Photo by Boston Photographer Erik Jacobs

The 24-square-foot house pictured is named the Gypsy Junkard. It's the largest of Derek Diedricksen's tiny house designs. Diedricksen has always been fascinated with tiny architecture, and once challenging himself to build a homeless shelter for less than $100. He accomplished that by using scavenged and recycled materials -and imagination. The four tiny structures he built in his backyard cost an average of $200 each in materials. Outside of his building hobby, Diedricksen is a building inspector who lives with his family of four in a 950-foot house. A fixer-upper, of course. Read more, and see his other constructions, at the New York Times. Link

(Image credit: Erik Jacobs/The New York Times)

This original infographic at Buzzfeed explains why my kids sold Girl Scout cookies for years and never encountered a Tagalong or Samoa, yet people on the internet still claim those are their favorites. You'll also get a good look at what cookies you can no longer buy from the Girl Scouts. Link

School officials in Raytown, Missouri have battled flocks of geese for years. The problem is the bird droppings in the playgrounds and ballparks. Young children were even forced to stay inside during recess. The school grounds crew was prohibited from poisoning or shooting the geese, but last month, they came up with a new idea.

They’re using plywood cut outs of coyotes, which is the natural enemy of geese. In the cutouts they placed plastic bags to make them look like they were carring a goose in their mouths.

Dr. Travis Hux, the assistant superintendent of support services for the district, said they brainstormed the idea after many golf courses use cutouts of foxes and other predators to keep animals away.

“For the geese from above it appears that they’re holding a goose in their mouth and that creates a threat to the geese, so they don't land on the playground. We have giggled about it and people laugh when I tell them, but I say go check it out, you’ll notice no geese running around on the playground,” explained Hux.

For Principal Dickerson she said she’s excited that they students get to enjoy the playground once again

Link -via Shoebox

The Gadget Show staged a foot race among various toy robots from all over the world in Manchester, England. The robots were controlled by audience members, which led to utter chaos. Some robots eventually made it to the finish line. See the whole thing at Technabob. Link

Joseph Tame will run the Tokyo Marathon while wearing an extensive set of gear that will enable him to publish constant updates on the web. He calls this getup the iRun.

The iRun features four iPhones on rotatable mounts, an iPad, and Android handset, three mobile Wi Fi routers, a four-in-one atmospheric monitor and a heart monitor – all to record his route round the 26-mile circuit.

A post on Tame’s website states: ‘This technology will allow me to broadcast live video on two cameras (using either skype or FaceTime to a local studio for re-broadcast), send live location/pace/heart rate data via Runkeeperon the iPhone, transmit temperature, COx/humidity/noise levels via a custom-made Android app – and do all of this while looking incredibly cool.’

Watch Tame looking incredibly cool in action at Japan Probe. Link

A woman in Parauapebas, Brazil, was shocked to find her three-year-old behind the sofa, petting an alligator!

The woman snatched the child away and called the fire brigade, who trapped the 1.5m-long (5ft) alligator.

The firefighters said the family was lucky the reptile was not hungry.

Firefighter Captain Luiz Claudio Farias said it could have seriously hurt or even killed the boy.

The alligator was taken from the house and released in another area. Link -via Arbroath

(Image credit: Flickr user Mohammed Al-Naser)

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This video explains how those cute little amigurumi figures are made -by magic!

If you have a big appetite and a big stomach, you might use this list of food challenges as a vacation guide. But beware: these offers have rules, like you have to eat everything on your plate in a certain time period to get the meal free. Eateries may have additional rules. LW Pizza in Long Beach, California, dares you to eat the 28-inch pizza shown in less than an hour with no bathroom breaks! If you do, the pizza is free plus you win cash and future pizzas. Link -via The Daily What

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Adam Fisher spent 13 months growing a beard. I had to check to see if we had already posted that part, but they are two different men. Fisher's beard became a prop for a public service message about our natural resources. -Thanks, Bill!

For the first time in history, beer, currently classified as food, is set to be reclassified as an alcoholic drink in Russia. The move is a part of the Kremlin's war on alcoholism, as beer consumption is rising in the country.

"Normalising the beer production market and classifying it as alcohol is totally the right thing to do and will boost the health of our population," Yevgeny Bryun, the ministry of health's chief specialist on alcohol and drug abuse, said.

"We have been talking about and have wanted such a measure for ages. I take my hat off to the parliament."

The new law would restrict beer sales at night, ban its sale in or close to many public places such as schools, and limit cans and bottles to a maximum size of 0.33 litres.

Many Russians consider beer to be a soft drink. Link -via Arbroath

Illustrator Benjamin Douglas created this chart as your guide to famous redheads. http://www.benjamindouglass.com/gingers.html -via Buzzfeed

Montreal artist Kim Gadbois created three minimalist but adorable pillows depicting characters from the Harry Potter series. This one, of course, is Harry. See the pillows depicting Ron and Hermione at Pantoufle de Verre, and buy them at Etsy. Link -via Geeks Are Sexy

Today's final launch of the space shuttle Discovery will have a robotic passenger aboard. Robonaut 2 (affectionately called R2) is going to the International Space Station so NASA can study how it performs in zero gravity. National Geographic has a photo gallery of the NASA robots who have paved the way for R2, including some that have been in space and some, like the Robonaut 1 shown, that were test models or concepts. I saw this picture and thought, "Spock on a lawnmower." Link -Thanks, Marilyn!

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These Dutch automotive engineers chopped up a Volkswagen Golf and it became the Mini-Golf. Then they added roll bars and it became the Rollgolf! See more videos at mastermilo82's YouTube channel. Link -via Everlasting Blort

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Watch the books dance around while the clock spins in this time-lapse video. It will make you smile. -via Boing Boing