Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Hump Day Humor - Chindogu - the art of unuseless

My friend Kristin stopped by last night. In hand, she had a few items to share with me -one was her Fashion Plates [my obsession recorded in an earlier post here] in its original box. We had fun creating new outfits with her little girl and reliving fashion designs we use to love to make.

She also brought along a book called The Big Bento Box of Unuseless Japanese Inventions. [Kristin and I share the same sense of humor]. This book, along with the International Chindogu Society , has been around since 1995 and somehow I missed it.

"Chindōgu (珍道具) is the Japanese art of inventing ingenious everyday gadgets that, on the face of it, seem like an ideal solution to a particular problem. However, chindōgu has a distinctive feature: anyone actually attempting to use one of these inventions would find that it causes so many new problems, or such significant social embarrassment, that effectively it has no utility whatsoever. Thus, chindōgu are sometimes described as "unuseless" – that is, they cannot be regarded as 'useless' in an absolute sense, since they do actually solve a problem; however, in practical terms, they cannot positively be called "useful." - Wikipedia

We laughed at many of the gadgets, some of which are actually now on the market. Here are a few of my favorites:

I love my shoes, but....

Back scratching guide - okay, this isn't a bad idea.


Fail!

Maybe if it were prettier?!


I don't even know what to say about this one!


*shaking head*


I'd love to know what the sign says.

5 comments:

  1. These are hysterical- I am totally making that back scratcher guide and shirt for my hubby's birthday!

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  2. I know! I think that is a great novelty item!!

    I have to buy the book!

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  3. perhaps your funniest post yet... i need the commuter helmet...

    ReplyDelete

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