Len Kendall went against the tradition of women proposing on Leap Day when he chose today to ask for Katie Holland's hand in marriage. So he posted this image on Buzzfeed. Along the way, Katie received encouragement from many, who posted with the Twitter hashtag #SayYesKatie. And she eventually said "Yes!" Link

The art collective We Are Dorothy created a map made completely of places in songs. In the full-size version at the link, you'll see Itchycoo Park, Highway to Hell, Road to Nowhere, Penny Lane, MacArthur Park, Long and Winding Road, and my favorite thoroughfare, Roll On Down The Highway. Link -via Boing Boing

More and more colleges are starting to employ what is called "differential tuition." That means that studying some disciplines will cost you more than others. One reason for this is to discourage too many students from a particular course of study. For example, at the University of Tennessee, the number of business students has doubled in the past few years, while the school's budget and the number of faculty has stayed the same. Still, students want a business degree because it will pay off better in the long run than a degree in philosophy. That is another reason college can charge more: because the result is worth it. But is it fair?

Universities have to pay "competitive salaries to retain" professors who are in demand elsewhere, says The Cavalier Daily of the University of Virginia. The "market value" of business, engineering, and nursing professors is higher than that of other disciplines, and it makes sense for those programs to be more expensive.

But what happens to students who can only afford a degree in a cheaper field? Should public universities set prices according to the laws of supply and demand? Or will higher tuition for, say, engineers only discourage students from becoming the workers we will need in the future? Link

(Image credit: Flickr user gadgetdude)

The attractive cat who modeled the Newsboy Cap a few days ago is becoming a celebrity! He is a purebred Abyssinian named Toki Nantucket. Read all about this handsome cat and see more pictures at Laughing Squid. Link

(YouTube link)

Davy Jones, the former singer for The Monkees, died this morning of a heart attack at a hospital in Florida.

After "The Monkees" disbanded in 1971, Jones sang solo as well as with various reincarnations of the group.

He also acted on stage and screen, with his most famous TV appearance as himself on "The Brady Bunch," in an episode where Marcia Brady was the president of his fan club and tried to get the singer to appear at her school dance. He also played Fagin in "Oliver!" on Broadway.

Recently, he played himself on an episode of "Sponge Bob Square Pants."

MSNBC posted a collection of music videos from The Monkees. Jones was 66. Link

Did your mother ever call you "Typhoid Mary" when she caught you coughing without covering your mouth? Typhoid Mary was a real person, an Irish immigrant  by the name of Mary Mallon who cooked for wealthy New York families, until 1906, when her life took a downward turn.

She spent the summer working for the Warren family while they vacationed in Oyster Bay, Long Island. Shortly after she left, three family members, two maids, and a gardener all came down with typhoid fever. The owner of the property hired George Soper, a sanitation engineer, to find the root cause. Soper hypothesized that it was Mallon, after learning that all of the families she had worked for had had outbreaks at some point. He asked to test her stool and urine but she refused, as she felt perfectly healthy (asymptomatic carriers were unheard of at the time). Soper continued to plead with her, even offering to pay her royalties from a book he wanted to write about her. Mallon just wanted to be left alone and told him that she had been tested privately and the results were normal.

The rest of Mallon's life was spent in a struggle between her right to do as she pleased and the authorities who were sure she was spreading the deadly disease. Read what happened to Mallon at Atlas Obscura. Link

We see some brand logos so often that we don't even pay attention to them anymore. So would you recognized a small change in them? In today's Lunchtime Quiz at mental_floss, you'll be presented with ten logos. Some have been flipped horizontally. Can you tell which ones? I scored 80%, which is surprising. Link

Seamus Clarke thinks it is hilarious that he reached his 11th birthday a day before his father did. Seamus was born 11 years ago on February 28th. His father, James Clarke, was born on February 29th, 1968. Although that is 44 years ago, this is only the 11th time that date has occurred in his life.

Despite missing out on a total of 33 birthdays since 1968, the car salesman admitted being born in a leap year does have its benefits.

'I'm used to missing out on my real birthday, but being born in a leap year did have its benefits when I was at school,' he said.

'You know what children are like - especially boys. We were always giving each other birthday bumps or beats.

'But I usually got away with it because on February 28 I'd tell them "it's my birthday tomorrow" and then on March 1 I'd say "my birthday was yesterday".'

This year, the father and son are celebrating with a joint party. Link

(Image credit: Caters)

When it was the fad to talk to your plants, I joked about how I threatened mine. Plants have their own way of communicating, but they do it with other plants, not with their human caretakers.

In the most recent study, conducted by a team at the Ben-Gurion University in Israel, pea plants have been found to alert each other to stressful situations. In the experiment the plants were placed close to each other, but not touching in any way. Some plants shared soil with those next to them, while others were completely separated. Next, a few of the plants were given drought like situations, while others were kept healthy and watered.

The plants kept in dry conditions responded to the situation by closing the pores on their leaves (which are called stoma) - a normal reaction for plants in drought. What was unexpected was that plants nearby (not kept in drought conditions but sharing the same dirt) did the same thing! Not only that, but they seemed to pass the message on to un-stressed plants even further away, which responded with stomatal closure as well. The plants who did not share any soil did not respond at all, meaning that the communication between the plants was done through root systems rather than the leaves.

Read about other experiments on plant communication at Environmental Graffiti. Link

(Image credit: Flickr user lobo235)

(TED link)

The latest marketing stunt for the Alien prequel Prometheus is a TED Talk from the year 2023. Peter Weyland is the founder of Weyland Industries, which will later become the Weyland-Yutani Corporation, referred to as simply "the company" by the crew of the Nostromo in the 1979 movie Alien. The movie Prometheus is scheduled to hit theaters in May and June, depending on what country you are in. Link -via The Daily What Geek

Finland's hot new sport is lawnmower racing -on ice! It only makes sense, because there's plenty of ice in Finland, and the lawnmowers are busy cutting grass when the ice is gone. The city of Jarvenpaa recently hosted an international race.

The object of the sport is to ride a lawn mower and accumulate as many laps as possible around a 1968-foot track in three hours, which isn't always easy, according to British racer Jason Huskinson, especially since race organizers add water on top of the snow and let it freeze to make the surface even more slippery.

"It's really bumpy. I'm really tired out. Brilliant," Huskinson told Reuters reporter Ellie Park.

Since the mowers reach speeds of 30 mph, fellow racer Mark Botts says the secret to succeeding is giving up any claims to sanity.

"You have to be crazy to do this," he told Park.

The Estonian team won by completing 136 laps. Link

Once again, it's time for our collaboration with the always amusing What Is It? Blog. Can you tell us what this thing is? Or make a wild guess?

Give us your guess in the comment section below. One guess per comment, please, though you can enter as many as you'd like. Post no URLs or weblinks, as doing so will forfeit your entry. Two winners: the first correct guess and the funniest (albeit ultimately wrong) guess will win T-shirt from the NeatoShop.

Please write your T-shirt selection alongside your guess. If you don't include a selection, you forfeit the prize, okay? May we suggest the Science T-Shirt, Funny T-Shirt and Artist-Designed T-Shirts?

For a picture of this from a slightly different angle, check out the What Is It? Blog.

Update: the pictured object is an M15 Grenade Launcher Sight. The first commenter in with the correct answer was Berhard, who wins a t-shirt for his efforts! The t-shirt for the funniest answer goes to villaridge, who said it was "one of the many scale models that Gene Rodenberry had made whilst he was fine tuning what the Enterprise space ship would look like." See additional pictures of the grenade launcher sight and the answers to the other mystery items of the week at the What Is It? blog!

Two Nepali men, Lakpa Tsheri Sherpa and Sano Babu Sunuwar, went on an adventure they dreamed up called The Ultimate Descent:

They would climb to the world’s highest point, launch a paraglider and fly for as long as possible, bicycle to a point where streams gathered into rivers, kayak across the Nepali border into India, and paddle the Ganges River all the way to the Indian Ocean. It would be an unprecedented first, but it was the overall combination of sports, audacity, and friendship that drew the duo to the idea. Babu, 28, had no climbing experience. Lakpa, 39, had never kayaked and didn’t even know how to swim.

In April of 2011, the duo had borrowed gear, slapped a basic plan together, and began their ascent of Everest. On May 21, they became the third party to launch a paraglider from the summit and set a new world record of 8,865 meters for free flight in the process. On the Kosi River’s Class V rapids, Babu got caught recirculating in a massive whirlpool in their two-man kayak, while Lakpa floated down river. Once they reached the Ganges, they paddled flatwater through unfamiliar country. They were robbed at knifepoint and had to live off fruit trees. After 850 kilometers, Lakpa and Babu reached the Bay of Bengal. On June 27, they became the first people to complete the descent from Everest’s summit to the Indian Ocean.

What did they get for their accomplishment? Besides being hailed as national heroes in Nepal, they are now the winners of the People's Choice Award in the National Geographic Adventurers of the Year competition. They garnered more of the 72,000 votes cast than any other of the Adventurers of the Year. You can see a photo gallery, read their story and interview, and see a video at NatGeo. Link -Thanks, Marilyn!

(Image credit: Sano Babu Sunuwar)

Angelina Jolie's leg keeps growing virally. In addition to all the links we posted yesterday, a new Tumblr blog called Angelina Jolie'ing is gathering and curating the Photoshop art generated by the actress' Oscar night images AND pictures of everyone at home striking the same pose. You can submit yours, too! Link -via mental_floss, where David Israel posted his nine favorite images.

Would you like to produce a retro-style movie like The Artist (which won five Oscars)? The Artistifier is a generator that takes any YouTube video and makes it into a black-and-white silent film with period music. You can add your own titles and captions, too! I made one using my own video, but I think the film generated by the Presurfer is a much better example. If you make your own, leave a link to it in the comments. Link -via the Presurfer