Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, theorized on the unconscious mind, dreams, and how sex shapes our psyches. He became somewhat of a patron saint to the Surrealist artists of the early 20th century. As such, Freud was the man-crush of a relatively young Salvador Dali.

Before Salvador Dali met Sigmund Freud during the summer of 1938 in London, the great Surrealist artist had tried unsuccessfully on several occasions to meet the revered psychoanalyst at his consulting rooms in Vienna. Dali had lacked the confidence to knock unannounced on Freud’s door and instead had wandered the cobbled strasse holding “long and exhaustive imaginary conversations” with his idol. He had also fantasised about bringing Freud back arm-in-arm to his room at the Hotel Sacher, imagining the great psychoanalyst “clinging to the curtains” while he babbled freely about his dreams, his sexuality, and his fears.

Dali had spent his teens and early twenties reading Freud‘s works on the unconscious, on sexuality and The Interpretation of Dreams. His inability to meet the psychoanalyst in Vienna suggests Dali was in some way terrified of Freud, as if this grand examiner of human behavior was capable of seeing straight through him like a believer might feel when coming face-to-face with God.

The meeting was eventually arranged by a mutual friend. Freud was 81 years old and Dali was starstruck, so the visit was exceedingly awkward. But Dali was inspired to draw Freud -as a snail. Read the story of that meeting at Dangerous Minds.

(Image credit: Library of Congress)

Matt MacMillan recorded the sounds his infant son Ryan made over a year's time, and then edited it into the AC/DC classic "Thunderstruck." The idea is insane, the editing is sublime, and Ryan is precious. -via reddit

The Wall Street Journal crunched the numbers on airline delays, cancellations, complaints, and more and arrived at a ranking of the nine biggest US airlines. People who fly a lot will not be surprised to see Delta at the top, American and United at the bottom, and the smaller discount airlines filling in between.  

1. Delta: ranked the best in on-time arrivals, canceled flights, and involuntary bumping.
2. Alaska: ranked the best in extreme delays.
3. Southwest: ranked the best in two-hour tarmac delays.
4. Allegiant: ranked the best in mishandled baggage.
5. Spirit: ranked the worst in customer complaints.
6. JetBlue: ranked the worst in extreme delays.
7. Frontier: ranked the worst in on-time arrivals.
8. United: ranked second-to-last in two-hour tarmac delays and mishandled baggage.
9. American: ranked the worst in canceled flights, two-hour tarmac delays, mishandled baggage, and involuntary bumping.

Since I fly by price, I am partial to Southwest. My only complaint is that they don't fly to that many destinations. You can get more details on the rankings at the Wall Street Journal, or if you are paywalled, at Lifehacker.

(Image credit: JacobAviation)

The Dionne Quintuplets were the first set of quints to all survive infancy, and the only set of identical quintuplets ever recorded. Born in 1934, before sonograms and neonatal care units, the five babies were a surprise to their mother, Elzire Dionne, who suspected she was carrying twins. They arrived two months premature at the farmhouse in rural Ontario where their parents and five older siblings lived.  

Local doctor Allan Roy Dafoe, who was present for the births, did an amazing job keeping the five premature babies alive under difficult circumstances and with no access to medical equipment. He sterilized the farmhouse, kept the babies warm in a wicker basket using hot water bottles or the open oven, and recruited nurses to massage them with olive oil. Before supplies of breast milk could be organized, Dafoe ordered the babies to be fed cow’s milk, sterilized water and corn syrup, mixed with one or two drops of rum for a stimulant.

As news about the miraculous birth spread across North America, reporters and photographers poured into the small town, followed by spectators in thousands. They gathered outside the farmhouse and peeped through the windows for a glimpse of what was already becoming a freakshow. Some ridiculed the parents for creating a litter of humans. Others provided monetary assistance. One couple offered to buy the bed where the girls were born for a thousand dollars. A hospital sent two incubators.

Oliva and Elzire Dionne were desperately poor and now had ten children. They felt they had no choice but to relinquish the girls to the Red Cross for their own welfare and to keep them from being exploited. The Canadian government soon stepped in and took legal custody. They lived in a custom-built nursery that also worked as a display case, where tourists could observe the girls in their private playground. The quintuplets were not only unique but adorable as well, and were used to promote tourism and sell products. Read the story of the Dionne Quintuplets at Amusing Planet.  -via Strange Company

Feeding astronauts has always been an ongoing experiment, as space food presents unique problems. Food supplies need to take up little space and last a long time. Preparing and eating meals without gravity is a challenge. And altitude makes food taste more bland than it does on earth. Those problems were all solved at once when Mexican food was introduced to space flight.  

In fact, NASA had used tortillas for astronaut sustenance as early as 1985, when Mexican scientist Rodolfo Neri Vela requested a pack as part of his food provisions, to make tacos. The media treated Neri’s food choices at the time with bemusement, but astronauts quickly took to flour tortillas—and not just because of the flavor, redolent of flour and slightly sweet, better than most of the sterilized slop astronauts ate. Tortillas didn’t spoil easily. Astronauts could wrap one around anything and make a quick meal. They also weren’t dangerous, like bread, whose crumbs crippled air vents and sensitive equipment.

NASA took tortillas so seriously that they tinkered with the recipe—which hadn’t substantially changed in millennia save for the introduction of flour—to keep stacks fresh for up to six months. Scientists created a nitrogen-filled packet that removed almost all the oxygen present in the pouch, to prevent mold from growing. One major problem arose: astronauts discovered that six-month-old space tortillas became bitter—and no one deserves a bitter tortilla. Finally, NASA found a manufacturer who made an extended-shelf-life tortilla that lasted up to a year and retained its allure, a maker that also sold their product to fast-food titan Taco Bell. Hundreds of thousands of dollars well spent.

“I cannot think of anything that cannot be put on a tortilla, or has not been put on a tortilla,” wrote Sandra Magnus, a veteran astronaut, in a blog post while up in the International Space Station in 2008. “When a Shuttle shows up you are in tortilla heaven because they show up with tons of them and graciously donate all of the extras to the ISS crews. You really want to be swimming in tortillas your whole increment.”1

In an excerpt from his book Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America, author Gustavo Arellano tells us how Mexican food took over America, the world, and even outer space. -via Metafilter

(Image credit: NASA)

This graphic shows the wealth of the entire world, proportionally broken down into the countries that hold it. While the US makes up less than 5% of the world's population, Americans control almost 30% of the world's wealth. In second place is China, which makes up 18.59% of the world's population and controls 17.7% of its wealth. That sounds more equitable on the surface, but neither nation is known for sharing the wealth with its citizens. Meanwhile, India looks fairly wealthy on this graphic, until you remember it contains 17.7% of the world's population. See a larger version of this chart and get the details at How Much. -via Digg

People have been collecting fossils since prehistoric times, but for most of history, they didn't know what they were. In the Middle Ages, the idea arose that they were the remains of once-living creatures. In the 17th century, fossils found high on mountains were assumed to be left there by the Biblical flood of Genesis. Swiss physician and naturalist Johann Jakob Scheuchzer was convinced of this theory, and set out to find evidence of Noah's flood in the fossil record.

In his quest, Scheuchzer would get quite ahead of himself when he came across a fossil that, in his eyes, offered incontrovertible evidence that humans had perished in the biblical flood.

The fossil in question is an incompletely preserved strange skeleton that had been discovered in a limestone quarry near the small town of Öhningen in southern Germany. Scheuchzer identified his prize fossil as Homo diluvii testis, meaning “man, witness of the Flood.” In 1726 he published a broadside to announce his discovery. In his great work on the natural history of the Bible, Physica sacra of 1731, Scheuchzer cited the Reverend Johann Martin Miller as expressing the hope that the “sad bony frame of an old sinner” would soften the “heart of new children of evil!”

Scheuchzer went to his grave believing that the fossil he found was human, but other scientists were skeptical. Only in 1811 was the fossil properly identified. Read that story at Smithsonian.

(Image credit: Ghedoghedo)

Those who have seen the movie 1917 were impressed by its realism. That may be because it was filmed to appear as one long continuous shot. Director Sam Mendes recalls the reaction editor Lee Smith had to the outlandish idea.

“I laughed hysterically,” Smith said. “Sam actually had it on the cover page of the script that it should look like a single shot. And as I was reading it, I kept thinking to myself, ‘I have no idea how this is going to work.’ Whenever I read a script, the film plays out in my head in conventional coverage–and I had to keep reminding myself that even though there will of course be edits, you’re not supposed to see them.”

It works, as 1917 won a Golden Globe for Best Drama, and is a favorite for Best Picture at the Oscars. Jason Kottke said the technique was a bit distracting, because he tended to look for the edits. So just watch this video about how they did it, then go see the movie and let yourself get lost in the action.  

You probably thought the chainsaw was developed to cut down trees, which makes total sense. But that's not how it came about. Before the cesarian section was refined enough for both a mother and baby to survive the procedure, drastic action was sometimes required to deliver a child stuck in the birth canal.

In the 18th century, two Scottish surgeons named John Aitken and James Jeffray devised a solution they could employ when faced with difficult childbirths. Rather than use a knife to widen the pelvic area by slicing through cartilage and bone to extricate a stuck baby, the two developed a chainsaw to make cutting easier.

While this sounds ghastly, the doctors were actually trying to lessen the agony endured by women who needed their pelvic bone separated. The knife took a long time, while their device—a modified knife with serrated “teeth” on a chain—could cut through bone and tissue more quickly.

This disturbing practice died out when medical advances allowed doctors to remove a child while avoiding bones altogether. But the chainsaw was still a useful gadget. In the 20th century, chainsaws were adapted for work that seems more familiar to us, like cutting trees. Read the rest of the story at Mental Floss.

(Image credit: Sabine Salfer)

Milton Bradley first sold The Checkered Game of Life in 1860, and almost single-handedly launched the board game craze. While the game tiles seem discouraging and downright depressing, it was a change from previous versions of the game that were designed to promote only morality. Bradley's version focused more on long life, happiness, and achievements -although there were some pretty scary pitfalls. The more modern version, of course, equates a winning life more on wealth and possessions. This video is only 4.5 minutes long, the rest is an ad.

The nominees for the Academy Awards were announced earlier this week, and Scarlett Johansson has been nominated for two acting awards: Best Actress for Marriage Story, and Best Supporting Actress for Jojo Rabbit. That doesn't happen often, but it has happened before, twelve times in the awards' 92-year history. Never has an actor been nominated in the same category twice, but that's apparently on purpose, because sometimes one nomination will be in the Best Supporting category even when the role was clearly the lead. In most instances, the actor received one Oscar, but sometimes they walked away with nothing. Will there come a time when one performer wins two acting Oscars in the same year? Perhaps, but not likely. Meanwhile, each of the previous double nominee occurrences has a story behind it, and you can read those at Vulture.

Kate Wagner of McMansion Hell staged the site's second annual gingerbread McMansion competition, and the winners have now been announced. The top honor went to Erin E. for her creation titled Simply Having a Wonderful Building Crime.

The judges all agreed: this house was outrageous - its execution was fantastic, and its design was full of so many delightful, humorous details. Sarah remarked: “This one is perfectly McMasion-scaled, with weirdly placed windows and gratuitous features to boot.” Anjulie couldn’t sing the praises enough: “I was particularly taken with the garage that is so far detached it makes the front door totally irrelevant…it’s a castle of grand sadness. The Pete Buttigieg sign is the literal icing on top.” Kate loved the details: the Pete sign, the ridiculously diverse selection of windows, the piped on invasive plants and basketball hoop, and the glass and siding effects. Part of the competition lies in its absurdity and humor, and in that particular category, this house took the cake.

See pictures of this winning McMansion from all angles, plus the second- and third-place winners and three honorable mentions that are a sight to see at McMansion Hell.

There's nothing sadder than a depressed cow. Bunter, a cow owned by the Maungaturoto Historic Inn in Maungaturoto, New Zealand, became blue after the death of her cow companion Rosie last year. A therapy goat named Peaches was donated to lift Bunter's spirits. It worked, as Bunter began eating and cavorting again. But then Peaches disappeared from the hotel in December, and the staff worrried that Peaches had become curry. Local police were notified, and investigated the burglary. Northland Police posted a pun-filled report at Facebook.

Bunter is happy again. Read the rest of the story at Newshub. -via reddit 

(Image credit: Maungaturoto - Heart of the Kaipara)

In places across the South, it is customary to paint a porch ceiling blue. This tradition began in the Low Country of South Carolina, and is frequently seen in Beaufort and Charleston. It's a pretty color, but there's a reason people incorporated blue in their homes- as protection from evil spirits.    

This “haint blue,” first derived from the dye produced on Lowcountry indigo plantations, was originally used by enslaved Africans, and later by the Gullah Geechee, to combat “haints” and “boo hags”—evil spirits who escaped their human forms at night to paralyze, injure, ride (the way a person might ride a horse), or even kill innocent victims. The color was said to trick haints into believing that they’ve stumbled into water (which they cannot cross) or sky (which will lead them farther from the victims they seek). Blue glass bottles were also hung in trees to trap the malevolent marauders.

While “haint blue” has taken on a life of its own outside the Gullah Geechee tradition—it’s currently sold by major paint companies like Sherwin-Williams, and marketed to well-to-do Southerners as a pretty color for a proper porch ceiling—the significance of the color to the descendents of the Lowcountry’s enslaved people still remains.

Indigo was grown in South Carolina by enslaved workers before the Revolutionary War. It was a lucrative trade, but not for those who brought the skill to raise and extract the dye, along with their spiritual beliefs, with them when they were taken from West Africa. While artificial dyes are used almost exclusively now, the Gullah Geechee community is seeking to bring back the indigo plant along with the history behind it. Read about haint blue and the people who produced it at Atlas Obscura.

The first mention of Rickrolling on Neatorama was in February of 2008, but the first mention of a spontaneous and unexpected Rick Astley song was covered earlier, in January of that year. The year 2008 was the peak year for Rickrolling, although it still happens 12 years later ...and is arguably more effective now that it is not only universally understood, but infrequent enough to catch people off guard. But who came up with the idea, anyway? The origins of the prank are a collision of a 2005 episode of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, a 2006 radio show prank, and 4chan's Duckrolling meme. But the ways people used it afterward are more fun than the origin story.  

Huffington Post, April 13, 2011, excerpt from “Oregon State Legislators RickRoll: Lawmakers Sneak Lines From Rick Astley Hit Into Speeches”: State lawmakers in Oregon have made a splash online, after a video emerged showing members sneaking the words to Rick Astley’s 1987 hit “Never Gonna Give You Up” into their speeches. The prank was the brainchild of Oregon House member Jefferson Smith. According to The Ticket, Smith convinced his colleagues to take part in the prank and then compiled the lines from their speeches over a period of around two months for inclusion in the video.

Read how Rickrolling got started, and how so many people have leveraged the prank in outrageous ways over the years at Mel magazine.

(Image credit: Ben W)