(vimeo link)

Elevator shoes that work like a real elevator -going up and down as needed, controlled by an iPhone app. -via Nag on the Lake

Do you pronounce "often" with the "t"? Boston Globe columnist Jan Freeman noticed that although the "t" fell silent in the 15th century, it appears to be coming back, at least among college students. It may sound pretentious, but she asks us to be kind.

Pretentious pronunciation surely exists -- I sympathize with McIntyre's aversion to "Bach uttered as if the announcer suffered from catarrh, or a Spanish name pronounced as if the studio were in the foothills of Andaluthia." But I think that in general, we're much too eager to label people dimwits or social climbers on the basis of pronunciations they probably acquired in the usual way -- by imitating the people they talk to.

More at the delightfully-named blog Throw Grammar From The Train. Link -via TYWKIWDBI

Pandemic takes the idea of audience participation to the world of social networking. The Colony is a simulated-reality Discovery Channel show that creates the scenario of a disease pandemic and we watch to see how isolated participants react to the altered world. You can join in via Facebook. The Pandemic site takes your circle of friends and puts them into that world. You can change the time line from the outbreak to the pandemic to the survival phase. I have to admit it was unnerving to read as my Facebook friends "reported" on the fictional chaos. The pandemic requires you to allow access to your Facebook data. http://thecolony.discovery.com/#fbid=5jr0YEqLhk6

They are beautiful, otherworldly, full of secrets, and can kill you. It takes bravery and special training to venture into the hydrogen sulfide atmosphere of the Bahama caves known as inland blue holes. Those who dare are looking for the chemistry of how our earth supports evolving life.

Offshore flooded caves, so-called ocean blue holes, are extensions of the sea, subject to the same heavy tides and host to many of the same species found in the surrounding waters. Inland blue holes, however, are unlike any other environment on Earth, thanks largely to their geology and water chemistry. In these flooded caves, such as Stargate on Andros Island, the reduced tidal flow results in a sharp stratification of water chemistry. A thin lens of fresh water—supplied by rainfall—lies atop a denser layer of salt water. The freshwater lens acts as a lid, isolating the salt water from atmospheric oxygen and inhibiting bacteria from causing organic matter to decay. Bacteria in the zone just below the fresh water survive by exploiting sulfate (one of the salts in the water), generating hydrogen sulfide as a by-product. Known on land as swamp or sewer gas, hydrogen sulfide in higher doses can cause delirium and death.

These strange but natural environments are threatened by both rising sea levels and people who use them for garbage dumps. Link

(Image credit: Wes C. Skiles/National Geographic)

(YouTube link)

Stinkers was raised as a pet, and later came to live at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center. Do porcupines make good pets? No. Despite the puppy-like behavior, notice the handler is wearing thick leather gloves. -via Digg

Whew, that was rough! Neatorama was down for quite a while, but we believe everything is back to normal now (cross your fingers). Blame a power outage at the server location. This is one of those things that remind us of how this alternate reality we call the internet is so dependent on a steady supply of electricity. Thanks for checking in! Next time you can't access Neatorama, check our Facebook page and/or Twitter for information.

Every empire eventually ends, some with a bang, others with a whimper. They all had a final leader with a unique story, as John Farrier showed us in The Last Emperor(s).

Hot enough for ya? That's why July is perfect for ice cream! Check out the many Weirdest Ways To Celebrate Ice Cream Month.

Piercings, tats, and other body modifications aren't new. Read about Ancient Bodymods from Around the World.

Steven Johnson continues to explore the limits of outlandishness with Cutting Edge Office Wear and The Automobile as Gymnasium.

Joseph Pujol made a living, and a name for himself, by farting. Read his story in The King of Farts, from (appropriately) Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.

From mental_floss magazine, we learned 12 Essential Facts About the Folks Who Race Horses.

At the Spotlight Blog, get a preview of Nat Geo AMAZING! a new book and TV series from National Geographic. Psst -you also have a chance to WIN the book for yourself!



Two new artists have some of their works displayed at the Art Blog: welcome to illustrator Rob Bridges and photographer and mixed-media artist Lee Gainer.

NeatoGeek held another geeky Caption Contest, with lots of participation. Congratulations to winner Eric Johnson who gets a t-shirt from the NeatoShop!

The What Is It? contest was Thursday. I'll update this post to announce the winners as soon as I get the names.

NeatoBambino presents a new contest: Decipher the Doodle. Congratulations to winners WrexLabs and daikoneklectik, who won prizes from the NeatoShop! Check the post to see their answers.

The deadline to enter the GTFO (Great Talent, Fantastic or Otherwise) contest is tomorrow! Get those entries in ASAP -details at the Neatorama YouTube page. Good luck!

You know what they say -when you find a look that works, stick with it. However, if you look back far enough, you'll see that he's tried other styles as well. Link -via J-Walk Blog

Many words are born from the name of the person associated with what that word means. An eponym is a word derived from a person’s name, whether real or fictional. In this Lunchtime Quiz from mental_floss, you'll be given a word definition and a clue about the person, and you figure out what what the word is. Simple? Not exactly! I scored 70%, which would have been 80% if I could spell correctly. Link

The city of Detroit has shrunk to a population of only 900,000 people -half as many as in the 1950s. Empty houses and businesses are apparent in every part of the city. City officials are weighing different plans for what to do about Detroit's long-term health. One idea is to return the outer parts of the city back to agriculture. Residents are already getting started in gardening.

Now the seeds of a remarkable rebirth are being planted – literally. Across Detroit, land is being turned over to agriculture. Furrows are being tilled, soil fertilised and crops planted and harvested. Like in no other city in the world, urban farming has taken root in Detroit, not just as a hobby or a sideline but as part of a model for a wholesale revitalisation of a major city. Some farms are the product of hardy individualists or non-profit community groups. Others, like Hantz Farms, are backed by millions of dollars and aim to build the world's biggest urban farm right in the middle of the city.

Mark Covington, 38, is one of those 21st-century pioneers, though he stumbled on his role almost by accident. Finding himself unemployed after losing his job as an environmental engineer and living back with his mother two years ago, he started tidying up an empty lot near his Georgia Street home, planting vegetables and allowing local people to harvest them for free. An orchard of fruit trees followed, as did a community centre – made by converting a pair of empty buildings – which keeps local youths off the streets. The result is a transformation of the area around his childhood home. Local kids come to movie nights held amid the crops. Residents love the free, fresh food in an area where no major supermarkets exist. The Georgia Street Community Garden is never vandalised.

Link (with video) -Thanks, Marilyn Terrell!

OK, here's a Friday fun quiz from The History Channel. How fast can you answer questions on American history? Challenge yourself, or your friends with the Ultimate History Quiz. I scored 1,332 in the first game. I'll be playing this again! Link -via Digg

How about a strange interactive website for some Friday fun? Nails has ten 27 different scenarios to explore with your mouse. No, they don't make any sense, but you keep clicking anyway! Link -via Gorilla Mask

There are more insects in the atmosphere than you'll ever see. In fact, you don't see them all because they fly really high. How high? NPR has an animated video with the surprising answers.

When British scientist Jason Chapman told us (listen to the radio piece or watch our video) there are 3 billion insects passing over your head in a summer month, he was talking about his survey in Great Britain. Closer to the equator, he says, the numbers should rise. He wouldn't be surprised, for example, that in the sky over Houston or New Orleans there could be 6 billion critters passing overhead in a month.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128389587 -via reddit

We can always dream up new products that make life easier, no matter how difficult they would be to actually produce. In 1939, Popular Science predicted that we would one day received newspapers printed at home with data transferred by radio broadcasts. That particular invention never came to be, at least in the sense it was envisioned at the time. Why print out the news when you can just read it on your computer screen? This item is one of nine products that were never developed, although some of the end results came to us by other inventions. Link -via Dark Roasted Blend

Something tells me that these guys aren't at all gloomy! This is one of ten creatively-named night spots in Namibia listed at Buzzfeed. Did I say "creatively-named"? It's possible these bar names were pulled out of a hat! Link

On Tuesday, workers digging a new level for a vehicle security center at the World Trade Center site ran into a set of evenly-spaced wooden beams. Had someone been building a boat in a basement?

“They were so perfectly contoured that they were clearly part of a ship,” said A. Michael Pappalardo, an archaeologist with the firm AKRF, which is working for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to document historical material uncovered during construction.

By Wednesday, the outlines made it plain: a 30-foot length of a wood-hulled vessel had been discovered about 20 to 30 feet below street level on the World Trade Center site, the first such large-scale archaeological find along the Manhattan waterfront since 1982, when an 18th-century cargo ship came to light at 175 Water Street.

The ground where the boat was found had been undisturbed for 200 years. Back then, the site was much nearer the Hudson River. Link -via reddit

(Image credit: Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times)