Yeah, and do it while sitting next to a box of high explosives and a witness.
Okay, There are no explosives in that box. It’s a collector’s item with connections to the American Revolution, and Pierre Samuel DuPont in particular. If you’re ever near Wilmington Delaware, the tour of the DuPont gunpowder factory is awesome, It’s 18th century water-powered technology, and yeah, it’s the origin of the company of the same name.
[Found here.]
This is both interesting and annoying at the same time. “Electric Pow Wow Drum” by A Tribe Called Red [via].
Like logic puzzles? Try this. For more variety, there’s this.
Very cool physics trick. Took me five tries to get it right [via].
Parking Pron from the handsome and fetching Ms. Cellania. [Update – The vid was pulled by the user, from that link, but here it is from another source.]
Interesting story about President Herbert Hoover and Jan Paderewski. Turns out to be true.
Never heard that story, and my first reaction was that it was Urban Myth. $2,000 in 1892 dollars could purchase a spacious two-story home with multiple fireplaces. That seemed to be an extravagant fee, even for a popular piano virtuoso. It’s about $50K in 2013 dollars. That young Hoover could have raised $1,600 (+$40K / 2013) in a short amount of time is just as astounding. But it appears the story is true.
–Bunk
http://www.paderewskiassociation.org/Paderewski_Biography.htm
http://www.ushistory.org/more/hoover.htm
Great cartooning with amazing .gif animations by Neil Sanders.
“The transistor was probably the most important invention of the 20th Century, and the story behind the invention is one of clashing egos and top secret research.” True.
Top image from here.
In a tiny corner of western Poland a forest of about 400 pine trees grow with a 90 degree bend at the base of their trunks – all bent northward. Surrounded by a larger forest of straight growing pine trees this collection of curved trees, or “Crooked Forest,” is a mystery.
[via]
Bizarre illustrations by Gustave Doré from The Mythology Of The Rhine And The Stories Of The Grandmother, 1863.
On 6 September 2013, NASA unintentionally launched a frog. True.
Kiwis replumb a friend’s house with beer. Pure awesome prank, even though it was promoted by these guys.
(Tip of teh tarboosh to SH.)
Tiny Cupcakes and Pies is very cool [via].
Some folks on Reddit liked our 2009 post on the timeless brilliance of Milton Friedman.
The Grimm Brothers. Nasty stories.
Interview with Robyn Adele Anderson, vocalist for Post Modern Jukebox, and featured in the .gif animation above. Pure awesome.
[Found here.]
Update:
The horse, named Rowdy, fell into a sticky situation Monday when he found himself stuck in a large tire on a farm in Belington. The tire apparently holds water for the livestock, and when some local residents found Rowdy stuck, they were afraid he was going to drown. […] One of Rowdy’s owners who was on the scene, believes that Rowdy got trapped after an altercation with some of the other horses.
[More about the incident found here, via here. Tip ‘o the Tarboosh to John M. for ferreting out the story.]
[Found here. Salting the pot works. Related True story here.]
Pure brilliance. Watch the vid first, because there’s more info about it below. Cheers!
JesiErin is a one-girl a capella doo-wop group from Huntington Beach, California, and the dubbing, both audio and video are top notch. Here’s her take on The Cascades‘ 1962 hit.
The beer-plumbing prank video was filmed in NZ and sponsored by Tui Beer as stealth advertising, yet it was a genuine prank by a bunch of friends of the “victim.” Some folks on Reddit busted it as an advert (the comments are funny) and it’s still an awesome prank.
Word on the street is that Aussies and Kiwis don’t bother with Foster’s (it’s for tourists and export) but there are unwritten rules about which beer you order, and it varies by region. They have beer allegiances (like rabid sports fans do with teams in the US) so if you order the wrong one in the wrong place, you may be headed for trouble. A credible source told me that if you go to Oz, order Toohey’s and you may avoid a situation like this.
Have a great weekend, and we’ll see you back here tomorrow.
Tacky Raccoons 