People who live in cold climes seem to be more practical.
You've got the Alaskans and the Russians. It must be the cold
weather. When you're cold you don't mess around with fluff.
You get the job done, in the best way practical. Two of my
favorite examples involve firewood and the pencil that writes
upside down.
Alaska, like all States, by 2012 had to comply with an EPA
mandate that demonstrated local enforcement and programs that
would adhere to new air quality regulations. Alaska
initiated the most basic and one of the more important
methods for reducing smoke from a fire: dry firewood. Burning
dry firewood puts out less smoke and thus less particulate
matter the EPA measures for. Residents were invited to
exchange wet firewood each year for dry firewood. The wet
firewood was stacked in a warehouse where it would be
exchanged as dry firewood the following year. Practical,
yes?
The Russians, when faced with the problem of writing in
space without gravity came up with a simpler solution. Even
though NASA invented the pump pen, that could write upside
down, the Russians used a pencil. NASA spent $80,000,
developing the pen, the Russians spent nothing, except for
the cost of the pencils. And who landed on the Mood first?
