Photo: Job Koelewijn - via KNAW Pressphoto

Dutch artist Job Koelewijn sure knows how to make an awesome bookcase. Behold his lemniscate (look it up) bookshelf that represents the infinite power of books and learnin' - via Book Patrol

Our pal Dark Roasted Blend dug up these photos of a hydraulic excavator climbing a tower. Supposedly, it's a publicity stunt by Lebherr hydraulics, to show off the strength of their machines.

Previously on Neatorama: How To Unload an Excavator

That's the Sylmar fire that's raging in Southern California. I took that photo just an hour or so ago from my backyard (I live just one city away). So far, it has destroyed 600 mobile homes and caused 10,000 residents to be evacuated. This fire comes right after the Montecito Tea Fire that destroyed more than 100 houses.

Fire is a constant worry here, and fire season is one big reason I don't like living in SoCal. Last year, there were big fires closer to where I live, so I hope we don't have a repeat of that this year. My condolences to those who lost their homes to the fires.

If you think about it, treadmills are kind of weird: you walk or run but never go anywhere ... So Alex Astilean of SpeedFit decided that he'll remedy that paradox.

Behold the first human-powered mobile treadmill ... and boy does it boogie down the road!: Link (embedded YouTube clip) - Thanks Marilyn!

Remember our post about the newspaper front pages about the Obama victory? Well, here's a collage of over 600 headlines made into a poster: Link (with a zoomable version, too!)

So what's so interesting about a gear made out of wood? Take a closeer look: it's elliptical!

Woodworker and artist Steven Garrison made helical (and helical-elliptical) gears using conventional woodworking techniques. Though such gears probably have no real world purpose, they are cool to look at in action: http://www.stevengarrison.com/id5.html (with embedded YouTube clips - don't miss the second one from the top) - Thanks Rob!

Also check out Steven's helix forms that fit together.

Can you go a week without buying anything? Not spending a single cent? Here's the story at RealSimple of one man (who is already a cheapskate to begin with) that did just that:

My friends and family see my attitude toward money in slightly different terms. “You’re a total miser” is how my darling wife, Erin, puts it.

In fact, it’s a bit worse than that. I’m one of those irritating guys who try to convert self-deprivation into a virtue. I buy my pants secondhand. I hoard hotel soap and used aluminum foil. I eat the not-too-badly-chewed leftovers off my daughter’s plate. And I constantly rail against consumerism.

Which is why I recently subjected myself to a little experiment: Could I go a week without spending a single penny? Here was my big chance to showcase all that adorable righteousness! To stage a tour de force, a morality play in seven daily acts!

This wasn’t how I sold the plan to my wife, though. I assured her the point of the challenge was (at least partly) to help me come to terms with my superior attitude toward money. Confronting my reliance on currency might actually lead me to be less judgmental, I argued.

My wife sighed deeply. “Oh God,” she said. “This is going to be so annoying.”

http://www.realsimple.com/realsimple/gallery/0,21863,1844394,00.html - via CNN, Thanks Tiffany!

Frustrated French vitners are fed up with slow sales, so they decided to try an unusual marketing gimmick: naming their wine "Le Vin de Merde" or "Crap Wine."

Restauranteur Jean-Marc Speziale and winemaker Walter Valgalier concocted their devilish little PR tactic in the caves of Gignac, near Montpellier. Speziale told Just-Drinks.com that the canny name acts as a backhanded compliment to Languedoc's underappreciated wine.

"This draws attention to the fact that we make very good wines," Speziale said. In actuality, Vin de Merde hardly lives up to its name--thankfully. Bottles sell for 7 euros (somewhat pricey by French standards) and are flying off shelves of local carriers. It seems, for now, that this publicity stunt initiated out of angst and frustration is wholeheartedly succeeding.

It's brilliant: if the customers don't like the wine, then it's their own fault for buying Crap! Link - Thanks Marilyn!

What do you get if you cross tetris with Jenga? Here's a neat little Flash game called 99 bricks, where the goal is to construct the tallest tower possible using 99 tetris-like bricks.

But you got to balance it juuuust right, if not the whole thing can come tumbling down ...

Link - via metafilter

Photo: Corvus

A quick update: we're having a fun little collaboration with ViewBug, a photo, video and art sharing website. It's a Neatorama Challenge where you can upload weird/strange/wonderful things about your hometown (best one gets $300!)

This one is the most-stolen sign on the Colorado State University campus, taken by ViewBug user Corvus.

You can still uploads yours for a chance to win the prize (hurry, contest ends Dec 5, 2008): http://www.viewbug.com/community/448/

First, they took away Solomon Islanders' rights to bear arms and then ... crocs! Here's the story of how peace is having a tragic side-effect for the unarmed villagers:

Under the peace deal most Solomon Islanders surrendered their fire arms - leaving them vulnerable to crocodiles.

Last week on the Russell Islands a 10-year-old girl was taken and killed by a crocodile.

Link

Can there be anything more boring than drain pipes? Well, not these: deputy dog blog has a few photos of the neatest drain pipes around the world.

This one to the left is Buster Simpson's Downspout Planter System in Seattle, Washington.

http://deputy-dog.com/2008/10/pimp-my-drainpipe.html

Stock market blues got you down? Well, take heart that you're not losing as much money as Sheldon Adelson. The casino and hotel magnate had lost (at least on paper) $30 billion in investments in the past year!

Put another way, his net worth declined by about $100 million a day, or $4.1 million an hour, or $69,000 a minute, or $1,157 a second.

It is possible Mr. Adelson now may hold the title for the largest one-year paper loss in U.S. history.

A graphic in Vanity Fair last month showing the biggest stock-market losers had Warren Buffett down about $16 billion. The Walton kids were down a combined $21 billion. The Google guys were each down about $12 billion, as was Bill Gates. (Overseas, there are some even more impressive, er, losers, such as Lakshmi Mittal racking up more than 20 billion pounds in paper losses, but for the purposes of this post, let’s stick to the U.S.).

Link

(Photo: Mike Clarke/Getty Images via Forbes)

Poor Anthony Michaels. When Classmates.com told him that long lost school friends were looking for him, he signed and paid ... only to find out that no one was! Now, he's suing Classmates.com for being a scam:

When Classmates.com told user Anthony Michaels last Christmas Eve that his former school chums were trying to contact him, he pulled out his wallet and upgraded to the premium membership that would let him contact long-lost fifth-grade dodge-ball buddies and see if his secret crush from high school had looked him up online.

But once he'd parted with the $15, Michaels learned the shocking truth: No one he knew was trying to contact him at all. Classmates.com's come-on was a lie, and he'd been scammed.

At least that's what the San Diego resident alleges in a lawsuit filed against one of the net's original social networking sites, whose banner ads featuring unflattering yearbook pictures remain a staple around the internet. If the lawsuit, which is seeking class action status, succeeds, it could raise the minimum standards of honesty for online businesses. "Upon logging into his Gold Membership profile in order to view the classmate contacts … Plaintiff discovered that in fact, no former classmate of his had tried to contact him or view his profile," the complaint reads. "Of those www.classmates.com users who were characterized ... as members who viewed Plaintiff's profile, none were former classmates of Plaintiff or persons familiar with or known to Plaintiff for that matter."

Link

We've blogged about the growing number of narrowly focused blogs, but the phenomenon isn't limited to teh InterWeb. Lisa Katamaya of Tokyo Mango found a store in Akihabara that plies pliers! http://www.tokyomango.com/tokyo_mango/2008/11/plier-store-dis.html

See also: Tokyo broom store (ignore the part about no customers since 1972 - that's a hoax) - via Boing Boing