(Photo: HGTV)

Timber Kings is a reality TV show about Pioneer Log Homes, a business in British Columbia that builds log homes from local timber. They can build more than just houses. They also make cars, as they demonstrated with this race car built from a single log of Western Red Cedar.

The Cedar Rocket, as the car is named, recently secured the Guinness World Record as the fastest motorized log at the Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park in Chandler, Arizona by reaching 47.64 miles per hour. Bryan Reid, Sr., the owner and founder of Pioneer Log Homes, drove the Cedar Rocket himself. He called the experience of building and driving this unique racer the "one of the top ten achievements" of his life.

(Unrelated photo via Kārlis Dambrāns)

Deputy Sheriff Seth Hopp of Monroe County, Florida found a car with all 4 doors open, but no one inside. When he approached, the heard knocking coming from inside the trunk. He ordered whoever was inside to come out. "I can't!" replied a voice from inside the trunk. The Sun Sentinel reports:

"I opened the trunk and a...male emerged," said Hopp. And the male had an unusual explanation for his predicament.

After going for a walk on the beach, Moore told the deputy, "he was looking for the keys to the vehicle and had accidently fallen in the trunk while searching for the keys. The trunk then closed on top of him."

What happened to Moore's keys remains unknown. The deputy may have opened the trunk using an in-car release, said Monroe County Sheriff's spokeswoman Becky Herrin.

Surprisingly, drugs were involved:

During his interview with Hopp, Moore told the deputy he had in the car a pill bottle containing marijuana.

-via Christina H. Sommers

Simone Giertz is a brilliant inventor who has changed the way we live our daily lives with gadgets that are now essential parts of modern life. She's the person responsible for many of the technological conveniences in your home, such as your kitchen chopping machine, your slapping alarm clock, your breakfast serving machine, and your tooth brushing helmet.

Her latest wonder--which will hopefully soon be available to consumers--is the lipstick machine. Do you find it troublesome to put on your lipstick every morning? It's just one more chore that Giertz has taken off your to-do list with this gadget that does the job for you.

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As it's been said before: droids are slaves. C-3PO is too cheerful about the experience, but R2-D2 isn't. He lets the biological characters know what he thinks about them all the time. They just can't understand him, which is probably a good thing. R2 takes all the risks, does all the work, and gets little of the credit. It's no wonder that he eventually snaps.

-via The Mary Sue

(Photo: HLN.BE)

Nico Van Lee of Beligum loved his Ferrari Mondial. But when maintenance became too onerous, he found a new use of it off the road. Now it's his household mailbox. His license plate is now the mailslot. You can watch a video of it here.

-via Jalopnik

How do you keep your nail polish bottle balanced while brushing your nails? Here's a clever invention that is a lot simpler than growing a third arm for the task. Liz and Mark invented Tweexy, a wearable bottle holder. It's like a ring pop, but less tasty.

The inventors first measured 250 bottles of nail polish to gauge the range of sizes, then designed a flexible silicone cup that would hold the largest number of them. Slip the bottle inside, then the Tweexy onto your fingers. Little wings on the ends make it easier to switch the Tweexy from hand to hand with wet nails.

-via Contemporist

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You're a taxi driver on a sitcom. Or you've just stepped onto an elevator with a very pregnant woman.* You need to be ready because there's a baby coming and you'll have to deliver it.

Joe Bereta of Epic How To shows us how. Is he a doctor? No, he's a comedian. That's why he urges you to seek attention from a medical rather than comedic professional should you go into labor. But in the absence of someone who knows what he's doing, here are some steps that you may wish to take.

There's just one problem with this video: it's over 7 minutes long. You may not have that long to prepare.

-via Blame It on the Voices

*Remember the Dave Barry Rule: never ask a woman if she is pregnant unless she is giving birth at that particular moment.

(Photo: Kennelgate Pet Superstores)

When he was 9 months old, Clive the cat disappeared from this home in Toton, Nottinghamshire, UK. Fourteen months later, he's finally home after spending the time living in a pet store company warehouse.

Kennelgate Pet Superstores maintains that warehouse in the nearby town of Stapleton. Workers there noted that something kept triggering alarms during the night. They found evidence of a cat, which they finally trapped.

Clive was microchipped, so after a veterinarian scanned the chip, it was easy to reunite the cat with his owner, Tanya Irons. She's delighted to have Clive back, even if he's put on a lot of weight. She told the BBC that "I can't believe that he's so porky."

-via Nothing to Do with Aborath

(Jim Benton)

A stranger would immediately rescue you because he knows that you're in pain and empathizes with your suffering.

A friend knows that can wait a little while. Opportunities like this one don't come around often. Get this one on Facebook immediately.

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Dan Iverson and his wife strapped a GoPro video camera to their son's head, then played hide and seek with him. It was the boy's turn to seek. In this point-of-view video, you can almost see how the child is trying to reason about the possible hiding spots.

During the entire hunt, the parents are hiding in a closet, watching a live feed of the video on a cellphone. They might still be there now if Ollie the dog hadn't helped the boy.

-via Laughing Squid

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5-month old Sam had an ear infection and was struggling to fall asleep. So his father, David Motola, turned on his electric piano and began playing Johannes Brahm's classic lullaby. It was very effective. Within a few seconds, Sam yawned broadly, then faded into sleep.

What makes this performance even more impressive is that Motola didn't have any sheet music. He was playing by ear and arranging the piece on the fly.

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Or he tries. Oh, does he try! Trent Vanderheiden says that Scat, his wife's cat, uses this hunting technique frequently. It never works, but he keeps trying.

-via Nothing to Do with Aborath

(Photos: Barkers Pet Motel and Grooming)

Maggie, an Australian Shepherd, was staying at the Barkers Pet Motel and Grooming in St. Albert, Alberta. A few cages down from her were two rescued puppies. Their mama was nowhere to be found, so Maggie stepped in.

During the night, Maggie broke out of her own cage, found the puppies, and lay down in front of them. That's where caretakers found her the next morning. They put them all together so that Maggie could comfort them directly. CTV News talked to Sandi Aldred, the owner of the facility:

“She just wanted to get to these puppies, so she pushed her way through, wiggled her way out,” Aldred said. “She must’ve known pretty much where they were because she almost went right to their room.

“She stood there, she pawed at their door, she put her nose in there, she did her little bum wiggle and little bow to them and just wanted to be in there with them.

“Then she just sort of stood guard with them until we got back.”

(Image: Priceonomics)

During World War II, almost all able-bodied young men entered military service, either as volunteers or draftees.

So who played professional football?

That became a serious problem for two teams in particular: the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Philadelphia Eagles. These teams lost so many players that they had to merge into one team known as the Steagles.

Problem solved, right? Wrong. Most of the men who served on the Steagles and other World War II-era teams got their jobs because they were physically unfit to serve in the military. These professional football players were often half-deaf, half-blind, or had ulcers or hernias. Zachary Crockett describes their challenges at Priceonomics:

Bill Hewitt, who was excused from military service for a “perforated eardrum” and served as the Steagles’ defensive end during the 1943 season, was so guilt-ridden that he quit the team mid-season, and went to go work in a milk factory.

Other Steagles players faced more pressing medical problems: Tony Bova, the receiver, “was completely blind in one eye and partially blind in the other. Two of his teammate, Ed Michaels and Ray Graves, were entirely deaf in one ear. John Butler, who, as tailback, was required to run dozens of offensive lines per game, had arthritis in his knees. In a wide variety of respects, the Steagles team was riddled with ailments.

-via VA Viper

How do you get your face looking sharp and wrinkle-free? Back in the 90s, not everyone could afford facelifts like you kids these days. No, we only had Facercise. It's like bodybuilding for your face. Carole Maggio had many TV appearances that she used to promote the techniques that she developed.

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You can have a face like this, too! Put on your sports bra and start working your masseters.

-via The Presurfer