Converted KFC

(via Pleated-Jeans)

Sometimes Old School is Better

When older people talk about how certain technologies were better in the past, young people roll their eyes. In some ways, the youngsters are right. It's really nice to have a phone, camera, flashlight, and clock all in one small gadget. However, there's a reason I have two vacuum cleaners. My modern 10-year-old vacuum is easy to use and picks up dirt quite well. But I also have a 75-year-old Kirby that's very heavy and not quite as efficient. Why? Because when the lighter vacuum breaks, I'll still have the Kirby. It refuses to break. 

I have a mental image of Chill Dude Explains as a young guy, from his voice and the way he pronounces some words. But even he has discovered that fancy modern features are not always the miracles they seem to be. Newer gadgets are fancy, lightweight, and convenient, but they don't last as long as they should and are expensive to repair or replace. In this video, he looks at ten things that are old school but will still do the job when modern innovations don't, and often better.  

Blanket

(via Fark)

True Facts : Pangolins Posse

Ze Frank tells us about anteaters, tamanduas, numbats, echidnas, pangolins, and other mammals that eat insects. They are a funny-looking group that have nothing else to do with each other, which makes them the perfect subject for the True Facts series. Warning: contains a brief shot of an echidna penis. (via Laughing Squid)

Corruption Profits

Cartoon by @jesseduquette.bsky.social

[image or embed]

— Econ Analytica (@econanalytica.bsky.social) June 15, 2026 at 1:25 PM

Ya Think?

(via Bad Newspaper)

Why People Love Aldi

Weird History Food gives us the history of Aldi, and only halfway through do they switch to why people love the grocery store. They don't go deep enough into the labor force, though. Aldi saves money by only having two or three employees on duty, whereas Kroger will have 40-50 during peak hours- plus overnight workers stocking shelves. At Aldi, every worker is either stocking shelves or checking out customers, and that's all they do. The employees are paid well and treated well, and they love checking out customers, because they sit down on bar stools to do it, unlike most American grocery chains. The reason you can't get a job at Aldi is because every grocery worker in town is waiting for one of the rare job openings at Aldi. 

Retail Math

Choose your price, and stick with it. (via reddit) 

Cat Upstages Romeo and Juliet

In Turkey, stray cats are everywhere, and they are both tolerated and cared for. During a performance of Romeo and Juliet, a cat came on stage just as Juliet realizes Romeo is dead. The cat stole the show, sniffing at Romeo, curling up against him, and playing with his hair, while Juliet tries to display proper shock and grief. But the audience was already lost. They brought the cat out for a curtain call afterward, because he was the star that night. (via Neatorama) 

Conversation

(via She Who Seeks)

Elvis vs. The Beatles

The biggest musical acts of the 20th century were Elvis Presley and the Beatles. They traded fame back and forth over time. Elvis owned pop culture in the late 1950s, right up until he entered the military, and afterward focused on movies. The Beatles took over during that period in the early '60s. Was Elvis jealous of the Fab Four's overwhelming popularity? It might seem so. Elvis considered himself the king of pop music, and he chafed under the thumb of Tom Parker, who insisted on so many movies instead of concert halls and albums. The Beatles, for their part, admired Elvis and wanted to meet him. That happened in 1965, although exactly what happened is rather vague, according to the differing accounts of those who were there. Elvis made his musical comeback in 1969, just as the Beatles were falling apart. Elvis' persona at that time made his rivalry with the Beatles about America vs. Britain. Weird History has the story as far as we know it about how each act regarded the other. 

Miss Cellania's Links

The Global Peace Index. Worst it's been in quite a while. (via Nag on the Lake) 

I Work Very Hard, And I Would Like To Try Cake. By A Horse. (via Metafilter) 

Cat ladies aren’t that ‘crazy’ after all – the social science behind the stereotype. (via Damn Interesting) 

Ian's Shoelace Site has been teaching people to tie their shoes for more than two decades. His knots are wonderful. But it is vulnerable to the forces tearing the internet apart. (via kottke) 

15 Medieval Warrior Women Who Led Armies and Defended Kingdoms. (via Strange Company) 

New technology developed in Canberra could prevent 70 million tonnes of milk waste each year. (via Metafilter) 

Last year, Kate Wagner of McMansion Hell shows us the perfect example of a McModern slopcore home.
It's on the market for $6 million, and she hates it.

A serval experiences ice for the first time. He's dumbfounded. (via Nag on the Lake) 

 Among All the Great Things Benjamin Franklin Invented or Discovered, His Alter Egos Gave Him the Most Freedom. (via Strange Company) 

Guts

(via Bored Panda)

A Report Of Connected Events

A Report of Unconnected Events is a video that connects those events in a surprising way. It's more than a mashup or a supercut. Iconic moments from your favorite films are blended together, often in the same shot, under an essay about the power of storytelling. Metafilter has a list of the movies used in the comments.

Incoming

Don't fret, you won't live to feel the loss. This comic is from Tommy Siegel. (via Pleated-Jeans) 

Grand Larceny

(via Bad Newspaper)

Some Answers from a 10th Grade English Exam

Okay, this will read funny to a native English speaker, but you need to know this is from an English exam in a German school. Look carefully, and you will find sparks of genius here. Handshoes is a direct translation of handschuhe, which is German for gloves. Waterkrank probably means seasickness. Altogether it highlights the difficulty of learning a new form of grammar. They certainly know English better than I know German! Commenters pointed out they've seen worse from native English speakers. (via reddit) 

Sarah

(Thanks, WTM!)

Will Ryker is the Best

Star Trek: The Next Generation aired from 1987 to 1994. When it debuted to much hype, fans of the original Star Trek series from the 1960s were eager to see what else happened with Starfleet. As the characters were introduced, we could get their type and purpose. They had a captain who was a wise, experienced, and stern leader, a woman doctor who could be a love interest in the future, her teenage son who was a prodigy, a tough woman security officer, an android, and a blind engineer. Then there was First Officer Will Riker, who was obviously there as the everyman male viewers could relate to, and eye candy for some of us. 

But Riker proved to be so much more throughout the series. The Art of Storytelling lays out in detail how Riker was the moral center of the show from the very beginning, displaying honor, loyalty, responsibility, and a willingness to set his own ego aside for the greater good. But he was no Pollyanna, and had flaws that made him only seem more real to those who were paying attention. He confronted his self-doubt and human desires often. This video is a bit longer than I would normally share, but it's from The Art of Storytelling, so you know it's worth it. (via Laughing Squid)  

Flag Day

As I drive home, the last two blocks I pass have eight houses with huge American flags displayed. Year 'round, 24 hours a day, rain or shine. None are illuminated at night. It's obvious that the homeowners have never read, or maybe they just don't care about, the US Flag Code. In a few years, some of the flags are faded and torn. And they still fly. 

I don't fly the flag every day. I don't need to be reminded of which nation I live in. I have an American flag, although it's not huge, and I put it out for Memorial Day, Flag Day, Independence Day, and Veteran's Day. The flag code has plenty of other appropriate holidays that I never remember. I never leave the flag out at night, or if it's raining. Sometimes we get a surprise rain, and I feel awful about letting the stars and stripes get wet.  

I have several other slightly smaller flags, too, representing the nations my four children came from, plus those that a few friends and neighbors came from. Plus a Ukrainian flag. Sometimes I put them all out at once, stuck into a window box together, especially when the kids are expected to arrive. Although looking through the code now, I realize that I misunderstood section 7g. I had been displaying several nations' flags and set the American flag in the middle, since it is taller. But now I see I got that from section 7e, which has to do with state and municipal flags. I might need to buy a new American flag that is the same size as the other flags for the international display. I can still use the slightly larger flag for holidays. 

I also don't have the ability to fly the flag at half-staff, since it's affixed to a wooden staff. But since it's not out everyday, that matters little. 

Some antiwar protesters burned American flag during the Vietnam conflict, and some people got really upset about it, more so than they got upset about the images of Americans returning from the war in body bags. When it happened in 1984, Gregory Lee Johnson was arrested on state charges. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, who ruled in 1989 that flag burning was a valid form of free speech guaranteed by the First Amendment. Last year, Trump issued an executive order to make flag burning illegal, but since it is constitutionally protected, the only way to prosecute someone for it is to go around the law sideways. 

However, according to the Flag Code, burning is the only approved way of getting rid of an old, dirty, or worn out flag. It should be done in a respectful way, and your local American Legion will do that for you. I drive by there occasionally, and wonder if anyone ever turns in a flag to them instead of chucking it in the garbage. 

After 9/11, my boss bought a flag that was big enough to cover the front of our building- the biggest flag I'd ever seen outside the Smithsonian. They draped it vertically and incorrectly- with the blue field on the right. I pointed out that the blue field should be at the upper left no matter whether the flag is hung horizontally or vertically, and management groaned and said it was too much trouble to change it. I have a t-shirt with a picture of the flag on it, hung vertically, and people sometimes tell me it's wrong. No it's correct, and the words "Fort Jackson, US Army" underneath should be a clue. And there's a difference between clothing that looks as if it's made of a flag and clothing with a picture of a flag. 

All this sounds very pedantic, but it seems to me if you are going to put your patriotism on display, it's worth the small effort of doing it right. Know what you're doing and why. Otherwise, it's just patriotism cosplay.