Weird Universe Archive

March 2023

March 6, 2023

Rhapsody in Big Blue

Darryl Gammill came up with a way to convert stock-price movements into music. The result was the release in 1985 of "Rhapsody in Big Blue," which was a musical rendition of IBM's stock activity between April 1984 to April 1985.

I haven't been able to find any samples of the album online. I can't even find any used copies of it for sale. This was evidently an extremely obscure record release.



Popular Computing Weekly - April 3-9, 1987



Time - Sep 16, 1985



The Economist - Aug 31, 1985

Posted By: Alex - Mon Mar 06, 2023 - Comments (2)
Category: Business, Music, 1980s

March 5, 2023

Serial aperitif thief

Philippe Delandtscheer may have preferred to steal aperitif, but that's not all he stole. He was later arrested for stealing meat from a supermarket.

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix - Feb 15, 1996

Posted By: Alex - Sun Mar 05, 2023 - Comments (0)
Category: Crime, 1990s

Murder, Inc. Vinyl Album

Get the full story here.

Start grooving with this cut, then find the rest of the playlist on YouTube.

Posted By: Paul - Sun Mar 05, 2023 - Comments (0)
Category: Crime, Music, Space-age Bachelor Pad & Exotic, 1960s

March 4, 2023

Music for playboys to play by

The woman looks both disturbed and perplexed.



Lancaster Sunday News - May 4, 1958



More info: Unearthed in the Atomic Attic

Posted By: Alex - Sat Mar 04, 2023 - Comments (0)
Category: Music, 1950s

March 3, 2023

Reamer Collectors

If you collect reamers, consider joining the NRCA (National Reamer Collectors Association).



The NRCA used to have its own website, reamers.org, but no longer. (The old site was archived by the Wayback Machine.) Now they have a private facebook page instead.



Some explanatory text about reamers from their old website:

Reamers, also known to many as orange juice squeezers or juicers, are one of the fastest growing collectibles in America today. The main reason for this is time and efficiency. They have been replaced by electric juicers which perform the function of squeezing juice faster, and frozen concentrate which makes providing juice to a busy family in today's society an easier task.

The reamers were invented over 200 years ago out of necessity when it was discovered that citrus provided a cure for diseases like scurvy. The first reamers were all producted in Europe. Major china companies such as Bayreuth, Miessen, Royal Rudolstadt and Limoges produced reamers for some of the finer tables in Europe.

The first reamer was patented in the United States around 1867, after the Civil War. It was a hand held reamer. Next came the one piece reamer with a small saucer and a cone that was meant to fit on top of a glass. These were quite messy as they slid and slipped off of the glass. In the 1880's a glass rim was added to the bottom of the saucer to help keep the reamer on the glass. Around the same time, wooden squeezers with a press action were also being used. Two-piece sets with measuring pitcher bottoms and separate reamer tops did not come along until the mid 1920's.

The biggest boom for reamers came in 1907 when a a co-op named the "California Fruit Growers Exchange" was formed. This co-op marketed the name Sunkist to sell fruit to the east coast. Sunkist reamers were produced as a promotional item. However, not until 1916 when the "Drink an Orange" campaign was launched, were reamers marketed to the masses.

I have an old glass reamer — a family hand-me-down. I didn't know it was called a reamer, nor that it was something people might collect.

Posted By: Alex - Fri Mar 03, 2023 - Comments (3)
Category: Collectors

March 2, 2023

Select-A-Size Mirror

The Select-A-Size mirror, invented by Milton Doolittle, had a knob you could turn to make yourself look slimmer or fatter. As explained in the 1976 Canadian patent:

A mirror has an upper portion which is held in flat condition by being secured in the upper portion of a vertically extending frame. The integral lower portion of the mirror is flexible, and its curvature is variable about a vertical axis, so that by varying the curvature of the lower portion, there is provided an image of the appearance of a person's body after a weight loss, the upper flat portion reflection a true reflection of the person's face, which would change comparatively little, if at all, after a weight loss. The curvature of the mirror lower portion is varied by rotation of a knob threadedly engaging a screw that moves a lever connected to the mirror. The mirror is supported on a stand or a wall support by a vertically movable member in a hollow tube at the back of the mirror, so that it may be vertically adjusted to reflect the face of people of different heights in the flat portion of the mirror.



Palm Beach Post - Mar 20, 1983

Posted By: Alex - Thu Mar 02, 2023 - Comments (4)
Category: Patents, 1970s, Dieting and Weight Loss

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