(Photo: Denver Post)

Cleopatra, a leopard tortoise in Golden, Colorado, suffers from pyramiding. This means that the scrutes of her shell did not grow evenly, but pushed up, forming pyramid-like structures. The pyramids make her vulnerable to other tortoises, as well as make it difficult for her to right herself if she gets flipped over. Holes that formed along the borders also make her susceptible to infections.

Roger Henry, a design student at Colorado Technical University, responded by building her a protective outer shell. He spent about 600 hours developing a design that would fit precisely over her shell. Then he built it with a 3d printer. Cleopatra has adapted to it well and is enjoying a healthier lifestyle as a result.

(Photo: Gary Stefanski)

-via Huffington Post

Aegon Targaryen--Aegon the Fluffy, the call him--subdued all the warrens of Westeros. Then all of the Chief Rabbits of the land surrendered their carrots. He used them to erect the enormous Carrot Throne.

Wallace the rabbit once delivered beer to members of the court using a purpose-built cart. But no longer. He played the game and played it well. Now he sits in the Carrot Throne. And occasionally snacks on it, too.

(Video Link) 

-via Huffington Post

(Photo: ESPN)

In the United States, professional sports are highly competitive. But designing the foods served at games may be even more competitive. Stadiums and ballparks across the country strive to offer extreme, one-of-a-kind foods to fans. These foods served at the concession stands include calorically gifted delights, such as horse collar sausages, bratwurst lollipops, and bacon donut hot dogs.

The current champion in this ever-shifting field is the deep fried nacho stick. Miller Park in Wisconsin, home of the Milwaukee Brewers, offers Inside the Park Nachos. This delicious concoction consists of a stick of beef covered with refried beans, rolled in crunched Doritos, then deep fried and covered with sour cream and cheese.

It’s a practical food to eat while watching a game because you can eat it one-handed. It’s considerably less messy than handling a tray of nachos. You can read more about the Inside the Park Nachos at ESPN (warning: auto-start video).

-via That’s Nerdalicious!

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JoeJoe the capybara lives like a human household pet. He even rides through pet stores in a shopping cart. He epitomizes the chill lifestyle. This is well-demonstrated in this video of him relaxing in a tub of water while baby ducks play on his back.

-via Nothing to Do with Aborath

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Either Nature has blessed you with an unadorned head or you have removed those unsightly follicles from your pate. No matter how you came to live the bald lifestyle, you’ll need to wash your head. That’s a bit tricky in the very low gravity that astronauts on the International Space Station contend with.

Luca Parmitano, an Italian astronaut, shows us how he cleans his head without spraying water everywhere. Enormous globs of water adhere to his bare dome and remain in place until he wipes them away with a towel.

-via Twisted Sifter

It’s a prank by the great Obvious Plant, who obviously planted this flyer at his local 24 Hour Fitness gym. It’s 1 of 3 that he’s played on the impressively patient gym staff. Trainer Chuck M. has a brilliant idea for staying in shape. Humans didn’t evolve to sit at desks or ride bikes. Our primitive ancestors didn’t have crossover machines. They got their exercise in everyday life by chasing and being chased by wild animals. So get in shape the natural way.

(Photo: unknown)

Have we learned nothing from Spider-Man? When humanity’s knowledge outstrips its wisdom, we end up with superheroes or supervillains, both of which are trouble. Move the spider farm someplace else. Here, there’s a vacant lot next to the old chemical weapons dump. That'll be fine.

-via reddit

(Photo: Collect Space)

This is not the actual sandwich. This corned beef sandwich sealed in acrylic is a memorial to a particular incident on the Gemini 3 spaceflight. 50 years ago this past Monday, pilot John Young snuck a corned beef sandwich onto the spacecraft, which was then launched into Earth orbit. This was contraband, but Young as a practical joker.

This joke, though, was a bad idea. When he bit into the sandwich, Young learned something important: corned beef sandwiches fall apart easily--especially in zero gravity. Crumbs floated around the cabin. It got him into trouble. Discovery reports:

"A couple of congressmen became upset, thinking that, by smuggling in the sandwich and eating part of it, Gus and I had ignored the actual space food that we were up there to evaluate, costing the country millions of dollars," Young wrote in his 2012 memoirs, "Forever Young."

Nonetheless, Young got to claim the title of having eaten the first corned beef sandwich in space. He also got to eat corned beef in space again when he commanded the first Space Shuttle mission in 1981. This time, he ate it in the form of cubes.

-via First We Feast

(Image: NASA)

Clocking in at 11 years and 2 months, it's a truly awful marathon time. But it's the first marathon ever completed on the surface of another world. On Tuesday, NASA's Opportunity rover crossed the 26.219 mile mark during its sojourn across the red planet.

The previous record was held by the Soviet Union's lunar rover Lunokhod 2, which traveled 23 miles in 1973. 

Opportunity landed on Mars on January 25, 2004. It's spent the past 4 years crossing the 14-mile wide Endeavour crater. NASA planned to use it for at least 3 months. Despite breakdowns, Opportunity continues to explore Mars and relay data back to Earth.

-via Jeff Zentner

Redditor Mneneon has a birthmark covering his entire right hand. In a brilliant and beautiful use of it, Mneneon added geographical lines to turn it into an entire fictional world. He toys with the idea of using it to build a world for a fantasy novel, but doesn't see himself as a writer. That hasn't stopped other redditors from coming up with story ideas, such as this one by the appropriately named that_gave_me_an_idea:

The Ford Motor Company’s European division has developed a system that monitors changes in speed limits as you drive. When a driver activates the Intelligent Speed Limiter on his car, he chooses a maximum speed. When the car exceeds that limit, it alerts the driver.

It also scans the road for speed limit signs. When it determines that the car is going over the speed limit in a particular area, it alerts the driver and stops accelerating. It doesn’t apply the brakes—it just takes its virtual foot off the gas. A driver can override the limiter by pressing on the gas pedal.

(Video Link)

-via Gizmodo

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This footage from Guangdong province, China, shows an army recruit learning how to throw a grenade. Summation: he sucks at it.

Instead of throwing the grenade over a protective wall, he drops it just a few feet away from where he and his instructor are standing.

The instructor, noting the problem, dives for a trench, pulling the recruit in with him. They both survive, apparently unharmed.

-via Daily Telegraph (warning: auto-start video)

(Photo: unknown)

Tumblr user fatpeoplemakemehappy points out that “the one on the bottom right  is trying real hard to be a good cupcake.” Good for him! He gets extra treats. The one in the center back, though, will need extra frosting when he’s done.

-via Tastefully Offensive

(Extra Fabulous Comics)

Think of Neatorama as the chubby penguin of the internet, although, technically speaking, only a third of the contributors are penguins.

The internet will charm and horrify you. It accentuates the extremes of humanity. Go ahead and read about the President hunting people for sport. Just make sure that you keep a kitten supply handy.

(Photo: Metro Centric)

Munich, a city in southern Germany, is a few hundred miles from the sea. But it’s a great place to go surfing. That’s because a fast-moving river offers ideal conditions for wave riding. The Eisbach, a 2-km channel of the Isar River, has been used by surfers since the 1970s. It’s been legal since only 2010, so the local surfers had to be discreet. They also have to use boards that are optimal for river surfing. A 2013 report from the BBC explained: