This cafe in Budapest, Hungary, is dedicated to Frank Zappa and has giant murals of him inside ...

Link - via grow-a-brain

You wouldn't know it by looking at the photo, but this marine flatworm has got to have one of the most complex reproductive systems known to man:

Each worm has both male and female parts. This thumb-sized flatworm from Kaikoura has between 226 and 229 penises arranged in a band around its thin body, and a central vagina.

Link - via digg

Is that a footprint on Mars? This photo, taken by the Opportunity rover in the sands of the Meridiani Planum, look suspiciously like a size 11 shoe footprint.

It turns out to be the rover's tracks, or so they say ...

Link

While we're on the subject of weird things found in Mars, how about this photo of a ... bunny on the red planet?

Like a rabbit in a hat, the identity of an oddity that looks like "bunny ears" in a picture from Mars has eluded the science and engineering teams. The public, also fascinated with the mysterious object, has asked in a slew of e-mails: What is it?

It is a yellowish object measuring about 4 to 5 centimeters (about 2 inches) long that made its debut when Opportunity's eyes welcomed Earth to a new neighborhood on Mars in her mission success panoramic image. Meridiani Planum is a landscape unlike any other stop on our decades-long tour of the red planet. Still, it wasn't the conspicuous bedrock outcropping near the horizon that initially fascinated many people. It was the "bunny ears."

Link

Michael Edmonds suffers from epilepsy and can have seizures without warning. One day, he noticed that his cat Tee Cee would sit close to him and stare at his face right before an impending seizure:

We noticed that Tee Cee began staring at my step-father prior to a seizure and then ran to my mother to let her know all is not well, acting as an early warning system.

"Once assistance arrives, Tee Cee doesn't leave Michael's side until he regains consciousness and his warnings have proved invaluable to the family."

Tee Cee has now been nominated as a Rescue Cat of the Year for his ability to warn Michael of impending seizures!

Link

From the website:

The brochure described it as a gently-sloping back garden.

But when Alan and Jackie Carter prepared to move into their newly-completed four-bedroom house, they were horrified to discover what could only be described as a cliff towering above it.

Astonishingly, builder Bellway Homes had constructed both their and their neighbours' back gardens on two levels - with one part 30ft or more above the other.

Link - via Nothing to do with Arbroath

This photo, taken by Wolfgang Hinz in Lukla, Nepal, shows these stunning crepuscular rays or sun rays [wiki]. (Jacob's ladder, or rays of light shining through holes in low clouds, are a form of crepuscular rays.) From the website:

This gorgeous photo showing pre dawn crepuscular rays was taken from Lukla, Nepal in November of 2000. As the Sun rises (or sets), rays of light interspersed with darker bands (shadows) can on occasion be seen in the direction of the Sun. Rarely are they as spectacular as these. The shadows result from clouds below the horizon but can also be caused by mountain peaks, as is the case here. Crepuscular rays seem to converge toward the horizon, but in actuality, they're parallel.

http://epod.usra.edu/archive/epodviewer.php3?oid=304960

A fantastic Rube Goldberg contraption made from stick and stones by Jesse Ferguson, Nate True, Bre Pettis, Andru Edwards and Jake Ludington.

Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] - via Make Blog

Last week, a giant wall of dust rolled across the Arizona Valley:

The wall of dust, which stretched from Apache Junction to Avondale, preceded a storm that dropped a quarter-inch of much needed rain in Tucson. The rainfall was a record for the date.

The temperature there dropped 25 degrees in 90 minutes, from the day's high of 101 to the day's low of 76.

Don't miss the video: Link

Russian webdesigner Artemii Lebedev recently visited North Korea, and took these (unauthorized) candid photos of everyday life in the Hermit Kingdom.

Link - via Metafilter

The Worldwide Fund for Nature's motion-triggered camera trap caught sight of this rare rhino in the jungles of Borneo:

The rhino is believed to be one of a population of just 13 whose existence was confirmed last year in a remote part of Malaysia's Sabah state, according to WWF. Very few other rhinos are believed to survive elsewhere in Borneo.

"The rhinos in Sabah spend their lives in dense jungle where they are rarely seen, which accounts for the lack of any previous photographs of them in the wild," WWF said in a statement.

Link

We've featured a dolphin and a beluga whale blowing bubble rings before on Neatorama - it turns out that this guy in Japan can do it too!

Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] via TV in Japan

A curious new trend in body modification is implanting magnet in a finger. Apparently, this gives the "implantee" a new sense of being able to "feel" electromagnetic fields.

According to Huffman, the magnet works by moving very slightly, or with a noticeable oscillation, in response to EM fields. This stimulates the somatosensory receptors in the fingertip, the same nerves that are responsible for perceiving pressure, temperature and pain. Huffman and other recipients found they could locate electric stovetops and motors, and pick out live electrical cables. Appliance cords in the United States give off a 60-Hz field, a sensation with which Huffman has become intimately familiar. "It is a light, rapid buzz," he says.

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,71087-0.html - via Boing Boing

Mike the Hamster is probably the luckiest hamster alive today: he survived an industrial shredder!

The rodent is thought to have got into a skip of rubbish that was taken to Recyclo recycling plant in Flintshire.

It survived a giant shredder used to destroy waste such as washing machines and was found in a sorting area with no injuries other than a sore foot.

Link

We think it's natural to base our perception of time on our body's orientation and locomotion: we place the future ahead of us and the past behind us.

It turns out that this isn't universal: for the Aymara people of South America, time is the other way around - the past is ahead and the future behind!

"Until now, all the studied cultures and languages of the world – from European and Polynesian to Chinese, Japanese, Bantu and so on – have not only characterized time with properties of space, but also have all mapped the future as if it were in front of ego and the past in back. The Aymara case is the first documented to depart from the standard model," said Nunez.

Link