6 posts tagged “green room”

Johnny-Light

Toilet Bowl Light

Link: Johnny-Light

Johnny-Light

The Johnny-Light is already 15 years old, but it's still going.  It seeks to avoid the battle of the sexes in the bathroom.  When the gentleman lifts the lavatory seat, the light goes on and stays on to remind him to put the seat down for the ladies.  When that's been done, the light will go off.  That's one gadget for the ladies, who should all be singing, "This little light of mine."

Johnny-Light

This reminds Leo of another toilet night light which he showed on Regis and Kelly, that was a little more advanced.  It had a motion sensor that would light up red for the gent to aim at when the seat was up, and light up green for the ladies when the seat was down.  Leo can't remember what the product was called, but he did blog about it in March 2003.  It might be the LavNav, or something similar.  See the article on Wired.com.

LavNav

Wine Tasting turned Fire Tasting
Leo has got a new sponsor Gary's Wine, so he does a wine-tasting session on Sunday.  With a bit of Dutch courage and a little help from Brain Brushwood of Scam School, Leo started tasting fire, too.  You can watch the video on odtv.me.

Leo eats fire (TWiT Army Flickr)

Feats of Daring-Do
Dick has had his share of daring-do.  He appeared on "That's My Line", with a tiger resting its head on Dick's lap.  Leo might have done the fire-eating, but he would not do the bungee jump or parachute jump, and Dick would definitely stay away from the Stratosphere Tower's See-Saw Ride (it's actually called X-Cream) in Las Vegas.

Xcream at Stratosphere Tower

A Camera-Printer for the Warehouse
Darryl Wattenberg of darrylsphotoblog.blogspot.com says that the Polaroid Pogo Instant Digital Camera (shown at CES and discussed in Episode 745) was not the first to attempt that combination.  Olympus did just that about a decade ago with the Camedia C-211 Zoom (or C-211z), a digital camera with 2.1 MP which used Polaroid instant film for the prints.  Read the review at Imaging-Resource.  Darryl also recalls a later camera/printer model from Olympus with dye-sub printing capabilities.  2 more gadgets for Dick's Gadget Warehouse.

Olympus Camedia C-211 Zoom

Dick in Disguise and Mercury Rising
Dr L S Powers of the chatroom asks if the gentleman with a moustache holding a plastic whale on Boston Whaler's website is Dick in disguise.  Not so.  Leo advises against eating too much deep-sea big-body fish such as tuna, as it may contain a lot of mercury, as Steve Gibson has recently found out.

This is not Dick

Listen to Episode 810
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Cell-Mate

Cellphone Hands-free Head Gear

Link: cell-mateus.com

Cell-Mate

The sales pitch of the Cell-Mate is that every time you introduce a new element to a cellphone, like a wireless or bluetooth headset, there is a loss in reception quality.  The Cell-Mate eliminates your bluetooth headset.  No pairing involved.  No charging necessary.  There is no new technology to grapple with.  You just velcro your cellphone to the Cell-Mate bracket and just wear the whole thing on your head.

You won't hear about the Cell-Mate on CNet, PC Magazine or CNN.  Only on the Daily Giz Wiz.

Cell Mate dashboard sticky pad

Dick doesn't think it will stand a chance, not to mention the other Cell Mate which makes these Stickpads for cellphones you put on your dashboard.  And how about a simple rubber band, like the one below, picture from Cheapedia:

Handsfree Cellphone Kit

iGrill
Alan Ralph from the UK saw this on the Wal-Mart site and thought immediately of Dick and Leo.  It's the George Foreman iGrill, an indoor outdoor electric grill complete with an iPod dock and speaker system.  It's a day of wacky gadgets.

George Foreman iGrill

Warmmi USB Heating Mouse

Temperature-Controlled USB Mouse

Link: vavolo.com

Warmmi USB Heating Mouse

For the summer, Dick has the Flexii USB Mouse which has a fan for cooling (Episode 646).  The winter equivalent is the Warmmi USB Heating Mouse, also available from vavolo.com.  USB-powered, it uses infrared rays to warm up your mouse-operating hand in winter - up to 45°C.  There is an on/off button on the USB wire to turn the heat off when you don't need the heating.

Live Audience
During this week's taping, Leo has in the studio a live audience - of one - Barbara.

Buzzers Old and New
Leo has a buzzer ready for the studio audience's reactions to Dick's jokes, but William Castle, maker of low budget horror thrillers, had selected seats in cinemas wired up with buzzers for his film "The Tingler", to give the audience a jolt.  Read about the Tingler on Wikipedia, or imdb.

The Tingler Movie Poster

Here's the trailer of the Tingler, introduced by William Castle himself.  You can also watch the beginning of the film on YouTube.

The Tingler: Trailer

Mad Study Group
Rick the Vegas Cabbie as a teenager used to go to a friend's home to read the Mad Magazine, all 15 of them.  He wants to thank Dick, Al Jaffee, Bill Gaines and the Usual Gang of Idiots for giving him a good time.

The Vegas Cabbie has driven Leo, Dick and Amber MacArthur in Las Vegas, and put them on videos, which you can find on YouTube.  Links to Dick's video can be found in Episode 492.  Leo's video (Part 1) can be found here, and Amber's here.

Dots Gloves
The Chatroom has found some gloves for Leo, in case he hasn't got something for tomorrow's TTTT.  Dots Gloves - gloves with tips compatible with the iPhone touch screen.

Dots Gloves

Listen to Episode 681
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USB Plasma Ball

Light Show

Link: VAT19   ThinkGeek

USB Plasma Ball

This Plasma Ball is powered by USB, 4'" in diameter, with an on/off swtich.  Put your finger on the sphere and the "glow" will congregate around your finger, like all other plasma balls.  Available at VAT19 and ThinkGeek.

Here is ThinkGeek's explanation of this magic.  A combination of gasses (such as Argon) are  trapped inside a plastic sphere at relatively low pressures.  An alternating current, at relatively high voltages, is sent into the sphere via an electrode in the centre.  This energy causes atoms (or electrons maybe) to be stripped from the gasses, leaving in its wake some positively charged ions and a gorgeous gaseous and electrically conductive environment (aka Plasma).  That high voltage served up through the electrode will now arc up through the plasma to the plastic sphere where the voltage is lower (starting at the top where the temperature is greater). The arcs glow because they are hotter than the surrounding plasma. You can touch the plastic and the arcs will strongly congregate to your touch because you will be creating an even lower voltage jump from the electrode.

Or just let Dick explain it to you in his own words:

The Giz Wiz Green Room
Dick is negotiating for the TWiT Studio to be named after him.  Leo suggests "The Dick DeBartolo Memorial Antechamber".  Dick thinks it's too early to do that, and prefers "The Giz Wiz Green Room".

The Bird Logo
Leo explains to Dick how the name Twitter came about.  Evan Williams was running Odeo whose logo was a bird.  As a side project, an engineer of Odeo suggested this IM-like web service, so people could send messages called "tweets" to each other.  Hence the name Twitter.  For Dick and Leo's previous mention of Odeo, listen again to Episode 150, towards the end of that episode at about 14:00.  And it was Leo who told Dick about Odeo.

No Begging, Again
Having finally overtaken Barack Obama on the number of followers on Twitter, Leo is now locked in a close race with Kevin Rose.  As with the May 2006 Podcast Alley vote, Dick and Leo do not beg (Episode 67).  So sign up at Twitter and follow Leo, follow Dick, and Alfred E Neuman.

Please alleviate Leo's mid-life crisis and follow him on Twitter.  Otherwise send him a Jacob's Ladder for The Giz Wiz Green Room.

Jacob's Ladder

The Belly of a Dead Fish
Jack from New Hampshire (who may or may not be Jack Kelly from Episode 419) was listening to Episode 564 and was amused by Dick's reference to the beigey colour of the Socket Pocket.  As a technician, he is all too familiar with the colour and has always called it the "dead fish belly yellow".  It's very close to Dick's Tainted Tuna Taupe.

Listen to Episode 573
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Ziszor

Portable Paper Shredder

Link: Ziszor

Ziszor

This time, it's Leo's turn to do a "What's In the Box?" routine, and Dick's turn to guess what it is.  It's Ziszor, a portable, hand-held shredder.  It runs on 4 AA batteries, comes with 4 Ziszor catcher bags, and you shred your paper trail right into the bag.  Ziszor's slogan is, Don't let your mail be your trail.  But as Leo demonstrates, it can't shred Colleen's credit card, though it will shred your English spelling into oblivion.

Ziszor in action

A Wireless Toaster
Karen Toast Conger, of ToastFloats, used to work for WatchGuard, a network security devices company.  As a parting gift, she was given a very special toaster.  Her colleagues bought her a Cuisinart toaster, took it apart, and put a WatchGuard Firebox X Edge wireless router into it.  A wireless router, security device, and a toaster.

Listen to Episode 557
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Sparxline Helmet Strobe

LED Helmet Light

Link: Sparxline

Helmet Strobe