Older homes that have been added to, altered, and modernized over the years sometimes contain surprising empty spaces. Andrea's family discovered that as they worked on their home. A little space under the stairs became a secret playroom for a small child. As their family grew, more work was done, and more small spaces found, until they had four "secret rooms" not quite large enough to be called a room, but big enough for children to play in. See how it all came about, with pictures, at Happy Chaos. Link -via b3ta
Miss Cellania's Blog Posts
Max X is not catering to his cat properly. That all changes when the cat gives him a taste of his own medicine! -via b3ta
Previously: More in the Max X series.
Purple Hearts are awarded to service members who are wounded in war. There are quite a few folks you know from the worlds of TV, movies, or literature that you may never have suspected are recipients of the Purple Heart. For example, James Arness, who played Marshal Dillon for years on TV's Gunsmoke.
Arness (or Aurness before he started acting) enrolled in the US Army in 1943. He wanted to be a fighter pilot, but with a height of 6’7”, there was no way that was going to happen – the maximum height of pilots at the time was 6’2”. So instead he served as a rifleman. Unfortunately, his height singled him out to be the first off the boat to test the water depth for the other men, leaving him to be the first target for the enemy. As a result, Arness was injured less than a year into his service during an invasion on Anzio, Italy, when he was shot in the right leg.
On the upside, his time in the hospital led to his work in television… eventually.
Read the rest of Arness' story, and those of other notable veterans with Purple Hearts at mental_floss. You might be able to guess a couple of them, but you won't guess all of them -and there are more in the comments, too. Link
In a psychedelic world where modern dance meets special effects, this was way cool in its time. Ballet Zoom was a popular Spanish TV dance troupe of the mid-1970s. Read more about them and see more video at a tribute blog. Link | English translation -via Boing Boing
The Tuscaloosa News informs us that arresting 55-year-old Walter White is the Tuscaloosa County Sheriff’s Office's top priority. Does this mean the end of Breaking Bad? No, just a series of coincidences. The Alabama man has the same name as the series' main character, engages in the same crime (methamphetamine manufacture), and was charged in 2008 (the same year Breaking Bad premiered). Link -via Fark
This article will take you back to an earlier time, when computers had few images and we played text-based games. At the time, they were state-of-the-art, but this analysis will make you either laugh or cringe -or both! Get a look into the sadistic minds who developed these games at Rant Gaming. Link -Thanks, Alex Galbraith!
Historically, cults and their leaders haven't had much luck getting good publicity. Maybe it's because of their intense religious fervor or their creepy recruiting methods, but most people do their best to avoid these cliques (not to mention the punch they serve). But hey, they aren't all bad. Ancient mathematician and philosopher Pythagoras had his own cult (er, "brotherhood") and if it weren't for him, children today might not be stuck at their desks trying to understand the multiplication tables. While most of Pythagora's philosophical beliefs seem pretty normal now, his theories on mathematics, music, and astronomy truly salvaged his legacy from "total whackjob" to "the father of numbers."
LET'S TALK TURKEY
Pythagoras was born on the island of Sámos (off what is now the western coast of Turkey) around 580 B.C.E. As a child, he spent most of his time writing poetry, reciting Homer, and learning to play the lyre. So he was a little precocious, to say the least. By the time Pythagoras turned 22, he pretty much absorbed everything his primary teacher, Pherecydes, had to offer in the areas of math and astronomy, so he was promptly shoved off to Egypt to further his studies. Luckily for our young scholar, this allowed him to get the heck out of Sámos, which was fast becoming a seething pit of unrest thanks to the ruling tyrant, Polycates.
WALK LIKE AN EGYPTIAN
Pythagoras made a quick beeline for the land of the Sphinx and immediately sought out the knowledgable priests of Egypt. But temple after temple turned him away, refusing to let him study with them because he didn't have the proper training in fasting and breathing. That is, until he arrived on the steps of the temple at Diospolis. There, Pythagoras was allowed to experience this training under their guidance, and, if able to endure the "hazing," would be admitted.
After completing the rites necessary for admission (and learning the extraordinariily complicated Diospolis handshake), Pythagoras was accepted into the priesthood. He spent the next 22 years there, learning geometry and cosmology while embracing the priesthood's other traditions, such as living life without personal possessions, adhering to a vegetarian diet, and, perhaps most famously, being strictly forbidden to eat beans. Although many historians are unsure why, some have postulated that the bean ban was due to the fact that they caused flatulence (still do), which destroyed the mental peace the priesthood of Diospolis felt was necessary for meditation. Another school of thought notes that black and white beans were used for voting at the time, and remaining sans beans was the equivalent of being apolitical. But, beans or not, during Pythagoras' time as a leader in this brotherhood, he began to develop philosophical beliefs that would one day become the cornerstone of his own teachings.
A Grand Theft Auto mod lets you play the game as a horse. No good could ever come of letting a horse loose behind the wheel of a convertible, I said, and I was right. All this needs is a clip of "Oh, Wilbur!" and a whinny at the end. -via Metafilter
Nemo Gould's kinetic sculpture The Visitor depicts an alien who has landed his craft on prehistoric Earth. Watch his eyes light up, his head turn to look out the "windows," and his, um, appendages flip levers in a video at the artisy's site. It was made from:
Typewriter case, picture frame, fresnel lens, electric massager, chandelier parts, voltage meters, book clippings, aquarium plants, LEDs, motors, fiber optic cable, laboratory beaker.
And it's for sale, too. Link -via Laughing Squid
Previously: Nemo Gould's Giant Squid Robot
Blue Chimp has escaped from a primate research facility, and a hunter is after him with a tranquilizer gun! This animation by Lee Daniels contains violence and bathroom humor. It's the beginning of a webseries featuring Blue Chimp. Link -via Kuriositas
A newly-hatched cephalopod swims by its yet-to-be-hatched sibling in this amazing photograph by Simon Chandra. The picture was taken off Pramuka Island, Indonesia, and submitted to National Geographic's Your Shot gallery. Then it was selected for the Weekly Wrapper to offer as downloadable wallpaper. Link -via reddit
(Image credit: Simon Chandra)
Kristen DaCosta of Somerset, Massachusetts, was ordered to wear an ankle bracelet as a condition of her probation, but didn't realize that police could track her movements with it. Detectives say they have evidence left by her monitor that she entered a home in Somerset and stole jewelry.
"She didn't destroy the place. She did not ransack it. But she certainly left her electronic fingerprint on the place for us. This lady was on a GPS monitoring device," said Chief Jospeh Ferreira of the Somerset Police Department.
Wait, it gets better.
Police told NBC 10 DaCosta was also sneaking through other neighborhoods, suspecting of breaking into at least a dozen homes all over Southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island.
DaCosta is charged with at least 17 break-ins while wearing the monitor, including burglaries in New Bedford, Dartmouth, Fairhaven and Tiverton.
Yes, she wore a GPS during 17 criminal acts before the police picked her up. In fact, this particular burglary occured two months ago, and the homeowner just recently realized the jewelry was missing. It's no wonder DaCosta thought she'd get away with it. Link -via Arbroath
Instead of regulation theater seats, the Beanie Plex theater in the Sunway Pyramid mall is filled with comfy fluffy love seats! And where do we find such comfort? In Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Those who write about the Beanie Plex tend to say they hope the concept spreads to a theater near them, but there's another way to look at it: You could stay at home and sit on a comfy love seat to watch a movie. Link -via mental_floss
Seven thousand Buddhist sculptures grace the caves and a sheer rock cliff face of the Maijishan Grottoes in Gansu Province, China. The work on these carvings took hundreds of years, peaking around 500AD, but continued until the beginning of the 20th century. Some are carved out of the cliff itself, some are made of clay, and some rock sculptures have been brought in from elsewhere. See lots of photographs of this amazing landmark from various vantage points at Kuriositas. Link -via the Presurfer
(Image credit: Flickr user mke1963)
This lovely performance is from the closing ceremony of the World Shanghai Exposition in 2010. We are used to seeing dancers fly through the air on by invisible wires, but what are the musicians sitting on? -via Arbroath
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