Neatorama

Hedgehog with a Crown of Flowers
Simple Optical Illusion
Don't Let Your Work Out Get Your Goat
How a Road in Canada Was Named after a Pillaged American Town
Sock Monkey Jack in the Box
Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark
5 Awesome and Geeky Ice Sculptures
Mouse Decorates Christmas Tree
"Wrecking Ball" Christmas Tree Ornament
On the Vampire Trail in Scotland
This 16-Year Old Girl Is a Monster Truck Driver
Star Warhols
McDonald's Will Sell Poutine in Its Canadian Restaurants
WIND
Enjoy The Convenience Of Christmas Tinner
GameMaxx Prank Gift Box
Have A Happy Christmas With This Hogwarts Gingerbread Cake
Blowing Bubbles
If Tim Burton Animated <i>Doctor Who</i>
Lucky Crab Avoids Cooking Pot
The First Scientific Paper Published in Elfish and Dwarfish
Inside The Mind Of The Pyro
This Week at Neatorama
50 Weirdest Christmas Gifts Under $15

Posted: 08 Dec 2013 04:00 AM PST

Kiwi the hedgehog is decked out regally. Myra, Kiwi's caretaker, know the value of a dash of floral colors. You can see more photos here.

-via Gardens in Unexpected Places

Simple Optical Illusion

Posted: 08 Dec 2013 02:00 AM PST

Look at this shape. It seems to be some kind of box with a hinge facing us. But what it is doesn't really matter. It appears that the top and bottom are different colors BUT…

Place your finger horizontally over the "hinge" part. See? The top and the bottom are exactly the same color now. What sort of wizardry is this? -via Boing Boing

Don't Let Your Work Out Get Your Goat

Posted: 08 Dec 2013 12:00 AM PST

(Video Link)

One, two, bleet -now that's how you get in shape down at the farm...at least, when you want to get your furry friends in on the action.

If you have a hard time sticking with a diet plan when you resolve to lose weight for the New Year, perhaps a drill sergeant goat can help keep you in line. They might ride you a little harder than your usual trainer, but the results are undeniable.

I'm planning to sign up for classes tomorrow.

Via Cute Overload

How a Road in Canada Was Named after a Pillaged American Town

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 11:00 PM PST

(Photo: Dalhousie University)

Dalhousie University is a college in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Castine Way is a road that runs through campus. It’s named after the town of Castine, Maine. This is a reference to an episode in American and Canadian history from 1814.

After Napoleon abdicated in 1814, Britain began a series of offensives designed to bring about victory over the Americans in the War of 1812. Among them was an invasion of eastern Maine in the summer of 1814. British forces conquered the area fairly easily.

Naval expeditions under Sir John Sherbrooke (left) and his subordinates captured the coastal towns of Eastport, Machias and Castine, then sailed inland up the Penobscot River, capturing Hampden and Bangor. Sherbrooke declared that Maine east of the Penobscot was now a British colony named New Ireland.

The British goals in the establishment of New Ireland were:
1. to create a buffer zone between the United States and the Maritime provinces.
2. to acquire land for an overload route between Quebec and the Maritimes.
3. to punish the Americans for going to war.

Meanwhile, the rest of the British offensives ended in failure. At Plattsburgh, New York, the US Navy defeated an invasion of New York down the Lake Champlain corridor. In the Chesapeake, the British burned Washington, but were unable to advance into and past Baltimore.

In the Flemish city of Ghent, British and American negotiators were at an impasse. The British were in a superior military position, but the Americans would not accept anything less than status quo ante bellum--the conditions that existed before the war. After the Duke of Wellington advised the British to accept the American position, the British signed the peace treaty (pictured above). The treaty, after ratification by the Prince Regent and United States Senate, officially ended the war.

It also ended New Ireland and John Sherbrooke’s ambitions for eastern Maine. He withdrew. But he had treated the area as British territory and collected £10,750 in tariffs during that time. Sherbrooke donated most of it to the founding of a university in Nova Scotia. The “Castine Fund,” named after the occupied town of Castine, Maine, launched Dalhousie University.

The university named a road on its campus after its unwilling financial benefactor. That’s how Castine Way got its name.

(Map of Maine: Portland Press Herald)

Sock Monkey Jack in the Box

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 10:00 PM PST

Sock Monkey Jack in the Box

Are you crazy for old fashioned toys. This Christmas share you love of two wonderful toy classics with the Sock Monkey Jack in the Box from the NeatoShop. Turn the candle of the delightful toy, when the music stops out pops the sock monkey.

More great Jack in the Box toys available.

Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more fun Toys & Games.

Link

Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 10:00 PM PST

(YouTube link)

When we saw the first trailer for Sharknado, we thought shark movies had finally jumped the shark, so to speak. What could they possibly come up with next? Now we know. Asylum has Sharknado 2 in the works, but first it's another entry in the Mega Shark series (after Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus and Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus). This time, the humans have sent their own opponent to fight Megashark -a giant robot shark! Watch the trailer for Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark, and do not miss the final scene. It will remind you not to take such things seriously -as if you ever did. -via Geeks Are Sexy

5 Awesome and Geeky Ice Sculptures

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 09:00 PM PST

Live long and stay cool -at least, that's what I take away from this awesome Star Trek ice sculpture. If you're more of a Star Wars fan though, then you'll probably prefer this Chillennium Falcon structure instead.

While this When Geeks Wed article suggests using these delightfully geeky ice sculptures for your nerdy wedding, really any of them would be fantastic for a Christmas party, convention, banquet or any other fun engagement with a geek theme.

If you plan on using these for a big party, I suggest using the Batman ice luge which is not only cool looking, but also a great way to cool your drinks.

Mouse Decorates Christmas Tree

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 08:00 PM PST

(YouTube link)

Brösel the mouse decorates her Christmas tree. She is a clicker-trained mouse, but when she first saw the tiny tree and decorations, she started playing with them spontaneously! It didn't take long to teach her what she was supposed to do. See more of Brösel and her buddies at Mouse Agility. -via Tastefully Offensive

"Wrecking Ball" Christmas Tree Ornament

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 07:00 PM PST

Miley Cyrus came in like a wrecking ball this year, especially with her controversial music video for the song "Wrecking Ball." It sets the perfect ambiance for the Christmas season, don't you think? So make one of these tree ornaments using the instructions provided by Instructables member mikeasarus.

First, he found a screenshot from the video. He printed it out, along with a mirror copy, and cut out Miley. Mikeasarus then took a glass bulb ornament and primed and painted the surface with gray paint. He attached a cheap necklace chain to serve as the chain for the wrecking ball.

On the Vampire Trail in Scotland

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 06:00 PM PST

After Shannon Moore Shepherd spent time in Paris researching the origins of Bram Stoker's Dracula, she visited her husband's family in Scotland, where she once again found herself tracing Stoker's travels. The author had stayed at the same hotel they were in!

In 1894, while taking holiday here in Cruden Bay, Bram Stoker may have experienced a similar palette and sense of delicious anticipation as he came upon the ruined castle grounds. According to multiple sources on New Slains Castle, Bram Stoker was invited by the 18th Earl of Erroll to visit his humble home. A dark and foreboding sky combined with a sense of awe at the majestic structure before him and curiosity about the nobleman who ordered its construction and walked its candlelit hallways at night, is all reportedly real inspiration for the fantastical fictional Romanian castle in Dracula and its eccentric master. The Kilmarnock Arms website even affirms that the castle was a tangible inspiration.

If Stoker was invited to cross the darkness to New Slains by its Earl, then his own story isn’t much different from his protagonist, Jonathan Harker. As Stoker might have done politely with the Earl, Harker returns the invitation to Count Dracula. Now, collective consciousness would tell us, though we may not be sure how exactly we know, that a vampire cannot enter a home without being invited. This is something Jacques Sirgent touched on in his recent lecture at the Shakespeare and Company bookstore in Paris.

Sirgent also had information about the ties between a Countess of Erroll and the original Dracula family in Romania. Read the rest of the story, and see New Slains Castle in many pictures, at Atlas Obscura.

(Image credit: Shannon Moore Shepherd)

This 16-Year Old Girl Is a Monster Truck Driver

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 05:00 PM PST

(Photo: Leah Millis, The Chronicle)

Though she’s only 16 years old, Rosalee Ramer of Watsonville, California is already a successful monster truck driver. She’s very smart, having scored in the 99% percentile of the math portion of the SAT. Rosalee uses her considerable brains to design, build, maintain and drive these custom-built car-crushers.

She’s been at it since the age of 3, when she first held a flashlight to help her father build an engine at night. Now Rosalee is designing the first electronic fuel injection system for a monster truck.

But she’s more than an engineer. Rosalee also drives Detour, her family’s truck, in competitions. She often jumps it 30 feet into the air. It’s a joyful experience:

"Just being in a truck that loud, feeling it under you, stepping on the throttle," Rosalee said, "it almost doesn't feel real. You feel like you're in a different world. You're taking something that weighs 10,000 pounds and with a tiny touch of the throttle, you can just roast the tires."

(Video Link)

-via The Mary Sue

Star Warhols

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 04:00 PM PST

Dutch artist Vincent Vermeij, also known as Chungkong (previously at Neatorama) created a series of posters that put Star Wars characters into the classic Andy Warhol soup can art theme. Of course, they are called Star Warhols. There are eight posters in the series; each one is for sale individually as a print or a greeting card. -via Daily of the Day

McDonald's Will Sell Poutine in Its Canadian Restaurants

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 03:00 PM PST

(Unrelated photo via Joe)

Poutine is a Québécois dish consisting of gravy and cheese curd over French fries. It’s popular in Canada, where it’s eaten as fast food and a comfort food. McDonald’s restaurants in Quebec sell it. But now the company plans to make poutine available in all McDonald’s outlets throughout Canada. A serving will cost $3.99

I’ve had poutine once. It’s not available in restaurants in my part of Texas, so I had to make it myself. That wasn’t easy, as I could find cheese curd at only one specialty food store. It was delicious! I promised my wife that I would save half of it for her, but…well….

Someday, I’ll make it up to her.

-via Nag on the Lake

WIND

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 02:00 PM PST

(YouTube link)

In this fictional place, it's windy -very windy! People have learned to cope with it in strange and funny ways in their everyday lives. This video is Robert Löbel's graduation project at the HAW Hamburg Design Department. -via Laughing Squid

Enjoy The Convenience Of Christmas Tinner

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 01:00 PM PST

Preparing a holiday meal is a pain in the neck, and often results in the cook(s) being reduced to a frazzled, grumpy mess. But is it worth all the hassle and bad vibes? Wouldn’t you love to simply crack open a tin full of holiday meal and dig right in? Well, your prayers have been answered, the Christmas Tinner is here!

Packed full of layers of goodness, this colorful ready to eat can of Christmas cheer will make meal preparation a snap, and there’s something for everyone so your friends and family members will have their ferocious holiday hungers sated the easy way.

Via Geekosystem

GameMaxx Prank Gift Box

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 12:00 PM PST

GameMaxx Prank Box

Don't pack your fabulous gifts in ordinary holiday boxes. This holiday season hide those perfect purchases in the GameMaxx Prank Box from the NeatoShop. This fabulous box makes it looks like you are giving someone a ridiculous product created by a clueless company. It is a great way to share the gift of laughter with everyone you love.

Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more great Gag Gifts & Pranks.

Link

Have A Happy Christmas With This Hogwarts Gingerbread Cake

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 12:00 PM PST

We've already featured a few cool cakes from the Bake Christmas Wish Fundraiser for the Make A Wish Foundation (like the Hogswatch and Frozen ones), but when they are all so fantastic looking, it's hard not to keep posting them. This particularly lovely gingerbread Hogwarts Castle from Harry Potter was created by Mimicafe Union in New York and it looks just about as magical as the one in the films.

This second photo shows just how impressive the detailing is on the castle.

Via That's Nerdalicious

Blowing Bubbles

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 11:00 AM PST

(YouTube link)

Ted and Mary in Manitoba made a video to show us what it's like blowing bubbles at -45°. When it's all said and done, that's the least impressive part of the video. What's really impressive is: Goodness, that woman isn't wearing gloves in this weather! What? The guy doesn't even have a coat on! And -oops- he gets water on his shirt. At -45°. And doesn't even react except to laugh at himself! They are altogether delightful. "Just keep blown' those bubbles, Honey." -via Viral Viral Videos

If Tim Burton Animated <i>Doctor Who</i>

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 10:00 AM PST

A stop-motion animated Doctor Who directed by Tim Burton? I want to see that! Alas, it's just a dream right now. But perhaps these sketches could inspire Mr. Burton and the BBC to make a deal.

Michael Kenny, a 15-year old artist from Australia, has (so far) drawn the Sixth through Eleventh Doctors. Continue reading to view the rest.

Lucky Crab Avoids Cooking Pot

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 09:00 AM PST

Some fishermen in Britain caught a huge edible crab and decided to give it to a sick friend. The friend didn't have a pot large enough to cook the crab and stuck it in the refrigerator. Five days later, the family checked on the crab only to find it still alive! They didn't have the heart to eat such a survivor (or the pot), so they called the Bristol Aquarium. David Waines of the aquarium said,

“When she told me it had been in there for five days I couldn’t believe it was still alive.

“I told them to wrap it in a wet towel and bring it along to the aquarium as quickly as possible.

“Although the crab was very weak when it arrived the fact that it was kept refrigerated meant it was in a kind of suspended animation.

“We placed it into a special tank in our quarantine area and began pumping oxygen-rich seawater over it and it immediately started to show signs of recovery.

The crab now has a permanent home at the aquarium, and is expected to enjoy a long retirement. -via Arbroath

The First Scientific Paper Published in Elfish and Dwarfish

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 08:28 AM PST

Dan Lunt is a climate scientist at Bristol University in Bristol, UK. He created a computer model of the climate of Middle-earth from J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. Writing under the name Radagast the Brown, Dr. Lunt published an article about it. In order to make the article accessible readers in Middle-earth who don’t know English, he published it Elflish and Dwarfish as well as English. Science magazine reports:

Using supercomputers and a model originally developed by the U.K. Met Office, his study compares Middle-earth’s climate with those of our (modern) and the dinosaur’s (Late Cretaceous) worlds. The Middle-earth model (pictured, showing predicted ground coverage: with grass in light green, trees in darker green, desert in yellow, and ice in white) reveals that the Shire—home to the Hobbits—would enjoy weather much like England’s East Midlands, with an average temperature of 7°C and about 61 cm of rainfall each year. An epic journey to Mount Doom, however, would see a shift in climate, with the subtropical Mordor region being more like Los Angeles or western Texas. The study—released today on the University of Bristol’s website and available in English, Elvish, and Dwarvish—also shows that the elves probably sailed from the Grey Havens because of that region’s prevailing easterly winds, while the dry climate east of the Misty Mountains is formed by a rain shadow.

It’s a fun idea for publishing and a sure way to get public attention. But Radagast’s work is also a serious attempt at understanding climate modeling. A press release from Bristol University explained:

Among other findings, he explains why the elves set sail from the Grey Havens (the prevailing winds were favourable for their journey to the West), and the existence of a dry climate east of the Misty Mountains (the mountains cast a rain-shadow over the region). Radagast also discusses the strengths and weaknesses of contemporary climate models, and shows how they can be used to understand and predict future climate. […]
Dr Dan Lunt added: “This work is a bit of fun, but it does have a serious side. A core part of our work here in Bristol involves using state-of-the-art climate models to simulate and understand the past climate of our Earth. By comparing our results to evidence of past climate change, for example from tree rings, ice cores, and ancient fossils of plants and animals, we can validate the climate models, and gain confidence in the accuracy of their predictions of future climate.”

-via io9

Inside The Mind Of The Pyro

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 08:00 AM PST

(Video Link)

The Team Fortress video game franchise is full of quirky characters trying their darndest to blow each other to bits in ferocious multiplayer combat, and the in-game characters don’t come much quirkier than the Pyro.

This fiery madman always seems to have his head in the clouds while he racks up team kills with his flamethrower and trusty fire axe, but the question remains- what is the Pyro thinking about while he eliminates the competition?

The animated short entitled Crackpot tries to answer that question, while reminding us that if we were able to see everything that goes on inside this guy's head we’d all end up stark raving mad!

Via Geeks Are Sexy

This Week at Neatorama

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 07:00 AM PST

It's been just over a week since Thanksgiving, and I'm surprised that all those leftovers are gone. The only thing that's left is the portion of turkey I put away in the freezer. Most of the family loves leftover turkey sandwiches. You can tell it's true: we normally take months to go through a jar of Miracle Whip, but went through an entire jar in one week after Thanksgiving. Now the kitchen has room for me to try out the recipes for Christmas candy, cakes, and cookies we post here! Is it cold where you live? You might want to stay inside this weekend and catch up with whatever you may have missed this week at Neatorama.

John Farier posted 11 Great Pieces of Exosquad Fan Art.

Eddie Deezen gave us a tribute to Oreos: The Greatest Cookie in the World.

Thanks for Nothing: The Story of Zero was from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.

The Annals of Improbable Research contibuted Missing Pieces Research Review.

Twin Peaks: A Shot in the Dark came from mental_floss magazine.

We had plenty of puzzles, riddles, and games this week. The Conceptis puzzle was Chain Sudoku. The Pzzlr was called Sprint. And the Whodunit was The Haunted Tree House.

The mystery object in the What Is It? game this week is an automobile valve spring compressor, according to the What Is It? blog. Y'all had much funnier answers, and two of them won t-shirts. MEM said "It's a pogo-stick for fence-sitters. It's for those times when you just don't want to overcome your ambivalence." Ha! And Steven Vredenburgh had a great answer:

This is an example of the "I've got your nose" device. 1340's Germany tradition held that the nose of a ginger child could cure the black plague. The "I've got your nose" device, pictured above, was used to gather the noses of these unfortunate children. Though the practice of harvesting noses soon died out, the idea lingered in the "I've got your nose" game that adults still play with children as a reminder of the horrors of the black plague.

We had a few polls. We asked how you ate Oreo cookies, and the biggest number of folks just eat them like any other cookie. Dunking them in milk was the second most popular method. You really do not want to see John grow a mustache that looks like a cat. And Jill wanted to know when was a good time for a snail facial, but neglected to offer the option of "none of the above." The most popular answer was at a christening.

The post with the most comments was Oreos: The Greatest Cookie in the World.

The comment of the week was from Patty O'Heater in the Obituary for the Letter E: "If a company cannot vn b bothrd to spll thir products or srvics corrctly, I don't trust thm and I will not us thm."

This week's most popular post was 10 Things You Never Noticed About The Wizard of Oz , with second place going to A Nutella Bar Exists, and Thanks for Nothing: The Story of Zero came in third.

The most ♥ed post was a tie between Dad Colors His Kids' Drawings and The Photo That Changed the Face of AIDS.

The most emailed post was Oreos: The Greatest Cookie in the World, which may have set some kind of record. That was followed by Don't Cross the Cat!and Dog in a Snow Maze.

The biggest post of the week on social media was A Nutella Bar Exists, which topped all our other posts for the most Facebook likes, Tweets, and Google+ shares. By a long shot.

Alex is having another weekend sale at the NeatoShop. He's in the habit lately of slashing prices for this and that in order to get you to see what clever and creative Christmas gifts and decorations you can impress everyone with! The NeatoShop has such a large and varied selection that you have to check in every once in a while just to keep up!

If that isn't enough Neatorama for you, we have extra content and fun at our Facebook page, Twitter, and Pinterest. And mobile users: Flipboard makes it easy to keep up with Neatorama.

50 Weirdest Christmas Gifts Under $15

Posted: 07 Dec 2013 06:00 AM PST

This Christmas, don't just get presents for your loved ones that make them go "wow". Get them some things that make them say "Whaaaaa!!?" instead! Make it a Christmas to remember - anyone can get cute and pretty gifts, but you can stand out with these 50 Weirdest Christmas Gifts from the NeatoShop. Best of all, they're all under $15!

This weekend only: Save 25% on 800+ items from the NeatoShop in our Weekend Super Sale. Avoid the long lines at the mall and get your Christmas shopping done early!