Why is this ship built so oddly? It's not sleek, like it's supposed to slice through the water. That's because it has one specialized purpose: to tow up to 24 sensor arrays that search for oil and gas hidden beneath the ocean floor. It's called the Ramform Titan. The operator, Petroleum Geo-Services, describes its capabilities:

Ramform Titan has 24 streamer reels, 16 abreast with a further 8 in a second row. The back deck layout is augmented by six independent source array handling booms. Together these enable faster deployment and recovery, with increased flexibility and safety, which make it possible to fully utilize the operational weather window. Steerable sources and streamers, combined with automated gear-handling systems increase flexibility and efficiency. This is an ideal platform for ultra high-density 3D acquisition, and reliable, compatible 4D projects.

-via Super Punch | Photo: PGS

At My Modern Met, Madeline Muzdakis describes clocks, with and without alarms, from millennia ago. A common one, first described in China in about 520 AD, uses candles that burn evenly. By marking the drop in the wick, users could note the passage of time.

To make this candle clock into an alarm clock, place nails into the candle. When the wax around a nail melts, the nail falls into a metal tray, clattering noisily, and hopefully getting the attention of the user.

Read about other ingenious early clocks, most notably those that could keep track of time on seagoing vessels, at My Modern Met.

Photo: Benutzer:Flyout

(Chris Hallbeck/Maximumble)

Those five channels were NBC, ABC, CBS, PBS, and the local UHF channel. The last of these was usually my favorite as a child, especially when it ran a 3-day Star Trek marathon when I was 8 years old. I never felt deprived, even when I had to tweak the aluminum foil around the TV antenna to improve the reception.

Which wine pairs well with chicken? Any will do, so as long as the wine decants in this glass chicken made by Simone Crestani, a glass artist in Italy. His Instagram page is filled with many wondrously shaped and delicately formed glass objects, many of which, like this decanter and pair of glasses, can be put to practical use in the home.

-via Ugly Design

🤹🏾‍♀️ pic.twitter.com/BrwAEA6SSV

— Zaila Avant-garde (@Basketballasart) April 17, 2021

Zaila Avant-garde, 14, won the Scripps National Spelling Bee. She's a true Renaissance woman because spelling words correctly isn't her only field of excellence. She also holds 3 Guinness World Records for basketball dribbling.

Those records are bouncing 4 basketballs simultaneously 307 times in 30 seconds, bouncing 6 basketballs simultaneously, and bounce juggling 4 basketballs 255 times in a minute.

In addition having an astonishingly high DEX score, her INT is off the charts. The AP reports:

The time commitment required to master roots, language patterns and definitions is what keeps many top spellers from seriously pursuing sports or other activities. But Zaila, who is home-schooled, claims to have it figured out.

“For spelling, I usually try to do about 13,000 words (per day), and that usually takes about seven hours or so,” she said. “We don't let it go way too overboard, of course. I've got school and basketball to do.”

Seven hours a day isn't going overboard?

“I have my suspicions. I don't know. I have some suspicions that maybe it's a bit less than what some spellers do,” she said.

-via Super Punch

How weird and wonderful can a Thai commercial be? Producers in Thailand are always pushing the creative envelope and this 2019 chocolate bar ad is no exception. It's called "The Secret" because the young lady in the ad is hiding something from her boyfriend. But thanks to a Voiz Waffle Chocolate Bar, it won't be an obstacle in their relationship.

-via Dave Barry

Will the koala hold still? Perhaps, if you put him in a comfortable environment. The caretakers at Kangaroo Island Wildlife Park in Duncan, South Australia, show a tool that they use with a scale to accurately weigh the little fellow.

-via Nag on the Lake

Are the aurora borealis visible? If so, and you don't see them often, then you won't want to miss the sight! That's why this hotel phone in Iceland lets you program an option to wake you up. Redditor KristjanHrannar shares this photo of a great feature.

If hotel phones in your town had a button like this, for what event would they wake visitors?

-via Nag on the Lake

Dylan and Wal, both incarcerated in New Zealand for methamphetamine production and related crimes, languished behind prison walls. Inside his cell, Wal watches the TV show The River Cottage, a program about old fashioned cooking. The episode airing is about making yoghurt from scratch. Wal gets excited and invites Dylan to their next racket. Tomorrow, he says, they're going to cook.

Peter Jackson's The Two Towers, which was released in 2002, includes a scene in which Merry and Pippin, who are Hobbits, meet the Ents. In a recent television interview, actor Billy Boyd, who played Pippin, revealed that an early version of the script included both Hobbits getting naked. Screen Rant reports:

Here’s the thing. There was almost nudity in the movies,” said Boyd. “[Screenwriter] Philippa Boyens…she wrote a scene, because we’d been doing some kind of gags and winding people up…[and] she said, ‘Oh, it’s a new scene we’re filming next week, with the Ents. When Merry and Pippin are up Treebeard, he gets afraid and shakes his branches, which makes you guys fall, and as you hit all the branches on the way down, by the time you hit the ground, you’re naked. And Merry turns to Pippin and says, ‘It’s cold, isn’t it?’ And Pippin says, ‘Hold me, Merry.’

Emphasis added. This certainly would have spiced up the movie.

Strictly speaking, I think that it was a nude scene. The Ents weren't wearing clothes, were they?

-via Dave Barry | Image: New Line Cinema

This is the GyroJogger. The first hands free way to watch your shows while on a run. pic.twitter.com/6v2kvIJaZT

— Unnecessary Inventions (@mattyxb) July 1, 2021

Matt Benedetto, the genius behind Unnecessary Inventions, calls his new device the GyroJogger. This 3D printed head-mounted bracket solves the challenge of watching videos while running. The heads-up display provides a gyroscopically-mounted holder for a cellphone while ensuring that the user is still looking up and forwards.

We Texans know how to respond to bad weather: with a smile and alcohol. On April 28 of this year, there was a hailstorm outside of San Antonio. The National Weather Service has confirmed that this hailstone, which measures 6.4 inches across, is officially the largest hailstone in Texas history.

That's officially the largest hailstone.

But it's probably not the biggest. Residents of the town of Hondo claim to have found a hailstone from the same storm measuring 6.57 inches across. They could have waited for the National Weather Service to measure and verify their claim. But, the San Antonio Express-News reports, the owners broke up the ice to make margaritas.

-via Super Punch | Photo: National Weather Service

How did the bag of cocaine get there? The defendant, according to the Belfast Telegraph, claimed:

[...] that a bag containing cocaine that was found between his buttocks had been put there by someone else without his knowledge.

Police arrested the man after he fled from them outside of a bar in Limavady, Northern Ireland.

-via Dave Barry | Photo: Pixabay

Karma is a ցӀìէçհ pic.twitter.com/0G20aDezO8

— Silent Rocco (@silentrocco) June 17, 2021

Silent Rocco is a master mime artist. Watch his videos to see astonishingly precise displays of physical movement that appear to defy gravity and reality. This video, which Rocco posted on reddit, demonstrates how he can perfectly balance himself so that unreal objects appear to become tangible.

Dr. Crom, an archaeologist and classicist, explains that this ivory tessera (a flat object inlaid in a mosaic), illustrates the hand symbol for the Roman numeral IV--that is, four. Fingers make the V-symbol and the thumb forms the vertical prefix. It's located in the National Library of France, which is where you will need to go to rock out with it.

-via Marilyn Terrell