Astronaut James Arthur Lovell Jr. was the oldest living former astronaut for a couple of years. He died Thursday at the age of 97. 

While Neil Armstrong is the most famous astronaut for being the first person to step onto the moon, he was just doing his job. Lovell, on the other hand, never walked on the moon, despite traveling there twice. But he commanded the Apollo 13 mission in 1970. When an oxygen tank exploded, the mission was scrapped and the world thought the three astronauts aboard were doomed. But Lovell, along with Jack Swigert and Fred Haise, moved into the Apollo Lunar Module and cobbled together the technology they would need to survive and return to earth. The fact that they did makes Lovell a hero of the space program.

Lovell also flew on the Gemini 7, Gemini 12, and the Apollo 8 missions. Lovell's total time in space flight was 715 hours and five minutes, a record that stood until space stations were developed. Along with Haise and Swigert, Lovell traveled further from the earth than any other human beings.   

In 1994, Lovell wrote the book Lost Moon: The Perilous Voyage of Apollo 13. A movie came from it, but the book is so much more, and I highly recommend it. Before Apollo 13 was filmed, Lovell thought Kevin Costner should play him. Costner looked more like Lovell, but Tom Hanks did a fine job. Lovell appeared in the movie as the captain of the ship that picked up the returning astronauts. Hanks posted a tribute at Instagram. Rest in peace, space hero.     

-via Metafilter 

Since 1876, the Heinz company has advocated for its products in creative ways. Last year, the firm offered a Barbie-flavored sauce inspired by the Barbie movie.

Now, the company is pushing the limits of what would normally be considered food. Heinz has teamed up with Smoothie King to offer, for a limited time, ketchup-flavored smoothies. USA Today says that it contains Acai sorbet, apple juice, strawberries, raspberries, and, of course, tomatoes. Selected Smoothie King restaurants in Atlanta, New York City, Denver, Miami, and New Jersey will offer it.

Should this smoothie be made sweet or savory? I don't normally associate tomatoes with sweetness.

-via Dave Barry

Indian weddings can be grand, glorious spectacles that are a delight to attend, even if you don't know the couple getting hitched. BBC reports that they're so much fun that some entertainment venues are throwing fake weddings and selling tickets to people who like a good wedding party.

At the center of this trend is the sangeet--a music and dance party traditionally held before the actual wedding. This is what people enjoy, whether or not there's a couple getting married. 2,000 people attended a recent staged sangeet in Bengaluru. It was so popular and financially successful that similar events are now being planned across the country.

-via Marginal Revolution | Photo: 8Club

We are all familiar with things that our distant ancestors considered true that were later proven to be just myths, mainly because we developed science to explain things. The sun doesn't revolve around the earth, even though it looked that way to ancient people. Illness doesn't happen because the body's humors are out of line- but that was the best explanation they had before germs were discovered. 

But the inverse also happens. Many things that ancient folks didn't believe turned out much later to be true! These are things that people couldn't believe because it was so outlandish, or because they didn't trust the source, or because they thought their own ancestors were less capable, or because they lacked context. Chill Dude Explains tells us about eight such "myths" that were eventually proven to be real. It will make you question the things we believe today. As you should. 

The last one is so wild, you might want to read more about Heinrich Schliemann. 

-via Laughing Squid 

I'm not that surprised. My Pomeranian barks at everyone and everything (including me, even though she's known me her entire life) and has no idea that she's actually small and ill-suited for combat.

Global News reports that Scout, a Pomeranian, lives in black bear country in West Vancouver, British Columbia. When a bear entered the home through an open door, Scout sent the bear scurrying for its life out of the home and then off the property. All six pounds of fury ran at the bear as fast as his feet could carry him in pursuit of the intruding bear.

-via NEXTA

The X account Sports Scran shares this photo from a soccer stadium in Nuuk, Greenland. That chilly island is currently under Danish rule, so it's not surprisng that Danish foods can be found there. 

Scandi Baking tells us that, in Denmark, a Fransk hot dog begins with a roll that is hollowed out. It is then filled with sauces and a sausage is then stuffed inside.

Do the French have something they call a Danish hot dog? I can't find out information on the topic. But there is a hot dog variety is is commonly called a "sausage wagon." It's an open-faced hot dog with pickles and a remoulade sauce.

Squirrels are not a common food source in the United States, but they are certainly edible. Mike Huckabee once taught us how to cook one in a popcorn popper. The brains are, I gather, a fine delicacy. So it is proper that people gather together to enjoy the best possible ways to prepare a sciurine feast at the World Champion Squirrel Cook Off.

The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission reports that this annual event will take place on September 13 in the town of Springdale. 40 teams will compete to prepare the most delicious squirrel dishes you've ever scooped into your mouth.

-via Dave Barry

The best use for artificial intelligence, aside from the eventual enslavement of the human race, is the creation of entertainments that would not be practical to produce otherwise.

The YouTube channel Neural Derp is dedicated to this noble pursuit. In this video, we listen to a country song about the cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation traveling from trailer park to trailer park in their warp-powered RV. They're a close-knit crew with each person contributing to the work, whether it's wrestling raccoons or using telepathic powers to cheat at poker. The bits about the foibles of Wesley Crusher are especially amusing.

-via The Awesomer

The Clark County Historical Society preserves and educates people about the history of the area around Springfield, Ohio. John Fritz, a member of the society, has been a dedicated volunteer and supporter for many years. The society has honored his tireless work for its mission by mounting an engraved plaque in his honor above a urinal in the men's room.

No disrespect is intended. For years, Fritz has joked that he wished to be honored for his work with a plaque above a urinal. The society has chosen to fulfill that specific wish. Visit the site and pay homage to his work.

-via Dave Barry

Ashcroft Fire Rescue in British Columbia responded to a brush fire last week and found locals already fighting the blaze. The fire was extinguished with no trouble, leaving a scorched area of about 60x90 meters. But what caused the fire? The answer is in the image above. The site is about three kilometers away from the nearest river. The firefighters determined that an osprey had taken the fish and then dropped it into power lines, causing falling embers that sparked the blaze. Ashcroft Fire Rescue had fun reporting the incident, using every pun they could think of. Here's a sample. 

We do suspect by the size of the fish and the heat of the day probably caused the rather tired bird to drop its catch. Or another suspicion could be that it’s tired of raw fish and wanted to give cooked a try. 

The local newspaper went all in on the alliteration potential for this story.  -via Metafilter 

(Image credit: Ashcroft Fire Rescue) 

Eighty years ago today, the first nuclear bomb was deployed over the city of Hiroshima, Japan. The bomb was dropped by the B-29 named Enola Gay, piloted by 30-year-old Col. Paul W. Tibbets. Six other planes participated for reconaissance, escort, scientific analysis, and photography. The mission commander was William Sterling Parsons, who worked with the Manhattan Project under Robert Oppenheimer. Parsons decided to join the mission on the Enola Gay to arm the nuclear bomb after takeoff to protect the US base on Tinian Island in the event of a crash during takeoff. 

The crew members of the various planes later described what the mission was like and their impressions of the nuclear explosion. Despite being miles away by the time the bomb detonated, they were rendered speechless. One crew member thought they had missed their target, because he couldn't see any city remaining. Three days later, a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, leading to Japan's surrender and the end of World War II.   

Although none of the Americans who participated in the mission are alive today, Garrett M. Graff compiled quotes from military archives, memoirs, speeches, and other sources for his new book The Devil Reached Toward the Sky: An Oral History of the Making and Unleashing of the Atomic Bomb. Read an excerpt published today in the Washington Post.    -via Damn Interesting 

The Seattle Kraken is a professional hockey team that hails from Seattle. Its mascot is Buoy, a "sea-troll" indigenous to Puget Sound. Buoy and the team recently visited Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska for fly fishing during a high school hockey camp event in Anchorange.

During the fishing, a grizzly bear carefully watched the party. Then it charged Buoy, perhaps enticed by his unusual appearance. Was this creature a new, exotic delicacy?

Fortunately for the human inside the Buoy suit, the bear kept some distance and no one was injured.

-via Fox News

Japanese artist Nanako Kume produced this stylish and eye-catching lampshade that look like shavings from a giant pencil. That's because that's what she actually made. Kume produced a giant wooden pencil (minus the lead) and a scaled-up manual pencil sharpener. Then she cut the shavings off one by one to form shades for pendant lights.

-via Nag on the Lake

The small hamlet of Torrington, Alberta, (population 239) is proud of their history. You can learn about it at the Torrington Gopher Hole Museum, which boasts 82 dioramas illustrating events in Torrington history, populated by taxidermied gophers. The museum is operated by volunteers and is open daily in the summer and on weekends the rest of the year. Admission is by donation, because "We will never let finances get in your way of the joy of seeing dead gophers!"

The origin of the museum is quite a story. In the 1990s, Torrington received a small grant from the province to create a tourist attraction. At a brainstorming meeting, one woman suggested a museum of stuffed gophers. It was a joke, but it became real. Five people volunteered to learn taxidermy, and the whole town got involved in making the displays. PETA heard about it, so by the time the museum opened in 1996 it had become world famous. You can see a short video about the museum here, and see more pictures here. -via Fark 

Remote control LEGO vehicles can do some amazing stuff. Can they climb walls? You have to design them specifically for the task. In this video, the guys at Brick Technology start small, but then attempt to climb ever taller walls. For each LEGO wall, they begin with failure. But we see how they quickly identify the problem, and redesign the vehicle to fix it. Bigger wheels. Lower axles. Greater length. Adjustable weigh distribution. Success comes only when the vehicle climbs to the top and manages to land on the other side without toppling over, and be able to drive away. For each extra layer in the wall, the vehicle gets bigger and more elaborate, until the later models look more like robots than vehicles. The last version, challenged to climb a wall 40 bricks tall, might remind you of a medieval war machine. They had to pull out all the stops for that one! -via Geeks Are Sexy