John Farrier's Blog Posts

The Waving Bears


(Video Link)


Crendro, Lord Shardik! Some of the Kodiak bears that live at the Olympic Game Farm in Sequim, Washington are known for waving at visitors. You can view two more videos of them at the link.

Link | Farm Website

Chewbacca Sings "Silent Night"


(Video Link)


Radiant beams from thy hairy face
with the dawn of rebellion in space.


It loses a bit in the translation, but Chewie sings the carol rather well.

-via reddit

Gingerbread K9



Forget the shooty dog thing. LiveJournal user therru made this gingerbread version of K9, the robotic dog from Doctor Who, on Christmas Eve a few years ago. It's completely edible except for the metal buckle on his collar.

Link -via The Mary Sue

Optical Illusion Rug


(Video Link)


This moiré pattern consists of static fish on a rug and a table with parallel bars. When you walk around it, the fish appear to move. The firm Clarke Hopkins Clarke won a coveted Red Dot design award for it.

Designers' Website -via Dornob | Previously by These Designers: Parallel of Time Clock

Correlation Does Not Equal Causation



Nothing helps an argument like poorly assembled and decidedly misinterpreted statistics (when your opponent starts to point out your flawed reasoning, call him a Nazi). Still, Vali Chandrasekaran of Business Week thinks that we should all be careful drawing conclusions from merely correlated data points. There are several more humorous examples at the link.

Link -via @MarilynTerrell | Previously: The Science News Cycle

Cat Inherits €10,000,000 Fortune

Tommaso grew up as a stray cat on the hard streets of Rome. But he's come up in the world and, with the death of his human, has inherited an enormous sum:

Since the death of his 94-year-old mistress last month, he has become a property magnate — or perhaps mognate — with flats and houses worth an estimated €10m scattered from Milan in the north to Calabria in the south.

In a handwritten will, signed on 26 November, 2009, Tommaso's mistress — the childless widow of a successful builder — gave her lawyers the task of identifying "the animal welfare body or association to which to leave the inheritance and the task of looking after the cat Tommaso".


Link -via Dave Barry | Photo of a different cat via Flickr user Willie Lunchmeat

The Ultimate Hamburger



Nathan Myhrvold, Ph.D. and Microsoft tycoon, is the creator of the comprehensive Modernist Cuisine cookbook. His crack research team set about building the ultimate hamburger. Each component was redesigned from scratch. A video at the link goes into some detail. The beef? It's taken out of the meat grinder in parallel strands, then frozen and sliced with a band saw into cross-sections so that the grains are cut evenly by the teeth of the consumer. After the meat is sliced, it's then seared with liquid nitrogen and immediately fried in hot oil. The result is a caramelized surface that keeps the juices inside without burning.

Link | Modernist Cuisine | Previously: The Drinkable Bagel

Gingerbread Typewriter



Pastry master Patti Paige made this gingerbread typewriter which is completely edible (even the rice paper) but not functional. It's on display at the Parker Meridien Hotel in New York City to benefit the charity City Harvest.

Link -via Nag on the Lake

Dollar Broom



Artist Mark Wagner works extensively with money. You won't be able to launder money with this broom, but you can sweep it around a bit.

http://www.smokeinmydreams.com/index.html -via Colossal

Master Parallel Parker


(Video Link)


The driver does it on a busy street, unlike the controlled circumstances of the current the Guinness World Record holder. He lightly bumps the car in the rear many times, but I've been told that in some cities the "love tap" is considered socially acceptable.

-via Jalopnik

The World's Largest Bucket of Chicken



After a Kuwaiti team shockingly established a world record for the largest bucket of chicken in 2009, a team of valiant and patriotic Americans bested them with this 1,645-pound bucket. Our Founding Fathers, like General Washington and Colonel Sanders, would have been proud.

Link -via That's Nerdalicious!

My Neighbor Batman



He is the keeper of the forest, the protector of the innocent, the avenger of the wronged. So turn on the Totoro Signal and summon him.

Artist's Website -via Comics Alliance | Image: Michael Petz

Wicker Motorcycle



While researching this post, I discovered that there are actually quite a lot of wicker motorcycles. Presumably they're popular because of high gas prices. This particular one was spotted in St. Andrews, New Brunswick, Canada.

Link -via Geekosystem | Photo: Wendyvee

Enormous Chart Shows How Magic Works in Dozens of Different Fantasy Series



Charlie Jane Anders and the staff of io9 assembled a staggeringly huge chart showing the rules and principles of magic in about fifty different fantasy series, both in print and on screen. You can see the entire assembly at the link. Be prepared to lose a couple hours of your day.

Link -via The Mary Sue

Piano Made from Buttons Hanging from Wires



What you're seeing isn't a single structure, but ordinary buttons hanging from wires spaced just right so that they present the image of a piano. It's a medium in which Miami-based artist Augusto Esquivel works. Check out more examples at his website.

Link | Artist's Website

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  • Member Since 2012/08/04


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