Archive for September, 2009
Well, yours for a night, anyhow. You and seven other people, that is. But in all seriousness, imagine having full access to this architectural icon without all of the hubbub of hundreds of tourists around you! We love the idea of having a quiet and intimate evening in this amazing example of organic architecture…
In my weekly profiles of various Sleeper Sofa models, the One Night Stand sofa from Blu Dot is repeatedly listed in the comments as a favorite of readers. The design is simple, modern and the transition process is easy and intuitive — and it flips!
The iPhone and iPod touch make for a convenient quick-look reference tool when you’re using recipes you don’t have a hard copy of. With the arrival of Dropbox for iPhone, those portable screens become really convenient kitchen tools.
You could, of course, always get at recipes searched out on web sites or emailed to you from your iPhone or iPod touch, but that requires a few clicks, and ignores the recipes you may already have stashed on your desktop or laptop computer. If you install Dropbox on your main computer and include your recipes in your synced files—whether by dropping a copy in your "My Dropbox" folder or using a symbolic link to sync any folder—you'll have a copy of all those recipes in your Dropbox app, and it's fairly easy to drop more in.
More convenient than just access, though, are the features Dropbox has built-in for cataloging and organizing. The app can read PDFs, Word documents, and HTML files natively, without having to launch another app. Your “recipes” folder gets organized in alphabetical order, and you can quickly mark down your culinary successes with a star for quick access later. Want to share a recipe with a dinner guest who especially loved it? Email it right from Dropbox, and they’ll get your copy of it, not a link they’ll have a hard time searching for later.
My wife maintains a fairly rich collection of recipes grabbed from all sorts of places in a desktop folder, so this is just an observation I made while hooking it up to Dropbox last night. If you’ve got another recommendation for how to make an iPod touch or iPhone into a great kitchen assistant, drop it in the comments.
Android: When you’re asleep, at an event, or otherwise indisposed, you don’t need your battery-draining data connection, but you might still want to take phone calls. Free Android app APNDroid can selectively turn off your data access while allowing calls.
The app’s design is a clever one, as activating APNdroid from its app button simply activates the on/off switch for GPRS, EDGE, and 3G networks, allowing you to use the APNDdroid icon as a kind of widget on your Android screens. You obviously won’t be able to surf the web or sync Google services while your data services are off, or send MMS messages. You will, however, have basic phone functionality, and your battery will probably live a bit longer without having to keep a data antenna powered at all times. If you need a quick fix but want to keep cellular data services off, you can still switch on Wi-Fi to sync or send an important message.
If they could only make a plug-in so data could be turned on and off by the Locale app, we’d be living in the age of total Android control.
APNdroid is a free download for Android phones only. Be sure to note the developer’s warning: If you’re going to uninstall APNdroid, do it while your data services are on, or else the fake/non-existent Access Point Name the app uses to kill data will stick, and you’ll have to manually switch it back.
A few months back, we highlighted a few tips to take better nighttime pictures. Now photography weblog Digital Photography School is chiming in with six more ways to score better night shots, including how to breathe properly when snapping away.
Photo by John Krantz.
In low light situations, a steady hand can make all the difference between a crisp shot and a blurred mess. According to the post, it’s best not to hold your breath during the shot. Instead:
Breathe normal and steady, don’t hold your breath. I read some place that sharp shooters are trained to squeeze the trigger while exhaling as the body tends to relax during that portion of the breathing cycle. I’ve found this to be mostly true and it does help with longer shutter speeds.
It’s also helpful to keep your finger on the shutter release when taking a shot, as attempting to remove it will “likely cause minor shakes.” Browse the post for the other night photo tips. If, on the other hand, you’re snapping away on your cellphone, take a look at our top 10 ways to get more from your cameraphone.
Update: Reader qldingo offers a bit more specific advice on the breathing techniques of sharpshooters:
The mantra for sharpshooting is “breathe, relax, aim, squeeze.” In other words, breathe in, and as you relax your body and exhale bring your sights up on to target. You should come to your target just as your breath runs out, and slowly and steadily “squeeze the trigger” in this case I’d lightly depress the shutter release.
Losing weight may help obese people as well as their partners sleep better by easing sleep apnea symptoms.
Randy Lee Arnold, co-owner and co-founder of Le Palais Gourmet tea emporium in Beverly Hills, has sold his newly built minimalist home in the Sunset Strip area for $3.8 million.
He designed and built the modern-style house of three bedrooms and 3 1/2 bathrooms from the ground up over a four-year period. The 4,000-square-foot home has a two-story entry, cantilevered roof lines, an open floor plan and walls of glass revealing city-to-mountain views.
Arnold, whose tea shop has become been a popular haunt with Hollywood stars since opening in 2003, said he took on the house “as creative therapy; realizing a vision inspired by Pierre Koenig and the vintage modern homes forever captured by architectural master photographer Julius Shulman.”
His goal was to build a home that epitomized the relaxed indoor-outdoor California lifestyle.
Now that he has accomplished his dream, he said he is ready for his next project, although it won’t necessarily be a home.
There are more photos at latimes.com.
– Lauren Beale
Thoughts? Comments?
Photo: A wrap-around pool was built into the home’s foundation. Bennett Carr with Sotheby’s International Realty, Beverly Hills, had the listing. Susan Dishell-Abbott of Prudential California Realty’s Brentwood office represented the buyer. Credit: William McCollum
Construction on what would become the world’s longest marine causeway, connecting Qatar and Bahrain, is due to begin next year, and what a project it is: We’re talking about a bridge more than 13 miles long, costing around $3 billion.
Somewhat adorably named the Qatar-Bahrain Friendship Causeway, this massive bridge is expected to take around 4.5 years to complete and cost somewhere between $2.3 and $3 billion, but should be a great help for travel between Qatar and Bahrain. The trip currently takes more than four hours and will be reduced to 30 minutes on the bridge, and those in charge expect 10,000 to 20,000 vehicles per day to use it.
For a sense of scale, here’s a chart that compares the bridge to other very large things. Of course, I need a scale chart to tell how big a blue whale is, which sort of defeats the purpose of measuring this bridge in blue whales, but still: This is one large bridge. [Mena Infrastructure via Reddit]
This is a weird one: Google has just slapped Cyanogen, maker of the biggest and most successful Android ROM mod around, with a cease-and-desist letter. But Google’s reasoning doesn’t make any sense, and we’re wondering what their game is.
See, Google’s cease-and-desist specifically states that Cyanogen should stop passing around Google’s closed-source apps like Google Maps, Google Talk and Gmail, because those are only supposed to be used on Google Experience Android devices like the G1 and MyTouch 3G. That makes sense, except for one thing: Cyanogen only works on the exact devices those closed-source apps were designed for, like, well, the G1 and MyTouch 3G. So what’s the point of trying to stop Cyanogen?
Engadget suggests that maybe Google just wants to discourage rooting of their devices in general, which seems awfully contrary to the Android open-source philosophy. Truth is, we have no idea why Google would want to stop a thriving and well-received modder, but Cyanogen says he’s trying to open up some communication with the big G, so hopefully we’ll get an explanation soon. [Android and Me via Engadget]
Ask and you shall receive! Earlier this week we wrote about the Survey of Modern Homes in New Canaan, CT and waxed poetic about how nice it would be to see the interiors. Then designer Lauren Fister sent over these lovely images of the newly finished kitchen in Celanese House by Edward Durell Stone (1959)…
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