An Ignoble Experiment

Nicolas Cage Bought a Pyramid in Which to Be Entombed

Weird Al Yankovic finally received his engraved 2015 Grammy Award, so he took the opportunity to parody all those unboxing videos while he opened it. This is actually Weird Al’s fourth Grammy: he won one each in 1984, 1988, and 2004, too. -via Viral Viral Videos

Posted: 01 May 2015 11:00 PM PDT

Britt Reints on Flickr

Two-hundred-year-old Saint Louis Cemetery in New Orleans is the burial place of many local luminaries. It's generally difficult to obtain a space in the overcrowded place of rest, but leave it to quirky actor and meme-muse Nicolas Cage to do so. In fact, Cage secured an area that would normally be dedicated to four spaces on which to build the giant white pyramid pictured above.

Read more on Cage's future final resting place, including the controversy surrounding it, at Amusing Planet.

14 Beautiful Vases to Make Your Mother's Day Flowers Amazing

Posted: 01 May 2015 10:00 PM PDT

It's almost Mother's Day today and while many people will be giving their mom's flowers, few think about the importance of the vessel carrying the blooms. That's why at Homes and Hues we rounded up some amazing vases that make a mere bouquet into a true gift.

Whether your mom is a bit silly, quite classic, totally chic or even a bit dark, there's almost certainly something right up her alley in this collection, so check out the full list at Homes and Hues: 16 Wonderful Vases Perfect for Mother's Day Floral Arrangements

Rugby Players Have Missing Teeth Replaced with Bottle Openers

Posted: 01 May 2015 09:00 PM PDT

To promote Salta Beer, the ad agency Ogilvy Argentina designed a tooth implant that functions as a bottle opener. It then had a dentist screw the implants into the jaws of three rugby players who had lost teeth in action.

They are totally effective. In fact, we should get bottle openers on both sides of our mouths so that we can open two bottles at the same time!

(Video Link)

-via Foodiggity

What Did the Romans Eat? Food and Drink in Ancient Times

Posted: 01 May 2015 08:00 PM PDT

Painting from Pompeii showing a feast during a family banquet or ceremony

With evidence collected from sewers and trash dumps at archaeological sites such as Herculaneum and Pompei, scientists can identify the diet of ancient Romans. The article linked below gives us a glimpse into what foods were enjoyed during those times.

The average Roman ate breakfast (ientaculum) at dawn, light lunch (prandium) around 11:00 am and dinner (cena), as the main meal of the day. Sometimes they also took in a later dinner called vesperna as well. Wealthy Romans ate a bigger cena in the late afternoon, with no vesperna.

"The cena could be a grand social affair lasting several hours. It would be eaten in the triclinium, the dining room, at low tables with couches on three sides. The fourth side was always left open to allow servants to serve the dishes. Diners were seated to reflect their status. The triclinium would be richly decorated, it was a place to show off wealth and status. Some homes had a second smaller dining room for less important meals and family meals were taken in a plainer oikos."

Read about what was on the menu (aside from dormice) here.

Via The Presurfer | Image: Andrew Dalby

Anything Is a Medium to This Artist, Including Toast, Cigarette Ash, and Fruit

Posted: 01 May 2015 07:00 PM PDT

Japanese Twitter user Shinrashinge uses everyday materials as the clay into which he shapes highly realistic images. He’s done several works with cigarette ash and tobacco, including this nicely arranged Pikachu.

Toast isn’t just something to eat. If it’s within Shinrashinge’s grasp, it can become a storybook, colored, cut, and covered with hunney for Winnie the Pooh.

With select portions of skin removed and a bit of re-arranging, fruits become Studio Ghibli characters, including Calcifer from a strawberry and Totoro from a kiwifruit.

When he doesn’t have anything to draw on, then Shinrashinge draws on himself. Here he is with the fist of whom I think is Monkey D. Luffy from the anime series One Piece.

-via Rocket News 24

73-Year-Old Character Named Carl Punches Bear in the Face

Posted: 01 May 2015 06:00 PM PDT

Sith Lord Head - With Stars In His Eyes...

Carl is a 73-year-old man who heard his beloved Chihuahua whining outside his Placer County, California home one day. When he went outside and discovered that a bear was the source of his dog's fear, Carl didn't give the situation a second thought. Using brawn over brain, he punched the bear in the face. The bear, likely one surprised animal, got the heck outta Dodge. Even bears can sense a guy nobody should mess with. Said Carl of the incident,

"The man or beast that I run from ain't been born, and his momma's already dead... You're not going to sacrifice my babies for some damn bear!"

-Via Arbroath

Posted: 01 May 2015 05:00 PM PDT

Sith Lord Head by Arinesart

Their minds are filled with dark dreams of conquest and destruction, and the force of evil coursing through their veins make Sith Lords look favorably upon the vast nothingness of space. They believe their destiny lies within that inky blackness, and they wrap the emptiness of the void around themselves like a warm blanket, never fearing death's embrace. They are the lords of darkness, and like a star in the night's sky they guide the Empire to the safety of another subjugated planet...

Add some far out sci-fi style to your geeky wardrobe with this Sith Lord Head t-shirt by Arinesart, it's a great way to wage war against the forces of boring fashion!

Visit Arinesart's Facebook fan page, official website and Twitter, then head on over to his NeatoShop for more star studded designs:


Falcon YT-3000	Link To The Future	Cucco Farm	Super Barbecue

View more designs by Arinesart | More Sci-Fi 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!

LEGO Recreation of Dungeons & Dragons

Posted: 01 May 2015 05:00 PM PDT

The 1977 Basic Set for Dungeons & Dragons featured the cover image that you see below. It’s a painting by David Sutherland that shows a group of adventurers combating an underground dragon sitting on his treasure. It’s an iconic work of D&D art.

LEGO artist Eric Harshbarger, whose work we’ve featured previously, owns a copy of that old edition and occasionally runs campaigns with it. He loves the cover image and decided to make an enormous LEGO mosaic of it. It’s 75 inches wide and 90 inches tall and uses over 50,000 LEGO pieces. The project took him 2 months to complete.

(Photo: Black Gate)

-via Ace of Spades HQ

Korean Toilet with Options

Posted: 01 May 2015 04:00 PM PDT

This Architect's Basement is a LEGO Lover's Paradise

A British man tries out a hi-tech toilet in Korea that offers several bidet functions. The video is SFW while the audio is priceless. He’s fortunate the buttons are labeled in English, which leads me to believe he's staying at a tourist hotel. Jeremy had a great comment at YouTube:

The ones I found in Seoul were never in English and the last thing in the world you want is a surprise enema.
I once hit all the buttons and the thing started blasting water out the toilet and against the opposite wall, I couldn't figure out how to shut it off so I just ran away haha, good thing their washrooms usually have a drain in the floor.

-via Daily Picks and Flicks

Posted: 01 May 2015 03:00 PM PDT

Captain America: Civil War as a Martial Arts Flick

Architect Jeffrey Pelletier's 250,000-piece LEGO collection is impressive, but what's more impressive is the manner in which he organizes it and the fantastic basement space that houses it. Pelletier's neon-colored house covers an incredible basement complete with nine-foot ceilings and a hidden screen for movies. This is one tricked-out LEGO/man cave and it looks like a ton of fun, even if the kids turn out not to like LEGO. -Via Nerd Approved

Posted: 01 May 2015 02:00 PM PDT

(Video Link)

Beat Down Boogie, the genius filmmakers who previously brought us two Super Mario Bros.war films, jumps into the Marvel Comics Civil War storyline that will hit the big screen next year as Captain America: Civil War.

Kung Fu Avengers: Civil War shows the story as a 70s-era Hong Kong martial arts film, complete with grainy visual resolution, English-language dubbing, and over-the-top combat scenes.

-via Geek Tyrant

Printing a Wall-sized World Map

Posted: 01 May 2015 01:00 PM PDT

Dominik M. Schwarz has always been fascinated with maps. He's also traveled a lot, and he wanted a big world map -the size of an entire wall, with detailed information and place names. Like many of us, he wanted to stick pins in the places he'd been. He couldn’t find the map he wanted for sale, so he made his own!

That doesn’t mean the process was easy. There’s the data collection, the image stitching, testing it on the wall, finding a printer for such a large one-off project, mounting the map, attaching it to the wall, and finding the perfect pins. Every step was more complicated than you’d think, and there were many ideas discarded along the way. Schwarz spent a year and a half on the project, and posted each step with pictures. He’s quite happy with the results. -via Metafilter

Watch Hours of Pro Photoshop Retouching in Minutes

Posted: 01 May 2015 12:00 PM PDT

Photographer Elizabeth Moss created these behind-the-scenes looks at high-end photograph retouching, like the jobs she does for her past clients Vogue, Elle, GQ and Vanity Fair.

In an interview with Peta Pixel, Moss said:

“These videos are unique because none of the high end retouchers make these type of videos, so the quality of the other before and after retouching videos available online are pretty terrible and not at all representative of what is typically done on high fashion editorials and campaigns. With all the talk about photoshop use or overuse, I thought it would be interesting for people to see how we actually add pores to skin (we do this in the 2nd and 3rd videos, sampled from the girl in the first video).”

Check them out. Don't miss the third video — it's an eye opener. -Via Gizmodo

Cats Who Have Forgotten How To Cat

Posted: 01 May 2015 11:00 AM PDT

It appears the feline pet population has let the internet fame of their furry cousins go straight to their heads, and now they’re no longer content with being mere housecats- they want to live like humans.

They’re trading in their litterboxes and flea collars for office building bathrooms and over-the-top bling, because these cats have totally forgotten how to cat!

Cats have always been the most rebellious pets in the house

So it was only a matter of time before they decided to revolt against their human owners

The revolution was a long time coming, and cats have been humiliated by humans for centuries

Feline internet fame inspired cats to rise up and take their rightful place in the world, and the internet taught them how to use their power of cute as a weapon

Cats started sowing the seeds of chaos in their households

Tired of humans telling them they can’t sit on the couch cats devised a clever new way to couch

And started plotting in secret, hiding their plans from the prying eyes of nosy humans

Cats started making friends with their enemies, in order to fill their ranks

And proved they were master tacticians by beating their humans at chess, having studied our tactics in secret for centuries

Knowing it was only a matter of time before they'd stop being pet pawns and become feline royalty

Cats were quick to realize that to be truly victorious they'd have to dress for success

Butsome simply couldn't bear the thought of scratching out a living like an average human, so they took a spa day instead

And those cats who'd watched too many cartoons started suffering from identity crises

One crazy kitteh named Karl thought cosplay might make him look tough, but it actually made him look delicious

Cats have a unique sense of style, and humans are mighty surprised by the style of clothing cats choose to wear when they’re free to dress themselves

And yet the true revolutionaries still believe the key to victory is looking as human as possible

Cats who grew tired of waiting for their lazy humans to deliver the tuna dressed for culinary success

Cats are used to being called cute, but when that patronizing adjective wore thin there was nowhere left to go but straight to the top, earning the title "the fairest in the land"

Cats figured out that the fastest way to a human’s heart is through their pocketbook, so some fat cats began invading the world of big business, ready to make a billion bucks

Other cats are trying to earn their fortune the old fashioned way, trading caterwauling in an alley for singing in a band

Or trying to shoot that perfect pic which will launch their photographic career

But the truly industrious kittehs took to the internet to seek out truly powerful secrets they can use against humans

And once cats uncover they scientific mysteries of the universe they’ll be truly unstoppable!

Take note, humans- if you can’t fight against the feline takeover slip on a cat suit and join em!

3D Liquid Floors Make Your Rooms Look Like Bodies of Water

Posted: 01 May 2015 10:30 AM PDT

These 3D epoxy floors by Dubai-based interior decorating brand Imperial go to the next level...of awesome! They've figured out a way to make your floors look like bodies of water, complete with dolphins, waves, fish, and other aquatic imagery.

I can't wait until they make ones that look like molten lava, so we can really start playing that Hot Lava game the right way.

Head over to Imperial's website to see an entire photo gallery of these trippy floors.

via Bored Panda

How Sailors' Love Tokens Got Into Women's Underwear

Posted: 01 May 2015 10:00 AM PDT

If your far-away lover gave you something to remember him by, keeping it in your underwear might seem like a good idea. In fact, that’s how scrimshaw art got into whalebone corsets. If a woman is going to be wearing stays made of baleen or whalebone anyway, a gift inscribed with love from a sailor made him feel closer to her heart -and other body parts.

“The whole concept was to give your loved one a memento, some tangible thing that she could wear or use,” says Nancy Rosin, the president of the National Valentine Collectors Association, who has 38 scrimshaw busks in her collection. “A woman would use something like a pie crimper often, and every time she used it, she would remember her sailor. Busks were huge tokens of love. She could wear it in her corset, where it would be a constant reminder of his love—probably because it was uncomfortable.”

Scrimshaw busks would be engraved with all sorts of symbolic images: A palm frond might indicate a place the whaleman had sailed to, while a North Star would assure the woman that her man would be guided home. Wheat stalks stood for abundance, houses meant security and comfort, and a church indicated plans for marriage. All of these hopes and dreams would be pressing into her torso throughout the day.

These busks were cherished in a bittersweet manner because a woman did not know if her sailor would ever come back. And if he didn’t, then his work would be a memorial. Collectors Weekly explains more about whaling, scrimshaw art, corsets, and how they all fit together.

(Image credit: National Museum of American History)

Cockatoo Rocks Out to Elvis

Posted: 01 May 2015 09:00 AM PDT

Giggity - The Sound Of One Man Creeping

In this hilarious video, one of these cockatoos is rocking out to Elvis and seems to be doing everything in his power to get his buddy on board. But no amount of his infectious groovin' is going to get his friend movin'. Maybe he's a metal head instead. -Via Arbroath

Posted: 01 May 2015 08:00 AM PDT

Giggity by Berserk7

The sun is out and babes are starting to hit the beaches in their itty bitty bikinis, which means it's time to get your giggity on! Bring Quagmire along for the beachy fun and you'll have a wingman by your side who will either creep the girls out, with all his grinning and giggitying, or reveal their freaky side. But just to be on the safe side you'd better keep a close eye on Glenn if you meet someone special, because he's no family guy- he's a pear headed lech!

Bring some animated fun to your summer attire with this Giggity t-shirt by Berserk7, it's guaranteed to turn heads and earn you a "well alright!" from your fellow fans!

Visit Berserk7's Facebook fan page and official website, then head on over to his NeatoShop for more delightful designs:


TIGER- BLOODY ROAR- Version Color	Snow White- The Dark Princess	SUPER- White Version	Planet Of The Apes

View more designs by Berserk7 | 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!

Cosplay Sewing Patterns by McCall's

Posted: 01 May 2015 08:00 AM PDT

Yaya Han Zippered Bodysuit

This is the Yaya Han Zippered Bodysuit. It's made from one of the many sewing patterns available through the new Cosplay by McCall's line.

See?!

Bonus: you've got plenty of time to sew your own outfit for the big Comic-Con in July.

[link] Thanks, Elliotte!

Bohemian Rhapsody by Vine

Posted: 01 May 2015 07:00 AM PDT

This User Experience Expert Will Evaluate Your Website While Drunk

How many ways can you do Queen's song "Bohemian Rhapsody?" In this collaborative project, Cody the Payne rounded up 59 different Vine users, who each contributed a six-second clip of the song. Individually, they are cute, but together they made an entire music video. Some try to emulate the original video, some illustrate the lyrics, some lip sync, and a few even play instruments. Then there are those who just did something interesting and artful. Is this the beginning of a new collaborative trend? I hope so; projects like this can be a lot of fun! -via Buzzfeed

Posted: 01 May 2015 06:00 AM PDT

(Photo: Stephen Cummings)

UX stands for “user experience.” It’s a field of web development that examines how ordinary people would understand and use a website. There’s demand for UX professionals because many developers have difficulty thinking like an outsider with limited understanding of the website. UX consultants can help shape websites that are user-friendly.

Richard Littauer, a UX expert, says that one of the principles of his field is that “the user is drunk.” A website should be designed simple enough that a drunk person could navigate it without difficulty. In exchange for money, Littauer will get very drunk and evaluate your website while screencasting his reactions.

I’m a librarian and UX is a very big topic in professional conferences and publications these days. For libraries, UX includes both websites and in-person experiences. A shrewd library director could do well by hiring patrons to get completely snockered and then attempt to use the library’s resources. It would be a great test of the library staff’s customer service skills.

-via The Presurfer

What is Jeopardy!?

Posted: 01 May 2015 05:00 AM PDT

(Image credit: Flickr user Shawn Smith)

The long-running game show is adored by millions. But there was a time—and another time, and one more time—when questions swirled around its survival.

When he welcomed a reporter into his Southern California home, the 44-year-old Alex Trebek was on a roll. Trebek was an industry veteran. For years, he’d worked as a newscaster and sportscaster for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation while trying to kick-start his career as a TV personality. So far, nothing had stuck. But at the start of the 1984 TV season, he landed something promising—a job as the host of Jeopardy!

Unfortunately, the program had a checkered history. Ratings had soared in the 1960s and early 1970s, but the show had also been canceled—twice. Now the high-paying trivia contest was being updated for a new generation. And as Trebek had quickly learned, Jeopardy!’s biggest hurdle was convincing station managers that a smart game show deserved premium air time. It was a hard argument to make. Programmers knew that established game shows like The Price Is Right and Family Feud could reliably draw a mass audience. But a show this cerebral was a gamble. In several major markets, including New York, Jeopardy! was relegated to a 2 a.m. time slot, a ratings wasteland. Trebek and the producers were pressured to dumb down the program and make the clues easier so viewers wouldn’t feel left out. Still, he remained optimistic.

(Image credit: Flickr user Steve Jurvetson)

As he and the reporter chatted, Trebek suavely flipped on his TV. At the time, Los Angeles was an outlier, airing the show at the decent hour of 3 p.m. But instead of seeing himself trot out to greet the audience, Trebek saw Jack Klugman. The local affiliate had replaced Jeopardy! with reruns of Quincy, M.E. “The fact that Quincy was a coroner seemed appropriate,” Trebek would later write. His optimism instantly disappeared.

What a difference three decades make. Trebek no longer worries about job security. But before viewers grew accustomed to shouting answers at the screen, its host and crew had to resolve one nagging question: Was Jeopardy! too smart for its own good?

Creating Jeopardy!

In the early days of TV, game shows were a network’s secret weapons. The programs were cheap to produce, with no highly paid actors, and they attracted rabid fan bases—everyday people who could identify with the ecstasy that came from winning a new oven. According to Olaf Hoerschelmann, Ph.D., director of the school of mass communication at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, “One successful quiz show could get a 50 percent ratings share or more—half of all households watching.”

At the height of the genre’s popularity in the 1950s, Twenty-One and The $64,000 Question became national obsessions. City streets, Hoerschelmann says, were quiet when they aired. But with ratings and revenue at stake, producers became hungry for melodrama, so they manufactured suspense by feeding answers to contestants. It was all fun and games until 1956, when one contestant blew the whistle, and Congress stepped in to investigate.

Having broken the audience’s trust—and inviting a federal law that prohibited the fixing of game shows—the genre all but disappeared. This didn’t sit well with Merv Griffin, a television host, producer, and game show developer for NBC. On a flight to New York in 1963, Griffin was discussing his worry with his wife, Julann: How could he convince a network to take another chance on trivia?

“Why not just give them the answers to start with?” Julann mused.

She was joking, but Griffin’s eyes lit up. Back in his office, he outlined a template: 10 subject categories, each containing 10 answers of varying difficulty, with a dollar value assigned to each. Griffin invited friends over to his Central Park West apartment for run-throughs. Although he wasn’t the first to use the inverted answer format—1941’s CBS Television Quiz had a similar premise—Griffin was sure he could create something special. He called his show What’s the Question? and presented it to NBC executives.

The network was intrigued, but skittish. To convince the execs, Griffin reminded them that, unlike in decades past, there was little money at stake. Instead of tens of thousands of dollars in prize money, some clues were worth just $10. Before long, he got the green light.

As Griffin refined the format, the network wanted to ensure that the show was compelling enough. What the game needed, one executive suggested, was “more jeopardies.” “I didn’t hear another word he said,” Griffin later wrote. “All I could think of was the name: Goodbye What’s the Question?, hello Jeopardy!” After months of tinkering, he presented his show for final approval.

The game was streamlined into six categories. The rounds moved from Jeopardy, to Double Jeopardy, with harder questions worth more cash. In NBC’s boardroom, Griffin pasted envelopes onto poster board and filled them with index cards revealing the answers. He emceed the run-through himself.

“It’s too hard!” Mort Werner, the head of NBC, cried, throwing up his arms in frustration. He hadn’t gotten one question right. Werner’s assistant leaned over to him and said, “Buy it.”

Soon enough, Griffin had ironed out the details. Art Fleming, a game show novice, was selected to host, and for background music, Griffin composed a rather suspenseful tune. But the real proof of concept was the ratings, and Jeopardy! found itself in an unlucky spot, pitted against The Dick Van Dyke Show. Jeopardy! made its debut at 11:30 a.m. EST on March 20, 1964, and it was an almost instant hit. Within weeks, it had grabbed 40 percent of the viewers in its time slot. People were playing along on college campuses and during lunch breaks. Despite its success, NBC felt less demanding clues would reap greater rewards: They wanted 13-year-olds to be able to keep up. Griffin refused. He wanted the program to stay smart. This was a competition between adults, and he saw little sense in diluting a game meant to highlight intellect.

“Griffin’s genius in designing games was, if you’re changing channels and hit one, you don’t need anything explained to you,” says Bob Harris, a multi-time contestant and strategy expert who penned a memoir about his experiences, Prisoner of Trebekistan. “The shows that have failed spend half their time explaining what’s happening.” Griffin’s instincts were spot-on. Between 1964 and 1975, Jeopardy! taped more than 2,500 episodes. The show regularly beat reruns and soap operas.

Then, in 1975, the network abruptly pulled the plug. Despite solid ratings, NBC wanted to appeal to a younger, female demographic. The show was reinstated in 1978, then canceled again less than six months into its run. Daytime soaps had come to dominate afternoon time slots. Worse, network research indicated that viewers weren’t interested in another incarnation of Jeopardy! The show was at risk of becoming a footnote in Griffin’s career.

Jeopardy! in Jeopardy

In 1983, Griffin met with executives at King World Productions about doing a syndicated version of Jeopardy! Though the show had fizzled, Griffin’s career had not. Wheel of Fortune—a game that had grown out of his childhood passion for Hangman—had become a monster hit by the fall of 1983. Griffin had other successes too, including Click and Ruckus. But for all his hits, Griffin couldn’t let go of Jeopardy! He still believed his quiz show had legs. Luckily, King World execs agreed, and they had reason for their optimism: The board game Trivial Pursuit, which had debuted in 1981, had grown into a phenomenon, proving consumers had a healthy appetite for trivia. Additionally, they knew if they paired Jeopardy! with Wheel, it would be easier to sell networks on the programming block.

As Griffin envisioned updating his show for the 1980s, a decade blinking wildly with VCRs, video games, and MTV, Griffin dreamed up a glossier, flashier show—one with a hightech game board made up of video monitors instead of paper cards. Decades removed from the quiz scandals, he also wanted higher monetary stakes, with individual clues worth up to $2000. The original theme song would be rerecorded with synthesizers.

(Image credit: Flickr user Justin Levy)

Fleming was the revamp’s earliest casualty. King World suggested that Griffin hire the younger, more polished Trebek to helm the faster-moving game show. “He’s like a pilot for the show,” Harris says. “He knows how to keep the tone right and when to lighten it up.”

Trebek’s charms notwithstanding, King World executives parroted the same concerns as their predecessors, advising Griffin to dumb down the questions. Again, Griffin refused. But this time, he had an ally in Trebek.

“We were getting feedback saying, ‘It’s too tough,’ ” Trebek recalled later in an interview. “I told them, ‘Well, I’ll ease up on the material.’ And I didn’t ease up.”

Rather than placate the syndicate, Griffin and Trebek raised the intensity of the game. Runners-up would no longer be allowed to keep their winnings. The original show proved that players sometimes wanted just enough to make a specific purchase and would stop buzzing in once they met their goal. (One contestant needed money for an engagement ring and stood silent as soon as he earned enough.) Now, players would be tempted to wager on Final Jeopardy, ensuring the entire game would remain suspenseful.