I was looking for USB powered lights because I thought they might be funny. What I didn't expect to see was something practicable. This little gadget from Belkin plugs into the side of your computer to illuminate your keyboard if you're typing in a dark area.
It has one LED bulb. I can't figure out how bright it is, but probably not enough to do much more than see you keyboard by. It's just under $15 at Amazon.
How often have I been camping over the years and had absolutely no luck starting a fire? Usually it ends up taking half a newspaper and half a can of lighter fluid, and sometimes it even ends up burning for more than 5 minutes after I've thrown all of this on the fire!
It's nice to know there is something out there for all of us fire-impaired. This fire-starter from ThinkGeek (yes, this appears to be a think-geek kind of week) would solve all of my problems.
The Swedish FireSteel has these great features.
I love the thought of using this in a snowstorm to start a fire! Of course, if you're stuck in a snowstorm, you might have bigger problems than just keeping warm, but I digress. |
For Easter, my mom always gives us random trinkets she thinks will amuse us. This year, one of my surprises was a LED candle. Mine is not nearly as cool as these I found over at ThinkGeek.com. These actually let you turn them on and off by blowing on them!
They look a lot better than many LED candles I"ve seen before, and the price is actually comparable (or less!) than what you'd pay for a pillar candle (they are 3' in diameter and run 3-6 inches tall. The cost is $12-$15.
I like the idea of having a solar charger to help with my car battery. I got stuck with a table topic last week at Toastmasters where I was asked to speak for a minute on what I would do if I were stuck in Eastern Washington with a dead battery. This is the type of thing that would be useful in a situation like that. Basically, you plug the battery maintainer into your cigarett lighter in the car, and position the solar panel to collect as much daylight as possible. Viola! Your car battery gets charged by the sun.
The cost is $20, but the reviews weren't so great at Amazon. Still, if you've got a littler battery, it might be an intersting toy!
A glowing bunch of grapes? No, it's a squishy glowing ball that flashes when you squeeze it. According to the website, you can squeeze this 2 1/4" Blob Ball to create multi-colored protuberances while activating the flashing lights inside.
This is something that if I had kids, I'd probably end up buying them for Easter, just so I could play with it. Hey, it's only about $3, but I don't have anyone but myself to give it to!
Changing time zones or sleeping when your body is getting external clues that it should be awake is hard.
Our body clock responds to a variety of 'cues' in our environment, the strongest of which is light. A pulse of sufficiently bright light at the appropriate time will move (or 'phase shift') our body clock forward ('phase advance') or back ('phase delay'). Phase shifting requires both a 'seek light' phase, and an 'avoid light' phase.
I know that I have a hard time staying asleep if I take a nap during the day since my body clock has become more regulated. I'll often shove my head under an extra pillow to block the light. That works fine when it isn't the middle of summer and I'm not overheating. I end up sleeping four or five hours some nights which I can't do for more than about a day, so I nap.
Most people would want to block light if they are trying to fall asleep earlier by triggering the melatonin release that is natural for your body at night. While these glasses might not be made for sleeping, it might be helpful if you're headed east a couple time zones for a business meeting or something and need to fall asleep before 3 am local time for an 8 am presentation where you've got to be on your toes!
I was perusing the Yahoo tech site the other day and I came across this post: http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/hughes/9660.
The Feel Bright Light take the portability of a lightbox one step further. You attach two bright lights to the underside of a brimmed hat and aim the lights direclty into your eyes instead of having to sit infront of a light box for 30+ minutest per day.
The idea's great, but I don't know how well it works. The picture in their post looks pretty silly, and I'm not sure that I want two lights shining in my eyes. It reminds me a bit of the vision finders in Star Wars, but maybe that's just me. It's gotten pretty good reviews on Amazon, if you want to check them out.
Link: Feel Bright Light Visor
I've had a Litebook for several years now and I love it. Actually, I have several Litebooks. I've got one at home, one at work, and one floating around somewhere that I lent to a friend and have yet to retireve. (They love it too) I've been completely happy with them and usually end up raving about the product if someone asks me about it.
Out of curiousity, the other day I visited their site just to see what was up. It looks like they've launched a new version of their light boxes that I wasn't even aware of! It looks pretty cool.
It's got a few new features that mine doesn't have, including a timer (15, 30, 45, 60 minutes), and a rechargable battery. Actually, one of mine does have a rechargable battery that is great for a weekend away.
Anyway, visit their site and check out what's going on.
While I was searching for a link to a biking jacket that a friend had, I came across something similar, but much odder:
Glowing Motorcycle LED Jacket
It looks like this is a custom order, but if you want one, you can order!
I admit I'm a sucker for cute lights. While I don't usually buy them, I'm quite prone to noticing them. I came across these on Luxury Housing Trends. If you want something for your walkway, you can find these over at Smart Home .
They're about $15, come in a set of three, and are safe for both indoor and outdoor use.
