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In the past year, I have experienced three very useful inventions. They are of the type that made me wish I had gotten them sooner. So now I’m sharing them with you, so you can have a better life.

• Ratchet Belt

  

  I have worn out a number of belts because my waist is a consistent size. So I’m always putting the belt buckle on the same setting, and all that wear and tear in one spot causes the notch to wear out faster. The rest of the belt is fine, but it’s gnarly-looking at best or worn through at worst.

  I tried the web-type belts with the clamping claw, but that has two problems. 1: the claw is slightly destructive, so the more I use the belt the worse it looks. I can see scratches and runs in the fabric webbing. And 2: the buckle releases way too easily. It occasionally catches on something when I turn and it pops open, rendering the belt temporarily useless.

  But at Christmas I got a ratchet belt, the kind with the ratchet on the underside. These belts are awesome. The design keeps any wear and tear to the inside of the belt, so no one sees it. It’s not infinitely-adjustable, but the sizing is a lot finer resolution than traditional notches. I highly recommend them.

• Clicky Paper Towel Holder
  That’s a clicky holder of paper towels, not a holder of clicky paper towels.

  

  My sister got one of these and we tried it and then had to buy our own.

  You can look up “click paper towel holder” or “one hand paper towel holder” or something like that.

  The point is that you can pull the end gently and it unrolls, but if you tear it then it doesn’t unroll. There’s a resistance mechanism built into it. Now I don’t have the weekly chore of winding the paper towels back onto the roll.

• Stepped Car Ramps

  

  I saw a Youtube video about someone who made these, and I was inspired to make my own. Sometimes the Youtube feed algorithm works.

  In this case, it’s useful for me because I work on my cars and I have a stick shift. I’ve had a set of ramps for years, and they’ve been helpful, but I never liked trying to get the manual car up them.

  Also in my case, I’m a little gun shy because I did overshoot the end of a ramp once, and ended up having to jack up the side of the car to free the ramp that it had crashed on. So now I am cautious if I think I’m nearing the end of the ramp.

  With the stick, it’s a pain trying to be cautious on a ramp, because that’s not good for the clutch. Also, my parking brake is not that good so if I stop before the end of the old-style ramp, I have to go back down to the beginning.

  The stepped car ramp is nice because I can count to know when I’m on the last level. 1, 2, 3, stop. And if something goes wrong and I have to stop before the end, each section is level so the car never rolls back. I can stop on level 2 and the car stays there. Note that I built my car ramps longer than this set, so each level has plenty of room for a tire.

  It’s also probably better for the automatic transmissions too – don’t want to use the parking pawl to hold you in place on a ramp while you get out to check if you’re at the top yet.

With a couple different vacations this summer, I’ve had time to read some books. Half of these I picked and half of these were recommended to me by the wife and/or kids.

I’m going in order of when I read them.

First up: The Time Machine by H.G. Wells

I have read this book before, but it was a while ago. It was on our shelf when I was looking for books to read, and as it was a small book it looked good for a vacation read.

I like this classic sci-fi type of book, and because it’s such a classic I feel any review I give will be mostly useless. If you’ve never read H.G. Wells it would be an okay start.

Next up: King Solomon’s Mines by H. Rider Haggard

I picked this book off our shelves as something to read for the last few vacations, and took it along but never got around to reading it. It also is not a very large book. It was a more interesting story than The Time Machine. I liked it, but it’s not for everyone these days. It was written a while back and different things were socially acceptable back then.

Spoiler Alert

After I read it, I was thinking it would make a good movie, but no one would make it as written. It’s about white people who are journeying into the heart of Africa to find some treasure, and helping a displaced king of a tribe regain his throne. I was thinking what they could do to make it into a movie, then I realized that’s basically the plot of Black Panther. Any attempt to make a movie of KSM would be seen as a white man’s Black Panther. And to remove the African tribe element would turn it into any other adventure story, which would probably be fine, but then it wouldn’t be this story. I think its time has passed for a movie.

End Spoiler Alert

Next up: Story Thieves by H. James Riley

Just kidding, the author is James Riley. But all the authors so far had a first initial of H. so I tried to continue the trend.

This one is like Inception. Except it’s a book. I’ll call it Bookception.

James Riley wrote this book, but in this book there’s an author who is writing his book series, and the protagonists move between the two. It was an entertaining story. There are more books to the series than this first one, which worked well enough as a standalone. It left the door open for the rest of the series but its not like some books that don’t resolve enough in the first book so you have to read the rest.

I don’t remember anything objectionable, so it’s probably fine for anyone who wants to read it. Lower middle grade certainly.

My only complaint is that now I’m interested in reading the book series that’s in this book. I was going to call it the fictional book series. As opposed to the fiction book series. James Riley should take up the pseudonym of the guy in the story and publish those books.

Next up: The Blackthorn Key by Kevin Sands

This one was highly recommended by my son, who is entering 9th grade. It was a refreshing change of pace – a unique setting and characters. England around the time of the Black Plague.

It is a little violent and gruesome, but not out of place with the things that probably happened back then. As with the previous review, I have read only the first book, so I can’t vouch for the rest of the series. But no problems with upper middle grade readers for this one.

Next up: Land of Stories by Chris Colfer

This is another one that I’ve been trying to read for a while. This was one of the better books I’ve read recently, as far as getting into it and wanting to read it once I’ve started. It’s good for people who know all their fairy tales and nursery rhymes and such. So if your kids don’t know those, have them go through Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen, and Mother Goose collections.

As with the previous review, I have read only the first book, so I can’t vouch for the rest of the series. But no problems with lower middle grade readers for this one.

That’s it for this review. Maybe I’ll be able to finish a series soon.

I just watched Pocahontas for the first time, and it was funny how closely it stuck to the standard Disney formula. I knew there were certain themes that were popular, but after that I listed all them I thought of and now I present those to you, dear reader.

• Main character is the daughter of the king/chief/etc. Bonus points if her mother has died.
• The king wants his daughter to follow traditions, but the daughter is impetuous and does not want to.
• She follows her own way and ends up falling in love with someone not from around these parts, which causes trouble.
• The king or villain or mob of townsfolk tries to kill the love interest, but …
• The daughter intervenes and changes her father’s heart / persuades the locals / helps defeats the villain to save the day.
• Everyone, including loyal animal sidekicks, lives happily ever after.

I came up with this list mostly with Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Little Mermaid, and Moana in mind (and Pocahontas of course), but some of it also applies to Mulan and Tangled.

Side note: I think some of the success of Frozen is due to its not following the formula.
Barely related note: The Emperor’s New Groove 2 (AKA Kronk’s New Groove) was made with minimal effort. They really phoned it in for that one – do not watch unless you have a lot of time to kill and nothing better to do.

Here is a GIF of a typing bubble. For hours of fun, text this to a few people when you can watch their reactions.

Some people don’t care, and others seem to really anticipate what you’re going to finish typing.

Our chat thingy at work does the same thing, and now people can track how long it takes me to compose a sentence. My wife knows by now that it may take awhile: “how long until you’re done working?” “I just need to finish this email” … 20 minutes later … “how long is that email?” “two paragraphs, almost done” I like to be thorough.

Although I do feel bad for the other person on the occassions when I’ve written most of a response but then got distracted or pulled away by something else. Then I’ll find my unsent chat message the next day and I’ll wonder how long the other person sat and waited for me to send my message.

Fun times.

I was reading something about appliances and someone mentioned the benefit of a new appliance is that new appliances are so much more energy efficient than the old ones

Then I was reading something else and people were complaining about how they don’t make stuff like they used to – old appliances would last for 20-30 years and now people are happy to get 5 years out of a new appliance.

So I put 2 and 2 together, and realized everything is a wash. It doesn’t matter what you do, the end result is the same.

Total cost of ownership? The same. Your old appliance costs more to operate, but you don’t have the replace it as much. Would you rather have small utility bills and a large lump-sum purchase every few years, or have somewhat higher utility bills and no lump-sum purchases?

Total energy impact to the planet? The same. Yes, the old appliance uses more energy at your house, but it gets built and shipped only once. How much energy does it take to build and ship 3 newer appliances over the span of that one old appliance? And dispose of them too.

I give the advantage to the old appliance, because I don’t like the inconvenience of having an appliance break, and having to scramble to replace it. But others may like more frequent upgrades, akin to repainting rooms and rearranging furniture.

Note: this is also my thought process about cars. I stick with older cars that have less to go wrong. The only problem is that because of salty roads, their longevity is not as assured as something like a refrigerator or a clothes dryer.

I have an update to an old post about the trichotomy of features. This one pertains to the problems with buying a used car.

Having bought several used cars over the past few years, I have noticed that it’s tough to find one with both an owner’s manual and two keys. And if they do have those, then there’s a large crack in the windshield. Since I avoid buying cars with bad windshields, it’s 50/50 for me on whether I get 2 keys. I get why people might lose a key, but where are they taking the owner’s manual that it gets lost?

I’ve been able to fit some book reading in during the long dark winter nights, so here are some more reviews.

First up: Aster and the Accidental Magic by Thom Pico and Karensac

This one was fine. It’s a graphic novel, aimed at the grade-school set. The drawing style took a little getting used to. No other problems here.

Next up: A Boy Called Bat by Elana K. Arnold

This book seemed to be mostly an insight into how an autistic boy thinks, trying to promote understanding and compassion for why he does the things he does. And by that measure, I think it succeeds. I don’t know that it’s the most compelling or gripping storyline, but it has its place.

Next up: The Dungeoneers by John David Anderson

Of these 4 books, this was the most entertaining. But it is also the one targeted to the oldest audience group, junior high+, so that might have something to do with it. A ragtag group of misfits bonds together in a common quest to [prove themselves to others / gain the family they miss or never had / redeem something for some debt / etc.] Standard adventure fare, but in a good way. Nothing objectionable, other than some peril and vague violence (with swords and clubs and such).

Next up: Granted also by John David Anderson

Same author, but much different. Different style, different type of book, different audience (although one could argue they’re both in the Fantasy genre). Whereas The Dungeoneers had a storytelling tone, Granted had a conversational tone. And, but for one word, nothing objectionable if you’re okay with the premise of fairies granting wishes. There was one word thrown in to promote acceptance of alternative lifestyles. The author didn’t make it a big point, but it just seemed enough out of place from the rest of the book that it stood out.

That’s it for this review. More book reviews coming up later this year.