I was just reading a newspaper article about an anti-loitering device, developed by a Welshman named Howard Stapleton.  Read about it here. What this machine (named the "mosquito") does -when placed in front of businesses- is emit a high-pitched sound which is apparently audible (and very irritating) only to people under thirty years-old.  (Actually, most people lose the ability to hear this sound once they're in their twenties.) The aim of this machine is to discourage teenage...

The day after Thanksgiving, my wife and I went Christmas shopping with our friends Rob and Yukari.  That day wasn't very productive as far as buying any gifts, but my wife and I got something nice for ourselves. One of the kiosks at the Mall of America was selling a game system that featured the older titles from the Super Nintendo game system.  My wife (who grew up in Japan) was familiar with a lot of the games, and those that she didn't know, I did. We are enjoying such games a...

So recently my computer broke down.  How sad.  It took a few days (plus the help of my uncle) to get it up and running again. While my computer was down, I received a 3 in 1 digital camera/ webcam in the mail.  I brought it to work and played around with a bit on my computer here.  I downloaded the device driver and a few of the components from the CD that came with the camera, but not all of them. Yesterday, I got my repaired computer back.  I was really excited t...

Today while I was taking a break from my yardwork, I watched a Japanese television show with my wife.  The show that we watched was a videotaped episode of "Sanma and Tamao make your dreams come true."  My Mother-in-law sent us a bunch of Japanese television shows on video for my wife to watch. On that show, they showed one nerdy guy who was pining for this lady who he used to work with.  The producers of the show dressed him up in a nice suit, rented him a Mercedes Benz, ...

222 Yesterday, my family was at Toys „` Us.   We were shopping for an umbrella stroller, and browsing for some other baby stuff. While my wife was looking at baby stuff, Kenny and I wandered over to the video game section of the store.  In there I found a display of a thing called the Eye Toy . The Eye Toy is a small camera that connects to the USB port of the PS2.  Included with the camera was a disk containing twelve games to play with the camera. The cool thing a...