Vintage postcards are available for locations all over the world, but somehow, they all have the same sky. Or one of three skies, it seems, with recognizable cloud formations if you keep an eye out for them. Vox takes a deep dive into them with James Brouwer, a postcard collector who found this phenomenon in his massive collection. Yes, there is an explanation. We'll learn a lot of about tourism postcards in the process. As soon as I finished watching the video, I went to my envelope of postcards. They aren't vintage, just family souvenirs. Most don't even have clouds, and I saw no duplicates. Then again, they are all from the last 20 years or so.  -via Nag on the Lake

Dr. Katalin Karikó was a biochemist in Hungary who didn't get the respect or funding her research deserved. So she, her husband, and infant daughter made their way out of communist Hungary in 1985 by selling their car, converting the money on the black market, and hiding it inside the baby's toys. She made it to the US and got a research job at the University of Pennsylvania's School of Medicine. While that's quite a story, it was only beginning. Karikó ran into the same problems in the US- supervisors who did not believe in her research and would not go to bat to get the funding she needed.

You see, Karikó was a pioneer working with messenger RNA, or mRNA. She believed it could be made to work against a host of human illnesses, but the substance was a problem to work with in the lab. Her colleagues considered her experiments failures, but Karikó considered them learning experiences. Still, it was hard to get funding without someone higher up to believe in what you're doing. She began to collaborate with immunologist Drew Weissman, who was looking for a vaccine for HIV. They had a breakthrough in 1997, but it still took several years to get a peer-reviewed paper published. By 2013, Karikó was making progress, but she had worked for Penn for almost 30 years, and she'd had enough. She left for a position at a fairly new biomedical startup called BioNTech.

You can see where this story is going. You can read the full version at Glamour magazine. -via Metafilter

Maurice Evans has been collecting fireworks for most of his life, and he's in his 80s now. The gentle author at Spitalfields Life takes us to his home in Shoreham to see the collection and hear his story, with just a bit of trepidation.

My concern about potential explosion was relieved when Maurice confirmed that he has removed the gunpowder from his fireworks, only to be reawakened when his wife Kit helpfully revealed that Catherine Wheels and Bangers were excepted because you cannot extract the gunpowder without ruining them.

This statement prompted Maurice to remember with visible pleasure that he still had a collection of World War II shells in the cellar and, of course, the reinforced steel shed in the garden full of live fireworks. “Let’s just say, if there’s a big bang in the neighbourhood, the police always come here first to see if it’s me,” admitted Maurice with a playful smirk.

But it seemed safe enough, as Maurice still has nine of his ten fingers. The story of his pyromaniacal past and how he developed a fondness for fireworks is more interesting than the collection itself. Read about Maurice Evans and his fantastic fireworks collection at Spitalfields Life. -via Nag on the Lake

Vehicles that run on electricity were around when the first powered vehicles were developed. However, when a new technology comes out in many forms, we usually managed to whittle them down to one type in order to embed the necessary infrastructure, like trained mechanics, factories, and most importantly, fueling stations in all locations. In the case of cars, the gasoline engine won out due to Henry Ford and the abundance of crude oil. But electric power has always been there, mostly in the background, waiting for the right conditions to make a comeback. This TED-Ed animated video explains the history of electric cars. -via Laughing Squid  

As they say, a lie can travel around the world before the truth gets out of bed. I recall telling my Mom that you can't go swimming for an hour after eating. She said, "You're not doing laps for the Olympics. You're just playing in the water. Go on." And she was right, even if that didn't quite debunk the myth. We call them old wives' tales or urban legends, but there are people who will argue with you about these myths today. Some may have once had a reason behind them, or at least faulty reasoning that seemed to make sense at the time, while others are just made up of whole cloth, like eating spiders in your sleep.

You know what can make you feel old? I can remember when some of these untrue "facts" were considered "news" or at least new research findings. See all 14 myths that aren't true at Cracked.

Go, dog, go! On October 23, Frisbee Rob McLeod and a very talented dog named Sailor performed during halftime at the Calgary Stampeders and Saskatchewan Roughriders game in Calgary. Rob threw a Frisbee from one end zone to the other- and sailor not only caught up with it, he caught it!

This sets a new world record for the longest catch at a live sporting event. Earlier this year, Rob Gronkowski caught a ball from 200 yards, albeit that was a ball dropped from a helicopter into an empty stadium. The longest catch possible in an official football game is the 99-yard pass, which has been done quite few times. But Sailor did it the hard way, by starting in the same spot as the thrower. If you want to see more of Sailor, a longer (five minute) video shows us the entire sequence.

That's a good dog. -via reddit

How does one survive the Antarctic cold? Seals develop a thick layer of fat. Penguins combine fat, feathers, and the habit of clinging together in large numbers. People build science stations with heaters. But the Antarctic icefish (Channichthyidae) is cold-blooded and uses some really weird alternative anatomy. It is the only known vertebrate that doesn't have hemoglobin in its blood! The blood of the icefish is almost clear.

What the fish's blood does contain is organic antifreeze. It has unique and specific proteins that lower the freezing point of water, so neither the blood nor the fish's tissues will develop ice crystals. Inspired by the icefish, a food company developed a yeast that produces these same antifreeze proteins and uses it in ice cream!   

But back to the icefish. Without hemoglobin, how does the fish get oxygen to its tissues? Luckily, Antarctic Ocean water holds more oxygen than warmer water. The fish has no scales, so it absorbs some through it skin. It also has a heart that's four times the size of those of similar-sized fish. Read more about the strange Antarctic icefish at Atlas Obscura.

(Image credit: Marrabbio2)

The best part of the traditional Thanksgiving feast is the dressing, unless you call it stuffing. The basic recipe for both is the same: bread, turkey broth, onions and celery, and spices. My recipe calls for cornbread and lots of sage, others use white bread, sometime sausage or oysters, and an article at Lifehacker mentions eggs, although I never found eggs necessary.

In the South, it's called dressing. If you call it stuffing in the South, people will think you are making Stovetop Stuffing, the instant stuff that comes in a box. In the West, it's more likely to be called stuffing. Other areas vary between the two terms. Semantically, it is stuffing if you put it inside the turkey to be cooked, and dressing when it is cooked separately and served on the side. Still, people tend to use the word common in their region instead of by how it is used.  

No matter what you call it, you shouldn't cook the stuffing inside the bird, though, regardless of what your ancestors did. The reasons why are spelled out at Lifehacker.

In the 1980s and the decades afterward, a cult flourished that revolved around Ior Bock, a Finn who claimed to be descended from mystical ancient pagans. Bock was once a well-known actor in Finland, and he spent years as a tour guide for a historical site until he was let go for embellishing his historical tales. Honestly, Ior Bock's biography is bonkers, involving incest, adoption, fratricide, showbiz, cult leadership, mental illness, paraplegia, and murder -and some of it is true.

In the 1970s and '80s, Bock spent his summers in Goa, India, which was at the time a refuge for hippies looking for enlightenment. He told the story of his family's saga as the keepers of history. It explained the origins of all the people of the world and how they are related, as well as the pagan paradise that was once the North Pole, but is now in Finland. Bock gathered followers and told them of a temple called Lemminkäinen that was a chamber full of treasures from the early civilizations he spoke of.  

So, since 1987, a small but dedicated team of amateur archaeologists have been excavating the Temple of Lemminkäinen on the Bock family estate.

According to Ior Bock, the temple was sealed in 987AD to protect the pagan artefacts from Catholic crusaders who invaded Finland, so the first job was to open it back up.

They've been digging for more than 30 years now. Dutch author Carl Borgen traveled from Canada to Goa as a teenager and heard Bock's saga, but didn't follow him back to Finland. He kept in touch with friends who did, and now had published a book called Temporarily Insane, which is an account of Bock and his followers. Read an overview of Bock, Borgen, and the book at The Scotsman. -via Strange Company

(Image credit: Paasikivi)

Just like clockwork, the end of the Halloween season means Christmas shopping is upon us. And every year, the John Lewis Christmas ad campaign sets the standard for holiday advertising that makes you go all verklempt inside. This year's ad offers us a close encounter, a new friend, and an out-of-this-world experience. Science fiction meets Hallmark, as it were. A YouTube commenter said, "Explain the plot of E.T in 2 mins. Oh, but make it set at Christmas.” His classmates are not going to believe this story when school starts again after the holidays. As many years as I have been posting John Lewis Christmas ads, I still don't know what they sell.

To someone who's not into chemistry, the Periodic Table of Elements may seem incomprehensible. Looking at it without understanding is downright boring. For that matter, looking at it can be boring even if you do understand it. So how about a bit of poetry to make the elements relatable? That's what we get with Elemental haiku. Here are some samples.

Neon

There's no shame in it.
Advertising pays the bills.
Stop looking so red.

Arsenic

Called in for questions,
blacklisted, cannot quite shake
your poisonous past.

Radium

Licked by the women
painting luminous watches.
How much time stolen?

See, every element has a story, one that can be told in seventeen syllables. Elements matter, so to speak. Check out all the elements at Elemental haiku.  -via Nag on the Lake

A question used for the 2014 US Physics Olympiad team qualifying exam managed to stick around because it was so intriguing. If you hang a flexible but consistent rope underneath a moving helicopter, which of the above shapes would that rope take? I figured that would depend on other factors, but let's assume they are not carrying a piano or a rhino. Derek Muller of Veritasium decided to find out once and for all, so he hired a helicopter and a pilot to do the experiment. Think about how you would answer the question, maybe even write it down, and then watch the video.



It's pretty neat that he also tracked down the origin of the question and interviewed the guy who came up with it. Don't be concerned with the length of the video; the basic question is answered in about four minutes, but then they add some confounding factors that you'll find quite interesting. The last minute is an ad. -via Digg

Facebook has been in the news lately for reinforcing preconceived notions and contributing to information bubbles. That's because the algorithm loading your feed is programmed to give you more of the same kinds of things you've shown interest in before. It's not the only social media platform to do this, and all kinds of websites are glad to recommend that you read "more like this." You can understand why they do that, but without some effort, you'll end up being recommended the same subjects over and over until you may begin to think that's all there is. Clive Thompson calls that "a form of intellectual monocropping." This applies to more than just politics or pandemic information. If you are into crocheting, football, veganism, or Marvel comics, and you keep following recommendations, you can end up missing out on a lot of the other things that the web has to offer.

Of course, you, being a Neatorama reader, have varied interests and already know that the internet is more than just social media. However, you may want to try some new ways to expand both your web surfing and offline interests. Clive Thompson has put a lot of thought into this, and gives us nine methods he uses to get out of a rut and into something fascinating you wouldn't have considered otherwise.  -via Kottke

(Image credit: Flickr user Jennifer C.)

You've heard the phrase "dead as a doornail" before, but it never made much sense, because all inanimate objects are just as dead. Besides, doors are now more likely to be held together with staples and glue than with nails. Maybe whoever coined the phrase just liked the alliteration. But there's more to it than that.

This video starts off talking about the phrase, but fairly quickly turns into a chapter in the history of carpentry. It has to do with the particular challenge of joining flat slabs of hand-hewn wood side-to-side to build a door, back when nails were hand-made. The video ends up being way more interesting than you expect. -via reddit

This odd picture has a wonderful story behind it.

A redditor who goes by Wildlife-outside works at a nature center that has hawks and owls and she got used to handling what we would consider dangerous birds. She also became a volunteer bird rescuer, and now get calls when a situation arises. One day, a bald eagle collided with a bucket truck and was injured. Authorities called her for help while she was in the middle of dying her hair! Wildlife-outside responded and chased the injured eagle through a swamp before wrapping him up in a blanket. Yes, he's a wrapped raptor. He had already tried to bite her in the face, which would have made a very different picture. She put the eagle in a box and drove it to a wildlife rehabilitation center, but not before her husband took a one-of-a-kind snapshot. The eagle doesn't look happy at all, and she has a thousand-yard stare that says, "You have to take a picture NOW?" 

The fallout: In case you're wondering, the dye job came out just fine. This type of color doesn't contain any bleach, but you still want to wait until it's finished to show it off. Wildlife-outside doesn't know what happened to the eagle, but is certain that the rehab center took good care of it. While it took her months to get up the nerve to share the picture, the post at reddit got 85K upvotes and 24K comments in only eight hours. I would love to say that a good time was had by all, but neither she nor the eagle had fun saving the bird's life. We are just glad she did.

(Image credit: Wildlife-outside)

Update: by request, she did an AMA (Ask Me Anything) post as a follwup.