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Gadgets, Technology, Public speaking and IT from an undergraduate's perspective.
Book Safe to Keep and Hide Valuables (Cash, Jewelry, etc)
I remember when I was much younger, and I happened to watch this movie where one of the characters stowed some secret item in a book safe. The much-younger-me was very much the impressionable and easily astonished kid, and if I don’t recall wrongly, I was extremely surprised when I first discovered the book safe.
I thought it was an absolutely ingenious idea.
Books were meant for reading and I never did explore the possibilities of actually having a fake book to store valuables in. The premise was simple — have a fake book, or a real book with a hole cut into it — and then storing your cash and valuables inside that book safe.

For book safes like that, a lock or combination wouldn’t even be possible. These book safes depend on security by obfuscation, which, is entirely inadequate. The complete system is based on the assumption that another person will not chance upon your book safe by accident.
That said, I know it sure as heck is a great conversational piece. And it’s cool.
Interested? Amazon has it, so you can get your very own book safe.
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Does Ireland Have Postal / Zip Codes?
I was packing a parcel to be sent to Ireland when I realised that there was something missing. There wasn’t any postal code! So I thought that I had the address wrong, so I double-checked it again. But the strange thing was that it was correct!
So I went online, and did a bit of research on zip codes in Ireland. Well it turns out that there are no postal codes for most of Ireland! That’s right, Ireland has no postal/zip codes, except in Dublin. The city of Dublin is divided in postal codes 1-24.
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All-Ett vs The Big Skinny Review (Slim Men’s Leather Wallets Review)
Yay! My new wallet from The Big Skinny came in the mail today. I’ve been on the search for a new wallet to replace my old one for a long time because I felt that it was just too thick.

The search was made more difficult because I had a certain set of criteria that I was looking out for. Namely, the new wallet must be:
- Super thin / slim
- Look good and presentable with any kind of attire
- Preferably compartmentalised
- Have a convenient compartment for cash notes
For that reason, I decided that I had to get a leather wallet, and the wallet should have a full-sized compartment for holding cash. None of those money clips because I think a little privacy is good, and none of those half-sized pockets that require you to fold your cash, because I don’t like fumbling with cash while I’m trying to make payment or collect change.

Well, so I shortlisted my choices to finally between either the All-Ett (Check out the choices available here ), or the Big Skinny (See the Big Skinny
). I made my ultimate decision the Big Skinny because it released a leather version just as I was about to buy.

This choice of leather turned out to be a bad idea because leather is inherent thicker, which actually goes against my first criteria (that the wallet must be super thin / slim). So the Big Skinny turned out to be just marginally slimmer than my original leather wallet.

Perhaps I should have chosen the All-Ett (Check out the choices available here ) or the original version of the Big Skinny wallet (See the Big Skinny
) instead.
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Toastmasters Table Topic Ideas for Impromptu Speaking - Toasting
Toastmasters should be highly competent with impromptu speaking and giving on-the-spot toasts, so practice that! As the Table Topics Master, determine an appropriate setting for each speaker, then have them make an appropriate toast for the occasion. Some examples can be during a school function about a teacher, at a company Dinner & Dance about your boss, at a friend’s party about a close friend or the host.
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Using Google For Calculations and Conversions (Metric, Distance, ANYTHING!)
Heh. Other than performing searches, Google’s actually great for calculations and conversions. For instance, try typing:
23oz to ml
to convert ounces to millilitres. I haven’t found anything that Google couldn’t convert — I’ve tried converting distances (km, m, cm, inches), volume (l, ml, oz, gm, m, kg) and even currency, like so:
USD10 to SGD10
Google also works as a math calculator, so you can even type our calculations like:
2 * 6
and Google with give you the answer. It works with more advanced functions too, such as:
(23^2) mod 2
which is essentially 23 to the power of 2, then perform a modulos 2 operation. Cool stuff! The only problem with this is that you’ll need an Internet connection, so if you’re offline, all these functions are unavailable to you.
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Toastmasters Table Topic Ideas for Impromptu Speaking - Art Critics
If you have children, a good Table Topics idea is to collect several unique-looking pictures that your children have drawn, and ask your Table Topics speakers to discuss the significance and meaning of those pictures.
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Funny Lift Floor Prank
This is an ingenius prank where they paint an elevator’s floor to look like it’s a bottomless pit. I must say it’s rather realistic!



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30 Jan 08 | 


