Heheh.. worked perfectly. She loved it. She'll be back Friday night and has already texted that I should prepare for a romantic evening, so to speak..
;D
Since I'm using a BoArduino from adafruit, it's even smaller than a standard arduino. Plugs directly into breadboard- though I plan to pick up an "actual" Arduino (and a Mega also) at some point when I've got a little play cash about, I'm loving the breadboarding ease of the BoArduino I must admit. Less wires means less places to go wrong. I'm using the AT328 version, no USB onboard (so you use serial/TTL converter)- draws very little power.
I power it with a 9v battery, when not plugged in, though for maximum duration I'd probably use 4xAA. The BoArduino has a 7805 voltage regulator, so it'll be happy with anything from 5v to around 12v without too much worry. If you used a Nano, the design would be even smaller, maybe you could power with lithium cells.
In any case, the little beast works with any NTSC input- so with some simple code you can have a little "teleprompter" or Ninja Video Feed Hijack for all of $15.. think walking into Best Buy, plugging it into a huge Plasma screen, and walking away while it cycles.
Someone set them up the bomb? Let go every Zig. For great justice.
-focalist