Christmas Gift Guide 2006

Volume II

This gift guide might reflect my own contradictions and preferences rather than act as a solid manual on what gifts to give loved ones this year. I do promise that buying any of my suggestions will get you remembered by your loved ones; I just don’t know if you’d get remembered in a good way or the bad way.

Back to my contradictions, I am by nature a Luddite. I regard most new technology with a skeptic’s eye. Video games? Forget it, I won’t play anything newer than 20 years old. Online computer games? Nope. I own and use fountain pens, I prefer rotary dial telephones and I lobbied against the new NBA basketball. I like my drivers persimmon and my irons are blades. Guns should be wood and metal. Bars should be smoky. I want my books to have leather bindings and I don’t read science-fiction written after Star Wars.

But…

I love gadgets. I love technology, especially technology that makes my toothbrushes more powerful. My computer runs all the latest programs and I have all the new accessories. I have a WiFi locater which can detect hotspots from over 500ft away. My Phone has internet and email with the ability to text posts to the blog. My camera is digital and I’m never without a flash drive with at least a gig ready for something, anything.

In school I was the nerd with the calculator watch which had a phonebook and a dozen other features an 8 year old had no idea how to use.

I regard myself with some humor and an understanding that people must have a strange conception of a man who can interview someone from their cell phone and have it instantly posted to a website yet will hand someone a fountain pen and expect them to know how to use it.

Luckily, Hammacher Schlemmer has a catalog that plays to my quirks. First, for the Luddite in me I can get a working steam engine locomobile:

This is the working 1:8-scale version of the classic steam-powered locomobile used by European farmers at the turn of the 20th century for threshing and plowing. Imported from Germany, the locomobile has a 2″ diam. brass boiler that produces hefty steam to drive the double-action, dual-flywheel cylinder in forward or reverse. The chain drive translates the rotation of the flywheels into power for the groundwheels, and the engine has a partitioned smoke chamber at the front to collect the condensation and allow the smoke to escape through the hinged smokestack. The intricately detailed model has a sight glass that acts as a water gauge to indicate remaining water level, and the locomobile also has a precise pressure gauge, spring-loaded safe ty valve to prevent over-pressurization, chain-pull whistle, steam regulator, steam jet oiler, water drain tap to simplify cleaning, and decorative gangways and ladder. Dry spirit tablets are required to heat the boiler which holds enough water to operate the steam locomobile for approximately 15 minutes.

Or…

We could look to the future of automotive personal transportation. Hammacher Schlemmer is also offering a small working model of a Hydrogen Fuel Cell Car (I’m sure it’s much safer than the last form of Hydrogen transportation, the Hindenburg):

Winner of Time Magazine’s Best Inventions award, this car uses the same technology that international automobile companies are implementing to develop zero- emission vehicles. Fueled entirely by hydrogen, the most abundant element in the universe, the car is powered without combustion while emitting only water from the exhaust system. An external fueling station uses electrolysis to extract hydrogen gas from distilled water and sends the gas to a small balloon inside the car that acts as the hydrogen storage tank. The hydrogen is slowly released from the balloon into the on-board fuel cell where it reacts with oxygen to generate electricity to propel the car’s motor. Refueling takes 10 minutes and the car can run in a straight line for thre e minutes and can travel up to 325′ on a full tank.

The best part is you can compare both of these items in a head to head competition. Sure, the steam engine is three times as expensive but it runs for 15 minutes versus 3 minutes for the Fuel Cell Car. It also only takes a few seconds to replace the tablet and get the steam engine rolling again while it takes ten minutes to get the Fuel Cell powered up. Think of the possibilities, a drag race, a tractor pull and even explosive capabilities. One thing you won’t have to measure is popularity. The Steam Engine is already sold out while the Fuel Cell car is available for “Immediate Shipment.”

People are just naturally a bit Ludditic.

Bloggers I’d suggest a steam engine to: Alan Anderson (the oldest blogger in the MOB) and Swiftee (though I’m sure he prefers an internal combustion engine with two wheels over an external combustion engine toy) while methinks Shyestviolet and Flash might dig the Fuel Cell Car thing.

Random Thoughts

-I used to really enjoy the Sunday night line-up on FOX. Married with Children, Futurama, Malcom in the Middle, The Simpsons and a half dozen other now forgotten shows used to make a great back drop to the last minute homework frenzy. Now it’s almost unwatchable. “American Dad” is painful to watch, “Family Guy” has lost it’s edge and now is just disturbing, “The War at Home” is a tired sitcom retread of funnier shows and “The Simpsons” has become lecture heavy (more so than usual). It’s enough to lead a guy to Farscape reruns.

–Ben de Hammerswinging1882 gets a link from bloghouse. What does he do? Does he thank O’Brien for the increased exposure? Does he brown-nose in a vain attempt to get noticed more? Nope, he tells any readers of the Strib to knock it off: “You do know that that the Star Tribune is a dishonestly partisan paper, right? Break free from the shackles imposed on you by Nick Coleman and Jim Boyd. Turn your back on the dispeptic rantings of Garrison Keillor. Buy a puppy and put the Strib to good use.”

Way to stick to your hammers Ben.