Every second Tuesday, Al deserts me and goes of to play with wires and things – or something. I sort of glaze over when the only way things can be explained involves diagrams – at Dorkbot Alba. For what seems like the last hundred years, they’ve been working on a project that, to be honest, made the toothbrush robot things (no, really) seem sane. Still, against all odds, it actually seems to be finished, and is turning them into internet superstars (Make: blog, Hacked Gadgets). You can’t impress me by showing me 100 solenoids and trying to explain how they work, but you can totally impress me by having the same solenoids referenced by Make!

Of course, much of the internet superstardom is just because they’re piggybacking on the success of another Edinburgh-based internet superstar and doing duets with him.

The petition for the creation of a Christmas megamix began, ooh, at least five minutes ago.

(Should you be interesting in playing about with wires and multimeters, would like to desert your girlfriend/boyfriend/flatmate/mundane existence every second Tuesday, and live within travelling distance of Edinburgh, you too could join Dorkbot Alba! More information is available here.)