It's hard to put a value on certain printed artifacts of our culture, the flotsam and jetsam that we encounter every day and sometimes even hate with a passion (like tickets, receipts, statements, etc).
For all we know, what's considered passe and banal today can achieve highest collectible value tomorrow. It's hard to gauge the sensibilities, or even trends, of our successors. They might disregard old books and postcards, but go squirrely nuts about old grocery receipts, or product bar codes (perhaps containing secret code plans for fledging worldwide revolution by some sinister AI...)
Japanese Electronics Catalog, 1971:
We like to flip through the pages of vintage ephemera and fancy scrapbooking, possibly measuring how much we've changed ourselves and how much our own world grew different from that of our ancestors. For this very reason, I believe, the sites and collection that preserve such seemingly little-valued printed material deserve respect - and may score big when the tide of society and culture changes.
Miniature television set, 1940 (?)
The World of Old Paper
Marty Weil from an excellent blog Ephemera explores the "world of old paper" and regularly comes up with items worth a second look. Here are a few, admitted into his "hit parade" of World's Coolest Ephemera:
1921 Multiple Choice Correspondence Card
The ladies (or "dazed" guys) who found it hard to correspond with their love interests in the midst of the intense vacation, could use this handy tool to make up their mind - if they feel "OKEH", or not. (click to enlarge)
This flyer also has another side, which, "if shown in full glory, might be too salacious for ephemera regulars."
(Submitted by Sarah Norris)
World War II hand-held fan (with the Pledge of Allegiance)
For a wartime lady, a fold-out fan to disperse the gun smoke and achieve some elegance - all the torpedoes be damned.
(Submitted by Owen Tew)
Porno Movie Waiver from 1969 (click to enlarge)
You could not enter the theater to see some weird "Infrasexum" movie, if you did not sign this form (which asks for your address, too!) -
(Submitted by T. Mike Childs)
If you read the fine print, this flyer also has the audacity to declare that by signing it you throw your full support to the adult industry, their production and distribution of such films in your community - a moral waiver, as well as a political one - all for a single pen stroke and a price of one admission.
One Good Turn Deserves Another
From the collection of Malcolm Warrington comes this culinary reversal of roles:
Mice preparing to eat a cat:
Turkeys preparing to roast a chef:
We heartily recommend Ephemera as a one-stop destination for all things printed and vintage, and will continue to feature some of the coolest stuff appearing there. Marty Weil says: "I'm on a mission to explore the world of old paper, but truly, I am are exploring the world through old paper. Meaning, I'm on a journey to both showcase interesting ephemera and the small histories suggested by these remarkable and wonderful pieces of raw, unedited history, and at the same time, bringing my own personal experiences to bear on the topic at hand".
The World's Rarest Signature
According to Luxist.com this honor goes to the autograph of William Shakespeare:
Every occasion of this signature, if found, will go for a cool $3 million.
Barf Bags (Air Sickness Bags) Collection
Steve Silberberg has been collecting barf bags for more than 25 years (see interview with him at Ephemera), and has some politically correct/incorrect items -
Hilary Clinton and George W. Bush barf bags present a hard choice for those politically indecisive in a moment of barfing weakness.
Medicine Atlas not for the faint of heart
Courtesy of National Library of Medicine comes this freaky, but strangely fascinating Medicine Atlas from Germany in the early 17th century:
Human anatomy too disturbing for you? Feast your eyes on Basilius (Basil) Besler's (1561–1629) Wunderkammern (Cabinet of Curiosities) - read more here (click to enlarge)
You can see McDonalds' hamburger in the middle of this page:
Gorgeous French Postcards from "La Belle Epoch":
Especially good find for the coming Valentine, the Tallulah website offers extensive collection of French vintage art and photos, many of "Love & Romance" variety (some might be nsfw):
Winged ladies -
Among the especially rare postcards are the so-called "satirical metamorphic" images: Portraits of famous political figures made up of nude women and romancing couples!
The pictures of the people bathing at the edge of a waterfall were taken at Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe. It is quite safe to chill out in the shallow rock pools right by the edge. Quite a breath taking experience indeed. Great collection of pictures. Thanks.
The baby magpie with its mouth open and the odd cashews photos are made into online jigsaw puzzles that you can play on the National Geographic site (pages 3 and 4): http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/yourshot/jigsaw-puzzle.html
The logical answer would be linked the earlier note about them possibly being on a trade route, they were probably used to collect rainwater so it would help travelers or some sort of message courier with water so they didn't have to run off path as much trying to find water.
the rainwater thing doesn't really fit, otherwise there wouldn't be any lids also, they would probably be more evenly spaced rather than clustered about. I addition, there used to be lots of smaller ones but the ones that were small enough to be moved have mostly been stolen. There's a fantastic story about how they were used to make sake and covered with the skins of fallen enemies, but the guides keep telling you they really don't know, although their best guess is that they were tombs, either for actual bodies or for ashes
Apparently they were used to store alcohol left for weary travellers along specific trade routes. But some of the other tales are much more entertaining.
I agree with the genius who said they're little tombs for ashes or whatever body parts would fit in them. My uneducated guess is that they were made after a battle. My Buddhist friend from Thailand said that most people are buried in tombs if they can afford it.
My father who is from Laos used to tell stories of ancient armies who would use these jars as containers for grain, however without further evidence one can't really know.
About the STS-75 "Tether Incident" video, what we're seeing are objects close to the camera, which is obvious for a couple of reasons:
Their fuzzy outline, when supposedly moving behind the tether is more in keeping with small particles near the camera going out of focus.
If some of the "ufos" were a mile in size, they would have been visible from the ground. Hundreds of amateur astronomers were watching it, and none of them saw any "ufos" flying around the tether.
There is having an open mind and leaving your mind so open that your brain falls out.
I do not know anything about this dog on the gun, but there seems to be a tradition: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=503870&in_page_id=1811
I do not doubt that the objects in the "Tether Incident" are indeed smaller debris closer to the camera, but why do they appear to go behind the tether? Is the tether image burned into the camera chip (like tube style cameras of old)? You would think that NASA would have better cameras than that.
If you check out the full videos of the tether incident, you can see that the tether breaks and coils up - but in the footage allegedly showing the ufos, the tether is poker straight, and there is no perception of distance or scale. The suggestion is that this is very zoomed in footage of something else. It also appears that the ufo footage is tacked on to the end of the NASA footage, it doesn't look very official
Well, in the documentary "ufo's, the greatest story ever denied" on Google Video, you can hear that they were filming with an infrared camera instead of a normal camera, that may be an explanation why we can't see them with our eyes, I find it a very interesting video, and imo it's not your regular debris... why would debris become translucent and then solid, have a spoken shape which changes sometimes! and they all look the same, It's like you drop food in an aquarium, and all the fish come to see what's new (that's how the former nasa guys says it in the documentary :)
The tether stretched out and is way further than in the beginning, why it is so wide, i don't know :)
After studying the footage more I must admit I'm even more confused. When the tether snapped, it bunched up at one end. There's no evidence of that in the "UFO" footage. All of the UFOs seem to be traveling on linear paths which would be consistant with debris in space, but it's coming from all directions. Weird.
Sinbad was the mascot of the US Coast Guard Cutter Campbell. As for the insignia on the gun, it is not political confusion but a indicator of the number of engagements by the cutter.
Mor information is availabe here: http://www.uscg.mil/history/faqs/Sinbad.html
The debris "translucent and then solid" because it's coming in and out of focus. Try it yourself if you don't believe it - stick a small spot on the window and take pictures of the world beyond. If you focus on the spot it'll be sharp and solid, if you focus in front or behind it'll appear translucent.
The tether clearly coiled up as it relaxed - so what we're seeing isn't twelve miles long but a much shorter coil which appears straight because the turns of the coil are closer together than can reasonably be resolved at that distance.
Does anyone know about some analysis of the tether video? I googled the incident but all I found was a lot of people blindly screaming at UFOs without any kind of analysis.
Look again, and look closely, i don't mean translucent when zooming in or out, they are actually changing from transparent to semitransparent and solid, like you see in some under water creatures too, there's this "glow" going through them. Not all of them show this behavior but some do, and you can also see this happening as in some "dots" (the smaller ones) just appear out of nowhere and disappear into nowhere, inside the camera-angle...
I know things become sort-of transparent of blur if you zoom in next to a near-by object. Just look closely again, and you'll see what I mean with translucency
Yes, the debris is probably floating in and out of shadows, causing the appearing disappearing act, and as for going 'behind' the tether, it's simply the sensitivity of the camera being very high. The tether is really bright, but the sensitivity isn't really uniform, and the over-saturation of the tether blots out the less bright debris. The same noise was made over the black crosses on the camera lens on the moon, they disappeared over white astronaut suits because of the over-saturation, and people claimed they were on the set background.
I think the pulsating, blinking effect in the video is just those pieces of debris rotating in the sunlight. They reflect different amounts of sunlight as they rotate.
OldSailor from www.marinebuzz.com: If possible delegate your job. Train persons under you or your team mates also. Many times we try to do all jobs ourselves as we feel the other person may not do it correctly. By training your team mates and by instilling confidence in them jobs can be completed successfully in time.
1) Don't do much 2) Take cigarette breaks 3) Do small things not big ones 4) Spend more time at the water cooler 5) Solve problems instead of finding them 6) Sleep in
@oldsailor: great point about delegation. Some people finds it hard to delegate because they feel that no one else can do it as well as they do - which is probably right.
But if you don't give others a chance to try, then they'll never have a chance to improve and you'll continue to be stressed out with too much to do.
That picture which is labled incomprehensible,it is in czech lang. and I suppose it could be from MFF UK,where I study.It is by the way mathematic.(Most probably math. analysis)
The uncomprehensible picture is almost surely from the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics in Prague. Apart from this I heared there is also one professor who writes on the blackboard with chalk in his right hand and straight after he cleans it with a sponge in his left hand. The students really have to write fast...
I'm sure that in ten or fifteen years we'll get to see the array of PDA, laptop, blackberry and cellphone pistols currently deployed against the supervillains of the world.
(Once they've been replaced by nano-gadgets, of course)
Looking at the instruction manual for the "gun inside the suspenders", it seems that it was meant to be fastened to the underside of the forearm, and worn underneath a suit or similar. From this position, it would be fired by tilting the hand back, presumably with the aid of a wire connecting the trigger to the button it is shown with.
Any chance of getting a wider shot of the "saddle clasp pistol" in use? I can't figure out where it is mounted or how it operates. It looks in the second photo like it's mounted in back of the cantle, which makes no sense to me unless you want to shoot your "podner."
Coho blackberry,pda,and cell phone stun guns already exsist. I am shore someone has already made one of the above into a gun, the flashlight shot guns are pretty cool too. http://wwwShopStunGuns.com
"QUANTUM SHOT" #366
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That picture called Vegas with the Golden nugget hotel isn't Vegas it's Reno, Reno has the golden nugget.
Note the "godless" version of the Pledge of Allegance - the addition of "under God" came in the 1950s.
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