Haha, watch this delicious retro-pastiche on both Buck Rogers (how he originally appeared in the early Twentieth Century, down to authentic costume and gun) and Kerry Conran's "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow". The miniature toy robot toy in the end is also cute, see more here.
Ladies and Gentlemen, here is the (truly) WTF Cadillac car - the World Thorium Fuel concept car. It is also a car that apparently got stepped upon by a Decepticon somewhere.
Nuclear fuel in a car should make motorists really excited, too. Follow this link for more info and images - via.
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The Tormented Spaceman
... is enchanted by her green eyes. Seen at the great "Old Comics and illustration" set Photo from "Adam and Eve on Mars" by Walker Graham, published in "Sir" Magazine, November 1954
Witness more damsels in distress in space and with robots.
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New "Skating" Thing from Italy
...consists of two wheels and a single bar between them. Very simple, and yet when Francesco Sommacal came up with it, it won him a Personal Design Volvo Award.
Get more info at Zerofra site (warning: loud music)
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Not every cat is a LOL cat
Some can even help to turn the pages:
and some have friends in high places:
(original unknown)
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The Brass Lion Steampunk Trike
Wilhelm Von Steuben writes to us: "The Brass Lion burns a hole through mundane reality" - Yes, we agree, reality shrivels and crawls away when a fine gentlemen rides this noble trike through the beautiful English countryside.
It also looks pretty cool when parked for the night (with a "fossil amber" Down Low Glow light) -
Two concept artists Weta Workshop (Wellington, New Zealand) - Greg Broadmore and Christian Pearce - who worked on "King Kong", "Narnia", "Avatar" etc., reveal new art that they created on the Nintendo DS at the 99DS exhibition (opening February 1).
Yes, you heard right - on a humble Nintendo DS handheld game console (via Colors, a freeware app enabled by the R4 cartridge). Apparently "less is more" and minimalist style is in vogue again. "DS" means Dodgy Slips and Deadly Sleds. While the first one is slightly nsfw (nude women falling over - admittedly the most fun subject to draw), the latter part consists of cute little hot rods. The concept is simple - pick a subject, draw it 99 times wherever and whenever:
Click to enlarge to see the whole poster - slightly nsfw
To get a taste of what WETA designers routinely conceive at work, head over to The Battery site, which features art by Greg Broadmore and Warren Mahy:
Don't miss tongue-in-cheek violent Perilous Parkour page by Christian Pearce - warning: graphic content, although you gotta have pretty rich imagination to get bothered by something like this.
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Sofia in the stratosphere (with a telescope)
... Better than Lucy in the sky with diamonds. Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy - Sofia - a 2.5 meter diameter, 20 (metric) ton IR-telescope, designed for infrared astronomy observations in the stratosphere and housed inside a modified Boeing 747SP - is on hold for lack of funds (originally a joint project of NASA and the German Aerospace Center).
See featured images from this project here and NASA updates here.
The future of this project is in doubt: "In February 2006, following delays, and costs which increased from US$185 million to $330 million, NASA placed the project "under review" and suspended funding."
UPDATE: NASA's recent response is that the program is funded and expects to capture the first science images this summer (more info).
Seemingly impossible items: bottles filled with every object imaginable, without any clue how it was achieved - the Puzzle Museum gallery will make you scratch your head:
Even though many pieces feature engraved word "THINK" to encourage visitors to figure out the secrets for thelmelves, the master provides some clue how the bottle (see above image, far right) was made:
"Find a piece of wood from the High Chaparral (Manginita wood). Drill Deck. Put case in bottle. Put cards in case. Put rope through deck. Tie knot. Put nut, bolt, and lock parts into bottle. Hold bolt with a magnet - screw nut on with dental floss. Assemble and lock padlock. Finally sign the pack of cards"
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Jeff VanderMeer took on the challenge to read 60 monumentally important books in 60 days Will Disaster Ensue? How Long Will It Take Him to Go Insane?
Popular writer Jeff VanderMeer has decided to read 60 classic books of great thought (books that have provoked discussion, fomented revolution and changed the world) in just 60 days - and not just read them, but also review them at www.JeffVanderMeer.com.
VanderMeer found Seneca's advice on using one's time wisely and avoiding life's many distractions in our increasingly connected world. By the way, Cory Doctorow also wrote recently on the same tricky subject, read his great article "Writing in the Age of Distraction".
Among others, VanderMeer has reviewed and responded to works by Confucius, Marcus Aurelius, Frederick Nietzsche and Jonathan Swift (all part of Penguin's "Great Ideas" book series). Check out his progress so far at Series so far page, or his summary of the first 20 books here
What's our take on this project? I think that Umberto Eco in his "Name of the Rose" said it best: we all know that books speak to readers but often do not realize that books speak to each other. Well, this is one sure way to eavesdrop on their conversation - to read wildly different masterpieces from mankind's history back-to-back.
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Messing up with your mind
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Aahh! What is it??
(original unknown)
Thanks for giving me new ideas for nightmares. Expect no mercy from the toothy rocks.
The photo of "Something old, something new -" is of a building in Romania, Bucharest, Revolutiei Plaza (Revolution). It was required by the construction authority to keep the old building's facade, as it is from the national patrimony. To be honest, it doesn't look so bad in real life.
The photo captioned "Need more square footage? Hire extreme and fearless contractors:" is from Bath, England (UK). The building faces the river on the opposite side to that photographed and was a goods warehouse, its in a row of many. The wooden cabin jutting out is on the opposite side to the river and housed a winch to lift/lower goods into/from any of the other floors (you can see the trap door through which the winch operated in the picture). This is a very common architectural feature and can be seen in large grain stores, warehouses etc..As the addition only housed a winch it was cheaper to make it from wood- it is however attached to the rest of the building with the correct layout of girders. How do I know this? I live in the converted one nextdoor!
The photo captioned "Nobody can tell me what this is: (maybe an altar to the gods of construction? They need all the forgiveness they can get)" is try to illustrate old russian tale about Emelya (men) who drive the stove. The same: http://www.es911.ru/files/1(1).jpg
re "Nobody can tell me what this is:" - it looks to me like a brickwork mockup. The builder makes one or more of these to illustrate different brickwork types, and the client agrees to one of them. The bricklayers refer back to that, so that the final brickwork is what the client wants. They should demolish mockups after the building is complete, but if the building is never completed...?
I quite like the look of the something-old-something-new coagulation in Bucharest. It reminds me of the Citigroup Center in NYC, the skyscraper which had to be built balanced on four huge stilts to make room for a church on the same plot.
I wonder how many other landmarks are designed to accomodate other buildings?
from what I know, the tower in the lake is an actual church-tower in the village of Graun, south-Tyrol. The village was moved when a dam for a power-station was constructed, but they left the church-tower standing (it's now a tourist-stop to make photos, obviously). when you search for "Graun, Italy" on Google Maps and activate photos, you can find it.
the italian "water tower" is not a water tower but a church tower. it was buried by water to create a dam for generating electric power. The town is Curn Venosta, in Val Venosta, near Passo Stelvio (not really Gavia). http://wikitravel.org/it/Curon_Venosta http://www.comune.curon.bz.it
I believe the "Nobody can tell me what this is: (maybe an altar to the gods of construction? They need all the forgiveness they can get)" is actually a portable stove. Like a George Foreman, but awesome.
I seriously had an apartment that had something like the "Throne Room". The toilet was on a platform raised 6 inches from the rest of the bathroom. I always thought "I'm high on pot" whenever I sat on it.
The hybrid stairs are common in the SNCF building (SNCF (Société Nationale des Chemins de fer Français) (French National Railway Company) is a French public enterprise). I have exactly the same one in my town, in Toulouse. and, yes, it's kinda weird.
The picture of curved bridge was made when the bridge was tested under pressure of heavy loaded trucks. In real life bridge is in good condition and stands straight as any other bridge.
That first one is the ugliest building I've seen in a while. It's not even creative or unique... it's just plain ugly. It looks like a building being attacked by hairy brown caterpillars or something.
U, my dear friend, it is obvious that you are not verry much informed about certain things you posted on your site. The "something old, something new" - is an awarded piece of architecture and it is verry spectacular, but yet, thank you for the publicity, anyone might want to see that one in real life or maybe just closer.
For the "Stairway Into the Wild," it actually looks like it goes around the corner of the building on that level. It looks like the stairs end because the railing is glass and see through so it looks like it just drops off!
Are these architects out of their minds or are the people who commissioned the works? There's a great book on this subject called "Architecture of the Absurd: How Genius Disfigured a Practical Art."
They can also swim using a sort of water jet; it's most obvious in the third pic, the sargasso frogfish. They "breathe" in with their mouths and instead of pushing it out of gill slits, it's jetted out of their "elbows". First hand experience, so no source (saw it in my local fish shop)
I didn't like that much the video with the challenged person trying to clean an automatic sliding door. For some reason the Internet is full of insensitive youngsters laughing their heads off at the old, the poor, the feeble. Thumbs down this time, though most the time this blogs has buckets of fun.
The library image is from a show called "Or Shalem, Jerusalem Lights the Night" - a group named Skertzò projected images on the "Tower of David" in Jerusalem.
see more info on that photo here: http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/10/lighting_up_the_night.html
"It is said that there is one fatality per week" - Someone who actually did research (asking the local police station) found rather lower numbers, even if 3-12 per year is still a lot. http://www.nurburgring.org.uk/warning.html
I was there few years ago on that road in Transylvania. My second scariest ride ever (number one was also in Romania). I was there on biztrip and had to go across Romania from one corner to another. I decided to make it a little more enjoyable and visited Dracula's castle/ruins (Poienari). After that i stayed on that road in the mountains. On map it look like a nice ride across mountains. In reality I was scared to death.
I had some help for that feeling: heavy rain started, which started some mud avalanches (don't know the right English word for it) and flooding the road. As i got higher in the hill, cellphone lost signal, because there is no network... And as an added bonus - my fuel gauge was right at the bottom. On the way up i passed some locals riding horses and a few ghost(ish) villages. At one point there were PET bottles blocking the way, but i got through. Soon after that i understand that warning. After one sharp turn the road just ended. It was all covered in snow. Absolutely no chance to keep going, even on foot. To make it even more unpleasant, right there was an abandoned truck, partially covered in snow. Apparently some time ago he was stopped by the same snow, and could not go back, because the road was too narrow for a truck to turn over.
At that point i was really really scared. No phone, almost no fuel, raining as hell... I turned back and driving crazy fast (just to get to the point where there is phone signal) headed back down. My luck - it was all the way down, which helped saving fuel. I managed to get back down to the city and went straight to the nearest petrol station.
This probably doesn't sound very scary, but then and there it really was :)
Here are some pics from that trip: http://picasaweb.google.lv/jybook/Hungarija#
Don't fall for the Nazi Autobahn propaganda myth. In fact, the democratic Reich had already built Autobahns and put them into operation before the Nazis gained power. Their propaganda effectively made people believe that the Fuehrer's order to build Autobahns created lots of jobs and helped struggling Germany to overcome unemployment, which is not true. First, the democratic Reich had already put up significant amounts of capital for exactly that purpose, second, the number of people working to build Autobahns was negleglible small number compared to the 6 million jobless Germans.
@jealousy : If you had looked for information before going on your, i quote, "second scariest ride ever" you would have known that part of that road is closed every year by the authorities until june or sometimes even july exactly because of the heavy snowing that is normal in wintertime there. For someone who gets scared of PET bottles and forgets to check the fuel before going on a trip, i can understand how that was scary, bu-hu-hu :)
I drove the road trough the transilvanian alps too ... It's not a bad road actually, it's especially spectacular. The road has quite some holes in them but nothing really crazy. We, too, got blocked eventually by the snow - but If you're ever driving by car from Bucharest to Sibiu, somewhere after may - really, take this road, it'll be the most beautiful you ever took
When I was a kid, the road to my paternal grandparents' home in Harlan County, Kentucky passed under a rock cut similar to the one in the second image. My sister and I always made sure to duck. :-)
I've been to Tajikistan, and the highway connecting the two major cities of that country (Dushanbe and Khudjand) is almost as scaring as the first road in this series. The road from Dushanbe to Khorog (a town in eastern Tajikistan) is even more scaring. Both roads are unpaved, and they go through mountain passes over 3,300 meters high. They are really spectacular! Please check these ones for your next series!
Talking about found treasures... check out this link about weird Argentinean lack of coins crisis. Looks like a treasure chest with pesos is worth its weight in gold... http://www.slate.com/id/2205635/
"When even the most insignificant purchase requires the same order of planning and precision as a long-range missile strike, you can hardly blame people for keeping a jar of monedas safe at home."
Yes, that creature is a baby two-toed sloth. If you notice the sign on the container, it says "Freckle y Velcro" "Y" is "and" in Spanish so I imagine there are two sloths in there and that's why it appears to have an extra limb. The other one is probably hidden behind it.
Good stuff as always. Extrasolar planets are incredibly fascinating. There is one (name and location escapes me at the moment) that is a "Super Earth" with nothing but water for a surface. But the pressure is such that the water molecules are tightly packed into a solid, similar to the "ice" within the ice giants Neptune and Uranus.
Titan would have been a good Saturn satellite to add to this list; being what Prof. Carolyn Porco calls "an analog of Earth." With its lakes of hydrocarbons and hazy atmosphere, you have rains and large bodies of paint thinner to enjoy on your Titanic vacation!
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2 Comments:
Oh my, the teeth picture is just too funny...
Wow, that "flattened" car looks awesome!
Are those tyres multiple thin tyres bolted together???
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