(YouTube Link) The OmniTread robot was built by engineering students at the University of Michigan. Its body consists of seven segments connected by pneumatic bellows. Treads on all four sides of the segments give...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/a-robot-that-moves-like-a-snake/(YouTube Link) As one of millions of people who like the new Batman franchise, and can't wait for Christopher Nolan to make part III, I must admit this song makes some valid criticisms regarding The Dark Knight*/e...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/dark-knight-plot-hole-rap/Who knew there were so many volcanoes in the news? If you were a volcano blogger like Dr. Erik Klemetti, you'd keep up with these kinds of things. Now he's posted the volcanic activity from each month of 2009. Shown...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/2009-the-volcanic-year-in-review/Most explanations of Darwinian evolution refer to genetic material as the manner in which changes are passed down to one's descendants. Now, a study by Jiali Li of the Scripps Institute in Florida finds that prions, the...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/evolution-without-genes/Preparation time: 12-20 billion years. Link.Carl Sagan, apple pie...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/carl-sagans-apple-pie-recipe/2009 ends tonight, and looking back at the weird stories of the year is always fun. Oddee has the twelve most memorable events that had us all doing double takes. Remember these? 6 year-old drives mom's car. 68...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/the-year-in-odd-news/A couple of these are on my pet peeve list; I bet you find a couple that are on yours as well. Enjoy The Oatmeal's humorous look at some of the most common (and annoying) spelling mistakes! LinkSpelling, stacy, g...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/10-words-you-need-to-stop-misspelling/The US Navy has the frigate Constitution, launched in 1797. The British Royal Navy has the Victory, which dates even further back -- to 1765. But both of these vessels are museum ships, rather tha...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/the-oldest-naval-vessel-in-active-service/Could anything be cuter than a baby panda climbing out of a crib? I don't think so. Wen Li the cub tried her great escape at the Chengdu Giant Panda Research Institute in China. Unfortunately, her sense of balance i...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/the-great-escape-attempt-2/The task for the architecture students from Trondheim, Norway was this: build a library for an orphanage in a village in Thailand using natural materials to fit in with the surrounding environment, with room for books,...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/thai-orphanage-library/(YouTube Link) Rachelle Brown of Houston, Texas, decorates the interior of her car with Christmas lights and fake snow. It looks so much like a snow globe that one might be inclined to pick up her car and shake vig...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/snow-globe-on-four-wheels/Anatidaephobia is the fear that a duck is watching you. The term was coined by Gary Larson, author of the comic The Far Side, who profited from ducks watching people. In these days of contextual advertising, the...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/anatidaephobia/In the Yamal penninsula of Siberia, resources are few, but the nomadic Nenets tribes survive by using the one resource as tough as they are: reindeer. Their main occupation is reindeer breeding and all they have are...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/russias-reindeer-herdsmen/(YouTube Link) The Estonian station TV3 recreated the introduction to The Simpsons as though the show took place in an Estonian village. via The Presurfer | Company WebsiteThe Simpsons, Estonia...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/the-simpsons-if-set-in-estonia/The staff at the Great Yarmouth Sea Life Centre in Norfolk, England learned their lesson last year, when farting turtles set off overflow alarms at another aquarium. The turtles get a Christmas treat of Brussels sprouts,...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/water-lowered-for-farting-turtles/Stained glass artist Joseph Cavalieri created panels based on The Simpsons. The series is called "Missing Episode" and mixes that TV show with the work of 17th Century French poet Jean de La Fontaine. Pict...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/stained-glass-simpsons/When you're trying to figure out where to build your next ski resort, you don't have to use guesswork to pick the ideal spot -- there's an app for that. Geographers at the University of Delaware have developed a g...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/schuss-perfect-software/Nothing like a land yacht to ring in the new year. Jalopnik has a whole parade of automotive monstrosities like this one. Which is your favorite? Link: Jalopnik Funny, design, cars, weird...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/31/frankencars/Mark Evans carves images onto leather with knives. He's deliciously unpretentious about his craft: Art doesn't get more primal than etching animal skins with a big knife. I don't do 'pseudo intellectual' I...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/the-carved-leather-of-mark-evans/You don't have to be actually driving a car to be arrested for drunk driving. People have been arrested while operating a horse-and-buggy, a golf cart, or even a couch. In perhaps the most absurd DUI case ever recor...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/11-of-the-most-bizarre-dui-stories-ever-told/[http://youtu.be/Z86V_ICUCD4][YouTube - Link]Some of you may remember the wonderful Leave Me Alone Box. Now you can make your very own, with step-by-step directions from Instructables. Link From the Upcoming ueue, s...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/the-most-useless-machine-ever/Two Germans have been apprehended in Austria after bringing $500 million in counterfeit million-dollar bills to a bank. The Austrian National Analysis Center (NAC) examined the 493 banknotes Hölzen and B. had in their...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/million-dollar-silver-certificates/The head of Russia's space agency proposed sending up a spacecraft to deflect Apophis, an asteroid that may have 1 in 37 chance of hitting Earth in 2029: "People's lives are at stake. We should pay several hundred...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/russia-proposes-to-blow-up-earthbound-asteroid/Law student Nick Kam has written a paper exploring a hypothetical legal scenario: from a set of conjoined twins, one commits a murder. Since justly punishing one requires unjustly punishing the other, would the guilty p...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/could-a-conjoined-twin-get-away-with-murder/Whether scuba diving where no man has scuba dived before, or surfing the chilly waves, you'll really stand out in one of these wetsuits offered at Roddenberry for an out-of-this-world price. I think we all know whi...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/star-trek-wetsuits/(YouTube link) Giant salamanders can grow up to five feet long! Flood control programs in Japan are threatening their spawning grounds, so scientists have developed innovative ways to help the salamanders get upstre...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/giant-salamanders/Anyone with a remote car lock has wondered at one time or another whether the signal is really one-of-a-kind. What are the chances that your keyless entry could unlock someone else's car? It turns out the odds are pretty...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/can-my-remote-unlock-other-cars/Swedish linguist Mikael Parkvall created this map using the relative size of regions to express how many languages they have produced. Papua New Guinea is quite a linguistic superpower. Aaron Hotfelder explains why...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/map-of-the-world-in-which-countries-are-weighted-by-the-number-of-languages-they-have-produced/Author Neil Gaiman contributed a story to Tor called "I, Cthulhu, Or, What's A Tentacle-Faced Thing Like Me Doing In A Sunken City Like This (Latitude 47° 9' S, Longitude 126°43' W)." As usual, Mr. Gaiman's humor is...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/i-cthulu/Diver Anatoly Beloshchin shot this footage in an underwater cavern at Cenote Angelita, Mexico. The illusion of a river is most commonly attributed to a layer of hydrogen sulfide. (YouTube Link)mexico, underwater, ca...
https://www.neatorama.com/2009/12/30/mexicos-underwater-river/
