Green Daily

When I was a kid I'd go to my grandmother's house in the old country and watch her make yarn on her ancient pedal-powered spinning wheel while she sang lullabies in a mysterious foreign language. Ok, the old country was New Jersey and mostly what Grandma did was spend the day on the couch watching soaps, but but she probably had a foot-powered wheel in the basement somewhere. Anyway, pedal power is back, thanks to the creative folks at Freeplay who are bidding fair to put your local electric company out of business with their selection of power-your-stuff-and-lose-weight-at-the-same-time line of gadgets.

The Weza is basically a big battery that serves as a portable emergency charger. The particular enviro-twist is that it can be recharged not only with AC power like wall sockets, or DC power like many solar chargers, but via a foot pedal. It can generate enough power to jumpstart your car, or keep your stereo booming long enough to get you kicked out of the campground.

Weza, by the way, is a Swahili word that means "power", and you can pick one up for $299.00 by web or by phone.

via [Inhabitat]