As far as we can tell these aren’t ready for production just yet, and that’s probably a good thing. Because I think most everyone prefers Windows XP. These would go great with the web 2.0 blinds.

[Unplggd]

Take a look out the closest window to you right now. What do you see? Odds are that it looks nothing like your PC’s desktop, unless you took a picture of the scenery yourself and placed it as the desktop design manually. How would you like to make Microsoft Windows a more aptly literal translation of the word itself?

Designed by John Nouanesing, the Fenestra 3.1 Window replicates the background of your Windows Microsoft machine. Microsoft, where everyday is a sunny day! While Nouanesing might be a little behind in the times with this design, he promises an XP (still behind) version is on its way.

For now, these Fanestra Windows are still in the conceptual stage, but the designer promises that by the end of the year they will be available for purchase from his website. No word yet if there will be a similar blue screen version, which sadly enough, would make sense.

Source via Trend Hunter
[ Microsoft Windows… Literally copyright by Coolest Gadgets ]

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No, you didn't accidentally happen on the website of The Onion but, rather, a story by Peter Slevin in yesterday's Washington Post about a thriving financial institution amidst the banking wreckage seemingly strewn everywhere these days.

Here's the article.

In Rural Missouri, The Place to Bring Your Cents of Humor

Banker Heard Name, and It Added Up

When Ellen T. Lindsey picks up the telephone in this flyspeck town, the first question, more often than not, is "Are you a real bank?"

Lindsey, the new manager, assures the callers that the institution is, indeed, real.

Tightwad Bank may be quirky and unproven, but it is a genuine bank with a real charter and a real vault and a pair of real bankers in charge. For good measure, the business cards say: "Tightwad Bank. Member FDIC."

"We're seeking the customers with a sense of humor," said Donald S. Higdon, 54, who opened Tightwad with his business partner in May after they grew bored with running a sober-sided bank in neighboring Kansas. "We thought the downside was limited, the possibilities were reasonable and the amount of fun was limitless."

If the concept does not work out — this is the second attempt at making a bank called Tightwad profitable — Higdon jokes that he can turn the place into a drive-through liquor store.

Coming from Kansas City, about 90 miles to the northwest, you have to drive through Peculiar to get to Tightwad. The next town east is Racket.

Not far away are Blackjack, Wisdom and Fair Play.

"Everybody just asks where it got the name," said shopkeeper Mark Huey, 37, whose family owns the Tightwad C Store on a main drag so short that "if there wasn't a curve in it, you could see both city-limits signs."



The story told by Huey and everyone else starts with a postman who coveted a watermelon. It was the early 1900s, and the mail carrier, making his rounds, made a deal with the grocer to set it aside until the end of the day. But when he returned, the melon was gone — sold to someone who agreed to pay 50 cents more.

As lore has it, the postman called the grocer a you-know-what, and the name stuck.

The first Tightwad Bank opened in 1984, the same year the town was incorporated. In fact, it was a branch of the Citizens Bank of Windsor, established first in a parked trailer with a safe bolted to the floor, and then in the formidable one-story brick building that is still standing.

Twenty years ago, Tightwad residents saw riches in the development of nearby Truman Lake, imagining a lively resort, maybe an amusement park or a water show. The bank would be well positioned to profit, but the boom never happened. To this day, the city-limits signs say "Pop. 63." Triple digits seem a long way off.

The Tightwad branch counted assets of more than $2 million at its peak, but managers closed the lobby in the late 1990s after two robberies. With the novelty worn thin and only a single drive-through window staffed, it did not take, well, a tightwad to see that the numbers no longer made sense.

The bank, then owned by UMB Bank, closed in January 2007.

Higdon heard the news one day when he was watching the local weather.

"The proverbial light bulb went off. I thought that might be fun to play with that name a little bit," explained Higdon, a career banker who had teamed with partner Jeff McCalmon to buy the 100-year-old Reading State Bank in nearby Kansas. He called his wife and McCalmon, expecting them to say it was the nuttiest idea ever.

They didn't. So Higdon contacted UMB about buying the building. He also set out to register the Internet domain name tightwadbank.com — only to discover that someone else in Kansas City had experienced his own proverbial light bulb. When they were unable to come to terms, Higdon reserved tightwadbank.net instead.

Higdon and McCalmon, who had built the Reading bank's assets from $4 million to $12 million, needed approval from state and federal regulators. They also needed a strategy, not to mention a bank manager, computers — and customers. Until the feds signed off this year, the bankers remained true to the Tightwadian code by refusing to spend money on new signs.

Along the way, the partners took another big step: They renamed the Reading bank, too.

"I thought, let's step out on a limb here and name the bank Tightwad," said Higdon. "To be really frank, the customer base in Reading, Kansas, was not too excited."

As Higdon was telling his story, he spotted a man and a woman climbing off their motorcycles to pose by the Tightwad sign. They turned out to be Lyndon and Debra Abell, D.C. residents touring the back roads.

"The Tightwad store was okay," Lyndon Abell said, explaining the photograph, "but the Tightwad Bank was too good to pass up."

That is what some of Lindsey's callers say, too. Like their predecessors during the bank's previous incarnation, they want to know how to open an account and draw checks on Tightwad Bank.

Higdon's challenge is to convert curiosity into cash.

To supplement the take from deposits, which have grown from zero to about $1 million, the bank sells Tightwad gear — $14 hats, a $9 mug, a $30 polo shirt.

The next product will be a Tightwad Bank gift card, designed for "your favorite uncle, also known as Cheapskate Charlie."

Achieve total geekitude with this very special window, called Fenêtres 3.1, French for, you guessed it, Windows 3.1. This design concept for a Windows window might take some serious construction to install, but maybe it could also be offered in a window shade version. Either way, it would be mighty amusing to operate it using those authentic Windows controls. Too bad that windowshade is the dreaded blue screen of death (BSOD).

Its designer, John Nouanesing, has already proven his originality to us — you might recall his crazy floating paint-drip table that we showed you last month. We’d like to see this Windows window idea done up in Vista trim, but then, we wouldn’t want it constantly asking us if we’re sure we’d like to open that window. Or Nouanesing could make an OS X version that substitutes mirrors for windowpanes, constantly reminding you of how superior you really are.

John Nouanesing, via Unpluggd

I took these photos from a bell helicopter last week on a trip to see this amazing building in Dubai with my son. They were taken on a 45 degree bank over the tower on a canon 1Ds mark 3 digital camera NO GOOD FOR THOSE AFRAID OF HIGHTS !! The interior shot however is not the Burge Dubai but the Arab Emirates Towers shot from the 10th floor bar looking up to the upper floors also took the attached shot looking out from the window across the street with the reflection of the interior in the window cool.

Here are more photos of the Arab Emirates Towers:

[Burj Dubai Skyscraper via Dark Roasted Blend]

The concept is simple, don’t let the Cineplex downtime useless and let gamer enthusiasts playing on giant screens, no additional investing needed, brilliant! If you live in Canada, you can rent Cineplex theatres to play Xbox 360 games, it costs $179 for two-hour seasons and start benefiting the giant screen as well as the super sound system. I’m sure the idea will be followed by other players, including the 21 Cineplex in my country.

“It takes it to a whole new level when you see the game on a screen that’s more than 50 feet wide, If they wanted to book a four-hour window, we could certainly go later in the evening, If the theatre manager has the staffing, they could go till two in the morning,” said Pat Marshall, Cineplex’s vice-president of communications.

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