For your growing collection of crazy and fun IO peripherals, lets add this:
https://github.com/badgeteam/mch2022-firmware-ice40/blob/master/projects/Ledcomm/rtl/ledcommflow.v
https://github.com/badgeteam/mch2022-firmware-ice40/tree/master/projects/Ledcomm
Its a drop-in UART replacement that uses a LED connected with both anode and cathode to GPIO pins as a bidirectional terminal connection, including link state indication and flow control.