I saw this the other day and thought, "Oh man, is that ever cool!"

However, this is the first opportunity to post about it. What I speak of is the Shadow Robot Company Air Muscle. These things are really something to see, if only because they are an interesting spin on something that you have seen a hundred times but never noticed.

The goal of a muscle (a Flexor) is to thicken and thus shorten to lift a load. That's why you bend your arm to show off your beefy bicep - it looks bigger because it's shorter.

So these air muscles are basically balloons that inflate and get shorter.

I hear you yawning out there. But take a look at what it can be used for. (Cool Video - Needs DivX)

This may or may not be a good blog entry, but it's all I've been thinking about today (well, I also saw a small hippo - but Lindsay already talked about that tonight).