Toys Made in America and Still Made in USA. Perfect for those who want a lead and plastic free holiday season.
Stainless Steel Wrenchware
Stainless Steel Wrenchware 3-Pc. Set The perfect flatware set for the mechanic! 3-pc. set includes a fork, spoon and knife with unique handles â one has a box wrench, one a pliers jaws and one an open-ended wrench. All made of 18/10 polished stainless steel. It's dinnerware with real flair!From Stainless Steel Wrenchware â 3-Pc. Set | Specialty Wrenches | Northern Tool + Equipment
Just in time for the holidays. I know my brother would love this.