Abstract: An exercise system uses a definable planar platform surface on which an exercise mat can be placed, multiple resistance tubings with attachment mechanisms at each end, a pair of grips that can be attached to resistance tubings, a pair of anklet bracelets that can be attached to resistance tubings, and three pipes detachably affixable to the platform surface. Each pipe has its own attachment device for allowing one or two of the resistance tubings to be attached. The three pipes are arranged such that one is centrally located at one lengthwise end of the platform while the other two are spaced apart and substantially equidistant from the other lengthwise end of the platform. The platform and the exercise mat can be made of two parts foldable 180 degrees from each other. The two pipes located at one lengthwise end of the platform are preferably spaced apart at least the shoulder width of a user and have their attachment mechanisms located approximately ten inches from the platform.

Abstract: A ball with a hollow inner core filled approximately 50% or less by volume with a fluid (which can include metallic spheres), a ball shell and struts (six or more) attached to the core and connected to an inner surface of the ball in such a way so as to maintain the core at the center of the ball. A swirling motion of the fluid within the hollow inner core determines the motion of the ball and a direction of travel away from a point of contact at which a force is applied to the ball to cause it to move or change direction. The direction of travel of the ball will be to the right when a counterclockwise spin is applied to the ball at the point of contact, the direction of travel of the ball will be to the left when it a clockwise spin is applied to the ball at the point of contact, and the direction of travel of the ball will be straight when a top spin is applied to ball at the point of contact. The weight ratio of the fluid to the ball without the fluid is approximately 1:1 or greater.

Abstract: An outdoor lighting fixture is disclosed including a first housing containing the fixture ballast or power supply, a second housing enclosing a lamp. Each of the housings is sealed. A support stem joins the two housings and defines a thermal air gap between the two. The only conductive thermal path between the two housings is through the stem and the fasteners engaging the stem and the two housings. In one embodiment, a plurality of tubular spacers are located on elongated screw fasteners define the size of air gap. In another embodiment a single fastener includes washers defining the air gap size. In that embodiment, the fastener may be hollow and acts as a conduit for the electrical leads for the fixture. In another embodiment one closure for a housing includes fins for cooling the fixture.

Abstract: A plug and socket electrical connection for environments with high humidity and low temperatures has a socket with female connections (holes with an electrical terminals), a circular recess for receiving a mating part and tabs and a plug with a male connection (electrodes), the mating part and hooks. The electrical connections are protected from moisture by a snug fit and o-rings when the socket and the plug are electrically connected and the tabs and hooks hold the socket and plug together in place. The socket and plug are disconnected by movement of a handle holding the hooks that is part of the plug and can act as a lever to help the disconnection. The handle also provides a convenient finger hold for pulling the plug away from the socket.

Abstract: A reflective tube centered on a lens of a camera is used in covert wide-angle photography in which and at least one reflected annular image is rotated by 180° to register it with the open-hole (zero-order) image to obtain a wide-angle corrected image. Any exposure differences in reflected images are balanced (or matched to the zero-order image) and rotation of odd-order image(s) is done by dedicated electronics of the camera or a later computer program to align such images with the zero-order image while the photograph is taken of an object using a tube which is no longer than approximately 1/100th the distance of the photographic subject. The reflective tube can be a transparent material (such as Plexiglas®) whose outer surface is painted black to block stray light which would otherwise be transmitted by walls of the tube and to absorb second-surface reflections from inside.

Abstract: A number of wave correction filters are disclosed which respond to power surges or spikes outside the intended frequency and/or voltage for a load device. The circuits respond to such undesired frequencies and voltage levels by sensing and separating them from the desired voltage and frequencies and connecting the energy from such undesired voltages and/or frequencies to resistors where it is dissipated as heat. In this way, the resulting energy is prevented from distorting the input voltage to the load device. It is also retained in the filter and prevented from traveling through a ground connection to pollute other related circuits.

Abstract: A coupling apparatus, or adaptor, releasably secures a tool such as a bucket to the linkage of a tractor such as a backhoe in a direction opposite the normal, rear-facing direction.

Abstract: A game uses a deck of cards having three sets of cards with designations 1 through 9, five cards with a Feng Shui designation, four cards with a Green Dragon designation, four cards with an East Wind designation, four cards with a South Wind designation, four cards with a West Wind designation and four cards with a North Wind designation. A player and a dealer hand, each with two cards, is generated and then it is determined whether either or both hands will receive one more card (the player hand can get hit if its cards have a ranking below a first number while the dealer hand can get hit if its cards have a ranking below a second, higher number) and then the hand with the highest ranking of cards is declared the winner. The rankings are based upon pairs of cards according to a preselected order. Players can be allowed to bet on the player's hand or the dealer's hand although a rake is taken from winnings bet on the dealer's hand and bonus bets can be paid when the winning hand is a certain ranking.

Abstract: A method for playing language puzzle games involving a unit of meaning in the Chinese language made up of a string of characters in which each character in the string is decomposed into radicals having from one to four strokes and all of the radicals are combined, and randomly mixed, to become a group of radicals. A player is given a category clue for the unit of meaning, the combined group of radicals and a number of characters in the string of characters, and then the player is allowed to attempt to guess the unit of meaning based upon a preselected method of revealing information relating to the combined group of radicals to the player.

Abstract: A photo subject station used to capture information regarding a subject suitable for integration into a personalized, printed product and method of using same with children so that a personal identification of a child need not be saved to deliver a customized product to the child when the child takes part of a session, for example, at a school. The station uses a stool, a color background device, preferably two digital cameras and lights located at fixed positions in the station and a computer. The computer creates and stores a subject file for each subject that contains photographs of the subject (e.g., three frontal and three profile photographs with three different facial expressions, plus a rear photograph), an image data file associated with the photographs (which contains x-y coordinates used for scaling the photographs), a data file containing an identification related to the subject and a bit map skin file (derived from one of the photographs for use in fixing personalized skin color).

Abstract: A utensil for cutting and serving pastry or similar goods has operating handles made in form of tabs similar to ordinary scissors for fitting in operator's fingers, a spatula simultaneously used for cutting pastry or similar goods and holding a sliced piece and rigidly connected to the upper operating handle, blades bent in a form of a frame rigidly connected to the lower operating handle, a pusher for serving a piece of pastry or similar goods to a serving plate and a lever mechanism made in a form of pantograph for moving the pusher.

Abstract: A dual sprocket contact motion picture film printer maintains film steadiness when running a film negative in contact with an unexposed raw stock film by tensioning perforations along one film side against sprocket teeth of a full fitting sprocket and a shrinkage sprocket on the other side. The films pass through a fluid chamber before passing through a printer aperture and a vacuum pressure applied from one side of the chamber tensions the negative against the sprocket teeth while a positive fluid pressure applied from an opposite side tensions the raw stock against the sprocket. The films are self-aligned by the fluid forces maintaining equal tension on both sides of each film strip as the films pass the aperture of the film printer.

Abstract: An electrical mounting connector for a bi-pin fluorescent bulb has a lamp holder with two terminals and a cap with two pin guiding openings that snaps into the lamp holder such that two pins held in the two pin guiding openings will be held in contact with the two pin-shaped over a substantial portion of the pins along a parallel length of the pins. An alignment marking is provided on the lamp holder and a visual inspection point (such as a hole) is provided on the cap that compliment one another to provide a visual indication of when the lamp holder and the cap are properly assembled together. A drain is formed by one or more slots in the lamp holder to drain a space between the lamp holder and the cap accessed through pin guiding openings when the lamp holder and the cap are properly assembled together.

Abstract: A distance indicating apparatus and method determine the distance between a fixed object and a moving object (such as a motor vehicle, airplane or water vessel) by using two spaced-apart projectors to project a distance indicating scale (which can include non-linear markings) and an index along two different paths onto a projection target surface where they are visible to create a visual distance indication that varies as the fixed and moving objects vary in distance less than a certain distance.

Abstract: Methods for increasing energy in men and women include ingesting internally, twice a day, products that include, for women, multivitamins, multiminerals, high-calcium bone support products, high-ORAC super food products, and enzymes, and, for men, multivitamins, multiminerals, prostate support products, high-ORAC super food products, and enzymes.

Abstract: Games (such as any poker game, whether it be draw poker, stud poker or a community card poker and, more particularly, a Texas hold 'em game or a variant in which players are either initially dealt four cards or the seventh card is dealt face down to individual players) normally played with a traditional deck of cards in accordance with a preselected set of rules for the game are played with a Chinese poker deck of 52 cards and the following additional rules: any player with the right to use a first wild card may designate the first card to be any card contained in the Chinese poker deck but no player may use more than one wild card and any player who can not make a hand because the player has more than one wild card looses the hand to any player who can make a hand. The Chinese poker deck has three different sets of nine cards in three suits (e.g.

Abstract: A prefabricated in-wall water service box with a five sided deep drawn stainless steel enclosure that has an open side with a reservoir lip and three closed sides integral with a top and bottom so that a reservoir is formed that is drained through a drain hole into a stainless steel nipple that is welded to the bottom and extends downwardly from the drain hole while hot and cold water control valves are mounted inside the enclosure through holes to a fittings located outside the enclosure at its two side walls. A trim bezel with a planar facing flush with a mounting wall is secured to the enclosure when it is mounted to two studs by two mounting brackets affixed to the two side walls by stainless steel screws.

Abstract: The concentration of a gas species is detected by using a single beam NDIR gas sensor in which an infrared source element is driven at two different temperatures, a feed back loop senses an operation voltage of the source, a differential gain amplifier creates a high cycle amplified output during a high cycle and a low cycle amplified output during a low cycle while a controller synchronizes the source driver so that a signal processor can determine the gas concentration through use of the high cycle amplified output and the low cycle amplified output. The infrared source can be a non-genuine blackbody source such as an incandescent miniature light bulb when the sample chamber is a thermally insulated aluminum tube that is maintained at a preselected temperature greater than ambient so that the glass envelope of the bulb is maintained at an equilibrium temperature (such as approximately 30 degrees Celsius plus or minus two degrees Celsius) during its low cycle operation state.

Abstract: A fire detector and method for generating an alarm signal in response to a fire uses an NDIR sensor to generate a detector signal based upon one or more absorption bands selected from the 15.1? absorption band of CO2, the 6.27? absorption band of H2O and the 4.67? absorption band for CO and generates an alarm signal when a signal processor receives the detector signal and a preselected criterion is met that is indicative of the onset of a fire based upon an analysis of the detector signal using a detection algorithm that relies upon a trending pattern of the detector signal such as recognizing a substantial drop in the detector signal strength. The fire detector has a waveguide sample chamber (which can be of a re-entrant design) with at least one opening covered by a thin filtering membrane and a heat exchanger thermally connected to the sample chamber with at least one opening covered by another thin filtering membrane.