What a great idea for a baby gift: customized white-noise CD! This guy used a hairdrier, but other babies I know might enjoy clothes drier, Volvo, old gas furnace, or freeway whoosh.

Yes, the kids are back in school and the germ soup is bubbling away- it’s time to start fruitlessly avoiding colds. The CDC and the American Society for Microbiology have some hand-washing tips to help you:
“Wet your hands with warm, running water and apply liquid or clean bar soap. Lather well. Rub your hands vigorously together for at least 10 to 15 seconds. Scrub all surfaces, including the backs of your hands, wrists, between your fingers and under your fingernails. Rinse well. Dry your hands with a clean or disposable towel.”
They also recommend that crazy turn-off-the-tap-with-the-towel thing which never works out for me. They also like those alcohol-based hand sanitizers.

Book title that sounds like a euphemism of the day: Tempting the Highlander.

From the back cover: “Catherine Daniels arrives in Pine Creek, Maine, at the right time for Robbie MacBain. She is on the run from her ex-husband, and Robbie is a sexy, single foster parent who needs a housekeeper while he travels back in time to medieval Scotland.”

Do you just put a card up at the co-op for that?

Since I have to work on September 11, can I commemmorate the anniversary by throwing unattended bags into the dumpster?

Unfortunately, I’ve pretty much missed my chance to see the exhibition, but wow, knitted superhero costumes!

Pictoplasma‘s archive is a way to see a whole lot of examples of what it is that makes a cartoonish character.

There was a fairly shifty guy in the library today asking what companies in the US manufactured certain chemicals, and asked that I help him find a company that made, oh just for example, hydrochloric acid. As an upstanding patriotic American, I feel I must arm non-shifty types with the same information. (Don’t you wish other patriotic [or at least patriotism-claimants] felt the same way about information?)

OPD Search
Chem Channels

and just because I like them, I’ll add IMEX– Mister Shifto was not interested after I got him one listing. Bah.

Yes, the shiny gadgets are quite nice, but I especially like the writing on Gizmodo. Extra points for Zombie Thoreau.

I’m not totally sure I understand how to read these lovely burr-like maps, but they sure are entrancing.

Yesterknits is a pretty neat repository of old knitting patterns, but darn it, as a thrifter, I just can’t see paying $5-10 for reproductions of single patterns when I could spend years of my life trying to track down the original booklet! OK, maybe I should just cough up, but not yet.