Spooky motion-sensitive Halloween eyes

This is one in a series of Halloween electronics posts. Read the full series: Spooky motion-sensitive Halloween eyes Interactive Halloween thunder effects Halloween goggles For halloween this year, some friends did a sort of “mini haunted house” in their garage. The plan was to mix having a small party with handing out candy and to … Continue reading Spooky motion-sensitive Halloween eyes

Radio Shack: “Is this stuff any good?”

My last two posts (skipping over the one regarding comics) mentioned Radio Shack in one form or another, so I thought I would complete the trilogy with this one.  As you may recall reading, I worked at Radio Shack in the early 90s.  It was minimum wage plus poor commission, so basically ended up being … Continue reading Radio Shack: “Is this stuff any good?”

The business card companion cube

A few years ago, I ran across Ned Batchelder’s instructions for making a business card cube. Since then, I have made dozens of them, including a few conjoined cubes that form Tetris pieces. It occurred to me the other day (about a year or two too late to hit the Portal craze and at least … Continue reading The business card companion cube

Flashback: thump, scraaaape… thump, scraaaape…

I started blogging in 2001. Prior to that I had a couple of website on which I wrote things in a fairly unorganized fashion. I had netninja.com, my main site since 1997, and used to have diedrichs.org, a site celebrating a gang of coffee shop buddies, from a few years after that until I finally … Continue reading Flashback: thump, scraaaape… thump, scraaaape…

Ex Libris

As a kid, I was fortunate enough to grow up in a household that promoted reading. From a fairly early age, my elementary school had occasional book fairs and a sort of monthly book club. In fact each month, all of the students of a particular set of grade levels would get a cheaply-printed color … Continue reading Ex Libris

The floor is made of lava

Did you ever play the lava game as a kid? The subject came up again last night as we were steam cleaning the carpet for a houseguest this weekend. It seems like everyone I talk to has played it, or at least some minor variant. Technically, I think the label “game” is less accurate than … Continue reading The floor is made of lava

Minor Update

No recent blog posts… it’s been a busy week. It would appear that 6 inches of silicone rubber weatherstripping is the best cat toy ever. Ebenezer loves it. Charlotte, who does not typically play with cat toys, was seen to be playing with it a few times. The non-toys always make the best toys. Portlanders, … Continue reading Minor Update