This engineering wonder merges ancient technology with the most modern.Thingiverse member Mojoptix designed a sundial that displays the time in 20 minute increments from 10 AM to 4 PM.
How does it work? The gnomon is perforated with holes that display the numbers only when light shines from particular directions. You can download the files here and print your own.
Paul Lukas is a journalist in New York City who obsessively focuses on the minutiae of life, such as cereal box design. His latest focus is on grommets. For his project dubbed Gromm It, he places them inside food and photographs the results. The grommets become portals to the interiors of common foods, creating a striking visual appeal.
Many years from now, when we are old and gray, we shall tell our grandchildren of the primitive times of our youth. We will tell them that once it was necessary for a medical technician to insert cameras into our bottoms in order to take pictures inside.
They will marvel at these tales because in the future, robots will be able to inch their way through our colons like worms. This video from the System Integration Laboratory at Okayama University in Japan shows how this impressive locomotion system works.
Presumably the next stage of colonoscopic development would give these robots artificial intelligence so that they make independent decisions and act autonomously.
-via Geekologie
That is: eventually. There's no rush. But when my time comes, the right way to store my remains after my burning my body in a pyre while I am dressed in a Darth Vader costume is with one of these urns offered by Urns for Ashes. My preference is for the Vader urn. But if it is possible to commission a custom urn, then a ceramic Jar Jar really captures the true me.
I've never seen a pew like this one. It's an original artistic concept by Cindy Chinn of Chester, Nebraska. Read from left to right, it summarizes the story of Jesus's crucifixion. In three sections, it shows his trial in Jerusalem, his execution on the hill of Golgotha, and his resurrection with an empty tomb. A stained glass panel in the center draws attention to the cross.
Here's what makes this amazing sculpture even awesomer: it's a lamp. Chinn built lights inside to illuminate the glass.
via Lost at E Minor, which notes that Chinn makes impressive pencil carvings that are also worth your time.
When I do stuff like this, my wife rolls her eyes and tells my kids that "Dad is being Dad again."
The best Dad Being Dad moment of the day comes from YouTube user Wheatbreat. The hole in the rock was filled with daddy longlegs. So he reached in, grabbed a big handful, then dropped them outside.
He notes that "I never even touched the back of the hole- endless spider supply!" That's the best kind.
-via Geekologie
(Photo: Daniel N.)
R2-D2 has wheels and thrusters. C-3PO has legs. But how does BB-8 from Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens move? As a technical question, that's really unclear--until now.
All you need is a cat. Are cats in the Star Wars universe? Never mind. An Ewok child will do the job, too.
-via Tastefully Offensive
YouTube user Useless Duck Company noticed that his friends were having lots of babies. He wanted to offer them a gift that was both unique and practical. The result of his efforts was an automatic baby soother. The whole thing is controlled by an app that you can load on a phone.
When the baby wakes up in the middle of the night, press the music button. That activates music from a speaker in your baby's bedroom. If that doesn't work, press the rocking button. A pneumatic piston rocks the baby's crib until he stops crying.
Be sure to watch until the end of the video.
-via Gifsboom
On Christmas, Mark Nutt introduced his 88-year old grandmother to virtual reality. He slipped a Google Cardboard interface (an iPhone in a cardboard frame) over her head and turned it on.
She doesn't just enjoy the experience. Her mind is utterly blown! She screams with joy to the point that it's disturbing.
And that's just Google Cardboard. Just wait until she experiences a professionally-developed horror game in Oculus Rift!
-via BuzzFeed
Scarlett needed a paintbrush. Miko's tail was handy, so she went right to work. Lance Ellis, their father, filmed them getting creative. Miko is incredibly patient with this unorthodox use for his signaling device.
Question: which breed of dog offers the best tail paintbrush?
-via Tastefully Offensive
Jumpy, a Border Collie, can do anything! He's remarkably smart for a dog and proves it by incredible stunts, such as riding a skateboard, walking on his front paws through a cone weave, writing for a popular blog while disguised as a human, and riding a scooter.
He can even write his own name! Omar van Muller, Jumpy's owner and trainer, hands him a paintbrush and directs the dog through impressive penmanship.
-via Tastefully Offensive
(Photo: Ben Hosking)
Knitters are often frustrated to find their yarn tangled. Some people, however, really enjoy the task of untangling yarn. It's a soothing, meditative experience. In fact, so many people like to untangle yarn that they buy balls of yarn that have been intentionally tangled. The Wall Street Journal reports:
Daphne Basnet of Melbourne, Australia, once paid about $50 on eBay for a 25-pound box of snarled yarn, simply for the pleasure of untangling it. “I was so happy, I can’t tell you,” recalls the 58-year-old of her purchase, a mess of about 120 knotted balls. […]
Devoted detanglers typically offer to take on the projects for the cost of shipping. Competition for the most maddening messes can be fierce. Some members check the group every day.
“People will jump in and say, ‘Send it to me!’ ” says Mary Enright, 56, a detangler from Sioux Falls, S.D.
Many say their work untangling yarn is strangely relaxing, an escape from their worries and a way to create order out of chaos. Some also enjoy unwinding iPod headphones cords and straightening Christmas-tree lights.
-via Marginal Revolution
(Photo: Jennifer)
Redditor Briawrz asks, "Who's the nicest person you've encountered through life and why?" The discussion thread filled with heart-warming stories of ordinary people--often complete strangers--acting with great kindness and generosity.
For example, mandrew31 shares how a truck driver whose name he didn't even know helped him escape homelessness:
A truck driver. I was sitting in my vehicle in a Wal Mart parking lot. I had been living in my vehicle, sleeping in the back. He had parked his rig for the night right next to me and we had a small conversation about trucker life and the places he'd been. The next morning I woke up to him knocking on my window and asking me to come out. He asked what led me to being homeless, I told him I was just divorced, working two full time jobs but couldn't afford the up front costs of an apartment without saving for a couple months because of alimony. He hands me $600 and says "here's first month's rent, you need it more than I do". A week later I was in my own studio apartment. I never caught his name, or where he was from, and I wish I had. I would love nothing more than to pay him back now that I'm able to.
-_Ryan_- tells the story of a teenager who was determined to be his friend, which required quite a bit of effort:
[Photo of Curly Neal (left) with Meadowlark Lemon via of Lemon's website.]
Meadowlark Lemon, a basketball player famous for his long contributions to the Harlem Globetrotters, passed away at the age of 83. He was a highly accomplished basketball player--not just a performer. But he excelled at the almost magical stunts that a Harlem Globetrotter show offers. Lemon, who was gifted at physical comedy, helped the team transition from a professional NBA team playing straight games to a theatrical troupe giving acrobatic exhibitions. The New York Times reports:
A gifted athlete with an entertainer’s hunger for the spotlight, Lemon, who dreamed of playing for the Globetrotters as a boy in North Carolina, joined the team in 1954, not long after leaving the Army. Within a few years, he had assumed the central role of showman, taking over from Reece Tatum, whom everyone called Goose, the Trotters’ long-reigning clown prince.
Tatum, who had left the team around the time Lemon joined it, was a superb ballplayer whose on-court gags — or reams, as the players called them — had established the team’s reputation for laugh-inducing wizardry at a championship level. […]
He chased referees with a bucket and surprised them with a shower of confetti instead of water. He dribbled above his head and walked with exaggerated steps. He mimicked a hitter in the batter’s box and, with teammates, pantomimed a baseball game. And both to torment the opposing team — as time went on, it was often a hired squad of foils — and to amuse the appreciative spectators, he laughed and he teased and he chattered and he smiled; like Tatum, he talked most of the time he was on the court.
-via Adam Baldwin
During my family's Christmas travels, we drove through the gorgeous little town of Helena, Alabama. There's a park there that stretches for about a quarter mile along Buck Creek. It's locally called the Helena Beach because residents treat the creek bank and a little island in the middle of the water as a beach. If you go there, park your car, then walk out to the shore to play in the surf and catch a tan.
My family visited as the Deep South was drenched in heavy rainfall and flooding. Buck Creek swelled massively, making this parking sign unnecessary.
