The US has had strained relations with Cuba for the past several decades only restoring the diplomatic relations that existed way back before being severed during the Cold War. But now, as the Trump administration issues some new restrictions regarding travel to Cuba, this leaves many confused with the state of affairs.
To get some clarity regarding the new rules, check out this short guide from Conde Nast that will help explain the vague policies.
(Image credit: Jorge Royan/Wikimedia Commons)
We all know it's a bad idea to flush anything that's not biodegradable down the toilet. Even things that are supposedly biodegradable can cause enormous problems if too many people discard them into the sewers, like the wet wipes and grease that form fatbergs. But battling a fatberg is child's play compared to what's in London's sewers now.
People pouring concrete into sewers has led to a “concreteberg” forming in central London that weighs 105 tonnes, as heavy as a blue whale.
The 100-metre-long mass is blocking three Victorian-era sewers in the heart of the capital. Thames Water’s operations manager, Alex Saunders, said it was the largest mass of concrete the company had seen, and could take two months to remove at a cost of at least several hundred thousand pounds.
Not that pouring concrete into a toilet has become a fad in London, but some construction company somewhere used the sewers to dispose of the building material. The concrete, apparently liquid at the time, has set rock-hard against the Victorian bricks of the sewage tunnels, and must be chipped away carefully. Read the particulars of this disaster at the Guardian. -via Gizmodo
Great white sharks like to hang around where the eating is good, but studies of tagged sharks reveal that when a pod of orcas shows up, the sharks flee and won't return for a month or more.
In October 1997, fishing vessels near Southeast Farallon Island observed a young white shark interrupting a pair of orcas that were eating a sea lion. One of the whales rammed and killed the shark, and the duo proceeded to eat its liver. More recently, after orcas passed by a South African beach, five great-white carcasses washed ashore. All were, suspiciously, missing their liver.
A great white’s liver can account for a quarter of its body weight, and is even richer in fats and oils than whale blubber. It’s “one of the densest sources of calories you can find in the ocean,” Jorgensen says. “The orcas know their business, and they know where that organ lies.”
Rather than ripping their prey apart, it seems that orcas can extract livers with surprising finesse, despite lacking arms and hands. No one has observed their technique, but the wounds on otherwise intact carcasses suggest that they bite their victims near their pectoral fins and then squeeze the liver out through the wounds. “It’s like squeezing toothpaste,” Jorgensen says.
Too bad they didn't have fava beans for a side dish. Read about the intelligence and ferociousness that make orcas the real apex predators of the sea at the Atlantic.
(Image credit: Olga Ernst)
Quality ingredients and an extended stay in a low oven are the keys to the best Italian-American Red Sauce. This is the kind of sauce you make with open windows to make sure that the neighbourhood knows what you're making for supper!
There are so many measures we can take to cut down on our carbon emissions in order to turn the tides on climate change and save our world. But there are some things that we might not have as much control over.
Most greenhouse gas emissions come from human activities and it's mostly carbon dioxide. But there are other gases as well like methane, which is produced as we digest food and comes out as gas. That shouldn't be a big problem since we can contain the gas somewhat. When it comes to livestock, however, things get complicated.
Cows and other ruminates, like deer, giraffes and goats, tend to eat highly fibrous material like grass. Those microbes in cow stomachs break down some of that food into carbon dioxide and hydrogen — while other microbes turn the carbon dioxide and hydrogen into methane. The cows belch out the gas, and it wafts up into the atmosphere. Since the methane is produced in cattle stomachs, the vast majority of the gas comes out of the cow's mouths, not the rear.
So far the emissions coming from cows are minimal but not negligible. And as demand continues to spur livestock production, scientists predict that by the year 2050, greenhouse gas emissions from livestock will account for 70% of the allowable emissions to keep climate change in check.
Several options are being considered to address this issue. The first is for people to stop eating meat which is near impossible. Another solution is to create an alternative to meat, something that tastes like meat but produced in a different way. In other words, use plant-based substitutes. It's possible but not everyone might be on board with that.
Another solution has been proposed which consists of changing the livestock's diet.
Far more promising is the chance to change how cattle process their food. That's where seaweed comes in.
"It has an active ingredient called bromoform," Kebreab says. That natural ingredient inhibits the conversion of the hydrogen in the cow's stomach into methane. By adding about 3 to 7 ounces of seaweed to the cow's diet a day, his research has shown, you could reduce the amount of methane emissions by up to 60 percent.
Of course, this is not a cut and dry solution. There are still challenges that need to be considered like how much seaweed do you need to feed all the livestock just in the US? And how will you get that much seaweed?
(Image credit: Jonas Nordberg/Unsplash)
Has anybody ever wondered what Wi-Fi means? I have, though I never got a satisfactory answer to it and I still have no idea why it's called Wi-Fi.
Actually, I kind of thought the "Wi" part stood for wireless since it is a wireless connection but I couldn't wrap my head around the "Fi" part and what it could be in relation to the whole term.
It turns out, it doesn't mean anything. It's all a bunch of marketing hokum.
Wi-Fi Alliance founding member Phil Belanger shared the history of the term with Boing Boing back in 2005. It seems the wireless industry was seeking a user-friendly name to refer to technology that adhered to standards known as IEEE 802.11.
“We needed something that was a little catchier than ‘IEEE 802.11b Direct Sequence,’” he explained. The Wi-Fi Alliance hired Interbrand to come up with ideas, and the brand consultancy proposed 10 names, including Wi-Fi (which sounds lot like “hi-fi,” AKA “high fidelity”).
(Image credit: Rawpixel/Pexels)
Faith in humanity is restored. Turns out the whole incident was a simple misunderstanding. A woman thought that Lucy, the pet rat of Chris, had been abandoned and so decided to bring her home. Police were able to track Lucy and reunite her with Chris.
(Image credit: superweevil/Reddit; NSW Police Force; Mashable)
You know cooties- if you're a little girl, boys have them. If you are a little boy, girls have them. The imaginary bugs were horrible, and you didn't want to catch them. So the rule was hands off, unless you were a contrary child and used a show of bravery against cooties as an excuse to touch the opposite sex. You know who you are.
The most familiar incarnation has features of a real infectious disease even as it says a good deal about what 6-year-olds think of the opposite sex. Every little girl knows that boys have cooties, and vice versa. One catches cooties by—eww!—touching. Shrieking games of cooties tag transmit the contagion rapidly. It can be treated with an origami “cootie catcher,” but it is better to be vaccinated.
This requires a friend and a retractable pen. Your friend clicks the pen onto your arm while chanting “circle, circle, dot, dot, now you have your cootie shot.” Folklore archives and internet forum threads show that regional variations of the therapeutic regimen have emerged. In Louisville, the charm is “line, line, dot, dot, operation cootie shot”; in Los Angeles, kids “pinch, pinch” in lieu of the “dot, dot”; in Hawaii, the process is known as an “uku shot.”
Cooties varied from place to place and featured in at least three kinds of games. But where did the term come from, anyway? Read the history of cooties at Smithsonian.
(Image credit: Flickr user Thomas Hawk)
The question was posed to Askreddit, "Parents of reddit, what's the funniest reason you've been called into school to collect your child?" The responses illustrate how sending your child to school means giving up some control over them, with unintended consequences you never considered.
"When my daughter was in 2nd grade, I got a call about a 'present' she brought to school. The night before, she had asked to go to the store to buy some Rolos for her friend's birthday. But turns out, she wrapped each Rolo in red paper, bundled a few together, put little black pipe-cleaner 'fuses' on them, and attached a note that said, 'You're the bomb.' The school was not amused."
—Larsasnor
Everyone has a story, and the only thing they all have in common is embarrassment, for either the child or the parent -or maybe both.
"I had just gotten off work when the daycare called me in a panic. My 4-year-old son decided to put the training potty seat around his neck and it got stuck. I showed up to find the fire department had arrived, they were able to get if off quickly. Fortunately, they also took a picture of him with it around his neck — if he ever gets married, it's going in with the wedding photos!"
—Maxtrt
Buzzfeed has a list of the 19 funniest stories, and you can read the entire reddit thread here.
(Image credit: Larsasnor)
One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. This proved to be true as La Tante DC 10 restaurant is a old passenger jet.
Tracing back, the DC 10 aircraft used to be “operated by Ghana Airways on flights to Europe and the United States.” It was impounded on 2005 at London’s Heathrow airport due to company’s indebtedness.
After a decade, it is now a new attraction near Kotoka International Airport in Accra, Ghana. The first-class seats of the airship were transformed into a cozy waiting area while the economy section functions as dining room for prying visitors and locals.
Guests can also enjoy a wide array of menu which includes both foreign and the country’s authentic culinary mainstay.
See the photos at Atlas Obscura.
(Image Credit: jojomotion/ Instagram/ Atlas Obscura)
Hong Kong is now facing a new gigantic issue. The disposable paper usage of this island pump-up to 179 tons a day. It includes tissues, wipes and paper napkins.
According to the survey conducted by World Green Management (WGO), from 500 plus Hongkongers, respondents consume disposable tissues, paper towels, and wet wipes at about the weight of 12 buses.
These types of paper products — contrary to many people’s assumptions, WGO found — can’t be recycled, and aren’t as readily biodegradable as others due to fibers, chemicals, and other substances added during production.
This really have a huge impact on the environment such greenhouse and carbon emission.
For more details about this story, visit Coconut Hongkong.
(Image credit: Ropable/Wikimedia Commons)
Start Rocket, a Russian start-up company, planned to use mini-satellites to prompt ads at night. And it looks like big dipper and other constellations will really have a competitor in the dark. “PepsiCo took the idea seriously”, they even partnered with Start Rocket for this futuristic advertising campaign.
In 2021, the joint project could launch the first ad in the orbit for PepsiCo product, the Adrenaline Rush.
While both of these companies are busy to advance the new platform, there are some critics that are concerned about the idea. Astronomer John Barentine, director of conservation for the International Dark-Sky Association states that -” This is a threat to astronomical research from the ground.”
Nonetheless, Barentine and other astronomers reached for comment agreed that space advertising like StartRocket’s proposal is likely imminent. There are no laws against making CubeSats spell out messages and the technology already exists to make this possible. If not Pepsi, another company with a large marketing budget may want to do something similar.
Check this out on Discover.
(Image Credit: Start Rocket)
Taking swabs from from the facial fuzz of 18 men and necks of some 30 dogs of various breeds, the researchers from the Hirslanden Clinic in Switzerland found out that the beards were dirtier, and the dogs cleaner.
Every single bearded men, aged from 18 to 76, had high counts of bacteria in their beards. While only 23 out of the 30 dogs had the same result. The other dogs tested recorded medium to low levels.
Seven of the men had so much beard bacteria, there was a risk of them getting sick.
Researchers actually found this disgusting information out by mistake, they were trying to find out if men could pick up dog diseases in their facial hair.
Looks like it’s high time to shave.
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Oftentimes, when our kids feel anxious, we go immediately to the rescue. We would immediately go to them and comfort. But this turns out to be counterproductive for the children, says Yale School of Medicine psychologist Eli Lebowitz.
"When you provide a lot of accommodation, the unspoken message is, 'You can't do this, so I'm going to help you,' " he says.
Instead of letting them face their fears and guiding them towards the road of independence, we make them dependent on us, and we unintentionally make their anxiety worse. And so, this kind of method works bad for the kids. Asking the children to change their behavior won’t work either. Enter Lebowitz, who shows us a better way — a new therapy.
The program was part of a Yale University study that treated children's anxiety by teaching their parents new ways of responding to it.
How should the parents respond then? Find out in the article.
(Image Credit: Christopher Cappoziello for NPR)
Laugh all you want, but they’re dead serious about this.
The memers of Instagram argue that while they generate a lot of money and engagement for the website, the said platform does not pay them back for their hard work.
The IG Meme Union will probably never be recognized by the National Labor Relations Board, but organizers say it can still act as a union for all intents and purposes. “We’re calling it a union and doing union-organizing tactics,” Paul Praindo, a representative of the organizing committee, told me. “We stand in firm support of others who are working to organize anti-labor industries. We think these movements mark the beginning of a labor renaissance.” Some other “unions” function this way: The Freelancers Union, for instance, doesn’t have a formal management structure to negotiate with, but does advocate collectively for independent workers.
...
Instagram follows the same business model as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and other social platforms. The service itself is free to use, but the platform monetizes the content posted to it to sell ads based on metadata attached to that content. Users themselves, who are the ones posting the photos, videos, and memes that keep people coming back to the app, don’t get a cut of that revenue.
Do you think meme workers should be paid?
(Image Credit: Screenshot from unionizedmemes / Instagram)
