Simona Bloom works as an IT professional, but her joy comes from making art. Her corpus includes paintings and colored pencil work. Her internet fame, though, comes from her composition of colorful cocktails that resemble real life objects. Lately, Bloom has recreated flags of many nations, such as the above cocktail that looks like the flag of Cameroon.

The monstrous clown is an archetype that speaks to a fear and yearning within the collective unconscious of the human psyche. The Batman villain of Joker is but one modern incarnation of this primal impulse to destroy and be destroyed. Nerdstalgic explores how artists, filmmakers, and audiences have seen him over time.

The Joker first appeared in a 1940 comic book. His character was inspired by a 1928 adaptation of the Victor Hugo novel The Man Who Laughs. After a central role in the 1960s Batman television series, the Joker faded from media until revived in 1973 comics emphasizing the character's violent insanity. He continues to haunt media with nihilistic joy, perhaps at its most extreme in the 2019 film Joker.

-via Laughing Squid

Minne, if I understand it correctly, is something like a Japanese version of Etsy. It is definitely a massive online purveyor of handcrafts, such as this lovely handbag made to resemble a gyoza--a steamed dumpling.

It's most inedible at the moment. But since the body is leather, one could slice it up to create smaller, bite-sized gyoza.

I am, of course, exaggerating. You don't need to drop $2,500 to wear this astonishing piece of haute couture. That's because it's completely sold out and unavailable except as a used item. And who would be so gauche as to wear a used trash jacket?

Cory Infinite is a fashion designer who conceives of and assembles by hand one of a kind articles of clothing that will make you stand out in a crowd. The Trash Jacket is composed of found items in the, uh, vintage neighborhood of West Bottoms in Kansas City, Missouri.

Due to its current unavailability, you may be compelled to build your own.

-via Massimo

Sometimes, if I'm unable to sleep in the middle of the night, I wake up and login to X to help me get back in the right head space to sleep. Does it work?

I'll get back to you on that. For now, let's keep in mind that doomscrolling is a respected tradition that has been practiced by sleep deprived people for millennia. J.L. Westover of the cartoon Mr. Lovenstein illustrates the phenomenon.

As I mentioned last week, scholars in a library in Leipzig discovered a previously unknown piece by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. It's a 12-minute composition made for a string trio.

A few days ago, the Jugendsinfonieorchester (Youth Symphony Orchestra) of Leipzig held a public performance of it. In the YouTube notes, you can see a breakdown of the seven movements of Ganz kleine Nachtmusik.

Could Mozart win a Grammy for this work? There's online speculation on the subject. I don't see anything in the official rules for the Grammy awards that would restrict the maestro from securing a trophy even though he's dead.

-via Kottke

In the 1970s and 80s, Kmarts swept across the United States like an army of the undead. Now they're almost gone.

What eventually became the Kmart Corporation can be traced back to a retail store created by Sebastian Spering Kresge in 1899. The name Kmart first went up on signs in 1962 and the stores proliferated. But it could not compete with similar firms, notably Walmart, in the 1990s and fell into decline.

Yahoo News reports that the last full-size Kmart outlet in the mainland United States is shutting down. That store on Long Island will close. There does, though, appear to be a Kmart in the US Virgin Islands and another in Guam.

-via Bruce Campbell (yes, that Bruce Campbell) | Photo: Google Maps

Elisa Sunga works as a user experience designer at Google in San Francisco, but she brings a completely different set of experiences to people who eat her food. If you peruse her Instagam page, you'll see one dominant color: orange. I'm not sure why, but her use of cheddar cheese in baked goods may be one reason.

Her cheddar-inspired recipes include sandwiches that she made with peanut butter swirl ice cream and cheddar shortbread. I've never considered cheddar as a good companion to the sweetness of ice cream, but perhaps the tang of the cheese complements the creaminess of the filling.

-via Gastro Obscura

Mark of Mark's Middle-Aged Metal is returning to songwriting after a couple of decades away building up a middle class lifestyle in the suburbs. He's got a serious death metal message about the importance of carefully cultivating one's lawn in order to keep the wife happy and impress the neighbors with one's badassery.

With a gravely voice, Mark proclaims the need to mow down everything in his path with his "red death machine" riding lawnmower. Like a warlord in a post-apocalyptic hellscape, he brings "order to chaos" with the swings of his mighty blades against the never-ending onslaught of the natural world.

-via Laughing Squid

Lorem ipsum is a corrupted and nonsensical adaptation the Latin text De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum by Cicero. Graphic designers often use it as placeholder text to illustrate what writing would look like on a finished product. It also makes for a zesty wrap when served with cheddar and (I suggest) spicy mustard.

Redditor /u/whatdhuman found this creative adaptation of the ancient Roman recipe at work. Fruere cibo, sed ne perdas caput tuum.

-via Super Punch

You may see news articles about organic food proliferating on the internet. This is because people increasingly care about their health and the dangers of industrialized food. Hence a revival of interest in Mountain Dew.

Writer and filmmaker Ellen Lang has experimented with recipes that incorporate Mother Nature's nectar into common foods. These include grilled cheese sandwiches. The cheese is a paste made from reduced Mountain Dew, cream cheese, and shredded cheddar cheese, then spread onto bread.

How does it taste? Lang kindly gave her creation to members of her beloved family. Lang's mother says that it "Definitely gets worse with every bite."

-via reddit

When a driver sees a pedestrian about to cross a street a crosswalk, the driver is supposed to yield by coming to a stop and allowing the pedestrian to cross. Not everyone is aware of this rule and the police of San Francisco would like to change that. Naturally, this goal necessitated dressing like chickens.

The San Francisco Gate reports that police leadership required their subordinates to wear the chicken costume in order to increase their visibility. In the above video, Lt. Jonathan Ozol is unable to cross when a car drives right through the crosswalk. An officer on a motorcycle speeds off to confront the driver.

-via Colin Rugg

Taylor Swift supports Travis Kelce @taylorswift13 @tkelce @Chiefs #tayvis #football #taylorswift pic.twitter.com/WT4n21NaWZ

— Fried Rice Art (@friedriceart) September 18, 2024

It is an ephemeral art that lasts for only a split second, which is why it is necessary to play back the video recording in slow motion.

Alissa, an artist in Dallas, produces what she calls fried rice art. She carefully arranges mosaics composed of rice on boards. A precise flip flings it into the air while temporarily retaining its order. That shatters after just a moment. But that moment is a perfect one, as you can see demonstrated in the above portrait of Taylor Swift.

-via Massimo

The Difficult Chair is, well difficult. The Easy Chair is easy and thus has certain advantages. But as one Instagram commenter notes, you really need to experience the Difficult Chair to appreciate the Easy Chair.

So, inspired by this comic by Dan Piraro, let us endure the Difficult Chair to ensure that our children may have the liberty to study the Easy Chair. This plan does, though, assume that we are able to have children after sitting in that chair.

TikTok is the modern equivalent of central Italy in the Fifteenth Century. It's the heart of a renaissance of intellectual development in which daring pioneers push the frontiers of human understanding beyond walls imposed by the reactionary elements of our society. It's why air fried Twinkies are able to exist.

@MorganChompz tests and evaluates mass-marketed foods in her home laboratory, but she also performs experiments at the edge of scientific certainty. Having heard that it was possible to cook Twinkies in air fryers, she conducted her own study. To follow her Promethean example, set your air fryer at 400° American and toast your Twinkie for three minutes. The result is a perfect balance between chewiness and crispiness.

-via The Takeout