Veterinarians have no choice when they need to check a cow for pregnancy or infection. The standard procedure is to stick your arm up the cow's rectum. The technique is difficult to teach to veterinary students because, well, it's dark in there.

That’s why veterinarian and computer scientist Sarah Baillie has created the “Haptic Cow,” a virtual, touch-feedback device that mimics the feeling of real bovine anatomy, placed inside a fiberglass model of a cow’s rear end.

“With this technology, students can feel something that feels like the inside of a real cow, but I or another instructor can be following their movements on a monitor,” said Baillie, who teaches at the Royal Veterinary College in London. “This means we can say, ‘Come back a bit or go left a bit.’ It actually means you can direct them.”

Not only can professors follow a student’s exact movements and critique the technique, but they can also keep track of how much force is being applied. If a fledgling vet gets too rough and exceeds the number of Newtons considered safe by experienced vets, virtual Bessie will belt out a cautionary “Moo-oo!”

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(image credit: Sarah Baillie/Royal Veterinary College)

Faking your death is not simple or to be taken lightly. A few people thought it was the easy way out of a difficult situation, or just a cool stunt to pull off. Read about the woman who faked her death because she found it too hard to break up with her boyfriend, or the guy who wanted to see how many people would come to the funeral, or the one who disappeared for years because of a mistaken idea. Link -via Gorilla Mask

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Which is better, a fresh apricot or a dried apricot? The way they argue, nothing will be settled. This is just one example of a series of talking food ads to promote the Supercooks program from the British Food Standards Agency. See sausages, potatoes, nuts, and more discuss their virtues at Eat Me Daily. Link -via Everlasting Blort

You may have to lose once to figure out how the game Drench works, but then it's a lot of fun! Select your next color to make your paint splotch bigger, and try to cover the entire floor in paint. You only have a certain number of moves for each level. Link -via Metafilter

Big Ben, the London clock tower, Westminster Palace clock tower bell, has a Twitter account. Online, it says the same thing it has always said in real life. The account was opened as a statement on the banality of Twitter, but Big Ben now has over six thousand followers! Come to think of it, this IS handy if you want to know what time it is in London. Link -via Blame It On The Voices

Arnie has a collection of around 350 patches and colors signifying motorcycle clubs from all over. Browse through and you might recognize your local club! Or just take a look at the many different designs. Link -via Gorilla Mask

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Thread tiny cameras through the singers' noses and focus on the larynx. Then have them sing sweetly and see what it looks like deep inside. The singers are Juleiaah Boehm, Emma Deans, Alexi Kaye, and Sally Stevens. -via b3ta

Japanese diplomat Chiune Sugihara was stationed in Lithuania when Germany invaded Poland in 1939. Thousands of Jewish refugees came to the consulate seeking travel documents in order to escape the Nazis. Sugihara's superiors in Tokyo ordered him not to issue any travel visas.

Sugihara discussed the plan with his wife Yukiko and decided to risk his career and his entire future by defying his superiors. The couple then spent 29 days issuing travel visas, up to 300 a day, as thousands of refugees stood in line at his office. Yukiko would prepare and register the visas while Chiune Sugihara would sign and stamp them, hour after hour, without breaking for meals. They would work late into the night until Yukiko would massage her husband’s weary hands in preparation for the next day. Sugihara was under orders to leave, which he could no longer delay. The family departed on September 1st, but he kept signing visas even as he boarded the train. Sugihara then tossed his official stamp out to the crowd, as he hadn’t time to stamp them all.

Sugihara's actions enabled around 6,000 Jewish refugees to escape the Holocaust. For his efforts, Sugihara was imprisoned by the Soviets and fired from his job by the Japanese Foreign Ministry. Read the entire story at mental_floss. Link

You can't make stuff like this up. A piece of a baguette dropped by a passing bird caused a shutdown at the CERN Large Hadron Collider.

The bird dropped some bread on a section of outdoor machinery, eventually leading to significant over heating in parts of the accelerator. The LHC was not operational at the time of the incident, but the spike produced so much heat that had the beam been on, automatic failsafes would have shut down the machine.

The LHC is scheduled to be reactivated later this month. The bread incident won't affect those plans. http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2009-11/bread-loving-bird-shuts-down-lhc -via Boing Boing

Hey, it's hard to keep a tower on the straight and narrow! The Leaning Tower of Pisa may be the most famous, but there are towers that lean all over the world. Web Urbanist looks at thirteen of them, including the Round Tower of the Kilmacduagh Monastery in Ireland pictured. It leans 1.5 feet, but is in no danger of falling over. And its door is 26 feet off the ground! Link -via Unique Daily

Thousands of mummified animals have been recovered in Egypt over the past hundred years. They include gazelles, shrews, rams, crocodiles, hawks, fish, dung beetles, and of course, cats. In the early days of excavation, they were considered unimportant, as things to be pushed aside in order to get to the treasure. Scientists are now studying them in detail for clues about the way ancient Egyptian humans lived. National Geographic looks at how the animals were preserved, and why. Link

(image credit: Richard Barnes)

David and Katie France of Dorset County, England thought they were being eco-friendly when they walked to dump to dispose of their recyclables. But they were met at the gate by an employee who told them they would have to bring their bags in by car! He cited safety concerns and warned the couple they may be hit by a vehicle. David France walked the 400 yards back to their home, got the car, and drove to the gate where they loaded their bags of scrap metal and took them into the center.

Mr France said: "It was farcical. I thought we were being doubly green by taking our recycling there on foot.

"But whatever good we did in recycling our waste was probably counteracted by the CO2 emissions we used up in our car."

The council responsible for tip said that because there is no "dedicated pedestrian access point" it was unsafe for people to walk there.

Link -via Arbroath

(image credit: Flickr user hugovk)

Children are rarely familiar with the names the LEGO company gives its various bricks and accessories. Giles Turnbull was delighted to find his son had his own terms for each piece. So he gathered more children, four in all, to find out what names they used, and assembled those names in a handy chart. Link -via Buzzfeeed

The family of 59-year-old Ademir Jorge Goncalves of Santo Antonio da Platina, Brazil identified his body after a fatal traffic accident. The funeral was held the next day, which is customary in Brazil. Imagine their shock when Goncalves himself appeared at the funeral service!

What family members didn't know was that Goncalves had spent the night at a truck stop talking with friends over drinks of a sugarcane liquor known as cachaca, his niece Rosa Sampaio told the O Globo newspaper. He did not get word about his own funeral until it was already happening Monday morning.

A police spokesman in the town of Santo Antonio da Platina said Goncalves rushed to the funeral to let family members know he was not dead.

"The corpse was badly disfigured, but dressed in similar clothing," said the police spokesman, who talked on condition of anonymity as he wasn't authorized to discuss the case. "People are afraid to look for very long when they identify bodies, and I think that is what happened in this case."

The victim has since been identified and the remains sent to the correct family. Link -via reddit

(image credit: Flickr user Hipolito Luiz)

I have four kids who all want to sit in the front passenger seat as I drive. There is an elaborate set of rules they must follow to decide who gets the honor of "riding shotgun".

You must say the word "Shotgun" to stake your claim on Shotgun. This must be done clearly and loud enough so that at least one other to-be occupant of the vehicle can hear you. No variations of this word are acceptable. After you have rightfully called Shotgun, you have exclusive rights to Shotgun for that ride. However, if no one hears you call Shotgun it is still fair game for everyone.

But that's just the beginning! There are many more rules to learn, such as the importance of having your shoes on when you yell "Shotgun!" and the crucial "hand on the door" rule. Link -via Bits and Pieces