Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Weird Inventions Read online

  PHONE GAS

  Kids today are wild about drugs they aren’t supposed to take, like OxyContin and Four Loko, but when you try to get them to take a puff on their life-saving asthma inhalers, they simply can’t be bothered. Also, you can never get them to stop talking on their cradle handset corded phones. Right, parents?

  Obviously that last part isn’t true, but should we ever find ourselves plagued by these kids today who love landlines and hate asthma medicine, some enterprising soul has already patented a solution: Phone Gas. It sounds like technology that somehow hides flatulence in a handset until a prankster can let it rip on an unsuspecting victim, which would be awesome. Instead, however, Phone Gas accomplishes the rather mundane task of blasting the user in the face with aerosol inhaler medication via a specially designed phone-shaped object that is not actually a phone.

  Instead of allowing the user to conduct a conversation with a human being who might be able to explain the cloud of mist wafting out of the microphone end of the handset, Phone Gas offers a “pre-recorded message or music playing into the earpiece” until the user opens his mouth (“in awe or boredom”), at which point a “magic button” is pressed, thus unleashing the life saving spray that the user has hitherto refused to inhale. Patented in 1988, it hasn’t been a big seller, outside of The Prisoner re-creation societies.

  THE LAVAKAN

  Giving pets a bath is the worst—dogs hate water and are prone to jumping out of the tub when they’re wet and covered in a mixture of grime and soap. Cats aren’t any better; used to bathing themselves with their tongues, they just don’t get it when you make them submit to a pool of standing water, and then they claw off all of your skin.

  The Lavakan is an alternative to the heartbreak of pet baths: It’s a washing machine for cats and dogs. This industrial-strength machine soaps, rinses, and dries your pet in less than 30 minutes. The machine resembles a restaurant-grade dishwasher, or a tiny drive-through car wash, with a window so you can spy on your spooked pets. One of the inventors, Andres Díaz, claims that the 5-by-5-foot appliance can even reduce pet stress. “One of the dogs actually fell asleep during the wash,” he said. Cost: $20,000, but if you have that kind of cash to spend on a pet washing machine, you probably aren’t the kind of person who washes their own pets anyway.

  THE FAKE FARMER

  Much as the theory of relativity has remained a constant in physics, the universe of poultry farming has always had its own go-to formula: chicken + food = a plump and tasty chicken. But what if the poultry population isn’t fattening up at a speed that’s fast enough for a farmer’s liking? Growth hormones may be the preferred method nowadays, but in 1981, someone came up with the idea of trickin’ chicken into eating at a hastier pace with the Dummy Chicken Farmer.

  Using the less-than-impressive IQ of the chickens to their advantage, this faux farmer may look like a human, but in truth, it’s little more than a human-shaped bag of stuffing that hangs from a hook attached to its hat, traveling in a circular path around the chicken coop every three-and-a-half hours. It’s like a scarecrow, but one that moves without scaring the birds. In an effort to both fake out and freak out the fowl, the Dummy Chicken Farmer also has an audio system in its chest that blares out whatever sounds the (real) chicken farmer has deemed most likely to inspire the birds to keep filling their faces. As if it weren’t odd enough already, a bonus bit of inexplicability is the series of streamers which, based on the patent diagram, seem to be emerging from the dummy’s nether regions.

  BODY HAIR THINNER

  When your formerly tight-cropped ‘do starts turning into a full-fledged mane, it’s clearly time to trim things back a bit. But when discussing the hair elsewhere on one’s body, there’s a bit more individual discretion as far as whether you’re going to take just a little off the top or go the Full Monty and make with a wholly-hairless look.

  That’s where the Mudage Jolie Body Hair Thinner comes into play. Although described by the website Japan Trend Shop as “a handy device for men who don’t want to scare girls away with their chest rug, but are reluctant to dispense with their body hair altogether,” the Thinner is ultimately little more than a standard razor, featuring a stainless steel blade which helps with follicular manageability when run over your chest, underarms, arms, or legs. It’s worth noting, however, that nowhere is it suggested that the Thinner is optimal for undercarriage use. That’s not to say it couldn’t be, but you’ll, uh, probably want to take a bit more care if you go that route.

  BEACH BOOTS

  You’ve got to hand it to the mind behind Beach Boots, as it is a mind with the courage of its convictions.

  See, the reason most folks go barefoot at the beach, despite the discomfort of walking across hot sand, isn’t just because wearing shoes can leave your feet sweaty and gritty—it’s because wearing shoes at the beach looks a little bit nerdy, like that time they photographed Nixon walking on the beach in a full suit, trying to look casual.

  The inventor of Beach Boots, though, doesn’t let that stop him. You can almost hear his creative process playing out: “So you think it looks nerdy, wearing shoes on the beach? Well, how about clunky plastic buckle-up clodhoppers tricked out with battery-driven motors and caterpillar treads?”

  And with a click of the toe-controlled switch, you’re tooling along the seaside in this unholy three-way hybrid of ski boots, roller skates, and a Sherman tank. Now, there are obvious utilitarian concerns: Will those mini-motors really propel the body weight of an average human? Is it wise to put spinning rotors so close to your extremities? And what’s the matter with flip-flops, anyway?

  Wear with knee-high black socks for full effect.

  INHALED CAFFEINE

  Making coffee every morning is a total pain. Even one of those newfangled individual-cup machines takes a few minutes to do its thing, and cracking open a can of Red Bull requires vital seconds when you’re rushing to get out the door.

  For those of us who can’t stop hitting the snooze button and don’t have time for a proper breakfast, let alone a latte, AeroShot Pure Energy could be the perfect morning eye-opener. It’s the creation of David Edwards, a professor at Harvard University who has also designed other inhalable products. His first foray into this weird industry was Le Whif, a no-calorie, light-as-air brand of chocolate that goes straight to your lungs instead of your hips.

  Each AeroShot inhaler contains eight puffs and 100 mg of caffeine, roughly the same amount contained in a tall Starbucks mocha. Another perk? These things won’t give you stinky coffee breath. They come in three flavors: lime, raspberry, and green apple. AeroShot also has vitamins like niacin and B12, making each tube at least as healthy as a bowl of Frosted Flakes. The inhalers debuted in early 2012. Cost: $2.50 each (which is less than a tall Starbucks mocha).

  EDIBLE FECES MEAT

  Recycling really is a wonderful thing. Thanks to constantly evolving technology, we can make a better planet by converting old newspapers into product packaging, aluminum cans into automobile parts, and human feces into steak.

  Yes.

  It all started because of Japan’s sewage problem. See, 127 million people living in a country roughly the size of Montana makes for a lot of dookie. So, the Tokyo Sewage service approached lab researcher Mitsuyuki Ikeda to devise a solution. And he came up with…poop steak.

  The process to create poop steak involves the extraction of bacteria-spawned protein from human excrement and cooking it to kill off the harmful bacteria. The extracted protein is then combined with a chemical-reaction enhancer and put through an extruder to create the new meat product. This so-called meat is enhanced with soy protein (for flavor, naturally) and colored with red dye. The resulting “steak” is 63 percent protein and reportedly contains fewer calories than conventional meat, meaning the kind that didn’t come from poop.

  Currently the main obstacle to producing this new meat en masse is the high production cost. And the fact that most people have an aversion to eating poop.


  SCARY CHILDBIRTH APPARATUS

  Evidently childbirth wasn’t scary and potentially dangerous enough, and it lacked an element in which a woman was strapped down to a table and spun around at high speed. So said inventors George and Charlotte Blonsky, who devised an “apparatus for facilitating the birth of a child by centrifugal force.”

  In their patent application, the Blonskys awkwardly and racistly say that “primitive peoples” have muscle systems so developed that childbirth is a breeze; not so for “civilised women, who do not have the opportunity to develop the muscles” within the realm of polite society.

  Their apparatus aids in the delivery of a baby via 125 separate components, among them bolts, brakes, a variable-speed motor, stretchers, ballasts, clamps, a girdle, and more. In short, it uses repetitive, mechanical power and centrifugal force to both help the woman push out the baby and force the baby out of the woman in as timely and grueling an ordeal as possible.

  Obviously, this invention was patented during the mechanics-obsessed and kind-of sadistic Industrial Age. But it wasn’t. No—it was patented in 1963.

  ROCKING-KNIT CHAIRS

  For centuries, the greatest minds in engineering have struggled with the dilemma of how to effectively combine the boredom and discomfort of sitting in an oversize, wooden rocking chair with the tedium of knitting large quantities of wool hats. But now, after it seemed all hope was lost, we have the answer: the Rocking-Knit Chair.

  Credit for the Rocking-Knit Chair goes to students Damien Ludi and Colin Peillex, who created it for the University of Art and Design’s Low-Tech Factory Exhibition in Langenthal, Switzerland. The back-and-forth motion of the chair powers a set of gears that automatically draw yarn from a spool and knit it into a tube pattern. The knitted yarn can be used to make hats, large socks, and more hats.

  Supposedly, the chair was meant to show how a relatively simple machine could perform relatively complex tasks, but we all know better. The Rocking-Knit Chair is obviously the first phase of an insidious master plan to enslave grandparents around the world and put them to work producing millions of useless items while making them think they are just relaxing.

  INFLATABLE BREAST IMPLANTS

  If you really want breast implants but just can’t bring yourself to pick a size, science finally has an answer for your unique and indecisive vanity: the Hinging Breast Implant, a gadget that unites humanity’s timeless breast obsession with the technology behind Reebok Pumps.

  It works, so to speak, by inserting what looks like a teardrop-shaped accordion file into the breast with—and here’s the crucial part—a nozzle poking out of the skin. If you’re a man, you probably read that part in slack-jawed astonishment; if you’re a woman, you’re most likely wincing the way guys do whenever some poor dad gets whacked in the jimmy during an episode of America’s Funniest Home Videos. Either way, you get the idea: The nozzle allows the Hinging Breast Implant owner to inflate or deflate according to her mood, outfit, or whatever reason a lady might possibly have for an impromptu cup-size adjustment.

  Although a patent was issued for this way back in 2005, it hasn’t caught on yet—perhaps because enough of us still remember Reebok Pumps—but in a world where bagel-shaped saline face implants are a thing in Japan (see here), anything is possible.

  VIDEO GAME ACCESSORIES

  Atari Mindlink. This bizarre controller for the Atari 2600 was announced in 1983, but was never officially released. Ads promised gamers the ability to play games not with a joystick or a wireless remote, but with their minds. Well, sort of—the Mindlink was a headband that connected to the Atari via infrared sensors that were supposed to pick up on subtle movements the player made with muscles in their head. (The accessory’s designers came up with a game called Mind Maze that really was supposed to have been playable via ESP.) The Mindlink never hit stores. A presentation at the 1983 Consumer Electronics Show proved it didn’t really work at controlling on-screen movements, and testers complained that the device gave them headaches.

  Wii Car Adaptor. Nintendo’s Wii system is a home gaming console that attaches to a TV. One of the Wii’s many optional accessories is the Car Adaptor, a monitor that snaps onto the system for gaming-on-the-go in the (hopefully) backseat of a car. However, the Wii is played via motion capture, requiring players to wave their arms around, an activity that’s not exactly conducive to road safety.

  Wii Bowling Ball. The Wii is packaged with a disc full of sports games, including bowling. When the Wii was first released in 2006, YouTube quickly collected hundreds of videos of people accidentally throwing their wireless Wii remotes through their TVs, windows, etc., which led Nintendo to make wrist straps for the remotes. Nevertheless, CTA Digital manufactured this accessory specifically for Wii bowling—a plastic bowling-ball-shaped Wii remote. The instruction book helpfully advises, “Never, ever release the ball!!”

  THE BOXING BUBBLE HEAD

  The major occupational hazard of boxing is probably all of the punches to the head and face, particularly if you’re a bad boxer who takes a lot of blows, as they can lead to brain damage. This invention, filed with the U.S. patent office in 1987, sought to make boxing safer, if not an entirely different sport altogether. The Bubble Head is a durable plastic bag filled with a clear, thick, shock-absorbing gel. The Bubble Head leaves the face completely unguarded and vulnerable, but protects the rest of the head, on all sides, with a barrier of goo-filled safety plastic.

  Another feature of the Bubble Head: a touch-sensitive reservoir filled with red dye. This red dye would create a surefire way to score boxing by counting blows—every time an opponent punches the wearer in the head, the dye would be released into the clear fluid. At the end of the fight, the loser is the fighter with the most red dye in their Bubble Head bag (instead of another red substance on the canvas).

  IMPLANTABLE CELL PHONE

  There are two facts of life that seem to be increasingly irrevocable: that cell phones keep getting smaller and smaller, and that we, the cell phone users, are obsessively attached to our cell phones, what with their abilities to text, browse the Internet, take terrible pictures of ourselves, and shoot pigs at birds. (Science has even coined the term nomophobia to describe the fear of being without a cell phone—nomo being a contraction of “no mobile.”)

  Two students from the Royal College of Art in London have chosen to accept this reality, rather than try to pry the masses away from their handheld devices. Instead, they’ve made possible the next step in the cell phone size and addiction progression and invented the Audio Tooth Implant. In short, it’s the bare-bones, working parts of a cell phone…surgically implanted into a cavity in a tooth.. It’s a tiny contraption, about the size of a tooth filling, made up of a vibration device and a low-frequency receiver. Via your jawbone, it transmits sounds directly to your ear (the jawbone is an excellent transmitter of sound). All told, it allows you to receive calls, and then talk to people, inside of your own head, in total privacy. Bystanders will simply think you ate your Bluetooth.

  ICE-CUBE PIGEON REPELLER

  There are lots of ways to get rid of pigeons or other unwanted birds that hang around on your roof, doing who knows what degenerate bird activities. You can stick metal spikes up there, set up a speaker to play ultrasonic frequencies that birds find annoying, or cover the whole mess in slippery or sticky substances.

  Or you can set up a mechanical arm to throw ice cubes at them. In 2011 Preston Jones of California patented his Bird Repeller. In form and function, it’s a tiny catapult. Simply load the Repeller with water, plug it in, and let it make ice. The ice automatically flows out into a bowl and is then launched, via a spring-loaded arm, one story into the air, onto the roof, which apparently scares the heck out of birds. As a bonus, Jones note, ice is “environmentally friendly and will not jam gutters.” As another bonus, it can be set up to shoot ice via a timer or remote control, just in case those lousy pigeons get wise and connect your presence in the yard with scary ice bombs.

  STU
FF THAT CLEANS ITSELF

  Japan’s Nippon Sheet Glass Company makes all kinds of windows—virtually unbreakable windows, windows that can withstand bullets. Big deal. They also manufacture a window that can clean itself.

  The Cleartect line of glass products is coated with titanium dioxide. That’s a photocatalytic material, meaning that it reacts chemically to light. When sunlight hits the glass, that unleashes a chemical reaction breaks down organic material on the window into smaller and smaller particles. The coating is also hydrophilic, so instead of forming droplets on the glass, rainwater forms an even sheet that flows down the window, taking the super-miniaturized molecules of dirt away with it. (Note: If it doesn’t rain often enough, you have to hose down the window yourself.)

  Moreover, scientists at Hong Kong’s Polytechnic University discovered that titanium dioxide—the same stuff that’s used for self-cleaning windows—can be used for clothes, too. When applied to cotton (no other fabric will work) the titanium dioxide breaks down dirt and other pollutants into smaller and smaller particles, the same way it does on glass. Sunlight and movement, they hope, will eliminate the dirt.

  DIGITAL EAR CLEANER

  One of the pros of cleaning your ears, if there are any, is that you can’t see inside of your gross ears while you’re cleaning them. The con is that you can’t see inside of your gross ears while you’re cleaning them, so you don’t really know if you’re doing a good or a bad job, or missing any spots, etc.