Most are designed to appeal to a man who might otherwise think that wearing a ring is effeminate. It's been enculturated that rough or chunky surfaces and machine parts are signs of manliness.
When I moved to Sweden, I was told this about the people up north. Then I noticed that even people in the south do it. I certainly enjoy using it, and it's intruded in my English. It's used in about the same way we say "uh-huh", that is, as "yes" in "Do you want the receipt? Uh-huh.", and as a signifier that someone is listening "I went to the beach yesterday." "Uh-huh".
When I was a kid, I saw a rerun of Emergency! where a kid gets stuck between bars like this. Later, during swim lessons, one of the other kids manages a real-life version of the same, and I remember the instructors discussing the TV episode. The solution then was that the bars weren't completely parallel, and higher (or was it lower down?) they were slightly wider.
It bugs me that Superman wrote "The last time Robin asked me" instead of "The last time you asked me". Why would Superman be talking to Robin in the third person?
Crick's prize sold at auction last year, for about $2 million. See http://www.livescience.com/28651-crick-dna-nobel-medal-sold.html . Chadwick's medal, which he sold to a private collector, went up for auction earlier this year for 329,000. According to the Nobel Prize site, "Niels Bohr's Nobel medal, as well as the Nobel medal of the 1920 Danish Laureate in Physiology or Medicine, August Krogh, [were] donated to an auction held on March 12, 1940 for the benefit of the Fund for Finnish Relief".
"The racial diversity found in the group reveals the progressive nature of the Spanish regarding citizens of African descent, in a time when the United States had only recently abolished slavery."
The US didn't abolish slavery until 1865, at which time California was already part of the US.
From my own knowledge of New Mexico history (Santa Fe was founded in 1610), the presence of people with African descent doesn't mean equality in Spanish society of the time. There was a strong social ranking based on how "pure" your blood is, the limpieza de sangre. Those of African descent were lower in the ranking than those of American Indian descent, which were lower than those of Spanish descent. See http://www.shmoop.com/spanish-colonization/race.html for a summary.
The article describes that. Switzerland has no blood bank, so he goes to France (which is a short bus trip away) to donate blood. He has a personal reserve, and the blood bank is required to get his permission before using it for someone else. He can only donate blood twice a year, and he limits his travels because of the difficulties should he need a transfusion.
I guess I just don't laugh about harassment. I don't find jokes about how women walking down the street need to be told to smile more, or be given wolf whistles as compliments, to be funny either. Perhaps I'm wrong - do you have other funny jokes encouraging random street harassment that you want to share?
"don't worry about how they feel- they live for that junk!" -- What? How can you believe that after showing pictures of celebrities who clearly lack enthusiasm for that junk? Look at the backgrounds - the ones where the celebrities were most engaged with their fans, or, you know, smiling, appear mostly to be at places set up for photo ops. As you wrote, the ones on the street, with "a celeb walking around trying to act like a normal person", are in the photo op "out of reflex, or as a way to avoid bad publicity" - not because they live for that moment.
Also, that Tom Selleck one appears to be of a cutout.
Crick's prize sold at auction last year, for about $2 million. See http://www.livescience.com/28651-crick-dna-nobel-medal-sold.html . Chadwick's medal, which he sold to a private collector, went up for auction earlier this year for 329,000. According to the Nobel Prize site, "Niels Bohr's Nobel medal, as well as the Nobel medal of the 1920 Danish Laureate in Physiology or Medicine, August Krogh, [were] donated to an auction held on March 12, 1940 for the benefit of the Fund for Finnish Relief".
The US didn't abolish slavery until 1865, at which time California was already part of the US.
From my own knowledge of New Mexico history (Santa Fe was founded in 1610), the presence of people with African descent doesn't mean equality in Spanish society of the time. There was a strong social ranking based on how "pure" your blood is, the limpieza de sangre. Those of African descent were lower in the ranking than those of American Indian descent, which were lower than those of Spanish descent. See http://www.shmoop.com/spanish-colonization/race.html for a summary.
Also, that Tom Selleck one appears to be of a cutout.