Undecimber is the thirteenth month of the year, according to the computer language Java.
It's not a joke: the logic is that lunar calendars sometime have 13th month (for example, in the Hebrew calendar, 7 years out of every 19 have 13 months.
Alex Santoso's Blog Posts
From On Gold Mountain: Sculptures from the Sierra by Zhan Wang
Artist Zhan Wang created the cityscape of San Francisco using stainless steel pots and pans and silverware!
His work is now on display at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco: http://www.asianart.org/zhanwang.htm | Photo Gallery - via Boing Boing
Yay! It's time for this week's collaboration with What is it? Blog: can you guess what this strange spiky tool is for?
Place your guess in the comment section. Please post no URL (let others play). You're playing for fun and bragging rights only today, folks!
For more clues, check out What is it? blog. Oh, and Miss C, it's NOT an instrument of torture, mmkay? ;)
Update 5/9/08 - the answer is: A combination carving fork and meat holder, similar to the one in patent number 2,496,062, which states:One of the particular uses for the improved holder herein is its use to hold meats, fowl, and other foods from slipping or twisting or oscillating while being carved either at the table or in the kitchen or at the restaurant counter or elsewhere.
Congratulations to Sherman Warren who guessed right!
Craftster user Theperilouspopsicle decided to make her own prom dress out of ... Skittles candy wrappers!
stats:
15 hours
101 skittle wrappers.a very cool thing about this project is that i posted ads on craigs list for wrappers and people actually sent me quite a few!
oh and yeah, turns out i dont actually like skittles..only the red ones. and after this project i dont think i'll ever want skittles again (i had my friends eating most of them...hey! it was like a recycling AND a feed the hungry project)
And apparently, being the Skittles girl made her into the Belle of the Ball:
Prom went really well, my dress was a total hit and tons of people stopped to talk to me and take photos. Even during afterparty when i disguised myself in a tshirt and jeans there were still people running up to talk to me/ 'omg thats the skittles girl!'. So all in all it was a great night, and the dress was definitely a success...now i wonder what i'll make next seeing as i want to do more unconventional material work.
Link - Thanks Candy Addict!
Californians who converted their cars to run on vegetable oil pride themselves for saving gas money, as well as promoting alternative or "greener" fuels. Unfortunately, they are also learning that no good deeds go unpunished, especially by the gub'ment:
(Photo: Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)Dave Eck, a Half Moon Bay mechanic, had attracted a media spotlight with his fleet of vehicles fueled by used fryer grease from a local chowder house. So when Sacramento called, he figured officials wanted advice on promoting alternative fuels.
Not at all. The government rang to notify Eck that he was a tax cheat. He was scolded for failing to get a "diesel fuel supplier's license," reporting quarterly how many gallons of grease he burns, and paying a tax on each gallon. [...] The state offered Eck only a potentially large fine -- and not just for failing to pay taxes. He can also get in trouble for carting kitchen grease away from eateries without a license from the state Meat and Poultry Inspection Branch.
Or for not having at least $1 million in liability insurance, in case he spills some of the stuff. Or for not getting permission from the state Air Resources Board to burn fat in the first place.
The regulations are so burdensome that even Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, trying to set an example for Californians by driving a Hummer that burns cooking oil he buys at Costco, had not complied.
Ready for the second Tokyoflash Treasure Hunt question? Here it is:
What Tokyoflash watch design is available in 4 different colors?
Find the answer at Tokyoflash.com
What is this? It's a new contest where you can win a Free Tokyoflash watch of your choosing. Find out more about the game on our introductory post here: Link
Update 5/6/08: Yes, I meant casing color, not LED. There's only one answer to this (hint: check out the color drop down in the product page - it's the watch with 4 options!)Nico de Bruyn was on a beach on Marion Island, a sub-Antarctic island that is home to Antarctic fur seals and king penguins when he noticed this bizarre attack:
De Bruyn and a colleague were on Trypot beach at Marion Island to study elephant seals when they noticed a young, adult male Antarctic fur seal, in good condition, attempting to copulate with an adult king penguin of unknown sex.
The 100kg seal first subdued the 15kg penguin by lying on it. The penguin flapped its flippers and attempted to stand and escape - but to no avail. The seal then alternated between resting on the penguin, and thrusting its pelvis, trying to insert itself, unsuccessfully.
After 45 minutes the seal gave up, swam into the water and then completely ignored the bird it had just assaulted, the scientists report. Why a fur seal would indulge in such extreme sexual behaviour is unclear.
Link (Photo: Nico de Bruyn)
Previously on Neatorama: 30 Strangest Animal Mating Habits
Bill Bramanti loves his Pabst Blue Ribbon beer so much that he got a custom made casket made to look like his favorite beer can. Bill and his family decided to make good use of the casket while he's still alive, so they threw a party and used the casket as a giant ice chest filled with ... you guessed it, Bill's favorite brew.
Here's a video clip from the Associated Press: Hit play or go to Link [YouTube]
Attention dog lovers! if Assemblyman Bill Maze of California succeeds, pretty soon you won't be able to drive with your pets on your lap anymore:
A California lawmaker wants to ban motorists from holding pets on their laps while driving. Getting caught could net a $35 fine.
Assemblyman Bill Maze said his legislation has nothing to do with pet-loving celebrities who are photographed driving around Los Angeles with their small dogs.
Maze said he introduced the bill after seeing a woman driving with three dogs on her lap.
The monkeys in the Ohama Park in Osaka, Japan love tourists. More specifically, the snacks and tidbits they hurled on to the monkey habitat.
So much so that they all got pretty fat, and officials at the park have to step in and put them on strict diet.
The Daily Mail has the photos of the corpulent monkeys (see what I did there?): Link (Photo: Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP)
Previously on Neatorama: Top 15 Amazingly Fat Cats
UC Berkeley Professor of Bioengineering Boris Rubinsky and colleagues have just developed a handheld medical imager that looks just like the medical tricorder in Star Trek!
New handheld medical scanners coupled with regular cell phones resemble "Star Trek" tricorders and could see what ails you with a push of a button.
The invention, using off-the-shelf cell phone technology, would allow medical scanners to boldly go where none have gone before — to the aid of the roughly three-quarters of the world's population currently without access to ultrasounds, X-rays and other imagers used for everything from detecting tumors to monitoring fetuses.
Ever since I ran across Josef Lee's Museum of Modern Fiction (on Neatorama here), I've been looking forward to his new cartoon installments.
The latest one, the Adventure of the Man/Fish Yutaro, doesn't disappoint. Josef's nifty artwork is neat and the, um, mature storyline is genius!
Behold the Greenpix Zero Energy Media Wall, a gigantic LED wall completely powered by solar energy!
Gizmodo has the story:
Greeting visitors attending the Xicui entertainment complex near the site of the games is a 20,000 square foot wall of computer-controlled LEDs, the largest of its kind ever built. Better yet, the wall manages to power itself completely using only the sun.
The GreenPix Zero Energy Media Wall, designed by Simon Giostra & Partners and Arup, uses thousands of solar capture cells attached to each of its glass panels to charge up during the day and then release dazzling light shows at night. It's the first time perforated photovoltaics laminated in glass have ever been used in a building in China, but if all goes off without a hitch, it most certainly won't be the last.
Office Snapshots blog, like its name suggests, is all about where you work. Well, if you work in a tech company or for a successful blog (not in a dumpy ol' warehouse like me!).
Here are some fun photo galleries of the offices of Digg, Apple, Adobe, and even Om Malik's neat tech blog GigaOM: Link - Thanks Haendel Dantas!
With all the money in Hollwood, you'd think that they can come up with better casting choices, especially when it comes to ethnic roles.
Take for instance, Swedish actor Warner Oland, who was hired to play Charlie Chan and Fu Manchu in the 1930s (he did it in "yellowface"). That may be norm back then, when Hollywood didn't want to hire authentic Asian actors, but what about now?
Cineleet blog has an interesting post about 10 bizarre ethnically-challenged casting choices: Link
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