A British Lottery scratch-off game sold by Camelot stores had to be pulled from circulation after the math involved confused too many players. The Cool Cash Lotto ticket dealt with temperatures, often below zero. To win a prize, the temperature number under the scratch off had to be lower than the one displayed on the …
straight stolen from Neatorama
Michael says: SurveillanceSaver is an OS X screen saver that shows about 400 live security camera videos from public accessible Axis network cameras. It shows surprising scenes from underwater pool cameras, cows in milking machines, to shopping malls and street cameras. Link…
straight stolen from Boing Boing
One day, this guy named RicMoo came home from a party where they had joked about mashing up Pac-Man with Zork [wiki]. Being a little drunk, RicMoo decided to actually make the game:
Wth?! Why would anyone invest the time and effort to build such a useless game?
Well, I had just got back from a party …
straight stolen from Neatorama
A Chelan County fire chief says a couple were lucky they weren’t killed by a cow that fell off a 200-foot cliff and smashed their minivan. District 5 Chief Arnold Baker says they missed being killed by a matter of inches Sunday as they drove on Highway 150 near Manson.
The 600-pound cow fell about 200 feet (61 meter) and landed on the hood of the minivan carrying Charles Everson Jr. and his wife Linda of Westland, Mich., who were in the area celebrating their one-year wedding anniversary. They were checked at Lake Chelan Community Hospital as a precaution.
The van was heavily damaged, including a broken windshield. Charles Everson says he kept repeating, “I don’t believe this. I don’t believe this.” The year-old cow had been reported missing by a breeder. It was euthanized at the scene.
Source: OregonLive
Tags: Cow
straight stolen from Spluch
Fun looking $14 to launch paper airplanes –
This is a fun educational aid product designed to demonstrate scientific concepts taught in school curriculum. Ready for take off! Kit contains everything you need to learn how spinning motors and plastic discs are used to launch a paper plane at up to 31 mph (50km/h). An ideal kit for exploring paper plane designs.This kit was designed at Middlesex University by specialists who teach teachers. Each kit is thoroughly researched and encourages young people to stretch their skills and thinking. Contains Base plate with guide, Plastic discs with pulley, battery box, motors, plastic rings (grommet), plastic suction cups, sticky pads, short screws, long screw, connecting sleeves x 4, terminal block, nuts, wire and screw driver.Electric paper airplane launcher kit – [via] Link.
Related:
Paper Airplane Contest – Make: Video Podcast – Link.
Paper AirplaneContest – Make: PDF Cast – Link.
The Online Paper airplane museum – Link.
Making a paper airplane a day… for 300 days – Link.
HOW TO – Supercharge a paper airplane – Link.
straight stolen from MAKE Magazine
Dustin sez, “After reading Friday's XKCD (#340) [Ed note: in which the punchline involves a love-letter written to the narrator's master boot record], I was inspired to write a program that does exactly that — it writes a 'love note' to your computers MBR, except in a neat twist it displays the 'love note' on bootup. There is a screenshot. There is also a quiz to determine whether or not you're qualified to actually install the program.” Link (Thanks, Dustin!) See also: Ninjas attack Richard Stallman, reenacting xkcd comic Cory Doctorow cosplayers at the XKCD picnic Xkcd fans bring chess-sets on roller-coasters Where LOLCats come from Ironic Internet malapropism grid Geeky comic about chess and roller-coasters Nerd humor about Katamari Damacy Sarcastic comic about computational linguistics (and emo kids) Funny map of online communities in the style of a D&D map Geeky comic strip uses Cory as the punchline Bloggin' 'bout my generation…
straight stolen from Boing Boing
Cartoonist Lars Martinson reminisces over a a shower he had to use in Japan. It sounds like something out of a bad dream. It was an imposing metal unit, and its operation required the use of five different cranks and knobs. That evening my girlfriend provided the necessary explanation: “Turn this knob to start the gas. Then turn that knob to “high”, and then push and turn this knob, and hold it down. While holding it down, turn this crank. [*click, click, click*] Okay, look in the little window. Can you see the blue flame?” I looked in the window: “No.” “You need to get the angle right. Look again.” I scrutinized the inside of the metal box from every possible angle, but still didn’t see it. Wait. There’s something, but it looks more like a reflection from somewhere, or a dying ghost. “You mean this little thing?” “Yes, that’s it. Now turn this knob to here. Okay, if the water gets too hot or cold, adjust that knob over there. NEVER turn it past this point, or you’ll get burned. Enjoy your shower.” So I took my first shower in my new home. The funny thing was, with five different knobs, there was still no way to adjust the water pressure. It was either barely on, or off. During the course of my shower, occasionally an arm, thin and yellow as an egg noodle, would squeeze through the crack in the door, check the water temperature, adjust the knobs accordingly, and then slip back out. Link…
straight stolen from Boing Boing
Ma Zhong Nan, a 93-year-old man living in a small village in China, recounts how a horn began to sprout on his head five years ago. Ma was combing his hair one day and carelessly injured his scalp. Because it was just a small wound, he did not pay much attention to it. Little did he expect that a thick, hard substance started to grow on his head. Since it did not bother him, he just ignored the growth. But the growth just kept getting bigger and harder, forming a horn of about 10cm (4 inches) long half a year later. Two weeks ago, Ma suddenly felt itching of the horn and his children brought him to see a doctor at the local hospital. But the doctor has no explanation for it. His children are now trying to seek help through the media.
Source: Shuangyashan
Tags: Ma Zhong Nan | Horn | Head | Growth
straight stolen from Spluch
SketchUp is Google’s free 3D drawing program. It’s easy to use, but it’s even easier when you watch someone with a lot of SketchUp experience use the application and explain what they’re doing. Aidan Chopra is an experienced SketchUp user. In fact, he wrote Google SketchUp for Dummies. (Here’s PC World’s generally glowing review of Chopra’s book.) He also created several videos available on his YouTube page that will get you quickly up to speed on the way SketchUp works. Link Reader comment: I forgot to mention that John Park wrote a great how-to for Make on designing a workbench with SketchUp. He also has a video on Blip.tv showing the process….
straight stolen from Boing Boing
That’s architect and sculptor Robert Bruno’s steel house/sculpture in Lubbock, Texas. Bruno spent 23 years building this strange home that looks like a giant pig out of 110 tons of steel!
Links (lots of pics): Robert’s official website [Flash] | Article at Dallas Art Revue, Sociothought, video at Ursi’s Blog
straight stolen from Neatorama
An appreciation of the Real Super Mario Bros 2. The game was released in Japan in 1986 but was considered too difficult/weird for US gamers and a different Mario 2 (based on a Japanese game called Yume Kojo: Doki Doki Panic) was released to the US.
In most games, you trust that the designer is guiding you, through the usual signposts and landmarks, in the direction that you ought to go. In the Real Super Mario Bros. 2, you have no such faith. Here, Miyamoto is not God but the devil. Maybe he really was depressed while making it — I kept wanting to ask him, Why have you forsaken me? The online reviewer who sizes up the game as “a giant puzzle and practical joke” isn’t far off.
The whole upshot is that RSMB2 is now available on the Wii Virtual Console as Super Mario Bros: The Lost Levels. And for the record, I loved SMB2.
(link)
straight stolen from kottke.org
Today Google released the Software Development Kit (SDK) for Android (what was previously rumored to be the mysterious Gphone), a free, open mobile platform being developed by The Open Handset Alliance. Here’s a demo video of Android showing some of the applications that will be available on the new mobile platform.
In order encourage developers to …
straight stolen from Laughing Squid
(Live Leak link)
A ghostly image has been observed by both witnesses and by security cameras. Surveillance video at a gas station in Parma, Ohio shows a “blue cloud” hovering over the pump area. Some people think it’s a ghost or an angel, but no explanation has been found so far. Link to story. -via Arbroath
straight stolen from Neatorama
Scaramouch says you can improve almost any food by wrapping it in bacon. For Thanksgiving, you might want to try Bacon-Wrapped Turkey this year. Here’s the recipe, with a video….
straight stolen from YesButNoButYes
Anthony Bourdain on the best method for finding good food in any city: provoke the nerds.
Take the city you want to go to and just google up some restaurant names that serve the dish you’re after. Then got to chowhound or another foodie site, and rather than asking about restaurants, you put up an enthusiastic post talking about how you just had the best whatever you’re looking for at one of these restaurants.
At that point, … the nerdfury will begin. Posters will show up from nowhere to shower you with disdain, tell you how that place used to be good but has now totally sold out and — most important to your quest — will tell you where you would have gone if you were not some sort of mouth breathing water buffalo.
I wouldn’t have guessed that there’s actually an upside to Internet Jackass Syndrome. (via clusterflock)
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straight stolen from kottke.org
20-minute video about how to turn a sphere inside out without creases or sharp corners. Way more interesting than it sounds…watch until about 1:45 to have your mind blown a little bit. (via 3quarksdaily)
(link)
straight stolen from kottke.org
