Can a boy be too good a baseball player to play? Here's a story of 9-year-old Jericho Scott, whose fastball (clocked at 40 mph) was deemed too fast/good/dangerous for the youth baseball league he's playing:

"I think it's discouraging when you're telling a 9-year-old you're too good at something," said his mother, Nicole Scott. "The whole objective in life is to find something you're good at and stick with it. I'd rather he spend all his time on the baseball field than idolizing someone standing on the street corner."

League attorney Peter Noble says the only factor in banning Jericho from the mound is his pitches are just too fast.

"He is a very skilled player, a very hard thrower," Noble said. "There are a lot of beginners. This is not a high-powered league. This is a developmental league whose main purpose is to promote the sport."

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/baseball/mlb/08/25/pitcher.toogood.ap/index.html - Thanks Tiffany and Stratoblogster!

Don't ask, don't tell - and certainly don't put it on your shirt. Here's the story of how Lapriss Gilbert was forced to leave a Social Security office because she was wearing a "Lesbian.com" shirt:

As she headed for a line to pick up a Social Security card for her son, Gilbert was stopped by a guard who said her T-shirt, naming an educational and resource Web site for gay women, was offensive.

She said the guard, who works for a private company hired by the Department of Homeland Security, demanded that she leave the building or face arrest.

"As an African-American and a lesbian, I haven't been through one day without facing some sort of discrimination ... but this is just shocking," said Gilbert, 31.

Link - Thanks Tiffany!

(Photo: Hans Gutknecht)

In his photo series Crude Oil Dependency (2007), English Photographer James Laughton likened our oil habit as if it were a drug that both saves our lives and destroy them at the same time:

A very clinical look at our relationship to crude oil. It has become the foundation upon which our entire civilization has been built. The work looks at the necessary evil that lies within the crude oil infrastructure.

http://www.jameslaughton.com/Crude%20Oil%20Dependency/Untitled01.html - Thanks James!

Illustrations: American Greetings

Hey whaddayaknow - today is Toilet Paper Day! So. Happy TP Day, I guess! If you want to send an e-card, here it is: Link - Thanks Pam!

Photo: jimray [Flickr]

Apparently some people store their valuables inside the oven for safekeeping when they're away. The downside of this method is that sometimes they forgot all about 'em ...

Here's the story from Flickr user jimray:

My buddy Kidd left his laptop in his oven while away - you know, in case of break-in or fire, it'd be safe. We're all over after grabbing him from the airport, ready to bake some cookies. Preheat the oven to 375, start mixing the ingredients, about ten minutes later, we notice a pretty awful smell. Open the oven door and, surreally enough, there's a laptop and a backup harddrive staring me in the face.

Link - Thanks Darren! See also When Bad Things Happen to Good Computers, a gallery of computer disasters at PutPlace Blog

Etsy seller Sally England Design made this awesome flat-panel TV cozy that looks like television test-pattern!

This is a really fun way to cover up your television when you are not watching it. Sometimes they say that the t.v puts off energy when it is not on that can effect otherwise good feng-shui. This design mimics those 'test of the emergency broadcast system' colorful bars that I was always amazed with growing up. It is made of felt and measures 21 1/4 wide x 14 1/2 long.

Link - via Boing Boing Gadgets

What does it feel like to be in jail? Sheriff Mark Curran wanted to find out, so he sentenced himself to a week in lock-up!

"People who have never been in jail," he says wryly, "don't know what it's like to sit on the toilet in full view of everyone."

Lake County, the stretch of area north of Chicago to the Wisconsin border, is a land of extremes-- from the mansions of Lake Forest to the mean streets of Waukegan. The wealthy tend to be white, and the poor are usually African American or Latino. Inside the jail, the other inmates know who Curran is. Some act friendly when he says hello. Others turn away, or greet him with glares.

The sheriff says he understands the reaction, "I'm just another white guy—like the prosecutor, probably; like the person who sold him down the river; like the judge."

http://www.newsweek.com/id/155376/page/1

Photo: Casey Cramer / Wired.com

Wired has a neat gallery of cars of futures past that never made it into production. This one above is the 1956 Buick Centurion, a concept car by General Motors that came complete with a bubble-shaped cockpit and body made of lightweight fiberglass.

Link

With all the attention to global warming, are we actually preparing for the right doomsday scenario? Perhaps not, according to physicist Phil Chapman, who thinks that another Ice Age is coming:

The reason this matters is that there is a close correlation between variations in the sunspot cycle and Earth's climate. The previous time a cycle was delayed like this was in the Dalton Minimum, an especially cold period that lasted several decades from 1790.

Northern winters became ferocious: in particular, the rout of Napoleon's Grand Army during the retreat from Moscow in 1812 was at least partly due to the lack of sunspots.

That the rapid temperature decline in 2007 coincided with the failure of cycle No.24 to begin on schedule is not proof of a causal connection but it is cause for concern.

It is time to put aside the global warming dogma, at least to begin contingency planning about what to do if we are moving into another little ice age, similar to the one that lasted from 1100 to 1850. [...]

If the ice age is coming, there is a small chance that we could prevent or at least delay the transition, if we are prepared to take action soon enough and on a large enough scale.

Link - via The Daily Galaxy

Of course, this is by no means accepted by most scientists in the world. In fact, the idea of global cooling is still a fringe theory. Read more about global cooling here.

Here's something that man, in thousands of years of farming and animal husbandry, has never noticed before - but thanks to Google Earth - now know: cows tend to face in the north-south direction of the Earth's magnetic lines!

Wind and time of day did not offer better explanations for why 8,510 cattle in 308 locations around the world would mostly face north-south. Shadows suggested that many of the images were taken on cloudless, sunny days, so Begall's group also factored in direct ground observations of cattle herds.

A strong wind or sunlight on a cold day have typically proved more the "exceptions to the rule" that might cause large animals to face away from magnetic north-south. [...]

Both cattle and deer faced a more magnetic north-south direction rather than geographic north-south, (Earth's magnetic poles do not line up perfectly with the North and South Poles).

Link

(Photo: Hynek Burda)

To lower the pressure for binge-drinking, presidents of some of the largest colleges and universities in the United States have been advocating that the national drinking age of 21 be lowered (see our previous post).

But why is the drinking age 21 to begin with? Ethan Trex of our pal mental_floss blog writes:

... how did we end up with a drinking age of 21 in the first place?

In short, we ended up with a national minimum age of 21 because of the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984. This law basically told states that they had to enact a minimum drinking age of 21 or lose up to ten percent of their federal highway funding. Since that’s serious coin, the states jumped into line fairly quickly. Interestingly, this law doesn’t prohibit drinking per se; it merely cajoles states to outlaw purchase and public possession by people under 21. Exceptions include possession (and presumably drinking) for religious practices, while in the company of parents, spouses, or guardians who are over 21, medical uses, and during the course of legal employment.

Link

This awesome cake of Han Solo frozen in Carbonite is made by Michele of Confectionary Delights: Link

Compact fluorescent light bulbs (or CFLs) may be more energy efficient, but to many people (including yours truly) they're butt ugly. And they give off a harsh glow.

Well, no more. Sustainability Action Group members Michael Mandiberg, Steve Lambert, and friends designed this clever "light bulb shade" out of heat resistant photo diffuser material that make CFLs beautiful.

Links: Bright Idea Shade | Step-by-step instructions at Instructables - via Divine Caroline

Cubeecrafts are cute paper toys that you can print, cut, and fold yourself (or better yet, with your kids). Best thing about them is that they're free! Link - Thanks Henry Myers!

Our pal Tokyoflash has come up with another gorgeous design: the Rogue watch. It's bright enough that you'll get noticed, but subtle enough to keep you looking cool.

I won't pretend to understand how to read this watch - which makes it on par with any other Tokyoflash watches for me - but darn it if it doesn't look so cool! I wonder if the they'll confiscate it if you try to board a plane wearing one ...

Link - Thanks Paul!

By the way, we run a contest with the good folks of Tokyoflash every month. The last one was won by Neatorama reader Sarindipity. Be sure to watch for it soon (get it?)