DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

Although it has garnered only tepid reviews at Amazon, Robert Heinlein’s lost first novel has been discovered and published by his estate: For Us, the Living

Heinlein is one of the titans of science fiction. His work contains the earliest written imaginings of numerous subsequent “inventions,” like cellphones, waterbeds, screensavers, and the rocket backpack made famous by the James Bond movie Thunderball. Heinlein is also credited with at least one actual invention; the mechanical arms described in his novella Waldo are common in industry. And, he coined the word grok. (For more, see Science Fiction Inventions.)

The New York Times covered the discovery and posthumous publication of For Us, the Living: Heinlein’s Prophetic First Novel, Lost and Found

LA Times food columnist David Shaw shares some wonderful stories of absurdly rude restaurant patrons. My favorite:

“People steal everything,” [says Chris Schaefer, the proprietor of Zax,] “silverware, salt and pepper shakers, wine coasters, the small flashlights we hand out if you need more light to read the menu — everything. We used to have conical glass vases with tropical fish in them, hanging on the wall in our ladies’ room. Women would flush the fish and the water down the toilet and steal the vases.

This is old news, but I learned about it only recently (thanks a lot, Mike):

Toxic fumes from overheated cooking pans lined with polytetrafluoroetheylene (PTFE), commonly sold under the trade names Teflon and Silverstone, are a little known but increasingly frequent cause of sudden death in caged pet birds, said a Chicago-area veterinarian…

There are numerous caveats in the article, despite its unambiguous and fear-mongering title, Nonstick cookware emits toxic chemicals. I think there’s too little evidence about the potential harm for you to rush home to box up your nonstick skillets. Unless you have birds, I guess.

I felt so good about rescuing 21 lbs of tech trash from the landfill that I announced a collection at work. I volunteered to pay the shipping and recycling fees for everybody’s old diskettes, CDs, videotapes, etc. I was slightly anxious that I was committing to a big expense, but I felt strongly enough that this was the right thing to do that I decided it was worth blowing part of my meager music budget.

I asked a co-worker to set up a collection box. I announced the recycling drive at a staff meeting, and then via email the next day. Then I sent an email reminder to everyone three weeks later.

Today I went to the office to pick up the box. I felt like a lobsterman, reeling in the trap with anticipation… what obsolete treasures would I have collected? Original Win95 install disks? Quicken 1.0 floppies? Prodigy startup diskettes? (Do not tell me you don’t remember Prodigy.)

But all I got was two lousy toner cartridges. I think there’s about 20 people in the office, with 30 home computers between them, yet there was not a single old floppy to be found. Not a single coaster CD. Nary a videotape, ZIP disk, cassette, or inkjet cartridge.

I hope this means they’d all already found sane destinations for their expired media. They tend to be a pretty green group.

Or maybe I’m the only pack-rat in the bunch. I’m sure some people don’t save 15-year-old installation media. I always figured I might have some use for, say, six consecutive releases of Stuffit Deluxe, but in retrospect I can say I was incorrect. I barely have any use for brand new installation media.

In any case, I will need to come up with a better plan to rescue tech trash from people’s closets and garages before it hits the landfill. I’m sure there are tons of it out there, raw material going to waste.

Kim Severson’s article on the obesity crisis, Perils of portion distortion, contains the answer to a question that’s bothered me for most of my life. This answer will tell you something unpleasant about capitalism — something you might have already figured out if you ever stopped to think about it.

Let’s ease into it with some surprising test results:

Brian Wansink, a professor who founded the Food and Brand Lab at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign… took to a Chicago-area theater and handed 161 moviegoers coupons for free popcorn and a drink. One group was given fresh, hot popcorn in medium and large sizes. The other group received 14-day-old popcorn, also in medium and large buckets.

People who received the larger buckets, whether stale or fresh, ate up to 61 percent more popcorn than those who got the smaller buckets.

Quality makes no difference: if there’s more to eat, people will eat it, regardless of what it tastes like. Why am I repulsed by this? Because I do the same thing. I’ve gotten what appears to be 2-week-old popcorn at the local movie house. The staleness doesn’t stop me from eating the whole cubic yard of it. It’s as if I’m thinking “It’s going to get better, maybe farther toward the bottom.” Gad.

The popcorn study yielded another result: The fresh-popcorn subjects ate less than the stale-popcorn subjects. The researchers theorized that “given better-tasting food, people will still eat more if given more, but they’ll slow down sooner because they feel satisfied sooner.”

This theory is the key to the question I’ve been wondering about since I was old enough to eat packaged snacks (in America, this means age three). The question is: in any seasoned snack, why do 99% of the chips (or pretzels or whatever) taste so bland? You’ve probably had the experience of pawing through a bag of Doritos or whatever, looking for the chip with the extra-heavy coating of spices. Surely I can’t be the only one.

The insidious answer: if the food is lousy, people eat more! Eating more means buying more! Buying more means better profits! Ironically, in this diseased society, an inferior snack will outsell a good one. As my friend Terry used to say, “Chew on that while you eat your lunch.”

This is so loathsome I’ve had to italicize part of it:

Peter Meehan, head of Newman’s Own Organics… said food manufacturers walk a fine line when it comes to making snacks that satisfy, yet keep people coming back for more. He said it’s common practice for food manufacturers to pull back a little on flavorings in some foods so consumers will not be completely satisfied with a small amount.

“If you put too much coating or flavor on a chip, you say, ‘Hey — that’s good. I’m done. I’m satisfied.’ And so you don’t reach back into the bag for more.”