We’ve all heard about the issue of waste caused by disposable soda bottles and cans. Under Soviet rule, they had this efficient, if slightly stomach-turning solution: the communal cup soda fountain. There’s only one glass cup, and everyone uses it. When you’re done, you place it on the right side, upside-down, and it’s cleaned by jets of water, ready for the next thirsty person that comes along.

I should be clear that, to the best of my knowledge, the countries formerly under the U.S.S.R. don’t use this system anymore. The only reason I came across it was because one was in a statue park, where the communist-era monuments depicting Stalin, Lenin et al were gathered, along with other Soviet miscellany after their empire collapsed. The soda machine has been kept running, I assume, as a reminder of those times.

My girlfriend snapped a photo of it when she was in Lithuania a couple of years ago. Her brother (pictured) was the only one brave enough to drink from it, though in effect I suppose it’s no worse than drinking from a cup in a restaurant.

My Photos of Port in the City

Yesterday, Montreal’s port had an open house. There were tours by train, bus and boat which carried visitors into the heart of the city’s port operations. It was great to see the inner workings of a system which is easy to take for granted. We saw ocean-going freighters being unloaded, and the much smaller lake-going ships readying themselves to take cargo to the great-lake cities of Toronto, Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, and Thunder Bay.

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Time Fountain

A relatively simple little fountain that ingeniously seems to bend time.

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Zoom into Concrete

A powers of 10 style video that shows the structures of concrete in great detail, down to a molecular level. Like the original poster, I would love to see this done for other materials.

My friend at Lake Jane has posted a profile of Les Touilleurs, the best cooking store in my town of Montréal. Aside from having an attractive space, they do a few things very right. In a certain sense it might be seen as the opposite of a big-box commodity store.

A few of the things they do which I wish more stores would copy:

- No packaging. You can pick everything up and see how it actually feels in your hand. It also lets you more adequately tell the quality of what you are going to buy, which can be difficult behind the thick packaging on many products.

- Small, but good, selection. They have been known to discontinue items that are selling well if they decide the quality isn’t up to snuff. This sort of editorializing makes sure you get something really good, and builds a great customer loyalty. Yes, you could buy something cheaper elsewhere, but you know the one from here will be great, and will probably last at least 10 years if maintained well.

- An Excellent Staff. They really know enough to help you find what you want. These aren’t apathetic Best Buy workers who don’t care about what they’re doing, they take pride in their work and it shows.

- Educational Courses. Cooking workshops are held often in the in-store kitchen. Many top chefs from the city take part.

In an effort to keep my home as free of harsh chemicals as possible, for the last year or so I’ve been making my own cleaning products. I’ve found them to be just as effective as commercial cleaners, but a whole lot cheaper. They’re also much healthier, and avoid releasing chemicals like Phosphates into the environment. Some of them are dead-easy, and some need a bit of work to make.

As I experienced success with certain cleaners, I’ve slowly branched out and added more to my repertoire. This is a round-up of my experiences, which have been almost universally positive.

Note: Everyone may not get the same results. Test on a small section first. Tweak recipes as necessary. These should be safe, but could damage some surfaces so be very careful.

Spray Cleaner

Ingredients:
- 1 PartWhite Vinegar
- 1 Part Water
- A Pinch of Dish Soap
- Lemon Juice (Optional)
- Essential Oils (Optional)

Cost: About 25 to 50 cents a bottle

Uses: Counters, Appliances, Outside of Toilet, Tabletops (be sure to test in a small area first), as daily shower spray.

This is probably the easiest one to make. The smell took a little getting used-to, but dissipates very quickly. It can also be nicely covered by a few drops of essential oils of your desired scent. Lemon juice works well too, and helps cut grease.

Pure white vinegar also does a great job cleaning toilets. Pour a cup or two into the water and let it sit for 15 to 20 minutes. Come back and stains will come right off.

Pure vinegar can also work as a glass cleaner, though doesn’t do quite as good a job as ammonia-based cleaners on heavy jobs.

Tub, Sink & Stove Cleaner

Ingredients:
- Baking Soda. That’s usually it.
- Table Salt, if needed.

Uses: Ceramics, Vinyl Floors, Stovetops, Fridges.

Cost: About $3-$4 for 2 KG of Baking Soda

This was a resounding success. Turns out that it does a pretty great job cleaning anything that needs a bit of scouring. I put mine into a jar and poked holes in the lid with a hammer and nail, so I can shake it onto cleaning surfaces. I then scrub with a damp cloth before wiping the Baking Soda away with a damp cloth.

This also did an absolutely fantastic job on our ceramic stovetop. We had tried several other cleaners, and found that this was better than some dedicated ceramic stovetop cleaners.

Drain Cleaner

Pour some Baking Soda down the drain, then pour in some vinegar. Wait a few minutes and then pour in boiling water.

Doesn’t unblock all drains, but can help some slower ones move a little faster.

Toothpaste (Experimental)

Ingredients:
- Baking Soda
- Table Salt
- Food-safe Vegetable Glycerine
- Peppermint Essential Oil

View the Full Recipe.

Cost: About $1 to $2 for 100ml

I was very skeptical of this one, but it worked-out better than I expected. I’m too chicken to use it exclusively, but I hedge my bets by using this one at night, and a more conventional toothpaste in the morning.

It’s really refreshing, and leaves my mouth feeling very clean.

I’m still putting this one in the “experimental” category. I am not a dentist, and so can’t guarantee 100% that this is safe long term. I do know that my mouth feels just as clean after brushing with this as it does with normal toothpaste.

I put mine in a reusable toothpaste bottle, though I assume this might be harder to find for some people. I suspect a chef’s style squeeze bottle would work well too.

The Gruen Transfer is the glassy-eyed, all-encompassing state of pure shopping consumers get in when they walk through the doors of a shopping mall or large department store. Douglas Rushkoff, in an article for PBS, describes it as:

a psycho-physical response to the overwhelming sensory data in a self-contained consumer environment . . .named for the gentleman who invented the shopping mall, where this mental paralysis is most commonly observed.

Fez’s Phil Fish on the Indie Games Industry

His comments on the “boiling ocean of shit” that is the mainstream games industry, given at the recent Interfaces Montréal summit. The designer of Indie-game Fez compares the cookie-cutter first-person shooters with great lower-fi fare like Rez, Katamari Damacy, and Ico. Via JiPé.

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6 Retarded Gas Saving Schemes

This is more for comedy than anything else. It’s amazing to see what people are actually trying to sell, and the lies they are willing to spout in order to do so.

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Seven Things You Need to Know About Ed Tufte

Anyone not familiar with Tufte’s work, and need a quick introduction, can read this to start. If you are interested in design you need to read his books, period.

Billboards and other ads in public spaces are, in most cases, a unsightly and irritating blights on the urban landscape. In the wake of more and more advertising noise, advertisers have of course started creating bigger and bigger ads. In Toronto, many of them have, according to some, begun to post their ads in clear violation of signage laws. In response, street artist Posterchild has been stenciling the phone number for the city’s building division along with the words “hows my advertising”, in hopes of having more people call to complain.

A website, illegalsigns.ca, has also popped-up to bring attention to the practice. They estimate that 175 of the 200 large vinyl wall signs in Toronto do not have the proper permits, and are thus illegal.

Amazingly, it even seems to have worked, as at least one advertiser has withdrawn their billboard, at least for now.

Read more at The Torontoist.

Time banking is a way that helps encourage community involvement while reducing the emphasis on money. Get Rich Slowly, which I’ve just started following, has an introduction to the practice:

Time-banking is built around the basic concept of earning and spending hours. Everyone’s skills, whether they are a medical professional or a house painter, are worth one “time dollar” per hour. The hours that you earn are stored in a “timebank” and can then be redeemed for any service of your choice from any member of the timebank.

This sounds like a great alternative to money-based transactions, at least for community involvement. Also a great way for volunteers to collect some reward for their time.

I’m far from the first person to link to this article, but it’s definitely worth a read. It’s a very forward-looking examination of the implications of our mass-produced society.

Yet the previous round of wealth in this economy was built on selling precious copies, so the free flow of free copies tends to undermine the established order. If reproductions of our best efforts are free, how can we keep going? To put it simply, how does one make money selling free copies?

I have an answer. The simplest way I can put it is thus:

When copies are super abundant, they become worthless.
When copies are super abundant, stuff which can’t be copied becomes scarce and valuable.

Kevin Kelly — The Technium

Here’s a set of locally made dishware I stumbled across on the weekend. They wear their non-commodity status on their sleeve by proudly declaring “not made in china”.

While I don’t generally think it’s a good idea to sell or buy something for what it isn’t, rather than what it was, I couldn’t help but be struck by the design.