Tyranny, I tell you! A man in Columbia, Tennessee called 911 with a genuine beermergency. But police, rather than helping him, threw him in jail!

“Hey, you want to take me to the store?” the man asked the dispatcher in a recording of the conversation.

After some conversation where the man revealed his motive for wanting a ride to the store – beer – the dispatcher set him straight.

“OK sir, I can’t take you to the store and get you a beer,” She said, and later added, “I can send you a ride over there, though.”

After confirming the man's name and address, she assured him she would send someone right over to speak with him. [...]

The man was taken into custody and charged with aggravated 911 calls in a nonemergency situation, a class A misdemeanor. He was jailed and released on $1,500 bond.

You can listen to an audio recording of the conversation at the link.

Link -via Dave Barry | Photo: schizoform

A Pac-Man game designed by Vinent Van Gogh would have been mesmerizing. The power pellets would let you fly and the ghosts would rather dance with you than attack. Alas, it was not to be, and we are left with only this excellent digital work, Starry Night at the Arcade, by Noah Gibbs.

Link -via It 8 Bit

Previously: Starry Night is Everywhere!

While waiting for a woman to back her car into a parking spot, this bard composes and performs a libretto exhorting her to move faster. She declines. Content warning: some foul language.

Video Link -via Sippican Cottage

Have you ever seen a résumé written in comic sans? Regardless of the content, the applicant has probably hurt him/herself. Little details in writing, such as the typeface, can subtly persuade or dissuade a reader. Errol Morris of the New York Times writes:

But is there a font that promotes, engenders a belief that a sentence is true? Or at least nudges us in that direction? And indeed there is.

It is Baskerville.

Psychologist David Dunning of Cornell University discovered this by asking people to evaluate the validity of statements. He used six different typefaces: Baskerville, Computer Modern, Georgia, Helvetica, Comic Sans and Trebuchet. Respondents were more likely to agree with a statement if it was written in Baskerville. Why? Dunning speculates:

The word that comes to my mind is gravitas. There are some fonts that are informal — Comic Sans, obviously — and other fonts that are a little bit more tuxedo. It seems to me that Georgia is slightly tuxedo. Computer Modern is a little bit more tuxedo and Baskerville has just a tad more starchiness. I would have expected that if you are going to have a winner in Baskerville, you are also going to have a winner in Computer Modern. But we did not. And there can be a number of explanations for that. Maybe there is a slight difference in how they are rendered in PCs or laptops that causes the starch in Computer Modern to be a little softer than the starch in Baskerville.

Link -via American Digest | Image: Baskerville fonts, Cambridge University Library

Does your company have communication problems? Do some departments act like independent countries? That's nothing compared to the headquarters building of the computer security company Alunsa. It straddles the Dutch-German border:

On one side of the building, there's a German mailbox and a German policeman. On the other side, a Dutch mailbox and a Dutch policeman. [...]

The border is open enough that a single building can span it. No border guards, no checkpoints. But a letter sent from the German side of the building takes a week to get to the Dutch side.

A computer security company called Alunsa has offices on both sides of the building. On one side, Alunsa employees call German customers on German phones. On the other side, it's all Dutch. Raimond Potgens, the company's CEO, has two offices, one on either side of the border. He carries his laptop back and forth all day long.

At the link, you can see a photo of the borderline inside the building.

Link | Image: Google

You're unlikely to get a natural 20 with this die, but you can afford to lose the hit points if it means keeping this beautiful lamp. Stained glass artist Claudia Malmberg made it and other items in the forms of stained glass dice, including clocks, planters and picture frames.

Link -via Nerd Approved

"Nah, that's not a coral snake. That's a king snake." In this short video, comedians Rhett and Link die many, many times after uttering stupid things.

Video Link -via American Digest | Rhett & Link's Official Website

CNN looked at the lifestyle of "MVP"--the world's top ranked StarCraft II player. For this fierely competitive Korean man, StarCraft isn't just a game, but a challenging event that demands rigorous training. CNN's John D. Sutter asks:

How do you draw the line between obsessive, unhealthy behavior and a drive to be the world's best? Should pro gamers (or chess players, for that matter) be put in the same class as track-and-field stars and gymnasts, who also go to extreme lengths to get in shape for competition? Many pro gamers in South Korea, for example, are required to run, swim and lift weights as part of their training.

Link -via Glenn Reynolds

Optimus Prime wasn't always the leader of the Autobots. Long before he took the Matrix of Leadership, he worked his way through college armed with a fryer and a griddle. You can see more pictures of this outstanding custom figure at the link.

Link (Google Translate) -via Kotaku

This tea table by Lithuanian artist Ainė Bunikytė has both a private and a public atmosphere. Placed high on a tile roof, it's almost inaccessible. But if you can reach it, you've got a lovely view of the world as you enjoy your morning tea.

Link | Photo: Kernius Pauliukonis

Like sardines and peanut butter, chocolate and cheddar cheese are two flavors that just belong together. Stef of The Cupcake Project stumbled upon this truth in her laboratory and shared it with the world. She's also developed an advanced version that involves frying the concoction on a griddle.

Link -via That's Nerdalicious!

It was the 70s. There was no time like it. Fashion, music and oil prices reached their grooviest apex. Take, for example, this variation on the Doctor Who theme. Surely it cannot be topped by anything modern.

Video Link -via io9

Jil of Kitchen Fun With My 3 Sons is getting her boys ready for school with these cute snacks. Her clever use of a knife gave the buses their shape. A few sprinkles, M&Ms and dots of frosting rounded out the details.

Link

Hiroshi Mikitani, the founder of Rakuten Inc., has a bold approach to making his company competitive in international markets. He's making employees conduct all of their communications--meetings, emails, verbal conversations--in the English language:

At the time of the 2010 announcement, only about 10 percent of Rakuten’s 6,000 Japanese employees could function in English, according to a case study by the Harvard Business School. Rakuten operated in just two foreign countries — it has since expanded into 10 more — and most of its business came from Japan. Critics argued that Rakuten’s employees, forced to hold meetings and write memos in English, would simply become less articulate, less efficient and far less happy.

At times, the two-year transition from Japanese to English — dubbed by the company as “Englishization” — has been as awkward as the term itself. Workers were told they would face demotions if they didn’t reach target test scores, and a handful of employees quit, Mikitani said. Other workers, quoted without the use of their names in the 2011 Harvard case study, saw it as an “exercise in perpetual humiliation” or as a “layoff tool.” [...]

At Rakuten, workers scrambled to improve their language skills by the July 1 target date, after which all major internal documents and meetings were to be in English. About 75 percent of Rakuten’s employees are based in Japan, the company says, and its foreign employees face the same language requirements.

Link -via Marginal Revolution | Photo: Koji Sasahara/AP

A carjacker in Shreveport, Louisiana experienced a major failure in the victim selection process when he tried to take a car that was stopped at a red light. Inside were three US Marshals:

Authorities say when Carter realized he had just tried to carjack three officers, he started running, but was caught a short time later.

He was booked into jail for attempted carjacking.

"To us, it's kind of comical. It's the kind of thing a police officer almost wishes would happen to him so somebody in the general public doesn't become a victim," said Turner

Link -via MArooned