Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Weird Inventions (2 page)
Read Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Weird Inventions Online
Authors: Bathroom Readers’ Institute
BETTER LIVING THROUGH LAWN MOWING
WEIRD
SCIENCE!
T
hey say that everything that could possibly be invented has already been invented. After all, we’ve got flat-screen TVs that hang on the wall, cars that run on electricity, phones that hold our entire music collections, and, most impressively, Hot Pockets. But it’s not true—there’s always more labor to be saved or human problems to solve which will inspire some enterprising amateur Edison out there to slave over a pile of wires and molded plastic in the basement to make a gadget that forever changes the way we live.
And then there’s this stuff. Welcome to
Uncle John’s Weird Inventions
. The honest-to-goodness real, and really weird, gizmos in this book are all things you never knew needed to exist…because they probably don’t.
In
Weird Inventions
, you’ll read about:
• Machines to wash your dog, and translate its barks
• Spray-on WiFi and skin-in-a-can
• The device that makes artificial egg yolks, then perfectly slices them.
And lots more goofy gadgets, silly science, and crazy contraptions. It’s patently absurd!
—Uncle John and the Bathroom Readers’ Institute
BREATH-TO-ENERGY CONVERSION MASK
T
rying to live your life in an environmentally-friendly fashion? Good for you, but…well, if you
really
loved your planet, you’d be doing something to help it 24/7.
Sound impossible? No, just unfeasible. Still, you’ll be making major headway if you wear the Breath Charging AIRE Mask. Just slip this thing over your face, and if you can get past the fact that it makes you look like Bane from
The Dark Knight Rises
, you’ll be pleased to discover that the mere act of breathing in and out activates wee wind turbines within the mask. The end result: You’re creating energy that, with the appropriate attachment, can be used to charge your iPod, your iPhone…pretty much iAnything.
The AIRE mask is the brainchild of Brazilian inventor Joao Paulo Lammoglia, who trumpeted his creation in an interview with the
Daily Mail
, crowing, “It can be used indoors or outdoors, while you’re sleeping, walking, running, or even reading a book.” Lammoglia also added that “its energy is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” which—what a coincidence!—is exactly how often you should be helping out the planet anyway.
INSTANT DRUNKENNESS-REVERSING PILLS
I
magine being able to get rip-roaring drunk, raise hell for a few hours, and then pop a few pills and sober up quicker than you can say, “I’ll be glad to walk on that line, officer!” Nothing bad could possibly come of that, right?
Well we’re soon going to find out, because scientists appear to have unlocked the key to countering the intoxicating effects of alcohol: enzymes. A team of researchers led by Yunfeng Lu, a UCLA professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, and Cheng Ji, a professor of biochemical and molecular biology at USC, has devised a way to package enzymes inside a nanoscale polymer shell. In non-egghead speak, they found a way to put chemicals inside your body that can change what your body does. Anyway, they tested these tiny capsules on drunk mice and found that the enzymes caused their blood alcohol levels to drop quickly and significantly.
Professor Lu stated that down the road he can envision an alcohol prophylactic or an antidote that could be taken orally. The impact of this is obvious: Without an alcohol buzz, we now have zero reasons to drink domestic beer.
T
he concept of the head massager—a series of thin, rubber-tipped metal “fingers” that bend to fit over one’s skull and massage the surrounding area in the process—has been successfully mass-produced to the tune of being available for less than a buck. Those who wish to avoid being labeled a cheapskate may wish to upgrade to a device that is far costlier and much more elaborate, if not necessarily more effective.
Patented in 1992, the so-called “Insomnia Helmet” is lined with a series of rubber “fingers” attached to a belt which, courtesy of a small electric motor, repeatedly rotate within the helmet, soothingly massaging the head of its wearer in front-to-back fashion so that they can sleep better. The inventor’s pitch for the apparatus cited the importance of head massage in civilizations both human and inhuman, referencing “the baboons who spend much time grooming one another’s heads to remove insects and dirt.”
Since he also noted how “the related act of head patting indicates approval or affection to children and adults both,” here’s hoping that someone at the U.S. Patent Office rewarded him with a few good pats for his efforts.
T
he American junk-food consumer can always rest assured that his tasty treats have been product-tested down to the last detail in focus groups, in grocery-store trials, and, of course, in the laboratory kitchen, the birthplace of so many delicious goodies that are abominations against nature. There, our brightest culinary minds examine every factor that will determine a snack’s market potential. Flavor is key, but there’s also texture, aftertaste, dunk-ability, and the all-important “behavior in the mouth.” Is the cracker crispy enough? Precisely how much chewing is required per bite of this soft-baked cookie? Could that new chip be somehow louder?
Clearly, snack-food impresarios spare no expense to please our palates. Yet every field of endeavor eventually bumps up against budgetary limitations, and at some point, these geniuses realized that details like crunch-testing become rather expensive when performed by actual human crunchers. So somebody devised an artificial chewing head specifically for testing snack-food crispiness. It offered a high-tech replication of mastication, complete with a built-in microphone for picking up the full spectrum of crunch noises. So nosh with confidence. Because if that chip was snacktastic enough for an animatronic head, it’s snacktacular enough for you.
W
e all know that leaves turn sunlight into energy through the process of photosynthesis, or so we’ve been told. In an effort to one-up nature, a team of scientists at MIT has invented an artificial leaf that works just like the real thing, only better. The science is fascinating; when placed in water and exposed to sunlight, the leaf splits the H2O molecule into its component parts of oxygen and hydrogen, producing clean, renewable fuel. (It also makes real leaves look like a bunch of freeloading jerks.)
It sounds, and is, weird, but theoretically, one artificial leaf placed in a bucket of water could provide enough energy to meet the daily electrical needs of an average home. The inventor, Daniel Nocera, has humanitarian goals in mind: Impoverished families in third-world countries could greatly increase their standard of living if they could essentially make free energy out of rainwater.
Unfortunately, development of the leaf is at a standstill due to the expense of the specialized silicon required to make it. There are cheaper ways to make energy, so Nocera’s project has run out of investors. And because the leaf is a wonderful concept that could reduce pollution and improve innumerable lives, the governments of the world probably aren’t going to devote precious tax dollars to help make it a reality.
H
umanity has long struggled to invent a device that wards off the sun’s harsh glare in a way that is easily portable. Well, not really—a parasol (which means “for the sun” in French) does the trick, as does an umbrella. Or a large-brimmed hat. Or a shelter of some sort.
But if you’re the kind of person who still proudly uses a parasol when cavorting in the park or down the promenade, then you’re probably also the kind of person who is so dainty that they tire of holding an object as light as a parasol upward for more than a few minutes.
The Floating Shade (patented in 1991) solves your problem. It’s a wide, helium-filled balloon made of extra-thick, virtually unpoppable rubber that floats directly over you and your immediate personal space. It’s tethered to your body with an elaborate series of ropes that strap on under your shoulders, resembling a parachute harness. It leaves both hands free to carry objects, read a book, talk on the phone, or use a walking stick. There’s also an extra-large, “family-size” model for shading a group of people and their vicinity, so long as they walk very close together.
E
veryone has a favorite home remedy for the hiccups: quickly downing a glass of water, holding your breath for a full minute, or repeatedly blowing into a paper bag, or loudly popping that same paper bag to scare the bejeezus out of the sufferer, for example. For one inventor, though, none of these old-wives’-tale cures was nearly good enough. Perhaps he objected because they don’t actually attack the root cause of hiccups, which is an involuntary spasm of the diaphragm, resulting in a breath that’s interrupted by the involuntary closing of the glottis. Or maybe it was because those old cures didn’t involve electricity.
So he invented a cup-like appliance fitted with electrodes that make contact with the user’s mouth and temple. When the user fills the cup with water and places it over his mouth to drink, the water’s movement creates an electric charge that runs through the electrodes and stimulates a pair of nerves that help regulate the diaphragm. If it works, voilà! No more hiccups. And if it doesn’t, perhaps the very concept of the device—a combination of low-grade waterboarding and electrocution—will scare the heck out of you and cure your hiccups anyway.
M
eat your future. In 2012 scientists at Maastricht University in the Netherlands managed to grow a small strip of hamburger in a lab. They even fried it up and ate it. Their research was a major step toward creating synthetic meat and even burger patties that can be made in three-dimensional bio-printers.
These 3-D printers are nothing new (one appeared in the 2001 film
Jurassic Park III
). As of 2013, however, they’re only capable of creating inedible objects like the conceptual models used by architects. They can’t make you something to eat, unless your idea of a tasty snack is a miniature strip mall or a plastic condominium tower.
