Vox Import

Pig in Boots

A recently born pig in the UK; refuses to walk in the mud without her specially made wellington boots.  For some reason this makes me very happy.

Pig in Boots

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せんべ　｜チプス　｜　マンゴ

Auto makers need time, and more candles

Recently it was announced that President Obama would be ordering the EPA to review its rejection of California's waiver for the clean air act, allowing the state to require stricter fuel efficiency for cars sold in the state (Obama's Order is Likely to Tighten Auto Standards).

Car makers, who applauded President Bush's stand against this waiver were vocal in their complaints against this reversal.  “Applying California standards to several different states would create a complex, confusing and very difficult situation for manufacturers,” says Charles Territo, a spokesman for the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers.

For some, it is hard to understand how this change could cause such confusion for automakers (when asked, 9 out of 10 small children said the automakers should apply the same standards to all states).  Besides, California has been setting the standard for 40 years, what is different now?

To find out, we visited one of the big automakers to see what could cause such consternation.  Territo, pointing to a wide slot in the wall of the R&D department, "Here's where a waiver starts its journey," and pushes a mock envelope through the opening.  Quickly, we were ushered though a door and onto a catwalk on the other side of the wall.  Here the intricacies and delcate dance of the manufacturing process were revealed.

Manufacturing Process

The envelope lands on a metal tray, hung by rope from the ceiling.  As the slight increase in weight by the envelope pulls the tray down, the rope, wound around a wheel, begins turning a large toothed wheel.  This wheel turns a second wheel set 90 degrees from it.  A tab on this second wheel rotates slowly to push a bright red lever joined with a spring.  When the lever is released, the spring flips the lever back, suddenly impacting a boot hung from a bar.  Sent swinging by the force, this boot then kicks over a bucket, which releases a steel ball down a switchbacked track.  At the bottom, the ball rolls within a half pipe to impact a long upright pole.  This allows a delicately balanced ball, far above at the top of this pole, to be dislodged from its roost, and roll into an empty bathtub suspended high above the factory floor.  The ball rolls to the end of the tub where it falls through a hole and lands on one end of a see-saw, propelling a life sized mannequin in a diving pose backward into a waiting tub.  Then it all stops.

"See, the new waiver just doesn't have the heft of the lower MPG designs we usually send this way," says Territo.  "If that rope in the beginning doesn't get pulled fast enough, it really throws a monkey wrench into the works."  To comply with these new laws, "we'd probably have to put a lit candle on a roller skate here," Territo says, pointing at some empty space in the contraption, "and have it kicked by a boot some how, to roll and then burn a string over here."  As Territo notes, such a candle addition would cost the automakers millions in new candles per year.  "This simply isn't a feasible restriction."

Good to see you again Japanese Vending Machine!

I think I might have to get that box of mini donuts tomorrow morning...

Vending Machine

Dear Whole Foods Man Child

Dear Whole Foods Man Child,

Please stop draining the liquid out of the soups and wet buffet items, taking only the meat and solid items.

I know grown-up life can be very exciting.  When you left home, all you ate was cheese pizza and hamburgers.  Whatever YOU want right?  No mom to force you to eat stuff that looks weird and doesn't taste like safe reliable beef.  At some point though, you moved to San Francisco and you noticed that many of the restaurants you found yourself in did not serve pizza or hamburgers.  You soon realized that you could order any item listing an identifiable meat, and then simply strip mine whatever came to the table leaving behind an gastronomical disaster zone of vegetable tailings and noodle mounds.

These dinners began to have an affect on your self image;  you had had been a patron of several non-fastfood restaurants, ergo you were a man who liked good food.  "Yes, I'd like the Pepper Steak", you'd say.  Later, while scraping the sauce off with the side of your fork, with an eyebrow raised at the friend who'd ordered a dish which clearly did not cost as much, you'd chuckle to yourself, "Obviously not a foodie".

This is how you found yourself at Whole Foods.  It was confusing at first, like all those things you'd been avoiding at past dinners back to haunt you.  But you knew you belonged here, you just needed to find where the "good stuff" was.  And then you found it; the soup and buffet island.  A resource so plentiful given just a little bit of work.  Like the Army Corp of Engineers in the Florida Everglades, all you had to do was drain, drain, drain the non-important bits to leave behind dry eatable food.

You, Whole Foods Man Child, with stainless steel serving spoon in hand, dredge the bottom of the soup pot, the middle of the casserole, then lift and hold against the side of the pot.  Hold....press....hold...until all the liquid has left.  After several times, you take one final sniper run through the pot to yank out a few choice bits and then you move on.

While you are doing this I am waiting.  You are either de-flowering what I want or hovering in front of it.  When you are finally done,  you leave behind a big pot of liquid that the Whole Food staff won't realize needs replacing because it is still mostly full.  "I did it" you think, marveling at your own cunning, like the toddler who has just used the pottie all by himself.  "I did it!".  Yes Whole Foods Man Child, you certainly did.

Crackling sound!

Firestarting logs at whole foods

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