Miss Cellania's Blog Posts

Jurassic Prank

When French prankster Rémi Gaillard goes on an Easter egg hunt, he's looking for nothing but the biggest, rarest eggs of all. In his latest caper, he comes running out from the bushes with a velociraptor egg -and the mother is following him!

(YouTube link)

The hapless runner that encounters the scene suffers a brain overload, and will probably never be the same again. Aren't you glad Gaillard doesn't live near you? -via reddit

See more pranks from Rémi Gaillard. 


5 Converted Follies in the UK

Britain has its share of "follies," or architectural structures that were built for vanity, a lark, or to show off one's wealth. As properties changed hands, they fell into disuse because they weren't suited for any practical purpose. But some of these buildings have been saved by the work of the Landmark Trust, which took responsibility and made them sound enough for an eccentric vacation stay, if nothing else. Shown here is Culloden Tower in North Yorkshire.

Built around 1746 to commemorate “Butcher” Cumberland’s victory over Bonnie Prince Charlie at the Battle of Culloden, Culloden Tower arguably has more room than many converted follies, but it’s original purpose was still primarily ornamental. Designed by architect Daniel Garrett and originally called the Cumberland Temple, the former folly had fallen into disrepair by the 1980s. Now faithfully restored by the Landmark Trust, it’s the perfect holiday retreat near Richmond on the edge of the beautiful Yorkshire Dales.

Read about five "follies" saved by the Landmark Trust that are now available to rent at Urban Ghosts. Three of them are towers, plus a temple that was later used as a cattle barn, and a pineapple-shaped home.

(Image credit: Paul Brooker)


Klek-Shops in Sofia

When the communist government of Bulgaria collapsed in 1990, businesses sprouted everywhere. In cities, there wasn't enough room for all of them, so the "klek-shop" was born. These stores display their wares on city streets, but if you want to buy something, you must squat down, as the actual stores are in the basements of the buildings! The goods are sold through low windows. DeviantART member sograph photographed the klek-shops of Sofia, the Bulgarian capital city. See the entire gallery here. -via Everlasting Blort

(Image credit: sograph)


Through the Eyes of California

Check out this 1947 map called Map of the United States as Californians See It. The proportions are a little bit off. The state boasts the world's finest harbor in four locations, movie stars everywhere, and claims a few landmarks that aren't actually in California. The rest of the country is pretty bleak: people are cold, even in Florida, and death awaits them. No wonder everyone is headed to the West Coast! If you like this, you're going to love the book that it's from.

Picturing America: The Golden Age of Pictorial Maps, a new book by geographer Stephen Hornsby, collects 158 of these charming visuals, largely drawing on the Library of Congress’s extensive collection. “Because contemporary curators and librarians generally did not consider pictorial maps ‘geographic’ or ‘scientific,’ most libraries did not collect them and they are quite rare today,” as Ralph Ehrenberg, who heads the Library of Congress’s Geography and Map Division, writes in the book’s introduction. Though the first real pictorial map depicted the London Underground, artists and cartographers across the pond embraced the style wholeheartedly, forming what Ehrenberg calls “a uniquely American art form.”

See the above map and eight others from the book in large size, so you can read them, at mental_floss.


Metal Dancing Queen

Norwegian musician Leo Moracchioli (previously at Neatorama) performs a metal version of Abba's 1976 disco song "Dancing Queen." He plays all the instruments and sings, while the Easter bunny dances with his young daughter. Is that weird enough for you?  

(YouTube link)

The song works well, and he adds a killer solo. Despite the video length, the song is only four and a half minutes. -via Tastefully Offensive


The Embarrassing History of Crap Thrown Into Yellowstone’s Geysers

The geysers and hot springs of Yellowstone National Park are a wonder of the natural world. They serve as vents for the geothermal energy below ground. And they are a delicate treasure that people have tried to ruin at every turn by throwing things into. This can alter the environment, sometimes permanently. And it started even before Yellowstone was a national park.

Yes, one of the most famous tales from that era is that an early expedition party used Old Faithful as a washing machine. According to an account shared by Frank D. Carpenter in his record of a trip to Yellowstone in 1877, The Wonders of Geyser Land, he and his traveling companions came upon Old Faithful and decided to experiment with “boiling” their clothes clean. The group put their soiled clothes in a pillowcase and threw it into the geyser’s cone. When it erupted, the clothes were sent flying over a hundred feet into the air. When they collected them, the churning, heated water had indeed cleaned them.

Emboldened by the results of their laundry experiment, they then clogged the geyser with “at least a thousand pounds of stones, trees, and stumps.” The geyser expelled all the rubbish and debris they’d choked the feature with, and they seemed pretty happy. As Carpenter says, “[Old Faithful] furnishes entertainment of unusual magnitude and duration.”

Even today, although it's illegal, people throw stuff into the geysers and springs. Sometimes specialists try to clean them out, but the process of doing so can cause damage to the delicate natural treasures. Read about the custom of throwing things into the geysers of Yellowstone at Atlas Obscura.


Bloopers and Ad Libs that Stayed in the Movies

Sometimes actors go off-script while filming a movie, either intentionally or accidentally. It could be a last-minute idea, a joke, a way to cover up flubbing your lines, or just plain clumsiness. What's rare are those times that these moments are so good they ended up in the film.

(YouTube link)

In this video, Looper explains great movie scenes that did not go as planned, but ended up even better for it. -via Laughing Squid


Washington City Paper's Peeps Diorama Contest Winner

This year, The Washington Post discontinued its annual Peeps diorama contest, citing low participation, so the alternative weekly paper Washington City News stepped in and held a contest. They've announced a winner, and it's "The Peeple v. O.J. Simpson," by Larisa Baste. She said she worked on it 66+ hours, not counting the time she spent watching the O.J. docudrama series and documentaries to get the details right.

See more images of the winning diorama, plus the next eight place finishers at the Washington City Paper. -via Digg


First Trailer for The Last Jedi

The movie is still eight months away, but we're all excited to see the next episode in the Star Wars saga. The trailer for The Last Jedi premiere today at Star Wars Celebration in Orlando. And now we can all see it.

(YouTube link)

Whoa, it seems that Luke is taking things pretty hard. The fans in Orlando sure liked it. No doubt we will see more trailers before December. -via mental_floss

Oh yeah, they unveiled the poster, too.


One-sided Affection

Cali the cockatoo and Jackson the Maine Coon cat act out a scenario that may be familiar to you. Cali desperately wants some attention, and Jackson wants none of her shenanigans.


(YouTube link)

I can see the speech bubbles about their heads now.

Cali: Pay attention to me! I like you; we can be friends!

Jackson: Scram! I'm a cat; you're just a bird. You are lucky I don't eat you.

Cali: Please? Come on, just for a little bit?

Jackson: Oh, all right… No! Someone might see us.

Their owner assures us that most of the time, they get along wonderfully. -via Tastefully Offensive


Takin' ur Jerbs …and More

Think a machine can't do your job? Don't say that out loud, or someone will immediately invent one that can. Think that there's other things in life besides a job? Don't say that out loud, either, because the machines will replace that, too. But look ahead: the ones who own the machines can only soak up so much of the profit until there's no one left able to buy anything. This depressing story is brought to you by Alex Culang and Raynato Castro at Buttersafe.


Two Guys Who Hate Each Other

Two guys who don't like each other at all show up at the same party, and they have to adhere to social norms of speaking and feigning a thin veneer of etiquette. That geniality only lasts a nanosecond as they launch into a game of one-upmanship over who can be more passive-egressive. Contains some NSFW language.

(YouTube link)

You probably know someone in real life who is like this, but I hope if you know two of them, that they don't show up together. Still, in real life this would be longer and more drawn-out, because most people aren't this adept at public vitriol. -via Metafilter


Childhood Photos of Some of Your Favorite Movie and TV Superheroes

Every one of us, even the most famous and glamorous celebrities, was once a little child. When these folks grew up to portray comic book superheroes on the silver screen, we got to know their looks well. In this gallery of childhood pictures of movie superheroes, some look pretty dorky, all look adorable, and you can see a glimpse of what they would one day grow up to be.


Butt Band

This weird old postcard from Germany is undated, but seems to be about a hundred years old. Weird Vintage has some information about the joke.

Apparently this is some fancy wordplay which makes a whole lot more sense when you’re in on the joke. User laurentbelkacem explained “About La Fanfare d'Écublens postcard - Écublens is a little town in Canton Vaud, Switzerland. The name of this town is pronounced in a way that in French sounds exactly, in this sentence, like “La Fanfare des culs blancs”, literaly “White butts brass band”.

I'm sure you can come up with more punch lines.


8-Year-Old Drives to McDonald's

What do you do when you crave a cheeseburger, but your parents are asleep? An eight-year-old boy in East Palestine, Ohio, figured it out. He looked up how to drive on YouTube, watched a video about it, and then drove his parents' van to McDonald's! Oh yeah, he also took his four-year-old sister with him.  

Witnesses told police that he expertly drove to the fast food joint, following traffic laws and staying under the speed limit.

“He didn’t hit a single thing on the way there. It was unreal,” Koehler said.

McDonald’s workers said they thought they were being pranked when he drove up to order a cheeseburger with money from his piggy bank.

“The workers thought that the parents were in the back, but obviously they weren’t,” Koehler said.

Police said the 8-year-old burst into tears when he learned that he did something wrong. He told officers that it was his first time behind the wheel.

The children got cheeseburgers, chicken nuggets, and fries before they were taken to the police station, where their parents picked them up. No charges were filed in the incident. -via Boing Boing

(Image credit: Danielk2)


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