Guess what. It ain’t gonna fly. Did you get my letter yet? No? Well, I’ve changed my default search engine on all my computers and devices to Bing. Yeah, hard to believe when Microsoft is less evil than Google, isn’t it? And my Gmail account? It’s head is on the chopping block, awaiting your decision to kill the deal with Verizon. It’s not like Gmail is the only portable email provider out there. Google Reader? Don’t need it. Maps? Yeah, Bing does that to, quite well.

I’m also letting my friends know what you’re doing, and encouraging them to do what I’ve done.

Seriously, Google. Don’t be evil.

• Save the Internet (includes form to mail Google CEO in protest)
• Net neutrality imperiled. (MSNBC/Countdown video)

When I discovered the site, I started planning my own travel trailer for camping, even though I had nowhere special I wanted to go. Since then, I’ve found a campground I really enjoy visiting, and want something more spur-of-the-moment than having to try to reserve a cabin–impossible at the last minute on a busy holiday weekend.

After successfully completing my bar, I decided to go for something bigger, and remembered the teardop camping trailer. So here’s my idea, based on Tiny Travel Trailers’ “Generic Benroy” plans, that I worked up four years ago:

I have some investing to do first: tools, most likely a table saw. I also need to establish a workspace. The bar was built on the patio under the second-story deck. That won’t do for a project this size.

I also need to start budgeting. The plans call for using a pretty generic Harbor Freight 5-ft x 8-ft trailer. The trailer is probably around $500, but is frequently on sale. In all, a rough guess is $1,500 – $2,000 for the finished trailer. Any more than that and I might as well buy one from one of the few manufacturers that still make them.

The plans also call for modifying that trailer by cutting the cross-members to reduce the width by two inches so that the side walls overlap the frame to hide it. That seems like a lot of trouble for what to me is a minor cosmetic issue. I’ll just paint the frame black to match the aluminum skin’s paint job. (Yeah, I don’t know where I’m gonna get that paint job done!)

So, here goes the next big project!

View of the completed bar

My portable bar is based on the instructions at Bar Plans Online. Rather than build a 10-foot indoor bar, I modified the plans to shorten the bar to about 6 feet across the bar top. Wheels make it easy to roll around on the patio, and hose hookups for water and drain get much-needed water to the bar. The outlet and under-cabinet lights round out the features.

Rather than go into the details here, download the PDF file which has basic instructions for building the bar. I’ve even included a materials and price list. I’ve reviewed the list, and created the assembly drawings after building the bar, but do double-check all measurements in case I made an error. You also may want to make the bar about 3 inches shorter–I didn’t plan for the additional height created by the wheels. Even so, the bar is very serviceable.

Mobile Bar Plans (PDF)

Business side of the bar, with lights on.

Things I learned (and remembered) while building this bar:

• Wood is far more forgiving than metal.
• Metal is also sharp.
• PVC glue is instant.
• When you get tired, stop. You’ll just goof up otherwise.
• Remember what your Dad said: Measure twice, cut once. Cut plywood with a skil-saw good side down.
• Don’t sweat the imperfections. Otherwise, you’ll be too paralyzed to even start, fearing the results won’t be perfect.
• Building stuff gives you an incredible sense of accomplishment and self-sufficiency.
• When you’re done, go ahead and plan something else. You’ll be hooked.

UPDATE: I sent pics in to Bar Plans Online, and they’ve posted my photos on their site! I highly recommend their site if you dream of having a bar of your own. Their plans, as you can tell, are highly adaptable for whatever style or size you want.

Also, if you need supplies and equipment for your bar, Bar Plans Online has an excellent store. Check it out! Tha Mixologist Barstore

Stuff you'll need

I’ve been working out for a few months, and recently really increased my intensity at the gym, and have been modifying my diet to help me gain weight. I’ve discovered that smoothies are a great way to get extra calories and protein in my diet, and are quick and easy before going to work out.

The thing is, yogurt is kind of expensive. You can buy a whole gallon of milk for what you’d pay for a quart of yogurt. By making your own, you can get four times the yogurt for the same price!

There are lots of instructions on the internet for making your own. I followed the steps at wikiHow and had success the first time.

Here’s the stuff you’ll need:

• A heating pad. Make sure your’s doesn’t have auto shut-off, or you’ll be running to turn it back on every hour. I used an old one we had around the house.
• Containers for your yogurt. I used Rubbermaid TakeAlongs Twist & Seal Liquid Storage containers, 4 cup (32-ounce, one quart).
• A thermometer. I used a digital thermometer because they’re way easier to read.
• Milk. I used whole milk, because I prefer it, and other sites say it makes thicker yogurt without having to add dried milk.
• Commercial live-culture yogurt. I used a couple of heaping tablespoons of some plain Danon yogurt. Remember, it must have live cultures. Don’t use flavored yogurt, either—not sure what would happen if you did, but you might end up with an odd flavor.

First thing you’ll need to do is heat up the milk to about 185°F to kill off any bad bacteria. If your milk is already pasteurized, shouldn’t be a problem, but you really gotta do this step. Use a water-bath to keep from scorching your milk—just put your pot in a larger pot filled with water up to the same level as the milk. I heated mine on the gas stove at medium-high.

Once you reach 185°F, cool the milk. WikiHow says use ice water in the sink, but just cold tap water worked very quickly. Cool to about 110°F, then stir in your live culture yogurt.

Pour it into your clean containers.

Then wrap the containers up in the heating pad. I read that you should also wrap it in a towel, but my heating pad ended up putting out plenty of heat, and I had to remove the towel so it didn’t get too hot.

Let incubate for about 7 hours or so—shorter for sweeter but thinner yogurt, longer for thicker, but tangier yogurt. You’ll want to keep an eye on it, and maintain the temperature at around 100°F. I used my little digital thermometer which has a range of -40 to 302°F.

When the yogurt’s done, it will be congealed in a solid mass. You’ll probably see some greenish liquid on top. This is whey, and is a normal product of the process—you’ve probably seen it on commercial yogurt, too.

Store it into the fridge where it should keep for a couple weeks. Make lots of yogurt smoothies, or mango lassi or other yogurt goodies.

Some things to experiment with after you make your first batch:

• Try varying the incubation time. As I mentioned, this can change the yogurt’s consistency.
• If you don’t want to use commercial yogurt as a starter, look at the many freeze-dried cultures available. If you’re really into probiotics, you can get just the results you want by varying the species of bacteria in the culture.
• I’m not sure I’d want to try it, but you can supposedly make “fruit on the bottom” yogurt by putting jam or fruit in small containers before pouring in the milk.
• You can thicken the yogurt or make yogurt cheese by draining the yogurt in a few layers of cheesecloth in a colander. You’ll need thicker yogurt for taztziki.

Heat the milk in a water bath

Cool it down

Add in some live yogurt

Put it in containers

Wrap containers in heating pad

Pulled the towel off because yogurt was getting too warm.

Seven hours later, yogurt!

Into the fridge, soon to be smoothies!

Rae630 Paper Lotus

Head on over and get your science geek on!

Introducing the Make: Science Room

Green Acroyear figure from the Micronauts Home Page.

Back in the late 70s, I had a few of the Micronaut toys. Until today, I had forgotten how many I had, and couldn’t find them on the net because I kept thinking they were called “Microbots,” which is a different toy altogether. Today, the neurons fired in the proper sequence, I remembered the correct name, and hit The Google.

The Micronauts Homepage
Inner Space Online
MicroHeritage Micronauts

Rummaging through the sites, I remembered the toys I had: the Acroyear (I) figure, the Mobile Exploration Lab, Crater Cruncher, and Hydra vehicles. My dream was to have the Battle Cruiser and the Micropolis Megacity.

Because all the parts used connectors that were the same size across the toys, you could build new things by taking bits of one toy and putting them on another. These combinations made it easy to come up with new ways of imaging how to play with the toys. To me this was better than Lego’s because instead of being generic blocks, the were bits and pieces that were shaped like things (and yeah, I never got into the Lego play sets, either). You could take rocket nozzles off one toy and put them on another, propellers off another, and so on, and build something completely new.

I wish the Micronauts would come back in to production. They were the best toys ever!

Needless to say, if something has batteries and a button and does something, it will be hacked by geeks. Here’s a quick roundup of interesting Easy Button hacks found on the web. Buy one and hack yours!

• Change playback speed of pre-recorded message (and a custom message mod)
• Replace circuit with custom recording module
• Easy Button Escape Key (this guy also made a giant (non-functional) SD card)
• Another custom recording circuit on Instructables

I’d like to make something like an office WTF? counter with an Easy Button, actually. What other interesting things can be done with a giant red button?

I’ve encountered the site before, but somehow I missed out on it’s geeky awesomeness. And from that site, I’ve hit a few others that give me that tingly, geeky feeling of wanting to build stuff–like finally build that cool workshop in the back yard in which I will build other, smaller cool stuff.

Thanks to that site, I’ve also encountered other cool sites that are new to me via Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories. Like

• NYCResistor (co-founded by uber-geek-stud and my hero, Bre Pettis)
• SparkFun Electronics

There are more, and as soon as I organize all the bookmarks I’ve saved just by hitting the EMSL links, I’ll post them here.

According to the report, a program manager named Barbara Robinson repeatedly bowed to pressure from large producers to weaken or override regulations, even allowing synthetics produced with hexane, a neurotoxin, to be added to baby formula that carries the USDA organic seal. Even organic milk, which should require cows to be at least sometimes put to pasture, may be produced from cows continually confined to feed lots.

“It will unravel everything we’ve done if the standards can no longer be trusted,” said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), who sponsored the federal organics legislation. “If we don’t protect the brand, the organic label, the program is finished. It could disappear overnight.” [quoted from MSNBC]

I agree with the report’s contention that the USDA organic label is under serious threat of irrelevancy. Unfortunately, most consumers will continue to trust the seal as the utmost authority of what foods are indeed produced using trusted organic methods, if for no other reason than that they simply don’t have time to research the various organic certifications. Until the time comes that the USDA National Organic Program can be trusted, I will encourage others to visit the Organic Consumer Association‘s site to find out more about what foods can be trusted as organic. And write to your representatives and the Obama administration and demand that the USDA National Organic Program be put back on track and that people like Barbara Robinson be fired, so that the taxpayer money spent on the program is not wasted on a soon to be meaningless logo.

(Maybe the whole USDA National Organic Program, as implemented, is not such a good idea anyway. Read USDA Organic Seal – Killing hometown organic farms in America? for more.)