Winding Road Hot List: Volume 39

Every week we sift through a truly amazing amount of “stuff” in the dozen or so hours we spend online—you know, the time spent not driving sweet cars. A lot of the cool stuff we find has to do specifically with new cars, naturally, but there’s also a huge amount of awesomeness that doesn’t completely fit in the normal Winding Road world. Once, we were in the habit of simply reading, watching, or talking amongst ourselves about this web detritus, but recently we thought it might be a good idea to start sharing it with you all. Thus, The Hot List.

 

We aim to bring you a list of the most interesting bits of information we run across. Ten worth-knowing-about things that may or may not be related directly to the world of cars, but all of which we think our typical enthusiast readers will be able to really dig into. We don’t know, from week to week, what will show up on this list, which is part of the fun for us and for you.

Read, enjoy, and comment. If you happen to know of something that you think would make for a good inclusion on next week’s list, drop us a line at [email protected].

 

 

 

 

Science, man! There’s some cool stuff going on in space today (when isn’t there?), what with the SpaceX Dragon docking with the International Space Station. The NASA: 2Explore Flickr account has some cool photos streaming in, documenting parts of the event. Scroll on through the photos for lots of amazing imagery, including the recent solar eclipse and some beautiful geographic photos of Earth.

 

 

 

 

A slightly different type of personal flotation, the Origami Paddler unfolds to offer a floating platform you can stand on to paddle yourself about your local lake. When you’re done, just fold it up and carry it off, or throw it in your trunk. As much as we’d like to endorse taking this sucker down some level five rapids, we won’t, so forget we said anything.

 

 

 

 

Season your food with sadness, like you’ve always dreamed. This salt collection starts with human tears, boils them down and crystallizes the salt, then prepares it for sale to people with really strange food fetishes. The range includes salt made from tears of anger, sorrow, and laughter, as well as from tears made while sneezing or chopping onions. Currently (thankfully?), Hoxton Street Monster Supplies only ships these salts to the UK.

 

 

 

 

If you enjoy a whiff of bourbon with your smoke, you may enjoy these “aromatically enhanced” cigars from Maker’s Mark. The cigars are all tobacco, with no artificial ingredients (that includes bourbon—it’s magic!). The glass tubes are sealed in wax, so no humidification is required.

 

 

 

 

You lapped the ‘Ring in record time. You got a 50-kill streak. You chopped off an ogre’s head in a really sweet, unlikely spin move. Nobody will ever know. Such is the ephemeral glory of the gamer. This device changes that by easily recording your virtual exploits in high definition, for you to save and share with the world.

 

 

 

 

Everyone loves a bouncy ball. How about one that is filled with helium, allowing it to bounce up to 75 feet? It’s four inches in diameter, and will probably keep your kid (or office colleagues) entertained for minutes! Helium: it’s a gas.

 

 

 

 

This tractor concept features a bright paintjob, aggressive styling, loads of horsepower (but no official specs), huge Bridgestone Potenza tires, and a racing seat. No word on if the T-Ractor concept will ever come to fruition, but we can hope.

 

 

 

 

Earlier, we showed you some beautiful foosball tables that belong in a museum. Now, we have found ping pong tables to match their quality and grandeur. This table tennis range from 11 Ravens is impressive, indeed.

 

 

 

This scary-looking pet bed wants to devour your furry friend, then let it take a nice, comfortable nap. It features special nanotechnology that absorbs bacteria, viruses and other micro-nasties, to help keep your pet and its dwelling clean. Plus, it’s a shark, for crying out loud.

 

 

 

 

These amazing flower photographs are actually splash photography. Artist Jack Long created theses “Vessels And Blooms” photographs by carefully splashing paint and capturing an image with a high-speed camera. The results are hard to believe.