John T. Unger — an artist and longtime Collision Detection reader — is masterful at taking castaway scrap materials and turning them into art. I while back I blogged about his gorgeous Great Bowl of Fire, a flame-cut firepit made out of a recycled tank. Recently John created another nifty project: A series of spanking paddles made out discarded truck tires. They’ve been an enormous hit online (though personally I’d be scared senseless to have someone coming at me with one of these things, heh.)

Anyway, the Treehugger blog has decided to hold a contest for “Weird Eco Habits”, the mandate of which they describe thusly:

We know TreeHugger readers have habits some might view as “weird”. Whether it is watering your plants with condensation from a dehumidifier, finding driving techniques for getting the most mpg out of a Prius, or even going so far as to turn a chest freezer into an ultra-efficient fridge to save energy, some of us tend to go the extra mile. We think it is about time you got rewarded for these “weird” habits.

They picked John’s paddles as one of the year’s most surreal environmentally-friendly projects, and he’s currently leading the race. But it’s close, and voting ends Tuesday — so if you like these paddles, hie thee to the voting page and make your voice heard!