Malkia Park Rescue Station in Orechová Potôň, Slovakia, takes in exotic animals from circuses and private homes. The lioness here is named Malkia, too. She is a product of circus breeding, and was raised by humans. A rescue park is the only place that is safe for her to live, although I wouldn't trust it to be as safe for humans as this woman does.
The park welcomes visitors, and will even let you pet some of the animals -but not the lions! -via Digg
We are used to three forms of chocolate: dark chocolate, milk chocolate, and white chocolate. Barry Callebaut, one of the world's largest chocolate manufacturers and a chocolate research center in Zurich, announced this week that the three main types of chocolate have been joined by a new form they call ruby chocolate, made from the unique ruby cocoa bean.
The fourth type in chocolate offers a totally new taste experience, which is not bitter, milky or sweet, but a tension between berry-fruitiness and luscious smoothness. To create Ruby chocolate no berries or berry flavor, nor color, is added.
Ruby chocolate was unveiled at an industry event in China on Tuesday. I couldn't find any easily-accessible information on the ruby cocoa bean, but Eater says,
“This is classic marketing hype,” says Megan Giller, food writer, Eater contributor, and author of the new book Bean-to-Bar Chocolate: America’s Craft Chocolate Revolution. “We don’t yet know what Callebaut means by the ‘ruby cocoa bean,’ especially since no expert I’ve ever spoken to has mentioned a unique type of bean that comes from the Ivory Coast, Ecuador, and Brazil.” Giller has done some research and believes this new product is made from “a genetically modified bean, maybe CCN-51, that has been processed in a particular way to get that ruby color.” (Schrauth would not go into specifics regarding how the bean was developed, citing intellectual property.)
The FDA will have to approve the new chocolate before it goes on sale in the US, so we might not see it in stores until Valentines day of 2019. Barry Callebaut is focusing on marketing the chocolate in China. -via Laughing Squid
If you grew up watching Rugrats on Nickelodeon, you might identify with Tommy, Dil, Phil, Lil, Chuckie, Kimi, Susie, or Angelica. Now that you're an adult, can you imagine how they would turn out as grown-ups? Artist Isaiah Stephens (previously at Neatorama) not only imagined, he illustrated what each Rugrats character would look like as a young adult. As you can see here, the only way Chuckie could ever get his hair under control was to let it grow out. See all of Stephens' grown-up Rugrats at TVOM.
It's probably been a long time since you've even thought about The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms, and it's possible you've never even seen it. The groundbreaking 1953 film turned out to be a confluence of talent that gave rise to a renaissance of monster movies. It was based on a Ray Bradbury story. It was the first film in which the special effects were overseen by Ray Harryhausen. And it influenced Tomoyuki Tanaka as he produced another movie called Godzilla. Harryhausen talked about the movie's monster, a reptile called a Rhedosaurus.
3. THE BEAST ITSELF WENT THROUGH SEVERAL DIFFERENT DESIGNS.
“I had to create a mythical dinosaur,” Harryhausen recalled. In his early concept art, he fitted the reptile with pointy ears, a sharp beak, and webbed, human-like hands. Another design sported what Harryhausen described as “sort of a round head.” Unhappy with this particular noggin, he replaced it with a new skull modeled after that of a Tyrannosaurus rex. The monster was then given a distinctive, four-legged stance to prevent it from looking like a “typical” carnivorous dinosaur.
By the way, there’s a long-standing fan theory about this fictitious animal. In the film, our villain is dubbed the “Rhedosaurus.” You may notice that the first two letters in its name spell out the animator’s initials. Was this a deliberate homage? Harryhausen thought not. “I don’t know where his name came from,” he told Empire in 2012. “People say it’s based on my initials, but I don’t think it is.”
Learn more about The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms at Mental Floss.
The picture above is called Feeding Flamingos by Alejandro Prieto Rojas. It won the top honor at the Bird Photographer of the Year awards, plus first place in the Bird Portrait category, from Nature Photographers Ltd and the British Trust for Ornithology. Plenty of other images were awarded in categories such as Best Portfolio, Birds in the Environment, Attention to Detail, Bird Behaviour, Birds in Flight, Birds in the Garden, and Creative Imagery. Andy Parkinson won gold in the Bird Behavior category with this image, entitled Fighting Coots.
See multiple winning photographs in each category at the winner's page. -via Boing Boing
Chile con queso, or just queso, is a staple of Tex-Mex cuisine. The classic recipe is based on processed American cheese with tomatoes and green chiles, often Velvet and Ro-Tel.
From the time it was introduced, Ro-Tel hitched its wagon to processed cheese, producing early advertisements that encouraged home cooks to make their “cheese dip” with Velveeta and Ro-Tel. That partnership continues today, with millions of dollars spent between Kraft and ConAgra (who now own Velveeta and Ro-Tel, respectively) each year in joint television advertising.
From there, chile con queso staked its place as a popular party dish. With Velveeta and Ro-Tel now widely available on grocery store shelves, home cooks could simply warm the block of processed cheese with a can of tomatoes to produce a dip that was always consistent, and always perfectly smooth. “The first recipe with Velveeta I could find was written in Lubbock in 1939,” says Fain. “From that point on, there was no looking back. It became the cheese to use for chile con queso. American cheese has more dairy in it, so you have to add stabilizers. You need starch and liquids to stabilize the sauce. And who doesn’t love processed cheese? It’s salty, it’s tangy, it’s delicious.”
But there are many different ways to make queso, and local preferences vary across the U.S. I make queso by stirring a jar of homemade salsa into a jar of store-brand cheese sauce. It's good with everything! Read up on the history and varieties of queso at Eater. -via Metafilter, where you'll find links to queso recipes.
(Image credit: Kathy Tran/Eater Dallas)
One language’s long journey from humble to honorificabilitudinitatihus.
Long ago, English was considered a barbarian’s tongue. It was fine for the workshop and tavern, but unfit for philosophy, art, and matters of the spirit. Even in England, the Catholic church and universities used Latin, while French was the language of Britain’s royal court and legal system.
But with the 15th- and 16th-century Renaissance, a surge of scholarship brought advances to all areas of thought. Scholars realized that they could use the printing press with everyday languages— even the debased English— to spread ideas. An audacious project was born: Translators would make Plutarch, Cicero, and ancient texts accessible for this uncultured lot.
Trouble was, English didn’t have the words they needed.
One scholar was frustrated that “there ys many wordes in Latyn that we haue no propre englyssh accordynge therto.” Another complained that, compared with Greek, “our grosse tongue is a rude and a barren tong.” To fill in the gaps, translators started to borrow and create words based on Latin and Greek.
Have you ever turned the volume of a cat video up just to see how your cat would react? That could be traumatic, especially if cats, as we have always suspected, have a secret language of their own. Franklin came right out of a sound sleep, ready to be the hero! I hope this particular video has a happy ending, so that he can calm down again. My big orange tomcat would have just sneered and gone back to sleep. This is the latest comic from Pedro Arizpe of Port Sherry. His comics are in Spanish here, where the kitten's cry is "¡¡Miau!!"
In Brisbane, Queensland, recently, a possum was spotted eating the plants for sale in a hardware store. From the YouTube page:
"While wandering through the garden section of a hardware store, I was surprised to see a very special animal customer eating the tomato and strawberry seedlings. A native Australian brush-tail possum, which is usually nocturnal must have felt a bit hungry. He didn't appear to be frightened and seemed to relish the attention! Protected by law they can't move him more than 30 meters away from where he is found."
This video contrasts the many differences between the U.S. and Australia. First off, this is a possum, and he's cute. In America, our possums have an "o" in front of them, and they are ugly as sin. Second, no store owner here would put up with any critter eating the merchandise, but in Australia, they appear to be tolerated, and even cooed over. Third, it is autumn in America, and all the plants are gone from the stores. -via Tastefully Offensive
A massive wilfire in Washington state has burned over 30,000 acres this week. Kolsefur posted this image at reddit yesterday, depicting a group of golfers at Beacon Rock Golf Course playing a round in front of a burning hill. Everyone's first reaction is that the picture was Photoshopped, but it is very real. Behind them is the Eagle Creek fire, which grew very fast. One of the golfers, Brandon Crawford, said,
"They were definitely not faked," Crawford said over the phone.
"When we first started there was a fire maybe the size of a grocery store," he said. "By the end of hole two, it was just crazy. The big one you're seeing on the internet was on hole nine."
Though the fire was across the river, Crawford said ash the size the soccer balls was falling around them. He and his friends would golf and then stare at the fire, and then golf some more.
Those who were there said that particular viral image made the fire seem much closer than it was -the burning hill was about a mile away. -via Gizmodo
Rian Johnson, the director of The Last Jedi, did an interview with the New York Times in which he revealed who the title to the new Star Wars film refers to.
It’s in the opening crawl of “The Force Awakens.” Luke Skywalker, right now, is the last Jedi. There’s always wiggle room in these movies — everything is from a certain point of view — but coming into our story, he is the actual last of the Jedi. And he’s removed himself and is alone on this island, for reasons unknown.
So the title refers to that point in time, and does not necessarily mean that Luke will remain the last, or only, Jedi in the universe. But even if he is, the saga will still go on. Uproxx has an opinion piece that posits that the survival of the Jedi order is not as important to the Star Wars saga as you might think.
The future of the Jedi may be in question, but even if the Order ends with Luke Skywalker, the Force will remain. Both Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and the final season of the Star Wars: The Clone Wars set up the idea that the Jedi and the Sith are merely the most active sects of an ancient religion that predates the invention of space travel in a galaxy far, far away. Whatever deity or universe-effecting energy permeates the Star Wars universe, it doesn’t need lightsaber-wielding humanoids to keep existing. In fact, based on other quotes Johnson gave the Times in his interview, Lucasfilm is inching away from extreme Light Side/Dark Side dichotomy and towards a “gray area.”
Both articles go on to describe the psychology between the forces (pardon me) represented by Kylo and Rey, which could carry at least a couple more movies. The overarching themes here completely ignore midi-chlorians, which are best forgotten. We can just put that in the files as a theory that Qui-Gon Jinn was completely wrong about.
John Green tells us more than you ever considered about LEGO bricks. First off, LEGO itself is not a noun, but an adjective, which is why I try to say "LEGO blocks" or "LEGO bricks" when I write about them. I'm leaning toward "LEGO pieces" lately because those things are way more than bricks when you factor in minifigs and motors and stuff. Did youknow that the LEGO company manufacture more wheels than any other company on earth? That's just a sample of the fascinating LEGO stories and facts in the latest episode of the Mental Floss List Show.
According to IMDb, Arnold Schwarzenegger can claim 61 acting roles, including a half-dozen movies now in the works. Before that, he was a world-famous bodybuilder, winning the title of Mr. Olympia seven times. He's also been a world-famous politician, serving as governor of California from 2003 to 2011. After all this time, it's fun to look back to the young actor who barely spoke any English in his first acting roles. Pictured above is the movie Stay Hungry from 1976, his third feature film and the first in which he was allowed to speak -and which won him a Golden Globe award. Check out 50 pictures from Schwarzenegger's long acting career in chronological order at TVOM. How many of these movies and TV shows have you seen?
Apple is suing Qualcomm for acting like a monopoly. Apple. The beef between the two tech companies is confusing, but even if you don't know a thing about business law, you can see how poor poor Apple's situation can seem amusing to outsiders -and even insiders. This is the latest from Jeff Lovfers at Don't Hit Save.
On a totally different subject, you can scroll down at the comic page and read the first part of Lovfer's Nashville flood experience. The rest of the story is promised for later. At least he's not crying over spoiled milk. -via Geeks Are Sexy
The U.S. exports more food than any other country in the world. Who is #2? Believe it or not, it's the Netherlands, which is tiny, only a thousand miles from the Arctic Circle, and partially below sea level. The Dutch produce more food per square mile than anyone, and rank #1 in the production of tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, pears, carrots, potatoes, and onions per square mile. Their secret? A nationwide dedication to using science and innovation to improve yield.
That copious output is made all the more remarkable by the other side of the balance sheet: inputs. Almost two decades ago, the Dutch made a national commitment to sustainable agriculture under the rallying cry “Twice as much food using half as many resources.” Since 2000, van den Borne and many of his fellow farmers have reduced dependence on water for key crops by as much as 90 percent. They’ve almost completely eliminated the use of chemical pesticides on plants in greenhouses, and since 2009 Dutch poultry and livestock producers have cut their use of antibiotics by as much as 60 percent.
An article at National Geographic looks at the large experimental farms that produce these enormous yields while constantly adding to their body of knowledge about sustainable farming techniques.
(Image credit: Luca Locatelli/National Geographic)
