Butcher block top, pine and poplar base, with poplar slats.
Solid Redwood Kitchen Table
Solid redwood slab, hairpin legs. Planed and sanded smooth, then finished with a protective varnish.
King size bed frame
Jim wanted to build a new bed frame to replace one that got destroyed while moving. We made it in 4 hours, at a cost of $94!
Fun Tech: Wimote Whiteboard
Wiimotes are cheap, and useful for all sorts of fun things! Just made this video to show off one of the things they can do.
C&B’s Old Fashioned Quinine Tonic
Friends who make things
Erin and Steph make their own Quinine tonic — it is delicious. I helped them with their packaging. I think it turned out pretty well!
Want some Quinine tonic of your own? Give me a shout. They are now selling it in San Francisco!
Small batches, made with care to order. You can get some of the first or second batches they are distributing to the public.
-Ben
Share with your tribe
Long ago it was prudent to share where good food, dangerous animals, and adequate shelter could be found with other members of your tribe. The more your tribe shared, the faster it learned.
Tribe: a distinctive close-knit group
How much of the digital content you consume comes to you by way of social media? Facebook, Twitter, the blogs you choose to read? How often do you re-share this information?
Instagram has a certain feel. People saw what others were doing with the filters, and started copying them. Then they started improvising and creating new content. This is happening with Vine now too. More people are becoming entrepreneurs because they see others doing it. We are a sharing and learning species.
I want a way for my tribe to give me daily, weekly, monthly updates on what they are learning. Where they failed, where they succeeded. The signal to noise ratio of Facebook makes it an imperfect platform for this. The time it takes to write an article and post it to a blog is a technological and mental hurdle for many people.
I want to learn from my tribe.
A few questions – and I really want answers:
- How big is your tribe?
- How do you share knowledge?
- What is the nature of the knowledge you share?
- eg. Do you share instruction on how to build something, job openings, videos, photos, social knowledge (gossip!) etc…
4 of the Most Useful iOS 6 Jailbreak Apps
The iOS 6 jailbreak is being created by the fellows of evad3rs (with MuscleNerd) and can be found at http://www.evasi0n.com/ I have a list of useful iOS 6 jailbreak apps for you to try.
There has not been an iOS jailbreak for quite some time, and this will the first one that allows people with an iPhone 4S to upgrade their operating system.
Useful iOS 6 Jailbreak apps and tools
Jailbreaking allows you to do a lot with your phone. Here are some of my favorite tweaks.
You can get these apps on cydia – the jailbroken app store after you jailbreak.
Swipe Selection
This Cydia install allows you to simply move your fingers over the keyboard, like they were arrow keys. No more damn magnifying glass. This is the best update to typing on an iPhone, and worth jailbreaking for alone.
Activator
This tweak allows you to change how the hardware buttons (Home, Volume, sleep and mute switch) behave, or to make custom touch interactions. Now when I want to launch my sound recorder, I just double tab the lock screen clock. Double pressing the sleep button brings up 1Password, so I don’t have to remember long passwords.
f.lux
f.lux changes the color temperature of your screen depending on sunrise and sunset. This makes it easier on your eyes as it gets darker out. Because it changes to a more incandescent color – you do not get the “wake up” effect of staring at a screen.
3G Unrestrictor
Want to use facetime over 3G or LTE? This is your tool. It tricks any app into thinking 3G (or LTE) is actually wifi.
If you have any questions about jailbreaking or these useful iOS 6 Jailbreak apps – ask me! I am more than happy to walk you through it.
Open
Today I woke up with an open mind. I have literally endless opportunities ahead of me. Should I set up a new workstation in my woodshop, read a book, or go for a hike? Should I rent a chainsaw and turn some felled trees in my backyard into chairs, or cut the grass? Should I do none of those things and spend the day on Facebook? The best part – IT DOESN’T MATTER. I now have a plethora of this rare commodity called “Free Time”.
I am willing to trade some of this precious time for interesting experiences. Want to go do something random? Hit me up.
AppGratis “Free” apps may be gamed
Apps are marketed as going from paid to free, a little research showed that this is sometimes a contrived marketing ploy.
Apps that were free switch to paid for a short time before they are featured, so that they can say they dropped in price.
App Rankings for appHiFi Dock Enhancer – note the price INCREASE that precedes the price drop for AppGratis.
App Rankings for Turnacle – note a similar price INCREASE that precedes the price drop for AppGratis.
Here is a short list of other apps that see a boost in rankings from AppGratis.
AppGratis’s description of their service:
Free & paid-to-free apps daily.
Huge discounts on paid apps.
Every single app hand-picked & tested thoroughly.
One unintrusive push notification a day.
AppGratis just raised $13.5 for their app discovery engine from Iris Capital and the Orange Publicis Fund.
Even with the gaming of the system, there is no denying the success of the AppGratis platform. Featured apps spike in rankings, seeing a push into the top 5 or so apps in the Apple app store. Pretty sweet little bump.
Your best cup: The Aeropress Coffee Press
I recently purchased the the Aeropress Coffee press on Amazon for $25.
I love it!
I had read good reviews and watch several videos of it in action, and decided I wanted a better cup of coffee.
Let’s just say my coffee consumption has gone up… a lot. Before, I was making coffee with a french press, but I would put off cleaning it because it was a pain, and I always had a lot of sediment at the bottom of my glass, which was ok, but not a great taste.
The Aeropress leaves no sediment, and only takes 15 – 20 seconds to make an excellent cup, and cleans up almost instantly.
It lets me carefully tweak my brew using scientific method to make it exactly how I like it. If you are looking for a better cup of coffee, I suggest you try it out.