another fav web comic of mine :: pictures for sad children
:: with gems like this and this

When it comes to saving time and money, sometimes the best approach means rolling up your sleeves and doing it yourself. Check out the best DIY projects featured here in 2008 and beyond.

Note on our definition of "most popular": These are the posts that were viewed the most by readers, a number which is often skewed by Google or Digg or links by other popular sites. As such one could argue that most views does not equal best, and one would be right, so we did a little pruning to keep the list high quality.

Most Popular DIY Projects Published in 2008

First, get a load of the most recent stuff: the most-viewed DIY posts of this past year.

• DIY Invisible Floating Bookshelf (includes video clip)
• DIY Camera Stabilizer On-the-Cheap (includes video clip)
• Backyard Shed Turned Home Office—See photos of a reader's awesome home-built backyard shed office.
• Set Up Cheap Ambient Lighting with Rope Lights—Jason lights up his workspace.
• Stash Valuables in a Full Soda Bottle (includes video clip)
• Build Your Own Wire Photo Wall—Gina rigs up a custom wire photo wall with digital prints.
• Build a Home Theater PC for Less than $200
• Microwave an Instant Chocolate Cake in a Coffee Mug (includes video clip)—Gina tries the microwave coffee cup cake, and it's fascinating and gross all at once.
• Drink Delicious Water with a Reverse Osmosis Filter—Jason installs his own water filter under the sink.
• Turn Your Broken Laptop into an Arcade Cocktail Cabinet
• Increase Your Privacy with $16 DIY Window Frosting—Jason frosts his windows so passerby don't see him in his skivvies.

Most Popular DIY Projects of All Time

While 2008's list is pretty good, we've had some doozies appear on these pages beyond the last 12 months. Check out our most-viewed DIY posts of all time.

• Turn your $60 router into a $600 router—Adam soups up his Linksys router with the DD-WRT firmware.
• Build a Hackintosh Mac for Under $800—Adam runs OS X on a home-built PC.
• Turn a flashlight into a handheld burning laser (includes video)—Perhaps the most controversial "you'll shoot somebody's eye out" story we've ever run.
• Transform Your Classic Xbox into a Killer Media Center—Gina takes the leap into soft-modding her classic black Xbox.
• Make your own air conditioner
• Boost Your Wireless Signal With a Homemade Wi-Fi Extender (includes video)
• The Cordless Workspace (sort of)—Adam gets control of all the cables under his desk.
• 10 ways to entertain young children for $1 or less (without the TV)
• How to install a hard drive
• Turn an old hard drive into an external drive

Most Popular Do-it-yourself Top 10 Listicles of 2008

If your DIY chops are more needed at home, at the office, in the garage, or with the camera, check out our most-viewed DIY top 10 lists that published this past year. These listicles package the best DIY technqiues around a certain theme.

• Top 10 Ways to Get Cables Under Control
• Top 10 Office Supply Hacks
• Top 10 IKEA Furniture Mods
• Top 10 DIY Laptop Stands
• Top 10 Printable Paper Productivity Tools
• Top 10 DIY Home Projects
• Top 10 Home Automation Projects
• Top 10 DIY Photography Tools
• Top 10 DIY Car Hacks
• Top 10 Summer Projects

What DIY project did you pull off this past year that you're most proud of? Tell us about it in the comments.

Paul and Storm present the musical advent calendar “The 25 Days of Newman”, where each day from December 1st until Christmas they are writing and recording a new Randy Newman inspired movie theme song.

image via Paul & Storm

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

Paul and Storm Present The 25 Days of Randy Newman

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12seconds is a really cool web service that allows you to record 12 second videos with a web cam or mobile phone letting people know what you are up to. Think of it like Twitter or Facebook status updates, but with video.

Today’s a big day for 12seconds, they are now in public beta, which means registration is open (invites are no longer needed) and they completely redesigned their website.

Today they also launched an official iPhone app that allows you create a 12 second video slide show using 3 photos and recorded audio.

12seconds was co-founded by my good friend David Beach who I worked with at the Palo Alto based interactive agency LVLi over a decade ago. I had the honor of collaborating with Beach on some cutting edge web projects like iSTORM and the Burning Man 1996 netcast.

It’s great to see Beach now doing his own thing making awesome stuff for the web.

photo by Scott Beale

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

12seconds Beta Public Launch, Redesign & iPhone App

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Here are a few photos from last night’s Co-Ho-Holiday Party at Citizen Space.

Santa made a surprise visit to the party and while there Hillary Hartley had an interesting conversation with him about Prop 8 (director credit goes to Chris Heuer).

photos by Scott Beale

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

Photos of the Co-Ho-Holiday Party at Citizen Space

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New VB scripter Troy modified a script for Outlook that lets him know when he's forgotten an attachment on an email (not counting his company logo).

Troy writes:

I started a new job back in July, and had to fill out a form to get access to a client’s network. Unfortunately I sent the email without the form. As part of my new job I had been working on learning VBScript, so this was the perfect opportunity to test my skills. With a little searching I was able to find an example of what I needed, and tweaked it to account for my signature’s company logo.

In short, Troy modified a script Jack Stowage originally posted in the comments here to work for him. Since he attaches his company logo in his outgoing message signature, this version of the script lets you set a base messages attachment number (in his case, one logo file) and compare from there. So if he sends a message with the word "attach" in it and it only has one file attached (the logo)? Outlook pops up the notification shown above.

(Gmail users, you can also have this feature by enabling it in Gmail Labs.)

Hit the link below to grab a copy of the VB script for Outlook, and get the instructions for setting it up yourself. Congratulations to Troy! He's earned himself a signed copy of our latest book, Upgrade Your Life. Here's how you can win one yourself by sharing your best timesaver of the year.

While much creative insight happens while your mind wanders, the key is being able to interrupt your daydreams in time to notice, scientists say.

News site Boston.com tells the story of how Arthur Fry dreamed up the multi-million dollar idea of Post-It Notes while daydreaming in church.

Many scientists argue that daydreaming is a crucial tool for creativity, a thought process that allows the brain to make new associations and connections. Instead of focusing on our immediate surroundings - such as the message of a church sermon - the daydreaming mind is free to engage in abstract thought and imaginative ramblings. As a result, we're able to imagine things that don't actually exist, like sticky yellow bookmarks.

But just slipping into the trance-like daydream state isn't enough to use it to your advantage. You've got to notice when you have your Post-It thought.

In his experiments, [psychologist Jonathan] Schooler distinguishes between two types of daydreaming. The first type consists of people who notice they are daydreaming only when asked by the researcher. Even though they are told to press a button as soon as they realize their mind has started to wander, these people fail to press the button. The second type, in contrast, occurs when subjects catch themselves daydreaming during the experiment, without needing to be questioned. Schooler and colleagues found that individuals who are unaware of their own daydreaming while it's happening don't seem to exhibit increased creativity.

Therefore, awareness of your own daydreaming—and the random thoughts it involves—is the trick to capturing any good insight. So next time you're deep in a daydream about how hot your co-worker will look on your first date (once you get up the courage to actually ask) or the sick yacht you'll buy when you finally win the lottery, keep a mental eye out for your next big idea. Photo by Kr. B.

guest post by mikl-em

New York theater group Banana Bag & Bodice performed an extended run of their original show BEOWULF: A Thousand Years of Baggage (A SongPlay) in Berkeley in the summer of 2008 to rave reviews.

For one night in January, the show will be back in the Bay Area, once again produced by the Shotgun Players for one night only at the Berkeley Rep’s RODA theater.

The show is based on the Old English epic poem Beowulf, adapted into a rock opera (or “SongPlay”, as the BBBers call it) with all original music and a live band on-stage. Below are a couple pictures from this past summer’s production:

Go here for ticket information. There are 700 seats and it will sell out.

This performance benefits the upcoming New York production of the show at The Abrons Arts Center in April 2009. The cast includes both New York and Bay Area performers, under the direction of BBB veteran Rod Hipskind.

More stuff:

• Reviews of this summer’s performances,
• Last year’s writeup on BBB’s show The Sewers
• Beowulf the poem online
• Other Banana Bag & Bodice plays

Here’s the King Hrothgar song, sung by King Hrothgar who is played by Dave Malloy who is the composer of all the music for the ShowPlay:

photos by Jessica Palopoli

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

Beowulf by Banana Bag & Bodice returns to Berkeley

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Inspired by Matt Harding’s “Where The Hell Is Matt?” videos, early stage venture capital firm First Round Capital produced a holiday card video featuring people dancing from the 70 companies in their portfolio.

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

First Round Capital Holiday Card

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It's your last chance to save some money buying online gifts: today is Free Shipping Day, and over 250 merchants have promised to get boxes to your door for free.

While many merchants' ship-by-December-24th order deadline has passed, there are still a few you can hit up today for by-Christmas delivery. Retailers from from Dell to Macy's to Zappos are participating. Click on the merchant name from the Free Shipping Day site to get the last-minute deal.

Label The World reminds me of when I wanted to start a collection of everything in the world. Humor about scale always tickles me.