All posts by Lenore Edman

About Lenore Edman

Co-founder of Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories.

How to Make Japanese Papercraft Boxes

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Business card display case

Kits for Japanese boxes like these are often given in Japan as gifts to foreign vistors. Here in the states, you can sometimes find the kits in stationery stores starting at about $6, for example here and here.

Alternately, you can make one yourself– no kit required. You can use paper, paperboard and tissue you probably already have on hand to make a box that will be the shape you want, not one of the three or four readily available designs. These instructions will take you through the steps of making a business card display box, but the techniques are general and can be used for any shape that you like.
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Nixie tube take-apart

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1.94   1.94

Don’t you just love nixie tubes? They glow with a lovely neon color and have gorgeous stylized numbers– something you can’t get with a dot matrix– or even sixteen-segment LED or LCD display.

Recently, we disassembled a well-loved tube when there was a photogamer challenge to break something, and so we had a chance to peek inside and look at how they are made.

Warning: This article contains graphic images of the dissection of vintage electronics which may be disturbing to some viewers. (No working nixies were destroyed in the making of this article.)
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Ball Bushing Box Matryoshka

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We shop regularly at Weird Stuff since it is right down the street from us. We get all kinds of goodies; mostly parts for projects, but also the occasional computer or flower pot. We had a very successful shopping trip recently, and came home with a set of Russian stacking dolls (a.k.a. matryoshka, plural: matryoshki). Thomson Ball Bushing Matryoshki
Our matryoshki are in the form of a matched set of American bushing boxes in graduated sizes. They stack together beautifully, making a nesting toy of the best kind.
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My Saffron

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Edman Saffron

One of the fabulous things about living in the San Francisco Bay area is the grocery shopping. There are stores catering to the cooking styles of so many cultures and we have access to all of them. We have our favorite Japanese, Asian, Indian, Middle Eastern and Mediterranean stores. We went to one of our favorite markets, Caron International Food Market, to get Bulgarian feta, kalamatas and saffron. They keep the saffron behind the counter, with good reason. The stuff runs $500 to $5000 per pound. Last time we got some there it was a decent price, so we asked the super friendly shopkeepers for some more. Lo and behold, they pulled out a package with my name on it. Literally, my name: the package says “Edman Saffron” and my last name is Edman. How cool is that?

Keep reading for more about saffron.
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Cocktail pick storage

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Cocktail pick storage

I received a fun holiday present – a set of metal cocktail picks. They are very pointy, which I like, but this very feature raised a dilemma: where to put the darned things?! In a drawer is no good – you’ll get poked when you reach for the pastry brush.

cocktail picks   Salt shaker

I looked around the kitchen (a good way to get ideas) and my eyes lit on the salt shaker. Perfect! Food snobs that we are, our pepper lives in a grinder, not in a shaker. That meant there had to be an extra shaker somewhere, and (miraculously enough) I managed to locate it. The picks dropped right into the holes – clearly it was designed for this very purpose.
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Jasmine Fruit

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Jasmine (Stephanotis) Fruit

Our jasmine vine produced a fruit. We didn’t know they could do that.
Heck, we didn’t even know what kind of jasmine we have. It can be a little confusing, because are several vines called jasmine: Jasminum (Jasmine), Trachelospermum (Star Jasmine), and Stephanotis (Madagascar Jasmine or Bridal Veil). There is a Gardenia called Cape Jasmine, and I’m sure there are still other flowers sharing the name.

Our plant is Stephanotis, which produces clusters of sweet-scented white blossoms. It attracts hummingbirds, who feed from the flowers and perch on the vines to keep watch over their territory. And, we have learned, it occasionally produces a large inedible mango-shaped fruit.
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Remaking a Maker Bag

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tool belt stitches from outside

Last year at the Maker Faire they gave away nifty canvas tote bags that have nice large handles and are a great shape and size.

The recent call for proposals for this year’s Maker Faire has just reminded us (1) that we need to choose a project to submit (we brought our dining table last year), and (2) that we were going to do something cool with that bag! Some time ago, it was suggested in this instructable that there be a Make Bag Re-Make contest this year. In that spirit, we are providing this guide to improving your bag and making it a little more useful. We have added a zipper closure and pockets and loops for pens, tools, business cards, an mp3 player, and of course, our favorite slipstick.
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DIY exhibit in Chicago

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Shipment

We’re infiltrating Chicago! More accurately, we’re sending a few of our projects there for a little while. In the box are: the RC Sweeper, Shuffle Headphones, a holiday LED ornament and menorah, and ornament and menorah kits.

They are heading to an exhibit on DIY called “Pass It On! Connecting Contemporary Do-It-Yourself Culture” at the A+D gallery, which is affiliated with the Department of Art and Design at Columbia College Chicago.

This exhibit is unique in that all of the items on display will have accompanying instructions for viewers to take home. There will be some incredibly creative folks participating in the exhibit, so if you’re going to be in Chicago this spring (March 1 to April 14) be sure to check it out.

Thanks to the A+D folks for inviting us!

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Cashews: the nut you can’t buy in a shell

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Ever since we discovered them, we have been enjoying (and eating far too many of) the highly addictive Thai Lime & Chili Cashews from Trader Joe’s. These things should carry a warning label: “CAUTION: MAY BE HABIT FORMING.”

Anyway, while we eating them, we were asked if we knew why you can’t get cashews in the shell. We had no idea. Actually, we’d never thought about it. But, come to think of it, you can get almonds, walnuts, pistachios, brazil nuts, hazelnuts, peanuts, chestnuts, pine nuts, pecans, and even macadamia nuts in a shell, but not cashews.

Why? It turns out that the cashew shell is toxic. However, that raised the question of what a cashew looks like in its shell. Again, we had no idea. When we found out, we knew more people should see it. Weird looking, isn’t it? And caustic, too!
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