Posted by Benjamin Roudenis on August 23, 2010
REACQUAINT YOURSELF WITH THE PLEASURES OF A HAND-SHARPENED PENCIL.
In New York’s Hudson River Valley, craftsman David Rees still practices the age-old art of manual pencil sharpening. His artisanal service is perfect for artists, writers, and standardized test takers. Shipped with their shavings and a “certificate of sharpening,” these extra-sharp pencils make wonderful gifts.
Traditionally people mail in their pencils to be sharpened; however David now offers a new service: He will provide the pencil.
IS THIS A JOKE?
If you start a pencil-sharpening business, you can expect to hear this question a lot. The short answer? No, this is not a joke. You pay David Rees money and he sharpens your pencils. It actually happens.
If you think it’s a joke, why don’t you poke yourself with your newly sharpened pencil? Or better yet, don’t — because it’ll really hurt. In fact, every pencil David Rees sharpens is shipped with a signed and dated certificate authenticating that it is now a dangerous object.
$60 gets you a sharp pencil and the poster you see here. Only want your pencil sharpened? That’s just $15.
Artisanal Pencil Sharpening
Posted by Benjamin Roudenis on March 28, 2010
Does your cat look like Adolf Hitler? Do you wake up in a cold sweat every night wondering if he’s going to up and invade Poland? Does he keep putting his right paw in the air while making a noise that sounds suspiciously like “Sieg Miaow”? If so, this is the website for you.
Cats That Look Like Hitler!
Posted by Benjamin Roudenis on January 17, 2010
Enter a URL for any page on the web, and PDFmyURL.com will turn it into a PDF. Easy enough.
Convert and save pdf from any webpage for free [PDFmyURL.com]
Posted by Benjamin Roudenis on November 25, 2009
For as little as $7.95, Warner Bros. is will let you trade in your DVDs for the same Bluray title. This is a great deal for anyone looking to upgrade their DVD collection to the latests and greatest high-defery. Check the list of eligible movies out at http://www.dvd2blu.com.
Upgrade Your Warner Bros. DVDs for New Blu-ray Discs [DVD2Blu]
Posted by Benjamin Roudenis on November 2, 2009
Bias comes in many forms. And the end of the 1970s marked a significant turn – and began a dark period – of discrimination against mustached Americans.
While until then it was fashionable to wear a mustache, virtually overnight, it became a fad reserved for the likes of law enforcement, steel workers, motor cross drivers, and members of the Village People.
Enter the American Mustache Institute (AMI) – based in St. Louis as the city is home to the world’s largest mustache – the St. Louis Arch. AMI is an advocacy organization protecting the rights of, and fighting discrimination against, mustached Americans by promoting the growth, care, and culture of the mustache.
AMI continues to battle negative stereotyping that has accompanied the mustache since those glory years of the 1970s – the peak of mustache acceptance – fighting to create a climate of acceptance, understanding, flavor saving, and upper lip warmth for all mustached Americans alike.
American Mustache Institute
Posted by Benjamin Roudenis on January 22, 2009
CNet.com has posted 2 articles by Declan McCullagh, Obama to .gov agencies: More Internet openness and Obama’s Whitehouse.gov: Frozen in time?, which discuss President Obama’s desire to use the internet for government transparancey:
President Obama signed an order on Wednesday proclaiming that the entire federal government should be more open, transparent, and Internet-friendly. It said that agencies must “put information about their operations and decisions online and readily available to the public.”
As someone who gets most of my information off the internet, I applaude this move.
Posted by Benjamin Roudenis on January 21, 2009
I just found Amazon Mechanical Turk. Anyone can sign up to work on HITs – Human Intelligence Tasks – that earn you money. Each hit pays from a few cents to a dollar depending on difficulty and time required. Many of the tasks simply involve finding information online and copying that information into a form for the person requesting it. I can see how I could easily make $10 – 20 while I’m sitting on my couch on a cold Sunday afternoon anyway. I’ve only done a few to try it out, but I think I could really get into this website.