When you do it as a “grown Up”, it’s still cool, isn’t it?

Yep, sure is…

What if someone figured out a way to make colored bubbles? Not each bubble reflecting the colors of the rainbow – but actual colored bubbles?

Shimmering with all the colors of the rainbow, bubbles are a joy to children young and old. For inventor Tim Kehoe, however, creating a bubble with a single color that won’t stain when it pops has been a 15-year, $3-million obsession. Two weeks ago, the world’s first colored, non-staining bubbles, Zubbles, went on sale.

The simple chemistry of bubbles — two layers of soap sandwiching a layer of water about a millionth of an inch thick — has foiled virtually every attempt to modify them. Bubbles that last a little longer or can be blown a little bigger have since been created, but adding color, what some toy manufactures have called the “holy grail” of toys, has remained frustratingly elusive.

Standard food coloring or dyes have no effect; they simply run down the sides of the bubble, creating a drop of color on the bottom. Other dyes can stain bubbles, but when they pop they also stain clothes, dogs and eyes, as Kehoe discovered during one accident. Other tests, including one for a bubble dye that washed out, didn’t fare much better.

“I thought a washable bubble was a great idea,” said Kehoe. “But the kids (of a large focus group) were covered head to toe in red dye. It looked like a scene from Braveheart.”

Red Bubbles

Eventually Kehoe and his colleagues found the three different classes of dyes that produce intense, vibrant and uniform colors. Originally, it took three days to produce what would eventually become Zubbles, but now it takes about 30 minutes.

Once a bubble pops, the dye fades in 15 minutes on virtually every material imaginable: concrete, leather, nylon, cotton and paint. Even easily stained material like silk remain unstained 15 minutes after a Zubble touches them.

Right now, consumers can only buy blue and pink bubbles, although Kehoe says that he can create bubbles of any color.

Blue Bubbles

Green Bubbles

I just think that they are so cool – Why not just do something a little fun and crazy – go blow some bubbles. Better yet – why not be the first on your block to blow some colored bubbles!

You can buy his colored bubbles, called Zubbles, at zubbles.com and through Tim Kehoe’s iPhone app.

And even if you’re not a bubble man, these things will blow your mind. Thanks to some seriously novel chemistry, the stain they appear to leave when they break vanishes in seconds. If only he could make pizza sauce do the same thing.

You can read more at the cool blog at Popular Science.

But the best thing I learned today was what the Internet is really for. Enjoy this really clever mash-up!

fi yuo cna raed tihs, yuo hvae a sgtrane mnid too Cna yuo raed tihs? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can. i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno’t mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! if you can raed tihs forwrad it.

So  if you are one of the 45/100 who can’t read this, just copy and paste the above article, and unscramble all the words.  The secret message is amazing!

They have a combined age of over 3,000 years and are more likely to have problems with arthritis than hard drugs – but pop sensation the Zimmers know how to rock and roll.

The band shot into the UK’s top 40 singles chart yesterday at number 26 with their cover of the Who’s My Generation.

Will Daws, producer on the BBC documentary about elderly people which led to the creation of the band, said: “Considering we weren’t on any playlists, because we were not being young and trendy enough, I think this is an absolute triumph.”

The video of the Zimmers’ My Generation became a cult classic on the video website YouTube.

Featuring lead singer Alf Carretta, 90, snarling: “I hope I die before I get old,” into the microphone, a diminutive elderly lady mimicking Who guitarist Pete Townshend’s signature windmill style, and a group of pensioners smashing their guitars, it attracted more than 2m hits in its first few weeks online.

Tim Samuels, creator of the world’s oldest pop band, said he did not want to reinforce the “victim” status of old people in Britain but aimed to show them in a different light.

“If you can judge a society by how well it treats its old people, we’d be in trouble,” he said. “I wanted to do something to help them fight back; something with a little bit of attitude and chutzpah.”

The music video, which includes closeups of guitars interspersed with images of old people holding up cards saying: “I’ve not left my house for three years” and “I’m bored in old people’s homes”, examines the feelings of isolation and imprisonment brought on by age.

Mr Carretta, lead singer of the band, said: “It’s just brought me back to life. I was 90 and stuck in a rut. And now I feel that I have come alive again.”

Snowball is a Medium Sulphur Crested Eleanora Cockatoo that dances to the Back Street Boys. And boy can he dance. Check out how he keeps the beat. Even the other bird in the cage next to Snowball gets into the act!

He came to the Bird Lovers Only Rescue in August 2007 and is a joy.

Visit them at www.birdloversonly.org