Into the Void

The Gathering of the Flashlights

April 10th, 2008

Radio
National Geographic Self-powered Emergency Radio

Every summer, Mr. X does what he calls “The Gathering of the Flashlights.” A leftover habit from our Philadelphia Folk Festival and camping days, The Gathering is Mr. X’s ritual of collecting all the flashlights in the house and replacing batteries and bulbs.

Well, National Geographic emailed me an ad for the gem pictured above – the National Geographic Self-powered Emergency Radio. What self-respecting engineer wouldn’t want a flashlight with a hand-crank? Let’s face it, folks, Green is more than a bumper sticker. 90-seconds of cranking gives an hour worth of battery for the radio. No fumbling in drawers in the dark trying to find the right size battery.

Ok, so National Geographic is more impressed with the radio aspect. And it’s a cell phone battery charger. It even gets international shortwave radio bands.

Oh, get this – it also has a red flashing beacon and a siren.

I think I’ll get the National Geographic Self-powered Emergency Radio for Mr. X’s birthday.

Fortunately he has no interest in anything other than flashlights so he’s not likely to read this.

Tags: cell phone, green, National Geographic, Philadelphia Folk Festival, shortwave
Posted in Education, research & related topics, General Consumer Information, Technology | No Comments »

Text Messaging – Bad 4 UR Health?

July 28th, 2007

Did Text-Messaging Lead to N.Y. Crash?

Take a giggly cheerleader. Give her a Cinderella driver’s license, an SUV and a cell phone,. Then throw four more cheerleaders in the vehicle with her. What do you get? Well, moms and dads, you get a fiery crash.

My cell phone account gives me a complete list of all calls and text messages sent and received from the three phones on the account. The girl’s parents had to have a clue. I won’t even go into the utter foolishness of putting a new driver at the wheel of an large inertial mass. “We got it for safety,” they’ll tell you. Well, the safest vehicle is one that has an attentive driver.

Tags: automobile, automobile accident, cell phone, Darwin Award, evolution, New York
Posted in Medicine & health, Neurology, Personal Health & Safety, Technology | No Comments »

Driving and Cell Phones

July 11th, 2005

Drivers using cell phones more likely to crash – Wireless World – MSNBC.com.
I don’t think I need to comment on the content of this article. It sure took MSNBC a long time to figure it out.