The Worst Things For Sale

Basically any other name would have been better.

The LED Word Clock isn’t the most annoying clock in the world. Sure, it costs a stupid amount of money, and it takes a practical function and turns it into a chore. But in my opinion, The Runaway Alarm Clock, which combines the unreadability of a small, unlit LCD with the fact that it rolls itself off of your nightstand on purpose, is probably the worst clock you could buy, if you’re looking to tell time.

Of course, neither of these is the Louis XVI bronze mantel clock, which is the price of a very nice car, or a small house (in Ohio.)

The purpose of a flask is to conceal alcohol so that you can bring it with you somewhere that alcohol’s not allowed. Carrying a Nintendo cartridge flask is probably more suspicious than most things you could stuff into (I’m assuming) your cargo shorts.

The Kymera Magic Wand is a $74 electronic device you use to remotely control your TV, by waving it in the air in certain patterns and directions.

Televisions would be so much more fun if they came with something like this. But smaller, and with buttons you could push to directly control the television, instead of memorizing a specific way to wave a stick in the air. And for free.

The full title of this item is “USB ionic Oxygen Bar Freshener Air Purifier ionizer For Laptop & With a Nice Gift.”

Does it actually do anything? If the graphic of a kitchen, a family, a woman with a dog, and some other tiny things didn’t tip you off: no. You can’t “purify” air with “negative ions.” But that didn’t stop multiple reviewers from claiming it does, including one poor soul who claimed that this USB stick cured his asthma.

The makers of the “Star Wars Science The Force Glove” have managed to use the power of Star Wars to sell a single glove with a magnet stitched to the palm for $25. Become a Jedi of… fucking… paper clips. Stick your hand to the fridge. You have The Force.

Do you have dreams of poisoning yourself with radiation in an attempt to harness the power of the atom? Skip the uranium ore, which won’t get you where you think it will, and do what The Radioactive Boy Scout did, and make a nuclear reactor out of old smoke detectors. It’s a cautionary tale, of course, but also happens to include step-by-step instructions on how to duplicate this guy’s backyard nuclear experiments.