Michael Koopmans is a Trekkie and dedicated collector of the most obscure and bizarre items of Star Trek merchandise. Yes, we are all familiar with the Spock helmet, an ongoing source of mirth on the internet for the past decade. But did you know about the Star Trek metal detector?

Yes, this is a real metal detector that has been branded as an authentic, licensed Star Trek tool with the application of a few decals. Now you can go metal detecting on the beach, just like Scotty must have done at some point.

Michael "Pac-Man" Leroy Luther loved playing Pac-Man as a young man. He did it so much that, after his death in 2007, his family commissioned a gravestone with images from the classic arcade game. It stands atop his final resting place in Thetford Township Cemetery outside of Clio, Michigan.

Pac-Man lived a full life, having served 10 years in the US Air Force and then working for General Motors. He was married and had three children at the time of his passing.

You can view other photos of the grave taken by Graves with Grace, an Instagram account that photographs unusual graves.

Hobby dogging takes its name from the hobby horse, which itself has spawned an eccentric sport. But in hobby dogging, participants lead imaginary dogs through real canine agility competition courses. This activity began in Germany with humor in mind, but has become at least semi-serious to participants who see it as a way to socialize and develop communication skills.

-via Aelfred the Great, who quips "Affection for commands, order, and training without anything as dirty and distressing as life, it’s the perfect German hobby."

Acclaimed musician haruka_2go_ can expertly play two recorders with her nose (one for each nostril) at the same time, which is two more recorders than I can manage. Her performances are precise and masterful.

She usually props the second recorder on an object, such as this loaf of bread. But she also will use a raised knee and complete a performance while standing on one leg.

-via The Awesomer

In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Phantasms," Data explores the world of dreams. As a result, he behaves strangely while awake.

In one dream, he sees his colleagues in the Ten Forward lounge. Deanna Troi has turned into a cake with a human head. It is, specifically, a cellular peptide cake with mint frosting. Worf thoroughly enjoys eating her. Holographic Sigmund Freud interprets the dream as Data struggling with sexual dysfunction (contra the experiences of Yar).

So there's a lot to unpack in the episode. But it makes for a straightforward and amusing cosplay. The host of the Trek Profiles Podcast snapped this photo of two cosplayers on the Star Trek cruise currently underway.

They say that, like opinions, everyone has one of these. But anuses are rare in the fossil record. Anuses generally do not survive the ravages of time. But, the New York Post reports, paleontologists found a fossilized anus dating back 300 million years.

They found the anus in a Thuringian Forest in Germany. It belonged to a reptile and was, properly speaking, a cloaca--a multipurpose orifice that, unlike your anus, can be used for urinating, laying eggs, and mating as well as defecating.

The reptile was about 3.5 inches long and has been named by scientists Cabarzichnus pulchrus. I'm not sure what Cabarzichnus means, but pulchrus means "beautiful." And it is lovely, don't you think?

-via Jarvis Best | Photo: Lorenzo Marchetti/Natural History Museum

I posted four years ago about a motorcycle produced for the British Army during World War II. The Welbike was sufficiently small that it could be air-dropped with paratroopers, who could then use the motorbikes to travel far faster than they would be able to on foot.

The 98cc-powered minibike continued in production after the war as the Corgi. When exported to the US from the UK, it was named the Papoose under the Indian brand. Various amenities added to it, such as a headlight, increased the weight but also made the bike more useful.

This particular beauty, lovingly preserved for decades, recently sold on Bring a Trailer.

-via Jalopnik

I love this simple but ingenious idea. Feuerwasser, a company in Austria, manufactures outdoor bathing products, including hot tubs. The heat source is the most natural and primal of combustibles: wood.

The company now offers a stainless steel shower set up with a wood-fired boiler for the water. Imagine beginning your day with the tactile contrast of hot water and chill winds as the sunlight and water bathe your body.

It would probably make me want to serenade my neighbors. As this is an Austrian product, yodeling would be appropriate. Yodeling is also a Texan tradition, so it transplants well.

-via Nag on the Lake

The Boston-based company Frigid Dynamics is the developer of the E-XC, which consists of a pair of motorized skis. These electric-powered machines have treads in the back that push the skier along the powder at high speed.

A set of these machines can propel a user up to 20 miles per hour for 10 miles. They can climb grades as steep as 20°. Users control them with a wireless device in one hand and a ski pole in the other.

Imagine this invention in the hands (or, rather, on the feet) of mountain rescue personnel or ski troops.

-via Toxel

Design Boom introduces to us this delicious handbag made by Esenes Worldwide, a fashion house in New York City. Control your hunger because it's not edible unless you're really committed. The company is selling 150 of these unusual purses priced at $150 each.

The leather has been carefully shaped while hot to give it the same wringled and irregular texture of a dumpling. Each bag is thus unique in its precise shape. A fabric lining creates the impression of a vegetable filling. It can conceal, as Esenes's video proves, actual dumplings. So the bag can serve as a novel lunch box.

In the olden days, library checkouts were completed without computer intervention with the use of cards that were signed by patrons and stamped with due dates by library staff. For over a decade, artist Heidi Pitre, who is based in Kansas City, has taken these old cards and used them for art projects. For her series titled "Permanent Record", Pitre has painted and inked scenes and images on the cards.

Many of the books are classics now painted with scenes from the stories (including a somewhat unsettling depiction of Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita) or illustrations befitting how-to books. To a large extent, Pitre explains to KCUR News, what she draws is determined by what book titles fortune delivers into her hands.

-via reddit

Libraries are, traditionally, zones throbbing with romance and sensual passions. If the fires of eros burn within you, head to your local public library.*

Fittingly, seven couples at branches of the Anne Arundel County Public Library system in Maryland married each other on Valentine's Day. WBALTV 11 News says that the library system began hosting weddings last year.

There was a mass event at three different branches of that library system on Saturday. You can see photos of the happy couples and library staff on Instagram.

-via reddit

*My wife and I met at my library and I proposed to her at her library.

The Petosky District Library, a public library system in Petosky, Michigan, is taking advantage of winter weather to make a temporary Little Free Library.

The books are, appropriately, in zip-lock bags to protect them from moisture and, presumably, freezer burn.

Sabin, Minnesota outside of Fargo is a sleepy town of 619 people in the heart of wheat country. By the railroad tracks is an old grain elevator. What's inside is unexpected: a luxurious 4-bedroom, 3-bathroom home. It's for sale.

CrackerMilk is a sketch comedy troupe in Brisbane, Australia. In this video, a police officer encounters mimes engaging in increasingly disturbing criminal behavior. The mean streets of Brisbane are tragically unsafe due to these monsters in face paint.

This is not surprising. Mimes are properly despised and tormented in any morally self-governing society.

Content warning: foul language.