Monthly Archives: March 2005

The button: The Gilette M3Power Razor

It was a scene from a TV commercial … i was standing around at a party and i noticed that Rob Reid has a really clean shave. commenting on this, Rob launches into a log product pitch on the Gillette M3 Power razor and tells me that his fiancée was also impressed with his close shave. Nearby at the same party, fellow shaver Alan Peterson chimes in that he loves the M3 Power too. they both made the switch right when the product come out — and neither will ever go back.

of course, i ran out to my local Walgreen’s the next day to pick up the $10 shaver and the $2 blades. pricey. is it worth it? well Rob and Alan swear by it. my tests for one week are very positive and i’m liking it enough to spend the time blogging it.

Gillette M3 Power razor is part of their Mach3 line. but unlike those shavers, the M3 Power has room for a AAA battery and it buzzes while it shaves — so it gets really close. And it is shower safe which is key. i’m not totally sure why it works, but it does. it is really cool. of course, when buzzing the handle on the shaver looks exactly like a marital aid … but that is another story …

Summation: this is definitely a product worth testing.

I asked Alan Peterson, who is my new maven on all things shaving, a question where to get cheap blades.

Alan:

Ah, cheap blades. That’s a tough one. Even at Costco there doesn’t seem to be a huge discount, so I’m not sure what to tell you. However, don’t feel that you have to get the blades housed in matching green plastic. Results from my test lab indicate that you can use the plain old blue “Mach 3” blades with the vibrating green handle. The only difference, as far as I can tell, is that the green cartridges have more yellow than the blue ones.

Alan also has a really good travel tip:

When traveling, I now take the battery out of the handle–sometimes the button gets pushed by the baggage handlers/inspectors, and then you arrive with a button that when pushed has no perceivable effect.

Books: The Moral Animal

Review of Amazon.com: Books: The Moral Animal : Why We Are, the Way We Are: The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology by Robert Wright

Why are we the way we are? Moral Animal tries to answer this question. The book was suggested to me by Patrick McKenna and Scott Faber and Alan Peterson … all telling me the book would change the way i look at life. And while the book was not as profound as to change my outlook, it was extremely fascinating and mind expanding and i would highly suggest reading the book.

The book chronicles Darwin and his ideas. And it has some great pages relating us humans to many other animals.

SprintPCS Girl … I love you

I’m in love with SprintPCS Girl … you know who I’m talking about … don’t deny it …

She’s the one that chimes in right before you leave a message on someone’s voice mail. She has such a sultry voice: “To leave a voice message, press one or just wait for the tone …”

Wow. I’m breathless every time I hear that soft voice.

And sometimes I cannot decide what to do. All the options are so good. I could just wait for the tone. That’s always really nice. And I can try to go extra long and press “#” after my message to review my options. Or I can go for a quickie and just press “2” to send a numeric page.

So many choices … so little time

She’s got so much more class Verizon Girl. And T-Mobile Girl is just too easy. Cingular Girl is boring — too businesslike for me. SprintPCS Girl — just right …

(disclaimer: this blog was posted at 1am … after the censors have gone to bed …)

product idea – web code for business cards

it would be great if most people put a little code on their paper business card.

you could give the card to someone you want to make contact with. if they saw the code they could, instead of typing in your contact information into their PIN (or using a card-scan reader), they could just type in the code and it would automatically download your most current information.

of course, ideally this would also work on a mobile phone.

i can’t imagine why plaxo (or even linkedin, skype, or numerous sites that collect your information) couldn’t do this today. if just a small portion of people adopted it, it would be a lifesaver for people that collect a lot of business cards (and very helpful to even the average person that collects a few). and it would be a great way of further advertising the service. i know i’d put it on my business card immediately…

Book: The Making of Modern Economics

I just finished The Making of Modern Economics by Mark Skousen.

this is a masterful history of economics from Adam Smith to Karl Marx to John Maynard Keynes to Friedrich Hayek to Milton Friedman. Skousen has a bias towards the Adam Smith school of economics but deftly describes all sides as well as a bit of the individuals who made economics come to life. This 19 hour audio-book was long but full of interesting information — especially for someone like me that has never taken an economics course and did not have a great grounding in all the different theories.

Summation: i very much recommend this book to anyone who wants a deeper understand of the world, its finances, and its monetary history for the last 250 years.

the next president of the World Bank

World Bank president James Wolfensohn will step down from his role in May and President Bush has the opportunity to appoint a game-changer to head up the bank at this critical time. Since there has been a lot of speculation recently about Carly Fiorina filling that role (who I think would be great), there are two other Silicon Valley candidates that should also be considered.

KvammeThe first is Floyd Kvamme. Floyd is partner emeritus at Kleiner Perkins — one of the most prestigious venture capital firms in the world and he’s currently co-Chair of President Bush’s Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology (P-CAST). He was one of five founders of National Semiconductor in 1967 and he’s had extensive international dealings (especially in Asia) ever since.

ScaliseThe other candidate is also a semi guy. George Scalise is currently president of the Semiconductor Industry Association and also chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. At SIA, he has to travel the world and build strong ties with people in many countries.

President Bush is already well acquainted with both Floyd and George and he should think strongly about looking to appoint one of them as the next president of the World Bank.

Storm Products makes Scented bowling ball

Today’s Wall Street Journal has a great article about how scented bowling balls are all the rage amongst hard core bowlers.

snip:

“The couple next sniffed a ball perfumed in strawberry … Ms. Gonzalez liked that one, too, but after sampling other balls smelling of amaretto and banana, she wound up buying a $139 ball that had cinnamon-apple fragrance.”

AP has another story: MAKING SCENTS by Carrie Antlfinger.

amazing how innovation can breath life into a staid product line…

Hunter Walk tries to drink all of Google

By day Hunter Walk manages AdSense for Google. Also by day, Hunter is attempting to drink every variety of drink in Google’s kitchen.

this is a pretty stupendous task.

Summation analysis:
Let’s say that Hunter has two drinks per day (as he might not always be motivated to try the latest watermelon cola). And let’s say Google carries 300 drinks right now and will add another 120 over the next six months (for those of you who have been to the Google kitchen, you know that this number is not an exaggeration). That means it will take Hunter 140 work days for him to drink all the drinks in Google’s kitchen. Given that he usually doesn’t go to the office on weekends or holidays,and given he’s probably already tried 50-60 of the drinks, that means that he’ll finish in on about September 30. I’m looking forward to hearing the result of Hunter’s quest then.

book: Fast Food Nation

i had mixed feelings about Fast Food Nation
by Eric Schlosser.

on the one hand the book had a lot of great information about nutrition, labor standards, and the history of fast food entrepreneurs. on the other, it was clouded with a lot of left-wing dribble about how Republicans in congress and President Reagan are responsible for making America fat.

overall, the book read more like a political campaign than a serious piece of journalism which presents all sides. i’d like to read a book that looks at the fast food industry with more objectivity and would appreciate any recommendations.

summation: skip this book.