Information Overload

Apple Store, Boylston Street

Beantown rejoice! America's largest Apple retail store opens this evening at 6 PM ET on 815 Boylston Street in Boston. As usual, there will be free commemorative t-shirts, and other goodies to celebrate the occasion.

Scarlett Johansson + Ryan Reynolds

Totally missed last week's news that Scarlett Johansson and Ryan Reynolds are officially engaged.

Dammit!

Forever Stamp

It now costs 42¢ to snail mail something First-Class (as of yesterday). The first 41¢ Forever Stamp is still good. One wonders if the ATM was out of stamps the other night because people were planning ahead to save 18¢... Nah.

Inquisitor 3

Inquisitor 3 is a neat (free!) little plugin for Safari 3. It enhances the Google search field in the toolbar with Yahoo! Search Assist, a dynamic list of search result suggestions provided while typing a query. It's truly like Spotlight for the web except it uses Yahoo! instead of Google, which is probably why the former recently acquired Inquisitor 3.

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to my Mom! Love ya!

Also, Happy Mother's Day to Jessica Alba, whose baby girl is due soon.

Stamp Out Hunger

The Wallet Pen

The Wallet Pen is the perfect replacement for iPhone users who used to depend on always having a pen stylus readily available in their old smartphone. It fits nicely in the fold of a wallet, and is easier to grip than most pen styli. $49 may seem steep, but the ballpoint pen is refillable, and feels built to last a lifetime (or until ink pens are no longer needed). The Original Wallet Pen can even be custom engraved for only $8 more!

Blizzard My Game Downloads

Blizzard's soul still remains in tact after being acquired by Activision. The new "My Game Downloads" section of Blizzard Account management serves as a game key safe for StarCraft, Warcraft III, Diablo II, and related expansion packs. Once registered, the games can be downloaded in their entirety, and played sans cumbersome CD. OG StarCraft fans are rewarded for their loyalty with keys for the complete StarCraft Anthology!

SIGG Bottle

Picked up a SIGG bottle to celebrate Earth Day. The SIGG bottle is extruded from a single piece of reusable (i.e. environmentally friendly) aluminum. Its innards are lined by a patented SIGG coating, which isn't supposed to flake if the sturdy bottle is dented. The non-toxic coating prevents water from acquiring a metallic taste—for the most part—from the aluminum bottle.

Got the SIGG model that holds 0.6 Liters. That's 0.1 Liters more liquid than the 0.5 Liter plastic water bottles. So far, so good despite some minor drawbacks compared to the disposable plastic bottle: Aluminum is less forgiving on the teeth (using the screw top). Transparent aluminum hasn't been invented yet so it's not possible to glance at how much water is left. The outer surface is more conducive to condensation from cold water from the cooler. Reusable containers need to be cleaned, periodically. This particular SIGG bottle also doesn't fit as well in the back jeans pocket although the ringed screw top is easy enough to loop around a finger. It would be nice if the screw top took fewer turns to un/screw.

On the bottle-is-half-full side, the SIGG looks cool, a model of Swiss design. Using one elicits a warm and fuzzy feeling that fewer plastic bottles are going into a landfill. It can probably be used as a blunt weapon if needed yet it's still about as light as a plastic bottle. Most importantly, SIGG bottles aren't susceptible of leeching chronically toxic bisphenol A (a.k.a BPA) into water like their plastic counterparts. BPA bad!

Mike Birbiglia

Saw Mike Birbiglia at Cobb's Comedy Club in S.F. over the weekend. Mike Birbiglia is funny, but not at the Dave Chappelle level... CBS has greenlighted a pilot about the somewhat pudgy and awkward comedian called "Mike Birbiglia's Secret Public Journal," a show based on his blog. Hopefully, his TV show will be about more than pimping CD's and DVD's.