Nylon
On the last day last month - we passed the 70 year mark (or birthday if you will) of nylon. So give it up for DuPont (who have passed 200 themselves!)- for that one at least. And no, it wasn't all about pantyhose... the first industrial use was a bit more everyday; the toothbrush. Nothing like a soft bristle to clean away all the excesses of modern living?
Speaking of blast from the past; Hasbro has relaunched the Millennium Falcon - or the plastic model of it anyway, for a mere $60 you can swing the turret and hide action figures (not included.... but i'm sure you have some in the basement from last time round) in the smugglers bay. With Star Wars KOTOR II: Sith Lords just out for PC and the last/third (????????) movie just around the corner, it looks like a new spring for the Force. Be sure to grab som Tie Fighters as well, for those epic battles, whcih brings us to:
Evil?
Xenosaga has a sequel out - called Xenosaga II - Jenseits von Gut und Bose, which translates into Beyond Good & Evil - which is also the name of an (underrated) adventure game from UbiSoft, where you play the reporter Jade trying to figure out just what is going on. But, more "importantly" it is also the name of one of F. Nietzsches central works - along with "Also Sprach Zarathustra". So, is there a minor revival of the old grumpy going on, or is it just a cool phrase to tack onto a game to imply that it isn't straight forward "kill everyone"?
On the "consider list" is the double DVD edition of "Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind" (or Kaze no Tani no Naushika) - as featured in Wired (where else... too many good ideas in there!) So - what to do with all our stuff?
Abundance and then some
According to an article (yes, yes, yes - in WIred this time as well), self-storage is a $ 17 billion industry. That is almost twice the Hollywood boxoffice take - or some odd $ 60 per American ! Or higher than the estimated GDP of 100 countries (not combined, but still!) No wonder design objects are flowing into every nook and cranny in the market: most of us already have everything we can claim to "need" - so now it is all about getting the right stuff and stuffing all our old memories and leftovers into giant warehouses by the highway. (more facts on self storage)
...and the sun shines a bit more each day...
