I just got a package of Sparkle Floam
I’m not sure if the floam is supposed to dry and permanently stick to whatever surface you put it on, I really don’t care either way, but it would have been nice if it came with instructions on how to use it.
Mika and her floam phone
Page 43 of 177
Googling my name, which I do once in a while when I’m fidgety, I came across website outlook, a site which purports to tell you how much your website is worth. And, according to them, marga.org, my main personal website, is worth $6,000. Meanwhile, voxpublica.org, where this blog is kept, is worth a little over $2K. Aha.
It’s not clear what they base these values on. The only data they give about the websites are the daily pageviews, which I have no idea how they think they can figure out. Their number for marga.org, a little under 2K, is about 60% less than what I actually get, about 3300 for February 2010. Voxpublica.org, of course, gets many fewer hits, but still more than they give it credit for.
I imagine their valuing of the website is based on its potential ad revenue – but that’s a very silly valuation. For one, it forgets the value of the domain name alone. marga.org doesn’t have much going for it as a domain name, beyond being my name and it being short and somewhat easy to spell (though not to pronounce in English). voxpublica.org may have a higher value just because there is an online magazine in norway that might want the name and because it’s a domain name that could work for many sorts of endeavors in any part of the western world. I got it originally to provide hosting for other human rights organizations – though I never used it for that purpose. I do like the domain name, though, so I’m keeping it.
But also, how much traffic you get depends on what you put on the website. I have to admit that some of my highest traffic pages are old pages. For example, my most visited content page in marga.org is the one for my recipe for yassa, which has been in my website for as long as I’ve had it. But my blog post on safeway birthday cakes, which I wrote in 2008, gets lots and lots of hits as well. And, personally, I have no idea what things that I post will generate a lot of traffic (or make it to the top of the search engines).
In any case, it’s nice to know that I’m worth something 😉
Today I found the Elmer/Scientific Explorers‘ Magnificent Manicure Kit
This is definitely the case with the Manicure kit. The kit comes with a 3.4oz bottle of lotion base, 4oz bottle of bath salts (aka sodium chloride or table salt), 1.2 oz bottle of crystal mud (aka sodium polyacrylate), 1ml of sodium melon fragrance, 1 ml green dye, 2 foam toe separators, a small plastic soaking tray, a measuring spoon, a mixing spoon, a small pipette, a toy nail buffer (I can’t imagine it’ll be good for anything) and a foot-shaped pumice stone. There is also an activity guide, which is really what you buy the kit for. My $2 kit did not have the lotion, fragrance, dye or mixing spoon – not a big deal as I have all those things at home. But indeed, I have everything the kit comes with save for the “crystal mud” (and the guide) at home.
My kids enjoyed playing with the “crystal mud” so much, that for me it was a good purchase. But the kit is definitely not worth $20, IMHO.
There isn’t very much science to the kit, though the crystal mud section is used to help kids learn about saturation, which was a concept Mika didn’t know before. There is also a few “fun facts” in the booklet with helpful information, though Mika was less than interested in this 🙁
—
Here are the activities included in the activity guide.
– Making gel with the “crystal mud”. The crystal mud is a polymer which starts as granules which can absorb 300 times their weigh in liquid. They basically become a gel when saturated, and you can use them to soak your hands for relaxation purposes. It doesn’t do anything for your skin/nails, though. But Mika LOVED making and playing with the stuff and holding it in her hands.
-Adding salt to the gel, supposedly to help rub off death skin from your hands. However, this part irritated Mika’s skin.
-Mixing the lotion base with color and fragrance and rubbing it in her skin. We skipped this part, though we’ve done it before with a previous kit and the lotion we make ourselves, and just used regular lotion.
-Buffing and shining your nails with the included nail buffer.
-Painting your nails with the non-included nail polish.
Then you do a pedicure
-Soak your feet in the gel
-Rubbing your feet with the included pumice stone
-Applying lotion to your feet
-Painting your toe nails using the included toe separators and your own nail polish.
I got this Stories from Ancient Egypt
I think the problem is twofold. The main one is that they are not told in the most interesting manner. The author, Joyce A. Tyldesley, is an Egyptologist – and while she has penned many pop-books on Ancient Egyptian subjects, writing for children requires different skills. The language, in particular, is sort of dry. The other problem is that, IMHO, Ancient Egyptian literature is not particularly compelling. As a student, I particularly enjoyed the Tale of the Two Brothers, in particular for its similarities with the much later story of Joseph from the Bible. I also liked the intriguing harem conspiracy, but looking through my Lichtheim
That said, I’m glad I have one book of Ancient Egyptian stories to tell my daughter (I’m sure she would not enjoy my reading directly from Lichtheim). One word of warning, while the stories are dumb down for the kids, and sexual contents are cleaned up, there is a still a fair amount of violence to this book. The book includes its version of the book of the heavenly cow (or the “holy cow”, as my friend Lola and I liked to call it), in which the goddess Hathor grows bloodthirsty and kills a large part of mankind. That may be a bit too scary for younger kids.
As an aside, I’m planning to get the book Tales of Ancient Egypt
Recent Comments