Dutch artist Henk Hofstra is known for his huge public installations, such as when he turned a city street into a river by painting it blue. In 2010, he created this massive work that Eugene of My Modern Met describes as "if God threw giant eggs down at us." It's called Art Eggcident and was placed in the Dutch city of Leeuwarden. It's not an act of serious commentary, but a joke based on a Dutch expression. Hofstra explains:

What was your inspiration for the "Art Eggcident" project?

There's a Dutch expression: "To lay down the first egg, you have to start with the first egg." In the city of Leeuwarden people talked a lot about what to do with Zaailand. It's one of the biggest city squares in Holland. There were a lot of plans for it, but nobody started. That's why I started with the first egg (and several more) and made them huge.

What kind of reactions did you get from people?

I had a lot of reactions. Off course, the reactions were not always the same. Some people liked it very much, some people didn't. When it was ready for a couple of hours 80 % was negative, just a few weeks later 80 % was positive. The surrounding shops were very positive because it attracted a lot of tourists and they sold more than otherwise.

-via Flavorwire

Cadbury has produced a new chocolate bar that will contain no fewer than 7 different flavors inside its chocolate blisters. They are solid chocolate, caramel, almond, fruit and nut, Oreo, almond butter, and Turkish delight. It's called the Dairy Milk Spectacular 7. Food artist Prudence Staite helped Cadbury design this ingenious candy bar.

You won't be able to buy it in stores. Cadbury is making only 50 of them, which will be prizes in a contest available to residents of the United Kingdom.

-via Home Geekonomics

At a mere 200 pounds, this elephant seal is just a little baby. He's been abandoned by his mama, so he's eager for some snuggling. Charlene Fritz, a tourist from Canada, was glad to provide it. While she visited Snow Hill Island off the coast of Antarctica, the little seal crawled over to her and climbed on of her lap.

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-via Tastefully Offensive

(Photo: BBC)

Yoyo Chan is one and a half years old. She has a big task ahead of her: nailing the nursery school interview. Doing so can get her into the best nursery school, which can lead to the best kindergarten, then elmentary school, and, eventually, the best medical school.

It all comes down to now. Focus, Yoyo. Focus.

In Hong Kong, many parents want their kids to offer their best at the competitive nursery school interview process. A dozen openings at a top school can lead to a thousand applications. So some companies now offer to train toddlers to perform better than their competitors during the interviews. Helier Cheung reports for the BBC:

At interview class, Yoyo is asked to greet the tutor and introduce herself. The tutor then asks her to complete a number of tasks, including building a house with bricks, drawing a picture, sticking two felt eyes in the right position on a felt face, and identifying pieces of fruit.

A little shy to begin with, Yoyo quickly warms up and appears to enjoy the tasks and playing with the toys.

"These classes and interviews can be hard work," says her mother, Emma. "But I do want her to be prepared. Most parents want their child to have a good start."

One nursery Emma is keen on had more than 100 interviewees for just nine places, so she'll do whatever she can to increase her daughter's chances of success.

Yoyo's younger brother, still a baby, will begin interview classes in a few months, she says - when he's about eight months old.

-via Dave Barry

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And I'm not entirely sure why. But I couldn't help but grin through this entire performance. It's by the band Goose House, which added a banjo to its normal repertoire. This version of the song is just a bit different from this performance of it by John Denver while touring in Japan. No matter who sings it or where, everyone wants to go back home to West Virginia.

-via American Digest

With a few bell peppers, olives, and the right shape, Wendi created a pizza that looks just like the helmet of Star Wars fans' favorite bounty hunter. Now it just needs to be slowly baked inside the oven for over a thousand years.

-via Between the Pages

This is a screenshot from Google Maps. It's not an error. This city park in Toronto is actually named the Main Sewage Treatment Playground. What fun things can you do at a place named "Main Sewage Treatment"? You can play baseball, rugby, ride a skateboard in its skating bowl, or ride a bike on the trail.

From Google Street View, it looks pretty. Let's go!

-via reddit

(Chris Hallbeck/Minimumble)

Having more to do doesn't encourage me to get up earlier. In fact, if you have a lot to do, then you'll need plenty of energy for the work. That means getting enough sleep to do the job. So this part of the day is really just preparing for the work that happens later.

(Photo: Sneakers the Corgi)

You can remain calm when encountering a solitary corgi. After all, it's harmless by itself, right? But what about when the second one appears? And a third? What would you do if you suddenly found yourself surrounded by no fewer than 634 corgis?

Visitors to Huntington Beach in southern California got to experience that terror at the recent Corgi Beach Day. Corgi owners brought their dogs to a huge meetup on the sand. You can see many more adorable/horrifying photos of them at Dogster.

-via Jonah Goldberg

(Photo: US Air Force)

The sky over Fort Bragg, North Carolina rained freedom in early April. Then, in the largest exercise of its kind there in 20 years, the US Air Force, Marine Corps, Air National Guard, and Royal Air Force dropped a combined 2,100 troops to the ground. The purpose of this exercise was to demonstrate the interopability of these forces and make it easier for the US and UK to engage in joint operations in the future. The Army Times reports:

The long-term goal is to have the ability to integrate the 16 Air Assault Brigade into the 82nd Airborne Division, allowing the two units to operate quickly and seamlessly if they're ever called upon to respond together in an emergency. […]

The American and British soldiers have taken advantage of their time together to learn about each other's equipment, tactics and standard operating procedures, said Lt. Col. Mike Shervington, commander of 3 Para.

One example is having U.S. soldiers jumping out of British aircraft and vice versa, he said.

"That sounds easy, but it's not," Shervington said.

For starters, the two armies use different parachutes – the T-11 for the Americans and the Low Level Parachute, or LLP.

The T-11 carries more weight, while the LLP opens at a lower level, Shervington said. The LLP also has a shorter count before the static line releases the parachute; three seconds instead of six for the T-11, he said.

-via Gizmodo

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A disaster has occurred and you are forced to travel somewhere by airplane. Perhaps if you were very wealthy, you could charter a private flight. But otherwise, you have to ride a commercial airline flight, forcing you to go through the torments of airport staff and fellow travellers, all of whom are committed to making it the experience as unpleasant as possible.

Glove and Boots gives you practical tips and points of etiquette that you need to know. Your fellow passengers--especially those seated right next to you--must learn about the etiquette in particular. So in the highly unusual event that the in-flight WiFi is actually working, show them this video.

-via Laughing Squid

(Photo: Ben Zucker/The Guardian)

In 1969, puppeteer Caroll Spinney donned the enormous Big Bird costume for the first season of Sesame Street. He still does 45 years later. Spinney writes in The Guardian that it led to fascinating experiences:

I once got a letter from Nasa, asking if I would be willing to join a mission to orbit the Earth as Big Bird, to encourage kids to get interested in space. There wasn’t enough room for the puppet in the end, and I was replaced by a teacher. In 1986, we took a break from filming to watch takeoff, and we all saw the ship blow apart. The six astronauts and teacher all died, and we just stood there crying.

Big Bird is a complex mechanism that requires considerable skill. Spinney describes how it works:

Big Bird is actually a puppet; my right arm is his neck, and my right hand moves his head, with my little finger controlling his eyebrows, moving them up and down to show when he’s thinking. I can change his expression by tilting his head toward the camera at a different angle. My left hand is in the left wing, which is linked to the right wing with fishing wire. I can’t see anything outside the suit when I’m in it, so I wear a little monitor strapped to my chest, which shows me what the viewers see at home.

In the early days, each scene was very simple and I could memorise my lines on the spot, but the show evolved and the storylines became much more elaborate as the years passed, so now I keep my cues and my lines taped to the inside of the costume.

-via KP

Mickael Delalande is an artist and graphic designer in France. He makes wire sculptures that look like animals and household objects. They often create the impressions of wire frames around more solid objects—like we’re living inside a 3d modeling program.

Kristina Bewley is a photographer, costumer, and photoshopper. She brought all of those skills together to make her daughter Giselle’s trip to Disney World especially memorable. Giselle wore princess costumes that were digitally enhanced with visual effects as she romped around the Magic Kingdom and Epcot.

When you leave home in the morning, are you going to work or to play? You can delay that decision with the True Wetsuit by Quicksilver. It’s a line of suits—complete with a shirt and tie—that you can surf in.

Well, technically speaking, there’s nothing to stop you from surfing in your professionally tailored business suit. But Quicksilver claims that its suits will dry out after a thorough dousing in saltwater. You won’t need to change before heading into the office and explaining why you’re three hours late.

Each suit costs about $2,500. You can see more photos at Spoon & Tamago.