Pain Medication and Water Sold Together.

This seems like a great concept! pain pills and water to be packaged and sold together. I don't know how many times a headache has snuck up at places like theme parks, concerts, public park functions, etc. where finding pain meds for sale is nil to non-existent. This concept addressed by Prietman Goode makes the concept of the pain pills and the water easy to vend, easy to buy, and easy to use. One side note is the amount of waste generated with this solution... however it is a great solution with (in my mind) acceptable waste to solve a real problem.

Check out some of their other industrial design solutions over at Priestman Goode.

12 fantastic factory photos

Like a scene out of Blade Runner, these 12 photos of factories have a ominous futuristic feel to them. These make excellent background wallpaper for your desktop.

Snow outside my house

Windows Intro Music

If you installed a copy of Windows XP, you were greated with a lovely song. It went on for 5 minutes (enough time to type your user info) and then went away, never to be seen again. Well it still exists on your hard drive. Open Windows Explorer and path over to... C:\Windows\system32\oobe\images\title.wma

Fractal Recursions

Fractals that look like buildings... or Borg buildings. I've not seen fractals generated in such an interesting and mesmerizing way. Check out Fractal Recursions and scroll down to the Mechanical Gallery.

Bent Objects Blog

Bent Objects is a blog maintained by an artist named Terry Border. He does neat things with wire and other everyday objects that I would never think to do.

Recycle Old Electronics at Best Buy

Recycle old computers, monitors & electronics at any Best Buy nationwide! It costs $10, but you get a Best Buy $10 card... not too bad.

Merriam Webster Visual Architectural Dictionary... and other things too

Back in college I purchased a large architectural dictionary to help me learn term and building parts. It was the only one I could find and it was horrible. The dictionary only had a few images describing the building... everything else was spelled out in complete sentences. It was terribly difficult to translate the writing into the visual world. When I got out of school I found better dictionaries which had more drawings than words.

Merriam Webster has a abridged visual architectural dictionary with some of the more popular terms. It is a nice start... however, if you want a very good visual dictionary, check out 'A Visual Dictionary of Architecture' It is one of the best!

Photoshop Lighting in 10 Steps

Fabio Sasso's blog, Abduzeedo, revealed his lighting techniques for spicing up an image. Also click over to Web Design Ledger and find their 28 Photoshop lighting tricks.

Backyard dogs

So funny, and so true. After 7 years with one dog, and now 6 months with the new puppy, our back yard is well fertilized.

Simpsons

Dance 2.0

Cadbury Kids Eyebrows

Google Earth now has Sunken Ships

Google has created several sunken ships in SketchUp and placed them for people to find while using the updated version of Google Earth 5

Keep up to date with the latest SketchUp news by going to the official blog.

Fire at the Rem Koolhaas complex

The very large and intense fire at China's 40 story CCTV & Hotel Building. It seems to have been passed over on USA news, as the regular news gave it just a 5 second mention.

The TVCC building, adjacent to the iconic CCTV building, included Mandarin Hotel Group’s flagship property in China and was unoccupied at the time of the fire.

Chinese investigators are now blaming illegal fireworks, set off by state broadcaster CCTV’s staff as part of celebrations to mark the end of the Chinese Lunar New Year, for the blaze.

I'm not sure what this building was made of, yet the tower took off like a torch (maybe they build with flash-paper in China). Lets hope this raises China's fire codes to more of a modern day standard. If you know more about the fire, please leave a comment, or post links.

• Check out the video... note the fireworks still going off as the building is on fire.
• CNN has a story... though it focuses mainly on China's firework traditions.
  

50 Icon Design Tutorials

Saw this compilation of Icon Design Tutorials over at Six Revisions and thought I would share.

What Colors can my Dog See?

So my youngest dog, Shala, loves to chase a red laser dot. When the sun goes down, she will beg and beg to have me shine the dot around the yard and have her chase it. Amused, it got me thinking, when she responds to the laser, how much of the red color can she see?

Psychology Today discusses the research scientist did to determine which colors a dog could see and they produced a wonderful color diagram showing the color a dog can see vs what a human can see.

... dogs see the colors of the world as basically yellow, blue and gray. They see the colors green, yellow and orange as yellowish, and they see violet and blue as blue. Blue-green is seen as a gray

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The Art of Hugh MacLeod

I just stumbled across this blog by Hugh MacLeod. I really enjoy his 'Kandinsky' style of art. Amazing what he can do with the simple ink pen. Most of his work struck me as quite amazing and some quite funny.
Also check out his homepage.

Warning... His language is very 'New Yorkish' and may not be office safe.

Old Siberian Mine

Absolutely cool Siberian mine photos!

Really, English Russia is a wonderful website.

So... Ummmm...

Car in Truck in Truck
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5th times a charm for Apple?

Apple would like to put a store into classic Georgetown, however their architectural design team (Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, Apples Architects) wants a contemporary glass box with a large Apple logo. The city counsel wants to maintain the classical look to the neighborhood. Unfortunately, each time the Apple team goes before the board, they don't change the overall design much from the previously rejected design.

It is the balancing act that every city planning board must go through. They are charged to maintain a certain level of quality and maintain an approved/historic architectural character and style. The mayor on the other hand just wants the revenue and the business, the city wants the style. It is a difficult position to be in. Apple is a good company with lots of draw. It would help the town economical and bring more people into the area. Unfortunately, allowing Apple to enter the town and break the architectural rhythm would set dangerous precedence for other businesses. The risk is a Vegas style street scape where anything goes... the other risk is a beautiful town with little life.

What Apple is going through is a normal process all businesses go through. A design is posted to the city, and comments are returned from the city board. Design changes occur and compromise is reached. The problem..... Apple and Bohlin Cywinski Jackson re-submitted the 1st design to the board for the 4th attempt. I'm sure you can guess, if it failed the first time, it sure as hell failed the next time. Really, it is contemptuious to waste the councels time resubmitting a failed design. It is also a few other things... one of which is unprofessional.

Let us hope Apple and Bohlin Cywinski Jackson decides that a technology store can have a beautiful classical face.

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Todays Unemployment Numbers. 1 in 8 unemployed.

It is rather depressing to read about the unemployment numbers that came out today. 7.6% Unemployed! Today's unemployment number say 1 in 13 people are out of work. The governments U-6 numbers puts true unemployment closer to 1 in 8 (13.9%). I hope the stimulus package helps push the economy back onto its feet.

When I was a child, Regan was in power and the nation was in a slump. The words recession and depression were thrown around. I asked my Dad what the difference was.... His response, 'A recession is when your neighbor is out of work... a depression is when you are out of work.' I know now he borrowed that line, but those words still rings true.

Raise your glass to all those who still have a job... your keeping the economy alive. Now lets raise a glass to all those out of work... may fortune shine on you and may locked doors swing wide open.

Death Star Costs $15.6 Septillion, 1.4 Trillion Times the US Debt

LOL! A quick calculation of how much one of those beasts would cost.... But that is just the base model.... would you like Air with that? LINK

It is that time of year.... iPhone Rumor Time

So it is that time of year... time to do our taxes, time to loose weight for spring... and time for the iPhone rumors to begin. LINK

Free Photoshop Filters

Hidden Pixel has a wonderful collection of Free Photoshop Filters and plugins. As anyone who uses Photoshop can tell you, the more toys... er.... filters you have, the more powerful.... ummm... productive you are.

Ahhhh Futurism

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Architectural Glitches

The good people over at Dark Roasted Blend have put together a collection of Architectural mishaps, glitches, and afterthoughts.

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and another LINK