Meanwhile, it is a holiday weekend, so you might have some time to catch up on the good stuff we posted this week. Jill gave us a timely post that might come in handy for your celebrations: 10 Fun Ways to Ring In The New Year.
She also gave us Failed Flavors Of Popular Snack Foods.
Edifice Complex was from the newest volume of Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.
The Annals of Improbable Research documented The Coming and Going of Cello Scrotum.
And 4 Amazing Powers of Chili Peppers was republished from mental_floss magazine.
In the What Is It? game this week, the object in question is a Holmes Steering Gear Clamp for towing automobiles (an antique). Aaron Rosen was the first commenter who knew what it was for, but he did not select a shirt. TDM had the funniest answer: A clothespin for chain-mail! For that, TDM wins a t-shirt from the NeatoShop. You’ll find the answers to all this week’s mystery items posted at the What Is It? blog.
Over at NeatoBambino, we've had a rash of adorable child meme images posted this week, including this badass little girl walking away from an explosion -without looking back, of course. (Could this be a metaphor for the New Year holiday?) You'll find cute kid videos, too, in addition to the normal news, information, and child product reviews at NeatoBambino.
If you haven't checked out our Twitter feed or Facebook page or G+ site yet, this weekend would be a good time to do that! You'll find plenty of "extras" that don't get posted at the main site, plus active communities of Neatoramanauts with their contributions.
As we say goodbye to the year past, an easy way to look back on 2011 is to go to The Best of Neatorama, where our feature articles are archived by year for your reading pleasure. You can select a year with the slider at the top of the page. I recommend starting with 2011.
The next logical thing is to look forward to a great 2012! We have some improvements in the works that I know you'll like, but we will still be bringing you new, interesting, and just plain "neat" stuff, so I sincerely hope you will join us every day of 2012!