The above video shows a complete and riveting story in a minute in just a half.
Fox News reports that, on August 5, Lori Keeney of Kingston, Oklahoma was swimming her backyard pool when she had a seizure and sank into the water. Her 10-year old son, Gavin, saw what was happening and rushed to jump into the water and keep her head above the water.
That's a big job for such a small boy and Gavin called out for help. His father rushed over, got into the pool, and helped lift up the woman until the seizure ended.
In the final few seconds of this compelling slice of time, the family embraced.
You don't see this everyday in Philadelphia! 🐊 Onlookers at Love Park were in for a surprise when they saw a girl taking an alligator for a splash in the fountains. Local reports say the reptile is her emotional support alligator. https://t.co/7qkneeaepJpic.twitter.com/Q6IaWmHV1M
This is Wally. He's not just any alligator, but an emotional support alligator. On Friday, his owner, Joie Henney of York, Pennsylvania, brought Wally to LOVE Park in Philadelphia.
Wally was leashed but, notably, not muzzled when he met the local humans. A young girl escorted him through the fountains. Wally permitted the humans to pet him (presumably he would have had the means to prevent such petting if he didn't care for it).
You can see more photos and videos taken by passerby at USA Today. My favorite part of the above video comes when Wally simply drops down heavily onto the bricks to enjoy the experience. We've all had Fridays like that.
Popping bubble wrap is fun, but it's also a force that can be controlled and distributed. The puff of air that comes from the popped bubble can be channeled into a tube, which will play a note. Grouped together these tubes form a pan flute. To play multiple notes in rapid succession, you need to mechanize this process like a music box with a barrel containing adjustable pegs to pop the bubbles precisely.
That's the concept stage. The implementation stage took much, much more effort because getting the bubbles to pop reliably and the sheet of bubble wrap to stay aligned required a lot of redesign and precision engineering. You can see Giertz's 15-minute build video here.
How can you tell if a song is a classic? I propose when a cover in a different genre is as strong as the original. "Sweet Child O' Mine" by Guns 'N' Roses is such a song and has inspired musicians since its release in 1988.
In the past, we've seen it on an accordion, by a mariachi band, and as New Orleans jazz song. Now Robyn Adele Anderson and Anthony Vincent offer this bluegrass cover. Drums, a string bass, and banjos contribute, but it is the fiddle version of Slash's opening guitar riffs that make this adaptation work so well.
Rajacenna van Dam, an artist in the Netherlands, is talented and successful. But she can do a lot more than just draw well. Although most visual artists will use just one hand, Van Dam can use both and both of them at the same time.
Oh, and her feet. Also at the same time.
Also upside down.
In this time-lapse video of a 40-minute drawing session, Van Dam completes 6 realistic portraits of celebrities, working on four with her hands and two with her feet through her transparent desk. It looks like she occasionally dips the ink brushes in her toes into a pool of ink on her left side.
Jess Pryles is a graduate student in meat science at Iowa State University and the founder of Hardcore Carnivore, a company that produces meat seasonings. She developed those seasonings after careful, scientific experiments.
Vinoy Alexander calls himself "The Timing Wizard" for a good reason: he times his interactions with movie and TV characters on the screen with seemingly magical precision.
This video from his Instagram page shows him pranking Luis Guzmán's character in the 2012 film Journey 2: The Mysterious Island. In this scene, Guzmán's character is hit by bird poop while riding on the back of a giant bee. Alexander is, presumably, eating a different substance when he flings a spoonful of it at the screen.
This is a typical interaction that Alexander has with his fictional acquaintances. He can be rather mean at times.
Newsweek brings us a story from a village near Bingol, Turkey, of a snake which passed away after suffering a toddlerbite. Neighbors heard the 2-year old girl screaming and ran to her. When they arrived, they found that the girl had bite marks on her lip and a living 20-inch snake in her mouth.
The snake died shortly thereafter. The little girl was taken to a hospital. After 24 hours of observation, she was released in good health.
The snake species is unknown, but of the 45 snake species native to Turkey, 12 are venomous. It is likely, but not certain, that the late serpent was non-venomous.
Mrs. F, a kindergarten teacher in California, knows the importance of adapting her communication to meet the needs of her audience. Right now, that's 5-year old children.
Her kids have a language of her own. She explains that this is because kids will naturally create words that fit into their pre-existing mental schemas. A lot of words invented by little kids simply make more sense than adult words. Why not call the lower half of your leg your foreleg if the lower part of your arm is the forearm?
Yes!! If you want to geek out about child development and get into the “why” behind these awesome word creations, Piaget’s schemas are a great place to start. Basically kids are trying to fit new knowledge/concepts into categories they already know. Piaget calls these “schemas.” https://t.co/izqdmsY0Ia
When she was a toddler, my eldest daughter referred to our stroller as the gogogol, presumably because it was used to go places. This was a superior designation to stroller, so my wife and I started using it, too.
Did your dog eat your homework? Or did your dog protect your sensitive documents from prying eyes? You can blame or praise this dog sculpture by Atlanta-based artist and art director Pablo Rochat.
Behind the cover, the paper shredder in the dog's mouth routes the strips to the rear. Perhaps a receptacle would be handy, but it's more realistic to show the dog uncaringly pooping on your nice clean floor.
Pro tip: do not put dog poop in your shredder. Instead, put it in someone else's shredder for mirthful hijinks.
There's an emerging trend in graphic design: brands are simplifying and flattening their visual logos. They're taking out the flourishes, shadows, accents, and other details that were common just a decade ago.
Why? Photographer, writer, and miscellanist Ben Schott explains in this video for Bloomberg News that the digitization of graphic design made complexity more feasible, so designers made complex works to demonstrate their skills. This is no longer necessary.
And, with graphic designs increasingly focused on small smartphone screens, complexity is counterproductive. "Pixel pressure" -- the maximum size available to a logo -- encourages designers to create images that are easier to instantly comprehend. The details must go.
At nearly 200 pages in length, the Treaty of Versailles that officially ended World War I covers many topics, from territorial changes to how everything is Germany's fault. Articles 245-247 address the return of various prizes of war that had been captured by the Germans. 246 requires the return of a stolen Koran and, most curiously, a human skull:
Within the same period Germany will hand over to His Britannic Majesty's Government the skull of the Sultan Mkwawa which was removed from the Protectorate of German East Africa and taken to Germany.
Mkwawa was the chief of the Hehe tribe in German East Africa, which actively resisted the German conquest. German troops killed Mkwawa in battle in 1898 and took his excarnated skull back to Germany as a trophy.
During World War I, the Hehe rose up against the Germans, which impressed British officials in Africa. They decided to try to recover the skull of the fallen Hehe hero from the Germans.
Desplat proceeds through the long history of this particular skull from 1898 until its delivery to the Hehe tribe in Tanzania in 1954. It's a great read because, in part, the issue of the skull is a microcosm of the diplomatic history of so many eras: World War I, the interwar period, World War II, the rearmament of Germany during the Cold War, and the Decolonization of Africa.
Are you hauling your stuff around in an ordinary garbage bag while you couchsurf with a decreasing list of friends? Maybe you'd be more popular if you'd show that you are fashion conscious. Try the luxury trash bag by Balenciaga, the Parisian fashion house that offers the finest in shoes, dresses, and trash delivery mechanisms.
The New York Post tells us that Balenciaga is offering the "Trash Pouch" for its winter 2022 line. The resemblance is no coincidence. We know this because the company states directly that the design is "inspired by a garbage bag". It comes in a variety of colors, but you can't go wrong with basic black.
Japanese Instagram member @inpot is a master of embroidery. Her entire body of work is worth exploring as she breaks the conventions of that artform with three-dimensional images that pop out of the fabric and unusual choices for subject matter.
Inpot is especially fond of pizza and features it often in her work. She includes it in her most recent piece, which is a clock. The pendulum of the timepiece is attached to a piece of pizza. As it swings, it pulls the slice along with its stretchy cheese back and forth.
Gastro Obscura introduces us to a particularly Czech way of pouring beer. Mlíko, which means "milk", is usually served as a pilsner, but the type of beer is less important than the way in which it is poured.
Pouring a beer from a tap is more than just flipping the toggle from off to on. It's an art form and the Czechs have mastered it. The mlíko is poured by opening the tap slightly and letting the beer foam into the mug.
When done properly, it tastes like a creamy "cloud of beer" rather than just airy foam. It's essential to drink this cloudy substance quickly before it settles, so it's not for slow, casual drinking while chatting.
