A question for you. Why would someone wear a shirt for a 100 days straight?
There are several answers of course. You really like that shirt, it’s a harbinger of good luck, you’re really broke, you’re…umm…trying to win some sort of bet, and of course many others.
Whatever your reason may be though, it is ultimately irrelevant as of course even the sturdiest of shirts need to be dried, ironed, and generally maintained in order to preserve their quality, meaning that the shirt of a 100 straight wears is in fact just a pipe dream.
There is one upstart designer, though, by the name of Wool&Prince that insists that isn’t true. What’s more is that they aren’t relying on some space age material or microchip to accomplish it either, but are rather using a simple wool blend to craft a shirt that can be worn for a 100 days straight, without generating a single wrinkle, or producing one bad odor. Also, unlike your typical wool sweater, the material is apparently very high quality and actually comfortable to wear.
While the 100 day wear spree may be a gimmick, it is one that proves the more interesting point that this is a durable shirt that can survive conditions both common and extraordinary and come out the other side in fresh from the dryer quality, with no more upkeep required than the occasional wash. While certain individuals like the business man on the go benefit most from this shirt then, it’s hard to imagine there isn’t a guy who wouldn’t like to have that one favorite shirt that just happens to be near invincible.
Of course the point is that you won’t have to imagine any longer. The makers of the shirt Wool&Prince have already earned $300,000+ of their asking $30,000 goal, meaning it’s just a matter of time until you can own a shirt that’s Clark Kent sensible on the outside, and Superman durable within.
There’s a compulsive activity I do almost everytime I leave somewhere, where I pat my front pockets for my keys, wallet, and phone, and don’t proceed until all three are accounted for. It’s a common impulse used to make sure your most necessary items are on you, but is far from infallible. For instance, sometimes you are running especially late, or are just hammered drunk, and don’t remember to take the usual precautions.
There’s been a variety of tracking devices over the years that help you keep tabs of your valuables in situations like that, but I’ve never considered one until the SmartWallit.
The SmartWallit is a small device that you slide into your wallet, and link to your phone via Bluetooth and an app. From there, if you leave your phone behind, the device in your wallet will beep as a notification. Similarly, if you snag your phone, but forget the wallet, the phone will beep, and even provide an approximate proximity to the wallet. While there is a keychain option for the device to keep the “band together” so to speak, there’s no way for it to notify you you’ve left them all, because, as in all things, at a certain point, you’re just screwed.
The SmartWallit isn’t just a high tech game of marco polo between the necessities, though, as there are additional app features. The most intriguing of which has to be the one that reads sensors from the device to know when you opened your wallet last to make a payment, and keeps a loose record of it that will show you the time and exact location it was used, meaning you’ll never forget where that twenty went to again. You can even import more advanced financial features to keep closer tabs on your active spending habits.
Looking for just under $7,000 to finish its Kickstarter campaign, the SmartWallit isn’t the first of its kind, but is among the least invasive, and most versatile, of the tracking devices I’ve seen yet. Plus you can never really have enough gadgets that help you never have to know the horror of replacing the contents of your wallet.
Despite the better efforts of one Happy Gilmore, and the ambitious sex life of Tiger Woods, golf remains in the eyes of many a proper sport, where tradition and pomp rule the day. Much like the Shire, change comes slow to golf, if it comes at all, and for the most part, the faithful of the sport prefer it that way.
In other words, it isn’t the type of place you would necessarily expect to see a hovercraft.
But if PGA golfer Bubba Watson has a say in it, that may become a reality in country clubs across the country. He is lending his name to a new golf cart prototype from Oakley called Bubba’s Hover that functions just like a traditional hovercraft (if there is such a thing), meaning it can easily traverse over grass, through wooded areas, and, of course, over water.
While the golf cart that works on water aspect is the money shot of this vehicle, and could open up entirely new ways to navigate a course, you may be shocked to learn that this idea is actually somewhat practical. This is due in large part to it’s lesser impact on the condition of a course, thereby ensuring the integrity of the playing surface without being limited to the cart path to do so.
Of course at the end of the day practicality and function come in second to the sheer amount of fun this thing could be.. Faster, more mobile, and infinitely cooler than the regular golf cart, Bubba’s Hover has the potential to cause overwhelming joy to everyone who uses it, or views it in action.
Which is why we’ll probably never see these go into production on a larger scale. Besides probably being more expensive to make, and slightly more dangerous to use, it’s just hard to picture the average country club swarming with these. Plus this was mostly intended as a marketing ploy.
That’s a damn shame too as it deprives people yet another chance to whistle the James Bond theme in real world context.
One of my favorite of the ’90s prime time sitcoms will always be “Home Improvement.”
In retrospect, this is most likely because it introduced most of the world to Pamela Anderson and Debbie Dunning (more than you can say for even “The Wire”), but it also had some memorable gags, a host of hilarious characters, and some truly standout episodes, including the infamous introduction of the man’s kitchen.
The first in a string of episodes where a common room is redesigned and “man-ified,” the man’s kitchen took the misogynist idea that the kitchen is only for women and presented one that was instead an almost cartoonish playground for the average man.
While absurd, with the gadget explosion that has occurred since, there are now enough devices available to truly craft a man’s kitchen. Some of these accessories are absurd and lavish, while others are common and accessible. But when combined, they create the ultimate real life man’s kitchen.
Grand Palais 180 Stove
Let’s start with the impossible shall we?
Your oven/stovetop is going to be the most important part of any kitchen, and if you really want something that will show off that idea, you need the king of all home ovens. Resembling a train car more than a stove, the Grand Palais wouldn’t be out of place in the home of an old world ruler or even steampunk baron. With its built in gas and electric ovens, as well as a variety of different stovetop grill and burner options, it also happens to work perfectly as the centerpiece of the man’s kitchen.
Sure they run around the $46,000 range depending on enhancements , but dammit we can do this thing cheap, or we can do it right.
Hot Dog Toaster
Of course it’s not all ovens worthy of the 1%, as some parts of the man’s kitchen are just down to earth essentials.
Since nothing is more essential than the need for a hotdog, instead of wasting your time with the stovetop or microwave methods, why not make the perfectly cooked hot dog and bun, as easy as you make a piece of toast? It’s possible with the pop-up hot dog toaster, which cooks hot dogs of your chosen consistency in mere minutes with the ease of the average toaster. It’s even got compartments enough for two hot dogs and buns and the design goes well with that $46,000 oven.
It’s the eternal question man has asked since the dawn of the caveman.
How can I use more fire doing this?
In the kitchen, the answer is simple thanks to the standard crème brule torch. Ideally used to brown that famous tricky desert, considering it’s nothing more than a small scale blow torch, feel free to use it to make anything where direct heat is required (like melting cheese over nachos) twice as bad ass, and ten times as manly.
Bartenders are truly some of the greatest people a man can know.
They listen to your problems, always know at least one good joke, will help you scope the girls (and provide useful information on the regulars), and most importantly, disperse sweet lady alcohol in a variety of creative and enticing concoctions.
The one downside? They are usually relegated to just the bar.
Party Robotics is looking to change that by bringing the drink dispensing skills of a bartender to your home through robotics. Their idea is called the Bartendro (because that’s exactly what a robot bartender should be called), and it lets you put a series of tubes into the liquor or mixer bottles of your choice, and then use your tablet or smartphone to send a Wi-Fi drink order to the machine based on the available liquids.
The “how” of the device is complex, but the why should be immediately evident. Coming in designs of 3, 7, or 15 (!) dispensers (a somewhat superfluous single shot model is also available), Bartendro is designed to make the perfectly mixed cocktail at any time, everytime. It’s ideally useful for social gatherings, though honestly once you’ve invested in a cocktail making robot, every day is a party.
Invest early on the device through Kickstarter, and for a full unit it will run you $699 for the 3 tube model, $1,299 for the 7 tube, while $2,499 gets you the 15 tube behemoth in all of its glory.
Bartendro may not be designed to tell jokes and listen to your troubles (yet…) but even at the heavy asking prices, is an incredible representation of the glorious and golden age of alcoholic technological possibilities we live in.
