What these Indian girls are apparently doing is manipulating in their minds and with gestures an imaginary abacus. This technique helps them keep the numbers in the man's rapid-fire math questions straight. He can barely keep ahead of them with his electronic calculator.
-via Daily of the Day
It’s a fantastic game, but I do have a few complaints: there aren’t enough save points, the respawning function doesn’t work, and you can’t skip the cut scenes. The graphics can be impressive, but the character designs don’t match the packaging at all. Honestly, I’ll give it only 2 out of 5 stars.
(Photo: Guinness World Records)
Hennig-Olsen, an ice cream company in Norway, earned a Guinness World Record by building the largest ice cream cone in the world. It’s over 10 feet tall and contains over 38 cubic feet of ice cream, 2 cubic feet of chocolate, and 243 pounds* of waffle cone material. That’s so much that the company had to airlift the ingredients from its factory to Kristiansand in southern Norway for the event.
(Photo: Mos Burger)
Mos Burger, a Japanese fast food chain, is now offering this healthy if unusual hamburger alternative. Instead of a bun, you get your patty and condiments sandwiched between the halves of a huge tomato. They’re available at only one outlet in Tokyo and only after 2 PM. The staff of Rocket News 24 visited to test it. Oona McGee reports that the meal, which comes with a cup of salad instead of fries, is tasty and uses quality tomatoes.
What other fruits or vegetables do you think should be used this way?
Master costumer Olivia Mears once made a dress out of Taco Bell taco wrappers and, on another occasion, ordered a meal at Taco Bell while cosplaying as the Disney princess Belle from Beauty and the Beast. Now, carrying that theme forward to its spicy conclusion is her Belle dress that makes it look like the mad scientists at Taco Bell have finally gone too far. Her Taco Belle dress is a wonder of satin and dry lettuce.
Bonus item: you can see Mears appear costumed in a Taco Bell commercial here.
-via Tastefully Offensive
(Image: WGRZ)
It's late July and 88ºF in Buffalo, New York. But that city had a rough winter with foot upon foot of snow. It took a long time to clear all that snow away. And the job isn't over, yet. There is at least one huge pile of snow that hasn't melted. It's been there so long that it's covered over with dirt and grass is now growing on top. Local news meteorologist Patrick Hammer explains how it's lasted so long:
"That pile of snow is like a glacier," explained Hammer. "It's very dense and it's covered in dirt and garbage, which acts to insulate the snow from the sun's rays. That's what melts the snow, not just the heat but the sun's rays, and it's protected."
Hammer also noted that because of this, most of the melting of the pile is not occurring from the surface, as one might suspect.
"It's actually mostly melting from below…from the ground which has warmed beneath it," he said.
Hammer says rather than sunshine and heat, water might be more effective in dissipating the pile.
"A lot of rain would do the trick,…but so too could the fire department with a bunch of hoses, which they could use to spray off the dirt and break up what's under it, because it's really the dirt that's insulating it."
You read more at WGRZ (warning: auto-start video).
I wonder if, like the Springfield Tire Fire, the snow pile will last until next winter so that nature can replentish it.
-via Gizmodo
You’re a law enforcement officer on the rough and tumble world of Edo, where every crime is punishable by death. This is how you dress to intimidate.
Is it effective? Well, it was enough to intimidate Wesley Crusher. That tells you everything that you need to know.
Alyssa Favreau of Quirk Books rounded up screenshots from days when the costumers were feeling just a bit too creative. Here, you can find the most outlandish outfits from Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Don’t park in the bike lane. Seriously: Don’t. Park. In. The. Bike. Lane. It’s not for you and this beefy cyclist will prove it to you. If your car is in the way, he’ll pick it up and move it out of the way. That’s a courtesy. A less polite response from him might be to throw the car out of the way.
-via Twisted Sifter
Earl S. Tupper gave us Tupperware and thus an extended life on that casserole you don't want to eat. But he did a lot more than just give us a way to forget leftovers in the back of the refrigerator for 6 months. He had lots of ideas. Scholars can find his sketches in the archives of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. For example, he developed an ice cream cone design with a gutter to prevent leakage. And he put a lot of thought into how women’s corsets should be designed.
But most importantly, Earl S. Tupper came up with a revolutionary form of naval propulsion. The fish-powered boat had a pair of wings that did not greatly slow down the boat, but prevented the fish from diving and escaping—or diving and taking the boat with it. We we don't use these today is beyond me.
You can see more of Tupper’s sketches at Hourzz.
-via Slate Vault
Irish Dung Spitting Competition Is A Thing! http://t.co/SbSguW2hrL pic.twitter.com/0DnptJyvpl
— Break (@break) July 21, 2015
It makes sense if you think about it: if you suddenly discover that your mouth is full of sheep poop, then your first instinct will be to spit it out—hopefully as far away from you as possible. That’s why the people of Irvinestown, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland, held a sheep poop spitting contest earlier this month.
44 people signed up for this test of skill and dexterity as part of the local Lady of the Lake festival. 7 participated. This is not an old tradition passed down for generations, but an entirely new event dreamed up by Joe Mahon, the owner of a local hotel (here is its menu). The winner walked away with a prize purse of £100, which is about $156 USD. It was presumably spent on mouthwash.
-via Oddity Central
Ian Stell’s Sinan table is a precisely designed and built piece of kinetic furniture that opens and folds. He explains that “Mutability in a piece of furniture should serve a purpose, but the act of transformation should be a kind of dance.” The Sinan does indeed dance!
Stell doesn’t list a price for the Sinan, but a somewhat similar design of his sells for a mere $20,000. For that much, the table should make accordion sound effects whenever it moves.
-via Home Crux
(Image: Google Maps)
This is a satellite image of an active runway at the main airport of Savannah, Georgia. The tarmac is on top of what was once the property of Richard and Catherine Dotson, both of whom were born in 1797. They died in 1884 and 1877, respectively, and were buried at a family cemetery on their property.
That land remained in their family until World War II. The Army then took the land to expand the local airfield and paid for the family to relocate the cemetery. The family did so, but refused to move the graves of the founders of their clan.
So the Army paved over the graves and moved the gravestones to the top of the pavement, directly over the final resting spots of Richard and Catherine Dotson. I can’t find current information, but as of 2001, the runway was in common use at the now-civilian airport, where pilots sometimes ask “if they could use the runway with the graves, just so they could see them.”
This is one of 8 strange locations for graves rounded up by Atlas Obscura.
(Photo: George Ruiz)
Not too long ago in the US, it was normal for fathers to wait outside the delivery room for the birth of their children. The mother, along with a doctor and nurses, would handle the delivery alone. Later, the father was allowed to be present.
The Daily Telegraph reports that increasingly, more people are present in the delivery room: family, friends, and anyone accessible through WiFi. When it comes to childbirth, there’s no such thing as “too much information”:
For women in their teens and twenties, an average of eight people are now present at some point during the birth, according to a survey by video blogging site Channel Mum.
And the results also showed that childbirth is becoming increasingly public, with almost a quarter of mums sharing the experience through social media.
Siobhan Freegard, founder of Channel Mum said: "The younger generation share are used to sharing every aspect of their lives, so why not birth? Many women feel it is their biggest achievement and so want to share the moment with all of those closest to them.
We did not crowd-birth for our kids. But our first child was born in a teaching hospital. There was a seemingly non-stop parade of medical students and interns interested in seeing more than we wanted them to see. I eventually shooed them out.
YouTube user Albizu Garcia visited a beach in Puerto Rico and found that a hermit crab had discarded a conventional shell for a stylish and functional LEGO brick. This should give him the ability to join with other LEGO crabs to create a larger structure. You can see the video here. Make sure that you don’t step on this crab, which is now a double threat to your feet.
-via Incredible Things
(Photo: Ethan Levine)
People and organizations often adopt stretches of road, promising to keep them clean and free of litter. This is a great way to contribute to the well-being of local communities and possibly get some good publicity from it.
So it’s no surprise that Lord Vader, who always wants to maintain the good reputation of our loyal Imperial forces, has pitched in to help. He’s adopted a section of US Highway 460 in Blacksburg, Virginia.
Occasionally standing in for him will be Henry Wakley, a local resident and loyal supporter of the Emperor. He wears a copy of Lord Vader’s helmet while picking up trash. News 10 reports:
Wakley had to pass several standard guidelines, including two highway clean ups, before VDOT would agree to the sign. He convinced the agency the sign was not a joke, and he intended to take care of the highway and draw attention to the adopt a highway program.
“We’d love to have more people follow Mr. Vader’s example and help us keep the highways clean,” Clarke professed.
Drivers could soon see more than just a sign. Wakley plans to clean up his portion of the highway in his Darth Vader costume later this month.
Wakley is an example to us all to stand together so that we may crush the rebellion and restore order in the galaxy.
-via Tor