Tales of Hoffman

Totally Useless? Totally Overpriced? I Must Have it.

OK, so let's just take a little inventory:
- Mini Geek? Check.
- Music Geek? Check.
- Gadget Geek? Check.
- General, every day run of the mill Geek? Check.

I fulfill all the necessary requirements in order to officially lust after this totally useless and overpriced thing (hey, isn't that the definition of "Art"?). Picture the package....A special domed case opens to expose four 12-inch vinyl records (Vinyl, oh how I've missed you!). The records are picture discs, so each one has some kind of hippy, trippy design on it. The content of the records are audio art, rarities, music and spoken word from the likes of David Byrne, Courtney Love, Michael Stipe, Adam Horowitz (Beastie Boys), Nick Rhodes (Duran Duran), Karl Bartos (Kraftwerk), Danger Mouse and Malcolm McLaren.

I can hear you saying, "Sounds great, but my turntable is buried beneath the detritus of many decades." Ah, they've got that covered. The kicker to all of this is that it comes with a cute little model of the brand, spankin' new MINI Clubman that actually has a needle and speakers in it. Put the MINI on the record and let it "drive" around and around playing the content of your new objet d'art.

It's all a production of Visionaire, which apparently does this kind of thing all the time. And you can order one right now for the low, low price of $250 from Amazon. Hey, no one said Art was easy. I MUST have it....

What if 24 First Aired in 1994?

(via Silicon Alley Insider) This is incredibly geeky humor, but the funny folks over at collegehumor.com envisioned what it would have been like had 24 aired back in 1994 (Jack Bauer using AOL and Windows 3.1?). Being the loser that I am, I found it hysterical.

Go Get Uncle Mark's 2008 Gift Guide

I link to it every year -- and at the pace I'm posting, entries about the Uncle Mark Gift Guide will soon represent about 34% of my total output -- but there's a reason for that. It's because after reading all the flashy, slick gift guides out there, the practical, pragmatic advice of Mark Hurst is a breath of fresh air.

It's a particularly good read for non-techie parents (or grandparents) who can't figure out what the heck all these gadgets are and what's a good one to get for thier children or grand-children. And, come to think of it, any of the recommendations in the guide go "both ways". I don't remember one that would not be a good gift for the parent or grandparent in your life who needs to move into the 21st Century.

I can't speak to his recommendations to new parents (8 years since I've had a newborn in the house, wow!), but...in Mark I trust. The Uncle Mark 2008 Gift Guide & Almanac: it's free, it's useful and it's a good read. Go get it.