I’ve considered this before. There are a couple problems with scanning the items’ barcodes as they enter and exit the fridge:

1. To be more efficient you need two barcode scanners, one for incoming and one for outgoing: toggling the mode back and forth with a button will get old fast.

2. Even with two barcode scanners, it gets old fast. What we need is passive RFID in product packaging. That will make building smart fridges a whole lot easier AND make tracking their inventory and expiration dates automatic.

Howabout simple scanning the barcode of every item you buy at the grocery store as you put them away in the fridge/pantry and then scanning them as they get thrown away/recycled? Still a lot of extra work. I should know: I tried it.

Writing lim’ricks is more than just luck:
It takes patience and skill not to suck.
So when taking the time
For a four-letter rhyme,
One should certainly use the word “darn.”

I saw this vehicle on my drive to work this morning:

My phone took too long to get into the camera mode and snap a pic, so I got him just as he was turning west towards Golden (apparently the turn signals aren’t functional or the driver does not know how to utilize them in such an advanced beta test vehicle). The decals say “Audi A3 e-tron” and “Audi electric mobility.” The vehicle has Colorado plates, so it looks like it must be one of those 17 pilot cars nationwide.

Funny, I was researching DDIs not too long ago. I like the idea. It reduces the number of light phases to two. We’ll see if they execute the concept correctly.

Colorado may get its first safe-minded “diverging diamond interchange” - The Denver Post.

This once again inspires me to remind you to USE S/MIME ENCRYPTION on any email you send that may have sensitive information in it. And by “sensitive information,” I mean information that you don’t want other people or companies to know about FOREVER.

Using email with S/MIME encryption is like having a safe deposit box at your bank. They store the items in a box in their vault (the encrypted email on their server) but it takes both of your keys to open it (theirs = server access, yours = private S/MIME decryption key). They know you have a box in their vault but they do not know the contents. Except whenever you don’t use S/MIME email encryption, it’s like allowing anyone at the bank to open your safe deposit box at any time and without your key. And I’m willing to wager that you almost never use S/MIME encryption on your sensitive emails.

I agree 100%. However I propose to take it one step further and introduce the jumping ovation. As the standing ovation has become so commonplace as to devalue its original meaning, we should introduce a new form of ovation that not only goes above and beyond the s.o. but also forces the audience member to evaluate the personal cost of said ovation by asking himself, “do I really want to put the effort into jumping for this performance? Was it that good?”

Theater Talkback: Against Ovation Inflation - NYTimes.com.

Here’s the answer for long trips or continuous driving: even faster than filling up a gas tank!

via Better Place demonstrates battery swapping in Yokohama - YouTube.

Hermes reached 200,000 miles this morning!

It changed over literally as I turned into my work’s parking lot this morning.