Magnetic doorstop - GIF

[Jon]

Magnetic doorstop. Not a fan of that plastic trim ring, but still a cool idea.




Previously:

Moving furniture into apartments - GIFs and photo
Cam lock furniture - GIF
Variety of transforming furniture - GIF
Industrial furniture made from machinery - photos and video
Human Hoist collapsible garage work chair
Automatic rising deck chair - GIF
"Chairless chair" wearable ergonomic mechatronic exoskeleton chair - GIF and video
Unusual cabinet opening mechanisms - GIFs
Automatic dropdown kitchen cabinets - GIF
Roentgen cabinets from the 1700s

[mklotz]

That's just too cool. The principle...

Device stops itself by magnetically engaging mechanical stop when it approaches stop position. Stop retracts when device moves away.

must have other creative uses. I've been thinking about it in the shower (where I do my best work) but haven't yet come up with anything clever.

The need to drill a hole in the floor could be eliminated. A small hinge, one leaf of which is held to the floor with some sort of adhesive, would do the trick. The other leaf is pulled up by the magnet and interferes with the catch on the bottom edge of the door.

[Jon]

Interesting. This one appealed to me because of all the doorknob-dented drywall we have, even with the stoppers on the hinges, which need constant adjustment.

BTW I have considered using a waterproof notepad in the shower. The combination of reduced external stimulus, plus the noise-covering effect of the falling water, is perfect for ideation. This plays into the concept of immediate idea capture; some great ideas arrive once in your life, and leave within seconds, never to be remembered again.

[mklotz]

Underwater notepads are simple, cheap and you can make sketches...

https://www.divegearexpress.com/unde...lue-cover-2600

Archaeologists and marine researchers use them. Too bad we gave up cuneiform. The Sumerians, along with the Greeks and Romans, used wax tablets for non-permanent note taking.

I've often considered one of those digital voice recorders, e.g....

https://www.amazon.com/Recorder-Lect...voice+recorder

for those middle-of-the-night inspirations. I wonder if it could be waterproofed. If has voice actuation so I suppose it could remain outside the shower. With the actuation level turned down, it might ignore shower noise but pick up loud speech.

[Jon]

Yup, that's probably where I'm heading. I've tried just leaving my pocket notepad on the vanity outside the shower. This does work, but the disruption of getting out of the shower, drying hands, jotting something down, and getting back in seems to upset my creativity. I've found that once a single good idea comes, a few more are often right behind. So I will try to conjure up an ad-hoc mnemonic to remember multiple ideas.

I've played with using a voice recorder, but I'm not sure if they're for me. There is something about longhand writing that helps my ideation.

[mklotz]

I'm often surprised at how few people think about thinking.

To get the best out of your mental faculties, one has to carefully observe and note where, when, and under what conditions one does his best thinking. Then one needs to set about creating the observed environment as frequently as possible, monitoring it for nuances that will improve it.

Probably half the people reading this will think we're crazy but one of the benefits of advanced age is that you're no longer required to give a damn what people think.

[Jon]

The more I systematize my cognition, the more I achieve intellectually, BUT - the worse my memory gets. I've been looking through memory training books at Amazon lately.

I'm reading Robert Pozen's Extreme Productivity now. Pozen is well-qualified to write this book: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Pozen . Anyway, he advocates allocating significant chunks of your day to just thinking. He also favors a short daily nap, and unaltered repetition of mundane daily rituals (same breakfast every day, Einstein-like daily clothes selecting, etc.). This centers around the concept of Decision fatigue - the belief that we can only make a limited amount of good decisions each day, so we shouldn't "waste" decisions on the mundane.

[Moby Duck]

At first I really liked the door stop but it became far too complicated on the first page of the instructions which must state somewhere " first take the door off ".
Add the fact that it needs a hole drilled in the floor, which has the potential to drill into water pipes and drains, electric power and heating cables, carpet or concrete and I don't think the inventor is about to make his fortune.

More thinking:
1. There was once a door security device looking similar to the in floor fitting. It was designed to replace those puny security chains. Inside was a spring and a 1" steel bar/pipe, which was normally latched in the down position. Stomp on it with your foot and it pops up to prevent access, and prevent the door being kicked in. Stomp it again to latch it down.
2. Doors are relatively flexible and even a block of wood screwed to the floor close to the wall doesn't stop them from flexing up where the handle is, and the handle damages the dry wall.


She Says: You haven't listened to a word I've been saying, have you?
He Thinks: What a funny way she's got of starting a conversation.