See this shit? Damn human can't do an otter thing!

A Rubik’s Cube for the Visually Impaired [Pic]

381 - The Stamp that Almost Caused a War

381 - The Stamp that Almost Caused a War: War is terrible, but the causes of war are sometimes laughably trivial. Central America seems to have a special knack for silly casus belli. In 1969, El Salvador and Honduras fought a four-day conflict popularly called the Football War, after the contested soccer games that lit the fuse of ongoing ...

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Archaeologists May Have Found Skeleton of King Richard III

Mother Goose and Grimm for 9/13/2012

Mother Goose and Grimm for 9/13/2012:

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Dogs in Footwear Are Hilariously Distressed [Video]

Dogs in Footwear Are Hilariously Distressed [Video]:

Dogs hate having things on their feet, be those things socks, boots, shoes or, as was most likely the case with Jacques Cousteau's dog, flippers. Unfortunately for dogs, their unwilling shoe-wearing adventures are funny, and some dog owners can't help but shod and subsequently exploit their unlucky companions. At times, this video of dogs promenading very carefully verges on cruel. Then you remember how hilarious dogs are when they wear shoes. More »

Get a Bigger Hotel Room without Paying More (and Other Hotel Secrets) [Travel]

Get a Bigger Hotel Room without Paying More (and Other Hotel Secrets) [Travel]:

Want a more spacious hotel room or that Wi-Fi charge waived from your bill? Hotel receptionists share insider tips for these and other ways to improve your next hotel experience. More »

Sports Cheat Sheet

Sports Cheat Sheet:

Jesus loves you

He has a point...

Mathematician Claims Proof of Connection between Prime Numbers

The Sleep Comfort Mystery [Comic]

Use a Pinch of Salt to Keep Veggies Bright and Green (and Other Creative Uses for Salt) [Video]

Use a Pinch of Salt to Keep Veggies Bright and Green (and Other Creative Uses for Salt) [Video]:

Salt is great for enhancing the flavor of our dishes, but it plays a bigger role in the chemistry of cooking than you might think. For example, the folks at America's Test Kitchen point out that if you're boiling green veggies, a few pinches of salt in the water can keep them bright and green while cooking. That's not all though. More »

The First Ads for Famous Books

The First Ads for Famous Books:
Because even genius needs share of voice to succeed.
In Read Me: A Century of Classic American Book Advertisements (public library), New York Times book critic Dwight Garner offers “a visual survey of book advertisements, plucked from yellowing newspapers, journals and magazines large and small, from across the United States during the twentieth century” — more than 300 of them, to be precise, including some of modern history’s most beloved literary classics by favorite authors like Susan Sontag, Kurt Vonnegut, Joan Didion, Anaïs Nin, and Ray Bradbury. What emerges is a curious alternative history of literature and its parallel evolution alongside twentieth-century communication arts and advertising. But, perhaps most importantly, it serves as a necessary antidote to the genius myth, demonstrating that icons are very much made, not merely celebrated for their “God”-given talent.

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Garner writes of the new visual language of the 60s:

Author photographs, in the 1960s, were increasingly put to bold use. Susan Sontag pops out of a 1963 ad for her first novel, The Benefactor, glancing provocatively from the page as if she were an intellectual Cleopatra.

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