Protected: Survey Candor
July 2nd, 2009Hallmark Hack-a-thon
June 16th, 2009Hallmark had a fun 24-hour hack-a-thon that started yesterday; when the dust settled around noon today, it turned out that I was one of the two winners.
The contest was basically to take a gift bag full of Hallmark’s products (you know, those irritating song-cards, dancing snowman snow globes, glitter, and so forth) and add/subtract anything to make a cool new product that answered one of four core questions. I lost my list of questions, but they were all pretty vague and fit within the “making moments matter” sort of mindframe one would expect.
The middle idea was the winner, although I had way, way more fun making the bone-conduction headband and dancing around to my old Mousercise LP…
FAMILY DANCE TROUPE
A customizable set of characters that fit into the “Dancing Santas” snowglobes. Customization can be cartoon-like (think the Mii characters of Nintendo’s Wii game system) and configured by the consumer via a web or in-store interface; alternately, new 3-d technology like Microsoft’s Project Natal could be used to accurately scan a person’s face and be printed out as an accurate likeness.
CHRISTMAS CONSTELLATIONS
A system for extended families to share memories. Each star in the constellation is a special Christmas ornament that has both a camera and a display. When Grandma sends you a picture or message (through an easy web interface like blogger or flickr), your ornament will glow gently to indicate that Grandma has sent you a new photo. As you’re seeing it, you can turn the ornament around, snap a picture, and send it right back to her via a local wireless link.
SECRET DANCE PARTY
Silly cartoon “ears” that children can wear at a birthday party or other special event. It’s a great party favor because it gives the kids an activity: they all put the ears on and magically can all dance in unison, even though the parents don’t hear any music! The secret is the bone-conduction speaker in the headband, which plays music inside the child’s head that is inaudible to others. The headbands will be pre-loaded with 8-10 full-length songs (the kids’ songs can have instructions, a la Mousercise, that allow them to do dance moves in sync), and the headbands can easily keep sync by only transmitting/receiving cues (ie, “play track 1″) instead of streaming audio.
I was determined not to use Powerpoint and not to have too much text in my presentation, as I find both to be deadly boring and inelegant. As a result, showing you the images I prepared for my presentation will be of limited utility without my spiel going on over it. That is, I think, how it should be: images should reinforce my talk, and depend on it, rather than the other way around. I hope to refine this presentation style/approach more, as it is one of the few things I think I might actually be able to teach/help other Labbers with…as a whole, we’re not so good at presenting our work. This is sad, because so many awesome ideas come out of the Lab, and only a few result in equally awesome prototypes; of those few, it is sad to see visitor/sponsor enthusiasm lag in the face of a bad presentation of an awesome concept-and-demo…
Experimental Pizza, Series 1
June 14th, 2009
Fresh young turnips with kale, turnip greens, carmelized onions, mushroom, mozzarella and parmesan.
The turnips were boiled in salted water till a fork could go in, but not easily – about 7 minutes.
Kale was done the usual way: fry three bacon strips cut into lardons, remove and dry the bacon when done, throw in one small shallot (sliced very thin on a mandoline) and stirfry until it becomes aromatic. Then add ribbons of kale (about an inch wide) and about 0.7 cups of chicken broth. Cover and let cook until fairly wilted, about 8 minutes. At the six-minute mark, I also threw in the turnip greens so they would wilt a little.
Onions were carmelized over a long time, about 45 minutes.
The mushrooms were sauteed in fat rendered from the fennel sausage being prepped for the other pizza. There was a big mistake involving garlic (I had to throw the garlic away, but the oil retained a pretty roasted/slightly charred garlic taste) that ended up affecting the mushrooms a bit. I deglazed with a tiny splash of apple cider vinegar, which I then poured in with the kale and boiled off.
I bought the pizzadough from Johnny Thugmaster for $1.19. I took the dough out of the bag and let it sit near the warming oven in a bowl that was painted with olive oil all along the inside. Our new boarder, AnnaRock, works at a pizzeria and said that you couldn’t use too much flour when rolling it out, and this advice worked great. I painted the outer edge of the crust with olive oil after pressing it down with my thumbs, which ended up giving the crust a bubble-free yet crispy texture.
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June 12th, 2009
the first CSA distribution from Red Fire Farms
- AKA
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June 11th, 2009
laser cut laptop stand
- AKA
Protected: NIME 09 sleepy recap
June 5th, 2009Protected: Eating / Achieving / Planning
May 30th, 2009Protected: Future Blindness
May 30th, 2009downsized_0515091145.jpg
May 15th, 2009
dome at the lab
- AKA
Chicken with Sage Mushroom Sauce
May 10th, 2009
Delicious! I made this and did not measure out the sage, resulting in a little too much sage taste, so I added some hard parmesan shavings that melted with the heat of the dish, which turned out very well.
