Imagine swimming in the sky! You can imagine all you want, but there are quite a few hotels and resorts that have pools high above the ground, and some are quite scary-looking. Not this one. This multi-level infinity pool pictured here is at the Ubud Hanging Gardens resort in Bali. Other sky-high pools have glass bottoms. See a roundup of these high-flying swimming hles at the Alantic. Link -via the Presurfer
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This fine-looking cat is named not Harvey Dent, nor Janus, nor Two Face. Not even Lokai or Bele. Her name is Venus. But her mask is quite fetching! Link
We've been familiar with the term Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder since the Vietnam War. The diagnosis of PTSD revolves around the presence of trauma and symptoms that include "intrusive memories, hyper-arousal, and avoidance of reminders or emotional numbing." Most of us figured it was a modern name for a condition once called shell shock, battle fatigue, or something else even further back in time.
But until now, few studies have systematically looked for PTSD or post-trauma reactions in the older historical record. Two recent studies have done exactly this, however, and found no evidence for a historical syndrome equivalent to PTSD.
A study just published in the Journal of Anxiety Disorders looked at the extensive medical records for soldiers in the American Civil War, whose mortality rate was about 50-80 greater than modern soldiers fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.
In other words, there would have been many more having terrifying experiences but despite the higher rates of trauma and mentions of other mental problems, there is virtually no mention of anything like the intrusive thoughts or flashbacks of PTSD.
A different study looked at even older records, going back to antiquity, and found the same lack of specific symptoms that designate PTSD. It may be truly a unique and modern malady. Could it be because our modern lives are different, or maybe modern warfare is different, or could it be even our brains that are different today? A post at Mind Hacks has links to the original research papers. Link -via Boing Boing
The president keeps a bowl of apples in the Oval Office, which ends up in a lot of photographs -forty of them in this collection gleaned from the White House Flickr photostream. You have to wonder if anyone ever eats one of the apples, or slips one in their pocket. And who's in charge of making sure the bowl is full of fresh apples? I keep a fruit bowl on the dining room table, and it constantly needs a refill. Link
(Image credit: Flickr user The White House)
Alana McCarthy puts cats and dogs into costumes from your favorite comics, movies, and TV shows. They aren't exactly comfortable, but they sure are entertaining! McCarthy says,
I created the cat paintings as a funny side project to my more serious illustration work. I've been selling them for years at comic conventions across Canada and the States and finally opened my Etsy shop, GeekyPet this June. I'm a cat person and think it's hilarious to try to capture the disdainful looks of cats forced into costumes.
And these pet prints are for sale through McCarthy's Etsy shop. They are surprisingly affordable, and you get a discount when you buy three at once! Link
See more of McCarthy's work at her website, Facebook, or the Geeky Pets Facebook, or follow her on Twitter.
The lions, tigers, and leopards (and other cats) at Big Cat Rescue cool off with some watermelons. That means both playing with them and nomming on them! -via Laughing Squid
The following article is taken from the book Uncle John's Legendary Lost Bathroom Reader.
From the warm-water beaches in South America to the frigid waters off the north coast of Scotland, if it can be surfed it probably has been. But it wasn't too long ago that the sport was unknown outside of Hawaii.
HE'E NALU
For at least 3,000 years, seafaring Polynesians who settled the many islands in the Pacific Ocean have been surfing. The Hawaiian Islands were among the last the settlers reached, sometime around 400 A.D. These pioneers depended on the ocean for their livelihood and were skilled at navigating the white water that surrounded their island homes. Their surfing skills were a byproduct of their canoeing skills -the ability to pilot a canoe through heavy surf onto an unprotected beach was key to their survival. Early Hawaiians called the sport he'e nalu, or "wave sliding," and rode two different types of boards: Olo boards were 16 to 18 feet long (or even longer) and could weight 150 pounds or more. More common was the shorter type of board called alaia. At 8 to 10 feet long, it was lighter and more maneuverable than the olo, and is the forerunner of the modern surfboard.
WALKING ON WATER
Surfing played a huge role in Hawaiian culture. The most revered wave riders were called ali'i, or "high class." They were often political leaders who competed against each other while entire communities cheered from the beach. The priests, or kahunas, would pray each morning for good waves. Surfboard construction also had a set of rituals, performed in beachfront temples dedicated to the art. But it wasn't just the leaders who surfed -nearly everyone in old Hawaii rode the waves, regardless of age, gender, or class.
When British explorer Captain James Cook's Third Pacific Expedition arrived there in 1778, his men thought their eyes were playing tricks on them -the natives were zipping through the sea while standing upright on wooden planks. One sailor wrote, "The boldness and address with which I saw them perform these difficult and dangerous maneuvers was altogether astonishing and is scarcely to be believed."
WIPEOUT
Although the Europeans who first landed in Hawaii were awed by the native surf culture, the missionaries who came later were not amused. They disliked the idea of scantily-clad natives frolicking on the beach, so they tried to supress the sport. In the century after Captain Cook's arrival, the native population of Hawaii dropped from an estimated 300,000 to just 40,000 -and surfing nearly vanished. Fortunately, the determined Hawaiians who survived 19th-century colonialism refused to stop riding the waves.
And later visitors were just as impressed as Cook's men had been. On a trip to Hawaii in the 1860s, Mark Twain gave "surf bathing" a try. "I got the board placed right," he wrote, "and at the right moment, too; but missed the connection myself. The board struck the shore in three-quarters of a second, without any cargo, and I struck the bottom about the same time, with a couple of barrels of water in me."
From the 1950s to today, the sport of women's gymnastics has gone from "That's impressive!" to "These little girls aren't human, are they?" -via Cynical-C
Design students Alex Cabunoc and Ji A You visited Cerro Verde, a slum outside of Lima, Peru, as part of a challenge from the Design Matters program at Art Center College of Design, which focuses on social innovation.
When they first arrived in the slum, the pair were shocked at the amount of time Cerro Verde’s inhabitants spent collecting the water needed to perform the most basic tasks. “So much time, energy, and resources are used for basic water chores like cooking and cleaning,” remembers Cabunoc. "It leaves little time for other activities that might help one get out of poverty.” In particular, washing clothes is a major timesuck--it can eat up as much as six hours a day. There are major physical challenges involved with doing a simple load of laundry, too: lugging heavy buckets of water from a clean site, for example, or finding a way to dry the clothes before they get moldy.
One of the many ideas that came out of the trip is GiraDora, the foot-powered washing machine.
GiraDora is a blue bucket that conceals a spinning mechanism that washes clothes and then partially dries them. It’s operated by a foot pedal, while the user sits on the lid to stabilize the rapidly churning contents. Sitting alleviates lower-back pain associated with hand-washing clothes, and frees up the washer to pursue other tasks. It’s portable, so it can be placed nearby a water source, or even inside on a rainy day. It reduces health risks like joint problems, skin irritation, and mold inhalation. Most importantly, it uses far less water and cleans clothes faster than conventional hand-washing.
The students have received a small grant to develop their design through a pilot program. Link -via Dark Roasted Blend
Maybe I should have said "Kitten drinks milk ferociously." He knows what he wants! -via Arbroath
You've probably read more than once about how your favorite authors drank -and how to recreate their favorite beverages. But what about their favorite meals? Flavorwire has a literary collection of recipes such as Ernest Hemingway’s pan fried trout, Vladimir Nabokov’s Eggs à la Nabocoque, and Allen Ginsberg’s Cold Summer Borscht. There are ten authors and their recipes in the list. Eating these won't turn you into a writer, but they might make you feel a little closer to greatness. Or at least full! Link -via mental_floss
Music producer and remix artist Pogo (Nick Bertke) remixed some of the sounds heard in the film The Wizard of Oz. Then he put himself in the video! -via Laughing Squid
Ole Kirk Kristiansen established a business on August 10, 1932 that eventually became the LEGO company. But it didn't start out with building bricks and minifigs. He sold ladders, some furniture, and wooden toys. Eventually, of course, the toys really took off.
The shop was called LEg GOdt, or “play well” in Danish. Later, it would come to light that the phrase also means “I put together” in Latin.
The business started small, manufacturing small wooden toys. World War II kept Godfred home in the shop rather than traveling to Germany for school as he had originally planned. By 1949, the Kristiansens had hired 50 people and released the first LEGO forerunner, the “Automatic Binding Bricks,” sold exclusively in Denmark with four or eight studs, in four different colors.
Read more about the history of the LEGO company at Smithsonian. Link
(Image credit: LEGO Group)
The theme of the wedding must have been "Resistance is Futile." It's a good thing pictures of the cake were taken, as it was quickly assimilated by Star Trek fans at the reception. This awesome Borg cake was made by a baker at The Sugarplum Cake Shoppe in Colorado Springs, who has a nephew on reddit. Link -via Geeks Are Sexy
A newly-discovered species of goblin spider has been named in honor of British TV naturalist David Attenborough, and is now classified as Prethopalpus attenboroughi. The informal name will be Attenborough's goblin spider.
In an acceptance speech in Perth, Western Australia, Sir David said about his new namesake: "I take it that it is careful in its judgement, merciless, certainly beautiful and I will treasure it and I thank you very much indeed for this.
"Naming a species is the biggest of compliments that you could ask from any scientific community and I truly thank you very much indeed for this one."
The spider is commonly known as a goblin spider, so the scientists behind the find said that made it Attenborough's goblin spider.
It was not the first such honor for Attenborough: a fossil fish was named Materpiscis attenboroughi previously. Link -via Not Exactly Rocket Science
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