Often there are interesting items that, by themselves, just don’t have enough meat on them to fill up a hungry Night Owl. This is one such occasion. Wouldn’t it be great if The Owl could sample a few different entrées without filling up on just one thing? The solution is Oh, Shorts! – a buffet of jibber jabber (or a salad bar, if you prefer word salad). Choose what you want from tonight’s buffet line and salad bar. Enough said, on with the shorts!
Unfog
If you’ve been wearing a mask when you break quarantine and leave isolation (and you’re crazy if you don’t) you may have noticed that masks will cause your eyeglasses or sunglasses to fog up.
The simple solution is to gently wash the lenses with soapy water, or rub a tiny drop of baby shampoo on them. Do not rinse off the soap/shampoo! Shake the excess water off and let the glasses air dry. If you’re in a hurry you can dab the remaining droplets off with a tissue. The key is to leave a thin film of soap or shampoo behind on the lenses.
You can test it to see if there’s enough of a soap film left on your eyewear by exhaling on the lenses. After some experimentation I found that just rubbing on a drop of liquid soap, letting it dry, and wiping the excess away with a tissue worked best.
Another option to prevent fogging is to add a folded tissue to your mask, and/or folding down the top fraction of your mask (inside down). Here’s a handy demonstration video (first 29 seconds out of 2:43). It’s in Japanese but you don’t need to be a ninja to understand it!
Yellow Submarine
The Beatle’s Yellow Submarine (1968) is an animation classic and favorite among many Beatlephiles. The movie was restored and remastered in 4K digital resolution for the 50th anniversary re-release in 2018. Plus, they made it a “Sing-A-Long” with song lyrics at the bottom of the screen so all you kids can sing along. It’s been kept hidden away these past two years, unavailable to the public.
Now, YouTube Music will live stream the 2018 version of the film on Saturday, April 25. This is a free, one-time-only good deal. The show will start at 12 noon EST, 9am PST. Tune in at “The Beatles – Yellow Submarine Sing-A-Long Watch Party” on YouTube.
Meanwhile, to wet your appetite, here’s the original 1968 trailer (3:42).
Relax
Soothing music is great to help relieve stress and tension. I’m always happy to find new music that satisfies that hunger, and it’s even better when I discover a new (to me) instrument at the same time. It’s called a kalimba, also known as a thumb piano.
The kalimba originated in Africa, but this particular music video has an oriental vibe to it, with soothing water flowing in the background (2:33).
Question of the night: What’s the best way you’ve found to relax?
