It's long been a given among Star Wars fans that stormtroopers have terrible aim. This is, of course, necessary to keep the main protagonists alive, but over all these decades it's become altogether ridiculous. Obi-Wan said, "Only Imperial stormtroopers are so precise," but he said a lot of things that weren't so. Even The Mandalorian got into the spirit with a scene that brings the trope into the Star Wars canon. Auralnauts took that scene and others and obliterated the fourth wall to explore how self-aware stormtroopers really are. Contains NSFW language. -via Geekologie

Tony DeMatteo of Churchville, New York loves Halloween. Every year, his Halloween celebrations get bigger and better. He's been on a pirate theme since, three years ago, his daughter asked for a Pirates of the Caribbean-style Halloween. This year, he went all-out with a mock ship that is 50 feet long and 20 feet tall. It took him only a week and $3,000 in materials to build. CNN describes his amazing project:

"I have no background in this, I just do it for fun for my kids, and that's what makes it so great," Tony DeMatteo told CNN. "It's also been a rough year for a lot of people so we decided this would be a perfect opportunity to put a smile on people's face and just give them a sense of normalcy."

The father of three said he was motivated to build the pirate ship by his children, whose faces "light up with excitement" whenever they see Halloween decorations.

-via Dave Barry

The Allies were using jellied gasoline as an incendiary weapon at the beginning of World War II, but a shortage of the necessary ingredient latex drove the search for a substitute. That's when napalm was developed. We tend to associate napalm with the Vietnam War, but the fearsome fuel that stuck to whatever it touched was also used in World War II and the Korean War.

In 1942, Louis Fieser and his team became the first to develop such an alternative—a synthetic powdery compound, which when mixed with gasoline turns into an extremely sticky and inflammable substance. They named it napalm, from the words “naphthenic acid” and “palmitic acid”, the two chief constituents of the agent.

Napalm was first tested on a football field near the Harvard Business School. Later tests were carried out at Jefferson Proving Ground on derelict farm buildings. But more extensive testing was needed in order to determine the effectiveness of the weapon against German and Japanese cities.

To do that, the military built an entire village in the Utah desert, filled with creepily authentic reproductions of German and Japanese houses. Read about the testing village and the destruction it enabled at Amusing Planet.

(Image credit: US Army)

Hey, the mom just wanted to help out her kids who wanted to bring their iPhones in the shower. If her kids’ iPhones get broken,that would be expensive. Facebook users however, called her innocent shower hack ‘x-rated’ for the other purposes the hack might also have, as Daily Mail details: 

Mum-of-three Kelly explained her sons had always taken their phones into the shower with them to play music so she decided to install a car phone holder onto the wall to make it easier. 

'I was forever telling them they were going to drop it and I wasn't getting them a new one. Until I came up with this fab idea,' Kelly wrote. 

But some were concerned the new addition could be used for less innocent activities.   

'Have you questioned why they need to take their phones in the shower?' one person asked.'

'Easy way to take nudes, thanks mum,' another added.

Kelly was disgusted with the online 'backlash' she received and said: 'I didn't put this up for backlash and not all kids do that. Geez.'

Image via Daily Mail 

Designers never stop making new innovations, huh! On the latest edition of appliances trying to be as unobtrusive as possible, here’s the Sauberair FLAT purifier, an air purifier that’s designed not only as  a functional home appliance, but also a great addition to one’s home decor. The purifier has a thickness of 3 ½ inches, which makes it possible to be disguised as wall decor, as Yanko Design details: 

By serving a more defined aesthetic purpose instead of just looking decor-friendly, Sauberair FLAT’s approach to tech is similar to the one found in Samsung’s TVs with their Ambient Modes, that displayed the pattern on the wall behind it, to cloak its appearance instead of looking like a massive black square when switched-off.

The sleek air-filters come in three variants. A ‘LITE’ version that requires you to manually switch it on, a ‘PLUS’ IoT-enabled version that uses automatic air-sensors to detect and filter air when it senses a quality-drop, and perhaps my favorite, the ‘BT PLUS’, which not only runs automatically, but even comes with integrated Bluetooth speaker, making it perhaps the only air purifier to be able to pump out fresh air as well as fresh beats! All variants rely on the same format, and fit into the same 3½ inch framework. Designed to be sleek enough to mount on the wall, the purifier’s intakes and exhausts are built around the sides, keeping the front-face intact for your art. The purifier hangs directly on your wall, although you can choose a standing version too. The art sits within a wooden frame (available in three colors – brown, white, and black) and can easily be removed to reveal the purifier beneath.

Image via Yanko Design 

I’m sure the anonymous mason would have wanted his peers to find out about his masterpiece sooner than 900 years after, but hey, people found it! A portrait carved in the early 12th century at Santiago de Compostela has been discovered by a British art scholar who claims that it was never meant to be part of the cathedral’s decorations, as the Guardian details: 

“You find this in medieval buildings,” Dr Jennifer Alexander told the Observer. “They’re usually in dark corners where only another stonemason would find them. This one is in a bit of the building where you’d have to be a stonemason to be up there to see it. It’s tucked away in among a whole set of capitals [the top of a column] that are otherwise plain.

“It’s just such a charming connection between us and the person that carved it. It’s almost as if it was designed just for us to see it by those people working on the building. Of course, this stonemason probably had no idea that he’d have to wait so long to be spotted.”

Despite the supreme talent of such craftsmen, they were completely anonymous, their names lost to history. This is the closest the mason got to signing his work.

Image via the Guardian ‘

Countries which observe Daylight Saving Time have switched their clocks back to standard time once again because it’s November. For almost a century, countries in Europe as well as North America have followed this practice of setting clocks forward by one hour. But is it time to end this practice?

This system’s twice-a-year transitions have become increasingly unpopular. Scientists have been calling attention to the damaging effects of the time changes—which include a general reduction in mental and physical well-being, as well as a potential increased risk of serious complications, such as strokes and heart attacks, soon after the shifts. There is also evidence of increases in traffic fatalities and harmful medical errors shortly following when clocks are moved forward in the spring.

In many countries, this might be the one of the last instances in which people make the adjustment. Governments around the world have been in discussions about scrapping the seasonal clock changes and sticking to one time—either permanent standard time or permanent daylight saving. In the U.S., many states are considering, or have already passed, legislation to adopt one of the two. Hawaii and most of Arizona decided to adopt just standard time more than 50 years ago. Last year the European Parliament voted to abolish the time shifts, but the member states of the European Union have yet to agree on how to implement the decision.

More about this over at Scientific American.

How about you? What do you think about Daylight Saving Time?

(Image Credit: pasja1000/ Pixabay)

The 2004 movie National Treasure made no sense whatsoever, but it was an action film that starred Nicolas Cage. As Screen Junkies points out, it also checks off all the necessary formula points for a blockbuster hit, so it didn't have to make sense. Now, if you really liked National Treasure, you could pretend that it was a satire of action movies that pretended to be deep, but if you were honest about it, you'd just say it was fun ride.

Pictured above is a Native Alaskan participating in a high kicking contest from 1950. The object is to kick a leather ball hanging from several feet off the air. The ball is gradually raised until only the winner is able to reach it. The Smithsonian Institution describes the legend that led to this sport:

High-kick competitions were once part of Kivgiq, the Messenger Feast. As each man entered the qargi he tried to kick an inflated animal bladder or ball suspended from the ceiling. An Iñupiaq story tells of a young woman who owned two balls; the larger was the sun, and the smaller the moon. The sun ball fell (or in one version was dropped by Raven) and burst open, bringing light to the world. The circular designs seen on this ball represent the sun and commemorate this ancient story.

-via Weird Universe | Photo: University of Alaska at Fairbanks Archives

This past June, Mie University in central Japan graduated its first ninja. That's right, Genichi Mitsuhashi, who is pictured above, holds a master's degree in that field. He's chopping wood because farm work was part of a ninja's lifestyle. The Japan Times quotes him:

“I read that ninjas worked as farmers in the morning and trained in martial arts in the afternoon,” he said.

So Mitsuhashi grew vegetables and worked on his martial arts techniques, in addition to copious ninja study in the classroom.

About three students per year enroll in this program, which was created in 2017. It is focused on the history of ninjas, not the practical skills of ninjas. That didn't stop Mitsuhashi from studying on his own, though.

-via My Modern Met | Photo: AFP/JIJI

The Green-Wood Cemetery is a cemetery located in Brooklyn, New York City. It is the resting place of many famous artists and musicians like Leonard Bernstein and Jean-Michel Basquiat. But of all the many famous figures buried in this 478-acre cemetery, they are not who get the most visits. Rather, many people visit this place not to pay tribute to men, but to a humble dog named Rex.

Rex was the faithful companion of John E. Stow, one of NYC's leading fruit merchants who died in 1884. Green-Wood’s files from the 19th century include a note that refers to the placement of a “bronze likeness of a dog,” next to Stow’s grave. However, it’s unclear if Rex is actually buried there. “I think people like to believe that there is a dog interred there and there very well might be,” Stacy Locke, Communications Manager at Green-Wood Cemetery says. “But it’s hard to say.”

But it seems that it doesn’t matter whether Rex is buried there or not. It doesn't change the fact that he was, is, and always will be a good boy.

Over the past months, people have gone by the cemetery just to leave sticks on Rex’s gravestone.

If you’re in NYC, you can find Rex’s memorial at Green-Wood Cemetery, Lot 2925, Section 81.

Wholesome.

(Image Credit: terrawindham/ Twitter)

Yemen’s ancient city of Shibam, a UNESCO World Heritage site, has a big chance of collapse. The ancient city, also called the ‘Manhattan of the desert,’ faces collapse from disrepair. If continued to be left unrepaired, the city’s hundreds of sun-dried mud-brick towers that are almost seven stories high may be gone forever, as Barrons detailed: 

"The city looks like it was hit by a disaster -- without precedent," said Abdulwahab Jaber, a local official in the town, 480 kilometres (300 miles) east of the capital Sanaa.

Jaber said at least four towers have been completely destroyed and 15 others damaged in recent floods, which have killed scores of people across Yemen.

Hassan Aidid, head of the General Organisation for the Preservation of Historic Cities in Yemen, said that the roofs and the exterior of the mud towers had sustained the most damage.

"Residents of the city have been unable to restore them because of the war and the difficult situation in which they live," Aidid told AFP.

Yemen is gripped by a war between Iran-backed Huthi rebels -- who control the capital -- and a beleaguered government supported by a Saudi-led military coalition.

Shibam is controlled by the internationally-recognised government, but while it has largely been spared direct conflict, it has not escaped the effects of the war.

The fighting has almost completely halted public spending.

The city, with its densely-packed tower houses and alleyways often too narrow for cars, was put on the UNESCO heritage list in 1982 -- but in 2015 it was also added to the "List of World Heritage in Danger

Image via Barrons 

We know that platypuses are weird enough that even scientists are baffled by their existence, but can these egg-laying mammals get any weirder? It turns out they can. When scientists put platypuses under UV light, they discovered that these mammals glow green and blue.

Under visible light a platypus’s extremely dense fur — which insulates and protects them in cold water — is a drab brown, so the trippy glow revealed under UV light on a stuffed museum specimen was a big surprise. 

Biofluorescence — absorbing and re-emitting light as a different color — is widespread in fish, amphibians, birds and reptiles. But the trait is much rarer in mammals, and this is the first evidence of biofluorescence in egg-laying mammals, also known as monotremes, scientists reported in a new study.

Learn more about why platypuses are strange over at Live Science.

(Image Credit: Mammalia 2020; 10.1515/mammalia-2020-0027/ Live Science)

The Ruhr Valley in Germany has been mined for coal for 170 years. Over that time, they took so much material out from underground that the surface sank, and now the valley is completely dependent on Emschergenossenschaft pumps to keep the area from flooding. The most surprising thing about the pump system is that the coal companies are paying for them! Tom Scott has the story.

How long does it take an amendment to become part of the the US Constitution? However long it takes to be ratified by three-fourths of the states (that's 38 as of now)  ...unless there is a deadline attached to the amendment when it comes out of Congress. There was no deadline attached to "Article Two" when it was proposed by James Madison in 1789. It simply said,

No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.

It makes sense to restrict politicians from giving themselves raises whenever they want, but the states didn't seem to care. After all, state politicians had hopes of someday becoming members of Congress themselves. Read how Article Two eventually became the 27th Amendment, a whopping 203 years after it was first proposed, at Damn Interesting.