April 2005 Archives

Inappropriately contextualized t-shirts from around the third world really must have been a great idea, because here's another version of it, this one a book now being shilled by NPR. It's funny, because when I first heard the story tonight I thought it was "travels of a teacher," which could also be kind of interesting, I guess. Anyway, this follows on the heels of a documentary broadcast on PBS on the same topic, and a NY Times article. What I don't understand is how these other people can do an idea that someone else has obviously already done -- maybe they're connected somehow, because they have the same name, more or less ("T-Shirt Travels" and "Travels of a T-Shirt"). Kind of shameless, I think. I mean, if the filmmaker and writer aren't best friends or something.

Anyhoo. I'm not bitter or anything, because I never would have followed through. Wait, is that reason to be more bitter? Well, whatever. I'm not. I'm really not. My version would have been funnier, that's all I'm saying.

OK -- it still kind of sucks (or maybe it's just really dada), but now it functions, from a technical perspective, anyway:

Great Idea Generator.

Update, May 1
Last week's webzen was all on generators, including the Prior Art generator, which is a more elegent (although less interactive!) application of the Great Idea Generator. Note that Melissa's old favorite, They Fight Crime! is also included.

I've been sick the last couple of days. Maybe I'd be feeling better if I had some time travel pills. It's a prescription a historian can love.

(I love David Reese.)

You'd think that as loud as I have snored throughout my life (as a child and an adult, alas), I would have had some great ideas about how to stop snoring (or wait, maybe if I'd had some great ideas about how not to snore I wouldn't snore so much ... whatever). Some of you will remember my grandparents' offer to get me pastic surgery to enlarge my nose because they feared I'd never find a man because my snoring was so robust ... alas, they seem to have been proven right. But I can safely leave snoring inventions to a legion of experts.

You've got your No Snore Zone (Did you know that snoring can lead to addictions?). And why didn't I think of the Noiselezz? Or the Silent Nite? The anti-snore pillow looks more like something you'd have sex with than sleep on (not that the two can't be one and the same, I guess). For the sadist (and who wouldn't be, after sleeping with a snorer for a couple months), there's
Shock therapy for snorers.

The hippies have a gentler herbal remedy (is there nothing that herbs can't do?). Or you can try spaceflight as a solution (a little spendy, though). Here's a magnetic snore solution! TWO rare earth magnets, to be exact. "two rare-earth magnets which stimulate blood flow and keep nasal passages clear. It's comfortable and re-usable for months. You know, I think there are some things that just shouldn't be reused. But that's just me. Or, "free" excercises. According to some folks, ANY excercise will help snoring, as a reduction in even 10% of your body fat can reduce snoring by sliming up your neck. In addition to having cloaked my neck in a goodly layer of fat, I do have an enourmous tonsil, too. Oh, lord, hear my cry: I JUST WANT TO SLEEP! Well, I could always try the Nose Brace. And I wonder if they have customer testimonials? Why, yes, they do!. Pretty compelling ones, too: "I must wear my Nose Braces day and night, at work and at home. I cannot be without them." "I cannot function without it." "I don't snore and wheeze anymore." I should definitely try one! And guess what? As an added bonus, "No parts of Nose Brace stick out of your nose. Thus, it is not readily visible by others!" in fact, "In some cases, Nose Brace may actually redefine facial symmetry and improve your appearance." My favorite part of this last website, though, is all the inexplicable winter scenery stock photos). Yikes!

I've always been pretty happy with my nose, but after talking to Alexa the other night, I wonder if I have a deviated septum?
Oh my goodness! -- I didn't know being a mouth breather was such a bad thing. Deepak Chopra is telling me to stop!

Well, fortunately for me, Rachel gave me a neti pot over a year ago (THANKS FOR THE NETI POT, RACHEL!!) and after several painful experiences I finally figured out how to use it, thanks to Dave's example. And boy, is it fun! I can get a real stream of water now pouring out my nostril -- Don't know what I mean? well, here's a neti pot website that, unlike those other snoring sites, probably didn't use stock photography after all, where would you get neti pot stock photography? Where, indeed? Here's a photo that maybe didn't make it into the stock photo book. I have to admire Wes for all he tells us about what came out of his nose (warning: it's not for the squeamish!).

My netipot looks like this and it's my friend.

OK -- that's enough about snoring and my neti pot. I was sort of waiting for this to turn into a coherent narrative before posting it, but I'm feeling sickly and want to get this out of to do file. Plus, I think that neti pot stock photography is pretty sweet.

... but Dave and Melissa just sent me a link to some lovely industrial wasteland photos which put my dirty landscape photography to shame

As a neighbor to both terminals 4 and 3, I especially like the containers.

And if you like that industrial photography, here's a whole gallary. Wow! -- those are nice, too! (danger! boiling iron and red-hot coke!.) Those Germans!

And there's many more, too, I'm sure. But like I said, I'm not blogging. (actually, I'm sick ... not too sick ... but kind of sick ...)

Check it out -- Tony forwarded me information about how these people are holding something they call the Pitch, which they describe thusly:

The Pitch, the brainchild of San Francisco artists Jon Rubin and Jason Mortara, is an evening of live art that revels in the promise of a good idea. The duo pre-screens and recruits fifteen individuals to pitch their original ideas to a live audience and panel of judges. The presenters compete for cash prizes, selling ideas brilliant and outlandish, pragmatic and fantastic. The judges include a local building contractor, newscaster, brand strategist, librarian, urban planner and cognitive scientist. The Pitch privileges the idea over the work, the imagined over the realistic. And in the end, as any self-respecting car salesman will confess, it all comes down to the act of persuasion.

Live Art
Jon Rubin and Jason Mortara
Saturday 30 Apr 2005 - 8 pm
Tickets $5 members, students, seniors

I wish I could go! Of course, I'm not one of their pre-screened participants, but I really hope that some new cable station picks it up as a brainier alternative to American Idol. Wouldn't that be great?! to have a bunch of people pitching their crazy ideas and then the audience votes, etc.

Anyway, you should go. I can't.

The streets of New York City are littered with cigarette butts. The problem, I'm afraid, was only exacerbated by Mayor Bloomberg's ban on smoking within bars and restaurants. On another, more tragic note, there are a great many homeless/impoverished people across the five boroughs. A large percentage of these less fortunate individuals dedicate tremendous amounts of time to rifling through garbage bins collecting cans for redemption.

What if, like cans, there were a deposit on cigarettes? It could be redeemed by turning in the butts. It might help keep the sidewalks a little cleaner, at least.

Sandra and I have gone 'round and 'round on this one, initially wondering if it is too degrading to think someone would go around picking up cigarette butts off the ground. We then realized that it's probably not any dirtier than going through garbage cans and, in fact, a less socially ostracizing action. Sandra also pointed out that anyone can pick up butts. The point is that the cost of cleaning the butt is tied to the person buying the pack - the deposit transferred to the person who helps pick them up.

Here's a good scenario: after a dope-ass party, one doesn't just go and return all the empty cans and bottles - but the butts, too.

Mary Comments:

I think this is brilliant. We tax cigarette's for health care, why not for environmental costs, too?

Question: would filterless cigs be taxed the same and if not, would this encourage people to smoke filterless cigarettes? (I think the answer is to tax them all the same, even though filterless cigarettes biodegrade a lot more quickly).

What about tuburculosis? (I suppose similar objections were made to early bottle bills). [I should really go look up a bunch more bottle bill links, but this is why I'm such a lame blogger these days!]

BTW: I can't believe we can't get an indoor smoking ban passed in Portland. Since I've been going out a little more lately, it really strikes me how stinky a town we are.

Yeah, I know, I haven't had too many great ideas lately. Tell me about it. The truth is, I've been kind of depressed and what little creative energy I have goes towards work and TiVo. In the good old days, being busy at work got me energized and gave me ideas to blog about. Now I'm happy to come home and drink beer on the giant couch and watch the giant TV. I know, I know, I should get rid of the TV.

Anyway, Tim had a great idea to help me out, which would be a Great Idea Generator, like a Mad-Lib. And it should work! Why not, if there are Julius Caesar and love poem and lawn madlib froggy Madlibs (be sure to check out the Froggy Madlib stories, too), why not a Great Idea generator?

It looks like the people with the Caesar madlib are offering the javascript code. I'm going to see if I can modify it to make it into a Great Idea generator. As Tim pointed out, all we need is ""Wouldn't it be great if they invented a (noun) that (task) (adverb) so that (target audience) could (benefit)?"

OK -- so, I've figured out some of it, but not the pay off. The window with your answer doesn't pop up. Why o' why not, o' gods of the internet?? is it because I pasted it into