These insanely confusing door bells are very simple, if you know what is happening – they sense the kinetic energy of a knock on the door, and use that to trip a circuit which rings a door bell. So basically, whenever somebody knocks on your door, they will hear a door bell sound. Argh!!

It is called the Knock Knock Door Chime  - ”Who’s There? Orange. Orange Who? Orange you glad I didn’t say green!”, and it costs $49.95 (US, I assume). Personally I think it is really, really unnecessary … if you can be bothered going to the effort of installing a doorbell, and then replacing the batteries, etc, why wouldn’t you extend the convenience and wonders of technology to your guests, who then only have to push a button when they want you to open the door, rather than bruising their knuckles and having to think up a crazy rhythm to knock to. Personally I like the old standard : ”Knock, kn-kn-kn knock knock” ;-)

Perhaps the most amusing thing about this invention is the way it is described in the blog post where we first came across it. It is said to both ‘confuse and punish your visitors’, and is described in the conclusion as ‘new-age retardetry’ !! Will definitely be adding that one to the Lucy edition of the Macquarie dictionary ;-)

The second most amusing thing would have to be the official promotional photo – hilarious!

Although I suppose there is definitely one good thing which has come out of this ‘retardetry’ … and that is the fact that rather than surpassing the old standard of the traditional and gorgeous doorknocker, it really is an advertisement for it!

Hee hee! We love the internet … that is why we work on it, all day long! It is because of gems such as this that our love for the net remains strong and true … and we don’t betray it, by doing most of our business at the shop front or other such traditional place ;-) Here we have for you some advice on lighting your kitchen … we think! If any translations of this text are offered, we are happy to accept them. Unless, that is, they have been done by a computer program! Even if anybody knows what language this has been automatically translated from, we would be happy to know :)

The only excited thing concerning this project is the planning aspect. I have been stipulated rather I can on each of your requests provide. If you to have long ceiling in the kitchen area nine feet happy enough are, the final result leaves your breath to take.

The importance of kitchen reduction is frequently overlooked. But too often a builder or remodeler only one range lights put in a niche and/or some surface institutions install to fulfil the need for general aim reduction. The modern kitchen is frequently much more than only the work area. It can be a quiet area true you by itself relaxes himself, a space where two people speak casually and become each other know it, or it can be anteroom who are used to support activities in an adjacent space. An assortment of reduction types will permit you the poll in your kitchen no maximise question what you use it for.

I find most dramatically you can in a kitchen reach am indirect mix reduction with direct reduction see. Indirect reduction becomes gecreeerd hiding the lichtbron of opinion. Light that it is caused by the hidden institution a warm of a ceiling or a wall and causes gloed plays at marbles which enormous quantities of atmosphere if done only exactly adds. The light institutions are possible on top of or it are hidden under wall cabinets or they are possible in open troughs or laminated ceiling areas are installed which surround the complete kitchen space. Open soffits can be installed in a space with eight feet ceiling altitude, but they look at best as the ceiling nine if even ten feet are long

These awesome automatic doors from Japan have a difference – which will be immediately apparent if you watch the video. They conform to the shape of your body, opening only as far as they need to for you to get through comfortably.

It sounds a bit faddish and useless at first hearing, but you soon realise that the implications on energy efficiency are actually quite great. Automatic doors have become something of a necessity in modern shops, as unfortunately people need to be able to get out with full hands, they often can’t use a door handle. A door handle would obviously be the most energy efficient (and beautiful!) option of all – it uses human energy rather than carbon-vomiting coal powered energy to open the door, and combats the obesity problem in its own small way with every time it must be opened.

So, automatic doors are here to stay – convenience and obesity win – but the payoff need not be a waste of energy in lost heat or cool every time the door opens and stays open for those few seconds longer than it needs to. This automatic door also minimises the entry of dust and pollens, for those sneezy people.

When it comes to wonderful, inexplicable old mechanical door locks, Sweden has all the luck! The rust on this Swedish door lock has not only become an artistic part of it, from the photographer’s point of view, but seems to have become part of the actual structure! If it were ever cleaned, scrubbed and de-rusted, I think it might fall apart.

You can tell how stiff it would be, and how many times you would have to curse at the lock to make it open, by looking at the metal spiral in the bottom left corner. This is what the key would turn … but only with much stronger fingers than mine!

Okay, this is not particularly technologically advanced … in fact, when your husband sees this, he will probably mysteriously disappear into the garage, reappearing only with a tape measure in his hand and several ping pong balls in the other … but the concept is very next century. Isn’t it???

This is the ping-pong door, which flips from the normal vertical position to a horizontal position, so that you can play ping pong on it. It is actually an inner panel that flips up and down, so you don’t need to have extra clearance on the bottom and top of your door to allow flipping. Ah ha! The table also hones your aim and accuracy, as you have such a reduced space available for shots – if you don’t get good pretty soon, you’ll be very sick of running to pick up the ball.

Also saves the hassle and space of having a normal table, even one with fold-up legs. The bloggers that have commented on this have all noted that you have to have a bright green door on one side … although really you could paint it any colour you liked, as long as it is dark enough to provide a contrast with the white ball. You could try red, brown, or even black – although green might be interesting, for a change!

The brackets that hold the net supposedly flip down to provide a streamlined profile (stopping you or somebody else putting an eye out!). This became available in early 2008, and we would be very interested to know if anybody out there has or has seen one!

The only downside I can see is that if you want to enter or exit a room while people are playing door-pong, you will need to crawl under the table … could be very, very interesting.