It's worth noting that Tim Friede didn't allow himself to be bitten by so many venomous snakes while in a controlled laboratory setting with close medical supervision. Rather, Friede's hobby is getting bitten by  snakes. He's enjoyed this practice since childhood. Now, at 57, he's encouraged snakes to bite him hundreds of times.

The New York Times reports that scientists have determined that Friede's lifetime of venom acquisition has allowed him to develop powerful antibodies to the venoms of 19 snakes.* The pharmaceutical firm Centivax thinks that Friede's blood can be developed into a universal antivenom that can provide an effective medical response to bites by a vast variety of snakes.

-via Alex Stapp

*There's a similar means of protection from iocane powder.

Legally Trek pic.twitter.com/FT2BE19lB9

— I Love Spaceships (@SpaceshipAddict) May 2, 2025

Science fiction X account I Love Spaceships remade the climactic scene in the 2001 comedy Legally Blonde with Star Trek: The Next Generation-era action figures. Ensign (note that she has just one rank pip) Barbie cross-examines Counselor Troi in the courtroom of Judge Guinan.

It pairs with the original very well, although I Love Spaceships uses what is, I think, a Voyager mess hall playset as a courtroom. And there's also a Conehead on the jury, whom I think was absent in the original film (a poor casting decision by director Robert Luketic).

AI is amazing, right? But although British voice actor Sam Hughes uses artificial intelligences to add Schwarzenegger's face to all characters present, his human facilities are impersonating the Austrian Oak.

In this scene known as the Council of Elrond, the Schwarzeneggers debate about how to deal with the menace of the One Ring. In their thick Austrian accents, dwarves, humans, and elves consider their options. It is the 4-foot tall Frodo Schwazenegger who proclaims the mission of the hobbits to ensure the Ring's destruction.

-via Giga Based Dad

Taste Atlas introduces us to the Salzwedeler Baumkuchen, which means the tree cake from Salzwedel. This small town in north central Germany is famous for its unique confection that vaguely resembles a tree.

The cake is made of multiple layers--generally a dozen or so--of batter dripped over a form rotating on a spit over an open flame. The ingredients are simple: butter, eggs, flour, sugar, and vanilla. Sometimes honey or brandy is added for flavor. Once finished, the cake is slid off the spit and coated with chocolate or a sugar glaze and sliced into individual servings.

Photos: Sven Tetschke, Klass Brumann, respectively.

Cosplayer @shellzyeah_cosplay wore this fantastic costume at the 2023 DragonCon. It perfectly blends the madness of the Barbie movie with magnificence of the 1988 Tim Burton film Beetlejuice. I've seen this movie about 167 times and it keeps getting funnier every single time I see it.

For humans, polar bears are perhaps the most dangerous of all ursines. That's why Churchill, Manitoba has a special-built jail for them and residents leave their car doors unlocked.

The Noregian archipelago of Svalbard, which is frozen year-round is home to many polar bears. As a result, carrying a rifle while outside of a settlement is not only lawful, but mandatory.

This gentleman in the village of Pyramiden was caught by surprise by a polar bear. He fired off a round from his rifle at the bear, which still charged him. The man fled on foot until he got onto a snowmobile. Nonetheless, the bear kept up the chase. It's not a bad strategy for a polar bear, as the species can run at up to 25 MPH.

-via kira

Law professor Eugene Volokh notes that Magistrate Judge Ray Kent ordered a firm named Dragon Lawyers to cease filing documents with an enormous watermark of a suit-wearing dragon on every page of its documentation.

Each page of plaintiff's complaint appears on an e-filing which is dominated by a large multi-colored cartoon dragon dressed in a suit, presumably because she is represented by the law firm of "Dragon Lawyers PC © Award Winning Lawyers". See Compl. (ECF No. 1). Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(f)(1) allows a court to "strike from a pleading an insufficient defense or any redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous matter." Use of this dragon cartoon logo is not only distracting, it is juvenile and impertinent. The Court is not a cartoon.

-via Jarvis

Fruits and ice cream are the staples of most parfaits. But we can count on Japanese cuisine to expand the boundaries of our palates to include other creatively-added ingredients. Sora News 24 sent a reporter to the Karafuneya Cafe inside a train station in Osaka to confirm rumors of a new type of parfait: one that includes fried chicken.

The cafe chain had already made headlines a decade ago with its fried shrimp parfait. Its fried chicken (karaage), which sells for about $9.70 USD has crispy fried chicken that is served warm. It contrasts nicely with the much colder ice cream and the sweet fruits.

The price of gold has risen steadily in the past year, with a noticeable jump in mid-April. Perhaps this rise has driven attention to a viral video from China showing a machine similar to an ATM.

You can deposit gold into it. The machine, which is located in a mall in Shanghai, melts the gold, assays it, and gives you credit for its value, minus a small fee, depositing the money in your bank account.

-via Trung Phan, who jokes about the value of scraping gold out of old VCRs.

I've just discovered this amazing Scottish musician named Ruairdh Maclean (the most Scottish of all possible names) who has gained internet fame for his remixes of popular songs. He attributes "Dueling Banjos" to his native fishing village in northern Scotland, although I think the song originates with a South Carolinian named Arthur Smith.

Maclean has also covered "Ring of Fire" popularized by Johnny Cash, "Delilah" as sung by Tom Jones, as well as classics of Celtic music, such as "Jean's Reel."

I've got to say that AC/DC's "Thunderstruck" works very well for the accordion.

-via Battle Byrd

Blowing out the candles on a birthday cake is a grand tradition to celebrate the passage of life and hopes for its future. But it's also somewhat unsanitary. It's done with the breath of the celebrant and therefore contaminates the cake with the blower's germs.

In 2014, Brian Donnelly of East Northport, NY received a patent for a series of shields that cover different sized cakes with perforated shields that allow for the passage of candles while providing some protection for the cakes.

Donnelly provided six different designs to reflect a variety of cakes, including circular cakes, layer cakes, cupcakes, and pies.

-via Weird Universe

Greenlandic ice is noted for its natural purity and age. Dubai partygoers are noted for being very wealthy and profligate. Put them together and you have a business opportunity.

The Wall Street Journal reports that a startup company in Greenland is breaking up icebergs that roll off of the island's icecap, packing the ice cubes for refrigeration, and then shipping them to Dubai in packages of six cubes priced at about $100 USD.

In Dubai, bartenders place them in expensive cocktails. Customers are willing to pay extra for drinks that have unique origin stories. Their tastes may allow Greenland to expand the diversity of its economy, which consists primarily of fishing and mineral extraction.

-via Marginal Revolution | Photo: Christine Zenino

Australia is home to some of nature's most dangerous predators, as well as nightmarish heat and drought. But Valerie, a Miniature Dachshund, survived for a year and a half on her own after she got separated from her humans.

BBC News describes how Valerie got lost (or escaped) while camping with her humans on Kangaroo Island off the coast of South Australia. Owner Georgia Gardner asked for help online and many volunteers combed island for the missing dog.

They finally set a trap baited with Gardner's clothes (and therefore scent) to attract Valerie. The dog fell for the bait and remained inside the trap until Kangaroo Island residents could contain her. Valerie is now back at home where she belongs.

-via Dave Barry | Photo: Kangala Wildlife Rescue

At Less Wrong, a blog devoted to rational thinking, Arjun Panickssery notes that English language sentences have gradually decreased in length. Jane Austen (1775-1817) wrote sentences that were on average 42 words long. The modern writer J.K. Rowling, on contrast, wrote the Harry Potter series with sentences about 12 words long.

Why has this changed?

Panickssery suggests a few possible causes. One is that journalists, who tend to have a terse style, inserted their writing norms into writing as a whole. Another is that much writing in the past was intended to be read aloud rather than silently, the latter of which emphasizes shorter sentences for clarity. Panickssery also suggests that writers learned a style derived from classical Latin works with very long sentences and the abandonment of this style led to reduced sentence lengths. Modern writers are taught to write with short sentences, whereas their predacessors were taught to write very long, complex sentences.

-via Marginal Revolution

The design blog Core77 shares this clever invention. The set (single?) of eyeglasses has a single lens that flips back and forth on a hinge. This feature allows a person to put on eye makeup while seeing clearly through the opposite-side eye.

The cosmetics and accessories store Donna May London offers them in seven different magnifications. It's the sort of unique, single-purpose tool like one might see on the subreddit /r/specializedtools.