College degrees used to be seen as these amazing sheets of paper that unlock a world of potential in our lives, allowing us to become educated heroes and head down the career path we've always dreamed of.
But then you graduate from college with a degree and a large amount of debt and start looking for a job in your chosen field, which either doesn't exist or doesn't hire people who don't have years of experience.
Then, as this Hot Paper comics strip shows, you're left with nothing but an expensive piece of paper and unfulfilled dreams about our dream jobs, which makes it really hard to get out of bed in the morning and find a job...
Later this year, a new $10 bill design will be put into circulation in Canada. It will feature the image of Viola Desmond, the first Canadian woman to grace Canada's most common currency note. If you've never heard of Viola Desmond, it's not surprising. Americans weren't taught many stories about our own Civil Rights pioneers in school, much less those of Canada's. Desmond was a businesswoman from Halifax, Nova Scotia, who fought against a system of segregation that wasn't covered by Jim Crow laws as it was in the US. But even so, the unwritten rules were enforced in a roundabout way. When she bought a movie ticket, she was sold a balcony ticket because she was black. But she sat on the main floor anyway.
Desmond was used to finding a way when racially motivated roadblocks were thrown at her. When she was denied entrance to Halifax beauty schools because of her skin color, she trained in Montreal, New York, and New Jersey, then created her own beauty studio and school in Halifax, drawing black women from across Canada's east coast. She also created her own line of black beauty care products. So, being a woman used to making her own path, once Desmond realized she was being discriminated against, she courageously strode back inside the theater to take a seat on the main floor.
She was just settling in to enjoy the movie when she was confronted by the theater manager. Desmond stood her ground, but the police soon arrived and forcibly removed her from the theater, injuring her hip and knee in the process.
She spent the night in jail, though not for disobeying segregation laws; there weren't any. Instead, officials got her on a trumped-up claim of defrauding the Government of Nova Scotia. They alleged that she had failed to pay one cent in amusement tax—that is, the difference in the amount of tax charged on a main floor and balcony seat. Under a 1915 Canadian licensing statute, those who entered a theater without paying the proper amount of amusement tax could be arrested without a warrant and fined.
The premise is right in the title. This is an elaborate cat trap, situated so that the feline stars will be facing the camera. The first cat gets his choice of box, and the rest can select from the leftovers. I like the little glance the sixth cat gave to the camera as he was deciding to double up on the lower tier instead of jumping to the higher tier. The seventh cat, who should be named Groucho, will learn that snoozing means losing.
Inside that textured green skin, it’s ripe with mystery. It’s an “evolutionary anachronism.” It’s not a vegetable, and not exactly your typical fruit. It’s an acquired taste that most Americans still resist. Meet the avocado.
HAVING A BALL
The avocado came from South America, so it’s not too surprising that the Nahuatl language of the ancient Aztecs gave us its name, derived from ahuacatl. Besides referring to the fruit, the word had another meaning: “testicle,” which also isn’t too surprising, considering the fruit’s shape and texture. Although “guacamole” doesn’t really sound like “avocado,” the two words share a root: Guacamole comes from the Nahuatl ahuacatl-molli, which means “avocado sauce.” (The fact that it also means “testicle sauce” is probably not something we want to dwell on.)
BEEN THERE, DUNG THAT
Biologists suggest that it’s a lucky accident the avocado is still with us, because it evolved to fill a niche in an ecosystem that went extinct eons ago. As with many fruits, the avocado developed as a mutually beneficial trade-off with animals. The tree provides tasty food, but there’s no such thing as a free lunch- the plant’s price for its fruit is mobility for its seeds. How does that work? The seeds of the fruit are typically small enough to pass through the digestive systems of the animals that eat it. The seeds are often bitter, sometimes even toxic enough to cause nausea. So animals rarely chew them more than once, but instead learn to swallow them whole. The seeds exit the digestive system intact, as waste, and end up planted in the animal’s nutrient-rich dung.
There’s no reason to believe that the avocado was an exception to this rule. It’s unlikely that the plant species’ survival was ever meant to depend on humans poking its seed with toothpicks and suspending it in water to get it to sprout. But that begs the question: What animal in South America is big enough to eat a avocado whole and poop out its oversize pit?
What kind of machine does this? It's called the Rubik's Contraption, and it was built by Ben Katz and Jared Di Carlo. They say it would go much faster if it weren't for the time spent actually moving the mechanical Rubik's cube. They could push it faster but the toy tends to fall apart under the pressure. Ben tells about about the machine and its specs here, and Jared gives an overview of the software here. I don't understand much of it at all, but I am impressed. -via Digg
Calling your professors names is not considered the best way to get an A in science class, but calling one teacher a slime mold is just a description. Physarum Polycephalum has been named as a visiting scholar at Hampshire College in Massachusetts. It has its own webpage, office (in a dark basement), and office hours. A recent symposium held to present the slime mold's work featured wine and cheese for the humans and oats for the slime mold. From the faculty page:
Physarum Polycephalum, a plasmodial slime mold, researches important problems from a non-human perspective, and enhances intellectual life on campus by helping students and colleagues to think about the world without human biases.
The visiting scholar at Hampshire is not on a tenure track. But the stunt highlights the amazing things that slime molds can do.
Slime molds are not actually molds. They’re much more like amoebas — single-celled microscopic sacs that move around by altering their shape.
Slime molds can exist as free-floating single cells. But when two or more slime mold cells meet, they dissolve the cell membranes that separate each individual and fuse together in one membrane. That means two individuals, with individual genetics, can exist within the same body. And there’s no limit to the number of individuals that can join the collective, called a plasmodium. Each cell of the slime mold is making decisions that ultimately benefit the whole collective.
When slime molds are placed in a new environment, they’ll spread out in every direction in a fractal pattern, assessing the lay of the land. If they find something beneficial to them, like food, they’ll reinforce the pathway. If they find something they don’t like — like direct sunlight — they’ll recoil.
It sounds simple, but through this process, slime molds can solve an impressively complex array of problems.
This story covers almost 14 billion years into one video. Each second represents 22 million years. The formation of the planet we live on is just a tiny part of the story in the vast cosmos, and humans themselves are only in the half half-second of the time scale. Luckily, we have Morgan Freeman, Brian Cox, Carl Sagan, and Sir David Attenborough narrating to keep us in the loop.
How much enlightenment can one person take? The desire for mind-expanding drugs is limited when all those drugs do is strip away the false veneer of reality. That false veneer of reality is the reason we buy the tickets and the popcorn! Not to mention the years we spent practicing our suspension of disbelief so we can overlook the shortcuts in special effects. Nah, I'll just stick with the ibuprofen. I don't want to think about how this fantasy will end in two hours, now that you've talked me into fantasizing about actually going to the movies. This is the latest comic from Tree Lobsters.
Back in the day getaway drivers had very few employment options available to them when they retired, but thanks to ridesharing companies like Uber and Lyft the Drive driver can now transition into a new career!
However, as this parody video created by Joey Thompson (who bears a striking resemblance to Ryan Gosling) shows- the Drive driver's new job as an Uber driver isn't nearly as exciting as his old gig, but at least he got to keep the cool jacket!
March is a month full of madness, Pi, saints and storms, and it's also the gateway to spring when the daffodils start to bloom.
The Ides of March brought misfortune to Julius Caesar and March was named after the Roman war god Martius, aka Mars, but overall March seems like a pretty boring month compared to most of its calendar cousins.
However, these facts show there's more to March than I thought!:
1. March is named after Mars, the Roman god of war as it was the month in which the military campaigning season got under way after winter.
2. In Old English one name for the month of March was “Hlyda” meaning “loud” possibly because of the roaring March winds.
3. March is the only month with three consecutive consonants in its name in English.
4. An old proverb says that “March comes in a like a lion and goes out like a lamb”, which means that winter is ending and spring is beginning.
5. In ancient Rome before Julius Caesar’s calendar reform, March was the first month of the year.
6. The expression “mad as a March hare” dates back to 1529. It refers to the wild behaviour of male hares during the mating season in March.
7. Fredric March twice won an Oscar for Best Actor. Main Street On The March (1941) and March Of The Penguins (2005) also won Oscars.
8. MARCH is an acronym for the Medically Aware and Responsible Citizens of Hyderabad.
9. The birthstone for March is aquamarine and the flowers are the daffodil or violet.
10. More 20th century UK Prime Ministers had birthdays in March than any other month
Beginning on March 14, Quad Cinema in New York City is presenting a 31-film retrospective of Al Pacino movies. They include his biggest hits, like Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, Scarface, Scent of a Woman, and two Godfather films, plus some of his favorite flops, a couple he directed, and some new films. Ahead of the event, Pacino talked with David Edelstein about his long career, starting when he was a 16-year dropout of the famous High School of the Performing Arts, and running through his most important roles.
Here’s what Pacino wants you to take away from the retrospective, especially if you think he’s often the same in every role onscreen — if you always say, “Oh, that’s Al”: “It’s an overview of an acting artist from the Village, really,” he says, and suggests looking at his four gangsters, Michael Corleone, Tony Montana in Scarface, Carlito from Carlito’s Way, and Lefty Ruggiero in Donnie Brasco. They couldn’t be more different. Pacino’s Montana is huge and burns like a filament, a purposely two-dimensional character in a film that the director, Brian De Palma, called a “Brechtian opera” — and Pacino loves how Tony became a cultural icon, however cataclysmic the trajectory. Carlito, on the other hand, is a man who gets out of prison and wants to put his life in order — the opposite of Montana, who manufactures chaos. Lefty is a Mafia middleman, a second-rater striving to rise in the ranks but brought down by a surrogate son who turns out to be an undercover FBI agent.
Sometimes, Pacino says, he goes overboard, sometimes underboard. “But as Lee Strasberg used to say, ‘Don’t do what you can do. Do what you can’t do. That’s how you learn.’ ”
Now that the kingdom of Wakanda has decided to come out of seclusion and join the rest of the world they've been busy figuring out new ways to interact and compete with other nations- and the sport of baseball is at the top of the list. When the warriors of Wakanda heard players get to carry around a big bat in case a fight breaks out they were instantly on board with the idea, plus they knew their vibranium-enhanced gear would give them an edge. But then they saw their first game would be against the Asgard Aces...
Show some love for your favorite fictional sports team by wearing this WAKANDA PANTHERS t-shirt by Fernando Sala, it's major league awesome!
Are you a professional illustrator or T-shirt designer? Let's chat! Sell your designs on the NeatoShop and get featured in front of tons of potential new fans on Neatorama!
There are plenty of people in the world who would love to be able to wake up every day and apply a fresh face, able to wear a different identity on a whim by swapping their own face for another.
This may cause the face swapper to lose touch with their original identity, however anonymous folks like Faceless Neil would actually benefit from this process by gaining an actual identity.
But when none of the faces in the Face Shop fit poor Faceless Neil he is forced take matters into his own hands...
The Face Shop is a strangely entertaining animated short by Noella Borie that's part of her Faceless Neil series. It has a creepy Tim Burton-esque feel and blends 2D and stop motion in a way that may make some viewers feel uncomfortable...
There are people who cannot survive without their phone or tablet available at all times. If you find yourself getting very dirty because you can't bear the thought of missing out on something while taking the time to shower, help is here! The iPad Mount Clear Shower Curtain Liner Tablet or Phone Holder (or screenholder for short) is a clear shower curtain with pockets to hold your phone or tablet. The pockets are on the outside, at different heights for different people -even children! This product is ...thought-provoking.
1. Better have a good lock on your camera, unless you really want to broadcast your ablutions.
2. If you must be constantly connected, how do you sleep?
3. Who has enough hot water to be doing anything in the shower besides washing?
On further thought, I can see someone watching a movie while taking a long relaxing bath. It might also be handy for elderly people who could call for help if they fell. Still, the marketing for this product seems a bit nuts.
If you can speak the language of food then you can communicate with people from other cultures better than any language ever could, because all humans enjoy sitting down to a good meal.
Food slides right past our tongues and speaks to our very souls, and when someone prepares a special meal for you they're sharing the flavors of their culture, life story and family heritage with you- and no words need to be spoken to enjoy each other's company.
Cartoonist and installation artist Shing Yin Khor learned the language of food from her grandmother, who also taught her that preparing food is a marvelous way to express your love when you have trouble saying it aloud.
Shing paid homage to her grandmother with this wonderfully honest autobiographical comic strip, telling the story of how food became an important part of her life- and how her relationship with food became complicated.
