Fun Time! William Robertson Miniature Tool Chest.

For those really tiny jobs.

Buddhist Monk Rated Happiest Man In The World

Yep, he looks pretty happy to me.

It's one thing to be happy and it's another one entirely to be designated the "happiest man in the world," but it appears that the University of Wisconsin has done the research, developed a means of measuring it and given the title to Tibetan Buddhist monk and molecular geneticist Matthieu Ricard.

Ricard is working to show how meditation can alter the brain and improve one's outlook on life.

"It's a wonderful area of research because it shows that meditation is not just blissing out under a mango tree but it completely changes your brain and therefore changes what you are."

Here's a link to the NYDaily News article describing the U of W experiment.

Tiny Modern Leaf House

Lloyd's Blog clued me into this beautiful small home and its Canadian builders. It's 20-foot long, with a sofa bed, full kitchen, full bathroom, a dining area and a feeling of luxury in 215 square feet . This baby is also insulated to take the Canadian winter. Cost? About $44,000.

Here's a link to the builders, Leaf House.

Travel Photo of the Week

Chomolungma (Mt. Everest

The Post-Apocalypse Survival Machine Nerd Farm

Awhile back, I featured Marcin Jacubowski and his work to create an open source civilization reboot kit. In case of Apocalypse just open up the kit and build any machine you need from it's modular parts.

In September I did an update on his open source brick press. Well, Bloomberg Businessweek has caught on to his work and has updated us on the progress of his project.

Jacubowski plans to have his entire project completed by 2015 and he publishes progress reports on the Open Source Ecology website.

How To Make A Brick Rocket Stove For $6.08

Here's a great tutorial on making a rocket stove with bricks.

How To Choose A Carribean Vacation

Maracas, Trinidad

With Winter on the way, it's time to think about a vacation and when the cold comes, what better place to vacate than a warm place. My favorite? The Caribbean.

Here's an article from Lonely planet on how to choose the best Caribbean destination. It includes a list of the various islands and their attractions, based on whether they are easy to get to (non-stop flights) or a little more out of the way.

Fun Time! The World’s Strongest Beer? Armageddon!

The Scottish company that brews Armageddon beer describes it as having "lots of flavour. It’s slightly sweet, hoppy, malty and retains much of the yeast present during fermentation."

Ingredients include crystal malt, wheat, flaked oats and of course 100% Scottish spring water. Then they freeze ferment the beer to bring up the alcohol content.

They recommend 35ml doses. It's 65% alcohol.

You can order it here.

Bookalokal - Eat with Locals Worldwide

Lately there have been a bunch of startups that have centered around the idea of leveraging local resources for travelers. Airbnb was one of the early entries into this field.

Bookalokal is all about food. Home-cooked and prepared by folks just like you and I who happen to live all over the world. Currently there are offerings of traditional foods in Zimbabwe and Turkey, an "ever changing global brunch" in Brussels, a classic Parisian lunch (in, of all places, Paris) and even farm-to-table pizza and salad in good old Washington, D.C., plus lots, lots more.

Prices vary, but seem very reasonable to me, especially since you also have a local host to enhance the experience. The best part? You could never get a waiter or waitress to sit at your table all night and give you tidbits about the town your in. Your host can.

You book through the website.

Four Foot Wide House

Now this is what I call a small house. It is three feet wide at its narrowest and five feet wide at its most spacious. Its plans were featured in the Tiny Life blog last year and now it is finished.

The Keret House in Poland is probably one of the most interesting and narrow, adaptations to the problems of limited urban space, but the question remains.....

Could you live here?

Here's some video to help you make up your mind.