How to spin a pencil around your thumb

THIS is what has been motivating me at work for the last few weeks. At the international school I went to all the Japanese kids could do this, and I remember spastically spasming the pen across the room much to everyone's amusement the first few times I tried this. As the years have rolled on I've toyed with the concept from time to time but my attempts have been laughable at best and awkward and uncomfortable at worst.

FINALLY I have found the answer- Here.

Hold the pencil between your index, middle finger, and thumb. Your index and middle finger should be spaced about the width of your thumb apart (Your thumb should be able to fit between your index and middle fingers). Your fingers should point upwards about 20-45 degrees. Your middle finger should be against the center of gravity of the pencil (towards the middle, slightly closer to the eraser).

Simultaneously fold your middle finger in (at the joint closest to your hand) and extend your index finger. Your middle finger should end up resting with the inside of its last joint on the thumb.

Catch the pencil after it wraps around your thumb and hits your middle finger, by moving your index finger back to its original position.

Now all I have to do is practice. I give it one day before I'm banned!
Thanks to WikiHow for attempting to teach me new tricks : )

Julie's Secret Obsession

I am addicted to Ah Caramel! Cakes:They are absolutely horrific for you- they are factory made white cakes, with caramel and thick confectionary icing on top, and the whole thing is covered in chocolate. They come two in a plastic pack (of course they come in plastic- that's how ghetto they are!), which means you can never have just one. Well, you could share the second cake with someone, but then you'd resent them for eating your second Ah Caramel Cake. You might begin to plot their untimely death.

I hadn't realized it, but they are only available in Canada. canadaonly.ca is, as you might guess, a site that sells only Canadian food products. They are willing to ship them anywhere in the world. I never really thought the food I was eating was so regional. These are also Canada-specific:The reason being it was a marketing idea from an intern at Ogilvy Advertising in Toronto. Although shreddies are everywhere, Canada is the only place they are being marketed like this. Hooray for cleverness and irony!

Before you ask...

No, honey, just no.
I don't care how much you try to pout or beg, the madness ends here and now- no wigs for cats! How am I supposed to look little Gatsby or Yarn! in the feline goggles in good faith knowing full well that I sanctioned such a ridiculous item of petwiggery? I couldn't live with the guilt and frankly you should be ashamed of yourself for even considering it. Oh, I know you are.

Yesterday was a very trying day at work. I've mentally left the country already so remaining focussed on great customer service is difficult while all around me the department descends into chaos... so I'm getting my hair cut tomorrow to cheer myself up!

I also am very excited because I just went shopping in the 2cv...Where I bought the following items of guilty pleasure...

Which magically became this delicious medley of indulgence!


My girlfriend has gotten me addicted to G & T's so badly its not even funny, I feel like I'm cheating on Jack Daniel's... I can't even look him in the eye when I see him now. Only time will heal that rift- and in the meantime Gordon is here to pick up the slack! (BTW the creme egg in a stick is GENIUS!)

Bad Day at Work?

Well, there are really only two choices.

Option one:
Or option two:
The first is the most practical. But the second is the most entertaining!

Inspiration, the Magazine

Design for Mankind is such an amazing site, and routinely go above and beyond the standard design blogs-- They put out regular e-zines of designer inspiration. Basically, they pull together different designers who work in different mediums and have them do up a page of what turns them on, gets them thinking, gets them working. They've just put out issue number 5.
A cup of tea, and this. Ah, I can feel the universe getting exponentially better.

Is this you?

If this is you, proceed directly to bed. Do not pass go. Do not forget toast and tea. Come out again when the world has stopped spinning!

In a bout of flagrant hypocrisy (do as I say, not as I do) here is a photo of Dex, Sam and I at the pub last night, bitching about our jobs.

My camera is deteriorating really very quickly... The flash has stopped working altogether now and it just won't stop blurring every photo I take! I can't wait to get a decent digital camera in the summer.

Thoughts on the impossible

When I tell people I meet that I'm moving to Toronto at the end of next month (June 25th, 32 days time) I've become increasingly perplexed by how many times I hear "Oh, wow! Thats a HUGE step!". Is it really though? Personally I think it was one of the easiest decisions I've ever made and I'm surprised at how much emphasis others have placed upon it.

Here is a slide from GMail creator, Paul Buchheit’s presentation at Startup School 2008:

I like this idea; as much as it trivialises the opinions of my friends and co-workers it speaketh the trutheth; besides... I look at all I stand to gain and I know that impossible is really just something people say when they're too scared to try.

The Perry Bible Fellowship

The Perry Bible Fellowship is drawn by Nicholas Gurewitch, who writes-

"The Perry Bible Fellowship" is amusing to me, as a name, because it's probably the worst name for a comic strip ever."

I agree.

I spent the afternoon working my way through his entire back catalogue and chuckling evilly into the phone, much to the confusion of whichever esteemed customer I was talking to at the time.





Seriously, I LOL'd, more than once! Is that a bad thing? I can't decide if the majority of his work should outrage me or not. On the whole I think its pretty bloody funny.

One of Julie's Secrets

As much as it pains me to admit it, I do this at least twice a day, every day, Monday through Friday......
Although for some reason, I take the weekends off. Mentally sorting out the best way to take down bad guys while remaining relatively unscathed is exhausting.

Maybe this is what's wrong with the MR2....

Nanobot Football

And by football I mean the proper english use of the word, and not the "soccer" to which other societies refer... I found this while trawling one of my favourite guilty-pleasure technology sites (Engadget) and it made me smile so much my next caller commented that they could hear me grinning! (Full disclosure- from time to time this blog is written from my desk in a callcentre)

Nanorobot Football!

Imagine an entire football league in a stadium the size of three grains of rice! I, for one, welcome the arrival of our robotic overlords. I bet they're still better than Chelsea; how long before their billionaire manager considers replacing his team with nanobot-constructed replacements?

Book Art

In Melbourne, Australia, there is a book artist named Nicholas Jones.
He carves paper. He folds pages. He is is, oddly enough, a book sculptor.
He even looks the part of the reclusive, crazy-haired artist, doesn't he?
I'm utterly entranced by these sculptures. And feeling pretty good that I live in a world where someone can make a living by creating and selling them.

(courtesy of The Design Files and Dlish Design)

Habi-Kat!

Finally, cat stuff for people with tiny apartments:

I love this concept. Instead of those giant carpeted cat trees, these are made from industrial felt and are wall mounted (with endless possibilities on the shaping and layout) so that your kitty can have all the fun of their own cozy place to curl up, without sucking up half your floor space. And this picture just clinches it: Look how much those kitties love habikat!

More of her work (and some seriously detailed mock ups that show the whole design process) can be found here, courtesy of design sponge .

Next up under the category of things I saw today and loved:

Those wall teacups are awesome! I would love to have several all in a tidy row.

And finally, a cartoon:

A party, some kittens and a trip to the pub

Work gets you down from time to time... Here, my colleague Derrick finds a way to alleviate the boredom, 2D style:Derrick's girlfriend Rachel had a birthday party recently, and I got to hang out with some pretty cool kittens, or at least have them climb all over me!

Rachel got a Little Mermaid snowglobe for her birthday! She's in her early twenties, but I think she deserved to be over the moon about this little gift.

Will Wolf clocks ever go out of style?!? I suspect not.

Lastly here's a photo of Bill and I staggering home from the pub after a few too many drinkees!

The Sheep are Calling

I'm willing to bet you haven't seen this before: Yeah, that's right. Sheep made out of telephones.
I wonder if they are fully functioning- I'm not saying I'd get a telephone sheep (Hello, Habitat? Are you selling telephone sheep yet?), they are pretty big, but I'm not ruling it out, either. I love how the hooves are made out of receivers!

(source: some spanish site of which I can't make heads or tails)

Chandeliers

Did you know that the hitherto unknown (at least to me) Tord Boontje designs items for Habitat? I didn't, and ended up looking mighty foolish in the aforementioned retail outlet (Ikea's sleeker, classier cousin) a couple of weeks ago when confronted over the gap in my knowledge.
For my sins I had no idea who Tord was and I was grateful for the lesson. I do however know that Julie likes chandeliers. I found these examples during my daily trawl and thought I'd add them today to give her something pretty to look at.

Designed by Kenzan Tsutakawa-Chinn and consisting of 364 LEDs on 94 copper tubes, this Constellation Light is flexible, creative and just darned cool.

I love the idea of moulding the chandelier 'just so'.

The second chandelier is the donkey's armpits- Neues Licht's UFO Chandelier consists of strands of fibre optics arranged above a floating ring, which give off a colored glow depending on whatever light source you attach to it. You can pump sunlight into this thing from another room through a catching mirror and optical cabling- so you can have the glow of sunlight (or moonlight!) in any room in the house... a totally cool idea in my book.

Yay for designer Simon Bruenner!
via Engadget

Guy already knows this about me (and lucky for me, doesn't think it's odd) but I regularly stalk about 15 design blogs a day (more if I'm procrastinating), which is why, although I have no formal education on the subject whatsoever, I know a frightening amount of useless information about design and designers from all over the world. Case and point: When I was in the UK , we had a wander in Habitat one day and I bought this...

I was so excited, because I have been in love with Tord Boontje designs for the last couple of years. And when I was having my overly excited fit in Habitat, Guy had no idea who Tord Bonntjet was. I think TB is awesome. It's the fairytale aesthetic, really. They way he swings completely in the opposite direction from minimalizism. It's lush, it's visually complex, it's all laser cut textures and the feeling that you wandered into a Brothers Grimm story.

Look at that carpet of leaves. Seriously. It's like a forest floor, in your living room. Looks like it would be a bitch to vacuum, though (so don't worry, love, I don't want it : P):

But I'll admit, he got commerical, started doing stuff for Target, and unleashed these ugly dishes onto the world:

Blegh. But I guess we don't always have great days at work, either. But the item below has brought me the most amusment today:

It's a coffee cuff. It's a bracelet AND a reusable coffee sleeve. It claims to be made from "reclaimed architectural veneer offcuts" (whatever those are....) and can be yours for $68. Seriously. It's the ongoing trend of pretending to save the world by buying over-priced cool stuff. Awesome.

HoverGator?

Haha, this reluctant reptile caught my eye and I thought I'd pass her on... I know they're warm-blooded, but who'd have thought they'd feel the cold so badly? Maybe no-one taught her how to swim ; ) or she's just pulled off the most impressive Jazz Hands of all time.

TaDaaaaa!

As for this picture, I don't know what to think. I'm really not a rodent person; my sister had several mistreated hamsters and the lasting impression they left me was one of utter pointlessness and a musty odour... but this lil fella? I defy you not to want to coax him out of his palace of cheese and hug him!



Maybe our kitten-to-be can be trained to bring cute mice to me for hugs? Having said that, all of my hugs will be reserved for the blog co-owner and the kitten-to-be, so I think the mice of the world will have to survive without my affections.

...and just to reclaim my testicles here's a sneak peek from http://www.jalopnik.com/ of the 2009 Ferrari California.

*swoon*

Grrr, cars! I feel much more manly again now... Its not Jap, but its still very pretty : D

Knock-Knock Jokes

Traditionally reserved as the last bastion of the working mens club comedy circuit or the preserve of small children (who typically chirp them out parrot fashion for hours at a time on long car journeys... sorry mum), the noble Knock-Knock joke stands proudly in the annals of joke history. Who honestly doesn't laugh at the "Doctor Who" punchline? I mean, honestly, who? I laughed so hard last time I heard it that I gave myself a hernia.

Today's second post is all about the top 5 Knock-Knock jokes of the afternoon and a quick passing around of the hat has heralded some real gems:

"Knock Knock!"
"Who's there?"
"Police."
"Police who?"
"Police let us in; it's cold out here!"

Genius! I mean, if only beggars and street children had paid attention at joke school they could find doors opening everywhere they turned, for warmth and a meal.

"Knock Knock!"
"Doris."
"Doris, who?"
"Doris locked, that's why I had to knock!"

This Knock-Knock is actually used fairly often and is generally commandeered by attention seekers and the more forgetful sections of society. Popular among old people and drunks.

"Knock Knock!"
"Who's there?"
"Norma Lee."
"Norma Lee who?"
"Normalee I don't go around knocking on doors, but do you want to buy a set of encyclopedias?"

Ah, the travelling salesman gag! If I had a penny for every time I'd heard this Knock-Knock, I'd have a penny.

"Knock Knock!"
"Who's there?"
"Tank!"
"Tank who?"
"You're welcome!"

Often handy when running low on self-esteem, this Knock-Knock is the equivalent of a comedic Mars bar and perfect for that mid-shift pick me up. "Coffee?" "No thanks, but Knock Knock!"

And last but by no means least, the heavy hitter of all Knock-Knock jokes...

"Knock Knock!"
"Who's there?"
"Aardvark."
"Aardvark who?"
"Aardvark a million miles for one of your smiles."

Its true, too. x

First Post!

My first blog post ever... I can't believe I made it to 28 without blogging? Hi, I'm Guy and this is Julie. We met in Toronto in March.

My cool friends, the amazing city and our great moments together led to me planning to move there, which led to Julie coming to visit me, which led to an idea for a blog that our friends and family can read to see all the cool stuff we'd been up to.

For the next month and a bit I'm still based in the UK so until the end of June I'll be contributing from this side of the water, while Julie will write from her amazing basement in Toronto.

To begin here are a couple of photos I took yesterday on my phone camera. We were blessed with incredible weather all day. My friend Bill and I (Bill is the gent with cider in hand, not the duck) went on a drive to Bath together where we sat by the river drinking cider and slowly pickled in the sun.

It turned out to be a nearly perfect day! Great company, an exciting job lead, cider and an amazing skate... Just missing one element ; )

Oilseed in full bloom

QUACK!

Pickled Bill

I hope your weekend was amazing too : )

-Guy