Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Weird Inventions Read Online Free
Author: Bathroom Readers’ Institute
abilities to text, browse the Internet, take terrible pictures of ourselves, and shoot pigs at birds. (Science has even coined the term nomophobia to describe the fear of being without a cell phone— nomo being a contraction of “no mobile.”)
Two students from the Royal College of Art in London have chosen to accept this reality, rather than try to pry the masses away from their handheld devices. Instead, they’ve made possible the next step in the cell phone size and addiction progression and invented the Audio Tooth Implant. In short, it’s the bare-bones, working parts of a cell phone…surgically implanted into a cavity in a tooth.. It’s a tiny contraption, about the size of a tooth filling, made up of a vibration device and a low-frequency receiver. Via your jawbone, it transmits sounds directly to your ear (the jawbone is an excellent transmitter of sound). All told, it allows you to receive calls, and then talk to people, inside of your own head, in total privacy. Bystanders will simply think you ate your Bluetooth.
ICE-CUBE PIGEON REPELLER
T here are lots of ways to get rid of pigeons or other unwanted birds that hang around on your roof, doing who knows what degenerate bird activities. You can stick metal spikes up there, set up a speaker to play ultrasonic frequencies that birds find annoying, or cover the whole mess in slippery or sticky substances.
Or you can set up a mechanical arm to throw ice cubes at them. In 2011 Preston Jones of California patented his Bird Repeller. In form and function, it’s a tiny catapult. Simply load the Repeller with water, plug it in, and let it make ice. The ice automatically flows out into a bowl and is then launched, via a spring-loaded arm, one story into the air, onto the roof, which apparently scares the heck out of birds. As a bonus, Jones note, ice is “environmentally friendly and will not jam gutters.” As another bonus, it can be set up to shoot ice via a timer or remote control, just in case those lousy pigeons get wise and connect your presence in the yard with scary ice bombs.
STUFF THAT CLEANS ITSELF
J apan’s Nippon Sheet Glass Company makes all kinds of windows—virtually unbreakable windows, windows that can withstand bullets. Big deal. They also manufacture a window that can clean itself.
The Cleartect line of glass products is coated with titanium dioxide. That’s a photocatalytic material, meaning that it reacts chemically to light. When sunlight hits the glass, that unleashes a chemical reaction breaks down organic material on the window into smaller and smaller particles. The coating is also hydrophilic, so instead of forming droplets on the glass, rainwater forms an even sheet that flows down the window, taking the super-miniaturized molecules of dirt away with it. (Note: If it doesn’t rain often enough, you have to hose down the window yourself.)
Moreover, scientists at Hong Kong’s Polytechnic University discovered that titanium dioxide—the same stuff that’s used for self-cleaning windows—can be used for clothes, too. When applied to cotton (no other fabric will work) the titanium dioxide breaks down dirt and other pollutants into smaller and smaller particles, the same way it does on glass. Sunlight and movement, they hope, will eliminate the dirt.
DIGITAL EAR CLEANER
O ne of the pros of cleaning your ears, if there are any, is that you can’t see inside of your gross ears while you’re cleaning them. The con is that you can’t see inside of your gross ears while you’re cleaning them, so you don’t really know if you’re doing a good or a bad job, or missing any spots, etc.
Mimikakis—reusable ear-cleaning devices—are popular in Japan, the land that gives us the King’s Idea, a super-futuristic mimikaki. In your hand you hold the main element, an L-shaped piece that looks like a periscope, and like a periscope has a small viewing screen in one end (but digital!). At the other end is a lighted camera/stick made
Two students from the Royal College of Art in London have chosen to accept this reality, rather than try to pry the masses away from their handheld devices. Instead, they’ve made possible the next step in the cell phone size and addiction progression and invented the Audio Tooth Implant. In short, it’s the bare-bones, working parts of a cell phone…surgically implanted into a cavity in a tooth.. It’s a tiny contraption, about the size of a tooth filling, made up of a vibration device and a low-frequency receiver. Via your jawbone, it transmits sounds directly to your ear (the jawbone is an excellent transmitter of sound). All told, it allows you to receive calls, and then talk to people, inside of your own head, in total privacy. Bystanders will simply think you ate your Bluetooth.
ICE-CUBE PIGEON REPELLER
T here are lots of ways to get rid of pigeons or other unwanted birds that hang around on your roof, doing who knows what degenerate bird activities. You can stick metal spikes up there, set up a speaker to play ultrasonic frequencies that birds find annoying, or cover the whole mess in slippery or sticky substances.
Or you can set up a mechanical arm to throw ice cubes at them. In 2011 Preston Jones of California patented his Bird Repeller. In form and function, it’s a tiny catapult. Simply load the Repeller with water, plug it in, and let it make ice. The ice automatically flows out into a bowl and is then launched, via a spring-loaded arm, one story into the air, onto the roof, which apparently scares the heck out of birds. As a bonus, Jones note, ice is “environmentally friendly and will not jam gutters.” As another bonus, it can be set up to shoot ice via a timer or remote control, just in case those lousy pigeons get wise and connect your presence in the yard with scary ice bombs.
STUFF THAT CLEANS ITSELF
J apan’s Nippon Sheet Glass Company makes all kinds of windows—virtually unbreakable windows, windows that can withstand bullets. Big deal. They also manufacture a window that can clean itself.
The Cleartect line of glass products is coated with titanium dioxide. That’s a photocatalytic material, meaning that it reacts chemically to light. When sunlight hits the glass, that unleashes a chemical reaction breaks down organic material on the window into smaller and smaller particles. The coating is also hydrophilic, so instead of forming droplets on the glass, rainwater forms an even sheet that flows down the window, taking the super-miniaturized molecules of dirt away with it. (Note: If it doesn’t rain often enough, you have to hose down the window yourself.)
Moreover, scientists at Hong Kong’s Polytechnic University discovered that titanium dioxide—the same stuff that’s used for self-cleaning windows—can be used for clothes, too. When applied to cotton (no other fabric will work) the titanium dioxide breaks down dirt and other pollutants into smaller and smaller particles, the same way it does on glass. Sunlight and movement, they hope, will eliminate the dirt.
DIGITAL EAR CLEANER
O ne of the pros of cleaning your ears, if there are any, is that you can’t see inside of your gross ears while you’re cleaning them. The con is that you can’t see inside of your gross ears while you’re cleaning them, so you don’t really know if you’re doing a good or a bad job, or missing any spots, etc.
Mimikakis—reusable ear-cleaning devices—are popular in Japan, the land that gives us the King’s Idea, a super-futuristic mimikaki. In your hand you hold the main element, an L-shaped piece that looks like a periscope, and like a periscope has a small viewing screen in one end (but digital!). At the other end is a lighted camera/stick made
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