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If you like trivia, you’d want to check out Qtoro. The website challenges you to a game of trivia, where you get points for answering correctly within an alloted time.
There’s a lot of trivia sites on the Net, but Qtoro is pretty awesome: the Flash Javascript interface is slick and the questions are pretty fun. But it’s maddening to see how some users have upwards of 19,000 points!
Link [Flash] – Thanks Ben, great job of creating Qtoro!
Mel Blanc [wiki], nicknamed "The Man of a Thousand Voices" for good reasons, was the world’s most gifted voice actor. Here’s a video clip of an interview by David Letterman in 1981, where Mel explained how he got the inspiration to do voices for cartoon characters like Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Yosemite Sam and so on.
Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] – Thanks Algonkin!
Sean Bluestone of A List of Lists blog wrote an interesting article about the 5 largest gangs in the world. For example, take Japan’s Yakuza:
Popularized in the west in several movies, Yubitsume is the cutting off of a finger as an act of apology or humility. For a first offense the offender cuts off the tip of his left pinky, giving it to his boss. Sometimes an underboss does this to his boss in order to spare a member of his own gang from retribution. This is so prominent in Japan that when UK kids shows Bob The Building and Postman Pat were imported, the Japanese considered adding an extra finger to the characters’ four fingered hands to avoid scaring children.
Link – Thanks College Online!
How do you charge your cell phones in rural Africa, where access to electricity is spotty at best? Here’s the solution: a donkey and solar-powered mobile charging station!
Fitted with a solar panel that charges a 12 volt battery under the driver’s seat, the “HAPPY” becomes an independent, sustainable source of energy that powers cell phone connectivity, front and rear emergency lights and a small neon tube at night. Add a water filtration system, and the “HAPPY” doubles as a multi functional mobile business unit, that can empower an entrepreneurial owner, to generate income from it as a fresh water outlet, a mobile phone kiosk or a spaza shop – even after dark.
Link – Thanks David!
Shatner’s the man – I know of no other actor of his stature and success who pokes fun at himself with so much gusto!
Here’s a (weird? strange? fun?) clip of William Shatner in the 1998 movie Free Enterprise [wiki], where he played himself staging a rap-version of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in hopes of finally being taken seriously as an artist.
Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] – Thanks John!
Barbara Takenaga’s hypnotic – abstract – swirling – spiraling pattern paintings
Larger galleries (but smaller images, unfortunately here)
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This is one of our blind dogs, Callie the Dachshund, who always pretends not to hear us when we’re calling all the dogs to go out one last time before bed. She rolls over and pretends she’s dead …
Except for one little detail. Push play or go to YouTube. -via Arbroath
An orchestra uses scenes from classic video games to illustrate their performance. Video link
Someone has carved a neat Super Mario inspired Jack-o’-lantern.
Also make sure to check out the 10 Mario Fun Facts entry here at Neatorama.
Link – via Miniature Brainwave
Pupill (Swedish for “pupil”), from the Swedish Drosselmeyer Designgroup AB, is a candle holder that will fit all kinds of candles – from tea lights to thin antique candles.
Last month, San Francisco artists and activists took over parking spots around the city and turned them into "PARK(ing)" spaces or temporary public parks!
Image: squash [Flickr]
There was even this strange contraption called the ParkCycle, which its builder Reuben Margolin, John Bela, Blaine Merker and Matt Passmore pedaled near San Francisco’s City Hall!
Link | Gallery – via Life Without Buildings
Transfer blog has a large collection of the anti-sit technology, which uses spikes and what-not to make darned sure you aren’t sitting, skateboarding, or getting some steam (see above) on a choice piece of urban real estate.
Link – via Cliff Pickover’s Reality Carnival
Meet the Seven Wonder Sisters (the Sutherland Sisters) who in the late 1800s launched their singing career and showed off their long tresses with the Barnum & Bailey Circus.
Actually, they were more famous for their long hair than for their musical talent, so they decided to sell hair grower tonic and scalp cleaner instead!
Link – via Geisha Asobi
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The US Navy is planning to make robotic ships – basically sea-bots that are armed to the teeth (gear? mechanical head?):
Lastly, there’s the "Fleet Class," capable of staying in the water for 48 hours straight, and reaching speeds of up to 35 knots. The eleven-meter long USV would be used to do everything from carrying commandos to shore, jamming enemy communications, neutralizing mines, and delivering a "Harbor Class" drone. Naturally, it would carry its own guns and torpedoes, too, so it could conduct ‘high end’ surface warfare missions."
If you like Nissan’s Pivo 2 concept car, you’ll get a kick out of this as well: the Honda PUYO. Apparently, Honda engineers worked hard to bring us a car with no discernible edge and uses a gel-like substance instead of cold metal (indeed, "puyo" is how Japanese sounds out "touching the vehicle’s soft body.")
Link – via Boing Boing Gadgets
Here’s a DIY video clip guide on how to make your very own "cloud" lamp using water and liquid soap. Kinda like lava lamps, without the 60s psychedelia.
Hit play or go to Link [Metacafe] – Thanks Ross Voorhees!
When dynamite was first produced, one of its ingredients was peanut.
Peanut oil was used to produce glycerol, an ingredient in nitroglycerin.
Comments Off We’ve featured record-holding card stacker Bryan Berg before, but here’s something too cool to pass up: a YouTube clip from Showtime of Bryan building the Rhode Island State House over 3 days with 22,000 cards! (Wait till the ending… )
Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] – Thanks Algonkin!
"Familiarity breeds contempt – and children."
– Mark Twain, writer (1835-1910)
