I can't help but think of video games like Tomb Raider when I see pics of people exploring underwater caves, because the whole environment looks too fantastic to be real.

But there are plenty of real, and really beautiful, drowned caves out there that have yet to be discovered, and the Yucatan Peninsula is the place to go when underwater explorers are searching for flooded caves:

The low-altitude, limestone-laden expanse of the Yucatan peninsula is the perfect place for the formation of submerged underground caves—geological features the ancient Maya people referred to as “cenotes.”

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Divers with the Gran Acuífero Maya project led by Robert Schmittner have spent the last ten months trying to prove two massive underwater cave systems in the Yucatan are connected- the 163-mile-long Sac Actun and the 51-mile-long Dos Ojos.

And on January 10th their dedication paid off when they finally found the connection between the two caves, making it the largest known flooded cave system on Earth:

Prior to the discovery, the Ox Bel Ha system, located just south of Tulum, was ranked as the world’s largest at 167 miles (270 km). According to caving naming convention, when two cave systems are found to interconnect, the largest cave absorbs the smaller one. So the Dos Ojos system is no more, subsumed by the larger Sac Actun system.

(YouTube Link)

Read Divers In Mexico Have Discovered The World's Largest Flooded Cave at Gizmodo

The 1991 romantic comedy Doc Hollywood starred Michael J. Fox as a doctor on a road trip from Washington, DC, to Beverly Hills to begin a new job. That was his intention, but when things goes wrong, his plans eventually change. It's a familiar plot made special by Fox's talents and a heartwarming script. Let's learn what went into the making of Doc Hollywood.

10. Fox was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease shortly before this film was made.

He started noticing a mild twitch in his left pinky finger. The disease didn’t start getting worse until later but it was diagnosed in 1990.

9. The movie was filmed in Florida.

Micanopy, Florida is a small town just south of Gainesville and was inhabited by less than a thousand people at the time.

It's crazy to think that Fox has been dealing with Parkinson's for 28 years. Read more about Doc Hollywood at TVOM.

Even though it's easy to shoot your own digital photos and get them printed any way you'd like people still hire professional photographers to shoot their "special" photos because they think the pics will turn out better.

But before you throw money away on a terrible set of photos taken by a "professional" photographer you'd better have a look at these ridiculous retouched photos shared by Pam Dave Zaring.

Pam says she hired a pro photographer to shoot some nice pics of her family, but the final photos she received had been "retouched" by the pro, who admittedly had no clue how to retouch photos or how to take a professional-grade photo.

Looks to me like this pro has been hanging out with the pro who "restored" the Ecce Homo Jesus fresco  a few years back.

-Via Laughing Squid

What's going on with these mantises? Are they about to fight? Are they posing for a picture? Are they even alive? Yes, they are alive, and it appears to be a kind of stand-off, where they are bluffing each other, waiting and even daring one of them to make the first move. Bluffing and posturing are perfectly good tactics in the animal kingdom.

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Turns out they are in their fighting stance in reaction to the camera, as it eventually becomes clear that's what they are looking at. They sure are pretty, for a bunch of bugs. Adrian Kozakiewicz (previously at Neatorama) of InsecthausTV has plenty more videos that delve into the mysterious world of insect behavior.  -via Boing Boing

Here's a story that might make you feel good, but it will also make you feel old. It started 17 years ago when 12-year-old Kristin from Arkansas joined a Neopets role-playing guild called Evil Jellies. One of her rivals was 10-year-old Michael from Ohio, although she only knew him as "Doctor," and he only knew her as "Zepher_Cat." They eventually became friends and began to communicate by AIM.

"We went from silly rivalry to talking about school and life," Kristin said.

"It took a long time from having talked pretty much daily when we were younger teens when he finally sent me pictures of himself and we would sneak phone calls."

The pieces of each other's human selves started to come together after they exchanged their real names, locations, and photos over AIM. Kristin soon started to develop romantic feelings for Michael.

years went by, and Michael arranged to go to college in Kristin's home town. They married in 2013. You can read the whole story of what can happen when you talk to strangers on the internet at Buzzfeed.  

(Image credit: Kristin Andrews-Karr)

This Saturday marks the 10th anniversary of the premiere of Breaking Bad. The AMC series followed Walter White, a chemistry teacher who turns to manufacturing methamphetamine after he develops cancer. It was an entirely new idea in TV to present a perfectly sympathetic character who gradually descends into complete villainhood and takes the audience with him. To celebrate the anniversary, Esquire assembled the people behind the show: Vince Gilligan, Bryan Cranston, Aaron Paul, and others, to tell the story behind the story.  

Charlie Collier, President of AMC, SundanceTV, and AMC Studios: I remember the day Breaking Bad hit my desk, because it was like nothing else I’d seen. At the time, we [AMC] had committed to Mad Men as our first scripted original series, but had not yet aired it. Having greenlit that, we were getting every historical pitch—flappers, Motown—and we wanted to steer clear. Having been American Movie Classics, we didn’t now want to become an “original classics” network known for period shows.

Vince Gilligan: Breaking Bad was dead by the time AMC came into the picture. I was emotionally moving onto other things, thinking, Well, we fought the good fight, but this show was just too damn crazy. A show about a guy cooking crystal meth and he’s the hero? What did I expect? When I got a call from my agent saying, "Hey, the folks at AMC want to meet with you about your project," I said, "Which project?" That’s how far gone I was. My response was "AMC? The channel where they play Short Circuit 2 ten times a day?" Little did I know they were undergoing a renaissance at that point.

Breaking Bad was an artistic treasure, but it also had some lucky breaks: AMC's rebranding, the writer's strike, and Netflix and the rise of binge-watching. Read the oral history of Breaking Bad at Esquire. -via Metafilter

From one end to the other, the state of Texas dealt with winter weather this week. Kristy Boyd of Longview, Texas, recorded vehicles trying to make it up an icy hill, with some having more success than others. Then a big rig tried it. It had the speed going up, but couldn't quite make it over the top. That's when things went downhill, so to speak.

(YouTube link)

First, gravity wins, then inertia. The real winner is the smaller car that didn't even try the hill. I bet that driver's life flashed before his eyes. -via Digg

(Image credit: Flickr user Travis)

Six destinations where getting there is all the fun.

1) ALASKA’S DO-IT-YOURSELF TRAM

In the winter, hikers at Alaska’s Chugach National Forest have to walk across Glacier Creek. But when the water is high in the summer, a hand tram dangling above is a safer alternative. Hikers climb into the cable-suspended box and pull ropes to get across.

2) LONDON’S ROLLING BRIDGE

Women are still struggling with issues of inequality and sexism even though we should have addressed and eliminated these wrongs long ago, but at least they don't have to wear the torturous clothing they had to wear in the 18th century!

Nowadays women can get dressed for work with ease, throwing on some light and comfortable clothes that don't chafe, constrict or weigh them down.

But back in the 18th century getting ready for work was a huge production that involved lots of lacing, layering and cinching, which puts the uncomfortableness of modern clothes into perspective.

(YouTube Link)

This episode in the series created by CrowsEyeProductions for the Lady Lever Art Gallery in Liverpool focuses on the morning routine of the working woman in the 1700s, and it's make you feel better about your morning routine!

Whoa, fella, there are universal dreams, and then there are your dreams! Have you ever just assumed that others share the same experiences you've had, and then one day you suddenly find out your experience is outside the realm of normalcy? I saw another example of this type of thing recently, which I declined to write about. It's a weird feeling when you come to the realization that something you've always known as normal is seen by others as unique, bizarre, or even terrifying. This is the latest comic from Randall Munroe at xkcd. By now, Munroe should be used to being unique.  

Mike Tyson - I'm on the Zoloft by RexelRetro

Mike Tyson used to have a bad reputation based on his wicked temper and tendency to nibble on his opponents' ears, but nowadays Mike is chillin' like Bob Dylan- because he's on the Zoloft. He's still livin' large on the stacks of cash he made as a boxer and the star of a hit video game, but his new passion in life is to star in cartoon shows about imaginary detective agencies and thanks to Zoloft he's darn good at it!

Add some old school game to your geeky wardrobe with this Mike Tyson - I'm On The Zoloft t-shirt by RexelRetro, it's sure to make you look like a total knock out without making you go bankrupt!

Visit RexelRetro's Facebook fan page, then head on over to his NeatoShop for more heavy hitting designs:

View more designs by RexelRetro | More Funny T-shirts | New T-Shirts

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!

A little fishing trip is more complicated than just that, when you have to build your world first. Even when that world is on your desk in your bedroom! The result is just as cute as it can be.

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I have some concerns, however, about the hooks that weren't removed from the fish before it was consumed. Swedish stop-motion animator Guldies Konst used 2,500 still pictures (out of 4530 he took) to create this video. That's a lot of time spent in his bedroom. You might want to go back and check out the images in the still frames -especially the fire. It looks completely different than what the moving video shows.  -via Tastefully Offensive

From the literature we see on the internet from the Cold War era, you'd think that everyone had a backyard fallout shelter ready to go in case the Soviets attacked. The truth is that, in 1962, only 1.4% of Americans actually did. As a child of that era, I recall assuming that nuclear armageddon could come at any time, and there was nothing we could do about it. What did the general population of adults of the time think about the nuclear threat? Michigan State University surveyed 3,514 adults in the early '60s about their feelings regarding preparedness for a nuclear war. Check out some of the results.

Is it cowardly to build a nuclear fallout shelter?

There’s nothing quite like the collision of midcentury toxic masculinity and the threat of total destruction from nuclear war. But the results of the survey may surprise you. Just 7 percent of Americans thought that building a shelter was cowardly.

Building a shelter is like hiding in a hole—only a coward would do it. (7 percent agreed, 90 percent disagreed)

Parents have a duty to protect their children by building a fallout shelter (52 percent agreed, 37 percent disagreed)

It would take a little while after an attack, but law and order would be restored. (79 percent agreed, 14 percent disagreed)   

Read more findings from the study at Paleofuture. There are also plenty of people in the comments sharing their memories of growing up during the Cold War.

Most kids wonder what it would be like to grow up overnight, because they think the life of a grown up means no school, no set bedtime and no rules, but these thoughts are usually fleeting because it's fun to be a kid.

But when they inevitably transform into young adults their childhood seems to float away on the wind, leaving nothing but memories and the trappings of youth- like their favorite teddy bear.

However, some kids don't want to let go of their childhood years, so they hang on as hard as they can until life forces them to let go...

Lili from TOM & HANI on Vimeo.

Lili is an absolutely stunning stop motion short film by Hani Dombe and Tom Kouris, with music by Gil Landau, that will make you want to get back in touch with your inner child.

Along with many other dubious medical practices of the 19th century, there was a fad for "orificial surgery." This was promoted by married doctors Edward and Elizabeth Muncie, who opened the Muncie Surf Sanatorium on an island off the New York coast. The Muncies could not only diagnose illness by looking at a patient's orifices, they could determine their personality and potential, too. Various surgeries on those orifices would cure what ails you. The philosophy behind orificial surgery was a branch of homeopathy conceived by Dr. Edwin Hartley Pratt    

While its conclusions are utterly bonkers, the premises that underlay orificial surgery begin at least somewhere in the region of medical science. To be in good health, Pratt reasoned, one needed normal circulation. Because the sympathetic nervous system helps determine blood flow, it must be important to good health. So far, so good. But then the evidence-based logic begins to break down. Pratt believed that disease occurs when the circulatory system is fatigued, leading to blood “stagnation.” Observing, correctly, that there are a lot of sympathetic nerves around some of the body’s orifices, in particular the sexual organs and rectum, he reasoned that by nipping and tucking these areas to keep them “properly smoothed and dilated,” poor circulation and thus disease could be kept at bay. And so, writes Ira M. Rutkow in Seeking the Cure: A History of Medicine in America, “when this giant man with the thinning hair and Vandyke beard went to work, no mouth, penis, rectum, or vagina was safe from a manipulation or scraping.” This is true—but the mouth was of far less interest to Pratt and his colleagues than their other targets.

The descriptions of such surgeries are cringe-inducing, and the fad of orificial surgery only lasted about 40 years. You can read all about Pratt's strange ideas and the Muncies' sanatorium at Atlas Obscura.