My best guess is that this drawing shows an amphibious assault craft used by cattle during a general bovine uprising. It's like a medieval Higgins boat. It was notably unsuccessful because the submerged ram in the bow tended to cause the boat to run aground too far out from the beach, thus exposing the cattle to longbow fire while they swam to the beach. In short, this design failed because it tried to do too much.
Cows are yummy, but they're terrible at naval architecture.
On Game of Thrones, people refer to Melisandre as the Red Woman due to her red hair and clothing and bloodthirsty means of acquiring power. She'll stop at nothing to advance herself and, for the moment, the cause of the true king Stannis Baratheon.
She and late night talk show host Seth Meyers went to college together. So when Seth and his wife held a baby shower, Seth invited Melisandre.
Melisandre understands how to dominate people. But as you can see from this sketch from Late Night with Seth Meyers, she's less skilled at small talk with strangers. Well, it's that or the other guests can't understand the terrors of the night.
Cosplayer Dani Skye made and wore this delightful punny dress to Katuscon in the DC area. She caught her boyfriend with it, who danced with her at the con ball. That was a challenge because, Skye explains, "the dress is quite poofy so it was hard to get close to my boyfriend to dance."
It's a nifty idea that could be good for entertaining guests. Serve soup in bread bowls alongside these bread spoons. Just trim canned dough in the shape of a spoon, slip it inside the Edible Spoon Maker, and bake it for a few minutes.
The underside of the spoon is ridged to make it easier to break off pieces and eat the spoon once you're done with the rest of your food. Try different flavored doughs in the spoon maker to accent the soup.
Peter Mayhew, the actor who played Chewbacca in Star Wars, owns a copy of an early script for the movie that eventually became Episode IV. At the time, it went by the title The Adventures of Luke Starkiller. He's tweeting photos of the pages of the script and promises that he's got a big announcement coming up.
The script includes an early vision of R2-D2 that is quite diferent from his eventual form:
Artoo is a short claw-armed tripod. His face is a mass of computer lights, surrounding a radar eye.
A tripod Artoo might have had an easier time with stairs.
Juniper the fox lives with humans, but understands the importance of maintaining his professional skills should he ever again need outside income. He knows how to dive into thick snow to capture mice and other small animals that hide beneath it.
Something is wrong here, though. This snow is broken. It's warm and so thick that he can't dig through it!
Landscape gardener Jason Hodges loves to nap a grassy lawn, but one isn't always convenient. So he built a garden box in the shape of a bed and topped it with grass. Now he can sleep on a living, outdoor bed.
Hodges planned the space in a concrete courtyard. He built a wood frame for the turf, then filled it in with soil. The headboard has hebe plants to provide shade. The grass is soft leaf buffalo, which is the grass equivalent of 1000-thread count sheets. Hodges finished it off with a few outdoor pillows. You can watch his complete video tutorial here.
These kittens look so cute that you could just eat them right up! And, thankfully, you can without people reporting you to the police. Rocket News 24 tells us that a cafe in Kyoto, Japan is drawing in customers with its delicious and adorable parfaits that look like cats. It's set inside a restored old townhouse decorated in a traditional style that customers find attractive. Once inside, they nibble at these cat parfaits, sip coffee, and read books that are spread throughout the establishment.
Forget the stairs or the escalator. This shopping mall in Shanghai has a great new way to travel from the top floor to the bottom. It's a winding slide decorated to look like a dragon. The trip through his gullet takes 16 seconds. It's free, although you do have to be at least 3 years old and 3 and 1/2 feet tall. It's open for transport on the Lantern Fesitival, which is on February 22. Shanghai Daily reports:
The slide attracted big crowds taking photos at the Pujian outlet of Printemps Department Store this afternoon.
"It looks fun and my son was too curious," said Yao Jin, who brought her five year old son to the store.
"My son was excited and very interested to have a try, but I still have some concerns on its safety," said Yao, who lives near the store.
Another visitor, Jack Shen in his 20s, said he will not take a ride.
"It is a stunt of the department store, and the slide seems to be very dangerous," he said.
That's fine. Then he won't take up space in the queue.
Because that's how you can escape financial regulators.
The Chinese government limits its citizens to moving $50,000 per year overseas. But as the Chinese economy is shaky, many investors would like to smuggle their money out of the country to more secure locations.
The Wall Street Journal reports on a clever new way that Chinese capital managers are trying to do precisely that. First, set up a shell company overseas. Then have that company sue you. Settle the lawsuit and pay the company, thus moving your money to the shell company, beyond the reach of Chinese government regulators:
In a post published on Sunday on Seattle-headquartered law firm Harris & Moure’s China Law Blog, Mr. Harris detailed his conversation with an adviser to a Chinese company. The adviser had called him essentially to ask Harris & Moure to help the Chinese company deliberately lose a lawsuit for a phony breach of contract that would result in a payout of $3.5 million, which the Chinese company would then send to the U.S.
The money, as it turns out, would be paid to entities in the U.S. controlled by the Chinese company itself.
Mr. Harris told China Real Time that the company, a privately-held Chinese manufacturer, wanted to pursue such a fake arbitration, rather than fake a simple legal settlement for the same amount of money, because it was concerned about convincing government regulators who have been closely scrutinizing offshore remittances.
“They wanted it to look really official,” he said in a phone interview. “Arbitration also moves quickly, so they could conceivably do it within three months.”
Reilly Flaherty went to a Wilco concert in Brooklyn, then took an Uber car home. At some point in that adventure, he lost his wallet. An anonymous person mailed back to him his driver's license and credit cards, but kept everything else. The thief included a sorry-not-sorry letter. It reads as follows:
Dear Reilly Flaherty
I found your wallet and your drivers license had your address so here's your credit cards and other important stuff. I kept the cash because I needed weed, the metrocard because the fare's $2.75 now, and the wallet cause it's kinda cool. enjoy the rest of your day
Toodles Anonymous
Flaherty sees a bit of humor in the situation, but is also upset. He tells the New York Post:
He said in another lifetime, the two might have been pals.
“I would say, ‘Man, we would’ve gotten along — we’re both into Wilco — but you turned out to be super selfish,’ ” he said. “It speaks to the New York mentality: I’m going to be nice but there’s going to be an asterisk.” […]
Flaherty declined to say how much cash was taken, insisting, “It’s not really about the money.”
“Whether it was a dollar or a thousand, [this person] is a pot-smoking, modern-day version of Robin Hood,” he quipped.
Albert the dog is a scientist, which is why his website is called Dog Scientist. In his video series, he uses his advanced scientific knowledge to eat treats that have been locked away by his humans in various containers.
For this experiment, Albert attempted to get at chicken soup poured into a cylindrical container. His tongue can't reach the soup, so Albert puts balls in the container. This displaces the soup, raising the level of the liquid in accordance with the famous principle of Archimedes of Syracuse. He continues to add balls as the surface of the liquid sinks. What a clever dog!
How did the stars of Episode VII: The Force Awakens break into the big screen? For John Boyega (Finn), it was as a street gang member in Attack the Block. For Daisy Ridley (Rey), it was as a kidnapping victim in the short film Blue Season. Adam Driver (Kylo Ren) was a gas station attendant in the 1920s in J. Edgar. Oscar Isaac (Poe Dameron) was a hapless shooting victim in All about the Benjamins. You can see them all here, thanks to this compilation video by Movie Munchies.
Ai Shinozaki is an actual girl. So, no, you can't date her. But she's worked with virtual reality developers to create a highly realistic and interactive program. You can tour her apartment and talk to her. And, unlike a real girl, she'll actually talk back to you!
The staff of Rocket News 24 tried her out at a recent exhibition in the Akihabara district of Tokyo. Reporter Seiji strapped on the VR headset. He said, "If there was a home version of this, I wouldn’t need a real girlfriend!"
