within the crainium

September 02, 2010

A trip through a Mandelbox

H.T. Paul B.

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Ba-a-a-a-a

A nice pic by Giancarlo Rado (from his Flickr collection). This was taken in northern Italy.

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Eyewitness news

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It must have been Miller Lite

Store Owner Uses Beer To Fend Off Robber
MARATHON, Ohio -- A Clermont County store owner used an unlikely weapon to foil an armed robbery on Monday.

The Clermont County Sheriff's Office said a man walked into Dave's Grocery on U.S. 50 in Marathon at about 9 p.m. and pulled out a gun, demanding money.

The store's owner, Narendra "Goppi" Patel, said he was preparing to close and was holding a six-pack of beer when the man came in.

Patel said he told deputies he picked up one of the beer cans and threw it at the robber, who ducked, losing his baseball hat.

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September 01, 2010

Cat parkour

:-)

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Gettin' even

Two good ol' boys in a Kentucky trailer park were sitting around talking one afternoon over a cold, after-work beer.

One of them says to the other, "If'n I was to sneak over to your trailer Saturday and make love to your wife while you was off huntin' and she got pregnant and had a baby, would that make us kin?"

The second guy crooked his head sideways for a minute, scratched his head, and squinted his eyes thinking real hard about the question. Finally he says, "Well, I don't know about makin' us kin... but it would make us even."

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Water skiing in Alaska

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¡Salud!

Heavy Drinkers Outlive Nondrinkers, Study Finds
One of the most contentious issues in the vast literature about alcohol consumption has been the consistent finding that those who don't drink actually tend to die sooner than those who do. The standard Alcoholics Anonymous explanation for this finding is that many of those who show up as abstainers in such research are actually former hard-core drunks who had already incurred health problems associated with drinking.

But a new paper in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research suggests that - for reasons that aren't entirely clear - abstaining from alcohol does actually tend to increase one's risk of dying even when you exclude former drinkers. The most shocking part? Abstainers' mortality rates are higher than those of heavy drinkers.

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August 31, 2010

These folks were filled with some kind of spirit

But I'm not sure it was the Holy Spirit.

Cops: 6 Arrested After Gunfire At Baptism Party
FORT SMITH, Ark. -- Police said a baptism party where some uninvited guests arrived turned into a brawl that resulted in gunfire. Police were dispatched to the Progressive Men's Club at 2 a.m. Saturday after a caller reported gunfire. Witness Amy Manjarrez told Fort Smith television station KHBS that her uncle was pistol whipped and that others, including her father and a disk jockey, were beaten.

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August 27, 2010

That's gotta be a rush

Tandem glider aerobatics

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Oh my

A clever ad for a book.

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What a garage should look like

Isn't that late 50s Corvette gorgeous? What a ride.

H.T. Tucson John

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How the fight started (3)

My wife and I were in bed watching Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. I turned to her and asked, 'Do you want to have sex?'

'No,' she answered.

So then I asked, 'Is that your final answer?'

She didn't even look at me this time, saying only, 'Yes.'

So I said, 'Then I'd like to phone a friend.'

And that's how the fight started.

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August 26, 2010

Two-stage water rocket

I'd never thought of multiple stage water rockets. This person (or these people, as may be) have a site here.

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Clever tree carving

Here's one of 18 images of carved tree stumps on Galveston Island (after Hurricane Ike killed the trees in 2008).

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Gives new meaning to "slam dunk"

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Robonaut

There are a lot of interesting bits to this story. Ya gotta love a robot that tweetw 'Hello, World'.

Robot Makes One Giant Leap for Twitter
Your best friend, your boss and your grandma are already on Twitter, and now the revolution is complete. A NASA crew member is now updating the universe, and it's not even human.

We're talking about a new robot slated to head to the International Space Station this fall. (It kind of looks like The Rocketeer on steroids.) Eventually, the robot could help perform tasks that are too dangerous for mankind. But right now, it's embarking into a brave new world of cyberspace.

Here's its first tweet:

"Hello World! My name is Robonaut 2 -- R2 for short."

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August 25, 2010

Contact juggling

The juggler is named Okotanpe and you can find more of his videos here.

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Make it so

Star Wars fans ask NASA to build a hyperdrive
Die-hard "Star Wars" fans have visited the imaginary worlds of Hoth and Tatooine countless times in the sci-fi films, and now they want NASA's help to do some real intergalactic exploring.

At the Star Wars Celebration V convention in Florida over the weekend, "Star Wars" filmmakers and fans asked NASA representatives to develop a hyperdrive that can transport astronauts through space at light speed. And to make it snappy.

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A matter of perspective

Check out the rider's point of view during this freestyle mountain biking run.

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Double planet

A 'Double Planet' Seen From Mercury
I never cease to be humbled and amazed when I see our Planet Earth reduced to a pinpoint when photographed from elsewhere in the solar system. So far, our planet-roaming spacecraft have taken tourist snapshots of Earth as seen from Mars, Saturn, and beyond Pluto's obit.

But this latest view from NASA's MESSENGER (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging) spacecraft is a jaw-dropper.

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August 24, 2010

What a hoot

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Assault with intent to elbow

I'd really like to hear what a judge would have said about his claim that Ms. Tyska was "intentionally swinging her elbow into his car." (And do you think he kisses his mother with that mouth? Tsk, tsk.)

Tribune photojournalist gets settlement after run-in with Oakland school police officer
OAKLAND -- The Oakland school district has agreed to pay $99,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by a photojournalist over a confrontation with its former police chief during an October 2008 protest.

Jane Tyska, who works for Bay Area News Group's Oakland Tribune, was covering an immigration march in East Oakland's Fruitvale neighborhood when she was grazed by a squad car driven by Art Michel, the school district's former police chief.

Michel accused Tyska of intentionally swinging her elbow into his car, blocking the street, and trying to incite a riot among the mostly teenage protesters. Tyska's camera was rolling during part of the heated exchange, in which the police chief called her a "lying (expletive)." Michel detained Tyska and confiscated the videotape, but it was later returned to the Tribune. The District Attorney's Office declined to file charges against the journalist. Two months later, Michel resigned.

Via

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If you take a walk, I'll tax your feet

Paul B sends this news about how Philadelphia is ripping off ts blogging citizens.

Pay Up
Got a blog that makes no money? The city wants $300, thank you very much.
For the past three years, Marilyn Bess has operated MS Philly Organic, a small, low-traffic blog that features occasional posts about green living, out of her Manayunk home. Between her blog and infrequent contributions to ehow.com, over the last few years she says she's made about $50. To Bess, her website is a hobby. To the city of Philadelphia, it's a potential moneymaker, and the city wants its cut.

In May, the city sent Bess a letter demanding that she pay $300, the price of a business privilege license.
Check out The Clog for some answers to the many questions this article has raised.

"The real kick in the pants is that I don't even have a full-time job, so for the city to tell me to pony up $300 for a business privilege license, pay wage tax, business privilege tax, net profits tax on a handful of money is outrageous," Bess says.

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August 23, 2010

More giant bubbles

These are made by a man named Sterling Johnson.

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Chiseled in graphite

The UK's Telegraph has a slideshow of 17 pencil lead carvings by Dalton Ghetti.

H.T. Carol

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Nice catch

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You know times are hard when...

Wall Street Drug Use: Employees Giving Up Cocaine for Pot and Pills
The credit crisis appears to have sobered up Wall Street in more ways than one.

A review of drug-test data compiled by drug testing firm Sterling Infosystems Inc., shows that cocaine is losing its favor among investment professionals. What drug is their choice? Marijuana.

Last year, cocaine showed up in 7% of the positive tests at Wall Street firms, down from 16% in 2007, according to Sterling, a New York-based firm that screens about 5,900 employees a year for some 270 finance shops.

Meanwhile, the prevalence of marijuana in failed tests jumped from 64% to 80% between 2007 and 2009.

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August 20, 2010

Breakfast rap

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Vintage U.S. Park posters

Here's 1 of 8 at National Geographic:

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Nice homer!

...unless you're the guy whose car window was broken. Tip o' the hat to Danilo.

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It's alchemy

How to turn a cell phone into a car.

How A 17-Year-Old Craigslist-Swapped An Old Phone For A Porsche
Starting with an old cell phone a friend gave him, 17-year-old Steven Ortiz of Glendora, CA, used Craigslist to trade up 14 times over two years and eventually end up with a Porsche Boxster. Here's how he did it.

Reminds me of the guy who traded up from a paperclip to a house, back in '05.

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