Using virtual tours to sell houses is so last year. In order to sell her $9 million oceanfront home, comedienne Rita Rudner took to YouTube. Realtors to the semi-stars are waiting for your call. (Don't like the video? How dare you!)
Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] - Thanks Tiffany!
When Elizabeth Blackwell applied to medical colleges in 1847, they rejected her left and right because she was a woman, and no woman had ever earned a medical degree from an American institution of higher learning. It was a ridiculous idea to even think about accepting her. So ridiculous that it happened! One school wanted to make a point, which backfired.
The Geneva Medical College, however, did not give Elizabeth an upfront yes or no. They put the issue up for vote under the stipulation that if but one student voted against her, she would not be admitted. This reads a little like an attempt to show her how very unwelcome she was, and possibly to humiliate her even further. What student in his right mind would vote for a woman to have access to a medical school?
The students, however, believed it to be a ludicrous joke and decided to have some fun: all one-hundred fifty men voted for Elizabeth.
It was as if the world had been tipped - a female student was to be allowed into the all-male medical domain!
Still, actually attending school in such an atmosphere was not easy. Blackwell graduated with a medical degree in 1849 and changed the course of medical history. Read more at ScienceZest. Link -via Ed Yong
The Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris has more than its share of celebrities: Jim Morrison and Oscar Wilde are the first that come to mind. But there is a strange story behind the monument pictured here that you may not know. In 1875, three balloonists ascended to 28,000 feet in the Zenith to study atmospheric conditions …and to break the altitude record. Joseph Croce-Spinelli and Théodore Sivel did not survive the lack of oxygen. Gaston Tissandier, the sole survivor, came to as the balloon was plunging to earth.
The Zenith crash landed in Ciron, France, and Sivel and Croce-Spinelli were found with their faces blackened and their mouths filled with blood. They were widely celebrated as heroes who gave their lives for progressing aviation. A May 2, 1875 New York Times article declared them as "martyrs to science." A monument was erected in Ciron where the Zenith had fallen and the elaborate grave sculpted by Alphonse Dumilatre was installed in Père Lachaise Cemetery as a memorial to the two French balloonists. Gaston Tissandier is also buried in the Paris cemetery, although he lived until 1899. Now fallen leaves gather around Croce-Spinelli and Sivel's linked arms and sometimes someone places a rose in one of their extended hands as they continue to slumber from the sleep they drowned into from such great heights.
Read the entire story and see more pictures at Atlas Obscura. Link
(Image credit: Allison Meier)
Thirty-seven years ago, I took a train trip from Kansas City to Oklahoma City (and back) and decided that was the best way to travel ever. Sadly, there are fewer passenger trains and routes now, so fewer people ride, and that means fewer luxury amenities, too. But we have pictures of the golden age of rail travel.
Throughout the Victorian period and the early part of the 20th century, railways were a source of great civic pride and prestige for both private citizens and the companies controlling them. And while newer networks tend to be more environmentally friendly than their forebears, the march of progress and modernisation has brought utilitarian trains and often soulless, unimaginative architecture. This article looks at 20 classic railway scenes across the world, spanning the past 180 years.
Relive those glory days at Urban Ghosts. Link
(Image credit: Flickr user State Records NSW)
What causes fairy circles, those circular barren patches of land found in the grasslands of Southern Africa? German scientist Norbert Juergens found the answer: termites.
These so-called fairy circles have variously been pinned on the presence of other, poisonous plants, on ants, and even toxic gases rising from below.
But Norbert Juergens says the one ever-present factor is sand termites.
The creatures have engineered the rings to maintain a supply of water in their environment, he tells Science magazine. [...] He reports how the invertebrates (Psammotermes allocerus) first clear a patch of ground by eating the roots of short-lived, annual grasses.
This bare, sandy earth then becomes an effective rain trap - with no vegetation, water cannot be lost through transpiration (the evaporation of water from plants).
Instead, it collects, oasis-like, just below the surface where it can sustain the termites and a supply of perennial grasses at the margins of the circles. These are available to eat even in the driest seasons.
Jonathan Amos of the BBC News' Science & Environment has the story: Link
Joann Moser's 8-year old daughter insisted that her 2-year old brother was sneaking into her room at night to take her toys. "Just lock the door." That's not enough if you have a toddler who knows how to pick a lock and hide the evidence of his crime before escaping.
Link -Thanks, Wifey!
Agent Starling knows that Hannibal Lecter is a serial killer. But an anime fan? That's a bit too much to handle.
Side note: this video would be unspeakably awesome if it made with My Little Pony posters instead of anime images.
-via Nerdcore
Ali walks past the cafe in Berlin where photographer Zoe Spawton works every day at 9:05 AM. Zoe admired the varied and dapper outfits that Ali wore, and finally worked up the courage to ask for a picture. Ali agreed, and a blog was born. Later, Zoe found out that Ali is from Turkey, has lived in Berlin for 44 years, has 18 children, and was a doctor until he retired and became a tailor. Many awesome pictures of Ali and his outfits followed, which you'll find at the Tumblr blog What Ali Wore. Link -via reddit
(Image credit: Zoe Spawton)
One wolf starts to howl, and they all must join in. This footage was taken on a visit to Wolf Creek habitat and Rescue in Indiana, when thirty wolves joined together for a howl. Just imagine what this would sound like if you were camping in the wilderness, and there were no fence between you and all those wolves. -via Viral Viral Videos
Photo: Lisi Niesner
A lot of men think of themselves as alpha males, but Werner Freund, 79, has got them beat: he's an alpha male amongst wolves. Reuters photographer Lisi Niesner documented Werner's life amongst packs of wolves that he reared by hand in a wolf sanctuary in Western Germany. Check out the gallery over at The Atlantic: Link
YouTube channel Smarter Every Day examines a Prince Rupert's Drop, which is a quickly-cooled glob of glass, and the strange physical properties of them. Slow-motion video shows us how really strange and cool this glass is! Of course, there's a perfectly logical explanation that's just as neat as the demonstrations. You don't want to try this at home. -via Metafilter
The combination of quadrotors, LEDs, and GPS can make for an impressive light show! That was the case for the Starfleet logo from the Star Trek universe, which showed up over the Tower Bridge in London as a promotion for the new movie Star Trek: Into Darkness.
Ars Electronica Futurelab, the same outfit that illuminated the skies over Linz, Austria, last year, launched 30 quadrotors near London's Tower Bridge and flew in a formation that any Trekkie would salute.
The 30 LED-equipped AscTec Hummingbird quadcopters from Munich's Ascending Technologies hovered about 118 feet to 426 feet above Potters Fields Park and formed a Star Trek insignia to coincide with Earth Hour.
The batteries that powered the micro UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) were charged on the Austrian renewable energy grid, according to event sponsor Paramount Pictures.
See a video of the preparations and the performance at CNET. Link -via Digg
(Image credit: Ars Electronica Futurelab)
Dafna Kopelis told her cat to take the dog the rest of the way home. And that's exactly what happened! Well, it's not difficult to convince a cat that he's the boss, but it takes some talent to teach one to use a leash properly. Don't let the static screen fool you- this video is actually easy to watch. -via Daily of the Day
Gabriel always wanted a firetruck, since he was a little boy. He never grew out of that infatuation with firetrucks, so at age 32 (and a half), he bought one.
If we based decisions on practicality, we'd all drive Taurcedes until we had kids, then we'd get minivans and we'd all be miserable. At 65, we'd retire and finally get that entry-level Porsche Boxter that we'd been wanting for the past 40 years. That doesn't sound like a good plan to me.
The coolest toys in the world aren't practical. Koenigsegg certainly aren't. Jet fighters - nope. Army tanks - nope. Did you know that you can buy old aircraft carriers on eBay? Can you imagine wake boarding behind one of those things? "Cool" just isn't practical. I've come to terms with that.
So I went ahead and pulled the eBay trigger and was elated to get truck 1213 for just $100 more than the reserve price. A total of $3,600 which also happened to be the hard limit my wife had imposed on this particular invaluable transaction.
Read the rest of the story of how he got his firetruck from Ohio to his home in Montana. Link -via Metafilter
Neat! Flip through the pages of a Finnish passport and you'll see a moose walking.
-via Daily of the Day
