It’s not often that you see new products come out for the home that are radically different than their predecessors. A garbage disposal is a garbage disposal – usually the new ones are a little more quiet than the old ones. Dishwashers, for the most part, look the same today as they did 10 years ago.

The utilitarian devices we use around our houses have yet to go through any sort of dramatic change in form or function.

So when The Husband sent me a link to Nest, a digital thermostat, earlier this week, the first thing I thought was: This device is beautiful. And then I thought, Steve Jobs would have been proud. It’s a connection that makes sense, because one of the people behind the company is a former Apple Exec. who had a hand in developing both the iPod and iPhone.

But Nest is more than just a pretty face:

Linked into the internet and to your life, Nest can be scheduled and can learn – in it’s first week, it watches how you control your heat and cooling and creates rules based off of what you do. Since it can go online, you can also control it from your computer or by their mobile app. Cool.

Since it’s not out yet, we haven’t had a chance to try it yet, but if our system is compatible, I probably will – especially at a reasonable cost of just at $250.

For large parts of the last month I’ve been slaving over a camera and light box trying to get good quality photographs for my paper goods store (launching soon!). For that reason, I have a special, personal, understanding of just how much work a photoshoot can be.

And when you’re a huge design chain like West Elm, it takes a room full of people to make a shoot work.

Check out this cool behind the scenes look at how they set up to take product shots of one of their fall 2010 duvet covers.

Whoever is behind this new(ish) site is awesome!

Funnier than that Photoshop disasters site, and less emo than the site that makes fun of hipsters, Catalog Living is perfectly witty as it offers commentary as if they were those living in the photos from popular home and design magazines/catalogs.

Some of the posts are outright hilarious, while others reveal the odd choices that stylists make when setting up a photoshoot.

A brief break from my normal posts …

Though national coverage has been eclipsed by other events, this past weekend Nashville and middle Tennessee saw more rain in just a few days than it usually does over the course of several months. The result? The south’s worst non-hurricane natural disaster in recent memory. Obama has finally declared a state of emergency.

(Photo by Chuck Bryant)

Flooding in downtown and the surrounding areas wiped out major Nashville institutions like the Opryland Hotel, Opry Mills Mall, and the Schermerhorn, caused over a dozen flood related deaths, and ruined houses of many people who have never had reason to even consider buying flood insurance.

We were luckier than many – a few inches of water in our basement, and our newly planted Cypress trees got their roots exposed by the sheer volume of water washing over them:

We also did some creative sandbagging to try and slow the waterfall cascading down our side stairs that washed out much of our recent mulching efforts:

Monday we were able to dry out our basement after getting a hold of one of the few remaining dehumidifiers and wet vacs in the area, but the water still hasn’t receded and for a lot of people clean up is just beginning.

And with one of the two local water treatment plants out of commission, residents are also under the gun to cut water non-essential water usage until full capacity can be restored.

If you’re able to help, the red cross is accepting donations here and this article has more information on what you can do.

You can also follow news and photos of the flood and cleanup on Twitter, whose users seem to be doing a better job of coverage than the press.