You may have seen Stanley's ascent to the stratosphere already, animated with appropriate reactions as Thomas' buddy travels 18 miles into the sky then plummets back to the ground. (Ron Fugelseth's train-launching project is "probably the coolest thing a dad can do," according to Gizmodo. I'm inclined to agree.) But Stanley wasn't the first toy to journey to the stratosphere, and we're hoping he isn't the last. Here's a great collection of sub-orbital footage from The Week. Link
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A constable on the night shift radioed his sergeant one night late in August to tell him he was "off up the hills" to investigate a suspicious light coming from the other side of Client Hills, Worcestershire. The light was bright—headlights, he thought—and he made the call expecting to find a couple looking for a place to hook up. (The area is famous for being the local outdoor rendezvous location.)
After climbing for 20 minutes through the hills, the officer was surprised to find no headlights, and in fact, no car.
"This diligent PC had in fact discovered the moon."
You'll remember that August was a Blue Moon month, and it seems the officer found the month's second full moon hiding behind the hilltops.
A police source said today: "The officer was a little reluctant to come back on duty the next day.
"He knew he was going to get a ribbing and he's had pictures of werewolves put on his locker by some of the more unforgiving officers.
"It will take a long time for him to live this one down."
William Faulkner was born 115 years ago today, and while he didn't make it to the big 1-1-5, he left behind enough work and wisdom to keep our brains busy for at least that long. So what's the first step to living a full and satisfying life?
“Read, read, read. Read everything —trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You’ll absorb it. Then write. If it is good, you’ll find out. If it’s not, throw it out the window.” – Statement at the University of Mississippi, 1947
More advice from the late, great Falkner on Flavorwire. Link | Photo: Wikimedia commons
That's a volcano flow, in case you hadn't noticed, and that's a guy in a suit he and a couple of friends rigged up to help withstand the deadly temperatures of molten-hot rock. Geoff Mackley, Bradley Ambrose, Nathan Berg built the respirator and heat proximity suit themselves, but details are scarce (read: nonexistent) about how they put the thing together, or which one of them is standing at the brim of a lava lake in this video. Without it, a person can stand beside the lavafall of Manum in Vanuatu for about 6 seconds. With it, the team reportedly hung around for 40 minutes. Link -via Motherboard
You could argue (successfully) that every item at Taco Bell tastes pretty much the same. But if you're eager to impress, or just long for the days the Enchirito (shown above) was still available, here's your guide to snagging nine foods no one else in the place even knows about. The Superman, the Hulk, and more at Refined Guy. Link | Photo: tacobell.com
Devon Carrow isn't your typical kid. His allergies are so alarmingly severe that his own mother compares him to David Vetter, the boy who ispired the film The Boy In the Plastic Bubble.
The roster of Devon's diagnoses show he suffers from eosinophilic esophagitis disease - an allergic inflammatory response in the esophagus - along with anaphylactic shock syndrome, respiratory distress syndrome and asthma.
The severity of airborne allergies jerked from hypothetical into real-life panic three months after the first incident, when Devon was accidentally exposed to peanuts during a visit to his godparents' home.
"That night, we wound up in the hospital with an oxygen tent on him," [his mother, René] Carrow said.
More than a dozen other times Carrow has had to treat her son with one or more epinephrine auto-injectors and then call for an ambulance.
"It's not a cure, it's almost like giving someone who had a heart attack an aspirin," Carrow said of the EpiPen. "We go to the emergency room a lot."
And those same allergies make it impossible for Devon to attend class, where literally anything could start a reaction and send him back to the hospital. But that's not stopping Devon from going to school: he has a VGo machine that can travel the halls, sit at a desk and head outside come recess time. Meanwhile, Devon is at home 5 miles away, safely isolated from his classmates' germs and stray dust. He controls the machine's movements and camera from home, and interacts through a hi-def monitor and indicator lights on the VGo.
Despite the VGo's admittedly odd appearance and Devon's unusual circumstances, he's not given any special attention or treatment throughout the day, and is expected topay attention and follow along just as the other students are. And according to his classmates and teacher, Devon is a great student. Link
Photo: Derek Gee/Buffalo News
We all know celebrities are, to phrase it politely, a little eccentric. But as with all things, some nuts are nuttier than others, and those come in different flavors. The folks at Jest were kind enough to pick out the best and brightest among crazy famous (crazy-famous) people, and then organize them into a comprehensive, easy-to-use map. From Gary Busey to Lady Gaga, Zany to Dangerous, here is a "highly scientific graphical breakdown" that is probably not at all scientific, though it is a lot of fun. Link
It is an uncomfortable truth that Nicole 'Snooki' Polizzi is famous. (I'm sorry.) Equally uncomfortable is that, as a result of her reality-TV fame, a new law was recently proposed in New Jersey that would give locations hosting reality shows more control over filming within their jusrisdiction. For instance, production crews will have to pay the city for police escorts and increased security instead of leaving taxpayers to foot the bill. The so-called 'Snookiville law' is scheduled for introduction on Sep 24, 2012. Here's a look at this and other laws named for celebrities, including Tim Tebow, Tom Cruise and Sonny Bono. Link | Photo: CC NVS_Inc
Oh, Japan. You are so weird/awesome. If, like artist Eric Siu, you've ever been jealous of a camera's charmed life, then you'll appreciate Touchy, a combination headgear-and-sensor setup that turns a person into human camera. Hold Touchy's sensor and his eyes/lenses open; hold for 10 seconds, and he'll take a picture of you, which you can view via LCD on the back of his head. Link -via kuriositas
Severe drought conditions in Zimbabwe have caused a number of issues for larger cities, including blocked sewers (thanks to dry supply dams). To help alleviate the stinky situation, the city of Bulawayo has adopted an interesting strategy: synchronized flushing.
Bulawayo City Council has asked its more than 1 million residents to flush their toilets simultaneously at 7:30 p.m. when water supplies are restored. City officials say "synchronized flushing" is needed to clear waste that would have accumulated in sanitary facilities which will have been affected by days of water outages.
The practice isn't new; the first synchronized flush took place in the city two decades ago. However, local residents say they're largely unaware of today's planned event, as "the whole issue wasn't properly communicated to them." Link | Photo
"We are never ever ever getting back together," says Taylor Swift, and recent divorcee Rebecca Gibbs of New Zealand, who sent her former husband's promises to love, honor and cherish into space on a small rocket. After giving away her wedding dress and other items symbolic of her failed union, Gibbs' plans for the ring were hazy until someone suggested she launch it off of the planet. For more about Gibbs, and a collection of other bizarre divorce stories, check out the piece on Huffington Post. Link | via-The FW
Photo: NASA
Got a spare stack of hundreds lying around and don't feel like sleeping in your own bed tonight? The good news is that you can resolve both of these fist-world problems at the same time. The bad news is that you might have to take a flight or two to get to your destination. From a 4,ooo-sq ft suite in Hong Kong to a room that costs as much for one night as — oh, let's get creative here — 6,500 malaria-preventing mosquito nets, these are the world's priciest digs-by-the-night. Link
Photo: The Peninsula Hotel, Hong Kong
This isn't a collection of Bosom Buddies stills obehind-the-scenes shots from all-male Broadway shows. Whether taken on Halloween or just another Tuesday, these are photos of notable cultural figures in crossdress. Check out Virginia Woolf and friends decked out as convincing Abyssinian dignitaries, F. Scott Fitzgerald in his pretties, and Mick Jagger and Jerry Hall as the least attractive woman and most beautiful man ever, respectively (above). Link
Photo: Philippe Morillon, 1978
terra cibus no.5 / table salt (45x Magnification)
terra cibus no.6 / red licorice (20x Magnification)
Commercial photographer Caren Alpert's dual loves — food and art — have teamed up in her series terra cibus, a collection of 36 high-res photos of food under an electron miscroscope. Aside from the salt and Twizzlers shownabove, Alpert's work includes super-close-ups of all kinds of food: kiwi, celery, OREO cookies. (Trypophobes beware the Brussels sprout shot.) Link -via
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