Neatorama

---

• Edward Payson Weston: The Great Pedestrian
• Mapping and Travel Planning Program for the Roman Empire
• Kids' Reaction to Parents Kissing
• Cheetah and Dog Get Birthday Popsicle
• A Handy Gadget for Dealing with <i>Those</i> People--You Know--"Huggers"
• Beer Grab by a Crab
• Make Sure That Your Dogs and Humans Stay Hydrated This Summer
• How to Deal with Boos - This Ghost Ain't No Buster!
• Why Is Tokyo So Cute?
• Dog Confused by Egg
• Surprise Stash of Sweets Found in Cambridge Library
• How To Do Porky Pig's Voice In Thirty Seconds
• The Sad, Strange, True Story Of Sandy Allen, The Tallest Woman In The World
• This Is the Fastest Tortoise in the World
• Myanmar Bans Map Tattoos Below the Waist
• The Carpool DeVille Is a Fully Functional Car and Hot Tub
• Tumblr Users Love Capybaras
• Funny Pictures of the Day - Jul 13, 2014
• Heeere's Luuuigi - Don't Overlook This Shining Star
• Time Travel Lover
• It's So Hot in Yellowstone That a Road Literally Melted
• Pregnant Star Trek Cosplay Win
• Dawn of the Planet of the Apes -Starring Pugs!
• 21 Terrifying Criminals Who Escaped Justice
• Tattoos: What Makes Them Permanent?
• This Isn't Trash, But Painted Wood
• The Only Battle Ever Attended by a Sitting U.S. President

Edward Payson Weston: The Great Pedestrian Posted: 14 Jul 2014 05:00 AM PDT The following is an article from the book Uncle John's Absolutely Absorbing Bathroom Reader. Over the years, sports have changed. Back in the 1860s, before the NBA, NFL, or NHL, you might have been cheering for your favorite pedestrian! Here’s the story of the Babe Ruth of professional walking. WALKING FEVER America’s number one pedestrian, Edward Payson Weston, walked his way to fame and fortune in the late 1860s and infected the sports world with a “walking fever” that raged for half a century. Largely because of Weston, walking contests for a time rivaled prize fighting and horse racing as an early big-money pro sport. Foot racing had been common at country fairs, and distance walkers were setting records before he took up the sport, but Weston’s endurance feats attracted huge crowds of fans, filled the pages of sporting journals, and turned pedestrianism into an international craze. AN HISTORIC WALK Weston first gained attention at the age of 22 when he carried out a bet to walk 478 miles from Boston to Washington in ten consecutive days, to attend Lincoln’s inauguration. He started from Boston’s State House on February 22, 1861, followed by a swarm of fans riding in buggies, and walked the first five miles in 47 minutes before setting down to a steadier pace. Crowds cheered him town by town, and reporters covered every mile of his marathon. A snowstorm slowed him some, and he slipped and fell several times, but plodded on through New England and got as far as New York on the morning of February 27. Most of the time he ate as he walked, although he did manage to sit down to one solid meal each day. Sleep was in catnaps by the roadside or in farmhouse kitchens, and he began each new day walking at midnight. By the time he reached Philadelphia, Weston was ahead of schedule, so he bedded down for a day in a hotel room. He then walked all night from Philadelphia to Baltimore, had breakfast, and started out in pouring rain to hike the final lap over muddy roads. He made it to Washington at 5PM on March 4, 1861, too late to see Lincoln sworn in as president, but still in time to enjoy dancing at the Inaugural Ball that night. A WALKING PRO According to the terms of the wager, Weston collected only a bag of peanuts for his long walk. But he also collected reams of publicity and decided to turn professional. He got his first big fee as a pro, and also created an international sensation, by walking from Portland, Maine, to Chicago in 1867 for a prize of $10,000. To win he had to cover the distance of more than 1,200 miles within a month, not including Sundays, which were eliminated to prevent a public outcry against sporting on the Sabbath. Nattily dressed in a short jacket, tight-fitting knee breaches, colored belt, silk derby, buff gloves, and red-topped brogans, Weston took off from Maine on October 29 and covered the distance in 26 walking days, with enough time to spare to not only attend church services but also to make speeches to the crowds of admirers along the way. Weston carried a walking stick to chase away hostile dogs, and at one point had to use his fists to beat off a man who attacked him in an attempt to halt the contest. He received threatening letters from gamblers who had bet against him, two attempts were made to poison his food, and he was warned that the only way he would reach Chicago would be “in a coffin.” But he arrived the morning of Thanksgiving Day, his feet hardly swollen, and was still fit enough to address a cheering crowd at the Crosby Opera House that evening on the benefits of walking as outdoor exercise. THE MAIN ATTRACTION For most of his long life, Weston crisscrossed the country’s roads on endurance walks against time for fat wagers and big prizes. He also competed against hundreds of other pros in walking contests at race courses and indoor tracks, where he drew such crowds that he was often paid as much as three-fourths of the gate receipts. Some walkers beat him on level tracks in six-day matches, but few equaled his remarkable feats on the open roads. He staged an endurance contest walking through snow in New England in 1869, covering 1,058 miles in 30 days. At St. Louis in 1871, he walked part of 200 miles backwards and still covered the distance in 41 hours. In 1874 in Newark, New Jersey, he footed 500 miles in just under six days after doing the first 115 miles of it in 24 hours. Weston went to Europe in 1876 to cash in on his international fame and spent triumphal and profitable years there in crowd-drawing exhibitions, mainly in England. In London in 1879 he won the Astley Belt, emblematic of world supremacy, by defeating British champion “Blower” Brown in a six-day “go as you please” match that allowed both jogging and heel-and-toe walking. He covered 550 miles in 141 hours, 44 minutes. OLD MAN WESTON At the age of 68 in 1907, after constant years of grueling competition, Weston repeated the walk he made 40 years before, from Portland, Maine, to Chicago. He walked 1,345 miles in 24 days, 19 hours to beat his own early record by some 29 hours. He celebrated his 70th birthday two years later with the longest endurance walk of his life, across the United States from New York to San Francisco. Weston started from New York on March 15, 1909, hopeful that he would cross the country by “a rather devious route” that would let him cover more than 4,000 miles in 100 days. By then there was a motorcar instead of a horse-drawn carriage to transport the judges and supplies. But Weston disdainfully rejected most of the “modern” comforts offered him along the way and also held onto his own ideas as to what was a proper diet. He began his days at 3:30 each morning with a breakfast of oatmeal and milk, two slices of buttered toast, three poached eggs, three cups of coffee, a bowl of strawberries, two oranges, and a half dozen griddle cakes. On the road during the day he consumed 18 eggs, each beaten in a pint of milk with a tablespoon of sugar. “If I want a piece of pie while I’m on a walk, I’ll eat it, or griddle cakes, or pudding,” he said. “The stomachs that cannot digest ordinary food are those that are spoiled by high living or no exercise.” STILL WALKING Weston was still at it in 1914 when, at the age of 74, he tramped 1,546 miles from New York to Minneapolis in 51 days. Even after that, he walked in some contests and exhibitions, but devoted more of his time to encouraging others to walk for health, competition, and “the joy of discovering the open road,” warning that motorcars were making people more indolent than ever. Ironically, the first great pedestrian was hit by a car while he was walking on a street in Brooklyn, New York, in 1927. He suffered injuries that kept him in a wheelchair most of the last two years of his life, and he died in 1929 at the age of 90. OTHER GREAT PEDESTRIANS *Daniel O’Leary was an Irish-born Chicagoan who did his first endurance walking as a door-to-door salesman. Inspired by Weston, O’Leary became his greatest rival. O’Leary’s greatest performance was in 1907 in Cincinnati, where at the age of 63 he walked a mile at the beginning of each hour for 1,000 consecutive hours. During the 42 days that it took to complete the test, O’Leary’s longest period of uninterrupted sleep was 50 minutes. * In 1910 John Ennis crossed the country from New York to San Francisco. Ennis added a showmanly flair by taking time for exhibition swims along the way. After a plunge into the Atlantic Ocean at Coney Island amusement park, Ennis started walking on May 23, 1910. He swam in Lake Erie and later swam in the Mississippi on a day he had walked 45 miles. As he made his way westward over the roads, he swam seven other rivers and lakes before reaching the Pacific at San Francisco on August 24. His total cross-country walking time was 80 days, five hours. * A group known as the Kansas City Hikers made pedestrianism a family affair in 1913. Mr. and Mrs. Morris Paul teamed up with Mr. and Mrs. Gus Kuhn and their five-year-old daughter, Ruth, to walk from Kansas City, Missouri, to San Francisco. They took their time, stopping for as long as five days at some places, and spent a total of 227 days in walking 2,384 miles. _____________________________ The article above is reprinted with permission from Uncle John's Absolutely Absorbing Bathroom Reader, a fantastic book by the Bathroom Readers' Institute. Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts. If you like Neatorama, you'll love the Bathroom Reader Institute's books - go ahead and check 'em out!

Mapping and Travel Planning Program for the Roman Empire Posted: 14 Jul 2014 04:00 AM PDT Let's say that you've been transported back in time to the Second Century A.D. You're in Eburacum, a Roman fort located in what is now Barnsley, South Yorkshire, UK. You want to get Tanais, which is a Greco-Roman colony at the mouth of the Don River in what is now Russia. How do you get there? Google Maps isn't going to help you. But ORBIS will. Provided that you can get a good WiFi signal, you can pull up this complex mapping and travel planning program from Stanford University. ORBIS comes with many different options to help you select your route. You chose to go as fast as you could, by any means possible, and during the summer. Well, you didn't hire a horse relay--you're not made of denarri. But you did rent horses for the journey. You're throwing a lot of money at this problem, but it's still going to take you a long time to get from England to Russia compared to modern standards. You're riding horses over what is now southern France, central Italy, and Serbia. You're also traveling by ship and riverboat. The trip will take you more than 60 days. If you don't have a lot of money available, then you may have to travel by foot and slower sea-going vessels. Then the trip will take almost 84 days. ORBIS is fun! You can explore it here. -via Marginal Revolution

Kids' Reaction to Parents Kissing Posted: 14 Jul 2014 03:00 AM PDT via Cheezburger Yup. This basically summarizes my kids reaction to PDA. Ilikepiforbreakfast shares this cute family photo showing two young children horrified by their parents kissing in public.

Cheetah and Dog Get Birthday Popsicle Posted: 14 Jul 2014 02:00 AM PDT This is how you celebrate a birthday in the hot Texas sun! The Dallas Zoo threw a little party for their cheetah Winspear and his best friend Amani the black Labrador retriever. The two were born only three days apart, a year ago, and have been constant companions since they were two months old. Winspear and Amani were treated to matching decorated tubs of water for dunking balls or taking a dip, and what appears to be the world’s largest Bomb Pop. The huge popsicle was made from “30 gallons of water, 2% milk, and low-sodium chicken broth for flavoring, they LOVED it!” See more pictures of the two at the Dallas Zoo’s Facebook page. -via Time

A Handy Gadget for Dealing with <i>Those</i> People--You Know--"Huggers" Posted: 14 Jul 2014 01:00 AM PDT There's one in every group--someone who is way too physically affectionate, even in formal environments. Anaïs Paulard, a French jeweler living in the UK, devised this solution to your hugger problem. It's a balloon filled with power resting delicately in a spiked broach. You may have to embrace your hugger once. But it'll be the last time. (Video Link) Paulard, though, did not design this piece with hugger-repelling in mind. That's just my own idea. She's thinking more romantically: "My heart fills up like a balloon that’s about to burst” Lester in American Beauty. The sensation you feel inside. The joy of sharing a moment with someone you like, simply give a hug. Hug, burst, share… -via Lustik

Beer Grab by a Crab Posted: 14 Jul 2014 12:00 AM PDT YouTube Link This crab apparently was parched from his sandy travels and nabbed a man's Samuel Adams. Sure, the man filmed the action in portrait mode instead of landscape, but alcoholic beverages plus crab burglaries in progress often produce poor decision making. Via Nothing To Do With Arbroath.

Make Sure That Your Dogs and Humans Stay Hydrated This Summer Posted: 13 Jul 2014 11:00 PM PDT Redditor machina99 spotted this sign at the Carolla Cantina in Outer Banks, North Carolina. Refraining from judgment is a great idea if you want your customers to leave good tips. The Carolla Cantina allows pets on its patio, so feel free to bring your cat, dog, or howler monkey. -via Tastefully Offensive

How to Deal with Boos - This Ghost Ain't No Buster! Posted: 13 Jul 2014 10:00 PM PDT How to Deal with Boos by Thom2Maro His name is Boo and he's here to say, that he hates those bros in a major way. They're always looking at him like he's a punk, but if they'd just turn their backs they would be sunk! Boo hangs around the castle like a pile of dust, but when you wanna scare a plumber calling Boo is a must! Mario's in the castle, whaddya do? Call a sneaky scary ghost by the name of BOO! Keep your geeky wardrobe funky fresh with this How To Deal with Boos t-shirt by Thom2Maro, it's the pixel-tastic way to show the world your love for the old school. Visit Thom2Maro's official website, Facebook fan page, Twitter and Tumblr, then head on over to his NeatoShop for more totally radical designs: A Pocket, Full of Pixels Like No One Ever Was The 107th Fight Festive Winner View more designs by Thom2Maro | More Funny T-shirts | New T-Shirts Are you a professional illustrator or T-shirt designer? Let's chat! Sell your designs on the NeatoShop and get featured in front of tons of potential new fans on Neatorama!

Why Is Tokyo So Cute? Posted: 13 Jul 2014 10:00 PM PDT Everything is cute in Tokyo, from food art to Pikachu to cosplayers speaking in baby talk. They even have a special word for all the cuteness: Kawaii. As Jürgen and Mike at For 91 Days near the end of their Tokyo stay, they’ve posted a slew of videos and images that illustrate how cute everything is. It doesn’t really answer the question of “why,” but Jürgen says, “There are no angry people in Tokyo, since everything is soooooo cute.” Take a look for yourself, at For 91 Days.

Dog Confused by Egg Posted: 13 Jul 2014 09:00 PM PDT (Video Link) This basenji isn't sure what to do with the odd ball. Is it alive? Is it a toy? Just wait until it hatches, pup. You're going to be a daddy! -via Tastefully Offensive

Surprise Stash of Sweets Found in Cambridge Library Posted: 13 Jul 2014 08:00 PM PDT A book on the shelves of a library at Cambridge housed a sweet secret awaiting any student who cracked it. A Newnham College Library stock check turned up chocolate bars stashed in a hollowed out area inside the cover of The Oxford Companion to English Literature by Margaret Drabble, a Newnham alumna.   Within the hollow area was also message encouraging the treats recipient to replenish the book with more chocolates after they enjoyed their find. Newnham College spokeswoman Jo Tynan said. "We do regular stock checks at the library and a student stock taker came across this book last week. It didn’t have any issue numbers on it so she opened it and the inside had been completely hollowed out.” It is not clear whether these two bars are the original chocolates or whether they have been replaced many times over the exam period.  We don’t know how long the book was there for but we don’t think it was very long." Read more here. Images Credit: Newnham College, Cambridge.

How To Do Porky Pig's Voice In Thirty Seconds Posted: 13 Jul 2014 07:00 PM PDT He’s the shy little pig with an extremely pronounced stutter, and even though he was typically cast as a sidekick (and the fact that he doesn’t wear pants) he became one of the most beloved Warner Brothers cartoon characters of all time. Every WB cartoon fan has tried to do the Porky Pig stutter at one time or another, but Mel Blanc is a difficult voice act to follow unless you know how to p-p-p-prop-p-perly st-stu-stu-stutter like good ol’ Porky himself: (Video Link) Let voice actor Bob Bergen, who incidentally knew Mel Blanc and may have picked up a few pointers from him, show you how it’s done so you can wow toon fans and s-s-st-stu-...talk funny just like a cartoon superstar! -Via Cartoon Brew

The Sad, Strange, True Story Of Sandy Allen, The Tallest Woman In The World Posted: 13 Jul 2014 06:00 PM PDT Sandy Allen was born in 1955, a normal-sized baby. But she grew, and grew, and grew to be 7’ 7” by the time she was 20, when brain surgery to remove a tumor on her pituitary gland stopped her growth. She was diagnosed with the tumor as a pre-teen, but as her family was uninsured, they could not afford it. If she’d had the surgery as a young girl, she would have been just a tall woman. As it turned out, Sandy Allen achieved the world record as the tallest woman in the world. But it came with a price- Gigantism has a lot of physical effects besides height. Doctors told her she’d be lucky to live past age 30. Sandy would always have two options: a life lived publicly — one that embraced her title, perhaps attempted to do good with it, but invited judgment — or a private one. Soon after she became aware of how short her life might be, she elected the former. A Scottish promoter named Norman Adie first took Sandy to Australia, where she appeared at several department stores. That summer she did appearances at Adie’s Fantastic Facts and Feats in Wildwood, N.J. Sandy brought along Michael and adopted a dog she called Adie. After two summers there, she decided to take a job at the Guinness Museum in Niagara Falls, Canada. “At that point her family needed money, and she wasn’t making it too well on a secretary salary,” Rose says. “She could be out on her own and make it for herself. That appealed to her.” Allen worked at the Guinness Museum for eight years, and did plenty of traveling and public appearances afterward. But her body strained under her 450-pound weight, and as she got older, she suffered more physical disabilities and became frustrated and depressed. But she always put on a happy face for the public. Read the story of Sandy Allen at Buzzfeed. (Image courtesy of Rita Rose)

This Is the Fastest Tortoise in the World Posted: 13 Jul 2014 05:00 PM PDT In the classic fable, the tortoise beat the hare by being persistent. But Bertie may be able to win through speed alone. Bertie is a tortoise who lives at Adventure Valley, a theme park in Durham, UK. Visitors commented that he seemed to move quickly--faster than you might expect from a tortoise. So animal caretakers at Adventure Valley decided to see what Bertie could do if he trained as a runner. (Video Link) The standard sprinting distance in competitive tortoise racing is 18 feet. A tortoise named Charlie set a world record in 1977 by running that distance in 43.7 seconds. Bertie smashed that record by crossing the finish line in only 19.59 seconds. That's a lightning fast pace of 0.6 miles per hour! Guinness World Record officials were on site to witness and confirm the event, so Bertie should get an official record soon. -via Nothing to Do with Aborath

Myanmar Bans Map Tattoos Below the Waist Posted: 13 Jul 2014 04:00 PM PDT For citizens of Myanmar, tattooing a map of their country below the waist is now punishable by a three-year jail sentence and a fine equivalent to over $200 USD.    Mandalay Region Advocate-General U Ye Aung Myint said of the new ban, "We can accept this symbol tattooed on the upper part of the body because it might demonstrate the wearer's pride in their country, but a tattoo on the lower part disgraces the country's pride... Although the Myanmar map is an abstract image, it has gracefulness and we should prevent such disgrace befalling the country." Unfortunately for those in Myanmar, this is not a crime in which evidence can be easily destroyed. Read more at Mizzima. Image: Wikimedia Commons

The Carpool DeVille Is a Fully Functional Car and Hot Tub Posted: 13 Jul 2014 03:00 PM PDT When they were engineering students at McMaster University in Ontario, Phil Weicker and Duncan Forster built a hot tub inside a 1969 Cadillac DeVille. It remains a fully functional car, with the original engine in the front. The water circulation system in the trunk processes 5,000 pounds of water and keeps it at a comfortable 102°F. Weicker and Forster want to take the Carpool DeVille to the Bonneville Speedway. This area in the Bonneville Salt Flats of Utah is ideal for land speed racing. If Weicker and Forster are successful, they will drive the Carpool DeVille on the speedway, making it the fastest hot tub in the world. They recently conducted a Kickstarter funding project to acquire what they need to transport the car to Utah and equip the car with the safety gear necessary to drive at Bonneville. Over the weekend, they passed their $10,000 goal. (Video Link) Here's the promotional video from their now-completed Kickstarter project. -via Nag on the Lake

Tumblr Users Love Capybaras Posted: 13 Jul 2014 02:00 PM PDT Capybaras are the largest rodents in the world, Rafael "Rafa" Nadal Parera is one of the largest tennis stars in the world, at least in terms of popularity and the fact he's an eleven time Grand Slam tournament champion, and thanks to the ridiculousness of the internet we are shown Capybaras That Look Like Rafael Nadal: Despite their large size, their big, gnashy teeth and stout build capybaras are very gentle critters, preferring to take a swim and lay around on the shore all day rather than running around town causing trouble. They're so easygoing that other animals consider them nature's chairs, as seen on the Tumblr site Animals Sitting on Capybaras: Capybaras look like they'd be quite comfortable to sit on, provided you don't mind sitting on a soggy rodent, and despite their semiaquatic nature they don't stink because their wiry fur and lack of an undercoat keeps them stench free. Since they're one of the least stinky animals living in their native habitat capybaras have become rather judgmental towards other critters, which inspired the creation of a Tumblr site called Capybara Is Judging You: Where does all that capybara attitude come from? It stems from the fact that they're internet famous, of course! They live a life of privilege, which some non-capybaras feel is an injustice, so a site featuring photos of posh capybaras living the good life was created, complete with colorful commentary, called This Is Capybara Privilege: It's clear the internet adores the look of the majestic capybara, and the trend of capybara adoration (arguably) began with one Tumblr with an explicit name- F%#@ Yeah Capybara: -Via Pleated Jeans, Smithsonian

Funny Pictures of the Day - Jul 13, 2014 Posted: 13 Jul 2014 01:30 PM PDT Kirk and Spock Travel Back in Time to 2014 If you love funny pictures, you don't want to miss these! We've just updated our LOLpic blog NeatoPicto with some of the neatest and funniest pictures you'll see today: Calculus vs Real People This Guy Just Likes to Hold Signs Superhero Beach Party Hail Pie-dra Zoo Jeans: Stylishly Ripped by Dangerous Animals Buy One Divorce Get The Next One Half Off Love funny pics? View tons more at NeatoPicto!

Heeere's Luuuigi - Don't Overlook This Shining Star Posted: 13 Jul 2014 01:00 PM PDT Heeere's Luuuigi by Zacly He was tired of playing second fiddle to his bros super platformer star status, and the once all play and no work Luigi was starting to crack up. They reached a level which was set inside an old haunted hotel, full of hallways, cobwebs and shining mirrors, and Mario began to worry about the look he saw in Luigi's eyes... Don't be a dull boy or girl, pick up this Heeere's Luuuigi t-shirt by Zacly and carve out a geeky style high score! Visit Zacly's Facebook fan page and Twitter, then head on over to his NeatoShop for more geek-tastic designs: Mr. Blast Ivy's Greenhouse Gizbo Plumber View more designs by Zacly | More Funny T-shirts | New T-Shirts Are you a professional illustrator or T-shirt designer? Let's chat! Sell your designs on the NeatoShop and get featured in front of tons of potential new fans on Neatorama!

Time Travel Lover Posted: 13 Jul 2014 01:00 PM PDT (vimeo link) Elisha Yaffe wrote and starred in this play about time travel. It starts with the usual: boy meets girl, but then someone invents time travel and everything skews out of control. If you could check in with the future to see if a relationship is going to work, how far ahead do you want to go? Three weeks? A year? Ten years? Careful, if you look too far ahead, you might not even be there! And who knows what you'll end up regretting if you change even one little thing. This video contains NSFW language. -via Geeks Are Sexy

It's So Hot in Yellowstone That a Road Literally Melted Posted: 13 Jul 2014 12:00 PM PDT (Photo: Associated Press) Yellowstone National Park is in the northwestern corner of Wyoming, along with a little bit spilling over into Idaho and Montana. At 3,468 square miles, it's larger than the states of Delaware and Rhode Island together. (Image: National Park Service) Yellowstone rests on a geological hot spot--specifically, a volcanic caldera. The enormous heat contained beneath the Earth's surface bubbles up through geysers and hot springs.  The geothermal heat can damage human structures on the surface. This photo from the Associated Press shows a strip of Firehole Lake Drive. The subsurface heat has melted the asphalt. -via Gizmodo P.S. Harry Turtledove, a fantasy and alternate history novelist, wrote a trilogy about life in the United States after a massive Yellowstone eruption. The first book is called Supervolcano: Eruption.

Pregnant Star Trek Cosplay Win Posted: 13 Jul 2014 11:00 AM PDT Being pregnant doesn’t stop women from attending fandom conventions, so why should it stop them from cosplaying? With a little imagination, some minor alterations and a good sense of humor you can easily incorporate that baby bump into your costume: This pregnant cosplayer is a lovely shade of green, which is apparently just the way Captain Kirk likes his ladies, and her costume brings to mind one rather geeky question- how many gals across the galaxy have fallen for that patented James Tiberius charm? -Via io9

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes -Starring Pugs! Posted: 13 Jul 2014 10:00 AM PDT (YouTube link) This movie recreation starring adorable little pug puppies contains no spoilers for the film Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, at least nothing more than the trailer would tell you. What you get is an attack scene that will bring a big grin to your face -because it’s PUGS! Enjoy the latest film parody from The Pet Collective. -via Viral Viral Videos

21 Terrifying Criminals Who Escaped Justice Posted: 13 Jul 2014 09:00 AM PDT Those who have chosen to uphold the law don’t always succeed in bringing criminals to justice, and sometimes they fail so spectacularly that the criminals slip right through their fingers, leaving people to wonder how they could have escaped so easily: There are 21 Terrifying Criminals Who Are Still On The Loose according to this Cracked user submission compilation, 21 nefarious no-goodniks who managed to avoid prosecution for their crimes, and for most of them that's where the terrifying part ends: Don't get me wrong, there are many bad guys on the list who deserve to be called "terrifying", but they're lumped in with thieves, hackers, and fixers of baseball games who hardly live up to the terror title. However, there are enough true crime tales in this collection to pique the interest of the avid armchair criminologist, despite the somewhat clickbaity title, and you won't believe how easy it is for some people to dodge the long arm of the law! (May contain language which is NSFW)

Tattoos: What Makes Them Permanent? Posted: 13 Jul 2014 08:00 AM PDT YouTube Link   Humans shed 30,000 to 40,000 skin cells per hour, or approximately one million per day. Given that huge amount of continually sloughed-off skin, what makes tattoos permanent? This TED-Ed video explains. (Don't get your hopes up about that embarrassing ink you got in college.)

This Isn't Trash, But Painted Wood Posted: 13 Jul 2014 07:00 AM PDT Honestly, you shouldn't be surprised to walk into a modern art gallery and see trash hanging from a wall. But that's not what Tom Pfannerstill makes. What you see above is not an old KFC bucket, but a painted image of one on wood. Pfannerstill makes highly realistic images of crushed trash with acrylic paint and enamel on basswood. You can find more examples in the series here. Pfannerstill notes that his paintings are not of generic pieces of trash. They reflect specific pieces of trash that he finds on the street. On the back of each painting are notes about where and when he found the original object. The paintings are memorials to these individual pieces of trash. Pfannerstill explains: There is also a missing time element, an implied narrative about how the object travelled from where it originated to where I happened upon it.These objects have a life span so to speak (if not an actual one, at least metaphoric one), from their production through their usefulness to their ultimate disposal. As such, I see them as ‘memento mori’, reminders of mortality and the corresponding corollary ‘carpe diem’. They are subtle reminders of the temporal nature of all things. -via Visual News

The Only Battle Ever Attended by a Sitting U.S. President Posted: 13 Jul 2014 06:00 AM PDT Remember that time Washington, D.C. was attacked by an army? Of course you don’t, it was 150 years ago this weekend. While legendary generals Grant and Lee were fighting elsewhere, the Second Corps of the Army of Northern Virginia pushed ahead to take the Union capital, guarded by Fort Stevens. Both sides were thoroughly unprepared. By the summer of 1864, the Confederate army was a mere shell of what it started out to be. For some time, in other words, there had been for the South precious little glory in this war and even less fun. The proud young men strutting to the music of the bands were no more; now sad-eyed, leather-skinned, worn-out infantrymen stumbled barefoot through the heat and dust until they dropped. The caped and ostrich-feathered officers, happily risking all for home and country, were dead, replaced by bitter shells of men playing out a losing hand.   And yet, by God, here at midday on a Monday in July was the balding, foulmouthed, tobacco-chewing, prophet-bearded Jubal Early, at the gates of the Federal capital. He had taken command of the men who had earned immortality as Stonewall Jackson's "foot cavalry," had marched them far enough and fought them hard enough to rival the memory of their dead commander, and now he stood on the brink of legend himself. He was going to take Washington City—its Treasury, its arsenals, its Capitol building, maybe even its President. The Union side wasn’t as formidable as they should have been, either -at least not in Washington. General Grant had taken the 18,000 artillery soldiers of Fort Stevens elsewhere to fight the Confederates, with Lincoln’s blessing, meaning the capital was guarded by a mere 4,000 home guards and militia. Everyone took charge of everything. The military department was commanded by Maj. Gen. Christopher Augur; but the Army Chief of Staff, Henry Halleck, ordered Maj. Gen. Quincy Gillmore to take charge in the emergency; but the Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton, had called in Maj. Gen. Alexander McCook to handle the crisis; but General in Chief Grant had sent Maj. Gen. E.O.C. Ord to save the situation. When yet another general, who for some reason was relaxing in a New York City hotel, sent word that he would be available for duties commensurate with his rank, Chief of Staff Halleck blew up. "We have five times as many generals here as we want," he responded, "but are greatly in need of privates. Anyone volunteering in that capacity will be thankfully received." But the foot soldiers from the South were so weary that their advance was slow, and Washington called up reinforcements. By the time the main bulk of troops faced each other, the president himself took up a front row seat at Fort Stevens.   Delighted at the prospect of seeing actual combat for the first time, Lincoln bounded up to the parapet and stood looking over the field, his familiar, top-hatted form an inviting target for Confederate sharpshooters. While Wright begged the President to take cover, a trooper in Lincoln’s cavalry escort saw bullets “sending little spurts and puffs of dust as they thudded into the embankment on which he stood.” Thus for the first and only time in history a President of the United States came under fire in combat. Smithsonian magazine gives the details of the battle that had federal bureaucrats shaking in their shoes 150 years ago.

You are subscribed to email updates from Neatorama To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now.	Email delivery powered by Google
Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610