Bart Sedgwick

A pregnant acquaintance of mine related the following story, about how "Grandmas of Harlem continue to come to my rescue." As she boarded a bus, the following happened:

This grandmother, sitting in an interior seat of the bus, saw me and flagged me over. The young man sitting next to her got ready to stand to let her out and asked her, "Are you getting up?" The grandmother said "No, baby, you are."

It's fair to say that no one knows what a pregnant woman goes through better than a woman that has been pregnant. In addition to the baby's weight, women pack on supportive pounds during pregnancy which, coupled with the new shape on the front of their body, turns previously trivial tasks like pulling socks on or getting into a car into outright ordeals.

In an effort to build awareness, a government initiative in Japan had three governors wear pregnancy-simulating rigs, then asked them to conduct daily tasks, both of their own office and of what a pregnant housewife might do on a daily basis. While there are no subtitles, the visuals are easy enough to understand:

Japan is a nation where traditional gender roles are still mostly adhered to. The initiative, which is part of Japan's Work Life Promotion Campaign, is intended to educate Japanese men on what their pregnant wives go through, in an effort to encourage them to do more housework themselves. The "96.7%" number shown towards the end of the video reflects the percentage of men who, after viewing the footage, agreed that they need to do more to pitch in.

That pregnancy rig, by the way, would make a great tool for male designers who are designing products or environments for pregnant women. But the better solution, of course, would be to have pregnant women design them themselves.

Story by Chris Priestman for Kill Screen.

Corridors are a significant architectural space in a lot of science fiction films. Perhaps you haven't considered this before given the brevity of their screen time. And that's largely due to the corridor's purpose as an interstitial space that connects rooms, meaning they are usually walked or ran through, and not dwelled upon.

One of the first lessons in filmmaking is to cut out any unnecessary footage when editing, and the example used is often a shot concerning a character walking between locations. It's a lesson that informs its student that the corridor is a waste of time, for the most part. Hence, when a corridor does make an appearance in a film, it is never happenstance; it's always for effect.

Take the Death Star in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, which is depicted almost entirely as a labyrinth of imposing corridors to be run through. This builds the idea that the space station is a hive of militaristic activity with soldiers constantly striding through to deliver messages to their superiors. Everyone is walking and talking; people in a constant state of transit in front of the camera.

Later on, the same corridors play host to Han Solo and Chewbacca's escape, forcing them to run and shoot in a half-backwards manner at the pursuing Stormtroopers for the lack of cover. Similarly, in Alien, Ellen Ripley alternately dashes and creeps through the hissing smoke and spinning red alarms of the Nostromo's corridors as it counts down to self-detonation. These narrow, dark passages are the veins and arteries of this enormous starfreighter, which has become host to a deadly creature. The corridors provide nowhere for Ripley to hide but are the quickest way for her to reach the evacuation shuttle that she has prepared for herself.

melisica:

(by vladislav popov)

Today’s must read comes to us from Fortune, where editor at large Allan Sloane rails against “Positively un-American tax dodges.” Its your must read for today.

Let’s see if the our elected representatives can manage to stop behaving like 10 year olds long enough to resolve this.

You never realize how hard it is to hang something until you actually have to do it. Getting your photo/art/mirror/whatever straight is tough enough, but finding a hanging system that doesn't take away from what you're trying to display is often a challenge in itself. Enter Dartstrip, a new product that epitomizes how the best design should be invisible.

And like most unseen designs, the system is deceptively simple: Dartstrip is nothing more than an eight-foot strip of magnetized steel with a restickable adhesive backing. The product is laser-scored with snap points at one-inch increments for easy customization depending on how large or wide your display space is. The strips are a clean white and can be painted over to match walls and other surfaces; magnetic 'pins' hold posters or photos in place. Check out the video below to see what Dartstrip is all about before we go into the details with co-founder Kermit Westergaard:

But the major innovation of Dartstrip comes in the form of none other than the packaging.

I was looking for something to clean under my major appliances without removing them. Vacuum crevasse tools are never long enough and nothing beats cloth-to-surface contact like this microfiber duster.

You’ll make a yuck face after extracting years of accumulated cat food kibbles and M&Ms from underneath your range and fridge.

The duster sleeve (washable and replaceable) is very fluffy along the edges and I’m slightly concerned about it catching on something under the appliance. Hasn’t happened yet, though. I ordered another just in case.

Yet another OXO win.

-- John Coke

OXO Good Grips Microfiber Slim Duster
$23

Available from Amazon