If Only E.T. Had Known About This

Phone Home is an automatic dialing device that can help children, elderly and mentally or physically disabled people telephone their homes, even if they don’t know the number or how to dial. The call can be made without money and from any phone.

The device, smaller than a deck of cards, can be programmed to dial up to a 16-digit number, enabling the user to make an operator-assisted or collect call to one number in any area code (0 for operator, a three-digit area code and seven-digit number).

The user just holds the device to the mouthpiece of a telephone and presses its “home” button, activating the phone company’s tone-dialing system and getting an operator. Phone Home has a clip at the end of a short chain, so it can be securely fastened to fabric or a key chain.

When the call is put through, the person being called can ask where the caller is. If, for some reason, that can’t be determined, the operator can trace the origin of the phone call.

The instrument can be reprogrammed with a special programming device that comes with it. Phone Home, which uses two alkaline batteries, was invented by electronics engineer Stephen Betheil of Nimrod International Sales in Clarksburg, N.J.

Betheil says that independent testing of children ages 3 to 12 showed they had no difficulty understanding the directions and using the instrument.

Phone Home has been endorsed by the Vanished Children’s Alliance in San Jose and the National Missing Children Division of the National Child Safety Council in Washington.

Phone Home ($19.95) is available nationwide at discount department stores or children’s shops or can be ordered by calling (800) 447-5196. Here, it is available at Play Well Equipment Co. in Pasadena.

Almost Like Having a Swiss Bank Account

If you want to store jewelry and other valuables at home, Sentry’s new Keep/Safe Wall Safe may be a solution. It’s like having a safe deposit box at your home that can be hidden behind a picture or piece of furniture.

Unlike most other wall safes, the Keep/Safe has a telescoping design which allows the cabinet depth to expand from four to six inches. The outside of the safe is 13 5/8 inches square. The unit mounts flush to the wall, and can be easily installed between the studs in the wall. All you need, manufacturers say, is a jigsaw to cut the hole and a screwdriver to screw in the four bolts on the face of the safe.

The safe has a 16-gauge steel cabinet, double-plated steel door with a concealed hinge, and a three-number combination lock. Behind the lock is an extra steel plate to deter a drilling attempt. Locking bolts secure the door to the cabinet, which features an adjustable shelf inside. It is not fireproof.

Keep/Safe Wall Safe ($154) will be available nationwide in June at Home Depot and K mart stores. If you can’t find it in your area, contact Sentry Group, 900 Linden Ave., Rochester, N.Y. 14625; (800) 828-1438.

When You Just Need a Little Bit of Cement

Do-it-yourselfers should love Odjob, a concrete mixer especially designed for mixing concrete for small jobs around the home. It also doubles as a paint or grout mixer, or for mixing seeds, fertilizer, soil or animal feeds.

Made of durable plastic (including a minimum of 25% recycled plastic) and weighing only five pounds, Odjob requires no electricity to operate and can mix a bag of premixed concrete in just 30 seconds, according to its inventor, Philip Lindesay, a New Zealand contractor.

“To mix small batches of concrete, you need a wheelbarrow and a shovel,” says Lindesay. “And you always have to rely on trial and error when it comes to mixing consistent batches. I told myself there had to be a better way, and one day I set out to find it.”

What Lindesay came up with is a barrel with a unique internal baffle system that tumbles ingredients inside the drum, moving them from one end of the mixer to the other when the drum is rolled in complete revolutions. The mixer itself consists of three parts--the drum, a screw-on calibrated top that’s used for measuring water, and a water-tight O-ring that ensures a leak-proof seal.

Odjob ($39.95) will be available in Ace Hardware stores nationwide by May 1. If you can’t find it in your area, call (800) 387-6018.