Hasta La Gadget!

ONE afternoon last winter, a man with a shaved head walked into Twisters, a burrito joint in Albuquerque. He was wearing a yellow helmet and Hazmat suit and carrying a gas mask. He put on the mask, struck various poses throughout the restaurant and then sidled up to the counter to buy a burrito topped with French fries, one of the restaurant’s specialties.

At a different fast-food restaurant, the manager might have been alarmed. But this particular one had doubled as Los Pollos Hermanos, the chicken joint owned by a ruthless leader of a methamphetamine cartel in “Breaking Bad,” the AMC television series.

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WASHINGTON — Republican lawmakers may eventually be able to win small concessions from Democrats with respect to the president’s health care law, but not during negotiations over a continuing resolution to fund the government or a debate over raising the debt ceiling, according to Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill), the second most powerful Democrat in the Senate.

Appearing on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” Durbin said that he himself would look at the proposal to repeal Obamacare’s medical device tax that House Republicans are pushing for in their newest continuing resolution. But he won’t do it “with a gun to my head.”

From the transcript:

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THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Chemical weapons inspectors who will oversee Syria’s destruction of its chemical weapons say their first priority is to help the country scrap its ability to manufacture such weapons by a Nov. 1 deadline – using every means possible.

The inspectors said Sunday that may include smashing mixing equipment with sledgehammers, blowing up delivery missiles, driving tanks over empty shells or filling them with concrete, and running machines without lubricant so they seize up.

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At first glance this looks like a giant tank that must be the work of the military industrial complex. Well, it is a camera on some tank treads, but it isn’t tank-sized. It is a one-of-a-kind object called the Soviet Rumble PHU x Z*E*R*O.

It is basically a retro camera with a companion dock. The camera is fully functional Russian FED-5 35mm, and can be undocked to snap photos. As art goes, this is a pretty clever project. It is completely handmade from recycled objects. It makes me wish we had real tanks that looked like this.

It’s selling for $395(USD) over at the Four Corner Store.

[via Damn Geeky]

Taste of Chicago turned a profit in 2013 for the first time in six years — thanks to a recipe that included perfect weather, a popular music lineup, celebrity chefs and food trucks — turning Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s revised, bumped and abbreviated format into a keeper.

One year after losing $1.3 million, the Taste made $272,000. That’s a nearly $1.6 million turnaround in just one year for a lakefront showcase that, some feared, was headed for the scrap heap.

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