Just another nerd.
According to Engadget, Bosch is selling a Lego-branded dishwasher that has a “toy cycle” option. The toy cycle washes at 40 degrees Celsius — hot enough to kill germs, but not melt the plastic.
Unfortunately, for the moment it is only available in Europe.
CongressIn30Seconds.Com is an amazing site that lets users create their own 30 second political ads. The site has an interface that allows users to combine stock video and audio (all in the public domain) and customize the ad further with text overlays.
There are some fairly clever ads given the relatively rudimentary choices available. It’d be cool to see a much-expanded version of something like this for the 2008 election.
Neverball is an open source, freely downloadable clone of Sega’s Super Monkey Ball (which is, of course, name-checked in a WoW quest),
Like Super Monkey Ball, you have a ball that you roll around by tilting the floor in different directions. There’s also a game called Neverputt included which uses the same physics engine, but is a miniature golf game.
Definitely worth downloading and giving a whirl.
November, of course, is National Novel Writing Month. The goal, for those participating, is to write a 50,000 word novel starting sometime after October 31 and ending before December 1.
They’ve even got a guidebook with a most excellent title, No Plot? No Problem!: A Low-Stress, High Velocity-Guide to Writing a Novel in 30 Days.
Bill Crozier, a candidate for Oklahoma State School Superintendent, has a bizarre idea to make schools safer — he wants to make textbooks bulletproof.
According to WBIR.Com, Crozier and some colleagues videotaped themselves shooting several different textbooks with rifles and pistols. WBIR quotes Crozier as saying,
Both of the pistols were stopped about two thirds of the way through the book, and of course the rifle shot went all the away through, so there are some things that could be improved on.
One of the possible “improvements” Crozier suggests is having book cover made out of Kevlar.
What a waste of money that would be given how safe schools are even without bulletproof books. SchoolSecurity.Org, which tracks school violence, estimates the following non-suicide deaths from gunshots in schools,
| Year | Deaths |
| 2005-06 | 19 |
| 2004-05 | 26 |
| 2003-04 | 29 |
| 2002-03 | 5 |
| 2001-02 | 11 |
Sources:
Candidate says bulletproof books could save lives in school shootings. WBIR.Com, October 24, 2006.
School Deaths, School Shootings, And High-Profile Incidents Of School Violence. National School Safety and Security Services, Accessed: October 30, 2006.