popSiren: Build your own lightsaber, turn old LPs into bowls, and the science of excessive H20

>> Hey, homosapiens. This totally complimentary episode of Pop Siren is brought to you by Netflix, Adagio Tea, and GoDaddy.com. ^M00:00:08 [ music ] ^M00:00:21 >> Welcome to Pop Siren. I'm Sarah Lane. >> And I am Jessica Corbin and if you're joining us for the first time, Pop Siren's the intersection of science, modern culture, technology, and making stuff, like really, really cool stuff. >> Really cool stuff. >> Indeed, indeed. On today's show, I'm on the prowl for cool internet stuff and Doctor Kiki is gonna perform an experiment, get this, on H2O. >> We all know what that is. >> That will answer a very important, nagging question. >> Yep. >> How much water will kill you? >> I've wondered that my whole life, my whole life. Plus, we've got some serious DIY going on today. Our delightful little creator of Nazhek Moujon [assumed spelling] is making a kitchen item out of an old vinyl record in today's Remix. >> Whoo-hoo. That is very Latin of you. I like it. >> Plus, Neha Tiwari makes an affordable and durable light saber. >> And our fearless producer, Heather Frank, bringing you a new band, specifically, a duo of satirical white boy rappers, In the Fringe. That's all I'm gonna say. >> Yeah. I mean, you know, do we need to tease you more? >> Is your interest peaked? Of course, before we get into the rest of the show, brace yourself, and I mean it, it's time for the jest. ^M00:01:30 [ music ] ^M00:01:37 >> Kicking things off, the future is here, people. Specifically, the fabricating of autonomous interactive companions. Yeah, scientists at Queen Mary University of London are launching an international endeavor, part of a project called LRIC, or Living with Robots and Interactive Companions, to experiment with and help advance the relationship between robots and humans. According to FizOrg.com and computer science professor Doctor Peter McGowan, the plan is to determine how people can develop a long-term relationship with artificial creatures in everyday life. >> So eventually, I'm assuming that this is going to escalate so that, you know, they'll be doing household items, you know, like housecleaning. >> Like washing dishes, taking out the trash. >> Yeah. Like a Roomba. >> That, I would like. >> You know what I would like? I'd like a robot to clean out my litter box. Not my litter box but my cat's litter boxes cause they do a lot of pooping. >> Yes. >> And it's not enjoyable for me. But yeah, I mean, the point is, is it's a long-term project. Obviously, you're not gonna be able to get robots to, you know, make you dinner tomorrow. >> Right. Unfortunate. >> But it's, you know, the whole point is, like, to understand them well enough to be able to have them do all the right things. And not the wrong things. >> Right. >> I want them to take over. I just want them to do our dirty work. >> Nice. All right, guys. Next up, after a decade long hiatus, the Bristol based [inaudible] and brooding trip-hop band, Portishead, one of the first popular [inaudible] is back with a third album, apply named, Third which evidently leaked online but it is officially out in the U.S. on April 29th and the big question is, during a ten year break, did gloomy and melancholic vocalist Beth Gibbons and producer/instrumentalist Geoff Barrow turn over a new, more positive leaf? Mm, not so much according to Mother Jones lyrical analysis of the album. The words that come up the most often include myself at seventeen times, want, wants, wanted at eleven, unsure ten, life eight, losing, lose, lost, and nothing following closely behind. Now, I would say myself and life, by themselves, not so, not so gloomy and dark. But I do know Portishead. >> Yeah. >> So it's probably like life is sad, I hate myself. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Nobody loves me. >> Right. >> It's true. >> Right. Yeah. I like the tool, the analytical tool, I think, is what's really interesting and they're from Mother Jones so that you can calculate [inaudible] >> It's fun. >> Yeah. I like it. >> Yeah, mixed reviews on Portishead. >> Yeah. >> From, you know, the word around the office, but we'll see. >> I listened to one cut. It's pretty good. >> Yeah? >> Yeah. It's groovy if you're down to get sick. >> All right. Finally, last story. Water.com reports that a lungless frog, that's right, kids, a lungless frog, has been discovered in a remote area of Indonesia and apparently breathes via its skin. Evolutionary biologist David Bickford's says that the Barbourula kalimantanensis is the first known frog to exist without lungs and that they're the most ancient and bizarre frogs you can get on the planet like a squished version of Jabba the Hut, direct quote. What's interesting about this discovery is that it will certainly shed light on what causes extreme revolutionary change. Most likely, this amphibian needed to reduce its buoyancy to adapt to the fast moving oxylen rich streams in which it swims. When I said, I meant oxygen. >> That story is breathtaking. >> Is it? Did it take your breath away? Frogs without lungs. >> It was a long weekend. I had a lot to drink. >> I know. >> You were there, too. >> We went hot-tubbing and drinking and it was a lot of fun. >> Yeah, lungless frogs, I'm really into that stuff. >> Yeah, lungless frogs. >> Lungless people? What's next? >> Maybe with evolution [inaudible]. >> Without lungs, there'd be no lung cancer. >> Yeah. >> Evolution is, it's exciting. >> Yeah, just stick around. >> Little scary. >> You don't know where we're going. >> Fear of the unknown. Yeah. They will be headless. >> [Inaudible]. >> You want to move on or continue talking about frogs? >> Yeah, I think, I think. >> Okay, good. >> I think it's time. >> Sometimes, I just want to have fun online. You know what I mean? It's all cool stuff, all the time, in this edition of On the Prowl. ^M00:05:40 [ music ] ^M00:05:46 >> I've got a couple of little fun tools for On the Prowl. The first one is how to make a photo, one of your own photos, look old and like it belonged in like a newspaper from 1903. Ready? Okay. So this is a Japanese website. It's kind of funny at first cause I looked on there and was like, oh, I have no idea what's going on here. But then, I realized, oh, okay, what it looks like is going on is that they somehow, you know, sort of create a filter from an original picture and make it look old. And I had a little bit of fun trying to figure out how to use it. But once you get past the Japanese characters, you realize that you just browse for a picture either on your desktop or at a specific URL that, you know, ends up being .jpeg or whatever. So either from your computer or a place on line. You upload it. You wait for it to do its magic, and then, as you can see with my little cats here, it comes out in this very cool antique-y sort of way. Some pictures work better than others. A picture that I did of myself, it's a little muted, a little weird, but certain pictures, it's kind of like you don't know what you're gonna get and the results can be really awesome. So I really like, I like little tricks like this and the reason I do is because Photoshop, I know you can do something like this in Photoshop, I'm sure, but Bert Monroy could school me pretty easily. But this is like a really easy way to get the same effect without having to use Photoshop, especially for people like me who don't really know our Photoshop filters very well. Thanks. This one goes to Maureen Fishenger. She's a photographer herself, has a really cool blog and that's where I got this little toy from. So thanks, Maureen. Number two, since we're talking about cool picture stuff is a little OS10 program I found called Picturesque and that's by a company called Acqualia, I hope I'm saying the name right, guys. They're down in, down in Australia. Anyway, Picturesque is great because I'm gonna go ahead and use the same cat picture I've been using here. What it does is act very much like iPhoto but it has better filters to make your pictures look cooler. So, for example, let's say I wanted to add a reflection here, right? Ooh, so I got this nice reflection down here so that's kind of cool. Then, in the shadow and glow areas, I've got some options here. I can create sort of a nice glow. I can screw with the opacity a little bit to make it a little brighter. That looks kind of cool. If you're embedding something onto your blog and you want to give, like, a nice curve, you know, pictures are always, they're so square. They're so rectangular. You can go ahead and add a nice curve here. You can choose if you just want it like in the upper left, lower right, that sort of thing. That's kind of fun. Then, of course, your edges, you've got some options here. Let's say that you wanted to, let's say your blog background or, you know, you might MySpace page or whatever is like hot pink so you could, you know, you could add a border and have it kind of match a little bit better. I find this tool very useful just to give yourself more options. You can also resize your photos very easily here which I, I've always had kind of a hard time doing that. You've got Preview, you've got iPhoto but Picturesque is a really good way to resize your pictures. It's free. The weird thing is that on the website, it asks you to buy it but you can download it for free. So what I am assuming, and if I'm wrong, somebody please write me and then let me know, that they are asking you to donate if you so desire. So, it's free, but it also costs money, so, it's all up to you. But if you like it, you should buy it. That's kind of the way it works, right? That's good internet karma. As always, I welcome your On the Prowl tips. They really help me, they really do. At popSiren at Revision3.com, they're great. >> They are great. >> They are great, yeah. I mean, I'm great. But they're really the great ones cause there's only so many ideas I can have. >> Yeah. >> I am merely, I am merely the vessel, merely the vessel. >> Now, I have a question for you. >> Okay. >> You like wind chimes? >> Is that what I've been hearing? >> That's what you've been hearing. >> Oh, my gosh, Jess. >> I think it's time for me to take these off. >> You know, they're cute earrings. >> Thanks. >> They are cute earrings but, yeah. >> I think we need to lay these rest. >> You know why? I wonder if the good folks at home have been like, what is that? Is Santa Claus in the house? >> Is there wind in the studio? Yeah. Sorry, guys. >> Thank you. Taking one for the team. >> Yep. Lay those to rest. >> Now, let's see, what time is it? Oh, I know. Time for an exciting new Netflix top ten list. Actually, it's our first one. Our last one was a top five. This time, we whittled down our list of favorite cult films to ten. And boy, are our arms tired. >> I mean. >> It wasn't an easy feat. There's a lot of good cult stuff out there. So, are you ready? >> I am. >> Should I just get right into it? >> Get in. >> Behold, our top ten faves. This is Spinal Tap, Fight Club, Heathers, Breathless, Donnie Darko, Office Space, Eraserhead, Harold and Maude, Run, Lolo, Run, and last but not least, Napolean Dynomite. >> I just feel like you went to like an Oscar like nomination speech or something like that. >> If only more of them had one Oscar. Now, if we've upset you in any way with our awesomely perfect cult film list and you want to debate us on some of our picks, that's fine, too. Just visit us in our forums, three words, bring it on. >> We got to get, my only addition. >> Yeah, yeah. >> Pretty comprehensive list, Pulp Fiction should be up there. Technically, it should be up there. >> I do agree with you. >> Uh-huh. >> I do agree with you. >> Uh-huh. >> I mean, I think the reason we decided to leave it off is because it's like so well known. >> And it's very. >> It's almost less culty and more like mainstream. >> Yeah. >> And cool. >> Okay. We want super cult like. All right. So, thanks to Netflix and you guys can get all those great cult favorites delivered to your doorstep in addition to other great titles, and even, if you just can't get excited about the cult stuff, and I don't know why not, Netflix has about seventy-five thousand other titles, including BluRay and just make absolutely sure they know you came through us by going through www.Netflix.com/siren just, of course, don't forget your Ws. And now, for an exciting experiment involving the most essential liquid on the planet, water. People, I give you Doctor Kiki. ^M00:11:36 [ music ] ^M00:11:42 >> Thanks, ladies. Man, I am so thirsty. These studio lights while I'm sitting and waiting for these women to finish what they're doing get me a little bit parched. Time for a little water to treat the dehydration, right? Like this, this would be tasty. Mm, or would something else be better? Maybe a sports drink. Hmm, I don't know which one would be better, actually. I think I'm gonna have to figure this out the fun way, with science, of course. We know that dehydration is bad because our body cells depend on water to function properly. Everyone's probably heard the recommendation that you need eight glasses a day to stay healthy. It turns out, though, that it's hard to say where that number even, came from in the first place. So, while the average person probably doesn't require that many, it's still not a good idea to under or even over do it. Wait, did I just say over do it? Yeah, I certainly did. Drinking too much water can be extremely dangerous to your health. Every once in a while, you'll hear a story about somebody dying from drinking too much water. Believe it or not, it actually does happen. To understand how something that is supposed to be so good for you can cause such trouble, let's start with how water is distributed in your body. Most of the water in your body is held inside your cells. The average sized man is about 60% water, women are somewhere around 50%. 40% of that 60% is contained within the intracellular space, that's inside the cells, and the remaining 20% is extra cellular, outside the cells. The extra cellular water is then split between the blood plasma and the interstitial fluids. Probable volume for an average size man is about 4.6 liters, and of that, the 700 cc's contained in the arterial circulation is the bit that signals total blood volume to the rest of the body. It's pretty interesting that such a relatively small portion of the total blood is responsible for triggering your body to get rid of water when you've ingested more than enough. When you drink water, it's absorbed from the small intestine into the blood so that it can be transported to the rest of the tissues in the body. Your blood volume increases as you add more and more water to it. Makes sense, right? So the condition that results from imbibing too much water is called hyponatremia or water intoxication, if you don't like the science-y words. Hypo means less than normal and natremia is related to salt. Natrem is actually Latin for salt. This normally happens after someone drinks more than ten liters of water in a very, very, very short period of time. Or, for some reason, isn't able to get the water out of their body. If you're wondering why a condition involving water is named after salt, let me break it down even more. Salt, otherwise known as sodium, is an essential part of the blood. Its concentration determines the distribution of water in the body. Water follows salt so if salt is high in one place, water's gonna move there until the concentration gets balanced. As you drink too much water and you're plasma volume increases, the salt concentration decreases, the excess water either needs to be excreted out of your body or it will move into your cells. Moving into the brain cells reduces their ability to function, hence, the similarity to alcoholic toxication. Salt and other electrolytes have to be at particular concentrations for our nerves to work correctly. And our nerves work via electrical convection because of electrolytes. Let's take a look at how electrolytes contribute to current flow. I've got this forty watt light bulb here hooked up to AC house current so this experiment is a little bit dangerous, i.e. you could get electrocuted so be careful if you try to reproduce it. I'm gonna wear my fancy glasses just in case and I'm wearing a rubber glove for electrocution purposes or, I guess, anti-electrocution. There are two parallel plates added to the circuit that cause it to short in the right conditions. So in the air, the bulb doesn't work very well. And, if I put the plates into a jar that contains only water, nothing happens at all, right? The light stays out. If I move it, though, into a jar that contains salt water, it starts to glow. The next jar here in the line has even more salt in the solution. Let's see if it makes it, oh, there it goes. It's glows even brighter. But what about a sports drink? We don't drink salt water, right? So let's try a sports drink that contains electrolytes. And lo and behold, ta-da, glowing light bulb. Other drinks that we drink give us energy. Energy drinks, yeah, well, let's give that a try. Works pretty good. So as we can see, salts are essential to electricity. There's no doubt that too much water diluting your blood and tissues can be trouble. Think you're okay just drinking beer? Well, beer contains a lot of water without much in the way of salt. It turns out that beer intake over six liters, I mean, that's a lot of beer, but without any compensatory salt intake, that's going to lead to hyponatremia. It's called beer drinkers potomania. It's a nice term for those word nerds among you. So, Jess, if you're planning to go big on the beer this weekend, just remember to chow down on those salty snacks to keep your kidneys working right. Back to you. ^M00:17:15 [ music ] ^M00:17:20 >> Wow, Kiki, I'm way ahead of you. >> Jeez, Jess. Whoa. >> Goodness, I haven't done that in a while. So beer and salt, I can do that. >> It's all about ratios. Isn't there a line in one movie where there talking about it's all about ratios? They're talking about a girl's hips and it's all about ratios. I think that the same thing applies. >> Beer and salt. Beer and popcorn is food of the Gods and the breakfast of champions. It's actually a heartburn, like, a case of the heartburn for me. Nonsense. >> Nonsense. Delicious. No, it's good, it's good. Drink your beer. Cheers. Get on it. Let's see, what time is it? Oh, yes, time for something random like, oh, this ostrich cart. That's random all right. Now, speaking of random and of ostriches, actually, get ready for some invigorating bird trivia found on our website. I'm pretty sure my grandma made cockatielcottage.net. All right, did you know that the reason why owls turn their heads around, you know how owls do that, is because they can't move their eyes? Yes, it's true, their eyeballs are tubular in shape, not round like you, know, yours and mine. And even more awesome, get this, an albatross can sleep and fly simultaneously. Albatross, totally my favorite animal now. And finally, female birds choose their mates by how attractive they are and how well they sing. What do you think about that, Jess? >> You do it very well. >> So female birds are not so different from females, female people. >> No, no, no, no, no. But it is funny to me in the animal kingdom how the males actually have to be prettier. Like, this happens with peacocks and ducks. >> So true. Yeah. Common guys, pretty it up. Now, question for you. >> Yes. >> Why throw it away when you can Remix It? ^M00:19:23 [ music ] ^M00:19:30 >> Thanks, ladies. Today, I'm gonna show you how to turn a vinyl record into a bowl. So easy that even a five and a half month old infant can do it. Am I suggesting that your infant should do this DIY for you? Yes. This project was a huge hit back in the seventies. It's short and very cheap to do. Lasts about ten minutes and costs you practically nothing so there's no reason why you shouldn't do it. First off, the materials. First, you need a vinyl record. You can either use a useless vinyl you have in your house or buy one at a thrift or record store. I actually got mine for free at my local Rasputin Records. Second, you need an oven safe bowl, third, a cookie sheet, fourth, oven gloves, and finally, you need an oven. What are the directions? First, you got to preheat your oven to two hundred degrees if you're a patient or higher if you are impatient. Turn over your over safe bowl and place it on the cookie sheet. Then take your vinyl and place it over the bowl and make sure it is centered. Place it in the oven for approximately five to eight minutes, more or less, depending on the oven temperature and the quality of your vinyl. You should expect longer for older, thicker vinyls. And as the vinyl is cooking, one cool thing you can do is make your own molding finger gloves by using aluminum and napkins. This is actually, my brother recommended this to me. Simply wrap a napkin over your finger, and then, cover it with aluminum. You're ready to mold, and also, you're ready to freak people out. Now, take the vinyl out of the oven. It should be conforming to the bowl. This is where you actually have to start working fast cause you have thirty seconds to mold before the vinyl cools off. Quickly place the vinyl inside the oven safe bowl and mold the edges however way you like. If it's hard to mold, just place the vinyl back in the oven for a few minutes and do it all over again. And after the vinyl cools off, you are done. Give yourself a pat on the back. You just made some magic. The vinyl record bowl is very simply, very cheap, and it also could be used for a variety of reasons. You can hold plants in it, snacks, office supplies, cats, so on. It actually has a hole in the bottom so don't put any sort of liquids in there. You could also use it for decorative purposes. I actually went to the dance section of the record store and found myself a nice green vinyl. Isn't this pretty fancy? This is pretty cool, right? It's actually called anyone could happen to me by Nation of Apple. No ones ever gonna listen to this so if you have any good Remix ideas, send them to Pop Siren at Revision3.com, especially if you have any good ideas for vinyl records. All right, thank you, and back to you, Sarah and Jessica. >> Marry me Mujon. >> You totally have a girl crush. >> I'm sorry, those are RAD. Like, I would totally use them to put candy corns in there. That's a party. You know what I'm talking about. >> Uh-huh. Uh-huh. >> Candy corns and vinyl. Hot. >> Oh, so fun. Okay, everybody. It's tea time cause we do love our Adagio teas, teas from a huge, huge selection of quality loose and bag teas at Adagio.com. Guys, I want you to take for me, this is a true story, I used to drink, like, two to three cups of coffee every single day. My life literally changed when I switched to tea. I'm not even kidding. It's got the caffeine I need but it's lots smoother. It's so much better for your stomach, too. Now, I prefer green. I'm also kind of into the rooibos these days, but if you like black tea, everything's filled with antioxidants. You kind of can't lose. You can't lose with the tea. >> You say rooibos; I say rooibos. >> Cause you're evidently Latin today. >> How true. So here's the deal, all the Pop Siren gals made their own blends and Sarah and I were trying to compete against each other. >> For the, you know, the most tea sold. >> But then, we saw the Digg Nation Adagio tea numbers. >> Okay, people, I'm begging you here, do not let us girls lose to a bunch of beer drinking, weed smoking, dudes. And they stink, too. >> [Inaudible], I'm begging you, come on now. Go to Adagio.com/popsiren, purchase your [inaudible] Pop Siren tea, remember to sip smart, and just, you know, let's beat those guys. You can do it. Let's do it. We need your help. >> Now, our very own Pop Siren nerd bird, Neha Tiwari, has been away for the last couple of weeks working diligently on a variety of nerdy, nerdy things, including a DIY light saber. >> Yeah, I mean, like many of us, Neha's a pretty big Star Wars fan. That's all fine and good. Although, she actually has a small collection of light sabers which is less common and she's wanted to build her own for quite some time now. >> It is a different level, you know, it's a different level. >> Yeah. >> But where does one start when one wants to build a light saber? Well, recently, Neha got a chance to take notes from a light saber builder extraordinaire to get some pointers. Yeah. ^M00:24:14 [ music ] ^M00:24:20 >> Thank you so much for joining us and you're gonna tell me how to upgrade my little toy into, you know, a man's saber. >> Sure. Yeah. >> Or whatever. >> We're gonna take a basic saber, basically. What we have here is a basic saber. It doesn't have any sound in it but it's a good place to start for people. And what you'll see here is it's just made of some, you know, basic parts that you can find like in a hardware store, some O-rings. >> Okay. >> This is just a sink tube. This happens to be a custom machine part right here but, you can use almost anything to build your light saber. >> Okay. >> And you have this nice, long polycarbonite plastic tube here. >> Right. So I kind of get the idea of the whole thing but, you know, you got to break it down. >> Of course. >> So starting with, like, just this hilt, of course, exterior, how did you do this? >> Well, that's the thing. That's what we have these parts down here for and we'll start with the hilt, as you were saying here, we have the one point two five inch sink tube. You can find this at any hardware store. And this is where you can, of course, store your components. You know, you put them all right in there, boom, batteries, your switch, all this kind of stuff. >> And everything fits. >> Sure, yeah. >> Okay. >> Cut it apart, put the parts together. This is the other part that you want to get. This is a custom machine part. It doesn't have to be. But here's the heat sink where an LED will sit on top. Okay? >> Okay. >> And then, of course, this is what will hold the blade when you slide the blade inside here, it just fits in. >> What exactly is this and where can I find it? >> Well, this is a polycarbonite tube and it's just available at any kind of plastic store. I'd recommend something with a one inch diameter like this tube because, of course, it's more akin to a light saber. You don't want something too thin and too wide. It won't be able to fit. But you can see this makes a perfect light saber blade and it's perfectly strong. >> And on the inside, there's some sort of film or is that just the way it comes? >> Correct. You can put some diffuser film in here to help capture the light. Now you can use any types of different materials. Some of them are available at like, you can go the tap plastics and they have sort of light catching films that you can roll - >> Metallic stuff, and - >> Exactly. >> How much is this guy gonna set me back? Cause I like it, and I mean - >> That's an excellent question. >> I want to make one. So - >> It wouldn't, with the batteries it wouldn't cost you too much more than say fifty dollars, probably less. >> Really? >> Yeah. >> Thank you so much for joining me. I'm sure we're gonna have you back to build fancier things. >> Fancier? >> Yeah. >> Did you say fancier? Like this? >> Oh my gosh. Yes, well that is my dream light saber, I'm sure we'll have you back. In the meantime they can watch your videos at thecuttingedge dot - >> Dot S5 dot com, thecuttingedge.s5.com. >> There we go. All right, well thank you so much, and back to you guys. >> Thank you. May the force be with you. ^M00:26:47 [ music ] ^M00:27:26 >> Hey there [inaudible]. After a few tries I finally figured out a way to make a light saber on my own. It's a big accomplishment, and I have to tell you that it's not only cost efficient, but it's durable. You can actually fight with this thing. But if you want to attempt this great feat, you're gonna have to get some materials, all stuff that you can find in your hardware store. ^M00:27:43 [ music ] ^M00:27:47 Let me start with the bottom. First you're gonna need a galvanized cap. This one's a one and a quarter inch, and it has these threading on them inside, which will help it screw to the next part, the hilt, which is actually a one and a quarter by four and a half inch galvanized nipple. So as you saw, the hilt has two sides, two threading sides, and I connected a bushing. Now this is gonna connect the reducer to the hilt. This is one and a half by one and a quarter, and then the next part then is the reducer, which goes from two inches to one and a half. What connects to this is the best part. That's a tube that I got from Tap Plastics. It's about two inches around in diameter, and it's about thirty six inches long, which is about three feet, I wanted a long saber. And that's basically it for the exterior. Now let's talk about the interior. ^M00:28:33 [ music ] ^M00:28:38 You can get LEDs and get all fancy, but I'm not really an engineer. As I mentioned, I don't know how to work that stuff, I didn't want to get messy with it. So I got an LED flashlight, and what I did was I put some tape on this side, so I pulled it here, and I put some stuff on the cap down here so that it would kind of hoist it up. What I did was I marked where the button would be, drilled a hole, and then added some threading here. And as you can see on the outside, I have a lot of like O rings and embellishments, and that's kind of the final thing that you need. If you want to like personalize it, you can do it with whatever you want. You know, some people have said they've put like champagne bottle parts on it and really weird stuff, I just went with the O rings for grip. Now some of the stuff is pretty obvious how you kind of put it together, you just screw everything on piece by piece. But with the plastic tube it's a little different. You have to use something called glue plastic welder to actually put this into here, into the reducer. Now I have to tell you, you got to be patient with this, cause I wasn't, and so my light saber ended up a little bit [inaudible], meaning crooked and pointing downwards. ^M00:29:43 [ music ] ^M00:29:46 [ background music ] Also next time around I think I would use lighter parts. This stuff is a bit heavy, and let me show you actually how it all comes together. ^M00:29:53 [ music ] ^M00:29:58 [ background music ] Right, and voila, there you go. You have a working light saber, and you just press this button and it's gonna light up. You can't really tell so much out here, but it's awesome at dusk. Anyway, as my man Yoda says, there is no try, there is only do. I showed you mine, I want you to show me yours. I'm gonna go fight with this, but back to you girls. ^M00:30:17 [ music ] ^M00:30:26 >> Okay, so Neja clearly has some moves. I think she's seen episode four once or twice. >> Yeah, yeah. >> I'm pretty impressed actually. Now let's all get together, shall we? Let's hold hands, and let's thank GoDaddy.com for bringing Jessica's fine [inaudible] to your internet airwaves. Ow! Their hosting is world class, you can build fast and easy websites, and a lot more. Dot come names start as low as one ninety nine, that's pennies people, pennies. Make an impact online at GoDaddy.com. >> Thanks for giving my assets a shout out there. Thank you. Oh and remember, enter code siren one - >> Ah, yes. >> - when you check out, and you can save an extra you know, 10% off of your entire order. That's a steal of a deal. >> That's a steal. >> Mm-hmm. >> 10% off one ninety nine? Are they out of their minds? >> Yes. >> Now because the internet is such a vast wasteland of time wasting goodies, I'm thinking it's high time for a trick. ^M00:31:26 [ music ] ^M00:31:32 >> So I kind of really meant what I said when I said time wasting. Little trick called flip, okay. So the website is kind of hard to read, but I'll put it in the [inaudible], redfad.com/flip.html. Okay, so when you get to the flip page you just write any text that you want, so I'm gonna go ahead and write I'm upside down, made you look, ha ha. And as you can see right underneath, the text is truly inverted. Inverted? Is that the right way to say, anyway it's upside down, right? Well what happens is, this is not the end of my trick, but you can just copy and paste this text anywhere you want. And I tried it on my blog, which is Typepad, I tried it in Microsoft Word Text Edit, and best of all Twitter. And once I actually threw it up on Twitter as you can see, it actually totally works, and it really scared everybody. In fact I've never gotten so many at Sarah Lane replies in Twitter as I did when I posted this yesterday. In fact you can see some of the replies included things like Awesome, how the hell'd you do that? Okay, that's just spooky. That upside downness is pretty amazing. All right for the sake of knowledge, how did you do that? So I kind of felt cool, I actually didn't tell anybody cause I wanted to wait till I could share it with everybody on the show. Really not gonna change your life, not gonna get you laid, but it might give you just a little something to do on a Sunday when you're sitting around in your underwear trying to be relevant. Anyway, [inaudible]. >> Well if it's not gonna get my laid Lane, I just don't even know what the point is. >> Sometimes, my point is people, sometimes internet is just about doing stupid stuff, like putting your text upside down - >> I want the site that actually mirrors you know? So it's not inverted or upside down, it actually mirrors. Cause I used to write stuff, here's a little fun fact about Jess. I used to write stuff backwards perfectly, Redrum, Redum, crazy, the train, yeah. >> Yeah, a little insight into your childhood. >> All right. Since the last time our loveable producer Heather highlighted one of her favorite wacky Heather bands, we got a ton of great new ideas from you guys. >> Very true. But she particularly liked a suggestion from Jeff Hildabrant, who is, goes by Mister Popular on our forum. Hi Jeff, you rock. >> I've seen you in the forums. >> Yeah, we like you. And you're actually supplying our information in this edition of The Fringe. ^M00:33:50 [ music ] ^M00:33:57 [ background music ] >> All right, trust me when I say you'll learn pretty much everything you need to know about life from funky rap act Grand Buffet [assumed spelling]. Well okay, at least the important stuff like religion and lemonade, meteorites, ludicrous theories of secular scientists, refusing a role like predictable people, cream cheese, and obviously time travel. Home grown Pittsburgh white boys Jarred Weeks aka Lord Grunge, and Jackson O'Connell Barlow, or Iguana Don are a nerve core hip hop duo who are known for their ambient drum and bassy apex twin like sounds, and ironic, cynical, and sarcastic lyrics. ^M00:34:36 [ music ] ^M00:34:46 [ background music ] Tracks like Oh My God, You're Weird, Cool as Hell, and a song about saving money to buy cream cheese might seem a bit goofy, but they really do rap about meaningful stuff. But they just never take themselves too seriously, and I dig that. >> Heather's such a catch. Mister Popular should give her a call. >> Absolutely. >> What do you say Dude? >> She's a bigger catch than Willie Mayes in the 1954 World Series against Cleveland. >> Indeed she is. >> Wow. >> Should we get some e-mails? >> Absolutely. >> All right, let's do that. >> [inaudible] last comment [inaudible]. >> Okay. Now for some emails, Jason and Eric wrote in about the remixed Scrabble bulletin board segment from last week. They said skip the thumb tacks all together and use a magnet for a more forgiving and lasting DIY Scrabble board. >> Which is a really good idea. Jason also specifically suggests to use an old traffic street sign that you've you know, found, not stolen, which is a really good idea Jason of course, because it's magnetic. >> Right. >> Metal and all. Next up Steve T writes is your theme song really an original song? Because it sounds a lot like music I heard while watching the movie For a Few Dollars More starring Clint Eastwood. Well rest assured that it is 100% original. I have not seen the movie, the Clint Eastwood movie. So now I'm actually curious. >> I really haven't seen that either, but you know what is crazy is that Clint Eastwood was in my dream last night, which is weird. I don't even know how to explain that, or if there's a connection. >> Maybe you guys are gonna get together and have like five hundred babies. >> I'm down, I think he's sexy. Okay, so Steve yes, it is an original. Lawrence Skuduto [assumed spelling] is our music composer, and he rocks. >> We love you Larry. >> Even though I can't say his last name totally. >> I don't know if he wants to be called Larry at all. And lastly, Eric Woods writes I'm embarrassed to say I do know the lyric that you were thinking of last week from the song Get Low. Last, I guess Eric definitely watches our bloopers? >> Yeah, that was the bloopers at the end of the show. >> That was like way at the end. >> Right. >> Cause we had this little conversation, cause I just - >> You had something about getting low. >> Getting low, and I had to do - >> And I thought it was short, it got low, low, low. >> Right, which I love that song, and it wasn't. It goes to the windows, to the wild, to the sweat drop down my balls. >> Ah, ah. >> Duh duh duh. >> Nobody wants that visual. >> Oh my God, I love it so much. Thank you, thank you. >> Do you love it so much? >> Thank you, because now I can like put my mind to ease on what the hell that song was. [ background music ] >> Coming up next week on Pop Siren Doctor Kiki on the science of DVDs. >> Plus Mujon, our creator of magic remixes an old toothbrush into a holder for a new toothbrush. >> Sounds like a lot of melting plastic to me. >> I love her. >> I do too, thank you though. And Heather's reviewing a graphic novel. I'll give you three hints. Okay, futuristic, punk rock, and hot chick. >> All sounds - >> You want to watch, right? >> - for me. >> Cool. >> Brand new episodes go live at four p.m. every Thursday, but through the magic of video on demand and RSS feeds, how and when you watch our show is totally up to you. >> We do a lot of magic lately, we're like magicians I guess. And if you missed any little details from today's episode, don't forget that we always write up a link to everything that we talked about in our episode show notes at popsiren.com. Sarah? >> Yeah. >> Put a fork in this, we're done. We are so done. >> Wow that was a long show. Something weird about this show. >> Yeah. >> Something in the water today. >> I think that's probably what's going on. >> I'm Sarah Lane, and I don't know about you, but I'm ready for a burrito. Want to go? >> Totally. So I'm Jessica Corbin, see you guys next week. [ laughter ] ^M00:38:23 [ music ] ^M00:38:38 >> Lower, lower, lower, ding ding ding. >> Want me to punch your boob? That's awkward. >> Roll out, roll out, roll out. [ laugher ] >> Curvy lane. >> That's your box framing, there's your center. >> Better than scurvy lane. >> Swirvy, we're swirvy. >> Nervy, nervy lane. >> Vervy. >> Vervy. [ burping ] [ laughter ] ^M00:39:28 >> Today I'm gonna, oh crap, or any other sort of [inaudible]. Because it's gonna mold to the edges, okay, voice over. >> Now this thing is called a nipple, and - [ laughter ] Okay. >> Might be hard to get through it. >> Cause I'm twelve and nipples are funny. And next is the hilt. Now this is a thing, okay. Okay, I'm gonna set this down for just a second so that. Oh come on. Okay, and so I'm gonna set this down for, so I'm gonna set this down for just a second so I can. All right, so I'm gonna set this down for just a second. Okay, so I'm gonna set this down for just a second here. Okay, I can't [inaudible]. >> Don't touch it. [ laughter ] >> Oh my God.