Yes, it's a watering trough, but to the monkeys, it's a swimming pool with both low-dive and high-dive platforms! -via Buzzfeed
Miss Cellania's Blog Posts
Once again, it's time for our collaboration with the always amusing What Is It? Blog! Do you know what the object in this picture is? You can win even if you don't know!
Place your guess in the comment section below. One guess per comment, please, though you can enter as many as you'd like. Post no URLs or weblinks, as doing so will forfeit your entry. Two winners: the first correct guess and the funniest (albeit ultimately wrong) guess will each win a T-shirt from the NeatoShop.
Please write your T-shirt selection alongside your guess. If you don't include a selection, you forfeit the prize, okay? May we suggest the Science T-Shirt, Funny T-Shirt and Artist-Designed T-Shirts?
Check out the What Is It? Blog for other mystery items. Good luck!
Update: the pictured object is indeed, a horn shark's egg. Ain't nature weird? Mindy Slover-Peek was the first of many commenters to recognize it, and wins a t-shirt from the NeatoShop! The funniest answer came from iago, who guessed it to be a "Piece of fossilized unicorn poop found in North Korean unicorn lair." (reference) That's good for a t-shirt, too! Thanks to everyone who played! You can see the answers to all this week's mystery items at the What Is It? blog.
Neatorama presents a guest post from actor, comedian, and voiceover artist Eddie Deezen. Visit Eddie at his website.
Okay, here's your question of the day: What's the only Christmas song to hit #1 on the pop charts? Did you guess Bing Crosby's "White Christmas"? "Rudolph the Red-Nosed reindeer"? "Frosty the Snowman"? "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree"? Maybe Paul McCartney's "Wonderful Christmas Time" (God forbid)? All good guesses, but read on.
In 1958, Ross Bagdasarian (also known as David Seville) created a fictional recording group and dubbed them "The Chipmunks."
(Pause for trivia: four years earlier, Ross was a young actor trying to make it in Hollywood. You can glimpse him as a struggling composer in the 1954 Alfred Hitchcock classic film Rear Window with James Stewart and Kim Novak Grace Kelly.)
The Chipmunks consisted of three animated members. Ross himself took on the voices of two of the Chipmunks: Simon, the oldest Chipmunk, and Alvin, the youngest and most mischievous one. Ross' wife, Janile Klarman, took on the voice of the middle chipmunk, Theodore.
The Chipmunks' voices sounded like three little kids who had been inhaling helium. To get his voice high-pitched enough to play a chipmunk, Ross doubled the speed of the tape recorder he used. Ross had his first number one hit earlier in 1958 with "Witch Doctor," a catchy novelty tune using the same technique.
Think about this the next time someone gives you a gift of fruitcake. From The Joy of Tech. Link -via Geeks Are Sexy
In honor of the new movie The Hobbit, Screen Junkies continues their trashing of our most beloved films with a combined honest trailer for all the Lord of the Rings films, thoroughly eviscerating them. -via Blame It On The Voices
Wanna make a bet on the winner in this wrestling match? -via Tastefully Offensive
This instructional diagram from How To Be A Dad brings back memories. I was a little disappointed this year when my teenagers put up the tree and only used the "pretty" ornaments, while leaving all their old homemade ones in the decoration boxes. Now I miss all those years when they decorated as high as they could reach, a little higher every year, and I gradually filled out fewer of the top branches. But they still eat all the candy canes! Link -via Tastefully Offensive
Kenichi Kanazawa demonstrates how sound makes art as it vibrates and moves piles of colored sand around.
This is version of what is better known as Chladni plates, as the table top is made of a plate of steel which vibrates when he rubs the rubber balls on its border, an effect similar to rubbing a crystal glass with wet fingers. The vibrating top then makes the sand jump and accumulate in nodal patterns.
Forgetomori has more videos that demonstrate the power of musical vibrations, featuring a Tibetan singing bowl, which makes water dance as it resonates. Link -via TYWKIWDBI
Google presents their annual look back at the most-searched people, stories, and events of the year, this time framing them as they were presented at G+ as well as YouTube, but also reminding us of the company's roots as a search engine. Link -via The Daily What
Now, if you are hosting a Christmas party and have all the food and treats covered, but you're still looking for something that will make your guests go "Whoa!!" when they see it, this will fill the bill. Make ice cubes with rosemary sprigs and berries to look all Christmassy. Instructions and more holiday drink tips are at Funkytime. Link -via Buzzfeed
Admit it, you smiled when you first heard about Spider-Man: The Musical or Spamalot, whether you ever saw those shows or not. They are far from the strangest subjects for musical stage productions. How about Octomom! The Musical, or Jerry Springer: The Opera? None of them are as weird as Triassic Parq:
A phony Morgan Freeman narrates the dramatic story of a Tyrannosaur sex-change. I am not kidding one bit about this. This parody of Jurassic Park is told from the perspective of some genetically-revived dinos dwelling on a tropical island who hail the local laboratory as their deity. Live actors in colorful clothing bring these singing saurians to life.
Read about 12 such weird musical productions at mental_floss, where they're celebrating 12/12/12 with many lists of twelve things on a variety of subjects. Link
The Koren Ensemble, otherwise known as Daniel Koren, repeats his stunt from 11/11/11 for today's date, 12/12/12.
What's so special about 12/12/12? It's just a series of repeating numbers in the date, but it will be the last one for a long time -after all, we don't have a month numbered higher than 12! Still, after all the others, people are just not excited about the date.
Perhaps we're all just a little jaded after so many numerical notables during the past decade, from 1/1/1 on up. Remember all the hullabaloo over 6/6/6? It was feared to be the end of the world -- hmm, where have we heard that before? -- and barring that, hundreds of expectant moms with sign-of-the-devil due dates opted for C-sections on other days. On 8/8/8, the Beijing Olympics were carefully coordinated to begin at 8:08 p.m., eight being a significant number in Asian cultures. And then we turned it up to triple 11s last year.
And now, the 12s. Yawn. Even the Bay Area's favorite numbers man, retired high school teacher Ron Gordon, of Redwood City, who pines for palindromes and loves a good Pi Day (March 14, or 3/14), sort of gave up on 12/12/12. He had sent out news releases about the sequential date of 10/11/12, but got little interest, so he figured folks might be tired of all the dizzying dates.
"Seemed like 12/12/12 just wasn't going to get enough respect," he said.
Or maybe it's because the date getting all the press is 12/21/12. Link
Pull the lever and see what comes up! It will be a random strange, horrible, or possibly amazing gift suggestion, with a link to the sales site. Link
The Crap-o-Matic Gift Generator is today's offering at Apocalymas, a countdown to the end of the Mayan calendar. A different distraction is offered every day until then. Link -via the Presurfer
A wild turkey invades the porch. Although the homeowners put up a staunch defense, using martial arts moves they saw in the movies, the turkey will not back down. Try to guess who wins this one! -via Arbroath
I think Ariel the parrot has spotted a squirrel. Ya think? -via Arbroath
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