No parent is ready to learn that their daughter is trending... #hotdogprincess Best part is it was all her idea! pic.twitter.com/YBmUkRoj4y

— Brandon E Turner (@turnerbrandon) June 2, 2016

It was Princess Week at the dance school, and all the little girls came dressed up as their favorite princess -mainly Disney Princesses. But Ainsley put on a hot dog costume because she is the Hot Dog Princess from Adventure Time! Of course, that went right over most people’s heads, but they admired Ainsley for her unique fashion sense. Oh yeah, she was wearing a princess dress under the hot dog costume, and said she was a princess on the inside. Now Ainsley is a viral sensation!

Always be yourself.pic.twitter.com/NVCr6CMwmI

— Holly Springs Dance (@marilynhssod) June 4, 2016

She was even asked to open the show at the school’s spring recital. See more pictures of Ainsley at Buzzfeed.

Neatorama presents a guest post from actor, comedian, and voiceover artist Eddie Deezen. Visit Eddie at his website or at Facebook.

It was February 18, 1964. The Beatles had arrived in America just eleven days earlier and had taken the nation by storm. They already had the number one record on the charts and several others quickly catching up.

They had appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show before 73 million awestruck and curious fans. It was the highest rated television broadcast in history. They had partied briefly in the Big Apple, done a quick concert in Washington, DC, and two more special concerts at the legendary Carnegie Hall.

Now they were in Miami Beach, Florida, soaking up the sun and relaxing after a second Ed Sullivan Show appearance. The boys requested to meet the world heavyweight champ- the surly, misanthropic Sonny Liston. But Liston quickly replied that he had no desire to meet "those bums."

Interestingly, Liston was in the crowd watching their second Ed Sullivan appearance on February 16th. He was not exactly a "fan,” calling them "sissies" and saying “My dog can play drums better than that guy!” -referring to Ringo.

And so it was, the Beatles had to settle for "second best" and meet Liston's challenger for the title, a brash 22-year-old named Cassius Clay. Clay and Liston were scheduled to meet for the heavyweight championship in a week on February. 25th (coincidentally, George Harrison's 21st birthday).

Clay was training at the fifth street gym and the Beatles casually marched in saying "Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

Clay replied “No, no, no!"

Clay was cordial at first, calling them "the greatest" and saying they "shook up the world.” He called Paul McCartney "the prettiest, but not as pretty as me!" But soon the general tone changed and it was clear who the real "star" of the show was.

Simon just finished mopping the floor when the kitten comes in and makes a mess. Sounds like the setup for a Simon’s Cat video!

(YouTube link)

Well, that’s just life when you have pets. Or children. See more Simon’s Cat videos, and check out Simon Tofield’s website for more.

 

Do you recall when you were much younger and you loved a song so much you made a mental note that you wanted it played at your wedding? FiveThirtyEight asked readers to send in their wedding reception playlists, and got a great response. People sent in songs played at their receptions and music plans for their future weddings, and DJs sent in their standard lists created from experience. From 163 submitted lists containing 3,358 unique songs, they compiled the ultimate wedding set list. The top twenty is here; see all 200 ranked songs at the post.

Walt Hickey also shares some trivia from the project, like the goofball who suggested “The Rains of Castamere,” and the songs folks specifically banned from their wedding. Other charts ranked the most-requested artists and the breakdown of what years the songs came out. It turns out that our favorite songs come from not only from our teenage years, but from our parents’ and grandparents’ tastes, too. -via Digg

Three-time Heavyweight Champion boxer Muhammad Ali has passed away. Born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1942, he changed his name from Cassius Clay to Muhammad Ali at the age of 22 when he joined the Nation of Islam. He won heavyweight titles in 1964, 1974, and in 1978. In 1967, he was arrested for refusing to be drafted, and was stripped of his boxing title. His conviction was later overturned. He was later named “Sportsman of the Century” by Sports Illustrated. Ali retired from the ring in 1979.    

"After a 32-year battle with Parkinson's disease, Muhammad Ali has passed away at the age of 74. The three-time World Heavyweight Champion boxer died this evening," Bob Gunnell, a family spokesman, told NBC News.

Ali had suffered for three decades from Parkinson's Disease, a progressive neurological condition that slowly robbed him of both his legendary verbal grace and his physical dexterity. A funeral service is planned in his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky.

Muhammad Ali, “The Greatest,” was 74.

Campbell Castle in Wichita, Kansas, was built in the 1880s by cattle baron Burton Harvey “Barbecue” Campbell. After he died, it was used as home, bed-and-breakfast, and even a high school. The current owners spent $2 million to restore it, and now it’s for sale for $3.5 million.

Today the home is on the National Register of Historic Places. It is “like going back in time,” Hoffman says. Original floors made of walnut, maple, and Canadian mahogany have been restored. Fireplaces that date hundreds of years, shipped in during the original construction, are placed throughout the house as is original stained glass. But the home also includes modern amenities such as air conditioning, six whirlpool tubs, and a two-car garage.

The main house is 10,457 square feet with 13 bedrooms and 15.5 bathrooms. It has a basement apartment that can be used for live-in staff. There’s also a four-bedroom carriage house, where the owners live.

All told, the property has 17 bedrooms, 16 full bathrooms, and three half-baths. Read the history of Campbell Castle, and see more pictures at the real estate listing.  -Thanks, Hearsetrax!

Before air conditioning became so common, people would often sleep on the porch during the hottest part of the summer. Some folks have a screened-in porch that was born for that reason. But sleeping outdoors is still a treat if you can do it comfortably. That often requires a roof and/or a mosquito net depending on your location. But it can be a "dream come true" with a luxury outdoor bedroom. See 15 wonderfully luxurious outdoor bedroom designs at Housely.

Justin and Rachel Vollmar and their three older children are part of the Deaf community and consider their deafness as part of their cultural identity. Their fourth child, Clarisa, is DeafBlind, which presents a challenge, but one that the Vollmars are better equipped for than most families would be.

“When Clarisa was born, my wife Rachel and I immediately agreed that we will modify our family to Clarisa's needs and make sure that she is fully involved with family at all times.”

What is the best way to do that? They are figuring it out as they go along. Most DeafBlind people are born with some level of deafness and slowly lose their vision. They have early exposure to language and a visual concept of the world and social interactions. (Helen Keller also had this; she became DeafBlind as a toddler). A baby born DeafBlind doesn’t have that, and the case of DeafBlind from birth is very rare. The Vollmars have consulted with teachers, specialists, other parents of DeafBlind children, and importantly, DeafBlind pro-tactile advocates. They have made public their journey to find the best way for Clarisa, and it’s a remarkable model of how a family can bring a child into their world by being truly attentive to her view of the world.

Clarisa is almost a year old now, and her family has been communicating with her in American Sign Language delivered in a pro-tactile way since birth. After all, babies are exposed to language a long time before they can use it themselves.  

Read about Clarisa and her family at mental_flosss.

Follow Clarisa’s progress at Facebook, where videos are delivered in sign language with captions and images are tagged with machine-readable descriptions.

(Image credit: Clarisa Vollmar at Facebook) 

This street art in Kaunas, Lithuania, doesn’t make any sense during the day. But after dark, you understand why it’s named The Star Sower. See, while the sun travels and casts shadows everywhere, street lamps are stationary, so this illusion works every night. The artist goes by the name morfai; you can see his works here. Sadly, city officials removed the graffiti, but the photographs remain.  -via reddit

America’s Got Talent is going through the audition round for their new season. This guy comes out with tape over his face, so they can’t talk to him. He’s a mime. There’s not a lot of market for mimes these days, but he puts a clever twist to what he does, and he does it well.

(YouTube link)

It’s a real hoot, but it's one of those acts that delight you when you see it -once. You have to wonder how he’s going to step it up to remain competitive over time. -via Viral Viral Videos

A young, struggling Walt Disney originally performed the voice of Mickey Mouse himself to save money on production costs. Bill Scott, cocreator of Rocky and Bullwinkle, likewise did the voices of Mr. Peabody and Bullwinkle.

Dan Castellaneta’s contract with Fox forbids him from doing Homer Simpson’s voice in public.

The first voice ever recorded was Thomas Edison in 1877, when he was messing around with his new invention, the phonograph. The historic first recording? “Mary Had a Little Lamb.”

Australia’s crested bellbird has an odd defense mechanism: It can throw its voice like a ventriloquist. Your vocal cords vibrate to create the sound of your voice. If you’re an average adult, they vibrate 100 (usually male) to 200 (usually female) times a second. A child’s, 250 to 400. And a screaming baby, 500.

The vocal cords of a soprano, singing two octaves above middle C, vibrate 1,024 times a second.

To do Smokey Bear’s deep voice in commercials, voice man Jack Weaver put his head in a trash can.

Lloyd’s of London once insured Bruce Springsteen’s voice for £ 3.5 million.

Like most of his audience, even author E. B. White became teary-eyed by the death of his fictional spider Charlotte. When he recorded the audiobook, it took 19 takes before he could read that part without his voice cracking.

Hank Azaria has voiced more than 160 characters on The Simpsons.

In Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Dopey makes just a handful of sounds during the entire movie: hiccups and snoring, rendered flawlessly by Disney sound man Jimmy MacDonald.

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The article above is reprinted with permission from Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Attack of the Factoids. Weighing in at over 400 pages, it's a fact-a-palooza of obscure information.

Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts. If you like Neatorama, you'll love the Bathroom Reader Institute's books - go ahead and check 'em out!

Marie and Pierre Curie first isolated radium on April 20, 1902. Prolonged exposure to radioactivity killed Marie in 1934. (Pierre died in 1906 after being hit by a horse-drawn wagon.)

In the 1920s, radium was mistakenly considered harmless and used liberally in kids’ toys to make them glow in the dark. Everyone started to notice the danger after radiation sickness became common among radium workers.

Spas also grew up around radioactive springs and even abandoned radium mines. Tourists could buy a radium-lined jar that came with a guarantee “to make any water placed herein radioactive within 12 hours” and a prescription to “drink at least eight glasses of water daily.”

Some foods are slightly radioactive from naturally present radium and/ or potassium, including Brazil nuts, white potatoes, carrots, lima beans, red meat, and beer.

The release of radioactivity outside of the Three Mile Island facility was actually minimal. If you lived within 10 miles of the nuclear plant when it partially melted down in 1979, you would have been exposed to only about 8 millirems of radioactivity, the equivalent of one chest X-ray.

_______________________________

The article above is reprinted with permission from Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Attack of the Factoids. Weighing in at over 400 pages, it's a fact-a-palooza of obscure information.

Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts. If you like Neatorama, you'll love the Bathroom Reader Institute's books - go ahead and check 'em out!

These are 100% honest-to-goodness headlines. Can you figure out what they were trying to say?

State Population to Double by 2040; Babies to Blame

Astronaut Welcomes Baby from Space

Parking Lot Floods When Man Bursts

Elderly Woman Found Using GPS

Indiana Guardsman Gets 2 Years in Ohio Bomb Case

Bans on Children Aim to Stop Swine Flu Spread

Road Rage Leads Police to Murder Victim’s Boyfriend

VIDEO: QUEEN VISITS IRISH NATIONAL STUD MYSTIC EVACUATED; COWS DIE

28M Gallons of Sewage into Mianus

Most Doctors Agree Breathing Regularly Is Good for You

Editor’s Wife Rented to 2 Suspects, FBI Says

Scientists Decode Why Humans Are Intelligent Than Chimps

Navy SEALs Responsible for Getting Osama Bin Laden to Be Honored at 9/ 11 Museum

Lawmakers Disagree Over Why They Can’t Agree

 

For Most, Water Is a Good Hydrating Drink

BISHOPS AGREE SEX ABUSE RULES

Solar System Plagued Again by Thieves

Big Rig Carrying Fruit Crashes on 210 Freeway, Creates Jam

REPORTERS RETURN TO TIBET AFTER RIOTING

Barbershop Singers Bring Joy to School for Deaf

Authorities Pursue Man Running with Scissors

Sultan Woman with Dog’s Head Taken to Hospital

HAY NOT PLEASED WITH SLUMPING PP

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The article above is reprinted with permission from Uncle John’s Factastic Bathroom Reader. The 28th volume of the series is chock-full of fascinating stories and facts, and comes in both the Kindle version and paper with a classy cloth cover.

Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts. If you like Neatorama, you'll love the Bathroom Reader Institute's books - go ahead and check 'em out!

High school yearbooks often feature a quote from each graduating senior, and some of them put a lot of thought into what they want to leave for posterity. Others just pull something out of a hat at the last minute, which can turn out to be the funniest for us. I really like what the triplets have done, since they knew what order they would be in. They’ve heard their names called in that same order for twelve years now at least! See 27 more of the funniest senior quotes from this year’s crop of high school graduates at Buzzfeed. Their grandchildren won’t understand them at all.

(Image source: imgur)

Patients with chronic frequent grand mal seizures are sometimes helped by severing the corpus callosum, the membrane of nerves that connect the left and right hemispheres of the brain. This keeps a seizure from overwhelming the entire brain. But these patients with split brains also gave us a look at what the two hemispheres do independently of each other.  

(YouTube link)

CGP Grey asks the obvious question: if we have two halves that can work independently, which one is the real us? The right brain is different from left brain, but do we really need both to be the person we always thought we were? -via reddit

See more videos from CGP Grey.