I don't know what they expected, riding bikes down a ski slope, but you know what to expect, you just don't know when. When it starts, it's all downhill from there, so to speak. You can see the long version here.

Held annually at the Les Deux Alpes ski resort in France, the Mountain of Hell pits 700 racers against a 15-mile course of snow, ice, rocks, and singletrack. The riders descend 8,530 feet in the process. And what’s best is they all start at the same time. So when one rider loses it on the slippery glacier, well, it becomes a pinball machine at full tilt.

-via Bits and Pieces

This time of year you'll find tons of lists of the best and worst things of 2020, but the most interesting are the ones that focus on the odd, strange, and bizarre. A list at LiveScience will entice you to read all ten stories, because they are medical reports of the weird things that can happen to someone's health. Maybe not you. We hope.  

The 54-year-old man suddenly lost consciousness after experiencing a life-threatening heart rhythm problem, according to a report of the case, published Sept. 23 in The New England Journal of Medicine. His family said that the man had a poor diet, and in recent weeks, he had consumed one to two large packages of black licorice every day. Despite receiving multiple treatings in the intensive care unit, the man died 32 hours after arriving at the hospital, the report said.

Black licorice often contains a compound called glycyrrhizin, which is derived from licorice root, according to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Consuming too much licorice root or candies flavored with licorice root can be dangerous because glycyrrhizin lowers the body's potassium levels. This, in turn, can lead to high blood pressure and abnormal heart rhythms.

So how much licorice is too much?

The FDA says that eating just 2 ounces of black licorice a day for two weeks can cause heart rhythm problems, particularly for people ages 40 and older.

This is the only case in the list in which the patient died. Read more of the strangest medical cases of the year, like the man with green urine, another man with three kidneys, and a woman who shed infectious particles of the novel coronavirus for 70 days straight, at LiveScience. -via Digg

(Image credit: The U.S. Food and Drug Administration)

In 1995, a group of four chess enthusiasts were devastated when their opponents took their queen in a very public New Year's Eve match at Madison Square Garden. Exactly 25 years later, they are staging a rematch, online of course. Phish will present "Dinner and a Rematch" on New Year's Eve, pitting themselves against online participants. You can join in through Chess.com (registration required). In addition to chess, there will be recipe swapping and some music. Drinking is optional, since you'll be at home anyway. And may the best mass player win.  -via Metafilter

Redditor emkay95 made a full-size apple rose tart for Christmas and wanted to show it off. Isn't it lovely? She said it was so labor-intensive she probably wouldn't ever make another. It's a good thing she took a picture before baking it.

That was a heartbreaking twist for readers, who were even more upset that she didn't take pictures of the aftermath. So no apple pie for Christmas dinner?

Well. It had tinfoil over it so it was kind of saved. We still made it and ate it but it wasn’t so beautiful anymore and kind of tasted like defeat

I'm sure it was delicious. Here's the recipe she used, although she did make a few alterations. Your mileage may vary.

As soon as you get over your food coma from eating so many Christmas treats, it's time to get ready for another holiday! In the US, especially the South, it's traditional to serve hog jowl (or ham hocks or just ham) along with black-eyed peas and your favorite greens to celebrate the New Year. It's supposed to auger health and prosperity. But there's no need to limit yourself to only what you've eaten before. You might want to look to other countries if you want to institute new food traditions for the holiday. Here's a sampling:

1. Spain

In Spain, it's customary to eat 12 grapes right at midnight on New Year's Eve, representing good luck for each of the coming 12 months.

8. Turkey

In Turkey, some smash pomegranates in the doorways of their homes. As the tradition goes, the number of seeds that fly out predict how much good fortune you'll have in the coming year.

Read about more New Year food traditions at Food52. -via The Week

Flatscreen television sets have opened up a whole new world to dogs and cats, who used to pay no attention at all to cathode-ray tube TV. Ella is a senior rescue cat who loves to watch TV, but she prefers to see one particular film, every day if possible. You can see more of Ella at her Instagram page.

Mileva Marić Einstein was a brilliant physicist who is little known today, mainly because she was a woman born in 1875. The reason she is known at all is because she was married to Albert Einstein from 1903 to 1919. Their collaboration in both science and life started in 1896 when both were at the Polytechnic Institute in Zurich. In what appeared to be a pattern set for their entire time together, Mileva dragged Albert through his classes.

Albert and Mileva became inseparable, spending countless hours studying together. He attended only a few lectures, preferring to study at home. Mileva was methodical and organized. She helped him channel his energy and guided his studies as we learn from Albert’s letters, exchanged between 1899-1903 during school holidays: 43 letters from Albert to Mileva have been preserved but only 10 of hers remain(5).

Mileva had better grades than Albert, but the professor giving the final oral exam gave her such low marks that she did not graduate. Her four male classmates did. Albert and Mileva went on to collaborate on groundbreaking physics research, but Mileva's name rarely appeared in published papers, possibly because she knew from experience that her participation could diminish those papers and therefore Albert's job prospects. What she felt would advance their future together ended up costing her everything. Read the story of Mileva Einstein at Scientific American. -via Damn Interesting

(Image credit: Unbekannt)

Sven Johnson had to make a video for the final exam in some media class, demonstrating his understanding of different technical aspects of production. What makes Sven's project stand out is that his brother is comedian and successful YouTuber Gus Johnson (previously at Neatorama), who volunteered to help out by appearing on camera. Sven has not revealed what grade he received. -via reddit

It's time for Barry Petchesky's annual list of things people had to go to emergency rooms to have removed from various bodily orifices in the preceding year. That includes the ears, nose, throat, penis, vagina, and rectum.

All reports are taken from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission’s database of emergency room visits, all descriptions are verbatim, and hey don’t put that in there, you might lose it.

Most of the list is just the object and its size, but there are some quotes from the reports. The reports of earbuds stuck in ears are quite believable, and the things pulled from noses appear to be mostly children, but you can almost hear the skepticism in the quotes about how objects became stuck in rectums -as reported by the patients. See the list at Defector.

pic.twitter.com/zNtLlCuESU

— Lady K (@Coppertopmpls) December 16, 2020

We have a breed of dog to resemble almost anyone you can think of, but how about the fantasy characters from The Lord of the Rings, many of whom aren't human? Lady K dared to ask the question on Twitter, but luckily, she was prepared to give us the answers. Continue reading for more.

Gouverneur Morris was given an awesome name at birth, and became a well-respected representative of what would become the state of Pennsylvania. He wrote the Preamble to the Constitution, and spoke up against slavery at the Constitutional Convention. Morris was later to serve as both a senator and a diplomat. But he had long term health problems, and died in 1816 at the age of 63.

Modern medicine has seen its greatest advances in the past century or so, with ever improving techniques and knowledge. Prior to that, people were often on their own to treat themselves and sadly such experimentation often met with unsuccessful results. This includes Gouverneur Morris, an American founding father, who died as a result of a self-inflicted injury to his penis.

The actions that led to Morris' death are cringe-inducing, but were the result of desperation. Read about Morris and his strange death at Medium. -via Strange Company

While you're stuck at home, dreaming of warmer weather, you might want to take a tour of the beautiful town of Savannah, Georgia. Online, that is. Savannah is known for its classic Southern architecture, museums, Spanish moss, antiques, and ghosts. And the people there take hospitality seriously.

The open container policy is a unique characteristic of the city, meaning it is 100% legal and 100% part of the Savannah experience to sip and savour while wandering the streets of the Historic District (provided you’re drinking from disposable cups). Throughout the historic district, there are hundreds of centuries-old live oak trees which are the true jewels of the city. Visiting in the mid to late fall is quite lovely with cooler temperatures and less humidity. It’s said that Savannah was spared from the destruction of the Civil War because of her beauty. There are numerous secret gardens to discover and wandering the many squares (all 22 of them) can fill an entire day – don’t miss the picturesque Wright Square one of the original four, where the city’s first burial ground lies beneath your feet.

Check out Savannah's best places to shop, eat, have fun, and learn some history, from a travel pro who's also a resident at Messy Nessy Chic.

DJ Earworm put together instrumental snippets of 52 hit songs, one for each year from 1970 to 2020 (there's two for 1985). It's like a timeline of pop music, accurately called Time of Our Lives. The part you will like best starts at whatever year you turned 12. I knew all of them until they got to the years when I was raising children, then my recognition got a little spotty. There's a list of the songs used at the YouTube page.   

Science says that having an alter ego, a different persona than the one you inhabit every day, can boost confidence and reduce anxiety. I can attest to that, as I used a stage name on radio and another on the internet. Batman probably got a lot of courage in hiding behind a batsuit. And others have tried that method of overcoming stage fright.

Beyoncé’s was the assertive and empowered ‘Sasha Fierce’, who allowed her to perform with extra self-confidence and sensuality. “Usually when I hear the chords, when I put on my stilettos, like the moment right before when you’re nervous… then Sasha Fierce appears, and my posture and the way I speak and everything is different,” she told Oprah Winfrey in 2008. It was a strategy that she continued to use until 2010, when she felt she had matured enough to avoid the psychological crutch.

Inspired by an emotional meeting with Beyoncé herself, Adele followed suit, telling Rolling Stone magazine in 2011 about her creation of ‘Sasha Carter’. The persona was a combination of Beyoncé’s Sasha Fierce persona and the (real) country music star June Carter. Adele said the strategy helped her give her best to every performance during her breakout year.

Although the embodiment of a fictional persona may seem like a gimmick for pop stars, new research suggests there may be some real psychological benefits to the strategy. Adopting an alter ego is an extreme form of ‘self-distancing’, which involves taking a step back from our immediate feelings to allow us to view a situation more dispassionately.

“Self-distancing gives us a little bit of extra space to think rationally about the situation,” says Rachel White, assistant professor of psychology at Hamilton College in New York State. It allows us to rein in undesirable feelings like anxiety, increases our perseverance on challenging tasks, and boosts our self-control.

Of course, that confidence isn't always used for good, as any internet comment section reader can tell you. Read about the experiments that led scientists to these conclusions at BBC.  -via Damn Interesting

(Image source: Shed On The Moon)

When you were young and shy and awkward and felt the world was against you, there may have been someone who told you that good things would happen to you eventually. It wasn't much comfort to hear right then, but time has a way of making it come true. Weird Al Yankovic was a shy and awkward 12-year-old with a crush on the girl who sat in front of him in school. Click the "see more" button, or click through to Facebook to read the story of his interaction with Patrice, and how he reconnected with her almost 50 years later. The story is a ray of sunshine. -via Bored Panda