To many wealthy Lithuanians, it was just a fancy horseback riding academy. But horses aren’t the only things kept in the barn: the CIA had built a secret prison there, where they interrogated (or tortured, your choice of word) suspected al-Qaeda terrorists.
ABC News has the story:
The CIA constructed the prison over the next several months, apparently flying in prefabricated elements from outside Lithuania. The prison opened in Sept. 2004.
According to sources who saw the facility, the riding academy originally consisted of an indoor riding area with a red metallic roof, a stable and a cafe. The CIA built a thick concrete wall inside the riding area. Behind the wall, it built what one Lithuanian source called a "building within a building."
On a series of thick concrete pads, it installed what a source called "prefabricated pods" to house prisoners, each separated from the other by five or six feet. Each pod included a shower, a bed and a toilet. Separate cells were constructed for interrogations.
There are no aliens in these stories from NASA and the Soviet space program, just true tales of how being an astronaut is no picnic. Decompression? Landing in the wrong place? Using the toilet without a toilet? Not pleasant!
On May 5, 1961, Alan Shepard wet his pants aboard Freedom 7, but Apollo bathroom facilities would get a lot worse before they got any better. I don’t think I’m the only guy to find something fundamentally frightening about a urinal that consists only of a “condom-like fitting,” a valve and the empty void of outer space. I keep thinking about that scene from “Goldfinger.”
“J” is an autistic child who also has post-surgical and bowel-related chronic pain. His autism manifested itself as aggression rather than simple withdrawal, resulting in severe behavioral problems. Authorities in Rhode Island granted the parents a license to give their child medical marijuana (they opted to do so in the form of brownies). The results were dramatic:
Pre-pot, J. ate things that weren’t food… His pica become so uncontrollable we couldn’t let him sleep with a pajama top (it would be gone by morning) or a pillow (ditto the case and the stuffing)… The worst part was watching him scream in pain on the toilet, when what went in had to come out… Almost immediately after we started the cannabis, the pica stopped. Just stopped. J. now sleeps with his organic wool-and-cotton, hypoallergenic, temptingly chewable comforter.
Next, we started seeing changes in J.’s school reports… An aggression is defined as any attempt or instance of hitting, kicking, biting, or pinching another person. For the past year, he’d consistently had 30 to 50 aggressions in a school day, with a one-time high of 300. The charts for June through July, by contrast, showed he was actually having days—sometimes one after another—with zero aggressions.
This post is likely to elicit strong opinions; I would encourage everyone to at least browse the original source articles rather than basing judgments only on the excerpts above.
Sean Michael Ragan of Make magazine declares that with this video by inventor Patrick Brawley, steampunk has ‘jumped the shark’:
Introducing the Electro-Flush! Technically, TeslaPunk Urinal. Hand-made solid oak tank with battery powered flush pump, laser aiming assist (aim at the laser dot in the bowl at night), lights, antique gauges, flush capacitor, and cup holder. Bowl is a round 1949 Standard.
A tiny breed of pig is born the size of a teacup and is the hot new pet among British celebrities. The micro pig is about nine ounces and the size of a teacup when born, but can sell for up to £700. Breeder Jane Croft has given up her former career to breed the tiny pigs full-time.
At two years old they are fully grown and weigh in around 40-65lb and are about knee height at 12-16in tall.
They can live for up to 18 years, but make popular pets as they are low maintenance, quiet and surprisingly clean.
‘Micro pigs make fantastic pets as they are very low maintenance. You don’t have to take them for walks and they have very few health issues,’ said Miss Croft.
‘They don’t make much noise, they are easy to toilet train and once they have bonded with you they are very loving
The pigs are also good pets for people who are allergic to dogs or cats. Link -via the Presurfer
Lovely Listing is a collection of user-submitted finds in the the real estate world. Sometimes you just have to wonder what people were thinking, whether it be the agent’s choice of photo, the seller’s interior decor, or the builder themselves, as exemplified above:
Dude. Check it out. The weirdest thing ever is going on here. You see? You see it? So bizarre: the toilet paper is hung on the shower stall door. Crazy!
A few months ago, photographer and environmentalist Yann Arthus-Bertrand
and his non-profit organization GoodPlanet
released the movie HOME,
a documentary about life on Earth and the current environmental challenges
of our planet (Arthus-Bertrand is famous for his aerial photography, and
the movie is quite wonderfully shot - if you haven't seen it before, it's
worth a look: HOME is available in
full, free on YouTube).
As a companion to the movie, Arthus-Bertrand released a companion book
HOME:
A Hymn to the Planet and Humanity.
The book is composed of nearly 200 short segments on the various environmental,
political, and sociological aspects of the problems facing the world.
From poverty to pollution, coal to carbon dioxide, the book is full of
(alarming) facts that Arthus-Bertrand hope will inspire people to act.
It was hard to pick just a few segments from the book to excerpt - the
whole book is interesting. And yes, undoubtedly there are many oversimplifications
that is inherent in presenting complex problems in short vignettes - but
Home: A Hymn to the Planet and Humanity is a good starting point
for many of us in understanding the environmental problems of today.
Here are 5 short segments from the book, published on Neatorama with
permission:
SIX BILLION SOULS
Blocks of flats on Seoul's south bank, South Korea
The world’s population quadrupled over the course of the 20th century
and now stands at 6.7 billion. Since 2000 it has increased by 700 million,
which is equivalent to the entire population rise in the 19th century.
In the 18th century, it rose by a mere 200 million. As their numbers have
grown, human beings have gravitated increasingly toward cities, which
have also grown as a result. Since 2007, more than one in two of us live
in a town or city.
There are more people in some of the bigger cities – such as Tokyo,
with its population of 35 million – than in some countries as a
whole. In developing countries, urban growth can occur at a rate that
is simply mind-boggling. Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, had a population
of 300,000 in 1950, whereas today the figure stands at more than 15 million:
a fiftyfold increase in fifty years. Boom towns such as Dhaka face immense
problems in terms of infrastructure including electricity, drinking water,
and waste disposal.
Nevertheless, this demographic explosion and the urbanization linked
to it seem also to hold part of the solution. Birth rates have been shown
to be decreasing over a great many parts of the globe, particularly in
urban areas. The current average stands at 2.6, with significant regional
disparities. In many Western countries, it has even fallen below 2.1,
the threshold for population increase. The world population is shrinking
and ageing. Whereas earlier projections for the coming decades envisaged
a global population of 12 billion, the estimate has fallen and it is now
thought that the population should stabilize at around 9 billion by 2050.
This seems to be due to the fact that city-dwellers generally have better
access to education. For many women, in particular, this signifies access
to information and to methods of contraception. It also means that these
women are often able to work in addition to having a family. Having children
becomes a choice, to be balanced against a career, for example. Urban
life, moreover, changes people’s behavior and living requirements:
couples have fewer children than those living in the country since they
no longer need help in the fields. This reduction in the birth rate responds
to one of the major challenges of the century: that of population control
as a means of successfully feeding the world and saving the planet.
THE END OF OIL
Oil fields near Bakersfield, California, USA
Oil will not run out suddenly. It will be a slow, agonizing decline.
As oil becomes scarcer its price will rise, and what used to be very cheap
will become expensive. Society will be wholly transformed.
The reason for this is simple: a finite planet has finite resources.
Once we have consumed all of our oil and other primary materials, there
will be nothing left. Oil is not a renewable resource on any timescale
comparable to its rate of consumption. The chemical reactions which led
to its formation occurred over millions of years.
There are, undoubtedly, oil deposits that remain to be discovered. But
the easiest have already been found and exploited. Each year, we consume
more oil than we find. This is clearly going to cause problems.
It is not only a question of when oil will run out, but how society will
change as it does. A world in which oil is much rarer – and therefore
costlier – will be different from our own. The modern petrochemical
industry will have to change dramatically: everything from lipsticks to
fertilizers and plastics of all types will either be made differently
or not at all. Transport will obviously become more expensive. This will
spell the end of the West’s huge retail and supermarket networks,
since these rely on road transportation and economies of scale. The price
of imported products will rise, and international tourism will return
to what it used to be in previous centuries: a luxury for the privileged
few. Competition for access to the last remaining oil deposits will increase,
and may lead to conflict.
These developments are inevitable, and will only be temporarily delayed
by the current recession which is slowing down the global economy. Developing
renewable forms of energy and reducing consumption are the two most basic
measures we can take to prepare ourselves.
FISHERIES: AN OVEREXPLOITED RESOURCE
What is the current state of world fisheries?
How important is fish to the average diet?
WATER SCARCITY
Moshav (co-operative village) farm at Nahalal, Jezrael plain, Israel
Today a third of humanity is suffering from water scarcity. Specialists
use the term “water stress” when the demand for water exceeds
the available freshwater supply by 10%. Although 10% of renewable resource
may not seem like much, we should not forget that before mankind’s
invention, 100% of this water was used by ecosystems. This extra demand
is enough to dry a water course, drain a spring, or prevent the replenishment
of groundwater.
While the population of Canada and the Amazon or Congo basin have a plentiful
water supply, the people of the Mediterranean basin, Central Asia and
Mexico are at greater risk of scarcity. The particular problem with water
is that it is difficult to transport in large quantities over great distances.
One solution is to use the same water several times. An increasing number
of industries are reusing water, retreating it up to 30 times in some
cases. Domestic washwater, known as “greywater,” can be reused
to water a garden or flush a toilet, reserving drinkable water for human
consumption, cooking, or washing. In countries where water is scarce,
wastewater from cities is retreated for use in agriculture. In Israel,
for example, where the average rainfall is 1 inch (25 mm) a year, 70%
of wastewater is recycled, allowing 49,000 acres (20,000 hectares) of
land to be watered.
There are many other ways of saving water, especially by being aware
of how much of it we consume. Some of this water is invisible: it is used
to make a product, but is not present in the product itself. This is called
virtual water. One pound of grain means hundreds of gallons of irrigation
water; a pair of cotton jeans require 2,860 gallons (10,850 liters) of
water; a cup of coffee 9 gallons (35 liters); a sheet of paper 2.5 gallons
(10 liters). A single tomato contains 3.5 gallons (13 liters) of virtual
water, which is more than many people use in a day. Paradoxically, some
countries that face water scarcity are actually exporting some of their
limited water resources in the form of agricultural or manufactured products.
THE COLLAPSE OF SOCIETIES
Volcano of Rano Kau, Easter Island, Chile
Sooner or later, societies disappear and are replaced by new ones. As
our own society enters a critical phase, what lessons can be learned from
those that preceded us? One example that has been extensively studied
is Easter Island in the Pacific Ocean. The island was once home to a flourishing
civilization, which reached its peak in around 1500, but it subsequently
experienced a rapid decline, losing four fifths of its population in just
one century. According to the American expert Jared Diamond, the explanation
lies principally in the fact that the people deforested their entire land.
Without trees, they were no longer able to build fishing boats, and crucially
the soil was eroded. As the situation worsened, the people began fighting
among themselves, and developed bizarre religious practices. In an effort
to erect increasingly gigantic statutes, they cut down more and more trees,
accelerating their demise.
Diamond also studied a number of other civilizations that vanished largely
as a result of environmental factors, such as the Maya and Babylonians,
who exhausted their land, and the Greenland Vikings, who could not adapt
to the cooler climate. While these societies did not vanish because of
environmental damage alone, it certainly weakened their economic and social
structures and created vicious cycles that ultimately proved fatal. The
same pattern could easily be applied to modern society.
In Diamond’s analysis, the factors leading to a society’s
collapse seem to be quite clearly set out every time. But for political,
religious, or social reasons, the society is incapable of reacting and
taking adequate measures to ensure its survival. What would the Easter
Islander who cut down the last tree have been thinking? Another expert
in the history of civilizations, the British historian Arnold Toynbee,
wrote that “civilizations die from suicide, not by murder”
– in other words, from their inability to resolve their internal
crises.
Today most people agree that we are facing an environmental catastrophe.
We need to change the course in which our society is heading, and remove
the obstacles to that change. It is too late to bury our heads in the
sand. It is also too late to be pessimistic.
Yann
Arthus-Bertrand published more than 40 books, including the multimillion-copy
international bestseller Earth from Above. Home, released in
conjunction with a film of the same name, is a stunning visual odyssey
across 50 countries combining Arthus-Bertrand's images and text by the
editorial team of Good Planet.
Being arrested is bad enough without having some embarrassing details publicized as well. Someday, when your grandchildren ask you if you’ve ever been in the newspaper, on TV, or published on the ‘net, you’ll be glad you aren’t these people!
It will be the second offense for Portland’s Gary Moody who was caught hiding inside the pit of a campsite latrine, once again. The creature of the black latrine claimed that he was not leering at the backsides of bathroom goers. His excuse was that he dropped his shirt down the hole; the previous time he stressed that he had dropped his wedding ring (which was never found). Moody entered a plea of no contest to trespassing for which he will serve two years of probation. He is also required to pay a fine of $1,000 and $700 to the Forest Service for the cost of pumping out the toilet tank and screening the contents.
These V-Houses were designed by Heinz Legler for use as eco-friendly shelters. They are in temporary use for workers is a forest near Yelapa, Mexico, but have proved so popular that more have been ordered to house resort guests. They feature solar panels, composting toilets, and a greywater system to reuse as much water as possible. No excavation needed to set these treehouses up, just stick them in the ground! Link -via Digg
This toilet paper dispenser looks like a giant tube of glue! No need to squeeze this tube, just pull the toilet paper out. The back end is sealed with Velcro, so you can easily add more paper. Link -via Unique Daily
Sadly, this product is currently out of stock — toilet paper always runs out at the worst possible moment. But when it’s available again, it will shine a light into the darker recesses of your bathroom. Normally on sale for £4.99.
The Mind Trainer Loo Roll is packed with puzzles, brain teasers, and Sudoku on every sheet. Create a game for yourself: you don’t get to use a sheet until you’ve solved the puzzle on it.
Artist Junior Fritz Jacquet crumples and folds toilet paper rolls until they make faces displaying anguish, happiness, disgust and more. Once they’re folded right, he adds just a bit of color to help bring out their color and then they’re ready to go.
Nom Nom Nom Nom Nom Nom Nom is a silly yet utterly fascinating collaboration between our pal, animator and T-shirt designer extraordinaire Nathan Mazur of Scared of Bees and Parry Gripp (of the pop punk band Nerf Herder). In the version above, Nathan added animation to Parry’s notoriously catchy tune (I apologize beforehand for getting the song stuck in your head).
If you like that, there’s *a lot* of similar songs over at Parry’s Song of the Week website: Link
James May of the British television show Top Gear is planning to build a full-sized house out of LEGOs:
On Friday, more than three million Lego bricks were delivered to the vineyard in preparation for the task.
Denbies marketing and business development manager, Jeanette Simpson, said: “The millions of bricks came all the way from the Czech Republic. The house will be life-size with a staircase, toilet and shower.”
New signs for a public loo in Winchcombe, England have people scratching their heads. The infographic resembles a skier with poles, or a man on an escalator. The words “ambulant urinal” convey the idea of a urinal that walks.
Barbara Heard, from Gretton Road, Winchcombe, said she failed to understand how the signs could have been sanctioned by Tewkesbury Borough Council.
She said: “Does anyone have any idea what these signs mean?
“My husband and I regard ourselves as fairly intelligent but we have no idea.
“What will our overseas visitors will make of these signs?
Chris Pike of the Tewkesbury Borough Council says “ambulant” restrooms are larger than standard, and are “intended for people who may be partially disabled but cannot access the full disabled unit.” Link -via Arbroath
When one of the two toilets on the International Space Station broke, io9 blogger Lauren Davis was inspired to write about the toilets (or utter lack thereof) in various science fiction movies, TV shows, and books. She rounds up the commodes from Star Trek, Lexx, Babylon 5, Galaxy Quest, Firefly, and others.
Apparently on the Enterprise-D, there was only one toilet, and the post includes a video of Jonathan Frakes pointing it out on a schematic of the ship.
Sculptor Antony Gormley of One & Other’s summer art project is loads of fun: he asks the people of London to occupy the empty Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square, usually reserved for statues of kings and generals. Every hour, 24 hours a day for 100 days, a different person will become their own living sculptures on the Fourth Plinth.
This guy to the left is aquatic scientist Oliver Parsons-Baker, who came up dressed as a giant poo. He’s trying to raise awareness and promote better sanitation around the world with Water Aid:
The 26-year-old, who works for Severn Trent Water, has teamed up with Water Aid to raise awareness of the billions of people trapped in the poverty cycle due to a lack of safe water and toilets.
His cumbersome costume meant he had to be hoisted onto the plinth, drawing laughter and applause from the crowd. The outfit was composed of brown foam and leather, with a sizeable housefly dangling from it.
Parsons-Baker got his message across via two placards which bore the message: "2.5bn people don’t have a toilet" and "G8 leaders – take action on the sanitation crisis now".
You can view the live webstream of the shenanigans here: Link | Coverage at the Guardian | Poo-Man at The London Paper (photo: PA)
You know the honeymoon is over when this happened: when the husband found out that his new wife took too long in the airport restroom, he decided to get on the plane without her!
The woman in question, a teacher, had gone to use the facilities at the airport before boarding a flight back in Saudi Arabia.
Quite how long she stayed in the toilet remains unclear. What is certain is she emerged to discover her husband had vanished without trace. The woman, who had paid for the holiday, began a desperate search of the airport and grew increasingly concerned that something terrible had happened to him. [...]
When he arrived at his destination, he calmly told relatives his new wife was still in Malaysia. His bride was not so calm about his behaviour. She has demanded an immediate divorce.
Did you guys hear that Indiana Jones 5 is apparently in the works? Are you all as horrified as I am? If you’re like me and hated Kingdom of the Crystal Skull with a passion, then you prefer to dwell on the classics – Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Last Crusade, and yes, even Temple of Doom. Here’s some trivia to remind you of the good times.
You’ve probably heard the rumors, and yes, they’re true – Indiana Jones was named after George Lucas’ dog, Indiana. He was the prototype for Chewbacca as well, so his old malamute had a pretty big impact on Lucas’ two biggest series.
“Indiana Smith?” Yep, almost, until Steven Spielberg told Lucas it just didn’t sound right. The equally-generic “Jones” was suggested and flowed much better.
According to George Lucas, almost every studio in town turned down the movie, feeling that it would cost too much money to make.
Tim Matheson and Tom Selleck both tested for Indiana Jones; Karen Allen actually screentested with Tim Matheson. Tom Selleck did very well and was the frontrunner, but had to bow out due to Magnum P.I. Harrison Ford was brought up early in the casting discussion, but George Lucas wanted to avoid casting him since he had already become so closely associated with Star Wars.
The role of Sallah was offered to Danny DeVito – he was Spielberg’s first choice – but was unable to do it because of Taxi. The job went to John Rhys-Davies instead. Picture from BlogCDN.
Indy’s leather jacket looks old and beat up, but in reality, it was brand new – and there were 10 of them. The costume director “aged” each jacket with a metal brush and Harrison Ford’s own pocket knife.
The famous hat is from Savile Row in London, a place called Herbert Johnson. The hat had a very wide brim and the crown was quite high, apparently the fashion Down Under since it was their Australian model. After a couple of fittings, it was declared the Indiana Jones fedora. When the customized hat arrived at the studio, the costume designer rolled it up and crushed it, then various members of the cast (including Harrison) took turns sitting on it to make it look like a very worn-in, well-loved hat.
Someone was actually sent out to find a mountain that specifically looked like the Paramount Studios logo mountain so they could create the opening shot of the movie. I suppose these days Lucas would have just made a CGI mountain…
There was a complication during the scene where Alfred Molina is covered in spiders – they didn’t want to move. They just sat stagnant on him, making the excitement of the scene rather… well, not exciting. They discovered that all of the spiders were male, so a female spider was put on Molina’s chest. It did the trick – the male spiders were immediately more active and started to crawl in the direction of the female.
The golden idol was based on an Incan fertility statue. Photo from FanPop.
The movie was filmed in Tunisia because it was a lot cheaper to shoot there than Egypt, and since the script never called for shots of the Sphinx or the pyramids, so they were able to get away with it. In fact, one of the scenes was shot in the exact same canyon where R2-D2 was stolen by Jawas in Star Wars.
The part where Indy watches a swordsman go through a very elaborate routine with his scimitar only to shoot him at the end of it happened because Harrison Ford really had to go to the bathroom. Indy was supposed to have a huge fight scene using his whip, but a bout of dysentery had left him weak and desperately needing the john. Because of this, someone – reports vary on whose idea it was – suggested that Indy just dispatch the dude like anyone who had a gun in his arsenal would.
Harrison wasn’t the only one who got sick – a majority of the cast and crew found themselves incapacitated at some point during filming in Tunisia. Steven Spielberg didn’t get sick because he ate only canned food from the U.K. Everyone else who ate food in the restaurants or at the hotel got horribly sick at least once during filming.
The giant boulder was Spielberg’s idea and was supposedly based on an old Scrooge McDuck cartoon called “The Seven Cities of Cibola,” where the exact same thing happens: when an idol is lifted off of its pedestal, a giant rock descends and almost kills the thief. The rock in Raiders was only made of fiberglass, but it was still very heavy and great precautions had to be taken to ensure that it could be stopped in case Harrison Ford or a stunt double tripped while the scene was being shot. Photo from Boxwish.com.
During the scene where Indy fights while the plane is rolling around, Harrison Ford actually sustained an injury when the wheels of the plane got too close and rolled right up onto his leg. It tore his ACL, but rather than submit to Tunisian hospitals, Ford wrapped it in ice and continued to shoot. He also bruised his ribs during the scene where he is dragged behind the truck.
Unlike his character counterpart, Harrison Ford isn’t afraid of snakes and had no problem working with them during the Well of Souls scene. Precautions were taken anyway – if you look closely, a reflection gives away the fact that a sheet of glass was placed between Ford and the cobra. It was a good thing, too – at one point the cobra actually sprayed venom onto the glass.
Some of the sound effects weren’t fancy at all: the sound of snakes slithering was really just the sound designer squishing his fingers through a cheese casserole, the sound of people getting punched was really a pile of leather coats being hit with a baseball bat, and the lid sliding off of the Ark was a toilet lid being slid off the back of a toilet. The sound designer was having trouble coming up with just the right sound for the rolling boulder at the beginning of the movie and ended up using the sound of a Honda Civic coasting down a gravel hill.
Marion was the writer’s grandmother-in-law’s name, and he had been mulling over a surname for a while when he came across a streetname called “Ravenwood” and loved the way the two names fit together. Photo from TheShadyCat.
The boat was actually the submarine model from Das Boot.
Although most shots were done in four takes or less because Lucas and Spielberg wanted a “quick and dirty” feel to the movie – nothing too perfect – there was one shot that took more than 50 takes. It was the scene where the monkey salutes with a “Heil Hitler” gesture. A grape was attached to fishing line and held just out of reach of the camera shot to achieve the salute, but it took a while to get it just right. It ended up being one of Steven Spielberg’s favorite moments in the movie.
The movie originally received an “R” rating because of the gruesome deaths that happen when the Ark is opened, specifically when Belloq’s head explodes. To lessen the effect, flames were superimposed over his exploding head. This earned the film a “PG” rating instead. Photo from LegalMovieDownloads.com.
Those of us who like little movie secrets know that George Lucas likes to include a reference to “1138” in all of his movies in homage to his first movie, THX 1138. You’ll find it in Raiders during the Nazi harbor scene if you listen to the numbers being read over the loudspeaker. It’s subtle, though, because the numbers are read in German – “Ein, ein, drei, acht.”
Another Star Wars nod: there’s a little hieroglyph of R2D2 visible if you don’t blink, but this is the only screenshot I can find of it. Photoshop job? What do you think?Photo from BlameItOnTheVoices.
Why wasn’t I told that June is National Bathroom Reading Month? I’ve been celebrating it all year long!
Anyways, to celebrate this momentous occasion, our pal Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader is running a neat contest: Deep Thoughts From the Throne.
You can win nifty prizes (including an iPhone, a set of Bathroom Reader books autographed by Uncle John himself and a year’s supply of toilet paper – a year! – now that’s a prize) for entering a video clip you create about … your bathroom!
If you consider that the modern toilet paper was first introduced in 1857, the whole butt wipe thing is waaay due for a major advance.
Ancient Romans used to wipe their butts after going to the bathroom with a sponge on a stick (which they put in a bucket of saltwater after they’re done for reuse – Eew!) – so, in a nod to history, here’s Comfort Wipe: a stick that lets you wipe your behind without ever coming close to touching it with your bare hands.
Now, before you recoil in horror, consider that this invention is actually quite useful for people with limited range of motion due to disability. Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] – via AdFreak
After years of pulling stunts on museums around the world, the guerrilla artist Banksy has gone legit. Somewhat. He’s pulled off his most audacious stunt yet: a secret exhibition in Bristol’s City Museum and Art Gallery.
In a rare statement Banksy said: ‘The people in Bristol have always been very good to me – I decided the best way to show my appreciation was by putting a bunch of old toilets and some live chicken nuggets in their museum. [...]
He added: ‘This is the first show I’ve ever done where taxpayers’ money is being used to hang my ictures up rather than scrape them off.’
The exhibition – called Banksy Versus Bristol Museum – consists of more than 100 items and will run for three weeks.
Out of necessity, pit latrines are the toilet of choice for hundreds of millions of people around the world. When they become full, these pits of poo have to be emptied – often by hand (well, technically, buckets). Needless to say, it’s a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad job.
Enters the adorably named Vacutug. It is a gasoline-powered four-foot-tall vacuum-pump conveyance that sucks human effluent out of holes in the ground at a lickity-split 1,700 liters a minute. Then, traveling at 5 kph on recycled wheels, it transports its odious load to treatment facilities.
Nonprofits and environmentalist groups hope that more Vacutugs can come to the aid of the world’s billion poor people who lack plumbing — and who typically empty their pit latrines by hand, often into the nearest river, ocean, or lake.
Toilets are no more an eyesore. Experience the difference of total comfort and luxury with these high-tech toilets. This post covers 10 most advanced toilets available.
The technology that’s packed into toilet seats these days will make your head spin.
Gamers at MIT have built a self-contained life pod in which to play World of Warcraft. It features a built-in toilet, three days worth of food rations, fresh water, and a small cookstove. Thanks to these Prometheuses among us, it is no longer necessary to go outside or interact with people face-to-face. Truly, we live in an age of marvels.
You can’t really appreciate the design of this scarf until you see how it looks when it’s rolled up. The picture is at the link, where there are also pattern directions so you can make your own.
From Craftster.org’s user everkutz, behold the Toilet Paper Scarf:
The roll is plastic needlepoint canvas and I did needlepoint on one side that would become the inside of the roll, and then used a brown yarn to crochet a “sheet” that covered the outside of the roll.
I think 18 “sheets” make up this scarf. It loosely wraps around her neck and then both ends hang at her waist.
Aw! Being the Internet slowpoke, I’ve just learned that NASA has bucked the will of the people and named the International Space Station’s next module "Tranquility" instead of the rightful winner of the online voting contest, "Colbert" (after the comedian Stephen Colbert).
But Colbert didn’t go away empty handed: he’s got a treadmill named after him and millions of adoring fans (and lots of money) to console him during these difficult times:
The space agency had asked people for help naming the node by voting on NASA-suggested names and writing in their own suggestions. After the poll ended on 20 March, "Colbert" came out the clear winner with more than 230,000 votes, while "Tranquility" garnered a mere 4493 votes. [...]
But Colbert didn’t walk away empty handed.
Astronaut Sunita Williams, who ran the first marathon in space two years ago, announced on his show on Tuesday that Colbert would get something in the new node named for him – and it’s not the toilet, as had been rumoured. Williams said his name would grace the node’s treadmill, due to launch in August. The exercise equipment will be called the Combined Operational Load Bearing External Resistance Treadmill.
To many wealthy Lithuanians, it was just a fancy horseback riding academy. But horses aren’t the only things kept in the barn: the CIA had built a secret prison there, where they interrogated (or tortured, your choice of word) suspected al-Qaeda terrorists.
There are no aliens in these stories from NASA and the Soviet space program, just true tales of how being an astronaut is no picnic. Decompression? Landing in the wrong place? Using the toilet without a toilet? Not pleasant!
“J” is an autistic child who also has post-surgical and bowel-related chronic pain. His autism manifested itself as aggression rather than simple withdrawal, resulting in severe behavioral problems. Authorities in Rhode Island granted the parents a license to give their child medical marijuana (they opted to do so in the form of brownies). The results were dramatic:
A tiny breed of pig is born the size of a teacup and is the hot new pet among British celebrities. The micro pig is about nine ounces and the size of a teacup when born, but can sell for up to £700. Breeder Jane Croft has given up her former career to breed the tiny pigs full-time.
.
The book is composed of nearly 200 short segments on the various environmental,
political, and sociological aspects of the problems facing the world.
From poverty to pollution, coal to carbon dioxide, the book is full of
(alarming) facts that Arthus-Bertrand hope will inspire people to act.
Yann
Arthus-Bertrand published more than 40 books, including the multimillion-copy
international bestseller 
. Home, released in
conjunction with a film of the same name, is a stunning visual odyssey
across 50 countries combining Arthus-Bertrand's images and text by the
editorial team of Good Planet.
Being arrested is bad enough without having some embarrassing details publicized as well. Someday, when your grandchildren ask you if you’ve ever been in the newspaper, on TV, or published on the ‘net, you’ll be glad you aren’t these people!
ueue
James May of the British television show Top Gear is planning to build a full-sized house out of LEGOs:
When one of the two toilets on the International Space Station 
Sculptor Antony Gormley of 
You know the honeymoon is over when this happened: when the husband found out that his new wife took too long in the airport restroom, he decided to get on the plane without her!
The role of Sallah was offered to Danny DeVito – he was Spielberg’s first choice – but was unable to do it because of Taxi. The job went to John Rhys-Davies instead. Picture from 
The golden idol was based on an Incan fertility statue. Photo from 
Marion was the writer’s grandmother-in-law’s name, and he had been mulling over a surname for a while when he came across a streetname called “Ravenwood” and loved the way the two names fit together. Photo from 
Why wasn’t I told that June is National Bathroom Reading Month? I’ve been celebrating it all year long!
After years of pulling stunts on museums around the world, the guerrilla artist Banksy has gone legit. Somewhat. He’s pulled off his most audacious stunt yet: a secret exhibition in Bristol’s City Museum and Art Gallery.
Aw! Being the Internet slowpoke, I’ve just learned that NASA has bucked the will of the people and named the International Space Station’s next module "Tranquility" instead of the rightful winner of the online voting contest, "Colbert" (after the comedian Stephen Colbert).
-
Your purchase helps support the blog - Thank you!
