Illustrator Gergely Dudás often makes puzzles featuring crowds of characters and something hidden among them. This week he saw the new movie Minions: The Rise of Gru and enjoyed it, so he drew a puzzle featuring a legion of minions -and three bananas. Can you find the bananas?
This was also probably the most time I've spent drawing one puzzle, it took me like three or four days! But I'm really happy with how it turned out, hope You'll like it too!
It'a also the first time he used existing characters for one his puzzles. You can check out more of them at his Instagram gallery. Oh yeah, when you feel stumped, you can swipe right to see the answers. -via Boing Boing
Last month, in the comments under the Honest Trailer for Goodfellas, I found that I am not the only fan of My Blue Heaven around here. There are three of us! If you haven't seen the film, learning how it came about will only make you want to see it more. My Blue Heaven is about a mafia figure named Vincent Antonelli (Steve Martin) who goes into the witness protection program. In his new town, he runs into other mob informants who are chafing under the blandness of suburban life. So they dip back into a life of crime on their own.
My Blue Heaven could be called a sequel to Goodfellas, except that it hit theaters a month before the Scorsese film, the lead character is not named Henry Hill, and it's a comedy. But it is a sequel, as Henry Hill's story ended in Goodfellas at the point it begins in My Blue Heaven. Steve Martin wanted to play the part of the FBI agent (ultimately played by Rick Moranis), but author Nora Ephron wanted him to play the local DA (Joan Cusack). We can't imagine Martin playing any other role besides Vinnie Antonelli, in which he out-caricatured any stereotype in Goodfellas and made the movie his own. Read how accurate My Blue Heaven was to Henry Hill's life and how it ended up as a comedy at Mental Floss.
Watch Justine cook a meal the way it would have been prepared 200 years ago. She's making steak pie, mustard greens, and macaroni and cheese, but with no stove, no electricity, and no running water. Since she is used to cooking in a fireplace, she has a few pieces of specialized equipment to make it possible. While this video is serene and relaxing, I would suggest going under the settings and speeding it up to 1.5x or maybe even 2x normal speed. There is no voiceover, so the speed doesn't matter -until you get to the end, where they show the original printed receipts (recipes). The macaroni and cheese especially is rather timeless in its ingredients, but heating a lid in the fire to make a broiler seems like a lot of trouble to us modern folks. This does appear to be a simple but yummy meal. -via Laughing Squid
During World War II, the Université de Montréal set up a secret nuclear laboratory to do experiments for the Allies and to produce plutonium for a nuclear bomb. After the atomic bombings that ended the war, Chalk River Laboratories went public, announcing they would do peacetime experiments. They also supplied uranium and plutonium to the US military for tests. The state-of-the-art 20-watt reactor was a mecca for nuclear scientists from all over the world. But compared to today's nuclear laboratories, there were quite a few opportunities for trouble.
On December 12, 1952, a lab worker reset two buttons by mistake and initiated a sequence of events, fueled by panic and confusion, that led to the world's first nuclear reactor core meltdown. When it was over, 4.5 million liters of contaminated water flooded the facility. The cleanup took 800 employees plus military personnel from both Canada and the US. The meltdown wasn't kept a secret, but the press downplayed the damage -and the danger. By 1957, a newer 200-megawatt reactor was built nearby. In 1958, another accident occurred when a crane tried to remove damaged fuel rods which melted and caught fire. This time, 1100 people took part in the cleanup.
A couple of decades later, those who worked during the cleanup operations were suffering from cancer at much higher rates than the general public, but it took until last year to get an agreement for compensation. Read about these two Canadian accidents and their fallout (meant both figuratively and literally) at The Walrus. -via Damn Interesting
This cartoon by Joel Haver never says the word Charmin, but you know who these bears are, even if they don't look like bears at all. They look like rotoscoped people. But that's all beside the point. The family has their purpose, and that's toilet paper. And don't even think about doing something else! This scene is a family sitcom moment featuring a ridiculous but strangely successful advertising premise, and it gradually turns into a pun fest. Warning: bathroom humor. -via reddit
Just in time for World Chimpanzee Day, Mattel has unveiled the latest Barbie doll in the Barbie Inspiring Women Collection, modeled after primatologist Dr. Jane Goodall. Goodall is world-renowned for her work in studying and advocating for chimpanzees since 1960. The Mattel company worked with the Jane Goodall Institute to make the doll come alive. It is the first in the series to be made with 90% recycled plastic, and is shipped in a sustainably manufactured box.
The Jane Goodall doll is quite recognizable, as she wears khaki shorts, carries a notebook, and sports her iconic ponytail. It also comes with a figure of David Greybeard, the first chimpanzee that trusted Goodall in her early work in Gombe National Park in Tanzania. Goodall is pleased with the doll, saying she has always wanted a Barbie in her likeness because the doll was so girly-girly in her youth and she thought girls needed choices. The Jane Goodall Barbie doll is now available for $35. -via Mental Floss
History and science combine to tell the story of how trade exploded when Europeans began crossing the Atlantic to the Americas. We know diseases were traded, with pathogens such as smallpox and measles killing millions of Native Americans who had no immunity to them. It's been conventional wisdom that syphilis traveled the other direction, and the sexually transmitted disease began to infect Europe. But a closer look at the historical record points to the existence of syphilis in Europe hundreds of years before Columbus sailed to the New World.
Paleopathologists have studied remains of European people who displayed the effects of syphilis going back to the 6th century. However, the presence of the bacterium Treponema pallidum cannot be pinpointed. But a new theory that venereal syphilis ran rampant among royalty and the wealthy while non-venereal syphilis plagued the poor finds evidence in, of all things, medieval art. One particular symptom of the disease was depicted in religious artworks, and was apparently well-known enough to be ascribed to sinners and evildoers. Read how this theory comes together at the Conversation.
You know how some of your favorite songs are so familiar that you appreciate them even when played in a completely different way, like a bluegrass version of a Queen song or Guns 'n' Roses played on an accordion? Or anything by Postmodern Jukebox? Then you're going to love this!
Moyun is a Chinese guzheng player who is noted for never showing her face (yes, that's a mask). Here she treats us to a full version of AC/DC's song "Thunderstruck" on a 21-string guzheng. She covers the guitar, bass, drums, and vocal parts with just two hands and one musical instrument. Moyun has videos of other rock covers, Chinese songs, anime themes, and video game music at her YouTube channel. -via Geeks Are Sexy
The global economy is projected to hit $100 trillion by the end of this year. The United States is the world's fourth largest country by area, and the third largest by population (we surpassed Indonesia), but when it comes to money, the US is where it's at. However, China is expected to move to #1 by 2030. This chart shows us the relative share among nations, grouped by continent. They could have made a pie chart, but some of the slices would be too small to identify. The US has the biggest chunk, followed by China, Japan, and Germany. The "nations" for this visualization are divided up into 191 entities (the UN lists 195), which can be argued over. For example, Puerto Rico is listed, even though it is part of the United States. The data comes from the International Monetary Fund's April 2022 report.
You can see a larger (and enlargeable) chart at Visual Capitalist, where you'll also find charts listing the top 50 and bottom 50 economies in the world. -via Digg
A whistling vessel (huaco silbador) is an ancient type of ceramic art in which water moves between two chambers and produces a bird whistle. There are many that survive from pre-Columbian Central and South America, but they are also being made again today. Even the reproductions are hand made and quite expensive. Steve Mould wanted to look inside to see how they worked, but considering the cost, he used x-ray technology to see inside. To really grasp the way they work, he ended up destroying at least one anyway, but the mechanism, and how it varies from piece to piece, is quite fascinating. The last minute of this video is an ad.
If your town's most famous citizen happened to be a murderous drug dealer, would you put up a statue of him? Maybe not, but what if the tourist draw of that statue could mean important dollars flowing into the local economy? That's a maybe. But then what if it were two statues, and they were a free gift? That might make a difference. And so Albuquerque, New Mexico, is welcoming statues depicting the fictional meth cook Walter White and his partner Jesse Pinkman. Albuquerque received renewed attention when the AMC TV series Breaking Bad became a hit, and has become a mecca for fans of the show, as well as those of the spinoff movie El Camino and the prequel series Better Call Saul. That the city has become associated with methamphetamine seems to be a horse that has already escaped, and there's no shutting the barn door now.
The statues were commissioned by Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan in 2019, and will be presented to the city at their official unveiling on July 29th at the Albuquerque Convention Center. Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul, who portrayed White and Pinkman, will be there along with Vince Gilligan and the city's mayor. And, we assume, a hoard of Breaking Bad fans.
When this old world starts getting you down, as it has for many people since the beginning of the pandemic, maybe you should listen to some wonderful music sung by great kids. Katherine Morris was feeling pretty low when the pandemic isolated everyone, on top of political grievance, economic woes, mass shootings, and climate change. She was already concerned with the rising suicide rate among young people. All that collided with personal setbacks when Morris' barn burned down. So she thought of her favorite "feelgood" song, and a campaign took off that culminated in the above video. It involved Morris, producer Richard Kaufman, Carole King, May Pang, and a bunch of talented young people across the country. Proceeds from the sale of the song will go to the organization Find Your Anchor for suicide prevention, awareness, and education. If you like this video, sent it to someone who could use a lift. -via Metafilter
During the days of the Byzantine Empire, monks who gave up a normal life for their Christian faith sometimes appeared to compete over who could sacrifice the most or even punish themselves the most. Simeon Stylites the Elder was a pioneer in self-deprivation. Born around 390 AD in Syria, he entered monastic life as a teenager. He became an ascetic, going weeks without eating to purify himself. He was so extreme that he was asked to leave the monastery, and went to live a hermit's life alone atop a series of pillars. The first one was three meters tall, but he found taller places to sit and stay. Simeon settled on a pillar that was 15 meters tall and stayed there 37 years! His living space was a platform of about a square meter with a railing of sorts. Simeon was only brought down after his death.
Some of Simeon's followers also tried living up on a pillar, and they became known as stylites, or pillar hermits. The practice lasted until the Middle Ages, at least in its extreme form. Read about Simeon Stylites the Elder and his pillar home at Amusing Planet.
The new space telescope is expected to outshine Hubble by orders of magnitude. The James Webb Space Telescope has been sending back images for some time now, and NASA is ready to start releasing them to the public. The above image is the first to be released, and it shows the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723. It was revealed today at a White House event.
This first image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is the deepest and sharpest infrared image of the distant universe to date. Known as Webb’s First Deep Field, this image of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 is overflowing with detail. Thousands of galaxies – including the faintest objects ever observed in the infrared – have appeared in Webb’s view for the first time. This slice of the vast universe covers a patch of sky approximately the size of a grain of sand held at arm’s length by someone on the ground.
You can see it larger here. NASA, ESA, and CSA will release more images from the first collection on Tuesday during a televised broadcast at 10:30 AM EDT. They will then be available to the public. -via Fark
The Ulster County (New York) Board of Elections is conducting a design contest for "I Voted" stickers to be given out at this November's election. Of the designs submitted, six finalists between the ages of 13 and 18 are up for a public vote, meaning anyone with an internet connection can vote. So far, the breakaway leader in the voting is a design submitted by 14-year-old Hudson Rowan of Marbletown. And you can see why.
Since the contest page has been passed around on the 'net, the design has gained the nickname Votey McVoteface. As of today, Rowan's design has garnered 93% of the 168,100 votes cast. That's more than the voting age population of Ulster County. This is the second year for the sticker contest, which drew around 500 votes last year. Rowan said he just wanted to be different, and didn't think his design would draw this much attention.
"Well I definitely thought it was unique," John Quigley, the Republican commissioner for the Ulster County Board of Elections, which is running the contest, said about Hudson's entry. "Somebody tweeted, this is how voters feel about politics right now, and I thought it was almost like the best way to summarize it. It sort of is exactly how we all feel about politics right now."
It would be a severe hassle to move to Ulster County in order to vote this fall and receive one of these stickers, but with a little encouragement, the election commission might be persuaded to license the design to other parts of the country. While Rowan's design is outstanding, the other five finalists are all well done. Voting in the contest will continue through the end of July.
