I’ve uploaded nearly 1300 of my Japan pictures to Flickr. For reasons I’m sure you’ll understand, I haven’t added titles or tags or descriptions proactively, but please add comments or questions on flickr and I’ll gladly offer a story or explanation.

Meanwhile, I’m including some of my faves here, as well as part 1 and part 3.

It’s great to see an awareness of user experience popping up in humble, low-tech places. Grabbing an apple yesterday, I discovered the small arrow pictured below at the top of the sticker, telling me exactly how to get the label off my fruit. Delightful. No apple under my fingernails on this one.

User Interface

And last week, I had another fruit-related experience that, while not as unequivocally positive, was still thought-provoking.

I poured myself a bowl of cereal-no raisins. Looked all through the plastic liner bag-no raisins. Figured I had defective cereal. Then I noticed a little yellow callout on the box-“Stay Fresh Fruit Pouch Inside Box.”

Sure enough, there it was at the bottom of the box-a silver foil pouch full of raisins. The experience promised by Health Valley on the pouch: eternally fresh, plump raisins and my choice as to the cereal/raisin ratio for each bowl.

Custom Cereal

While I still think I prefer having my cereal pre-mixed and ready-to-pour, I do appreciate the concept of this approach-the appeal to freshness and personal tailoring. Though I’d suggest that Health Valley do a better job calling attention to their packaging system, so that people don’t have to go through the same terrible moment of perceived raisinlessness that I did.

The Seattle Monorail is no longer the dream it once represented

Repairing the monorail is not always easy. Some parts are unique. After the collision last fall, the scene shop of the Seattle Opera was hired to build new monorail doors.

Wow – I guess that’s the get ‘er done attitude I wrote about before, but also the challenges of non-standard designs that seem common in transit infrastructure that I also wrote about earlier.

We did an unplanned meal shopping thing at Safeway the other day – went in for that night’s meal, thinking “let’s get some fish, and maybe some vegetables.” We check out the fish and choose Dover Sole, relatively bland. We think about some spices and I go off to the spice aisle for something from Zatarains or whoever has that silhouetted dancing chef (anyone?), but then we see this pretty cool display right in front of our noses (there’s so much crap on display in these stores that I guess we tend to look past it when possible) – a variety of spices and marinades.

The fish-prepping man was incredibly nice, very genial, and asked lots of questions as he prepared our food (“how spicy do you like it?”, etc.). We could get the spices on the fish, or on the side. He pointed out another flavor they had but didn’t have room for in the display. We went from ingredients to meal with an enjoyable and custom bit of service (yeah, you can buy flavored/spiced fish and chicken, already done, but this was done at that moment, just for us).

Of course, there were no ingredients on these containers and if you’ve ever read the packages on marinades and flavoring spices you’ve probably noticed the ridiculous amount of salt they contain. We usually comparison shop at length until we find something that is not going to drown us in NaCl. Well, as you can imagine, the fish was spicy and really really really really salty. Each bit was like someone held your tongue with a pair of tongs and held a container of free-running salt above your head for a full minute.

Interestingly, I don’t blame Safeway for that. I take responsibility – caveat emptor – for purchasing a likely-to-be-salty product without finding out more. I compliment Safeway for providing a value-added experience (with the quality of the service – the human – really making it work). I guess we won’t do that next time, and will take the prep burden back on ourselves.

also: I thought the design of the marinade dispensers was kinda cool, allowing you to measure and presumably prevent overpouring.

Echo Memoirs creates custom coffee-table books for Pregnancy, Travel, Bar/Bat Mitzvah, Anniversaries, Engagement, Wedding, Family History, Pets, Friendship, Business, Retirement, Birthdays, Mother’s Day, Graduation, Showers, and more. To create your book, they take about 150 hours to interview relevant stakeholders, transcribe, write, copy-edit, design, and print. First copy is $6,000, with reprints about $200.

A company called 3C will make custom colors for various cosmetics (lip color, blush, eye shadow, face powder, etc.)

We can reproduce your favorite discontinued lip color shades or we can create a lip color for you from a color swatch that you provide. Your ‘recipe’ then remains in our permanent files for easy re-ordering!

If you would like us to re-create your favorite discontinued shade, we ask that you send a sample for us to analyze. HERE’S HOW: Enclose a dime-sized sample of your favorite discontinued lip color in a plastic baggie or small jar (do not swatch the lip color on paper – it will change the color). OR: Enclose your tube in a padded envelope or small box. Your tube will be returned to you with your match.

We analyze your shade for color, texture and coverage and create a formula that remains in our permanent files! If there is anything you would like changed about your color, i.e. if you would like a gloss instead of a matte, or if you would like shimmer added, please let us know (some texture and shimmer options are listed below). Otherwise our formulation will be as close as possible to your original. If you do not have a sample but you remember the brand name and color name of the shade you are looking for, please email us and we can check our archive of over 7,500 shades that we have matched for other clients. If your shade is not in our archives, we can arrange to notify you if we receive it from another client.

To create your own shade
You can have us create your own shade ~ from a splash of nail color in a baggie, a piece of fabric, a paint chip, a photo from a magazine, two lip colors blended together to create the ideal shade… anything!

This is a fantastic service; freeing loyal customers from the capriciousness of fashion/sales volumes/limited availability. Years ago I trailed a friend to every single store in the massive King of Prussia mall, as they pursued in vain a specific shade that just wasn’t available. Anywhere.

Via MightyGoods