Disposible everything 

I replace lots of things rather than try to fix them or get them fixed. If I happen to have a little extra cash it's even worse. Like, right now I'm thinking of trashing a $230 steam carpet cleaner. It's some kind of bad guilty feeling I can't exactly put my finger on, but I keep trying to tell myself it's as much about society and cheap offshore products as it is about my moral fibre.

Cutting room floor 

One of the magazine writers at work had a great quote edited from his story on meth labs cleanup. Jim asked the source -- maybe a CDC official or something, not sure -- if there were any typical clues that an office space had been used as a lab. The guy said there were. "Usually you'll find a lot of porn and NASCAR stuff."

Trying Taskable 

It's an RSS and OPML browser that sits in your Windows taskbar. Still in beta. Download. Made by Sean Nolan, a former Microsoft guy. I tried adding the OPML blog changes page. It works.

This is the second time I've run across a reference to it in the last 2-3 days. Have you ever noticed that the motivation to check out something new on the web is a little like the theory of multiple exposures to ads? You usually don't respond the first time, but if you hear about it again from a different source or through a different medium, you start to think, "This might be something I should pay attention to." (I suppose that is one definition of "buzz.")

The taskbar icon is a little Mister Bill head. The Taskable page says he's XML orange, but it's displaying more red on my monitor. It made me think about the RSS feed icon debate. The one aspect almost everyone seems to agree on is the color. Maybe the answer is to go with the color as the identifier, since it is so distinctive. Forget about the symbol or text. Just make the button a little solid orange square or rectangle.