Laurence Brown tells us about some things he's learned about America that really surprised him. None of us Yanks are surprised, because these are just everyday things to us. We know our country is strange. There's an ad from 3:24 to 4:29.
Tuesday, July 14, 2026
Mind-Boggling Facts About America
Jet Powered Pirate Ship
Robert Maddox, the Crazy Rocketman is in his 70s and feels the need for speed. He also sells rocket engines. Maddox is living his best life now as a pirate.
Maddox figured out how to repurpose an old cannon to direct a 240 pound thrust pulsejet engine to rocket power his boat. As he tested how fast he could use it to get away from shore, he almost killed the guy helping him launch in the process (twice). Max got away, though, and managed to operate the drone camera filming this nonsense, augmented with a selfie stick.
The next step was to make Captain Bob's 12-foot aluminum boat into a pirate ship, complete with flame effects and Jolly Roger flag, although not enough room for a plank to walk nor anyone to walk it. It's hard to mutiny on a solo voyage. (via Born in Space)
The World's Strangest Time Zones
The logical way to divide a spinning planet into time zones would be to draw 24 latitudinal lines on the globe, leaving equal areas for each time zone. But that doesn't work for people who live with real life geography, national borders, and human nature. Countries did not adopt standard time all at once, and politics plays a part. So we have some extra time zones that set their clocks a half-hour different from their neighbors, and some places that could use more time zones. RealLifeLore explains some of the weirder anomalies in global time. (via Digg)
Monday, July 13, 2026
Let's Be Ominous!
The best use ever for John Williams' Jaws theme. From the BBC series Walk on the Wild Side. (via Everlasting Blort)
Long Legged Larry
Long Legged Larry is a bullfrog with a talent for jumping high. Follow along with this song from Aesop Rock as Larry saves the day over and over. (via Laughing Squid)
The Trojan Horse
You know the story of the Trojan Horse, of course, because you've read Homer's Iliad, the epic poem about the Trojan War, right? No, because you haven't read it, and also because the Trojan Horse isn't in the Iliad. But you know the story of how the Greeks won the war against the city of Troy after ten years by leaving a gift of a massive wooden horse behind, which the Trojans accepted and brought into the city gates, not realizing it was full of Greek soldiers. It only makes sense the Trojans would do that, despite the horse's odd weight, without looking to see what was inside.
Is there any truth at all to the story? We once thought that the city of Troy was itself fictional, until Heinrich Schliemann found it in Turkey (and dug right through the layer that would have existed at the relevant time). But that doesn't mean there was a ten-year war. And while the tale of the Trojan Horse was layered with supernatural deeds by Greek gods, that was normal for both historical and fictional accounts in ancient Greece. Weird History looks at the story of the Trojan Horse, and reveals some theories about how it could have happened, whether it did or not.
Miss Cellania's Links
The Loop is a game of pictogram logic. The goal is to arrange 12 images in order so that each image is somehow connected to the next, even when the circle reconnects at the top. (via Metafilter)
The U.S. spent $30 billion to ditch textbooks for laptops and tablets: The result is the first generation less cognitively capable than their parents. (via Fark)
5 Historical Figures Who Didn’t Actually Exist.
Down the Tube: A History of Short YouTube Horror Films. (via Nag on the Lake)
6 surprising lessons on how to stay hydrated, according to science. (via Real Clear Science)
The new foods at the Minnesota State Fair and the Iowa State Fair.
The history of our future. Lisa L. Hannett tells her scary birth story while looking at motherhood in science fiction. (via Metafilter)
The Real Story of Will West and William West, the Leavenworth Look-Alikes.
CDC Stopped Monitoring Parasite Now Causing Explosive Diarrhea Across The Country. (via Fark)
Is Everything Okay Up There?
Trolling at its finest, from Zack Weinersmith at Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal.
Sunday, July 12, 2026
Daffy Duck and the Dinosaur
In the 1939 short Daffy Duck and the Dinosaur, a caveman does a Jack Benny impersonation as he and his dinosaur named Fido look for a delicious duck dinner. That's Daffy. This is the first Daffy Duck cartoon drected by Chuck Jones. (Thanks, WTM!)
The Experimental "Sex Raft"
In 1973, Mexican anthropologist Santiago Genovés put 11 young adults, including himself, on a raft sailing from the Canary Islands across the Atlantic for three months to Cozumel island, Mexico. He expected to document the power struggles, sexual jealousy, and violence that would inevitably overwhelm the group. Kind of like a reality TV show. But you know what they say about assumptions.
I had heard about the Acali raft experiment, but didn't know a lot about it until I watched a video today. It was interesting, but with an AI-generated narration and images, I didn't want to post it. Then I saw a video from three years ago with the exact same title, and it has most of the same narration and actual footage of the event. The newer AI video has an update about a reunion of the surviving participants, who had a wonderful time meeting up with each other 45 years later.
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