Neatorama

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• Movie bloopers from 1936
• Real-Life Superman
• When SUV-Sized Fish Roamed Kansas
• Ninja Restaurant
• Bacon Cheese Turtleburgers
• London Council Issued Parking Tickets to Self, Refused to Pay Fine to Self
• Vacuum Cleaner Museum
• Movie Title Stills Collection
• Evgeni Plushenko's Sex Bomb Ice Skating Performance
• Hairstyles of the Middle Ages
• Star Trek in the Style of Edward Gorey
• Woman Dies, Leaves Behind 2,000 Descendants
• The Case of the Elderly Movie Pirate
• Man Breaks Into Prison For Love
• Bird Feeder is a Fake Speed Camera
• Carl Orff's O Fortuna Translated
• Sleep on This: Nap Boosts Your Brain's Ability to Learn
• The Surprising Role of Dust in Earth's Ecology
• Man Gave Company to Employees on His Birthday
• NASA Relies on Duct Tape
• Lynx on the Downhill Slope
• Biology Rap

Movie bloopers from 1936 Posted: 22 Feb 2010 03:38 AM PST A collection of Warner Bros. movie bloopers from 1936, featuring Humphrey Bogart, Joe E. Brown, James Cagney, Bette Davis, Kay Francis, Leslie Howard, Paul Lukas, Barton MacLane, Fredric March, Paul Muni, Pat O’Brien, Claude Rains, and more. Link [YouTube] – The Retronaut via Stuart Witts

Real-Life Superman Posted: 22 Feb 2010 03:28 AM PST Someone risks his own life to save another persons life. He pushes the stalled vehicle off the railroad track, runs back to his motorcycle, and is only inches away from getting hit by the train. Link (animated gif) – via Metro

When SUV-Sized Fish Roamed Kansas Posted: 22 Feb 2010 12:57 AM PST Scientists have identified a new species of extinct gigantic filter feeding fish, the SUV-sized Bonnerichthys: The fish fossils, described in the latest issue of Science, also prove that filter feeding emerged long before the first whales. For this method of eating, the diner suspends itself in the water, mouth agape. Water escapes through gill slits, leaving behind the filtered food. It can help to have a big mouth, which many of these enormous fishes must have had. Co-author Kenshu Shimada, a research associate in paleontology at the Sternberg Museum of Natural History, told Discovery News that one of the fish he and his colleagues identified, Bonnerichthys, grew to around 20 feet in length and swam through a seaway covering what is today the state of Kansas. I can’t get the image of the fish going "nom nom nom" when I saw the image. Darn the Interwebs! Link (Photo: Robert Nicholls / Paleocreations)

Ninja Restaurant Posted: 22 Feb 2010 12:55 AM PST Perhaps it’s not such a good idea to be rude at your waitress in this restaurant: they wield swords and flare flames at diners of the Ninja Restaurant. "The ninja is mysterious," said Ou Chia-wei, owner of the restaurant simply named Ninja, explaining why he chose that theme for the Japanese-style restaurant. "On that premise, we can do magic tricks and light up the food." Waitresses working the barely lit dining room floor burn specialty menus, which vanish without a trace of ash, and send flames snaking across tables as customers watch. Link

Bacon Cheese Turtleburgers Posted: 22 Feb 2010 12:55 AM PST Like its name says, This is Why You’re Fat website is dedicated to chronicling the brave culinary concoctions guaranteed to give you a coronary by day’s end. I think I’ve gained a few pounds just looking at the photos, and therefore can’t wait to show my latest find: the Bacon Cheese Turtleburgers! Details at Interwebs Randomness and Other Inspiring Tales – via This is Why You’re Fat

London Council Issued Parking Tickets to Self, Refused to Pay Fine to Self Posted: 22 Feb 2010 12:54 AM PST It doesn’t get any sillier than this, folks: the councils of 6 boroughs in London issued parking tickets to themselves, then refused to pay the fines to themselves. One farce saw Islington Council in North London issue a ticket, then take itself to an appeal hearing – where it asked for costs against itself. The costs process involves another four steps. Stunned adjudicator Gerald Styles said he could not make an order for costs because the council could not "act wholly unreasonably or vexatiously against itself". You can’t make this stuff up: Link

Vacuum Cleaner Museum Posted: 22 Feb 2010 12:53 AM PST Some people collect stamps, but James Brown of Nottingham collects vacuum cleaners. In fact, "Mr. Vacuum Cleaner" has so many of them that he opened a museum: He was eight, and desperate for a cleaner of his own, when he spotted a red Goblin 800 lying on a rubbish dump. "I took it home, wiped all the muck off it, plugged it in, and it worked," he sighs. "That was one of the most fantastic moments of my life." By the time he reached his teens James already had 30 vacuum cleaners. One by one his other interests – sport, music, books – bit the dust. "I suppose you could say that vacuum cleaners took over my life," he says. "I loved the look, the feel, the sound of them. You can’t really explain it to people who don’t have the same enthusiasm. It’s like some people love vintage cars or clocks. For me it was vacuum cleaners." One of his party turns is to put on a blindfold and identify the host’s vacuum cleaner by its engine note. Link (Photo: John Robertson)

Movie Title Stills Collection Posted: 21 Feb 2010 11:32 PM PST Web and graphic designer Christian Annyas sure watched a lot of movies over the years. To prove it, he collected screenshots of the movie titles (and many trailer and "The End" titles as well). His collections include movies made int the 1920s to today’s films, but for whatever reason I gravitated to movies from the 50s. Link – via The Litter Box Previously on Neatorama: Stills

Evgeni Plushenko's Sex Bomb Ice Skating Performance Posted: 21 Feb 2010 11:31 PM PST We’ve posted this spectacular performance by Russian ice skater Evgeni Plushenko several years ago – but since he recently won silver at the 2010 Winter Olympics, the clip has enjoyed somewhat of a resurgence. If you haven’t seen it before, here’s Plushenko skating to Tom Jones’ Sex Bomb back in 2000: Link [embedded YouTube]

Hairstyles of the Middle Ages Posted: 21 Feb 2010 11:30 PM PST Women have been obsessed with hairstyle since, well, for-ev-vuh. As you can see, even women from the Middle Ages liked their hair all done up fancy, as documented by the Dictionnaire raisonné du mobilier français de l’époque carlovingienne à la Renaissance (Reasoned dictionary of French furniture from the Carolingian era to the Renaissance), vol. 3 by E. Viollet-Le-Duc (1874) If you’ve got the time, it’s pretty nifty to scan through the book, available at the Internet Archive, for the woodcut illustrations: Link – via TYWKIWDBI

Star Trek in the Style of Edward Gorey Posted: 21 Feb 2010 11:29 PM PST Artist Shaenon K. Garrity (of Narbonic and Smithson fame) discovered that Edward Gorey was a Trekkie, so naturally she created what might have been: a Star Trek comic in the style of the late macabre children book illustrator. Link – via The Zeray Gazette

Woman Dies, Leaves Behind 2,000 Descendants Posted: 21 Feb 2010 07:22 PM PST Yitta Schwartz of Kiryas Joel, New York, died last month at the age of 93. She left behind 15 children, more than 200 grandchildren, and so many great and great-great grandchildren that her family guesses that she could claim 2,000 direct descendants. In The New York Times, Joseph Berger writes: Mrs. Schwartz was a member of the Satmar Hasidic sect, whose couples have nine children on average and whose ranks of descendants can multiply exponentially. But even among Satmars, the size of Mrs. Schwartz's family is astonishing. A round-faced woman with a high-voltage smile, she may have generated one of the largest clans of any survivor of the Holocaust — a thumb in the eye of the Nazis.[...] She was born in 1916 into a family of seven children in the Hungarian village of Kalev, revered as the hometown of a founder of Hungarian Hasidism. During World War II, the Nazis sent Mrs. Schwartz, her husband, Joseph, and the six children they had at the time to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.[...] With so many children, Mrs. Schwartz had to make six loaves of challah for every Sabbath, using 12 pounds of dough — in later years, she was aided by Kitchenaid or Hobart appliances. (Mrs. Mayer said her mother had weaknesses for modern conveniences, and for elegant head scarves.) For her children's weddings, Mrs. Schwartz starched the tablecloths and baked the chocolate babkas and napoleons. Link via Marginal Revolution | Photo: New York Times

The Case of the Elderly Movie Pirate Posted: 21 Feb 2010 04:44 PM PST An 88-year old man was caught videotaping Avatar in the movie theater … for his wife who couldn’t come to see it for herself. The police were called in, but the ending was different than you’d expect: Police described the alleged film pirate as being 88 years old, about 152 centimetres tall, wearing large glasses and carrying a walking stick. He said his wife couldn’t come to the cinema, so he was recording the film for her to watch later. Police deleted the file from the video camera and let the man stay. Link – via Fark What? Discretion and compassion by the police? What has the world come to?! What happened to LAW AND ORDER!!! RAWR! RAGE!!1!!ONe

Man Breaks Into Prison For Love Posted: 21 Feb 2010 04:42 PM PST Most people want to bust out of a prison, not in – but love makes us do crazy things. Here’s the story of a man who break into a prison not once, not twice but night after night to visit his girlfriend: The suspect, 33-year-old Daniele E., was arrested in November for scaling a steel fence to break into the prison where his girlfriend was serving time for drug-related offenses, according to the local daily Westfalen-Blatt. On Tuesday, the Bielefeld public prosecutor charged Daniele E. with trespassing and announced a trial date in March. Lawyer Carsten Ernst, who is representing Daniele E., said he thought the charges were excessive. "Couldn’t we have just laughed this one off and cancelled the trial?" he commented. [...] Nov. 8 proved to be the fateful night for Daniele E. When prison officials noticed a man climb over the fence and enter the building where the woman was being held, they called the police. Using dogs, the police sniffed the unlucky lover out — in his girlfriend’s cell. "I love her — we’re engaged!" Daniele E. reportedly pleaded with the arresting officers. Link

Bird Feeder is a Fake Speed Camera Posted: 21 Feb 2010 04:41 PM PST Tired of seeing motorists speed through his neighborhood, retired police officer Bill Angus decided to do something clever: he put a bird feeder shaped like a speed camera at the edge of his property facing the road. And it works! Since the bright yellow box – pictured right – went up, the number of drivers doing 60mph through the 30mph zone has come down. Mr Angus insists – without so much as a hint of a smile – that the effect on speeders is no more than a happy coincidence. ‘Why does everyone think it’s a fake speed camera?’ he asked. ‘It’s a bird box and has been designed this way to stop people stealing it. It’s a bright colour, too, to attract the blue tits and finches. ‘Since I have put it up, the traffic is keeping to 30mph. If people want to think it is a camera, that is a matter for themselves.’ [...] Mr Angus said the domes on either side of his bird box were fake camera lenses to deter thieves, and the lamp on the front, which looks like a camera flash, was part of an old torch he used to plug a hole he ‘accidentally’ made. He added: ‘I’d been reading that people should put up bird boxes because of the cold winter. I’m a bit shocked people think it’s a camera.’ Police added that there’s no law against putting up “fake” speed cameras on private property: Link

Carl Orff's O Fortuna Translated Posted: 21 Feb 2010 04:01 PM PST Everybody knows O Fortuna by Carl Orff. They may not know what it’s called, but they’ve heard it in hundreds of movies, TV programs and commercials. But do you know what it’s all about? Here’s the lyric of O Fortuna, translated from Latin: Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] – via Look At This

Sleep on This: Nap Boosts Your Brain's Ability to Learn Posted: 21 Feb 2010 04:00 PM PST If you’ve ever felt guilty of taking a noontime siesta, here’s science coming to your rescue. A new study revealed that napping can boost your ability to learn: "Sleep not only rights the wrong of prolonged wakefulness but, at a neurocognitive level, it moves you beyond where you were before you took a nap," said study author Matthew Walker, a psychology professor at the University of California, Berkeley. The study involved 39 healthy young adults who were placed into either a nap or no-nap group. At noon, all the participants performed a learning task intended to exercise the hippocampus, a region of the brain that helps store fact-based memories. Both groups performed at comparable levels on this test. Then at 2 p.m., the nap group took a 90-minute siesta while the no-nap group stayed awake. Later that day, at 6 p.m., participants performed a new round of learning exercises. Those who remained awake throughout the day became worse at learning. In contrast, those who napped did markedly better and actually improved in their capacity to learn. Link

The Surprising Role of Dust in Earth's Ecology Posted: 21 Feb 2010 03:59 PM PST Dust storm approaching Stratford, Texas (1935) Photo: NOAA George E. Marsh Album Dust may be an annoying facts of life to you and me, but it is endlessly fascinating to scientists. Indeed, dust actually play a big role in the planet’s ecology: Dust can have a variety of impacts including fertilizing the ocean with iron, added Natalie Mahowald of Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. "These particles can be carried for thousands of miles in the atmosphere, and during that time can interact with chemistry, clouds and radiation to modify climate," she said in prepared remarks. Dust can be both good and bad, concluded Muhs, threatening health yet fertilizing land and ocean. It also affects the Earth’s radiation, which is currently undergoing a warming due to human-induced gases being added to the atmosphere. Over dark surfaces that absorb heat from the sun dust can have a cooling effect by reflecting light, but it can also warm other areas. Link

Man Gave Company to Employees on His Birthday Posted: 21 Feb 2010 03:56 PM PST Usually, you get presents on your birthday – but on his 81st birthday, it was business owner Bob Moore that gave out presents. A big present, actually: he gave his whole company to his employees! Scores of employees gathered to help Bob Moore celebrate his 81st birthday this week at the company that bears his name, Bob’s Red Mill Natural Foods. Moore, whose mutual love of healthful eating and old-world technologies spawned an internationally distributed line of products, responded with a gift of his own — the whole company. The Employee Stock Ownership Plan that Moore unveiled means that his 209 employees now own the place and its 400 offerings of stone-ground flours, cereals and bread mixes. "This is Bob taking care of us," said Lori Sobelson, who helps run the business’ retail operation. "He expects a lot out of us, but really gives us the world in return." Link (Photo: Doug Beghtel/AP)

NASA Relies on Duct Tape Posted: 21 Feb 2010 09:03 AM PST The user-generated website There, I Fixed It often showcases how people use duct tape to fix anything. An engineer at NASA submitted photos of how duct tape is put to work on the International Space Station! See more pictures and the explanation at the site. Link

Lynx on the Downhill Slope Posted: 21 Feb 2010 08:59 AM PST Vancouver is a city, but the community of Whistler, where the winter Olympic skiing events are actually held, is shared with native wildlife. A family of lynx was spotted hanging out near the luge track, and on Wednesday a lynx crossed the downhill skiing track. The lynx is a large cat – weighing up to 30 pounds and reaching 26 inches in height – that roams forests of the northern United States and Canada. And take it from a Canadian – downhiller Manuel Osborne-Paradis – the lynx is no cuddly outdoor friend when you’re speeding down an icy slope at 70 mph. “Get out of the way,” he said. “Oh, wow. You do not want to get close to that.” The downhill session was already on hold because of fog, and no skiers linked with lynx. Still, officials issued a warning over the race radio in case someone was on the course. The lynx had its own agenda and hopped over the barriers lining the perimeter to retreat to the forest. Link -via Digg (image credit: AP/Gero Breloer)

Biology Rap Posted: 21 Feb 2010 08:39 AM PST (YouTube Link) Stanford University students Derrick Davis and Tom McFadden made this rap video about metabolism. It’s called “Oxidate It or Love It/Electron to the Next One” and is a parody of 50 Cent’s “Hate It or Love It” and Jay-Z’s “On to the Next One.” via Make

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