Christie’s gem auction last week was a success with the 63.93 carat diamond going for $4.2 million (apparently to a husband bidding on it for his wife) and the 478 carat sapphire going for $1.5 million to an anonymous phone bidder. However, Sotheby’s failed to auction off the gigantic 103 carat diamond the following day, as no one was willing to go above the minimum $8.5 million price. In other auction news, the catalog for the British Airways Concorde Charity Sale, to be held on December 1, includes instruments such as Ice Detector Heads and Fuel Pressure Indicators. There’s also passenger seats and a captain’s seat. At Air France’s Concorde auction, the nose cone went for $500,000.

Alas, the N.Y. Times has proclaimed that Hartford, Connecticut is no longer “the insurance capital of the world.” In 1810 the Hartford Fire Insurance Co., now called the Hartford Financial Services Group, was the first to form, and is one of two remaining insurance firms still headquartered there. The Phoenix Companies, established in 1850, is the other. Mergers and acquisitions caused five companies to move their headquarters out of state. At least Hartford gets to hang onto the title of capital of Connecticut.

Glass artist Josh Simpson’s Infinity Project is still going strong. His scrapbook lists a growing list of recipients of his glass “planets” which are being placed around our planet in a myriad of locations. (original post 1/11/01)

During a time when I watched infomercials because I could not get to sleep, I thought up two ridiculous cooking gadgets that I could sell to Ron Popeil and see on TV during my next bout of insomnia. One was a machine that could make Chinese stir fries. It would be shaped like a small barrel, suspended like a spit, with a heated area inside. You’d put your stir fry ingredients in and turn a handle on the side, and your food would cook as it turned. It would be marketed with different flavors of sauce packets (“lemon chicken! just add chicken and veggies!”). The other device was a self-stirring pot that would make risotto for you. Risotto requires wrist and arm stamina. There is enough tending and stirring to make you reach for the box of Rice O’ Roni, but the creamy results are always worth it in the end. Well, I started sleeping again and the world was safe from my madness, but I can’t save the world from everyone else. Now there’s StirChef. It’s a paddle device that fits on your saucepan and does the stirring for you. It reportedly makes a mean risotto. You still have to tend your risotto, pouring in the liquid as it is absorbed, but your arm can now rest up for the more important task of lifting forkfuls of yummy arborio rice to your mouth. Will this gadget show up on late night TV? I hope I don’t find out. Incidentally, these folks are headquartered in Connecticut. (via Gizmodo)

Katharine Hepburn’s home in Old Saybrook, Connecticut is on the market for $12 million. It’s a lovely brick home which includes three acres of land and a 600 foot stretch of Long island Sound waterfront. It was in the Hepburn family for over a century.

After re-reading the first year of my four years of archives, my favorite link of all is still Amy Winfrey’s Traffic Cone Preservation Society. It embodies much of what I love about the World Wide Web and what life on the ‘net was like before corporations caught on. Celebrate randomness. (original post: 5/23/00)

One of our big hurdles in moving to Seattle from the Bay Area was, of course, the weather. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not the rainfall that makes a difference, it’s the number of overcast days. Although there have certainly been stretches of time when I wished for the sun to make an appearance, and the cat often looks at us with a mournful, sun-deprived expression, the general consensus is that the weather so far has been Not Normal. When we arrived in the summer, we were greeted with hot, dry days that stretched on and on, just like home. As we lamented over our terrifyingly high water bill, everyone told us “this is Not Normal.” Then the rains did arrive. “Ah, at last!” we thought. “The rain is here!” But it would not stop. Basements flooded. Streets flooded. That’s to be expected, right? It rains here. But the response was “Not Normal.” Then we had a some lovely autumn days, crisp and cold, reminiscent of my New England youth. Apparently that was also Not Normal. The mass of rain returned. Natives spoke fondly of the “mist” that they missed. Then yesterday, it snowed. I’ve decided that I am enjoying Not Normal. It translates to real weather.

In the quest to deliver smell over the Internet, Digiscents got a lot of PR and then went out of business in 2001. AromaJet‘s website, however, is still up, though I can’t find any recent mentions of it in news coverage. They may be still making a go of it, along with competitor Trisenx. (original posts: 3/13/00 & 12/4/00)

In February 2000, I wrote “How many home furnishing ecommerce sites can the market support?” Then I listed six sites that sold furniture online and three related home furnishing sites. Out of the six URLs, only furniture.com still actually sells furniture. The rest are either dead or repurposed. Out of the three related sites, one is now under Amazon.com, one is dead, and one is still Sur La Table. (original post: 2/15/00)

Do you want a turkey & gravy soda? I know I don’t. But if you’re having one, I’ll try a sip.