Gadgets, Gizmos, and Games for Geeks

Because why limit skeletons to just your closet, macabre Etsy shop the blackened teeth (mine are just yellowed) is selling the Spine Lamp, a 60cm (~24″) table lamp made with a realistic human spine. Perhaps a little TOO realistic.

Because what good is a robotic gripper if it breaks everything it touches, researchers at Harvard’s John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) have developed a robotic gripper that can carefully grasp and pick up objects with its creepily long tentacles.

The Pocket Miku is a tiny synthesizer that turns its key presses (or audio input) into Hatsune Miku’s voice. For those of you unfamiliar, Miku is a Vocaloid software voicebank created by Crypton Future Media and its official anthropomorphic mascot, a Japanese idol with long, turquoise hair.

3D printed meat: just the thought alone probably has your mouth watering right now. I know mine is, but I’ve eaten nothing but saltines for the better part of a week because I’m too lazy to go to the grocery store and too poor to order delivery.

Because nobody likes a wet butt (I only face forward in the shower), the Butt Be Dry (affiliate link) is a portable seating pad to prevent the back of your pants from getting soaked while sitting on a wet seat.

Designed, 3D printed, and sold by Etsy shop 3DCubedPrinting; the TTG2.5 is a  handgun that uses mints as bullets. That way, you don’t even have to clean up after shooting cans for target practice in your living room; just let your dogs enjoy minty-fresh breath.

Priced to bust wallets at $550, the LEGO Avengers Hulkbuster set is the toy giant’s largest Marvel set to date, with an impressive 4,049 pieces. For reference, that’s $200 more but only 277 pieces more than the LEGO Daily Bugle set.

Because most computing technology is notoriously earth-unfriendly with its inability to be reused or recycled, researchers at the State University of New York at Binghamton have developed circuit boards printed on paper that can be safely disposed of after a single use, either by burning or naturally biodegrading.

Participating in the Downtown Benicia Main Street Scarecrow Contest, bakers Hanalee Pervan and her mother Catherine of One House Bakery in Benicia, California, created this lifesize ‘Pan Solo in Carbonite’ bread sculpture. Did it win the contest?

Inspired by the scene from The Exorcist that kept me up countless nights when I was a child because I watched the movie entirely too young at a sleepover, this pewter bottle pourer features the likeness of Regan MacNeil projectile vomiting.

Because who didn’t get into puzzles or model building during the pandemic (I got into miniature ships myself), the $55 ROKR Tilt-A-Whirl is a DIY music box wooden puzzle kit from the company’s Magic Amusement Park series.

Anxiety: we all experience it. And what better way to help alleviate that feeling than with a 3D-printed, articulated fidget slug? I can’t think of anything. Granted, I’m not trying to think of anything, but I have to save my brainpower for more important things like what’s for lunch.

Originally created as places for monks to meditate on Buddha’s teachings, Zen gardens have been miniaturized and available in desktop versions for quite some time now. Just not in interplanetary form, like this Mars Zen Garden available from Uncommon Goods.

Because there will never be enough Star Wars merchandise in the world, Merchoid is selling this The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly-inspired stormtrooper statue. Complete with a cowboy hat and poncho, this stormtrooper is clearly ready to set out on his trusty steed (read: speeder bike) and seek his fortune.

Because with enough liquid resin, anything is possible, YouTuber buildxyz constructed his dream standing desk by encasing printed circuit boards (PCBs) in clear plastic. What a beauty. As I’m sure Indiana Jones would agree, it belongs in a museum.

Because dinosaur feet make everything better (googly eyes, too, but this isn’t about them), Thingiverse user melgrubb created 3D-printed dino feet to support a flatscreen television. That’s cool, but he should have also printed little t-rex arms hugging the television from the sides.