The guys over at Futility Closet dug up this awesome retro invention which I only wish they had actually made.
Patented by Ann Margaret Zaleski way back in 1973, this dog-shaped vacuum was supposed to help your scaredy pup cope with the stress of you vacuuming up their hair when being groomed by hiding a Suck-o-Lux inside a doggie doppelganger. Yep. Brilliant. Of course, most dogs would look at this thing and cower in the corner, bark at the thing, or immediately start humping it. Maybe that’s why it never made it to market. Or maybe it was just ahead of its time, and we’ll be able to buy one in 2011.
According to its inventor, “It will be readily obvious that other shapes of dogs, not shown, may be used instead, preferably one to correspond to the particular type dog to be groomed so that he will feel more friendly toward it. Of course, cats or other pets may be similarly simulated in the toy animal configuration. Thus it will be seen that I have provided a novel combination and arrangement of a toy animal, such as a dog, and vacuum cleaner and blower for completely concealing and muffling the noises of a vacuum cleaner and blower within the confines of the body of a toy animal.”
Damn, and I was going to patent a cat-shaped vacuum and an iguana-shaped one too. Stupid patent trolls. I swear.
[via Nag on the Lake]
