This Week at Neatorama

This week, I find myself in the curious position of wrapping up a week of Neatorama that I wasn't even here for. In fact, I've been gone for three weeks. You probably didn't notice, as I had my name on a few posts anyway. My family went on divers and sundry adventures in the Great West: South Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho. You'll see some pictures eventually. But I'm glad to be back and see that things ran well without me -and relieved that things didn't run well enough for my job to be eliminated. So I'm catching up with the stuff I always tell you to catch up on!

Jill gave us a tour of The Wonderful Sights and Strange Tastes of the San Diego Fair.

Eddie Deezen looked into the question of Why Do Men Say "Hubba Hubba" When They See a Beautiful Girl?

Call Me Mister came from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.

The Annals of Improbable Research contributed An Astrology Chart for Bacteria.

And The Quest for a Malaria Vaccine was a selection from mental_floss magazine.

I'm glad to see we have a new series called Whodunit from Hy Conrad. This week the second installment was Whodunit: A Maze of Suspects. Did you figure it out before you read the solution to the mystery?

We also had one Brainteaser, the Seven Letter Riddle from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.

In this week's What Is It? game, the pictured item is still a mystery gadget, but if any of the guesses check out, we'll find out later this weekend at the What Is It? Blog. However, that doesn't really matter, as the object of the game is to come up with a funny and clever answer. About half the answers were some variation of a Bat'leth (which it does resemble), but the first person to suggest it didn't even select a t-shirt, so we looked for other answers. MJ Druitt said it's a toe jam removal tool for elephants, which is good for a t-shirt! Then The Professor said, "This device was once used to pry lobbyists and politicians apart if they got too close. Unfortunately since this device is the only one in existence and is now in the hands of the What Is It? Blog, politicians and lobbyists have become permanently fused at the wallet and are completely inseparable." That also deserves a t-shirt from the NeatoShop! Update: The real answer is... This is a tool for holding the lid on a barbecue grill at various heights. See the answers to all this week's mystery items at the What Is it? blog.

Also, I figured out that Neatoramanauts Roy Hinkley and The Professor are not the same person, even though they are on TV.

The most commented-on (non-giveaway) post of the week was Whodunit: A Maze of Suspects, which is not at all surprising. That was followed by Rent-A-Tire and Baby Mistakes Mole for Nipple. 

The comment of the week came from Joseph Francis, who reacted to the post Magician Turns $1 Bills into $100 Bills for Panhandlers by trying it himself. He said, "My knuckles are bruised and so far I haven't been able to transform a one into anything larger than a ten. What gives?"

The most popular post this week was Heartwrenching Photo of a Boy Spending Some Time with His Dad. Coming in second was Why Do Men Say "Hubba Hubba" When They See a Beautiful Girl? and Honest Disney Movie Titles is in third place.

The most hearts went to the posts Amazing! How to Create Ice Instantly, followed by This Man Invented the Plastic Pink Flamingo. He and His Wife Have Worn Matching Outfits for the Past 35 Years, and Even Baby Horses Need A Teddy Bear.

The most emailed post by far was the Heartwrenching Photo of a Boy Spending Some Time with His Dad. The only other emailed post of note was NSA Surveillance Children's Book. Emailing a post from Neatorama is simple: just click on the title to isolate the post, then look for the little email button at the end of the article to bring up a form in which you can put your friends' addresses.

And don't forget, we have extra content and fun at our Facebook page every day! You are also invited to follow Neatorama on Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. And mobile users: Flipboard makes it easy to keep up with Neatorama.

Oh yes, Fathers Day is tomorrow! You've probably figured that out due to the many posts about fathers in the past couple of days -and the Neatobot wearing a new tie above. If you didn't order a gift for your dad from the NeatoShop, you can order one today and slip a picture of the gift into a nice card. And if YOU are a father, grandfather, stepfather, godfather, father-in-law, father figure, or have a hand in raising the next generation in some manner, Happy Fathers Day from all of us at Neatorama!