I’ve discovered that having a mini fridge in my office is about as essential as having a chair. Sure, the kitchen isn’t terribly far away, but when I do get up and wander off to another room, it usually breaks my concentration. Sometimes that’s a good thing, but if I’m really trying to churn out a lot of work, I prefer to stop as little as possible. Oh, and I’m lazy.
I’ve been tempted in the past to add a microwave to the office, since it would require me to leave my desk even less. Well it looks like Heinz may have the perfect solution, the Beanzawave. It’s a USB-powered microwave that was designed to work with their own single-serving cans of Chef Boyardee foods.
There aren’t a lot of details listed, like the all-important wattage of the device. Since it’s USB-powered, I’m going to guess that it’s probably not very high, which would mean long cook times. Not to mention that Heinz is only testing the waters with this right now, if there is enough interest they might put them into production. Honestly, I’d probably just go with a full-size microwave. This thing looks like it’d be a bit small to reheat leftover pizza and such.
Over the years I’ve amassed quite a collection of cool business cards, but nothing even comes close to being as awesome as Bryce Bell’s calling card. You see, he’s a mechanical engineer with a penchant for cannons (check out his site, gbcannon.com) so he designed a business card that transforms into a working catapult! The cards are about as thick as 5 regular business cards when assembled, but not only does that make it sturdy in the heat of battle, but also facilitates the moving parts (like the retractable legs) that make it possible to stash this thing in your wallet.
The photo alone is impressive enough, but the video I’ve included below shows it being transformed and launching various bits of office refuse.
But the best part is Bryce has actually taken the time to put together an Instructable complete with thorough assembly instructions and downloadable printable templates so you can make your own.
This one’s definitely an oldie (we’re talking the year 2000) but it’s a clever idea that’s new to me. Football Tape was designed by Martí Guixé and it’s basically just a roll of adhesive packing tape with a football or ’soccer’ ball hexagon pattern on it, so when you use it to create a giant tape ball in order to play soccer/football around the office, it will at least look the part.
Sadly it isn’t available for sale, and given the concept was created 9 years ago it seems it’s probably never going to see the light of day. So you’ll just have to be content with your inferior clear or brown-tinted tape balls. Suck it up!
When you think about it, handing people a small paper card with your contact info in this age of wireless communications is a bit old-fashioned. But I’ve yet to find an easier, or as universal a solution as the business card, so as antiquated as they may seem, I don’t think they’re going to be disappearing anytime soon.
Thankfully the WorldCard Ultra serves as a handy middle-man for getting the contact info from a business card into your contacts database. It’s a palm-sized scanner that’s actually powered via the integrated USB cable, making it particularly convenient for business travelers who have to deal with a new stack of cards every day. And not only will the WorldCard Ultra produce a full color scan of every business card (allowing you to ditch the originals) but the included WorldCard software will automatically OCR and add the contact info to your databases in Outlook, Lotus Notes or pretty much any other application. At $179.95 it isn’t cheap ($199.95 for the Mac-friendly version) but it’s probably well worth the investment if you’re on the road a lot.
Why spend your life studying the Knights Templar and other historical figures in your quest to find the Holy Grail when a quick visit to Entertainment Earth and $31.99 will land you a replica that’s sure to fool your gullible friends? Unless they’ve seen Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade that is, in which case they’ll probably recognize this as a replica of the prop Grail created for that film. And hopefully they won’t ask to drink from your Grail in order to gain eternal life or heal a bullet wound, since the only magic this cup possesses is the magic of magnetism. It won’t do diddly-squat for people, but you won’t believe the power it has over paperclips!
There is of course no way to improve on tape after 3M came out with this nuclear grade stuff. But that’s not going to stop Art Lebedev from trying… This roll of authentic 3M packing tape comes with an equally authentic sound wave emblazoned upon it. What’s the sound wave a sound wave of? I have no idea, but I’m guessing it’s something like, “this tape costs three times as much because it’s got a sound wave on it.” And it does cost more, but not that much more… $5.77 for a 60 meter roll.
For those who never got around to mastering the multiplication tables comes this talking calculator that should help hide your shame. It reads aloud all digits, functions and calculations you enter in addition to displaying them on a generously sized LCD display. But the calculator also includes a headphone jack, or at the least a permanently tethered set of earbuds allowing you to keep your basic math calculations secret from your co-workers. It’s $29.98 from Full Of Life, but I suspect you could probably find a free software alternative if you looked hard enough.
What do you do when someone asks you what your favorite color is? Tell them something like “blue?” Bah. That’s an unacceptably imprecise answer. Ideally, you should specify the wavelength, but failing that, you can just use this color picker pen to replicate any color. Place the end of the pen against an object or surface to read the color, and the pen will automatically combine red, green, and blue ink to give you exactly the color you want.
I’m convinced that I would go completely mad if I had to work in a cubicle all day. The urge to knock down the barricades that wall me in would likely only be surpassed by the desire to throw random objects into the other tiny squares. I’d give myself two weeks until I got myself fired for one of the aforementioned reasons. Now if I was trying to get myself fired, I would do so with the assistance of one of these awesome DIY trebuchets.
I think the best way to go about this sort of task is to start off on Monday by bringing in your kit as discreetly as possible. This shouldn’t be too difficult, as the model will only end up being 26-inches tall. Just toss your coat over the box and you’re good. It will probably take around 2 hours to construct if you pace yourself. This is just enough time to work on it for a half hour during your lunch break. As the week progresses, people will no doubt take an interest in your handy work. Thankfully not everyone knows exactly what a trebuchet is, so you could probably convince them that it’s a really crappy car or something.
Related Tags: Kitchen Gadget, Office, USB
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By Andrew Liszewski
By Andrew Liszewski
By Andrew Liszewski
