Friday 5

DIY Action Hero shots

Today's photos of our "DIY Geek Action Hero" were clearly the most popular part of this Friday's edition. Here's the original, before Photoshopping for the illustration...

... and here's an out-take that shows our model, the wonderfully and naturally geeky Laura, with her Leatherman tool heroically thrust skyward...

 

For those of you who were wondering, the gear -- including the hat with the LED brim -- belongs to yours truly. But you see that purple duct tape? THAT belongs to Laura, who is a regular fix-it machine, apparently.

She's also a great sport. Thanks to Laura, Rodolfo and Melissa for making this shoot work.

 

5 Firefox add-ons

Have you tried the free Firefox Web browser yet?

If you haven’t (and you should), consider these five great tools you can add to your Firefox surfing experience — all in less than five minutes:

1. FoxyTunes: Adds a row of music-player controls at the bottom of your browser window, allowing you to pick, play and pause your music without leaving your browser.

2. Stumbleupon: Tell this add-on just a bit about your interests and start “stumbling” around the Web. You’ll join thousands of people with similar interests in a cooperative quest for cool new stuff.

3. Download Status Bar: Don’t you hate it when you download something and then you can’t find where the computer stashed it? This simple tool brings sanity back to downloading.

4. Foxmarks Bookmarks Synchronizer: Set this up for every computer you use and it will keep all your bookmarks identical on each machine.

5. gTalk Sidebar: Add Google’s popular Instant Messaging tool to your browser sidebar.

And the best part? There are literally hundreds of free add-ons for your Firefox browser, so you can customize it to fit your needs.

A good trick: Cat, Hat, thing, do...

From our friends over at Boing Boing comes this sweet little idea: Write a poem, or a story, or whatever, using only the words that appear in the Dr. Seuss classic “The Cat in the Hat.” Ready, set... GO!

But what are those words? And how many are there (articles cited either/or/and 223 or 236 words). And though I did (eventually) find an online list, I needed something better.

My solution? Type every word of the book into a spreadsheet, run a couple of filters and functions on the prose and ... voila! I got an alphabetized, numbered list of every word Dr. Seuss used to write his easy-reader. And yes, I eventually came up with 236.

You can find that list on Charleston.net, or as a numbered list right here, or as a single-page, printable PDF. And if you do bother to try this little challenge, please send me the results  (if snail-mail suits your results better, try: Dan Conover, The Post and Courier, 134 Columbus St., Charleston, SC, 29403).