3D Printing

Printed in color, as one piece. Amazing!
(source)

Lately I've been hearing a lot about 3D printing, and it has me all kinds of excited. You can make models of pretty much anything--I've seen cups, crazy gear systems, a working crescent wrench printed as one piece, and lots and lots of heads. People love printing their heads.

In fact, Disney recently invited some annual passholders with little girls between ages three and sixteen to get 3D photos taken of their faces in order to make customized princess figurines. And they didn't invite me. That's just so cold. I mean, obviously I need a figurine of my face on Ariel's body.

Clearly that's the best use of this technology--creating dolls for narcissists. I'm getting a doll with my face on it, and that's just all there is to it.

The best place I've found for this so far is Clone Factory in Akihabara. Unfortunately, I was there a year and a half ago, before I knew I needed a doll with my face, and I don't think Poncho's going to be willing to make the trek back to Japan any time soon.

I just... I just really need a 3D printer. Life can be so hard sometimes. Woe.

With This Purple Cover, I Thee Wed

When I was a young teenager I read a lot. I mean a lot. I'm an introvert so I would be totally content to sit in my room and finish two R.L. Stine books on a Saturday. As I got older I read less and socialized more, but lately I've re-kindled my love of reading.

Now I spend a lot of my time reading again. Poncho usually gets in bed around 20:00 and I'll crawl in with him because he smells good, but I often stay up reading until 2:00.

Holding a book open while laying down got irritating. My pinky was getting tired. So I started reading ebooks on my laptop, but that made my eyes hurt.

So, with my birthday fast approaching, I begged and pleaded and whined for a Barnes & Noble Nook. Well, my birthday was last Sunday, and lo:

 I'm so spoiled.

I admit I was against the idea for awhile. What bookworm doesn't love actual books? Yes, the smell of them, the sound of turning a page, the way they sit on your shelf like a trophy once your done with them... Bookworms love owning physical copies of the books they've conquered.

After about the fifth time packing them up and moving them to a new place you get over that.

Now I have all of my favorite books with me everywhere I go! Yes, I got digital copies of my favorites, even though I've read them all as many as five times. It's comforting to have them with me though. Yes, I'm like that.

Crispy.

I shopped around before settling on the Nook, of course. If I'm going to beg for it I'd better be sure I'm begging for something awesome. It has it's flaws, sure, but I've found that they're mostly software flaws, which could potentially be fixed by a simple software update. B&N has already fixed a couple of flaws.

Allow me to break it down simply:

Things About the Nook that are Awesome:

1. The "E Ink" screen. No glare and easy on the eyes. (more on E Ink)
2. You can turn the page either by clicking the big buttons, or by flicking your finger on the touch screen.
3. Speaking of the touch screen: the touch screen. All the menus can be navigated easily by touch, and it has pretty colors.
4. Expandable memory was a deal-breaker for me. A must-have.
5. The music player. Add an extra 2GB of memory and fill it with music to listen to while I read? Yes, please.
6. It can read ePub, PDB, and PDF formats.
7. Customizing the wallpaper and screensaver with my own JPGs is fun!
8. The battery life is, like... long. The battery is also replaceable, so if I bork it I can just get a new battery instead of a new Nook.
9. I named it Maynard.

 Things About the Nook that are Not so Awesome:

1. There is no proper image viewer. This means I can't put a manga on it in JPG format and read it; I have to convert it to a PDF first. (More on that another day.)
2. There is not yet a "go to page" function. I can go to chapter or title page or search for a word, but I can't just "go to page number." When I first loaded it up I was on page 308 of my current book. Finding that page sucked. I assume they will add this feature soon. Update: They added it.
3. When the touch screen is functioning as a keyboard, they have the "clear" and "cancel" buttons right freaking there. I can't imagine how a person with fat fingers would function when faced with such a dilemma.

I guess some people consider the lack of Internet browser to be a flaw, as those who purchased a Kindle are all "Neener-neener I'm checking my email!" I prefer it this way though. I know myself, and I know if my book has Internet I will get too distracted. I already get all my emails, tweets, and Facebook updates sent to my phone, I don't need them all up in my book. Though the super geeks have already found ways to add their own browsers and such to it anyways. Update: It has a browser now. And chess and sudoku. And the pages turn faster.

Overall, I love it and I'm going to marry it. With all the free ebooks you can get, it's a fairly economical choice, I think.

Read more about the Nook on Wikipedia.