Scanned candy bar wrappers and their nutritional labels. (via Feed)

And that’s it for today ’cause I’m off to celebrate my birthday! Yay!

Why the extra inner envelope in wedding invitations and other formal correspondence? It actually had a practical purpose, according to Crane’s. Invitations used to be hand delivered by footmen and needed protection from muddy streets and bad weather. The outer envelope would often be soiled upon arrival. So the inner envelope made for a clean presentation. Now it could be considered extraneous, I suppose. But it adds a level of importance to the contents. Crane’s makes its papers from cotton and other more renewable resources than trees. They import hemp from Europe and seem active in pushing for its return as a U.S. crop. They also use clothing remnants to make papers. Denim scraps go into U.S. currency and the worn out currency is itself recycled into more paper. They have the right philosophy.

My favorite olympic torch lighting ceremony was in Barcelona, 1992, when an archer shot a flaming arrow over the altar to set it afire. It was a completely unexpected, entirely appropriate moment. I often wonder what happened to the arrow. Someone must have had the job of tracking it and putting it out. Perhaps it actually landed in the flames.

I finally started reading Harry Potter (you don’t need a link for that, right?). As with most good writing, the fascinating details make the story. (I’m also reading Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon where the interesting details actually tend to bog down the story for me — at least in the beginning.) Harry Potter is published in the U.S. by Scholastic which I knew in grade school as the company that sold rather cheap paperback editions of various children’s titles through school programs. My parents raised me on the library so I was sometimes a bit jealous when my classmates would receive their shiny new book orders. I remember them getting a lot of “pop trash” though, books about current TV shows and movies, rather than “literature”. Not surprisingly, Scholastic’s business has been doing better recently. They were reporting losses a few years ago which prompted a turnaround plan. Their stock price took a huge dive in 1997, right before they outbid other publishers for the right to publish Harry Potter in the U.S. The New York Times did a little looking into Bloomsbury, the British publisher who lucked out on their Harry Potter find. Their stock price languished in the dumps until Harry took off.

Ever since I found out that nothing decomposes in landfills (the photo stuck in my head is of someone uncovering a 10 year old hot dog, but then, are hot dogs really organic anyway?) I have tried not only to recycle but to use the disposal for food items. I don’t know if putting mashed food into our sewage system is any better then putting it into landfill, but it’s almost impossible to compost (the best solution) in a condo with no yard. Recently, however, I read this Straight Dope column that says “the landfill crisis of the late 1980s was a myth propagated by the media with the aid of environmentalists”. It also gives some hard facts about the reality of recycling. Now I know to get a mulching lawn mower. First, I need to get a lawn.

Ever wonder about Harris Tweed? I bet you didn’t. Well, I did. You may recognize Harris Tweed even if you don’t know what it is. The most common occurance I’ve noted is in the tan, brown twill of a herringbone patterned sport coat. But there are many colors, including pastels, new patterns and textures much evolved from the traditional scratchy dull stuff. Harris Tweed is protected and regulated by a 1933 act of British Parliament. It must be woven by hand in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, in the home of the weaver, using Scottish virgin wool that has been spun and dyed also in the Hebrides. Authentic Harris Tweed is labeled with a golden orb symbol. This account of learning how to weave the tweed describes the pedal powered looms used to create the various patterns. The history of Harris Tweed reveals even more interesting details about the heritage of this textile. For official screensavers and desktop patterns, visit the Harris Tweed Authority web site (Shockwave req’d). They have games too. I jest not.

Wired has an article on the special effects for the new Lord of the Rings movies. Weta Ltd, a New Zealand firm, is producing the visual effects, both physical and digital. Gollum will be completely computer generated, and regular sized actors will be shrunk into hobbits (hmm). Most of the article discusses how they are managing the processor power needed for rendering (luckily, SGI is still alive and kicking).

With the current realities of dotcom backlash, how many Internet companies have considered dropping the “dot com” from their name? But there are many company names that are completely dependent on the “dot com” suffix. Without it, they lose the complete meaning of what they do. For example, all the companies that have taken plain ol’ nouns like “pets” and “diamond” and “giftcertificates” are pretty much stuck with having to end with “.com”, while those who have either used another web-nomer like the “e” prefix (ebay, evite), or even the “i” prefix can build their own brands without mentioning “.com”. Then there are the brave ones who are trying to give new meaning to known words (Amazon) or, perhaps even harder, trying to give some meaning to a completely new combination of letters. However, I suppose those plain noun guys come out ahead, .com or no, because you don’t have to remember much to get to their sites.

I enjoyed this account of Motorola’s cell phone torture chamber. Phones are dropped, baked, frozen, shaked, bounced, and squashed with a round rubber pad (the “butt test”). As if that wasn’t enough, they are also blasted with Arizona sand which Motorola buys for $30 per gallon. (And I thought gas was expensive.)

It looks like Buffy is going to come face to face (or perhaps neck to teeth) with the vampire granddaddy of ’em all: Dracula. Joss Whedon’s vampire mythology differs somewhat from the traditional Dracula stories, so it will be interesting to see how they bring the ol’ Count into the ‘dale.