We giggle a bit at the implausible ways detectives on TV solve crimes, like the impossible "enhance" technique that allows us to see hi-res images on low-res security video. But crimes have been solved by thinking outside the box, in ways that may surprise you. They should have called this list five police "techniques," as there are actually more than five cases here. Several of them were solved by the presence of glitter.

Glitter might look all the same to you while you're trying to get that shit off your sweater, but there's reportedly "tremendous variation" in the stuff. Bulk glitter conglomerates can boast of having tens of thousands of different types to decorate your belongings, nether regions, and disgruntled pets as you see fit. Knowing this, one can see how leaving even one fleck behind after committing a foul deed can lead investigators right back to the exact Frederick's of Hollywood where you bought your sparkly apple-flavored nipple balm.

The first recorded instance of glitter being used as trace evidence happened at the end of the Cold War in Germany, when the U.S. Army's crime lab used it to solve a sexual assault case during a local celebration. Specific glitter from the victims' Mardi-Gras-like costumes was found on the clothing of the suspects. Another time, a killer in Alaska was nabbed in part because his estranged wife had dropped glitter in his car at some point, and some of it stuck to his victim. More recently, this method was used to bust a deadly hit and run driver who denied being at the wheel, but had a hard time explaining how the exact same cosmetic glitter she wore on her face wound up plastered to the airbag.

Read about glitter, glass. mosquitoes, and other odd ways police have found a perpetrator at Cracked.

Neatorama is proud to bring you a guest post from history buff and Neatoramanaut WTM, who wishes to remain otherwise anonymous.

In the spring of 1918, New Orleans, Louisiana (NOLA) was not exactly a city known for banking its fires. Although WWI was still in effect, the city’s motto then was as it is now – ‘Laissez les bons temps rouler’ – let the good times roll. And roll they did. NOLA had culture, a storied history, the country’s first movie theater, a booming financial district, any and all kinds of vice, Jax beer, jazz music, fine cuisine, the French Quarter, and Mardi Gras. NOLA was one of the nation’s busiest seaports, had a curious mix of wealth and poverty but relative overall prosperity, and was possessed of a diverse international citizenry and surprisingly good race relations for the day, thanks to its Cajun and Creole heritage. To its inhabitants, NOLA had all that one could want - and now it was about to have a serial killer.

Outer space has always fascinated us, and has been a staple of movies since A Trip to the Moon in 1902. Which is your favorite? The Ringer takes a deep dive into space movies to rank the top 25 best movies about space, and A Trip to the Moon is not one of them -these are all great films. Sadly, only two of them are based on true stories, but that says more about our imaginations than it says anything about NASA. However, many of these movies inspired the scientists who are working on space travel now.   

Aaron Franks built a doghouse on his deck. That's a bit of an understatement. This is not ordinary doghouse! It's a three-level dog dreamland featuring stairs, three entrances, cubbyholes, beds, a pool, three swings, an umbrella, tunnels, a pirate wheel, a potty pit (complete with fire hydrant), and a water dispenser.

(YouTube link)

Franks also has a monitor in his bedroom so he can watch his four pit bulls enjoy their doggy mansion. His wife didn't realize the scope of the project, as he worked on it for two years. He may add more in the future.  -via Tastefully Offensive

Caddo Lake in Texas is suffering under an alien invasion. Giant salvinia was imported from South America as an ornamental plant for aquariums and lawn ponds, but some escaped in 1998 and invaded a Houston pond. In 2006 it started moving from lake to lake and has become the scourge of Texas wetlands.  

Australian researchers have calculated that, given the right conditions, an M&M-size salvinia plant could blanket 39 square miles of water in just over three months. As the advancing front reaches maturity, it swells into a carpet of vegetation up to three feet thick, smothering other life in its path by consuming nutrients and blocking sunlight from penetrating the water below. Fish can’t survive. Native plants and amphibians struggle. Lake recreation halts as viny roots clog boat engines and become ensnared in propeller blades. In some areas, the dense layer of salvinia can even become a substrate for other opportunistic weeds, making it difficult to tell where the lake ends and the shore begins.

People who live among the lakes have tried many ways to control salvinia: sweeping it up in nets, building barriers, and even blowtorching it. Importing weevils seems to be the best bet, but even that program has drawbacks: lack of government funding, a climate that salvinia survives better than weevils, and the fact that importing one invasive species to get rid of another can have devastating consequences. Read about the invasion of giant salvinia at Texas Monthly. -via Digg

(Image credit: Flickr user Omar Bárcena)

Sixteen years ago today, the world was shocked when almost 3,000 people were murdered by terrorist hijackers. TIME photo editor Patrick Witty rushed to the World Trade Center to document the event. He caught this iconic image of the crowd's expressions as the South Tower collapsed.

When asked why he chose to turn his lens, a Leica M6 loaded with black-and-white film, away from the tower, Witty said it was due in part to turn away from the chaos in front of his eyes.

"I could no longer bear seeing bodies falling to the ground. I turned around and saw a sea of faces that truly captured what it was like to be there. Everyone, including myself, started running," he told The News in a previous interview.

Twelve years later, Witty turned to social media for help in identifying the people in the picture. The response helped him to put names on all six people in the front of the photo. -via reddit

(Image credit: Patrick Witty)

In our modern world, smartphones allow anyone to be obsessed with their own photographs, and the internet allows those folks to broadcast their obsession to the world. But even in the days when photography was new, expensive, and relatively difficult, Virginia Oldoini, Countess of Castiglione, harnessed her wealth to record herself in over 400 portraits. She wasn't a photographer, but an artist, with herself as the medium.

She wasn’t the most likeable character of her time. Once rumoured to be the most beautiful woman in 19th century Europe, a queen of both style and drama; model, mistress, self-appointed muse, narcissist; if there’s one thing to know about the Italian Countess de Castiglione– it’s that she was seriously vain. Shipped off to Paris in 1856 to compete for the affection of the reigning King Napoleon III, she wasted no time weaving herself into a highly scandalous affair with the crown, all the while cultivating her own celebrity through hundreds of elaborate, self-directed photo shoots. At a time when photography was still in its infancy, the Countess had a body of work that could be compared to Kim Kardashian’s selfie collection. It was her vanity and obsession with her own beauty that came to define her entire lifestyle, around which her status, identity, and ultimately her demise, revolved. A cautionary tale of a woman who thought her beauty would last forever…

The Countess was used and abused by the European nobility for their own ends in her younger life, which reads like gossip column fodder. But she is most remembered for her legendary vanity and her portrait obsession. Read about the Countess of Castiglione and see more images at Messy Messy Chic.

To celebrate the kids going back to school, parents might want to have a few laughs by watching movies. If you don't have the time to watch an entire film, you'll get a laugh or two out of reliving some ridiculous scenes where kids start school. Yeah, the first day of school can be quite awkward, and you may get a nice feeling of schadenfreude after putting up with those rugrats all summer. See first day of school scenes from five movies at TVOM.

Look closely at this picture, and you still wouldn't know it was a steam iron with a slug inside without the accompanying text. That's a unique household problem. The Facebook post has more than 14 thousand comments, with comedy gold floating to the top, so to speak.

Rachel Caswell Tell him you're developing feelings for him.
That's how I get my guys to leave.

Richard Phillips Have you tried not body shaming the slug into thinking it's too big? Perhaps with a bit of self confidence it might come out on its own without ridicule.

Boone Arthur I asked the wife what she does when we get slugs stuck in the iron and without hesitation she said, "same thing I always do when I have a fat jerk i need to get rid of. Poison them in their sleep." She stared at me long enough for things to get awkward.

Chris Eubank Searle You're gonna need a length of fishing line, a toothpick, an ice cube and a bottle of superglue.
-Put the superglue on ice to chill.
-tie the toothpick to the end of the fishing line.
-sniff the glue
-become friends with the slug and forget all about the rest.

If you dig deep enough, you'll find some practical advice.

Lysandwr Blaidd Empty water out, leave on side with water hole open. Place saucer of beer next to water hole. Wait. (Mom's advice, because nothing fazes old ladies from Kentucky.)

The upshot is that you should drain the water out of your iron after you finish ironing, which I used to do to prevent it from spilling. I no longer iron anything. Meanwhile, you might go check your iron now, and discover it does not have a see-through reservoir, so you'll never know whether there's a slug inside. The post is from a Facebook page entitled Animals in Predicaments, which may explain why so many people with a sense of humor were enticed to add their two cents. -via Metafilter

When our pets have a new experience, their reactions can be awesome. The title for the cat picture above is "We forgot to tell our cat that we had a baby." Yeah, she is surprised, to say the least. In the sequence below, the guy bought and used a vacuum cleaner of the first time. You have to wonder how much cat hair he had to clean up by then.

It's not just cats. Dogs can surprise us with their reactions, too, like this dog who had never seen kittens before, but then suddenly was confronted by four of the infernal fluff balls.



Bored Panda presents another mega-post, with the reactions of cats, dogs, and some other critters reacting to a new experience. There are over 200 submitted images, ranked by votes. -via Metafilter

Meteorologist Juston Drake from the Weather Channel show Storm Riders stepped out of the car for a moment to measure the wind speed during Hurricane Irma. His co-worker Simon Brewer caught some video of the moment. 

@JustonStrmRider tearing it up! pic.twitter.com/VhC97GZJBa

— Simon Brewer (@SimonStormRider) September 10, 2017

Weather professionals spent several days telling everyone to leave Florida, and a couple more days telling everyone to go to a shelter and stay away from the windows. And then they go outside during the worst of the storm to broadcast.

Weather channel: don't go outside. You'll die. @weatherchannel: Reporting live from outside in middle of storm.
pic.twitter.com/EAWxW8zPsD

— Jeff Hernden (@jeff_hernden) September 10, 2017

We could have easily done without seeing TV people put their lives in danger, but since the videos are there, you can go see a roundup of these types on on-air shenanigans at Uproxx.

Boy, is he going to be upset when he finally figures out the truth! If he ever does, that is… and if he does, he'll pull the same prank on the next new guy that comes along. That's something he won't ever forget. This is the latest from CommitStrip.

In olden times, harvesting crops was a community chore, in which everyone had a specific task they specialized in, and the process was laid out by tradition. The corn harvest, as it existed before machinery is described in detail, as well as the customs that made it easier (hint-cider). And the superstitions.

The last sheaf of corn was always saved. This was believed to contain the corn spirit, which was gradually condensed as harvest progressed until it reached the final sheaf to be cut. Often the sheaf was scattered on the fields in spring, returning the spirit to the fields. In some areas it was hung up for the hungry birds to peck on New Year’s Day; in others it was made into a corn dolly. This tradition exists across Europe and it is believed by many in the pagan tradition that this is a relic of the millennia-old belief in the Dying-and-Rising God or God of the Green, who dies in Autumn to be reborn the following Spring.

Read all about a traditional harvest at Foklore Thursday. -via Strange Company

(Image credit: German Federal Archives)

What happens when you mix boiling water and liquid nitogen? An explosion of freezing mist that produces dense clouds! Watch that happen when the guys from Kuma Films try it out. They keep enlarging the experiment until they can assume even cynics will be impressed. And we get to see what's happening in slow-motion, too.  

(YouTube link)

The close-ups recorded inside are the best part. I would say don't try this at home, but since most of us can't just run down to the corner store and pick up liquid nitogen, watching this is the next best thing. -via Digg

Is there a haunted hotel in your hometown? Historic hotels become haunted because so many different people have slept there over a long period of time, and some those folks go to a hotel to keep nefarious activities out of their own homes. Or else there's an even scarier history in the building's past. For example, take the historic Marshall House in Savannah, Georgia.

The Marshall House used to be a hospital during the Civil War and then a medical ward during yellow fever epidemics. Rumors such as faucets turning on by themselves and sounds of children running down the hallway haunt this hotel. If that isn't enough, many TripAdvisor reviews claim to have had ghost encounters, such as this person who "was woken from a deep sleep by a loud whirring noise that made her hair move. She then heard what sounded like drums from a marching band for a while."

Yeah, that's weird, but it's only one story of 13 from hotels across the US at Buzzfeed. You'll want to remember these while planning your next vacation trip.

(Image credit: Daniel Mayer)