One of the few things I recall from being in the Girl Scouts in the 1960s was reading about how young children, such as we were, could perform a blood transfusion in case of a nuclear attack or other wartime emergency. It didn't seem all that absurd to me at the time, but it drove home how precarious we thought our lives were. I memorized all the steps and probably earned some kind of badge for it. But Girl Scout badges come and go, and some are better left in the dustbin of history.

Girl Scouting has been around for 110 years as of March 12th, and in that time, there have been badges for grooming, laundry, and invalid cooking (which is preparing food for invalids, not cooking from your bed). There were also badges called Gypsy and "Oil-up," which were both for skills that had nothing to do with the title. Read what these and other erstwhile Girl Scout badges required as accomplishments at Mental Floss.

(Image: Library of Congress)

Thursday, KTLA reporter Gene Kang was on Hoover Street in Los Angeles reporting on a fatal hit-and-run crash that had occurred on February 26. No sooner did he utter the words "It's one of the most dangerous street in all Los Angeles...." when two sedans collided behind him, in full view of the camera. That's not a good time to flee the scene of an accident, but one car did. The TV crew called 911, since it was not an illustration for the story. No one appeared to be injured from this crash, which may be solved fairly soon, since the license plate fell off the car that fled the scene. That and the video evidence mean this hit-and-run driver will not get away with it.

Police are still looking for the perpetrator of the February 26 crash, which killed a 42-year-old pedestrian who pushed his wife and 2-year-old son out of he way. -via Digg

Over at Pop Culturista, we took at look at Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy of the USS Enterprise and his most memorable catchphrase, "I'm a doctor, not a (whatever)!" That phrase was used over and over, and long outlasted McCoy and the original Star Trek series. However, it's not the only line McCoy relied on in the series. John DiMarco gives us another compilation that highlights McCoy pronouncing someone dead, over and over, throughout the show's three-year run. We usually remember this as "He's dead, Jim." But it varied quite a bit. After all, you can't address Jim when it's Jim himself, Captain James T. Kirk, who is the dead one in at least three of these clips. Lucky for us, Dr. McCoy was often wrong in that conclusion. -via Laughing Squid

Throughout history, there have been tales of dead animals washed up on the seashore that no one can identify. The really big ones make the news and have often been identified by witnesses as monsters of some sort. These are called "globsters," which is a combination of glob and monster. The more decomposed the creature is, the harder it is to identify. Once barnacles and other scavengers start feeding on it, it may start to look very strange indeed. And the sea can leave a decomposing corpse slimy or hairy or quite monstrous. You can see how this sort of thing once made people believe in dragons and sea serpents. These days, scientists can usually identify what this globster once was, but until then, it may as well be a sea monster. The 20-foot hairy globster pictured here was seen on a beach in the Philippines in 2018.

The white, shaggy carcass may have resembled the dragon from A Neverending Story (1984), but its origins were less fantastical. Local officials concluded that the remains belonged to a whale that had died a couple of weeks earlier—possibly after being struck by a ship. The long “hairs” were actually decaying muscle fibers, and the white coloration was a natural consequence of decomposition.

These are stories that are better read about than witnessed, mainly because of the smell. Read the stories of six really bizarre documented globsters at Mental Floss.

(Image credit: Huntxel)

When you have a railroad snaking around mountains in areas where few people live, there's always the possibility of rockslides or even single boulders that can wreck a track and derail a train. In 1882, John Anderson came up with a system for the West Highland Line that travels through the Pass of Brander in Scotland, to warn approaching trains of falling rocks. It was so simple that it will remind you of when you were a child and set a rabbit trap you saw in a cartoon. The system is called Anderson's Piano, and it's worked fairly well for 140 years. It's not a perfect system- the parts get rusty and are hard to replace, but it doesn't depend on a power supply. As Tom Scott explains, so far, no one's come up with anything better.

Before the interstate highway system, Route 40 was the main road between Washington, DC and New York City. The highway crosses the Mason-Dixon Line, which traditionally separates the North from the South. Diplomats from around the world used this highway to commute between the United Nations in New York and their embassies in Washington. For African diplomats, this meant dealing with segregation laws in Maryland. Restaurants and gas stations along 40 in Maryland regularly denied service to men in limousines charged with representing an entire nation. An incident in 1961 made international headlines when the new ambassador from Chad, Adam Malick Sow, was denied a cup of coffee at a roadside diner.

The wife of the diner's owner refused to serve the diplomat because he was black. "He looked like just an ordinary run of the mill [N-word] to me. I couldn't tell he was an ambassador," Mrs Leroy Merritt later told the national magazine Life. "I said 'There's no table service here'."

The insult sparked an international incident, making the front page of newspapers across Africa and Asia. Soon after, diplomats from Niger, Cameroon and Togo reported similar experiences at Maryland restaurants.

The news coverage set off a campaign of protests. Some businesses agreed to serve diplomats only, but that only raised the stakes of the protests, as one group impersonated diplomats from a fictional country to make their point. Read about the role Route 40 played in the battle against segregation at BBC. -via Digg

(Image source: Boston Public Library Tichnor Brothers collection #75026)

When a friend or family member is struggling with life or a mental health issue, it can be a real drag for you. Who has time to listen to someone painfully open up and confide in you? What you really want to do is just make the problem go away, which is easy when you have useless platitudes at your beck and call. Then you can tell yourself you helped, even if all you are doing is making them shut up about it ...or they stop being your friend. There, that was easy, wasn't it? This skit from Viva La Dirt League may wake someone up to how unhelpful they are being, even though that won't make a difference in someone who just doesn't care.

Then again, if you do care, the first and best thing you can do is listen. Sometime that's all that's needed. If not, be supportive and encourage them to get professional help.  -via Geeks Are Sexy
 

九尾の狐の伝説が残る、殺生石にひとりでやってきました。

縄でぐるっと巻かれた真ん中の大きな岩がそれ…

のはずなのですが、なんと岩は真っ二つに割れて、縄も外れていました。

漫画だったらまさに封印が解かれて九尾の狐に取り憑かれるパターンで、見てはいけないものを見てしまった気がします。 pic.twitter.com/wwkb0lGOM9

— Lillian (@Lily0727K) March 5, 2022

A large volcanic boulder in Tochigi Prefecture, Japan, called Sessho-seki, or the Killing Stone, has an extensive mythology. The rock is supposed to embody Tamamo-no-Mae, who is a nine-tailed fox and beautiful woman who bewitched the emperor in the 12th century, both at once.

The Killing Stone is said to emanate poisonous gasses. Anyone who touches the rock is in danger of death. Still, the rock is registered as a historical site, and draws tourists who are more curious than scared. But in the last few days, the rock has split into two parts. Does this mean that the spirit of Tamamo-no-Mae has been released to do mischief, or maybe even cause calamity on the earth?

A local guide says the rock has developed cracks over time, and rainwater worked its way into the stone, leading to the split. But you can never be too sure. Read the story at The Guardian. -via Metafilter

Oksana Masters was born in Ukraine with birth defects believed to be associated with radiation from Chernobyl. She came to the US through adoption when she was seven, undersized and traumatized. Sports became her therapy, and now she represents the US at the Paralympics in Nordic skiing. Masters participated in the Summer Paralympics, where she medaled in rowing in 2012, and won two gold medals in cycling in 2020. In the Winter Games, she has medaled in 2014, 2018, and 2022 in skiing, and in two Paralympics in biathlon. Masters has a dozen Paralympic medals in four sports. The 2022 Winter Paralympics are going on now through March 13 in Beijing. -via TYWKIWDBI

Virginia Hall grew up in Maryland, learned several languages, and attended college in both America and Europe. She wanted work for the U.S. State Department, and maybe work her way up to diplomat. Instead she got a job in Turkey as a clerk. While there, she has a hunting accident in 1933 that destroyed her left foot. Gangrene forced the amputation of half her leg. That injury precluded her working for the State Department, as they only took able-bodied employees at the time. But Hall still wanted travel and adventure, so she went to France in 1939. She made contact with the British Special Operations Executive (SOE), which considered her potential as a spy.

Hall's work in occupied France became so legendary that the Gestapo looked for la dame qui boite, or "the lady with a limp." She escaped by walking through the Pyrenees Mountains to Spain alone, on a wooden prosthetic leg. But then she returned to France in disguise to continue her work! Read about the exploits of Virginia Hall in World War II at Mental Floss.

In the mountains of Chile, farmers grow crops of strawberries that resemble ping pong balls. They are white, they are very sweet, and they are huge, and they're also a part of Chile's history. At one time, Chileans used the strawberry fields for bait to lure enemies into ambush. If it weren't for Chile's frutillas blancas, we wouldn't have the red strawberries we get at the grocery. These big white strawberries were crossed with tiny American strawberries -in France- to give us the strawberries we are familiar with.

But even as the white strawberries bring high prices to those who farm them, more than ten times that of red strawberries, they are becoming more and more rare. It takes good soil, cold weather, and expertise to grow white strawberries. The lumber industry has degraded the soil, climate change has made the winters warmer, and younger farmers are turning to easier crops. Read about the plight of the Chilean white strawberry at Atlas Obscura.

A commercial truck was broken into in Denver Thursday morning, on 23rd Avenue in the Central Park neighborhood. A box was stolen, but it isn't known if the thief had any idea what was in the box. It was a shipment of cadaver heads that had been donated for medical research. The thief also took a dolly from the truck. Residents of the area expressed concern. Isaac Fields said,

“Pretty shocking. I guess I don’t see too many strange things happening around here usually, but you know you never know,” said Fields.

Police are asking the public for tips on the theft. They described the box as a blue and white cardboard box about 20"x15"x18" with “Science Care” written on the sides. Oh yeah, and there are human heads inside. They have no description of the perpetrator. Anyone with information is urged to call Metro Denver Crime Stoppers. -via reddit

(Image credit: Tony Webster)

Yeah, we know, pizza originated in Naples, where it was street food for poor people. It's also true that Margherita of Savoy made it acceptable in other parts of Italy, although it was still not popular. But it was the US more than any other country that made pizza what it is today, and fairly recently in the grand scheme of things. Before 1880, most Italians who immigrated to the US were from northern Italy, and did not eat pizza. Four million southern Italians arrived between 1880 and 1910, but their pizza still wasn't popular.    

The first successful pizza restaurant in the world located outside of Naples was founded in Buenos Aires in 1882, when a Neapolitan immigrant baker named Nicolas Vaccarezza started selling the pies out of his shop in Boca. For reference purposes, a decade earlier, an attempt to open a pizzeria in Rome, Italy, had ended in bankruptcy, meaning, at the turn of the last century, you could get a pizza in Buenos Aries, São Paulo or New York, but not in Rome, Florence or Venice.

Only after World War II did pizza take off, as American entrepreneurs invested in pizza ovens, diverse toppings, delivery, and entertainment for diners. Now pizza is readily available in Italy, mainly because American tourists expect it. Read how all that happened at An Eccentric Culinary History.  -Thanks, H.D.!

Lent is the 40-day period leading up to Easter, meant for abstinence and penitence, observed most formally in the Catholic Church. The current rules for Lent are that Catholics age 14 and up must must abstain from meat on fast days (Ash Wednesday and Good Friday) and all Fridays during Lent. There is an exception for the chronically ill and pregnant or nursing mothers. That's why churches have fish fries on Fridays and how McDonald's came to serve the Filet-O-Fish. Fish is not considered to be meat.

But over the history of the Catholic Church, the question of what is meat and what isn't has been asked again and again. The original idea was to avoid basic livestock meat like beef, pork, and poultry. The rules for eating wild animals came up over time as Catholicism spread to different parts of the world, and local bishops made rulings that had little to do with biology, but a lot to do with the foods local people depended on. The reasoning for each animal varied.

In Canada, beaver is classified as a fish for the purposes of Lent because it is an aquatic animal. In the southern US, Alligator is considered a fish for the same reason. And in Central and South America, capybara is okay to eat during Lent, and has even become a traditional Lenten dish, because the animal spends so much time in lakes and rivers.   

Other animals have received dispensation to be consumed during Lent not by being classified as fish, but because they were deemed essential to nutrition for the local population. In the Detroit area, muskrat is okay to consume during Lent because at the time the question came up, food of any kind was really scarce. Iguana and armadillo flesh also qualifies, and both are Lenten staples in Nicaraugua.

Puffins were once forbidden to eat during Lent, but in the 17th century were allowed because doctors testified that "the biological and nutritional qualities of puffins made them more like fish than birds." From this we can assume that the porgs of the planet Ahch-To are okay to eat on Lenten Fridays, because they were based on puffins. Read how these exemptions came about at the Lafayette Daily Advertiser. -via Fark

(Image credit: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)

Thomas Palef made a game so simple that it can't possibly be challenging, right? Wrong. Almost Pong has the same goal as Pong, in that you are batting a ball back and forth between two paddles (yeah, like ping pong). The difference is that there's only you, and only one button, which is your spacebar or your mouse. There's not even a start button. The kicker here is that you are playing as the ball.

While the instructions and gameplay are simple, you have to adjust your reflexes from the paddles to the ball, which might take a couple of rounds. Oh, yeah, you do not have control of the paddles. They will move at random, but so far they have given me plenty of warning. That might change if you play for longer than I've managed to. Almost Pong is mindless but simple fun, at least at lower levels. -via Kottke