Bestselling author Neil Gaiman wrote about his recent trip to China, including the experience of holding a year-old panda in his lap.

Utter, utter happiness. Better than any number of awards. Makes being a writer completely worthwhile. I suspect that world peace and harmony would come about in weeks if people just got to put pandas on their laps every few months. Honest.

Link -via Exploding Aardvark

Also read about how giraffes hide in Beijing.

If you want to see Las Vegas as a neon wonderland, you should visit in the near future.

... neon will be close to extinction in Vegas by 2012. With the new neon-less casinos going up and the old casinos being imploded between now and then, visitors will only be able to find these tubes in places like the Neon Museum, Downtown and other nostalgic venues.

To get the most neon experience out of your trip, see this overview of the best and brightest neon displays in Vegas. Link -via Cynical-C

An example of cymatics, {wiki} or the effect of sound waves on particles. Push play or got to Metacafe. You may want to turn the volume down somewhat -this caused my cats to run from the room! -via Videosift

Qian Hongyan, the young amputee who used a basketball in lieu of legs (featured previously on Neatorama), has joined a swim team! She hopes to compete in the 2012 Paralympics in London. Although she now has prosthetic legs, she uses the basketball during swim training to help her get in and out of the pool. Link -via Arbroath

The Pete’s Pond webcam from National Geographic is back up for its third season! The webcam is at a watering hole in the Mashatu Game Preserve in Botswana. If the animals aren’t out when you go to watch, push play or go to YouTube for a taste of last year’s webcam feed. http://www9.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/wildcamafrica/ -via Metafilter

John Milkovisch spent 18 years and 39,000 cans of beer replacing the building material in his house with aluminum beer cans! Its one of the many stories in the article Alternative & Crazy Home Construction Materials : Beer Cans, Tires & Cardboard. Link -via Look at This

Dr. Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy discusses how the weirdest aliens Hollywood could dream up are still based on life as we know it on Earth. The clip is from of the UK show Cosmos: A Beginner’s Guide. Link

This 1964 promotional film for Florida State University stars an aspiring young actor and student named Jim Morrison before he and Ray Manzarek formed The Doors. Push play or go to YouTube. -via Metafilter

These bedsheets are printed with a ruler, so you can see how close you are to your partner, or how much of the bed he or she is hogging! The zero is in the exact middle. Link -via Swiss Miss

A Chinook helicopter is tied down for a ground resonance test. Those who know say they are more stable in the air. Push play or go to Live Leak. -via Arbroath

The Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland is a natural phenomenon that looks manmade! Around 40,000 columns of basalt left by volcanos have peculiarly geometric shapes. Legend attributes the formations to the Irish giant Finn McCool, who traveled over it to fight his Scottish enemies. Link -via Dark Roasted Blend

Hear snippets of the sounds made by twenty different common “singing” insects, such as katydids and crickets. I recognized several from my own backyard! You’ll also want to explore other parts of the Songs of Insects site. Link -via I am Bored

You might think that having a robot solve your Rubik’s Cube takes the fun out of the toy. But robots are cool, and Straydog Scraps has eight different puzzle-solving robots, with videos. Link

After a four-year effort, conservationists have the first photographs of the elusive Chinese mountain cat, taken by remote cameras triggered by body heat.

"These [new camera-trap] pictures will call attention to one of the rarest and most beautiful small cats," said Jim Sanderson, a cat specialist with the Wildlife Conservation Network who has studied the animal for the last four years.

"Until now, even cat specialists had only seen this animal as skins or in less than perfect shape in zoos," he said.

No one knows how many of the shy high-altitude cats are left in the wild. Link

The Ecosphere is a sealed globe containing algae, shrimp, and gravel. You control the temperature and the amount of light it receives, otherwise, the system can sustains itself for several years! An abrasive magnet can be used to clean the inner surface, if neccessary. Useful as a learning tool or as a very low-maintenance pet. http://www.eco-sphere.co.uk/ -via Dump Trumpet