5 things I did this week:
I have received my brand-spanking-new iPhone 4 via FedEx (after they delayed the delivery by 3 days, and then sent it from Mississauga to Vancouver, and then back to the GTA to delay it one extra day). I also preemptively made a case for it out of a Moleskine notebook. Pretty impressive that the damned things fit together so snugly, considering I never had the iPhone with me while cutting, and based pretty much everything off of estimates and measurements from Wikipedia. I made another time-lapse video of the cutting process, and normal recordings for the unboxing and fitting of Ulrich (my phone) in his handmade crib.
Notes: The original audio track was supposed to be Kaela Kimura’s “Level 42″ but because the folks at Columbia Music are dicks sticklers about people promoting their artists on their behalf for free illegal use of their “property” they wouldn’t let me use it on YouTube and the audio got nuked. I then used an audio-swap feature of YouTube’s to substitute a pre-licensed song (the “I’m Feeling Lucky” automatic song finder gave me Finger Eleven’s “Paralyzer” after two tries).
I hope you enjoy the video, without the original, nicely cut and faded audio. Thanks be to Karen for helping me with the cutting of the pages, and Amy for her genius idea on how to bind and seal the pages together. Oh, and thanks be to Columbia Music, just for being the kind of company they are. Please, continue to set this kind of precedent for all those in the music industry and do for your artists what only you can do, and I’m almost sure you will have a flourishing business model on your hands. That, or crash and burn like the bags of fecal matter in airplanes low on fuel that you so desperately wish to resemble.
Hate for petty and childish business models aside, I’m loving the phone and loved making the case. I have indeed been able to replicate the attenuation problem (to crush the dreams of all those who were hoping some magical fix had been implemented in the second batch of iPhones), but it seems that it is only an issue in inherently weak-signaled places, and I do think the reception overall is actually better on the iPhone 4. For example, I get 3 bars that will drop to none or 1 when applying the death-grip to Ulrich from within my condo. As a reference, I normally get zero/no reception at all with my previous handset in the same spot. This proves that attenuation is still a problem. However, the fact that the phone even gets any reception in that spot at all indicates that the antennae actually performs better if not being cheated.
The P.Pole has a new-ish face! Freshly polished and adorned for your enjoyment! For future reference, here’s what I’m looking at:
I’ve grabbed some comics to read, and have been reading through Marvel’s “Siege” storyline (January to May 2010), which, as far as I’ve gotten, deals with Thor and the Asgardians (I think it’s pronounced ”az-guardians”, not “ass-guardians”).
Anyway, Thor has this totally badass hammer, named Mjöllnir. Here is an excerpt (taken completely out of context) from the Wikipedia page:
At a banquet Þrymr holds in honor of the impending union, Þrymr takes the bait. Unable to contain his passion for his new maiden with long, blond locks (and broad shoulders), as Þrymr approaches the bride by placing Mjöllnir on “her” lap, Thor rips off his disguise and destroys Þrymr and his giant cohorts.
Read more about Mjöllnir here.
Update: Here’s a video of me, making a Chibi-Mjolnir:
Shivon showed me the first version of these shoes, and they were nifty. I think this second iteration is cleaner and more in-line with what I would like… I’d wear these if I didn’t already have wings.
More photos here: Adidas Wings 2.0 @ UFunk
In the recent trend of making all posts musical, and because I received my Rock Band 1 disc recently, here’s another song. Lyrics after the jump.
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I bring you, the philosophy of the late Bruce Lee!
5 Bruce Lee-isms:
Note: “Papa” is read as a bastardization of “Paper”.
Anyone who has gotten moderately deep into the airsoft world will know what the Tokyo Marui Hi-Capa 5.1. Specifics aside, here’s a gallery of the gun, stock, ending with a little mod done by the user. I am a fan of this gun—been around for a long time, made by the oldest maker in the game—and aim to acquire one someday. Anyway, I modeled my pistol after this (in terms of shape, dimensions, etc…). Obviously it’s lacking some of the more complicated features, but here’s a list of things it does have:
Everyone who likes neat little models of things needs to go here right now and check out the gallery.
I made the paper gun using an ancient NT Cutter 1-300 x-acto knife, ample Flying Horse white glue, and a 100 sheet stack of index cards. Just as a teaser, here’s a picture of my final result:
