Spotted at Target this weekend: FLOR carpet tiles for kids in Pooh, Cars, and Disney Princesses (pink of course). They’ve had FLOR for about a year now, but I don’t know if the kiddie patterns are new.

650 pounds of sunflower seeds are on their way to the USA Network, courtesy of fans disappointed in the cancellation of “The 4400.” Giants Seeds in North Dakota is handling the orders. (Who knew sunflower seeds came in dill pickle flavor?)

Are the faithful every-3,000-miles oil changers being unkind to the environment? The California Integrated Waste Management Board is launching a campaign to call the 3,000 mile oil change a myth. Many manufacturers recommend more mileage between oil changes for cars these days. The Automotive Oil Change Association, an organization that represents fast lube companies, is not surprisingly calling the campaign “misleading.” The bottom line is: read your owner’s manual, and dispose of used oil properly.

Two fun new exhibits in the Seattle area: on Saturday the Museum of Flight opens “Style in the Aisle: The History of Fashion in Flight,” a display of flight attendant uniforms from their extensive uniform collection. And yes they have the infamous Pucci+Braniff space bubble headgear. At the Pacific Science Center, kids can learn all about trees from the inside out, sit in a giant bird’s nest, crawl through a log, and go inside a huge acorn.

“Last year, clients of China’s two state-owned mobile-phone companies sent each other a staggering 15.1 billion text messages, via short-message-service technology, during the weeklong holiday, according to the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications.” Wow. And that number is expected to jump this week. Happy Year of the Rat.

It hadn’t occured to me yet to think about organic flowers when purchasing bouquets, but it makes perfect sense if you’re being “green.” Organic Bouquet was recommended on a discussion list I’m on. And of course if you can buy something grown locally that’s even better.

Thirteen years ago Nike entered the hockey market with its purchase of Canstar Sports, the parent company of Bauer. Seeking to splash their swoosh across all things hockey, something they’ve done so well with other sports that the Nike name is not needed alongside the logo, the company used some tried and true formulas. They sponsored hockey players and NHL logos, designed some fashionably stylish skates, and moved manufacturing to Asia. But things didn’t boom as they had hoped. The stylish skates were white, like women’s figure skates, not a great idea for a sport that probably has more fight clips than actual gameplay highlights uploaded to YouTube. And worse, their high-end skates were painful, unusually sized, and expensive. Nike improved on the problems but things never took off as they had hoped. Now they’ve put the Bauer unit up for sale. Perhaps it will go back to Canada where all things hockey can always find a good home.

The Anne Frank Fund was sent up by Anne’s father, Otto Frank, to hold the copyright of her diary and the proceeds. He also set up the Anne Frank Foundation to turn their hiding place into a museum and run education projects. The two organizations have been at odds in the past over ownership of the name Anne Frank, with the Fund presumably well off from book and rights sales, and the Foundation claiming it was short on funds. When Rafael Alvero decided to create a musical based on Anne Frank’s life, he approached the Foundation for approval and received their go ahead. But with the musical set to open at the end of February, the Anne Frank Fund has threatened to take legal action to stop the production, saying they did not grant any rights for the musical.

A love of carving led to a need for a better knife which led to a family business that has lasted four generations. At the Warther Carving Museum and Knife Factory in Dover, Ohio they still make knives by hand, tempering the steel hard and grinding it very thin. Ernest “Mooney” Warther, a talented carver who wanted a better tool, founded the knife company in 1902 and 106 years later the operation remains small and family run. (via Serious Eats)

Apparently True Love will soon be obtainable by downloading the Princess Bride Game, coming in the spring for Mac, Windows and Linux. Get your ambidextrous mouse/trackpad practice in now.