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Updated childhood favorites <3
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Castillo de San Cristobal and Castillo San Felipe de Morro
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Photos from Puerto Rico finally processed and up. Finally catching up on things.
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DFA, making me feel real nostalgic <3 - 12 Years of DFA: Too Old To Be New, Too New To Be Classic (by RedBullMusic)
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Now that school is over, I am going to watch so many nature documentaries.
Like an elusive, caped creature in the ocean, a female blanket octopus glides through the water. We know this video is of a female of the species because she is around two meters (6.6 feet) long. In contrast, the male blanket octopus is less than 3 centimeters wide. Yes, centimeters!
Differences in males and females of a species is called sexual dimorphism, and can include size, coloring or ornamentation, form or structure, and behavior. A few examples of this include peacocks, peacock spiders, birds of paradise, lions, elk, and even humans. The BBC is a good start for further viewing.
This clip is from Oceans, a French documentary film by Jacques Perrin (released in the US by Disneynature). You can watch another clip from the movie here.
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NOM!
NOM! is an interface meant to guide novice cooks through the kitchen designed by my classmates Tyler Davidson and Shelly Ni. There are multiple parts to the system that make it such a well considered tool. The meal planning portion allows you to find inspiration online, suggest recipes based off of your existing kitchen inventory and suggest complimentary recipes to ones already chosen.
A grocery shopping option allows the user to purchase required ingredients for a recipe from Fresh Direct, or another similar service. By continuously using the service, NOM! will eventually get to know your kitchen and know what your inventory is. A great answer to a problem I’ve been thinking about how to solve lately - how does one design a smart inventory for the kitchen? My first round of answers revolved around RFID tags and scanners, a complicated and probably soon to be obsolete option. Using a third-party service that is your main way to purchase food means a passive system to track your inventory, simple.
The third part of the system is a convenient way to watch video tutorials on your countertop while you’re cooking. Not having to constantly walk away in the midst of a process or swipe your dirty fingers across a screen makes a big difference in the cooking experience, especially as a novice that needs more hand holding. Another interesting part of the countertop experience is the way the system can interact with certain objects in the kitchen to allow for accurate measurements and precise knife techniques.
I can remember a Metropolis magazine from the early 2000s that featured a smart kitchen. Networked countertops were one of the many features but one that always stuck with me as something that seemed so obviously useful. Since then we’ve seen iPads installed in refrigerator doors and that’s about it. NOM! is an exploration into a useful tool that would allow for retrofitting and modifying an existing kitchen rather than being a cumbersome and expensive new series of furniture. I hope someday to see something like it in market!
On a final note- I love NOM! for setting the precedent for LGBTQ representation in user journey videos. More gay boys and gals please!
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Moving Out
A bittersweet feeling washed me over as I packed my belongings into boxes and bags today. 9 months of my life committed to this endeavor and now it’s all over, for the time being… This summer will be spent (hopefully) learning a lot more, working hard, enjoying the sun and my free time, preparing for the next 9 months.
But for now, I just needed to pack it all away. The precious laser cut models and mountains of paper, all stacked neatly ready to be taken to my office in Bushwick by Dani - my new found hero with a van. I hired Dani from Task Rabbit, something I would probably not have normally done. It was a nice convenience, an easy way to let it all go. Dani was the first and only person to respond to me on the service. He had a few questions, but it was relatively easy to make arrangements and Dani was a super friendly guy. In terms of hiring someone for the service, I’m not sure if I would do it again, it mostly seemed like an extravagance to me… normally I would just ask my boyfriend and a friend with a car but it was nice to try out. I was actually interested in Dani’s attempts at making a second income by picking up tasks in the evenings and on the weekends. I wonder how many people do this? How much can they really make? My contract might have been worth it, it took about 1.5 hours and I paid him $65. Not too bad for a side job.
I guess in times like this people need to get creative about how they make ends meet, it’s nice to have services like these allow people to do that.
Theme: Linear by Peter Vidani
