A series of ads for Samaritans of Singapore illustrate how people who suffer from depression often mask their real state. The graffiti, expressed in ambigrams, says something completely different when turned upside down. See more examples at Laughing Squid. Link
Miss Cellania's Blog Posts
The complete title of the post is “We would’ve come earlier, but your husband wasn’t dead then”: 18 incompetent law-enforcement officials who save the day. That's what happens when TV and movies combine popular crime themes with comedy. The list will make you smile as you recall the most ridiculous premises that lead to a crime being solved despite the best efforts of investigators like Sergeant Frank Drebin, Axel Foley, and Inspector Clouseau. There are plenty of more recent offerings, too, that you might want to revisit for a laugh. Link
The following is an article from The Annals of Improbable Research.
by Max U. Sage, MD, MBA, Elias A. J. Alsabti, MD, Andrew A. Skolnick, MS
Livermore Transplantation Unit
Canker Treatment Center of America, Omaha, Nebraska
A conventional organ donor. (Image credit: Flickr user Kenneth J Gill)
Organ transplants save many human lives, and are vital to the health of many transplantation centers. However, there is a shortage of donor organs.
We have developed a procedure that will provide a safe and virtually unlimited supply of one kind of transplantable human organ. We believe that introducing this procedure into medical practice will protect the fiscal health of transplantation centers, especially small ones like ours.
Accordingly, we report here the first successful human appendix transplant.
The General Shortage
The shortage of donor organs has led some to suggest that underutilized transplantation centers should be shut down.[1] The consolidation of resources would make transplantation more economical. Perhaps most important, it would improve patient outcomes by increasing the level of experience of the remaining transplantation teams, thereby increasing their competence.
We argue that transplantation centers should not be shut down.
There are good reasons for finding a way to keep underused transplantation facilities economically viable. Space limitations here limit us to mentioning the most important reason. Closing down smaller transplantation centers would decrease access for the poor. Many patients and their families would be compelled to travel to distant facilities and be forced to incur the expense of finding alternative housing, often for long periods while a donor organ is found and while the patient recovers following transplantation.[1]
Down With Animals, Up With People
A good solution to this problem is to find new sources of transplantable organs.[2 ]
Back in the mid-1990s, people were buying up Beanie Babies, not as toys, but as investments. The collectable stuffed animals were supposed to rise in value, especially when a particular model was "retired" from manufacture. A book published in 1998 catalogued the available models and predicted how much they would rise in value in ten years. The speculation in Beanie Babies seems laughable now, as models that were predicted to bring in thousands of dollars are now available on eBay for a few dollars. Link
You've heard of a zebra crossing, haven't you? In this video taken in Bolivia, there aren't any stripes painted on the pedestrian crossing. Oh no, instead you'll get a zebra to stop traffic and escort you across! -via Arbroath
Women in video games is a much-discussed subject on the internet, so Unreality magazine interviewed its own staff members who are female gamers: Sara Clemens and Benny Bedlam. They talk about their favorite characters and what they think of gender roles in video games. Clemens addressed a conundrum in which it's hard to criticize the way female characters are designed, because there are so few that we can't afford to lose any of them.
I always struggle a bit when criticizing portrayals of women in media, and that goes for all forms, not just games. You’re actually hitting on a common theme within the ways women are portrayed across the board, be it video games, film, television, or literature. A lot of female characters are still very clearly designed to appeal to the male gaze while simultaneously possessing complex personalities.
Sometimes I’m crestfallen because it seems like despite these complex personalities, their real value still lies in how screwable they are. Other times I kick myself for judging too harshly, or worse, participating in slut-shaming. I don’t want to be the clothing police. Demanding women cover themselves up only serves to demonize and hypersexualize female bodies even further. Adding to all that internal struggle, some male characters in fighting games have ridiculous costumes that also aren’t conducive to fighting, and I’m way more apt to just accept them as they are.
I think the real problem stems from the fact that there just isn’t as diverse of a spectrum when it comes to female characters in media. Often we’re left judging one or two female characters in a male-dominated group so they end up bearing more than a fair share of the burden of representation.
There's a lot more in the article at Unreality. Link
Some kids visiting the Dallas Zoo disrespect a gorilla, calling him ugly and jeering at him. They got what was coming to them. -via Daily Picks and Flicks
Luc Bergeron (Zapatou) has another expertly-edited video compilation of people (and a few animals) doing amazing things. He used 187 YouTube videos, with the title of each at the bottom of the screen, in case you see one that makes you want to go back and see the whole thing. -via Viral Viral Videos
A Wiffle ball is a lightweight, plastic baseball that curves when you throw it right. Sure, you've played with them! Mental_floss has its origin story and the run down on the most pressing question you ever had about Wiffle balls.
What's with the name?
Like a lot of baseball fans, Mullany's son and his friends referred to strikeouts as "whiffs." Since the new invention made knee-buckling curveballs a breeze to throw, pitchers started racking up the punchouts. Mullany named the product the Wiffle Ball to honor its strikeout-friendly breaks.
Why no "h" if the ball is named after whiffs?
The Mullanys allegedly nixed the "h" to save money if they ever had to buy a sign for their fledgling enterprise.
You'll also find out about the serious sport of competitive Wiffle ball. Link
The following article is taken from the book Uncle John's Legendary Lost Bathroom Reader.
Monsters have always been hits with moviemakers and their audiences, but The Outer Limits (which aired from 1963 to 1965) marked the first time TV viewers got a "monster of the week." The show was more than that, though; the lighting and cinematography gave the show an offbeat, intensely atmospheric look -and the writing was impressively literate. Despite its lukewarm ratings in its first run it remains one of TV's most memorable shows.
HOW IT STARTED
In 1961, Leslie Stevens came up with an idea for a science fiction show about "the awe and mystery of the universe." He brought it up in a conversation with "package programmer" Dan Melnick, who agreed it would make a good show -as long as it had monsters in it to make it commercial. And The Outer Limits was born.
Well, actually Please Stand By was born, because that was the title of the proposed pilot that Stevens sold to ABC in 1962. Filming began on December 2, with Joe Stefano producing. Early on, ABC requested the addition of a Rod Serling-like host to speak directly to the audience. Stefano didn't want one, so he compromised: he created an unseen presence called "The Control Voice" which introduced and commented on each episode. It was Stefano's excuse to editorialize. However, 1962 was a bad time to flash "Please Stand By" on screen while an "ominous voice" took control of viewer's TV sets. Only a few months earlier, the Cuban Missile Crisis had brought us to the brink of World War III. ABC guessed that an already frightened public might mistake the show for an official announcement and create an Orson Welles-type panic.
So the name was changed to Beyond Control and then to The Outer Limits. The series finally began shooting on May 22, 1963 and premiered three and a half months later. The show ran until January 16, 1965.
SPECIAL EFFECTS
The only things we have in an amount that we cannot change is time. All we can do is decide what we will do with the time we have. In this video, Ze Frank illustrates the time we have with jellybeans. So make the most of the jellybeans you have! -via mental_floss
There's nothing better on a hot summer day than some cold homemade ice cream, in your favorite flavors. If you grew up on fluffernutter sandwiches, you'll love this recipe for fluffernutter ice cream! First you cook up a mixture that reminds me a little of peanut butter fudge, then use it in your ice cream maker and swirl in marshmallow fluff and more peanut butter. Get the complete recipe at Hipsteaders. Link -via Laughing Squid
Snack lovers went into a slight panic when Hostess went out of business last year, because that meant no more Twinkies. To me, it meant no more Merita bread, and I still haven't adjusted. But fear no more, Twinkies will return July 15th!
Metropoulos & Co. and Apollo bought Twinkies and other Hostess cakes for $410 million.
Apollo Global Management, founded by Leon Black, is known for buying troubled brands then selling them for a profit; its investments include fast-food chains Carl's Jr. and Hardee's. Metropoulos & Co., which has revamped then sold off brands including Chef Boyardee and Bumble Bee, also owns Pabst Brewing Co.
***
The trimmed-down Hostess Brands LLC has a far less costly operating structure than the predecessor company. Some of the previous workers were hired back, but they're no longer unionized.
When Twinkies return, they will cost $3.99 for a box of ten. Other Hostess products, such as Wonder Bread, were bought by different companies. Link -via Fark
We now have silk fabric that glows under black lights created in three different ways. First, you can buy silk that has been dyed with fluorescent dye. Or you can use silk that was spun by silkworms that have been fed fluorescent dye. But now we also have silk that has been spun by silkworms that have been genetically modified with genes from fluorescent protein-producing animals. In three different colors!
Creating the glowing silks meant borrowing from organisms that already produce fluorescent molecules. Scientists inserted the DNA sequences that produce these foreign fluorescent proteins into the silkworm genome, creating what’s called a transgenic animal. One batch got a red, glowing protein normally found in Discosoma corals; another got a glowing orange protein from the Fungia concinna coral. The third strain incorporated the green fluorescent protein derived from jellyfish.
When the silkworms started spinning, the glowing sequences turned on and produced silk in three different colors — and the colors stayed vibrant and glowing for more than two years. Scientists bred and reared more than 20,000 of these transgenic silkworms in the lab, feeding them mulberry leaves, harvesting their shimmering threads and working out how to turn the raw, glowing cocoon silk into a functional material. Because the processing steps for normal silk — such as cooking cocoons at 100 degrees Celsius — destroy fluorescent proteins, the scientists needed to find a slightly different way to produce the fabrics. In the end, they found that a combination of slightly lower temperatures, an alkaline solution, and a vacuum produced softened cocoons that could be reeled.
Link -via Ed Yong
(Image credit: Iizuka et al., Advanced Functional Materials)
Okay, we knew on one level that fruits and vegetables are still "alive," because we can grow a new plant from just a piece of celery, carrot, or potato from the produce market. But a new study throws a different light on the concept of "life," as far as plants are concerned.
A study published online today in the journal Current Biology found that store-bought cabbage, lettuce, spinach, zucchini, sweet potatoes, carrots, and blueberries respond to light-dark cycles up to about a week after harvest.
And when the produce was kept on the same light-dark cycle as a predator—cabbage looper moth caterpillars (Trichoplusia ni)—it was better able to resist attacks.
Circadian clocks tell plants when the seasons change due to variations in day length, said Janet Braam, a plant biologist at Rice University in Houston, Texas. But the clock is also critical in plant defenses against insects.
"[Plants] know when the insects eat," said Braam, who is a co-author on the recent study, "so they can prepare a defense in advance."
Thinking about this led me to wonder if scientists can take individual cells from fruit and determine whether they are still alive. And when do they really die? Two weeks in the refrigerator? When we cut them? Or when we cook or eat them? Thinking along these lines can lead to nightmares. Read more about the study at NatGeo News. Link
(Image credit: Flickr user Jean-Alain Le Borgne)
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