An 11-bedroom mansion in Indianapolis is on the market with an asking price of $1.75 million. It's more than just a posh house, as the A.V. Club describes.

Selling for $1.75 million, the house was apparently owned by an “eccentric millionaire” who must’ve taken notes from Sarah Winchester. As the listing’s copious photos show, the house isn’t garish so much as it is confusing, looking as if a mansion, a dentist’s office, and a cobblestone road were smooshed together by the grubby, Cheetos-dusted hands of some adolescent giant.

The house has mismatched stoneware all over the place, even in the bedrooms. There's plenty of statuary, gingerbread, windows in all shapes and sizes, and kitsch. It all looks very expensive (if not tasteful), but confusing is a better word. And that's without the weird furniture staging.

Oh, hey, put the children's bunkbed in the room with the GIGANTIC OPEN GRILL. pic.twitter.com/H20w7ysCSB

— Gabriel Rosenberg (@gnrosenberg) August 19, 2017

 
Check out the real estate listing to see all 48 pictures of this property.

Matthew Inman of The Oatmeal looks at the eclipse (with glasses, of course) in a way most of us haven't. While everyone is talking about looking at the sun, we will actually be looking at the moon while it just pushes through where it doesn't normally belong. -via Matthew Inman

NPR illustrated an article about the plague with a medieval image. A historian pointed out that the picture was actually depicting victims of leprosy. So they replaced the image. Well, the second image was about the biblical curse of skin boils. It turns out that a lot of what we thought was art about the plague is just wrong. Most real plague victims were not covered in spots or sores as we've come to think. What a real plague victim looked like was worse, but not as easily conveyed in a painting.    

First off, there were a lot fewer spots involved. People in the mislabeled images tend to be covered from head to toe in red lesions. Some patients probably did get petechial hemorrhaging — pinpoint dark spots of blood under the skin. But today, as in the past, plague victims would only have had one bump on their bodies — a big swollen lymph node called a "bubo" close to where they were bitten by a flea carrying the infection.

This is not to say they looked good. They were probably sweating and shivering with fevers, and they supposedly smelled terrible, says Jones, "because their bodies were breaking down from the inside." But those aren't characteristics that would stand out in an illustration.

The Black Death swept through Europe between 1347 and 1353, but artists weren't keen on sitting down to paint them. Read about the lack of plague victim images and how we got the wrong idea about the disease at NPR. -via Digg

(Image credit: The British Library)

One fine May morning in 1924, the Ku Klux Klan gathered for a rally in South Bend, Indiana. They had high hopes of engaging a crowd with their fiery speeches. After all, they were in friendly territory.

Fresh off a controversial leadership election in Indianapolis, Indiana, there was no reason for Klansmen to have any apprehension about holding a morale booster in South Bend. Indiana was Klan territory, with an estimated one in three native born white men sworn members within state lines. Just a few months later, Klansman Ed Jackson would be elected governor.

It was only when Klansmen found themselves guided into alleys and surrounded by an irate gang of Catholic students from nearby Notre Dame University that they realized mobilizing in South Bend may have been a very bad idea.

The Klan wanted a rally. What they got was a full-scale riot.

That was not the reaction the Klan was used to at the time. Read the story of that riot and the pushback that continued for days afterward, at Mental Floss.

The way a TV series begins is incredibly important in the age of hundreds of channels running 24 hours a day. So many stories are available to the viewer that the very first episode must grab an audience at the same time it sets up the beginning of a story. And even then, if a show doesn't intrigue the viewer right away, they may not watch the entire episode. Therefore, some of the most successful shows begin with a bang, with a first scene that won't take place in the narrative until later, when the story gets more exciting. If that scene grabs you, the show can jump back and let us in on how it came to be. Breaking Bad is one example, as the insane opening scene only takes place after a lot of explanation in the actual timeline. Relive that scene and those from four other hit shows at TVOM.

Remember when you were a kid, and you didn't really know what to do with an aunt or uncle, and then you found out they were the coolest person in the family? That only works until Mom and Dad find out. It's pretty fun on the other end, too. Babysitting is always easier when you're not the one responsible for how the child turns out. Also, if Mom and Dad find out, then maybe they won't ask any favors of you in the future. This is the newest comic from Lunarbaboon.

Motherhood has never been easy, especially when you have several young ones to keep track of. This raccoon has at least two kits, maybe more. When it's nap time, she wants to get them all into the tree where they live so she can get some shut eye. But that last child does not want to cooperate.

(YouTube link)

This raccoon family was recorded in Leesburg, Virginia. Note that at about two minutes in, the mother notices the camera operator. She doesn't have time to smile for the camera, at least not until every kit is inside and accounted for. -via Tastefully Offensive

Comedian and movie star Jerry Lewis died Sunday morning at his home in Las Vegas. He was long known as half of the comedy duo Martin and Lewis, who performed together in 16 films over ten years. Lewis then starred in a series of comedy films on his own, the most memorable of which was The Nutty Professor in 1963.   

Barely out of his teens, he shot to fame shortly after World War II with a nightclub act in which the rakish, imperturbable Dean Martin crooned and the skinny, hyperactive Mr. Lewis capered around the stage, a dangerously volatile id to Mr. Martin’s supremely relaxed ego.

After his break with Mr. Martin in 1956, Mr. Lewis went on to a successful solo career, eventually writing, producing and directing many of his own films.

As a spokesman for the Muscular Dystrophy Association, Mr. Lewis raised vast sums for charity; as a filmmaker of great personal force and technical skill, he made many contributions to the industry, including the invention in 1960 of a device — the video assist, which allowed directors to review their work immediately on the set — still in common use.

Jerry Lewis was 91.

Read more about Jerry lewis in some Neatorama articles by Eddie Deezen: 

11 Facts You May Not Know About Jerry Lewis

Jerry Lewis' The Nutty Professor

The Day Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis Teamed Up 

Jerry Lewis' Flop TV Talk Show

Jerry Lewis' Lost Film: The Day the Clown Cried

Why Do the French Love Jerry Lewis?

Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis: Restaurant Owners

The following is an article from Uncle John's 24-Karat Gold Bathroom Reader.

As 1972 approached, President Richard Nixon started to get more and more concerned about his coming reelection campaign. He became convinced that his political adversaries weren’t just opponents-they were “enemies” and had to be stopped. He and his advisers compiled this list of 20 public figures who they felt could hurt them in some way. Were they ever really threats to Nixon? Probably not, but Nixon thought so, which makes this piece of history all the more fascinating.

“ON SCREWING OUR POLITICAL ENEMIES”

In 1972 five men were caught breaking into Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C. The culprits turned out to have ties to high-level members of both the Republican Party and the Nixon administration. The Congressional investigation that followed unraveled the Nixon presidency, exposing the systematic way Nixon abused power and attempted to destroy his enemies (real and imagined), eventually leading to his resignation in order to avoid impeachment.

One year before Nixon’s resignation, on June 27, 1973, White House counsel John Dean testified before Congress about possible connections between the Nixon administration and the Watergate burglars’ plan to steal information damaging to Democratic candidates. Dean mentioned that in 1971 he’d received a memo titled “On Screwing Our Political Enemies.” Written by Charles Colson, another Nixon attorney, the memo was a list of people singled out as those most threatening to Nixon’s career. The memo detailed how the White House planned to go about discrediting Nixon’s opponents, which included anyone trying to run against him and any reporter who’d given him unfavorable coverage. The goal: to ruin every person on the list with a campaign of rumors, character assassination, and even IRS audits.

WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?

Spacesuits in TV and movies may look cool, but how safe and usable would they be in real life? Some of them were designed for media before we actually put a human into contact with space, so we can't expect them to be anywhere near accurate, while others are from a time when they should have known better. The continuing saga of Star Trek began after the first EVA, but the original series did not have the budget for realism. It's become better with time.

Where to start with Star Trek? The upcoming show Star Trek Discovery features a badass suit that looks like an entire miniature spaceship. But there are also some bizarre, cringeworthy depictions, like these from The Original Series. They’re sparkly! They have weird, seemingly useless colored attachments, the wearer can really only see right in front of them, and the visor extends to the back of their head for some reason.

Fortunately, the show went with some marginally better (but still science fictional) versions for The Motion Picture, and some really plausible ones in Enterprise. But although the latest series’ suits look cool, they don’t seem that realistic either, with an emphasis on armor and propulsion over anything else. We’ll have to wait until later this year to know just what they’re used for.

Read about the plausibility of spacesuits from fiction, and see some pictures that will make you laugh and remember the first time you saw them, at the Verge. -via Digg 

Once upon a time, the side of a building was as good an advertising medium as any, and many were painted to alert passers-by to the business inside, or for some totally unrelated product. Now they are part of history, sometimes faded and barely readable, sometimes only existing in photographs. Seeing one provokes a sense of whimsy and nostalgia. Should these 'ghost signs' be preserved? Even if you think they should be, the greater question is "How?"  

Some cities and towns are restoring ghost signs with fresh paint, but that can be a contentious issue. Winslow says that in the sign painting community, many people believe that for a restoration to be authentic, it must be repainted by the person who originally painted the sign, or a direct apprentice. That’s tough for a 75-year-old sign.

Color and paint choice presents another problem. Ghost signs have lasted so long because the paint contained lead. Modern paints peel, rather than slowly fading away. Many of today’s restorations are painted in bright colors, but old paints were less vibrant, and the available palette was limited.

Preservationists see the question as the kind of tradeoff they confront all the time. Tod Swormstedt of the American Sign Museum said,

“It’s kind of a subjective call, like when you restore an old house; are you going to restore it back to not having electric lights and have gas lights and not have a bathroom, not have indoor plumbing like some of the early Victorian houses?” Swormstedt says. “How purist do you want to get?”

But experiential designer Craig Winslow has a totally different method for preserving ghost signs, one that doesn't affect the building at all. Read about his work at City Lab. -via Metafilter

(Image credit: Bill Whittaker)

How average you are depends on how many different parameters you are looking at. If you look at more statistics, you'll find some category in which you are exceptional, and that, too, is quite normal. It turns out I am average in almost every way, except for how many children I have, and whether I am above or below the average depends on your definitions. Still, being above or below average does not mean you are abnormal.    

(YouTube link)

Then again, you are probably more average than you think you are. All my life I've been told that I'm short, when I have always been the exact average for a woman my age. I knew that. Where people are particularly bad at knowing their own "averageness" is in their intelligence and competence. That's where the Dunning-Kruger Effect and Impostor Syndrome come in.

Riding along interstate 90 in South Dakota, you expect to see roadside art. But a glorious new statue went up last year that dominates the landscape as she welcomes you. You'll find Dignity between exits 263 and 265 near Chamberlain.

She was created by artist Dale Lamphere, who has been South Dakota’s Artist Laureate since 2015. He received the commission from a local couple.  Eunabel and Norm McKie of Rapid City wanted to create something to commemorate the 125th anniversary of South Dakota’s statehood but they also wanted something which would celebrate the determination, wisdom and bravery of the state’s indigenous peoples, the cultural inheritance of the Lakota and Dakota.   The couple gave over a million dollars to support the project.

Dignity is 50 feet tall and constructed so that the wind flows through her blanket instead of pushing against it. Read all about this magnificent statue at Kuriositas. And look for her the next time you drive through South Dakota.

(Image credit: Amphibol)

Here's a dog with a unique job. He walks around the tourist district of Huangpu village in China, showing everyone a sign advertising his owner's hamburger shop!

(YouTube link)

Take his word for it, the burgers are good. Want to take a picture? He'll pose, but only with his sign facing front so you can see it. That's a good dog. -via Tastefully Offensive

Somewhere in the Pacific Ocean 72 years ago, a Japanese torpedo tore through the hull of the USS Indianapolis. The ship sank 18,000 feet to the bottom of the sea, and wasn't seen again -until Friday.

The Indianapolis sank in 12 minutes, making it impossible for it to send a distress signal or deploy life-saving equipment. Before the attack, on July 30, 1945, it had just completed a secret mission delivering components of the atomic bomb used in Hiroshima that brought an end to the war in the Pacific, according to the Naval History and Heritage Command in Washington.

Most of the ship's 1,196 sailors and Marines survived the sinking only to succumb to exposure, dehydration, drowning and shark attacks. Only 316 survived, according to the US Navy. Of the survivors, 22 are alive today.

You might remember the story as it was told in the movie Jaws. A civilian expedition led by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen spotted the wreckage of the ship using hi-tech equipment capable of diving miles underwater. Read the story of the Indianapolis at CNN. -via Metafilter