This microwave popper is simplicity itself: 1/2 cup of corn, a little oil (or not), and a little time in the microwave yields a healthy, low-cost, low-cal snack you can eat right out of the popper's bowl. Unlike other microwaveable poppers or Tupperware containers, the Nordic Ware's top cover has nifty ridges that facilitate comfortable removal after popping (i.e. when everything is very, very hot). If you don't remove the cover immediately, the popcorn gets too moist. I've tried a variety of devices on my long march to the perfect popper... table-top poppers often made a mess (and big noise) and they're not machine-washable. Some microwave poppers require pads that deteriorate with use and need to be replaced, but are difficult to find. The stove top method, I just could never fully master: burned pans, burned corn, mess to clean. Lastly, those convenient microwavable bags of popcorn: if you eat a lot popcorn, you'll be spending exorbitant sums and -- depending on which brand you purchase -- consuming chemical additives. The Nordic popper does not require oil, if you so chose, so the end-product is essentially the same as an air popper. The Nordic can go in the dishwasher -- or just be wiped clean. Plus, the Nordic is perhaps the least expensive one out there. I paid less than $10 for mine. As of late, we've been producing popcorn five nights a week.

-- Daniel Wilson

Nordic Ware Microwave Corn Popper
$8
Available from Amazon

Manufactured by Nordic Ware

This small unit measures the effects of breathing on the parasympathetic system in order to help you feel calm and relaxed. My doctor actually prescribed it for me. The results are subtle but pretty amazing. My major successes have been trying to get to sleep at night. I fire up the small playing-card-pack-size box, which runs on two AAA batteries. Then I insert my finger into the trap door on the top left and begin working to control my breathing pattern. If you haven't used it in a while, it coaxes you to reset date and time. Then it begins with a straight line.... and you begin to breath. What the manual recommends is that you breath in through the nose and then exhale from your mouth. What's different from some other meditation and yoga methods is the StressEraser doesn't want you to count on the inhale, but just to breathe in as deeply as you can. On the exhale you should do it slowly with a count to three, four, or five. The idea is to create a curving graph of regularity that can be worth 1 or 3 points on the device. A meditation session can total as many points as you want. Usually I shoot for 30. It takes a while to get into the rhythm of deeply breathing in and then slowly breathing out with a pause at each end point. It takes me about 15 - 20 minutes to get into the pattern and then complete the breathing session. When I finish, I don't feel much different. But when I climb into bed I find it amazingly easy to fall and stay asleep. It's not cheap, but I paid $200 for a returned model at Sharper Image. My friend gave one to her father, who uses it after watching the evening news. She says it's worked well form him, too.

-- George Brett

StressEraser
$250
Available from Amazon

Manufactured by Helicor, Inc.

This two-color LED light is geared toward us aircraft owners and pilots, but it's also popular with hunters or anyone else working at night or in conditions where they need to preserve night vision. It has 26 LEDs -- 20 are bright white and six are a less-obtrusive red. The push button switch alternates between the colors. I use mine when I'm preflighting the aircraft and also during flights if I need something more powerful than the existing interior lighting inside the plane. I also know some law enforcement people who use them in vehicles at night. The light is sold by the big aviation supply houses like Aircraft Spruce, but also on Amazon. It's very inexpensive, especially considering how effective it is.

-- Robert Cullinan

Pilot's Flashlight
$18
Available from Amazon

I've made four kinds of alcohol stoves: the previously-reviewed Pepsi Can Stove, the Turbo Cat II, the Peyo Revolution, and the Super Cat. Of the four stoves I built and tested with a stopwatch (in my 60-degree garage), the Super Cat boiled water the fastest. While one of the others took as long as seven minutes to boil 500ml of water, the Super Cat did it in roughly 4 minutes and 30 seconds, and required no fuel re-fills to do so. Your use may vary, but regardless, the Super Cat called for the least number of materials and tools to make. A lot of tin can stoves require assembly with JB Weld, as well as cutting apart cans with scissors and X-Acto blades, which can lead to getting cut on sharp aluminum. To make the Super Cat, all you need to do is open the can (cat food, hence the name), dump the contents, and drill or punch holes in the prescribed pattern. Since it's just a simple dish of fuel that you light in the middle, the stove does not require a primer dish to pre-heat the stove, nor does it require a pot stand. The stove is actually designed to have the pot sit on top. Without the pot on top, it burns much less efficiently; it needs it there to force the fire out the side holes. In the field -- once on a summer mountaineering trip and twice camping -- it's held up and functioned great. It definitely seems more crush-proof than the other stoves. The only disadvantage: I had to throw out the cat food because I don't have a cat!

-- Steve Schmitt

Super Cat Alcohol Stove

Related items previously reviewed on Cool Tools:

Sierra Stove

Wall Tent Stoves

JetBoil

I am an architect and have been working with programs like Photoshop for years, but Spoonflower really opened up a new world for me: fabric design. It's a service that let's you upload an image to a web site and the company prints the design as a pattern on 100% cotton fabric. Their customer service is great, and I think the fabric is reasonably-priced: it costs $18/yard, not counting shipping, and an individual 8x8-inch swatch is $5. The site is still in beta, so I had to request an invite to use Spoonflower, but a week after contacting them I was experimenting with patterns and ordering fabric.

So far, I've placed three orders with three different designs (3x3 yards worth) at $ 66 per order, shipping included. The trickiest part was preparing the image file so the pattern matches up. I used the "define pattern" command in Photoshop to test my image files before I uploaded them. I defined the image size (150 dpi), set colors to LAB color space and saved the files in TIF format. After I uploaded them to the Spoonflower site, they were automatically tiled to fill the desired fabric size. Then I specified the shipping address, paid using my credit card and that's it! The turnaround was reasonably quick: my fabric arrived in a month (I live in Switzerland). I made a skirt with the fabric from my first order -- a present for my Mom (pic below).

A couple caveats: I have noticed some distortion after washing the fabric and there was a little color shifting from my original designs. Still, the color shifting and fabric distortion really are minor. Overall, I'm happy with the color accuracy and I've been very satisfied with my orders. I have been having a lot of fun with Spoonflower and will likely place my fourth order very soon. I am even considering setting up an Etsy shop to sell some of my fabrics.

-- Isabella Kuntz

Spoonflower

Beta invitation request

Skirt:

Pattern:

NOTE: definitely check out this blogger's enlightening side-by-side close-ups of fabric printed from her artwork. One of her conclusions: "strong graphic lines turn out better than images with subtle shading." Also, check the Spoonflower pool on flickr for more fabric samples, including this skirt. --sl

Related items previously reviewed on Cool Tools:

World Textiles

Books on Demand

Brother Sewing Machine

I have been considering buying a kitchen scale for quite a while, but was often underwhelmed with what was out there. Unlike a garden-variety kitchen scale, which typically weighs up to only four pounds, the Ultraship can handle up to 55 pounds. It reads in ounces, pounds, grams or kilos, so it's perfect for the kitchen, but can also be used for shipping packages and mail. Heck, you could even weigh a small child on it. Also, it features a just plain brilliant design:i f you are weighing a really big monster package that blocks the display, you can detach it! The entire face of the unit can be unclipped and pulled away from the scale with a 5-foot-long extension cord.

When I compared the Ultraship to a laboratory-grade scale used at my company, this one went gram for gram with the lab scale. Within the 0-2 pound range, it is actually accurate to essentially 0.035 ounces as opposed to the 0.1 ounces in the specification. If you take baking seriously, this is the only way to go. I fish quite a bit, so it's nice to be able to weight those 30-pound striped bass. From 2-55 pounds, the scale is accurate to within 0.5 ounces. While my initial motivation was for the kitchen, I have also been using it for boxes and packages.

-- Aram Salzman

Ultraship Digital Shipping Postal Kitchen Scale
$35
Available from Amazon

Manufactured by My Weigh

Russell is a hundred-some-odd-year-old shoemaker I've been ordering from for the past 15 years. In addition to the quality of the workmanship and materials, you get the simple, timeless pleasure of a hand-crafted, made-to-order shoe/boot. Options include any number of various soles, hides (including supplying your own!), styles, insulation, toe cap, steel shank, and other custom options. For me, the Vibram sole was perfect. But others might be after oil resistance, traction, silence, longer life, etc. For instance, I'm not a hunter, but for those that are, Russell also has snakeproof boots and options for preventing thorns/cactus. That ability to customize your sole/leather/style per application is great.

There's a downloadable instruction form for sending in your measurements, which they keep on record for a decade. I am very flat-footed and they were able to accommodate the necessary additional space for orthotics. Not that unusual, but I recommended Russell to a friend with extraordinarily narrow feet (especially for how long they are). They were able to create his size no problem; and he's since ordered a half dozen different pairs over the years. One other thing I'd add is they do repair work as well, so you won't need to toss them as they get really old -- and you get the added bonus of having someone who knows the shoe doing the work. I have both the Cavalier boot and the Buckle Chukka. They're not cheap, but the Cavalier boots I mainly wear now I've had for at least 10 years, and the pair has only gotten better with age.

-- Wrye Martin

Russell Moccasin Footwear
$360 (cavalier)
Available from Russell Moccasin

The Remington Shortcut is a clipper designed for self-administered haircuts. A curved clipper head makes it almost impossible to over-cut small or large regions, and the clipper's unconventional hairbrush-like shape makes it easy to reach the most awkward spots on your head. Before getting the Shortcut, I'd tried cutting my own hair several times and always had disasters. On my first attempt with the Shortcut, I got about the same results I'm used to from a pro, which rather astounded me. It seems almost impossible to mess up. Using the Shortcut takes me five to ten minutes, which I usually fit in just before showering for obvious reasons. The cutter can be set from "skinhead" to "George Clooney" and you can easily mix lengths on the sides and top for effect. Once you get used to five minute haircuts on-demand they're rather addictive. Going to the barber for a typical male haircut now seems as silly -- and time wasting -- as traveling across town for a shave. Every time I use the Shortcut I save about $20 and at least an hour and a half of my time -- a good return on my initial investment.

-- Jonathan Coupe

Remington Shortcut
$35
Available from Amazon

Manufactured by Remington

Downhill skating is like surfing; carving back and forth on long downhills. Note: you guys who skated as kids and have quit. The technology is way advanced these days. Decks, trucks, wheels, designs. It's a different skating world. If you've ever skated, you've got the motor skills (due to "muscle memory"), and you'll be surprised at how much fun you can have skating downhill with today's boards. Here are three unique skateboards meant for downhill, as opposed to acrobatic street and ramp skating.

-- Lloyd Kahn

Loaded Carving Systems

This is my board of choice, after maybe 20 boards. The decks are made of 1/2 cm strips of vertically laminated bamboo (with the grain running truck to truck,) sandwiched between layers of fiberglass. The decks are convex (from end to end) and you can pump to accelerate, gaining speed from the flex of the deck and rebound from the truck bushings and wheels. They produce a graceful and flowing ride. I've got a Dervish model with Orangatang wheels. Check out the film clips on their website.

Dervish complete board w/wheels
$315
Available from Loaded Boards

Carveboard

This is a whole other animal. Surfers love them. They're heavy, have adjustable air pneumatic tires, and the deck tilts off springs so you can carve insanely tight angles. I use one with tires deflated to about 10 lbs. pressure to be able to skate a steep local hill that I can't handle on any other board.

43" Carveboard
$450
Available from Carve USA

Landyachtz Evo 2008

From British Columbia, land of heavy-duty mountain bike riders and downhill skaters, come these downhill racing boards. The drop-down decks give you a lower center of gravity and great stability at high speeds. Being closer to the ground makes it easier for skaters to get a padded glove on the ground for sliding (to slow down).

Evo 2008 w/Gumball wheels
$240
Available from Landyachtz

Safety Gear

1) Loaded sliding gloves -- best ones available. When you fall face down, these save the skin on the palm of your hand. They are also used for sliding.

2) TSG Force 2 knee pads. Top of the line; you can put these on over long pants.

NOTE: top image via the Northern California Downhill Skateboarding Association --sl

Mushrooms as solution. Fungi as ninja warriors. That's what this spirited, hyperkinetic book offers. Mushrooms as solutions to pollution (mycological remediation), fungi as a soil supplements for vegetables (companion planting), and as a source of human medical nutrition (harvested from inoculated logs, sawdust, cardboard) -- in other words, mushrooms to save the world. It's sort of crazy, far fetched ... but not. There's a lot of original ideas in this thickly illustrated book, with some fantastic visions, but all of it surrounded by deep strands of very practical how-to advice. How to grow fungi in your yard, or in toxic waste dumps, or anywhere. The author claims that the running mycelium of mushrooms were the first internet, and after you see what fungi can really do, you'll believe him. This book is about how to employ fungi to get things done. Mushrooms as overlooked tools.

-- KK

Mycelium Running
Paul Stamets
2005, 339 pages
$24
Available from Amazon

Sample excerpts:

Some of the mushrooms reached mammoth sizes, a testimonial to the nutrition they found in the petrochemicals.

Mycoremediation of Chemical Contaminants: Mushrooms as Molecular Disassemblers
With mycoremediation, brownfields can be reborn as greenfields, turning valueless or even liability-laden wastelands into valuable real estate. Remediation with living organisms addresses several expensive issues. Foremost, bioremediation and mycoremediation eliminate the expense incurred in removing thousands of tons of tainted soil to a remote toxic waste storage site. Current policy prescribes burning, hauling, and/or burying toxic waste. These steps leave a lifeless environment that is ecologically crippled or inert.

*

Spores in Oils
Spores can be immersed in canola, corn, or safflower oil, which can be used as a lubricant for chain saws or other cutting equipment. As trees, brush, or plants are cut, the spore-infused oil distributes spores to the newly cut surfaces, an efficient method of transfer. Another advantage of using oils is that they help the spores stick to the surfaces upon contact and have less chance of being washed or blown away.

One of these spored oils was made especially for Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters and contains hundreds of millions of spores of Psilocybe azurescens. See also figure 77, showing a mycelial colony emanating from point of contact with spored oil.

*

Growing Mushrooms on Stumps
Stumps and their root systems can be massive, often weighing hundreds of pounds. Once stumps are inoculated, colonization can occur for years before mushrooms form. Once fruiting.begins, mushrooms can sprout for prolonged periods, sometimes decades, before the stump totally decomposes. Growing mushrooms in wood chips or on logs is far faster. But this apparent disadvantage of using stumps to grow mushrooms also foretells of its advantage: mushroom fruiting can persist on a stump for many years longer than on wood chips and logs. I have seen a stump produce woodlovers, for instance, every October for more than 10 years. Stumps that are interspersed amongst overshadowing stands of trees have the best chance of success.

*

Oysters (Pleurotus ostreatus) and honey mushrooms (Armillaria mellea species) fruiting from the same stump. Such events suggest that oyster mushrooms, which are saprophytes, can be good competitors against honey mushrooms, which have a dual nature, first parasitic, killing trees, and then saprophytic, growing upon their dead tissue.

My wife has been asking me to build a firewood rack for years. I was planning to construct something from square steel tubing, which would require a lot of cutting and welding. A friend recommended Stack-It Brackets, which allow you to quickly assemble and locate 2x4s in three directions without using any additional hardware. I'm sorry I didn't find these years ago, as we've been stacking wood badly for quite some time. They're inexpensive, work as advertised, and allow for quick and easy variations in the size of the rack.

I picked up a set of four steel brackets and in less than 30 minutes, I had an 8x3-foot firewood rack. Most of the time is spent in cutting the 2x4s into whatever lengths you want. After that, you just install the pieces. NOTE: the brackets will not hold true 2x4s. The rectangular hole in the bracket that determines the dimensions of the lumber giving the rack it's length is 1.61" x 3.61". With that piece of wood in place, the space for the vertical piece is 1.63"-1.72" x 3.63". The space available for the piece determining the width is 1.65 x 3.69". I used dimensional lumber measuring 1.5' x 3.5" with both of my racks.

The brackets are drilled to allow the used of screws for added rigidity, if one chooses. The first rack I made, I used some decking screws to attach the 2x4s to the brackets, because I thought it needed to be rigid. The second rack I assembled to hold kindling is made without using any hardware other than the brackets, and it is working just fine (below). Without using hardware, increasing or decreasing the capacity of the rack means just swapping in different lengths of 2x4. I'm actually a bit bummed about using the screws on the first rack (below), as I want to add taller verticals to increase it's capacity, but will have to wait until the rack is almost empty to move it to get to the screws on the backside.

According to the box, the brackets can also be used to construct a workbench, storage rack, plant stand, or shelving. I've seen a similar bracket product online, but they're made from ABS plastic rather than steel. With a bit of wood preservative, my racks should last for years.

-- Kurt Jensen

Stack-It Brackets
$13
Available from Amazon

Manufactured by Seymour Manufacturing

Most colds are transmitted through hand-to-nose contact; alcohol-based hand sanitizing gels and sprays reduce the potency of most viruses within seconds, and so provide a good defense -- as long as you keep some handy.

This is the first sanitizer I've found that's not only fits easily in my small purse -- or clips to a pocket -- but is also refillable. The top unscrews, and you can refill it with 70% rubbing alcohol (use ethyl alcohol; less stinky and not as drying as isopropyl). Sprays are more useful than gels, as they can also be used on questionable restroom fixtures, for example. I've seen 1 or 2 ounce spray bottles, but those are usually about 1 1/4 inch wide. This one is the size of a slender highlighter, slightly thicker than a standard pen (at its widest, the barrel is 5/8 inches—not counting the clip—and 5 inches long). It fits easily, even in my inky-dinky overfilled purse, and when I have a cell phone or PDA in my pocket along with the bottle, things don't get uncomfortably bulgy. I'm a pharmacist, exposed to every cold virus that comes down the pike, and I haven't had a cold in a year. Dunno if it's the spray or dumb luck, but I used to get them pretty regularly before I developed the habit of spraying my hands after any exposure to a suspiciously sniffly customer.

-- Barbara Dace

Persani Instant Hand Sanitizing Spray
$2
Available from Drugstore.com

Manufactured by Persani

"The Tool" is a minimalist stainless steel multi-tool intended for surfers. It has an Allen wrench, Phillips and standard screwdrivers, wax comb and a leash hook. I asked a friend who works in a surf shop in Venice, CA if he'd heard of it. Turns out he uses it almost daily... -- sl

Since I started working in the shop about four months ago, I've been using The Tool fairly regularly, mostly to tighten or install fins with the flathead screwdriver and the Allen wrench. The little hook, prong tool is solid for jamming the string used to attach a leash to a board through a surfboard's leash plug.Though the Phillips rarely gets used in surf-related application, it's still handy to have for random, non-surfing needs.To buy all these tools separately, I guess you'd spend about 30 bucks, maybe less, so it's not a huge savings. But you have to factor in the convenience of the one-stop tool shop. That has value, to me, especially on the go, in the car, and on the beach. They're not flying off the shelves at our shop, but we have had several customers specifically request them and a few folks have been impressed after seeing them in action. I rarely use wax combs, but even if I did, I actually would hesitate to use this one, get it covered in wax, then throw it back in my pocket or bag. Once you get wax all over it, next comes sand, pet hair, you name it. Then again, carrying the Tool you'll always have a comb handy. In dire straits, you could use it and deal with the sticky aftermath.

-- Rob Kieswetter

The Tool
$20 (w/shipping)
Available from Cor Surf

Or $30 from Amazon (w/shipping)

Manufactured by Cor Surf

The price per-pixel of flat-screen computer display continues to drop. At the same time the per-pixel price difference between different size models of large screens currently being sold has gotten very small.

Currently there's no longer a big monetary reason to buy two smaller monitors instead of one big one. That's what I did recently. I got a huge 30" Apple Cinema Display and it changed how I worked. I ended up buying a used one on eBay for $1500. I've seen Dell's 30" monitor for sale on eBay for $1000 or less.

I've upgraded displays before but this upgrade to a Cinema screen gave me the biggest proportional step up in size. It was several weeks before I wasn't awe-struck when I walked into my home office. What I hadn't thought to prepare myself for was how much it changed my work habits.

The first thing I noticed was that the number of times I printed out hard copies of documents went down. Before, I would print copies of diagrams, specifications, and other reference material so that I could easily refer to them while working. Now I have space on the screen to have these visible. I wouldn't say I've made it all the way to the "paperless office," but it's gotten a lot closer.

Within a few days of using a large screen I began to experience a much more significant effect, though: when more of the things I needed to look at were already in view, the amount of time spent on visual context switches went down. Having more documents in view not only reduces the time consumed by the switch, but also the "recovery time" needed to remember what I was doing. A related time savings is that when a document I may need to switch to is visible, it takes less time to realize that I need it.

The display fills a lot more of my visual field - so much, in fact, that it took me a week or so to get used to how far away the left and right edges of the screen were. In the end, I found that this made it a little easier to concentrate (since my attention was less often directed toward wherever I'd been keeping the notes that wouldn't fit on the screen).

I found that once I got used to the idea that most things could be expanded to a size that required no window scrolling, I began to "think big" about a lot of things: my spreadsheets got bigger, my diagrams got bigger - and more unexpectedly: the size of the kind of thing I thought I could handle got bigger; and because I was much less often having to chop things into smaller pieces so that they could fit, things got simpler.

The 30" Apple Cinema Display puts out a lot of light. The biggest difference this makes for me is that even with sun streaming in the window, the display is still bright enough to see clearly; I am no longer tempted to close the blinds. At night, I often turn it down to a dimmer setting to match the subdued lighting of the rest of the house.

I'm recommending a 30" inch display to lots of people. I wish I'd bought one sooner!

-- Stephen Malinowski

30" Cinema Display
$1200 - Dell
Available from Dell

$1710 - Apple
Available from Amazon

Packing material is part of a vicious cycle. No matter how much holiday shopping and shipping my household does, the supply of bubble wrap and Styrofoam peanuts stashed in our garage just keeps replenishing. Hate to throw it away, but can't toss it in the recycle bin either. ExpandOS, on the other hand, are 100% recyclable. Essentially small cardboard pyramids -- made from 30% recyclable paper -- the shapes are engineered to fit together to create a stable environment for whatever's being shipped. As the picture above shows, each pyramid has ridges along its edges and holes in the face of each side, allowing a box of these suckers to lock together into a lattice-like structure.

ExpandOS are intended for commercial use, but I'm posting this in the hope that more businesses will give it a shot.

They way it works is you a purchase large flat sheets of specially-cut cardboard (made from 30% recycled paper). Each sheet gets fed into a special machine that separates and crimps small strips and spits them out in their folded, triangular form. You lease an "Expander" machine (pictured below, note: there are various size units). The machine is free to use if you order four or more pallets of sheets per month. If you order less than two pallets per month, you pay $300 for the machine. One pallet = $1800 = 16,660 sheets. Depending on the size of an order, the cost supposedly breaks down to about $1.50 - $1.80/cubic foot.

I discovered ExpandOS when my wife ordered a piece of pottery from Heath Ceramics in Sausalito. When I emailed Heath, a rep for the company told me they've been using ExpandOS for a year with a very low breakage rate. They say they've eliminated all peanuts, bubble wrap, foam inserts and pillows, and that they're budget for packing materials is roughly the same as it was before (if not reduced). Better yet, their packing time has dropped "dramatically." When they ship multiple items in one package, all they do is place a cardboard sheet between items in a stack, tape them together and surround them with ExpandOS.

-- Steven Leckart

ExpandOS

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