Archive for January 10th, 2008

Ducks Redux

(YouTube link)
VonSkippy thought that the Duck Herding video could be improved with a musical soundtrack. Since he’s such a sweet guy, I went right to work and talked my brother into remixing it.

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Star Murals by Rip Read

Rip Read is a star painter, or "startist" as he calls himself. Specifically, he paints stars and galaxies on the ceiling.

Rip uses phosphorescent pigments (that glow for up to 25 hours) to create his artwork. Though I haven’t seen it in person, he assured me that his stars not only glow, they also twinkle and shimmer - just like the actual stars in a night’s sky - due to a clever layering technique to create an illusion of depth and movement.

Note: Yes, the photos on his website are photoshopped - I’ve had an email
conversation with him regarding "night" photography and Rip said that he’d tried everything (using all sorts of low lux cameras) but nothing had managed to capture his "stars" just right.

Link [self-starting audio] - Thanks Rip!

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Tata Nano: World’s Cheapest Car

Meet the Tata Nano car, currently the cheapest car in the world:

The vehicle, called the Tata Nano, will sell for 100,000 rupees or $2,500 (£1,277) and enable those in developing countries to move to four wheels. [..]

Tata will initially make about 250,000 Nanos and expects eventual annual demand of one million cars.

Could you imagine that? One million new cars per year - as if the roads in India aren’t choked up enough already! Predictably, critics said that making cars available to the poor will lead to environmental disasters:

Environmental critics have said that the car will lead to mounting air and pollution problems on India’s already clogged roads.

But Tata said the car had passed emission standards and would average about 50 miles to the gallon, or five litres per hundred kilometres.

Link -
Thanks moronic50!

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Top 100 Funny Quotes

A list of more or less funny quotes by famous persons such as Albert Einstein, Fredrick Nietzsche, Sarah Silverman and George Carlin (above photo).

Link - via ebr303

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Valentine Geekery: Chocolate Miis

This Valentine’s Day, don’t just buy a box of chocolate for your beloved geek, buy him or her this: the Choclate Mii.

This box of candy has it all. In fact, the box is even part of the gift. Crafted to look like a miniature Wii with the message "Wii belong together, you and Mii" written on the top, the box opens to reveal two chocolate Miis with little red-hot hearts on their shirts. You can choose to have the traditional boy and girl grouping, or any combination of the two, so give the gift to a loved one or share with a friend.

Link - Thanks Sabrina!

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Dude, Where’s My Bridge?

Workers at a heating plant in Khabarovsk, eastern Russia, went to work early one morning to discover that a bridge on the only road to their work had disappeared overnight!

The thieves worked at night when there was no one around, which allowed them to dismantle and remove the heavy construction without anyone noticing, a spokesman for the heating plant said.

Local workers arrived at the bridge in the morning to discover that the only direct route to work had disappeared.

Link - Thanks cybele!

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Nut and Bolt Wedding Ring

Kiley Granberg, an artist and student at the Alberta College of Art and Design, sent us one of her creations: a nut and bolt wedding ring, perfect for the gearhead, or lug nut, that you love!

It’s clever in oh so many ways! Link - Thanks Kiley!

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Hello Kitty Jesus Tattoo

Apparently, this is what you get when pop culture and religion clashed:

I know you read the title of this post and were shaking your head in disbelief even before you looked at what I have written. You thought that I was exaggerating to draw you into the blog because there is no way in Hell (Hello Kitty or otherwise) that anyone would ever get a Hello Kitty Jesus tattoo. Hello Kitty fanatics are wacko, but there is a line even they will not cross, right? See, I have had that delusion too, but it always proves to be wrong because fanatics of the evil feline don’t know what a line looks like that shouldn’t be crossed. Thus, the Hello Kitty Jesus tattoo

Link - Thanks financial hack!

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Mandelbrot Fractal Art Contest

Spiral Fantasy by Alfred Laing

Fractals are so purty! Here are the winners of the 2007 Second International Benoit Mandelbrot Fractal Art Contest, which was named after the Father of Fractal Geometry himself: Link - Thanks Jon Jason!

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Grossest Ear Plugs Ever: Man Cut Own Nipples, Cast ‘Em in Resin, Wears ‘Em on Ears!

Before I write this post, let me check the date. Yep, too early for April Fool’s, so it can only mean that - hands down - it’s the grossest plugs ever:

John Blake cut off his nipples, cast them in resin and wears them as plugs in his ears.

ModBlog (which is not for the faint-hearted) has more: Link - Thanks Jase!

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Trivia: The Origin of Cobb Salad

The first Cobb salad was made from leftovers.

The story goes like this: In the late 1930s, LA’s famous Brown Derby restaurant owner Bob Cobb went to fix a late night snack for Sid Grauman, the owner of Grauman’s Chinese Theater. He took leftovers from the refrigerator and chopped them up finely because Grauman was suffering from a toothache. Grauman loved the salad so much that Cobb added it to the menu. (Photo: kk+ [Flickr])

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Untangle

The game Untangle challenges you to simply fix the lines so that they do not cross. Simply? Ha! Sure, it starts out simple, but rapidly becomes a mind boggler. Link -via YesButNoButYes

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Double Vision

Ever have a bit too much to drink only to end up getting double vision? Sure it’s funny when you’re drunk but this neat website has a very cool collection of pictures (presumably done with Photoshop) that will have you focus your eyes. Some of them are pretty funny as per the example above.

Via: freakingnews

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The Stay-at-Home Home Server

Tom O’Conner wrote the online children’s book Mommy, Why is There a Server in the House? to help children understand the stay-at-home server. Yes, it’s an ad for Windows, but it’s cute. Link -via the Presurfer

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The Placebo Effect in Weight Loss

Can your perception of your exercise habits change your weight? Harvard psychologist Ellen Langer performed an experiment with hotel maids. She found that the maids didn’t consider what they did as exercise, although their daily work activity exceeded recommendations. Half the maids were told their activity levels met the surgeon general’s definition of an active lifestyle. One month later, the group that had the information was found to have lower weight, lower blood pressure, and smaller waists! However, there was no indication of changes in the group’s overall activity.

Essentially, what Langer is talking about is a placebo effect. She says that if you believe you are exercising, your body may respond as if it is. It’s the same as if you believe you are getting medication when you are actually getting a sugar pill — your body can sometimes respond as if a placebo is actually working.

Link -via Reddit

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Boy Scout Saves President of the Maldives

15-year-old Boy Scout Mohamed Jaisham outdid himself for his good deed of the day -he saved the life of his president! At the opening of an environmental project, a man stepped out of the crowd with a knife wrapped in the country’s flag. As he reached toward Maldivian president Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, Jaisham wrestled him to the ground and took the knife away!

“I have been saved thanks to Mohamed Jaisham and Allah,” President Gayoom said in a national radio address after the incident.

Jaisham, who wore his Boy Scout uniform for the event, suffered an injury to his hand. The president received a rip in his shirt. Link -via Arbroath

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The Stars Wars Guide to the Candidates

In this tongue-in-cheek posting, the 2008 presidential candidates are each linked with his/her Star Wars equivalent. Darth McCain, Hillando Clintrissian, Mitt Skywalker, and Grand Moff Giuliani included. Link -via the Presurfer

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High Speed Video Compilation

Here is a beautiful compilation of high speed videography that includes people, machines, animals, bullets, water and much more. Enjoy!

Link: LiveLeak

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Quote: Jules Renard on Laziness

"Laziness is nothing more than the habit of resting before you get tired."

- Jules Renard, author (1864 - 1910)

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Gorgeous Bird-Shaped Clothespin

Designboom has a neat post about an exhibition of Yoav Ziv and Gad Charny’s clothes-pins (or clothes pegs, take your pick) collection (curated with Yaacov Kaufman):

One would have expected the pegs to disappear, with the appearance of the drying machines, but they have survived the technological change. on the contrary, the number of different clothes pegs seems only to be growing.

Like this lovely bird-shaped clothes-pin above, for instance! See more here: Link - via Ishbdiddle

Previously on Neatorama: Fighting for the Right to Dry

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Golf Commentator Got Into Trouble For “Lynch” Tiger Woods Joke

The Golf Channel’s commentator Kelly Tilghman got into hot water (bunker?) when she joked about what young golfers that wanted to challenge Tiger Woods should do to him:

Faldo and Tilghman were discussing young players who could challenge the world’s No. 1 player toward the end of Friday’s broadcast at Kapalua when Faldo suggested that "to take Tiger on, maybe they should just gang up for a while."

"Lynch him in a back alley," Tilghman replied.(Source) [Both were chuckling at this point, see the video below]

[YouTube Link]

Though Tiger Woods himself didn’t take offense at Kelly’s remark (they’re long-time friends), the uproar got Kelly a two-week suspension. Rev. Al Sharpton even joined the fray and demanded that she be fired over a racist comment.

I understand the charged meaning of the word "lynch" to the African American community, but let me ask you this: is the whole thing overblown? Are people like Rev. Al Sharpton just being overly sensitive or do they have a valid point?

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USB Desk Vacuum Cleaner

Messy desk? Well, this tiny USB Desk Vacuum can’t help with the big stuff, but it can definitely help keep your workstation crumb-free!

Just plug it into a free USB port and vacuum up those crumbs (the mini-vacuum handle tilts back, just like the real one!)

Link - via Militant Platypus

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World’s Largest Snow Sculpture

That’s "Romantic Feelings," the world’s largest snow sculpture in the 20th International Snow Sculpture Art Expo in Harbin, China.

The sculpture is about 115 feet (35 m) high and 656 feet (200 m) long!

Sun-Sentinel has the photo gallery: Link

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“Meanest Mom on the Planet” Sold Kid’s Car

When Jane Hambleton of Fort Dodge, Iowa, found a bottle of booze under the front seat of her 19-year-old son’s car, she took out this ad on The Des Moines Register’s classifieds:

"Totally uncool parents who obviously don’t love teenage son, selling his car. Only driven for 3 weeks before snoopy mom who needs to get a life found booze under front seat. $3,700/offer. Call meanest mom on the planet."

And that got her nationwide attention and kudos from a lot of people!

[She said] "The ad cost a fortune, but you know what? I’m telling people what happened here. I’m not just going to put the car for resale when there’s nothing wrong with it, except the driver made a dumb decision," Hambleton said. "It’s overwhelming, the number of calls I’ve gotten from people saying, ‘Thank you, it’s nice to see a responsible parent.’ So far, there are no calls from anyone saying, ‘You’re really strict. You’re real overboard, lady.’ "

Steven Hambleton, a freshman business major at Briar Cliff University in Sioux City, obviously was not one of the callers. And he didn’t feel much like talking when contacted Tuesday.

"I don’t think you can print" his response to the ad, his mother said. "He’s very, very unhappy."

Link

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COLOURlover’s New COPASO Color Palette Tool

Our pal Darius Monsef of COLOURlovers blog has created a new web-based color palette tool called COPASO:

COPASO is an advanced color palette tool that helps you create the perfect color schemes and themes. With a scratch pad to save colors you’re working with, a photo tool to extract colors and an advanced color picker and color theory wheel to give you all the color inspiration you want. Using COPASO you can save your palettes to a private folder or download them to your local computer.

It’s geared for designers and "color enthusiasts" (what does that mean, Darius?), but it’s kind of neat to play around with.

Link | Blog entry - Thanks Mr. Baby Man!

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How Could the New Hampshire Polls Get It So Wrong?

Over the years, polls have gotten very accurate in predicting who will win elections. But obviously, pollsters were wrong - very wrong - in predicting result of the New Hampshire primaries.

Nine individual polls (even Hillary’s own poll) showed that Obama had a significant lead - some even had him with double-digits leads. So how did the pollsters got it so wrong?

There will be a serious, critical look at the final pre-election polls in the Democratic presidential primary in New Hampshire; that is essential. It is simply unprecedented for so many polls to have been so wrong. We need to know why.

But we need to know it through careful, empirically based analysis. There will be a lot of claims about what happened - about respondents who reputedly lied, about alleged difficulties polling in biracial contests. That may be so. It also may be a smokescreen - a convenient foil for pollsters who’d rather fault their respondents than own up to other possibilities - such as their own failings in sampling and likely voter modeling.

Gary Langer, the director of polling at ABC News, explains: Link [ABC World News Webcast, Flash video] | The Numbers, Gary’s blog - Thanks Zach!

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Steampunk Superheroes

Inspired by the Gotham by Gaslight comic book by Mike Mignola and Brian Augustyn (a Batman comic set in the 1880s), Siloff created a set of steampunk superheroes (famous members of the Justice League set in Victorian Era!)

Link - via Boing Boing

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Japanese Marshmallow Eating Contest

Japanese game shows can make anything look funny, including this marshmallow eating contest.