December 5th, 2007
For Latchkey Kids Who Always Want To Watch Their TV, Even If They're A Thousand Miles Away From It
Slingbox ($130 for non-HD, $180 for HD, $230 for up to four video sources, including HD)
So it's Super Bowl Sunday and you're stuck in London, where football is played with a round ball and nobody cares about the Green Bay Packers. (Or if you're a Londoner, replace "Super Bowl" with "European Cup," "round" with "oblong" and "Green Bay Packers" with "Manchester United.") No one's broadcasting the game, but if you have your laptop, a high-speed Internet connection, and your trusty Slingbox hooked up, you can watch it live from your hotel room thousands of miles from home. Or maybe catch up on that Women's Murder Club episode that's waiting in your DVR. Or terrorize/annoy your family by controlling the television like some remote-hogging ghost. The Slingbox picks up the signal from cable, satellite, or DVR systems and pumps it through the Internet via steaming video. Though the image quality can vary widely, depending on signal strength, it's a neat trick for the traveling armchair commando.
For People With Squishy Or Slimy Coffee Tables
Nicktoons! coffee-table book ($40)
In theory, coffee-table books are meant to provide stimulating entertainment for perusers, provoke stimulating conversations over aperitifs, or maybe just make the owners look like smart people who really like oversized black-and-white photography collections. In practice, this particular coffee-table book will mostly prompt people to poke it. An oversized reference guide to Nickelodeon cartoons, packed with hugely blown-up quotes about the shows but mostly concentrating on big, bright art, Nicktoons! comes encased in a dual-layer plastic slipcover with squooshy green gel between the layers, like the oil stickers of the '80s. Poke the cover, and the gel gooshes around. Hours of fun for the whole family. They should package the next couple of John Grisham books like this, too.
For People Who've Become Bored With Everyday, Routine Pooping
Toilet aquarium ($300)
Toilet monster ($18)
Everybody has to use the bathroom sometime, right? In fact, most people have to use it daily. So why not liven up the process with some fairly random crap (no pun intended) designed to make toilets more interesting? The Fish 'N Flush kit turns a toilet flush tank into an actual aquarium. (The fish aren't included, but the two fake plants are.) Now your pet fish can watch you pee, just as they've no doubt always secretly wanted to. Those with less ambitious budgets but just as much secret love for eliminatory voyeurism can instead buy a plastic collapsible Toilet Monster, which is designed to pop open when the toilet seat is lifted, thereby scaring the shit out of people. (Pun actually intended this time.)
For Those Who Always Wanted To Put A Raw Beefsteak On Their Black Eye Like People Do In Cartoons But Didn't Want To Waste The Meat
Bacon strips adhesive bandages ($5)
Patterned Band-Aids, off-brand and otherwise, are nothing new. But how about patterned Band-Aids that look like meat? These kind of greasy-looking adhesive bandages, available via a variety of novelty online retailers, make getting hurt fun! Just watch out for people trying to lick your wounds for you. Or push your damaged limbs into a hot frying pan. Or chop you up with some tasty eggs and scallions. Wait, maybe these are a bad idea after all.
For Mega-Geeks, Super-Geeks, And Just Plain Old Normal Geeks
Wi-fi Detector Shirt ($30)
T-qualizer T-shirt ($40)
Ambient Forecasting Umbrella ($100)
Ah, nerditry, and the amazing wonders it brings us. First it was electricity, then cell phones, and now battery-operated apparel that gathers useful information for us. Thinkgeek.com's wi-fi detector T-shirt is particularly amazing: It checks for area wi-fi signals and lights up a little expanding animated signal icon to indicate area signal strength. The site's "T-qualizer" shirt isn't really an equalizer—it doesn't actually moderate and balance the ambient sound around you, it just detects and displays it in a similar light-up animated signal. The Ambient Forecasting Umbrella, meanwhile, acquires daily weather forecasts via wireless, lights up to indicate rain or snow on the way, and flashes its light faster when the chance of rain is particularly high. In essence, it sits around quietly until you need it, then tries to attract your attention to let you know it's necessary. Your kids aren't that smart. And can a Thinkgeek shirt that displays your GPS position at all times be far behind? We hope not.
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