Grass-covered mouse: Ch-Ch-Ch-Chia
(Credit:
Hanaoka)
Japanese artist Hanaoka likes to cover objects in grass. Cars, business card holders, cufflinks, ashtrays, compact mirrors...you name it. He even blankets computer peripherals with the stuff.
To wit: the grass mouse pictured at right. Pair it with this grass cell phone and start the hose (or maybe that's not such a good idea).
Thanks to my ever-helpful co-worker/translator Takayuki Sakurai, I'm able to glean that Hanaoka has, in the past, made his verdant mouse available for purchase, though we're not seeing evidence that it's currently for sale. If you're liking the grass-on-all-things idea, however, the artist does sell a grass-covered badge for 300 yen (about $3.50) and a grass-covered cell phone strap for 700 yen (about $7.50).
Hanaoka donates 50 percent of his proceedings to a nonprofit called Shibafu Sprit, which aims to make Osaka-area schoolyards green (Shibafu is word for grass in Japanese).
We hear he's also been donating to the Chia Pet Rescue Foundation.
Leslie Katz, senior editor of CNET's Crave, covers gadgets, games, and most other digital distractions. As a co-host of the CNET News Daily Podcast, she sometimes tries to channel Terry Gross. E-mail Leslie. 
