Grammar Nazi's Triumph

Kettleman's Bagels has had a couple of unfortunate connections to stories in the media. There was the time that I caught them with taxi hands, and more recently, some of their product was recalled due to insufficient labeling. Of course, I still go there, because the bagels taste good.

But the thing that gets me most about Kettleman's is the motley signage. Lots of notes are scribbled in permanent marker on white paper, taped to various surfaces. And they all have apostrophes galore where they don't belong.

They renovated their store this past fall, and redesigned their garbage bin to have a hole for recycling. A nice new container, with modern stylings.

Then they slapped this onto it:

"Recycle only / glass + can's please."

Now, I'm easily perturbed by such miscarriages of punctuation as this. I also like a good challenge. The easy thing to do (aside from ignoring it) would be to scratch out the apostrophe, but that would just draw more attention to it and make it look uglier. It'd be sufficiently passive-aggresive, but clumsy. Also, not much of a challenge.

I could also point out the typo to a staffperson, but nobody likes to feel patronized by being called out that way. (The store has a few signs where apostrophes were clearly added after the fact, so getting them to make a new handwritten sign would likely have little long-term effect). Generally with this type of thing you want to give the offender an 'out' so they learn what their error was while still saving face, pretending that they knew all along how it was supposed to be.

I figured if I was going to fix this, I was going to fix it completely. No leaving the Kettleman's sign-scribblers to solving it halfway. I am a perfectionist, when I have the patience to see something through.

My solution? I made this sign, with Kettleman's trademark red and yellow colours (mimicking the arched text of the word "BAGEL" on their outdoor sign). As an added flourish, I used the whitespace for a not-so-subtle plea for an end to apostrophe abuse:

This isn't just a piece of paper, it's a big sticker. You see, when I took the picture of the sign in the first picture, what I was really after was the hole, using the pop can for scale. From there I could tell how big a curve I needed for a sign to fit neatly in.

I've got a little device designed for cutting circles in paper (functionally equivalent to a compass with an X-Acto knife at the end), with which I scored the arced bottom edge of the sticker, and I used a straight edge and knife to score the sides.

As for delivery, again, subtlety and minimalism is the rule of the day.

Sure I could go there, tear off the taped sign and stick this thing on, but there are enough staff in the store that I'd probably get some questions. And the whole point of this exercise is to avoid directly confronting them about their bad grammar and terrible sense of signage style.

So I did what any psychology-conscious trickster would do: I brought in a newspaper, read it during my visit, and left it there. Underneath the newspaper on the counter was the sign. Odds are, I gambled, that a staff person would be the one to put the newspaper away, and would see the sign.

I told a few people about this plan, with various responses. One person was particularly incredulous that the plan would succeed, and suggested I should have just put the sticker on myself. But the next time I visited, lo and behold:

Now that's satisfying. The best part, aside from the perfect size and design, is that the plan involves the intervention of the target. That's the key to any successful practical joke. The requirement for conscious thought on the part of the mark changes things from a mere object to a message.

And try to imagine what would be going through someone's mind: somebody, somewhere, went to the trouble of making this very specific sign for this very specific purpose, and just left it here. Who would have done that? What was their motivation? On its own, it's such an innocent sign that you can't deduce any reasoning from it.

Unless they thought that some other manager had left it there, I'd like to believe that after a certain amount of head-scratching they gave up, shrugged, and thought to themselves, God thinks it's Friday.

The only kink in the plan--a very minor one--was that the offending sign had already been replaced with another paper-and-marker sign, sans erroneous mark of possession. Obviously someone had gotten the message through to them, making my little "stop abusing apostrophes" message redundant. In the interests of minimalism, I pulled that part of the sticker off, leaving just the "Recycling" sign. This left it with even less context, adding to the psychological aspect.

This isn't the first time I pulled this kind of thing. One of these days I'll tell you about the prank I pulled at Bridgehead.

Oh, and I should give a shout-out to Rob Cockerham of Cockeyed.com, who does a lot of this kind of stuff (like the McDonald's drive-thru menu prank and the TGI Friday's Menu Prank).

Also, a shout-out to Elmaks (RIP), whose swap boxes helped me realize that anything we can touch, we have the power to change.

- RG>

Beat the heat with RG's Purple Slush Drink

It's possible that you don't live in Ottawa, or you're reading this in December, or you're one of those people who goes from their air-conditioned house to their air-conditioned garage to their air-conditioned car to their air-conditioned office garage to their air-conditioned office (in which case, that's real weak). Otherwise, you'll likely know that it's fucking hot outside, like 37 degrees not counting the humidex.

During the previous heat wave, I had run out of my soft drink of choice, and either it was too late or hot or I was too lazy to go to Bridgehead for my favourite slush-based drink. It occurred to me that I had purple stuff mix of a certain vintage, allowing me to make the next best thing.

Here's what you need:

• Drink Mix (can be Gatorade powder or sugary drink mix or try out something else--on a per-drink basis the stuff is dirt cheap)
• Blender
• Mason Jar, or County Fair Drinking Jar (with screw top)--I've seen them at Canadian Tire
• Ice
• straw (at least 0.5cm diameter; not pictured)

The amount of ice I used in this sample was not enough. It should come loosely to the shoulder of the jar, or about 3/4 full. Too much and there's no room for it to blend; too little and the drink is too watery.

Add the Purple Stuff mix (2 heaping tablespoons tingles my sweet tooth just right, though you might want less)

Add water to the shoulder of the jar. Again, this is a bit too low. You might want to put the water in first to make sure the mix doesn't stick to the bottom.

Unscrew the bottom of the blender jug and reattach it to the jar. This makes for one less thing to have to clean afterwards. Don't tighten it too much! If you do, it is a bitch to unscrew it. The rubber seal works well.

Put the jar with the blender attachment on the blender. Yes, it feels weird turning a container full of drink upside down. Get over it.

Once again, this doesn't have nearly enough inside to blend properly. Here's one I did during the last heat wave that blended much better:

I had to add more water to this one, which made for a poor ice-to-water ratio. This shouldn't have layers like this; it should be more homogeneous.

Either way, it's an iced drink, and if you used Gatorade powder, it has electrolytes too. Pop a straw in and drink! Drink it without a straw at your own risk!

So there you go. It's easy, cheap, and fast.

Unless, I guess, you don't have a blender or a compatible jar or glass. In that case, you'll probably have to buy air conditioning, which is probably not easy, cheap, or fast.

- RG>

RG's Workshop: RG's Laptop Box

Last year, I bought a new laptop after the audio jack was irreparably damaged on my previous one from being bumped around in my bike panniers too much. (The one before that got a broken screen from the same thing)

Since I didn't want yet another laptop to start breaking up on me, I'd known before I even bought my current laptop that I wanted to build a box for it. So within days of receiving my laptop, I built myself a box, custom-sized for my brand new laptop:

I'd spent the previous few weeks keeping an eye out in trash piles for just the right type of particle board to use. I didn't want it to be too thick, but I wanted it to be strong enough to sit on. You see, the benches at Bridgehead are a couple too inches to comfortably use for typing or writing, and I'd wanted to build myself a laptop box to serve this alternate purpose. Knowing I'd be buying a new laptop soon, with different dimensions, I had to wait until I'd bought (and received) the new one. The old laptop was already busted, so why bother trying to protect it with a box?

I didn't take any photos of the initial construction, but it was almost entirely used materials, including these antique hinges from a cabinet door somebody was throwing out. The side pieces were cut from IKEA Lade bed boards (featured in the 90-minute glove rack) sliced down the middle. While attractive, functional, and perfectly sized, the hinges were a bit loose, especially since they were going in the end of the particle board. I glued the screws in to keep them tight:

The finish on the board I'd chosen had some water damage in some places and was peeling, but there was enough undamaged wood to use for the box.

This was a feature, not a bug, as I was able to use it to veneer the ends of the side boards.

The box was quite oversized for my panniers, threatening to rip them open, but inspiring further creativity in its repair (my 15" screen was a size or two too big with the box wrapped around it).

To economize on space, I cut a notch out of one of the side boards for the laptop's protruding battery case to slim down the box's profile. I also, unfortunately, had to angle the top ends of the side boards, cutting off the DIY veneer in the process. You'll also notice a little metal plug next to this notch (the kind used for adjustable shelving units), which keeps the top aligned and thus solves the loose hing e problem.

In addition to a laptop protective box and a booster seat, the box serves many other purposes. It provides a hard flat surface to rest your drink when lounging on a couch, a writing surface, and, shown here, a laptop lifter to bring the screen to a more comfortable viewing height when, say, watching videos of the masturbating Santa Claus:

A few months later, I calculated that a well-placed 1/2" hole...

...lets me plug in the laptop to charge it while still in its box.

It's the laptop box!

Want your own? Want the plans? Too bad. Figure it out and make your own fucking box!

- RG>

Technology *is* great (when it works)

I'll part from my usual rants about what essential gadget of mine is broken to write about what happens when gadgets do work.

Every now and then, I get a little reminder that I do live in the future, and sometimes I take it for granted.

Like Star Trek for example, just because it's an easy one.

In Star Trek (from TNG onwards, for the sticklers), you had a little communicator that you could tap, say the name of who you wanted to talk to, and then talk to them. We have that now. Many smartphones, when you press and hold the button on your hands-free headset, will automatically recognize your voice and match it to the name of someone in your address book, and call them. My previous non-smart phone even had a similar option, where I could record up to ten or twenty names to associate with people in my contacts.

In Star Trek, there were doors that open automatically for you. Okay, that's old hat. Supermarkets have had those for a long time.

But they also had fancy ways of turning on lights. Like by yelling "lights!" when you walk into a room. I don't even have to do that. In my office, if I walk into the hallway, a sensor will detect my movement and automatically turn on all the lights in the hall. If I walk into the washroom or kitchenette, I get the same thing, except all the lights were off. I no longer have to remember to turn the light off when I leave a room, and I'm almost at the point where I've overcome the instinct to think about turning the lights on when I enter them. Meanwhile, the building owners save money on electricity.

Those are the ones that I notice most, but laptops and tablet computers also have their Star Trek equivalents. Skype allows video conversations, and YouTube and the internet let people record their own daily log, blog, and vlog. (Qaplog!)

And while it's not quite the same as a replicator, when I walk into Bridgehead, the servers know that what I want is a Tea, Earl Grey, Hot.

- RG>

Notice previously given

Back in November, I pointed out some street art popping up on streetposts around town called Take Notice. Coyote noticed them too.

Turns out it's an art project by Paul Roorda, which is currently on display at City Hall. Not the first time I've seen former street art on display in an gallery (though it looks like this one was only put out on the street in order to later go into a gallery. Not sure if the street art scene likes that)

There are a couple other of Roorda's projects (of similar format) on display also.

Coyote doesn't include text in his blog, so I don't think he'll scoop me on this update!

Take Notice is on display at City Hall until April 3, 2011. It's open daily from 9am-5pm. No admission; just walk right in!

[Cool visual illusion: if you scroll up and down so that the second photo goes past the bottom of the page, and stare past your screen, it looks like the little squares are zooming in and out or moving. Or something. It did for me.]

- RG>

Another swap box at Elgin Bridgehead, another repair by RG

[Edit: added photo of hook to close swap box at end.]

Heading out from Bridgehead last night, I was thrilled to find a new one of el maks' trademark Swap Boxes on the post which formerly held this box, which helped save a life. Here 'tis:

Unfortunately, on opening it, I found it to be very empty. There was about $0.13 in change, and a gambling chip I had just put in (I always have a trinket with me In Case Of Swap Box*). While the box was large, it was shallow, making it hard for anything to stay inside. I took this photo with a ruler so I could fashion something of the right size help hold things in. I was thinking along the lines of a panel of clear plastic packaging stapled across the front.

(*title for your next book, Maks?)

Getting home, I looked at my inventory of paraphernalia and found a Ferrero Rocher box my dad gave me at Christmas (a tradition. I was very disappointed the year he gave me Toblerone instead of Ferrero Rocher for Christmas, though I would have accepted Toblerone and Ferrero Rocher). The box was exactly the right width, it just needed to be opened on one end. Here it is trimmed, taped on the sharp cut edge, with some of the cutting tools I employed to try to cut it to the right size. (The laziest, easiest way I found was scoring it with a knife and/or glass-cutting tool, then clipping it with wire clippers carefully. It will not be a clean cut on the discard side).

I had also pre-drilled some holes in the plastic for small screws to hold it in, making sure not to put the holes too close to the edge, lest my hand and the mini-screwdriver not fit in the gap. I then installed it in situ tonight, first marking the holes, then pre-screwing the screws to make the holes, undoing them, then putting them back in with the plastic piece in place. Worked like a charm (and I only measured once!). El Maks approves! See comments.

Then I populated the box with some new stuff I had brought, "swapping" out the gambling chip I had put in the night before (it had been so long since I'd seen a swap box, I had gotten used to this thing in my pocket) and most of the useless goddamn pennies. The extra benefit of this Ferrero Rocher box is that there is a bevelled edge, making it easier to pull things out of the box.

Unfortunately, maks painted the wooden box over its smooth finish, and the paint is chipping off in the cold. Nothing we can do about that.

Also, because of the way the box is attached to the post, the door doesn't close very well.

I fashioned a simple hook out of a piece of wire just now and will install it next time I'm down there, so that the box's contents will be protected from the elements. [Edit: done. See below.]

I'm grateful to Maks for making (and installing?) the box. It's been so long since we've had one in Centretown since he moved to Montreal. It's up to us to make sure it's well used and well kept!

- RG>

Take Notice: there's a new street artist in town

I saw these two "Take Notice" installations on street poles around Elgin and MacLaren yesterday:

Looks like Coyote has seen them, too. One is his picture of the day today.

Looks like Ottawa has a new street artist in the neighbourhood (or at least a new campaign by an old hand). I'm not sure if the images have a specific message, or if "take notice" is simply an instruction to the people who are so tuned out that they don't see these creative invaders as they walk or drive down the street.

Either way, I think it's a good message.

- RG>

The next HUGE internet fad...

As regular followers of my blog know, I can sometimes write out rather long, drawn out posts. I sure as hell don't want to start twittering.

In a Slashdot conversation on the horrors of redirects and URL shorteners (like TinyURL and bit.ly), someone posted a link to HugeURL.

This, I think, is just what this blog needs. No more having to remember a difficult address like "http://realgrouchy.blogspot.com".

From now on, all you have to do to get to this blog is enter this link into your browser:

http://www.hugeurl.com/?MTU0MThlZmMyZmEwYmVhYTNhMmM0ODEwNjdm
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BRPT0= (all one word)

You're welcome.

- RG>

Someone went ahead...

It seems anonymous comments aren't just for blogs anymore.

Last night, amidst a gruelling week of boring and stressful meetings and e-mail battles, I was feeling quite tired and dispirited.

When I left the meeting, I was thrilled to see this note left on my bicycle handlebar clipboard:

It totally made my day!

Thanks, random person. You're cool too!

- RG>

RealGrouchy's Workshop: Bicycle Handlebar Clipboard

When you spend a lot of time on your bike, there are some good reasons to have a clipboard on your handlebars. Holding a map, a shopping list, or directions to your destination. Taking notes when you're hit by inspiration. Or by cars.

I've thankfully never been in a serious bicycle collision, thanks to my attentiveness. I've had a few very close calls, all while I was obeying the letter of the law. You often have only a few seconds to write things down before you forget or lose sight of the license plate number, plus a description of the car's make, model, approximate age, colour, driver skin colour, age, gender, hair, etc. While I've always got a pen and paper on me, by the time I pull over and fish them out, I sometimes forget if the license plate was AXYZ 132 or AXZY 123.

The other day, I was on the phone with 3-1-1 reporting a street light that I had seen burned out earlier, but I could only remember that it was at number 283; I couldn't remember which street! With a clipboard, I'd have been able to jot it down without having to interrupt my ride for more than a few seconds.

I used to have this clipboard on my handlebars. The board was from the bottom part of a standard clipboard, and the low-profile clip was salvaged from some age-old binder that had otherwise fallen apart. I had cut two horizontal slots and threaded a metal hose clamp through them and around my handlebars, but as you can see, that wasn't sturdy enough.

I still have the rest of the original clipboard in my workshop's junk pile, but I didn't want to use it on account of the large clip. I also didn't want to replace its perfectly good (although large) clip with this smaller one, because that would be a waste.

I decided instead to figure out a new way to mount the old board to my handlebars.

This little wooden thing was in a box of miscellaneous bits someone was throwing out a couple years ago. It contained some odd things; tracks for a keyboard tray (which recently found a new home with a friend in need thereof), feet for a coat stand, and this...thing. Maybe it was for holding eggs?

Anyway, the holes in it are the same diameter as the middle area of my handlebars. The only part of my handlebars not yet occupied.

The plan was to cut off the outermost holes and make little clamps out of them. To do so, I had to drill holes large enough for the only bolts I had in my workshop that were long enough. This took a few passes with successively larger bits, as it was dense hardwood. To ensure proper alignment of the bolts, I drilled the holes before slicing apart the 'clamps'. I also had to mitre a couple centimetres off the end of one side so they'd have the same depth.

The back part of the wooden thing helped align the saw for the inside cuts, and the remaining four inside holes could still theoretically be used again, should I ever find another use for them.

Here are the bits for one 'clamp' after cutting, before sanding the edges. The rounded edge is actually a bit offset, which later helped in matching the pieces for each clamp pair.

Here's a dry test on the handlebars. It seemed there was a bit of a gap between the pieces from where the saw cut, but the diameter was definitely a match. I discovered that I hadn't cut the bolt holes exactly parallel, which meant the bottom piece needed a bit of finagling to attach.

Thinking that the wood would slip on the handlebar, I figured the universal rubber spacer--used inner tube--would be suitable. This just made the gap between the two halves even wider, and I didn't have thick enough washers to fill the gap with, so I abandoned the innertube spacer idea.

I discovered that I had cut the hole in the smaller side a bit too close to the opening. This caused the washer to rub against the handlebar and keep the clamp from clamping. Using the file pictured above at right, I shaved off an edge from the washer.

Turns out I'd only need per clamp set to get the spacing right, and the wood on its own ended up being plenty tight on its own without a rubber gasket. Having proved the concept, I then made the second clamp.

The next step was to cut holes in the clipboard to mount it onto the clamps. Notice that I put the thicker side on top, so that the clipboard would clear the stem bolt. Since the bolts placement was entirely freehand, I needed a way to transfer their pattern to the bottom of the board. I suppose I could have traced over it with a piece of paper and then flipped the paper over onto the board.

But what I ended up doing, and coincidentally what worked, was I used a flipchart marker to colour the heads of the bolts, then pressed the board against the heads of the bolts to transfer the locations. If you use this method, I suggest using something with more body, like white out, to transfer the pattern of the entire bolt head.

I started by drilling small holes where I guessed that the green markings told me to drill, then put some small screws through these holes. I put this up against the heads of the mounting bolts to confirm the alignment. This method would allow me to adjust if necessary when widening the holes to their full size.

And here we are with the clipboard mounted. I had to turn my light mount upside down, which in turn conflicted with the cables coming out of my brake/shifter levers, so I had to adjust those too.

Oh, and the gaping hole and big fat bolt heads are a bit of a problem too, but I'm sure I can overcome that, maybe by using a cardboard backboard with holes for the bolt heads, resulting in a relatively flat surface. In the meantime, I've got some cardboard facial tissue box covers as note pages, which are thick enough to provide their own flatness. An elastic band keeps them from flapping in the wind.

I guess the lesson here is, anybody can make a clipboard for your handlebars, so long as you have some miscellaneous clipboard bits, some serendipitous scraps of wood with holes the right diameter, and some bolts.

- RG>

[Continuity postscript: I posted about the clipboard when I initially created it back in 2004, before it broke]

Interesting video on motivation and "flow"

XUP (and others, I'm sure) was wondering in a comment to a previous post how I could possibly forget to eat meals.

This TEDtalk presentation by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi* explains it well, and presents other paradigms to help me understand other things about myself. Specifically, he describes the state of ecstasy (being outside your normal functioning) around 9 minutes in, and talks about "flow"** (a.k.a. '[being in] the zone') further on, which is an extension of this. Around 15 minutes, he shows a really neat graph*** to describe one's state given variable skill and challenge when faced with a given task (or lack thereof).

It's a bit longwinded, but it gives lots of food for thought:

Unfortunately for me, I tend to experience "flow" right around the last hour or two of my work day. Sometimes I'll work late to take advantage of it, or I'll stay at the office after work to tackle some non-work project (thank goodness for internet access at work! That doesn't block Google and other stuff****!)

Similarly, when I plan to spend a weekend doing an hours-long project, I usually have the most energy to begin it around 11pm on the Sunday.

* I copy-pasted it; I haven't tried pronouncing it yet.
** No, I'm not talking about the monthly kind.
*** Fans of graphs should enjoy the webcomic Indexed
**** No, by "other stuff" I don't mean porn, thank you.

- RG>

Scrimshaws discovered near Percy

David Scrimshaw posted today a photo of a street art installation he saw on Gladstone just West of Percy. It was a little rectangle of painted canvas tacked to a street post, sporting the words "Looking Good!"

He said he saw this back in October and had been meaning to post the photo of it. Which he did.

I also happened upon some similar works, likely by the same artist, in late November. And since David Scrimshaw was the first to discover and describe one of these things, I'm hereby defining a Scrimshaw to refer to "a guerrilla inspirational street art installation". And in keeping with my recent trend of ripping off blog ideas from David Scrimshaw's blog, I'd might as well post photos of the Scrimshaws I found.

This one is on Gladstone, just East of Percy--kitty-corner from the one David posted. It has a mirror on it (in which I've cleverly reflected a building that matches the background (hmm... the 'background' in this case is really closer than the image in the mirrors (hmm... lots of brackets here...))). The slogan on this one is "Today is potentially awesome!"Potentially, yes, but it wasn't particularly so for me.

This other one is also nearby, this time on Percy itself, but further down, at Powell in the Glebe. It also has mirrors and a positive message.

Being a grouch, I'm not a big fan of unnecessarily positive messages, but this one--"You're looking Sharp Today"--is a pun, which balances it out. The sharp shards of mirror also help.

Whoever the artist is, first I apologize for not bothering to so much as do a simple google search to see if you've identified yourself somewhere. And second, keep up the good work dressing up the neighbourhood, but please apply a tone of dressing down in your future works.

Another street artist (or conceivably the same one) put something up on Elgin Street this past weekend, but unfortunately by the time I got to see it, it had already been vandalized. It looks like it had been in the style of El Maks' Tell Me A Story journals (Maks, were you in town? Was this you?)

All this has reminded me that I've wanted to make a swap box for quite some time, though it isn't exactly a priority for me. Maybe I'll make a few Scrimshaws instead, as I hear there's a big market for them overseas.

- RG>