Walt's Corner

Have you ever come across one of those words where you are not sure how to spell it? You spell it out, but it does not seem right. Autocorrect throws some weird shit at you and you accept, but then there is some other color line under it now. Something is amiss. Great. Now I must perform a google search on fucking marshmallows. So, I did. And I learned something.

Before I even finished typing in the word “marshmallow,” the responses start auto populating on my screen. The first one of which was from WebMD and read “MARSHMALLOW: Overview, Uses, Side Effects, Precautions…” Um… NO. Not at all what I am looking for. The scrumptious candy should not be popping up on WebMB. I must have the wrong spelling. I keep scrolling down until I find the type of results I was looking for. Marshmallow. Marshmallow root. Marshmallow in Spanish. Marshmallow fluff. There it is. Wikipedia Marshmallow is a confectionary made from…” and that’s all I needed. I had the correct spelling.

But wait. What was all that stuff about marshmallow root? And WebMB? This required further investigating. The rabbit hole had opened. Also from WebMD: “Marshmallow is sometimes used to form a protective layer on the skin and lining of the digestive tract. It also contains chemicals that might decrease cough and fight infections. Don’t confuse marshmallow with the mallow (Malva sylvestris) flower and leaf.”

Holy shit. Do my s’mores marshmallows have an origin story? Turns out, they do. Here is what I learned from Wikipedia. Check it out if, like Paul Harvey, you want the rest of the story. My generic overview follows. The word marshmallow comes from the name of the mallow plant species Althaea officinalis. It grows in wetlands or marshes. Marshmallow. It appears the use of this plant for medicinal purposes goes back as far as ancient Egypt, 2000 BCE. The Egyptians would prepare this mallow root pulp  by boiling it with honey, straining, cooling and then using it for sore throats and healing wounds. My guess would to be to make it more palatable. But who knows their original line of thought. Certainly not this guy.

Fast forward to to the mid 19^th century and you’ve got the French adding sugar, water, and egg whites to it and whipping it up into a fluffy candy called Pâte de Guimauve. And that is the basic recipe still in use today with egg whites or gelatin used to hold the foamy structure of what you and I know as the lowly marshmallow. Minus the mallow.

In summary, today’s marshmallow is an ancient medicinal delivery system, minus the medicine. And now you know.

I’m a sucker for a nice safety razor, especially one that completely redefines the category. The Leaf is one of those razors.

For as long as I can remember, the classic safety razor has come in 2 flavors, both of which has the blade perpendicular to the stem, or handle. The blade is secured by either a butterfly enclosure that opens by twisting your handle, or the blade gets pancaked in between two portions of the head which is then squished together by the handle which holds it all together by screwing into the head.

When it comes to the underlying physics involved in these types of razors there really is no difference. The angle of your blade is offset about 90º from your handle. The skill of a baby bottom smooth (BBS) shave with these razors is knowing at what angle to hold the handle as you drag the blade down your face. Be careful! Too little of an angle and no dice. Too harsh of an angle and you have just sliced your face to shreds. The best type of these razors for me has been the Henson AL13 that I reviewed back in June of last year.

The Leaf has redesigned the safety razor from the ground up. Not only does it shift the angle of blade from that 90º, but it adds multiple blades in much the same fashion as your standard plastic disposable blade cartridge. You know, the ones that cost $20 for a pack of 4 – albeit at a fraction of the cost because it uses standard single edge safety blades. If you already have standard double edge safety blades you can easily snap them in half inside their paper sheaths before unwrapping them. Now you have 2 single edge blades that will fit the Leaf. I paid around $10 for a pack of 50 of these blades – 100 if you snap them in half.

You can choose to shave with one, two, or three blades when it comes to the Leaf. The razor seems like a solid slab of stainless steel but is comes in a variety of finishes. I always prefer chrome. Putting the blades in the Leaf is straightforward. A simple unscrewing of a knurled thumbwheel on the back will allow the different leaves of the blade holding system to turn up, revealing the spot to place the blade. There is even a small magnet that will hold the blade in place as your drop the 2nd leaf down to put your 2nd blade in, and so on. When done, it is as simple as turning the thumb screw to lock it all in place.

I do not recommend using this if you need to shave your upper lip, or for precise lines, as the blades are recessed on the sides and the large space above the top blade will prevent someone from getting a full swipe in on the upper lip. For myself who has a goatee, these shortcomings do not present a problem. In fact, Leaf suggests you use this for shaving your body, legs, and head. For facial shaving, Leaf has another version with an aggressive angle but holds only a single blade and is designed for more precise shaves. This version comes in two variations, the Twig and the Thorn. I will be trying one of those soon.

I have to say, using the Leaf on my face is exceptionally smooth and effortless. At first, I thought it must have been a wrong angle and did not shave anything. I felt like nothing happened. Upon further review, it had shaved and shaved well. I paid about $64 for the Leaf Triple Blade.

I thought I was going to have to wait until the end of the week to put this together. But… Wasting no time in providing us with some quality entertainment, our President-Elect took to the airwaves today to double down on his desire to take over the Panama Canal and Greenland by force, if necessary. Does he think we’re going back to the imperialistic era?

He drew the line at invading Canada, though. He’s going to rely on economic pressure to get them to join us. Damn straight, buddy.

Oh, and then there was the talk about changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. Somebody get on the horn with Rand McNally.

You noticed how he looks recently? Like he aged 10 years overnight. Lots of stress involved in planning on taking over the world. Or maybe it’s the stress from the convictions.

I do have to say though, they did elect a House Speaker way faster than I thought they would.

At the end of these next 4 years we’ll see how this all panned out.

Have not watched The Six Million Dollar Man since I was a kid. It’s on Peacock streaming service so I thought I’d give it another go. Lee Majors was one of my childhood heroes. I even had his action figure. We were quite low on the economic ladder, my father bringing in $20/week salary (plus trailer was included), but he did manage to find this action figure for me at a handy discount. It was either a return or damaged product. Maybe a yard sale find? Who knows. I remember it had no box that it came in. But there it was. Nestled on my pillow upon my return from 1st grade school that day. It included none of the spare parts that was supposed to accompany the action figure. But I could look through his eye from the back of his head and roll up his fake rubber “skin” to expose the nuclear powered cy’borg mechanics underneath. Steve Austin and I had many boy-hours of fun.

I don’t remember the pilot episode specifically, so it was a pleasant surprise. Then there was the guest appearance of someone else who I have not seen really since childhood. I had to look the character up on IMDB to realize it was another character I had watched as a kid with my father – Darren McGavin as Kolchak: The Night Stalker; also available on Peacock. I guess I have a couple shows to rewatch.

$95 Million. That’s how much Apple has to pay out in the case of Siri listening in, recording, and sharing our information with advertisers from 2014 through the end of last year. After the attorneys who brought the case get their almost $30 Million cut that brings us down to around $65 Million left to split amongst the rest of us. Depending on how many file for their share, that could put up to $20 in the pockets of those of us who were used.

It was so almost guaranteed to happen that Carol and I would say random things into the other’s phone just so that advertisements would start to appear. “Oh man, why is my penis so small?” I would ask her phone. Sure enough. Penis enlargement ads would creep their way into her devices. At an exponential level compared to the usual. Good times. Definitely worth my $20.

Can you guess what my iPhone’s been named for the last few years? Wiretap.