SunChips Canada To Noisy Bag Haters: Here's Free Earplugs

SunChips Canada To Noisy Bag Haters: Here's Free Earplugs: "

Unlike their lilly-livered counterparts to the south, Sun Chips Canada has decided to hold the line on their jet-engine loud biodegradable bags. Instead of caving to detractors, they're offering them free earplugs.

'Our bag is loud, our bag is different, our bag is good for the environment, and our bag will remain on store shelves,' says the company. They've also launched a public awareness campaign, starting with this informational video:



Hopefully they'll also be making a series telling people about how to make their compost piles, too. The bags advertise that they'll break down in 9 weeks, but you'll need a much more intense compost pile than most people have the time or care to make.

You'll want your compost pile to preferably over 130 degrees and at least 21 cubic feet. SunChips's instructional PDF recommends a recipe of the following to create optimal conditions:

1 part food scraps (greens)

2 parts leaves (browns)

2 parts grass (greens)

2 parts hay (browns)

1 part finished compost (a bacterial activator to start the composting process)

Still, even if you have to wait a few more months for the bag to decompose, that's a lot faster than a traditional chip bag, which will take hundreds of years to break down, and even then will only be a fine grain of plastic dust.

Know what's even more annoying that a noisy bag? A planet full of garbage.

SunChips to complaining consumers: 'Yeah, compostable bag is noisy - get over it' [Sustainable Food News]

Do Sunchips 'compostable' bags really decompose in a compost pile? [Examiner]

PREVIOUSLY

Were 'Biodegradable' Sun Chips Bags Not So Biodegradable?

Unbearably Noisy Biodegradable SunChips Bag Terminated

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Who Is The First Moron To Break His TV With The Kinect?

Who Is The First Moron To Break His TV With The Kinect?: "

All those shattered TVs and cut-up hands that resulted when the Nintendo Wii first came on the scene sorta made sense. People were flailing their limbs around holding a plastic controller with a flimsy strap. But the new Kinect motion-sensing system for the Xbox 360 should have cut down on at least some of the damage done by removing the controller completely. And yet, some moron in Arizona has already ruined a perfectly good TV with his recklessness.

Over on his blog, the moronic moron writes:

A public service announcement: Do not under any circumstances play Kinect Sports Volleyball at 1:30 a.m. while standing under a ceiling fan with a dangling chain for a light switch. You could conceivably spike it into your year-old amazing TV, causing it to die with a rainbow LCD teardrop dripping down from the impact wound.

Plus you'll lose the match by forfeit.

When reached by Consumerist for comment, the moron said, 'It's fine. If there is a time to volleyball spike the shit out of your TV it's November.'

Yes, I Am The First Moron To Break His TV With Kinect [BecauseItoldyouso]

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Most "Close Door" Buttons Don't Work, And Most Office Thermostats Are Fakes

Most "Close Door" Buttons Don't Work, And Most Office Thermostats Are Fakes: "

You can stop pounding on the 'Close Door' button on the elevator. They're not there for you. Turns out that most of them don't work unless you've a maintenance person or fireman with the special access key inserted. It's just one of several different 'placebo buttons' placed around our world that only give us the illusion of control.

Walk buttons? In Manhattan they're totally useless, as the New York Times reported in 2004. And most office thermostats are dummies, not connected to any system at all. In 2003 the WSJ detailed how they're just installed by HVAC guys who are sick of office workers calling them up and complaining about the temperature.

To get around this, some NASA engineers described how they tweak the temperature, like:

* Getting ahold of the special wrenches to undo thermostat covers

* For heat, strapping bags of ice water to the sensors

* For cold, holding lamps or monitors up to the thermostat

* Getting a ladder, popping through the drop ceiling, and adjusting the dampers for more cold

Crazy! Next thing you'll be telling me this button in the coffee break room that says 'Get Raise' isn't functional.

Employees Only Think They Control Thermostat [WSJ via Futility Closet]

For Exercise in New York Futility, Push Button [NYT via Futility Closet]

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Cops Catch ATM Napkin Scammer

Cops Catch ATM Napkin Scammer: "

San Francisco PD have caught a crook using an ingeniously low-fi method to rip people off ATMs: napkins.

A merchant on Divisadero Street tipped the cops off after he spied the crook stuffing napkins up into ATM cash dispenser slots. When people tried to take cash out, it would get stuck up behind the napkins. After they walked away frustrated, the guy just strolled over, reached up into the slot, and dislodged the napkins, and walked away with their cash.

According to the police, the man who lived in the Tenderloin district of San Fran, is a serial napkin stuffer. He was charged with burglary. After they arrested him, cops found another ATM stuffed with napkins close by.

So if you go to withdraw money from an ATM and it doesn't come out, don't just finger around in the try, also reach up into the slot and see if there's anything stuck there. After that, try to take a cellphone picture of the ATM screen for evidence and then call the number on the ATM for service. (If the ATM is in a bank, you of course should just go inside and ask for help.)

Cops catch crook in ATM scam [Law & Disorder] (Thanks to Rachel!)

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Dodgers Forget They Left Brooklyn In 1957, Sue Brooklyn Burger Over Logo

Dodgers Forget They Left Brooklyn In 1957, Sue Brooklyn Burger Over Logo: "

Fifty-three years ago, the Dodgers told the borough of Brooklyn to shove it its nose with a rubber hose and lit out for the warmer climes of Los Angeles. Now they've returned -- well, at least their lawyers have -- to file a lawsuit against a local burger company for daring to use a similar font and the word 'Brooklyn.'

The L.A. Dodgers (note: L.A., as in 3,000 miles away) have filed suit against the owner of Brooklyn Burger because they think the logo and name would somehow, possibly in some world, confuse people into thinking the burger company was associated with a team that hasn't existed in over half a century.

The Brooklyn Burger logo was actually approved for trademark back in April, and yet the Dodgers have just filed their official complaint with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Brooklyn Burger's lawyer tells Gothamist that the whole thing is just stupid:

People who see [Brooklyn Burger's logo] in Brooklyn aren't going to think the Brooklyn Dodgers are selling hamburgers... It's crazy for the Los Angeles Dodgers to claim exclusive rights to the word 'Brooklyn.'

If you check out the Brooklyn Burger site, you'll see that the company is actually the official meat patty provider for a Brooklyn baseball team -- the minor league Cyclones in Coney Island.

Let's just hope this lawsuit gets thrown out before Brooklyn Burger is forced to move to the west coast.

L.A. Dodgers Sue Over Brooklyn Burger Logo [Gothamist]

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