Recently, Teressa Cee, a dancer for the Miami Heat basketball team, was visiting the Blue Lagoon Island resort in the Bahamas. While lounging on a floating platform, she asked a man to hold her phone for a moment. He accidentally dropped it into the water.
That might have been the end, but a local dolphin named Cacique picked up the phone from the water and brought it back to her! (auto-start video)
-via Tastefully Offensive
Cartoonist Simon Tofield has to get his cat to the vet. The cat knows this the moment he sees the pet crate. He will use his claws, his teeth, and--most importantly--his wits to evade this trap.
For millions of years, domestic cats have evolved to have superb defenses against their natural predators, veterinarians. Simon's cat is ready.
Plot twist: the kitten was in on the con from the beginning.
-via Pleated Jeans
It is well known that Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union and Josip Tito of Yugoslavia despised each other. Shortly after World War II ended, the two leaders and their respective countries became embroiled in a diplomatic struggle, largely because Tito refused to accept the Soviet Union as the leader of the Communist world.
What is not widely known is how Stalin's personal hatred of Tito and his country almost instigated a general war in Europe between the Communist East and the Free West over the fate of Yugoslavia.
15 years ago, John R. Schindler, a historian and national security scholar, published an article on the subject in Cryptologic Quarterly, a classified periodical maintained by the National Security Agency. The NSA recently declassified it. You can read the full text here.
In the article, Schindler describes how Tito became, in Stalin's mind, a terrible enemy of Communism that had to be destroyed at all cost:
Although the sibling wars and meltdowns seem to come out of nowhere, they're actually planned--sometimes days in advance. This is why it seems like the pointless battles happen at only the worst times and places. It's not by chance.
It's almost certainly a hoax because the photos are lifted from other sites and no one would actually do this, right?
Well, maybe. While you work at the neighborhood artisanal mayonnaise shop, you need someone to take care of your chickens. Without mental and social stimulation, a pet chicken can develop an anxiety disorder.
Qoopy, an alleged business with facilities in Portland (Oregon), San Francisco, and Brooklyn--where pet chickens are thick on the ground--offers professionally staffed day care options with convenient drop off and pick up times. You never have to miss another brunch.
Disc-It is a custom gas grill company in Albequerque, New Mexico. It makes the grilling experience very personalized by selling unique designs for every interest and speciality. The legs and base reflect individual design specs, and often the wok-shaped pans do, too. Each one is fueled by clean-burning propane.
Is your piano worn out? Or do you just not know how to play? If that old piano isn't serving any useful purpose, you can give it a new one! Home Crux shows you 9 ways to repurpose old pianos. This upright was turned into a handsome bar with a wine rack, liquor cabinet, glasses, and LED interior lighting. When closed, it looks like any other piano.
A man is like a multi-tool. He's got several useful functions, as well as a fish scaler. Sarah C. Andersen puts her multi-tool boyfriend to work for everyday household tasks.
My wife most often uses the Be Tall For Me function, but I also kill bugs, open jars, and drive Phillips screws. She's never asked me to scale fish, but I'll be ready immediately if she does.
-via Tastefully Offensive
In most Star Trek scenes in which two or more ships meet, they'll face each other on the same plane, as though they were traveling in two dimensions, not three. This is physically unrealistic, but it's the only way to avoid the impression that a lot of ship captains are smashed drunk.
Lately, I've been re-watching Enterprise, the last Star Trek television program. The writers corrected many of inconsistencies from the previous shows. You can occasionally see ships meeting each other in non-parallel fashion.
-via Geek Tyrant
Although the patient pup may not feel like his roommate is much of a friend right now.
In his defense, the thieving dog may have thought that his companion couldn't figure out how food works and needed a demonstration.
-via Gifsboom
Dave Hax makes helpful videos that illustrate science experiments, such as how to get an egg inside a bottle, and essential interpersonal skills, such as how to steal pizza without getting caught.
For this trick, Hax shows how to burn a candle underwater. Yes, really! All you need is a bowl of water, a candle, and a lighter. When properly arranged, the candle wick will continue to burn even when it's below the level of the surface of the water.
-via Laughing Squid
You get a candy cornocopia! Jessie Oleson Moore, the internet's CakeSpy, melted an entire bag of candy corn on a cookie sheet in her oven. It turned into a flexible sheet of candy corn that resembled orange stained glass. She rolled it into the shape of a horn, then filled it with more candy corn, creating a Horn of Plenty that's perfect for both Halloween and Thanksgiving.
(Photo: Barna Páll-Gergely and Nikolett Szpisjak/ZooKeys)
This is the Angustopila dominikae, a resident of Guangxi Province, China. At 0.86 mm across, it's the smallest known land snail in the world. It's 1 of 7 new microsnail species discovered by Dr. Barna Páll-Gergely and his colleagues in Guangxi Province. They published their findings in the journal ZooKeys. It's a landmark discovery, but Páll-Gergely admits that they don't know what evolutionary advantage such a tiny size could offer the Angustopila dominikae. The Guardian quotes him:
We cannot explain their size by adaptation to the environment. For very tiny insects we can guess the evolutionary reason why they evolved like that, but in the case of snails it is much more difficult. The whole family of species are all very small and their common ancestor, which lived maybe 60 million years ago was also very small. Since then this very tiny species survived somehow in different geographical areas and under different climates.
-via io9
(National Geographic/David Gruber)
What is biofluorescence? Jane J. Lee of National Geographic explains that it's:
[...] the ability to reflect the blue light hitting a surface and re-emit it as a different color. The most common colors are green, red, and orange.
Biofluorescence is different from bioluminescence, in which animals either produce their own light through a series of chemical reactions, or host bacteria that give off light.
This property is found in some fish, crustaceans, and corals. But now, for the first time, scientists have found it in a reptile. David Gruber, a marine biologist, led a team that searched for biofluorescent creatures off the Solomon Islands. They were shocked when an Eastern Pacific Hawksbill Turtle swam into view and glowed:
Though cats and snails are natural enemies, the cats are surprisingly relaxed--not a trace of fear from either one. Shiro is so peaceful that he's almost asleep, rousing only to kiss his companion. Kuro noses the snail curiously, who responds in kind. It's the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
How did the snail end up on Shiro? His owner has a great hobby: putting objects on Shiro to see how he will react.
-via Rocket News 24
See also: More of the Shironeko cats.
