The latest innovation in the world of the puppet toys are the unsettling dolls of celebrities that are manufactured by the German company Puppenklinik. The most outstanding are the Dalai Lama, the Pope Benedictus, Obama, Angela Merkel and Lady Di. The website offers different articles, where the proud creator shows his works, and a complete shop where special attention is given to the buyers of Barack Obama, which is — understandably — a hot item.

Mozart doll by Puppenklinik

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Israeli-artist Yigal Ozeri’s provocative photo-realistic paintings of young women in nature look like a large format photographs, but are actually the work of minute brushstrokes laced together. Inspired by the Pre-Raphaelites, the paintings are exotic portraits of woman enraptured by nature, caught in the lens of the artist’s eye. Ozeri’s inspiration lies in Carl Jung’s concept of the Anima, the psychology of the female’s true inner self.

Oh man, the 80s were fun. Back then it was all beaches and smiles, lightweight soft drinks and squeaky clean advertising. Somewhere along the way, the message was corrupted, and the beach bunny actresses and guitar shredder actors of that golden era of naivety were forever tainted with the pastiche of their weird TV legacies.

Tired of having your food stolen by sticky-fingered coworkers or roommates? Bullies taking your kid’s lunch? Well, worry no more. Anti-Theft Lunch Bags are sandwich bags that have green splotches printed on both sides, making your freshly prepared lunch look spoiled. So don’t suffer the injustice of having your sandwich stolen again!

The first publication of the book 101 Unuseless Japenese Inventions, at the end of the 90s, was centered around Chindogu art. Created by author Kenji Kawakami, this art of unusual and useless inventions, displayed different ways of solving the everyday problems. One of the Chindogus is the Baby Mop, a pair of trousers and a sweatshirt for babies with strips that clean the floor while the baby crawls.

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The renowned brand of pianos, Baldwin, launched a new line of Exoticos Products, inspired by the eccentric artistic viewpoint of pianos that were used by the master Liberace in the 70s and 80s. This collection has customizations for everybody: fluorescent reminiscences, African Savanna inspirations, a little bit of the casinos of Las Vegas, and the spirit of the American Way of Life.

I was thinking the other day that it would be so practical to have a folding motorcycle that fits in the trunk of my Honda City. Just then, I stumbled upon the Motocompo, a folding motorcycle that fits in the trunk of a Honda City. It’s fate. This little single-speed machine came out in 1981 and Honda sold 53,369 of them in Japan. It features an AB12E 49 cc air-cooled two-stroke engine with 2.5 hp at 5,000 rpm. I was a bit disappointed to see that it only has 0.38 kg-m of torque at 4,500rpm, but you know, you can’t have everything! It’s also worth noting that it weighs 42 kg dry and 45 kg wet. It’s a bench. It’s a fruit holder. It’s man’s best friend.

I met one of the Chicago contributors of this New York, LA, Chicago collaboration site in front of a local bike shop this past summer. He was happily showing off his latest thrift store VHS scores to a mutual friend of ours. I slept on the “blog” he said he was collecting the tapes for for some time. Sometimes I make mistakes. Everything is Terrible is a brilliant library of all things unsettling. These are not posts of mindless YouTube anomalies. These are serious and hilarious documentations of what could be lost on most people were it not for these ironic excavators.

A favorite from my more perverted days — I’m saying they are behind me — Robert Crumb has once again shocked his audience. This time by not getting dirty but rather completing a 207 page word for word illuminated version of Genesis. The Hammer Museum in LA is currently exhibiting this Magnum opus. Crumb definitely did not rest on the 7th day, this epic undertaking is enough for one man’s life work, yet disturbingly enough is just one of his many. A quick side note, I saw Raymond Pettibon at the exhibit and even he was looking a little overwhelmed by the endless black frames of drawings, he still looked pretty damn cool though, too.

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Seattle-based photographer Chris Jordan’s new work features astounding images of the carcasses and stomach contents of albatross chicks from a remote strip of land in the Northern Pacific ocean, 2000 miles from the nearest continent. The chicks are fed human waste by their parents, who mistake the garbage for food. Jordan notes his subject matter is reproduced as discovered, in the interest of accurate representation.

Maryland-based cartoonist Jonathan Wojcik’s obsession with insects, monsters, and anything related to Halloween comes through hilariously clearly in his web comic, Bogleech. Check out the rest of his site for various projects and his Etsy shop.

Now ‘octopus’ can be added to myth that hot dogs are made from who knows what. This invention turns a hot dog into an octopus so that the kids of the world will no longer get bored with their meals.

Now this is fun. The Mood Chair is piece of interactive furniture which changes color in response to the colors that its sensors perceive from the environment and the users.

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Did you play with your food as a kid? Perhaps you still do it now. Indulge yourself with the Food Face Dinner Plate, ‘made from hotel-quality, food-safe, high-fire ceramics. So now you can play with your food and give Dan a whole new look’.

Sometimes pessimism is more encouraging than optimism, because more is true. I’m a huge fan of Straw Dogs, but the English counter-Humanist philosopher’s Heresies is just as bracing: ‘Belief in progress is the Prozac of the thinking classes’. Living in Los Angeles, where a brittle, self-obsessed ‘hopefulness’ is everywhere, I might need this writer (who certainly shouldn’t be confused with the Men Are From Mars guy) even more than you do. But you do, you do.

The hamburger, that icon of fast food, has evolved in Germany to the point where it is now sold in cans. Canned Hamburgers were created by the company Trekking Mahlzeiten and are aimed at those who enjoy the outdoor life. According to the instructions on the can, you must boil the can for a few minutes, take the lid off, and then enjoy an authentic cheeseburger with ketchup and gherkins that contains just 257 calories per 100 grams.

Now, who couldn’t do with a watch like this? Featuring an interactive touch screen and animated LED display that plays short animation upon demand, the time display on this awesome watch switches between colors on touch. We have them for sale in the Lost At E Minor online store.

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Tweet this: Twitter is launching its own wine label. And that took only 41 characters. Now for the story behind it all. In an effort to help make a positive impact, Twitter says, they’ve teamed up with San Francisco-based non-profit Room to Read, which helps brings libraries and literacy to the world’s poorest countries.

Each case of Twitter wine sold will supply books and education to children in need. Via Crushpad — a custom wine making venture — Twitter is offering limited editions of apparently “awesome” Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. The Fledging Initiative is the place to sort this whole curious thing out and buy your own bottle. Now retweet that.

‘Just add water and let the fun come up’. Sea Monkeys are here and we don’t know what to do with them. They are graceful and funny, they have monkey tails, they are real aquatic acrobats and they are totally playful and easy to breed. The real name of the Sea Monkeys, of course, is ‘brine shrimp’.

It’s a crustacean that is used to feed fish. It was discovered by an American at the end of the 70s and he turned it into a way of earning money. Some tiny encapsulated eggs hutch out when they are in contact with salty water and they grow up quickly, becoming the amusement of every one 30 years or older who remembers nostalgically those cheap pets of the 80s. Now they’re back in a kit with Sea Monkeys, Triops Triops (similar to the original ones) and NASA Gel.

Artist Jim Sheely, otherwise known as Ojimbo, is a master of the grotesque, rendering intricately detailed images of writhing, squirming, twisted, spewing creatures as well as maniacal, pop-informed wood sculptures