Commuting on public transport gets tiring sometimes. However, that doesn’t mean we can’t find entertaining things on our daily commute. Bored Panda compiled a list of 100 plus odd and funny things people chanced upon during their ride in the subway. From a woman who strangely looks like the Mona Lisa to a man faithfully engrossed in a book titled How To Talk To Your Cat About Gun Safety (not gonna lie I would read the hell out of that book) to a guy randomly holding a peacock, surely there’s something in the list that will baffle you or make you laugh. Check the full list here!
What could have possibly happened to the colonists left in Roanoke in 1587? This has been a subject of multiple theories online and was featured in an episode of Buzzfeed Unsolved. When John White, governor of Roanoke Island colony, sailed back to England to get some supplies and reinforcements, he didn’t expect to come back to an abandoned location. When he returned in 1590, aside from the ghost town he found himself in, there was a mysterious word carved on a palisade post. The fate of the colonists he left behind has remained a mystery ever since.
Experts remain clueless as to where the colonists went. According to Charles Ewen, director of the Phelps Archaeology Laboratory at East Carolina University, “past archaeologists believed that the colony was located at what is now the Fort Raleigh National Historic Site, but this idea has been called into question, because some of the artifacts found at Fort Raleigh date to after the colony vanished.” Real Clear Science delves deeper into this mystery. Check out their full piece here!
Early 20th-century modernist architecture was big in Southern California. There were innovative architects bringing sunlight and class to the homes of the nouveau riche, movie stars, and real estate moguls. Many became quite famous, and led lifestyles that rivaled those of movie stars. And then there was Jock Peters.
When the great 20th-century architect Richard Neutra arrived in Los Angeles in 1925 with his wife, Dione, and the couple’s young child, his first residence was 835 Kings Road in West Hollywood. There, the Neutras shared the home of fellow Austrian architect Rudolph Schindler and his wife, Pauline. Schindler, who designed the architectural landmark, had already made a name for himself in the United States by writing a “manifesto” that described, perhaps for the first time in so many words, an architecture in which, “The distinction between indoors and the out-of-doors will disappear.” A stint with Frank Lloyd Wright sealed Schindler’s reputation, as did the legendary soirees at Kings Road, where it was not uncommon for modern dancers to perform in the nude while Schindler’s guests drank freely, despite the strictures of Prohibition.
When the little-known 20th-century architect and designer Jock Peters arrived in Los Angeles in 1922, his wife, Herta, and their five children remained back home in Germany. Peters’ first lodging was a room at a local YMCA, which he shared with his brother George, who had landed in the United States almost a decade earlier. “I want to lead a quiet, insular life with you here,” Jock was soon assuring Herta in a letter home, “and shall try to avoid ambition and fame.”
Peters kept this promise, maybe too assiduously…
Peters started his career in California at a draftsman table, working for an architectural firm. But he branched out by getting creative for Hollywood studios, designing fantasy sets and interiors, a step that may be even more lasting than the expensive houses that brought acclaim to other architects. He went on to design stores and other commercial businesses, but he always kept a low profile. Now Peters' real influence can be recognized through the publication of his archives in the book Jock Peters, Architecture and Design: The Varieties of Modernism by Christopher Long. Read an overview of Peters' life and work at Collectors Weekly.
Radon is a naturally-occurring radioactive gas that we are warned about in our basements. We know the dangers of radiation, which was driven home forcefully after Hiroshima and during the arms race. There was a time before that in which people sought out the miracle of radiation in cosmetics and even medicine. That belief hasn't quite died out.
There are places in the world that people go to and pay good money to be exposed to radon. Radon therapy seems to help some people, but is it a miracle cure, a placebo, or a matter of faith? Tom Scott visits the radonstollen (radon tunnel) in Bad Kreuznach, Germany. It's the site of a thriving pain clinic. The unique feature of this clinic is that the radon can be turned on or off! It sounds like the perfect place to propose a double-blind study on the effects of radon, but that probably won't happen. Even if you could find enough volunteers, good luck getting that idea past a university's ethics board.
If you know only two things about Benjamin Franklin, you know the story of how he flew a kite in a thunderstorm to capture electricity, and how he wanted to name the turkey as our national bird. If you know three things, you know he also liked beer. And then there's all that Founding Father stuff. You might like to learn how Franklin combined his electrical experiments with his fondness for turkey meat.
Two years before his famous kite experiment, Franklin decided to slaughter a turkey using electricity. He theorized that turkeys killed by electricity would be tastier than those killed by the usual method of decapitation. On December 23, 1750, Franklin set up the procedure. But instead of killing the turkey, he electrocuted himself! No, he didn't die, but he wrote about his injuries. We don't know what happened to the turkey, but it most likely ended up as Christmas dinner anyway. Read the story of that experiment at Smithsonian.
🌋 The Cumbre Vieja volcano on the Canary Island of La Palma has been erupting for two months, and as if lava and rain of ash aren't scary enough, it's also been chucking lava bombs the size of boulders. Watch as this red-hot lava bomb roll down the side of the volcano.
🐶 This dog is richer than you: A German shepherd named Gunther VI eats meals prepared by his private chef, travels by private jet, and sleeps in Madonna's former master bedroom. Now, he is selling his $38 million waterfront mansion in Miami.
🕷️ A reptile park in Australia received a mystery donation in form of a tupperware container with no notes. Inside they found a funnel-web spider so huge, which they aptly nicknamed MEGASPIDER. Warning: well, this post has images and videos of said creepy-crawly.
Do not underestimate doors. If you see a door in your favorite game, say, The Witcher 3 or Breath of the Wild, know that developers had a hard time coding that piece of wood you love to enter and exit from. Regardless of what game it is, developers have admitted that one of the most difficult aspects of a game to get right are doors. Watch Vox’s video on the topic to learn about the process (and the struggle) of making doors work properly in games.
The murder case was left open for more than 30 years, as investigators tried to solve the case. DNA evidence that was found on Cuylenborg’s pants was uploaded to the same website a matching DNA sequence, Chelsea Rustad’s, was uploaded. This coincidence led the authorities to the identity of the killer, as Moore identified the culprit in just two hours. "It's the web of matches," Moore said. "It's putting those pieces together little by little."
Check out CBS News’ full piece on how the case was finally closed here.
It’s not priced at $1 million. The One Million Dollar Puzzle is a big jigsaw puzzle sold at $30. The catch with this particular puzzle is that upon assembling all the pieces, a QR code can be used by the buyer to see if they won something-- twenty-five cents, one hundred, one thousand, ten thousand, or one million dollars. Everyone wins something, regardless of the amount of money. The special puzzle is now on sale for 16% off, which is perfect if you’re looking for a way to have fun and get some prize money. In addition, it could also be a perfect gift for someone this holiday season!
Meet Oishii, a company created by MBA graduates Hiroki Koga and Brendan Somerville. The company specializes in providing restaurants in New York City with the highest quality of strawberries. Koga and Somerville initially tested out the reception for their berries by importing a suitcase of the fruits from Japan. They wanted to know if the chefs would pay for berries like theirs, which tasted like candy and melted on the first chew, and how frequently, if they were available year-round, from a farm less than an hour away.
Upon realizing that there was a potential market for the strawberries they imported, the two decided to find a way to farm these berries for their business. They used the method of vertical farming, which employs carefully controlled artificial environments that are mostly used for growing leafy greens. As to why the media calls Oishii ‘the Tesla of strawberries,’ it’s because their business model resembles the popular electronic company’s: they start with a luxury product before moving to mass market. Learn more about Oishii here.
The 58-story Millennium Tower in San Francisco is the tallest residential building in the city. Whatever you may think of the wisdom of living in a skyscraper in an earthquake-prone city, residents began moving in in 2009, despite the fact that there were already signs of trouble with the building. Two terms come to mind when reading about the Millennium Tower: One is the "sunk cost fallacy," but that's a little too on the nose, and "throwing good money after bad," which means the same thing without the word "sunk."
Such a large and heavy building built close to the sea needs an extremely stable foundation. The Millennium Tower was built on a ten-foot-thick slab over 950 concrete piles installed 80 feet deep. Engineers thought that was enough, and predicted the building would settle four to six inches over its lifetime. But the building settled 16 inches by 2016, and not evenly. The top of the skyscraper was 12 inches out of plumb! That's twice what building codes allowed, but the residents were assured the building was safe. Still, there were numerous lawsuits to be settled.
What next? Engineers came up with a plan to fix the Millennium Tower, even though the repairs to the foundation would cost twice the original construction cost. And when they started the repair process, plans went awry again. Read the story of the Millennium Tower from an engineer's perspective, or watch it in video form, at Practical Engineering. -via Nag on the Lake
It was all an accident too! NASA’s Curiosity rover was on Mars’ Vera Rubin ridge collecting samples when it suffered from a slight malfunction. The robot dropped one of the samples into a cup with a chemical mixture instead of one of the containers in the sample carousel. This accident caused molecules to rise from the combination. Upon analysis, scientists discovered organic molecules on Mars that no space agency had previously detected. Check Inverse’s full piece on the discovery here.
Nazaré is a municipality located in Portugal. The area, filled with beautiful tourist spots for visitors to take advantage of, has encountered a problem that became a threat to their local economy. The problem is the huge waves that were too high to be tamed by surfing enthusiasts. The once-popular summer holiday became a ghost town, as tourists tend to avoid the huge waves that spawned in the area. Learn how the municipality turned their big problem into a big tourist event here!
Archeologists have discovered human bodies at Huaca Santa Rosa de Pucalá, northwestern Peru. Out of the total 29 bodies, four of them were reported to represent the region’s first examples of human sacrificial offerings. According to Edgar Bracamonte Lévano, the excavation's director and research archaeologist with the Royal Tombs of Sipán museum, the ‘offerings’ were two children, one teenager, and one adult-- which were estimated to have been entombed approximately 1,000 years ago.
In addition to human remains, the excavation unearthed skeletons of different animals-- eight guinea pigs, several alpacas, and llamas, all believed to have been sacrificed along with the human bodies. Learn more about the discovery here.
People who work from home and have very, very clingy pets, the days when our furry companions take over our work table, our laps, or our laptops is now over! Swedish inventor and YouTuber Simone Giertz created a perfect chair that accommodates you and your pet. Her creation allows our fluffy friends to sit beside us as we work throughout the day. This chair would definitely be ideal if you’re a pet owner!
