I gave only a temporary email address to Sharper Image, but they started bombarding my Gmail account immediately, three times a day. It started happening right after I signed up for “Email on Deck.”

The purpose of a temporary email address is to shield your main address from view. Theoretically, after an hour or a day, the temp address vanishes, taking all spam with it. But what happens if the temp service sells your data? You get inundated.

It’s better to sign up for a second regular service. Besides Gmail, I use AOL, Yahoo and Xfinity. I don’t bother looking at these accounts until I know that a coupon or something special has arrived. This works well.

New Features Coming to Chromebooks

With a new feature available to all Chromebooks, I’m now able to charge mine to 80 percent instead of 100 percent. This will extend its battery life. To turn it on, go to “Settings,” and search for “adaptive charging.” Now toggle the switch on.

Another new Chromebook feature, aimed at the disabled, allows you to control a computer with facial expressions. A YouTube video shows how to do this by opening your mouth, which signals the computer to accept voice input. Turn your head to tell it what to click on. See it in action by searching on “Face Control on Chromebooks.”

Beyond these features, why do people buy Chromebooks instead of Windows PCs or Macs? It’s mainly the price, but it’s also security. Each activity you do is “sandboxed.” This means it takes place in a separate compartment. If a virus penetrates the area you have open, the rest of your machine is unaffected. Though Macs also offer these virtual bubbles, in Windows you have to get Windows 11 Pro. Another nice feature: At startup, your Chromebook checks to make sure it hasn’t been corrupted and fixes any problem.

Working Offline on a Chromebook

Chromebooks are mainly for online activity. But what about working offline, perhaps on an airplane? I’ve finally figured it out.

While you’re online, start a new document in the Google Docs app or open one an existing one. Now click the “Help” button. In the search box, type “Make document available offline.” After clicking the offline option, type your steamy love letter or whatever. Even if you reboot, you’ll find that all the changes you made while not connected to the internet are still there.

I practiced this by turning off WiFi and adding a row of nonsense letters to the top of my offline document. Sure enough, they were still there even after restarting. I just had to open the Google Docs app to see the changes.

Selfie Toaster Sold Out

Readers told me that they can’t find the “Selfie Toaster” I wrote about last time. It no longer comes up in a search on the Hammacher Schlemmer site because it’s sold out. To see its product page, go to tinyurl.com/joyschwab. In the meantime, I’m trying to find it elsewhere. No luck so far.

Creepy Computer

“This Nightmarish $35,000 computer is powered by a lab-grown human brain.” That’s the title of a PC World article that sounds like it’s describing Frankenstein’s monster.

Cortical Labs figured out how to grow brain cells in the lab and can keep them alive for six months. Besides offering insight into how genes and proteins affect learning, the so-called CL1 biological computer can be used in drug development by simulating neurological processes at the molecular level.

Flying Taxi

Next time you’re at Heathrow Airport in England, or trying to get from a downtown heliport to JFK Airport in New York, you might be able to take a flying taxi for a seven-minute hop that would take 49 minutes by car. At least that’s the plan, pending FAA approval. According to The Verge, the five-seater from Joby Aviation can take off vertically, like a helicopter, then shift into forward flight using its six tilt rotors. With speeds up to 200 miles per hour, it can travel 150 miles on a single battery charge. It’s 100 times quieter than other aircraft. Virgin Atlantic, Delta Airlines and Toyota are partners.

AI in the ER

Researchers at Yale University and John Hopkins created an artificially intelligent tool that speeds up “triage,” the process by which medical professionals figure out how to prioritize treatment and ration supplies.

According to ZDnet, an “AI-informed triage” program led to shorter wait times in the ER and faster diagnoses. Nurses using the tool were more attentive to patients needing hospitalization, surgery or admission to the intensive care unit.

The Wow Department

Texas Instruments introduced a new microcontroller the size of a flake of black pepper, and it only costs 20 cents. According to CNET, it’s most likely to be used in medical wearables, earbuds, stylus pens and electric toothbrushes. Or, for a mere $200, you could launch an army of 1000 robot spiders. Each microcontroller includes a 12-bit analog-to-digital converter, 16 KB of flash memory and 1 KB of SRAM.

Internut

“Scientists Turn Skin Cells Directly Into Neurons.” Search on that phrase to learn about a new technique for helping those with spinal cord injuries or ALS. In 2006, Shinya Yamanaka invented a way to turn specialized adult cells into stem cells. Now MIT engineers have figured out how to transform skin cells directly into neurons.