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A seedbank-testing experiment that started in 1879 has decades to run. It's a simple experiment, but the simple things are hard: neither losing the seeds nor digging them up too early. From the point of view of the *seeds* the simple thing -- don't germinate until you can grow -- is also getting pretty hard. [more inside]
posted by clew at 2:29 PM - 1 comment

When the Pentagon spokesman gets asked about Polish strippers and geopolitics: "Bravo Zulu to Pentagon spokesman John Kirby, a retired admiral, who calmly and professionally responded to the most bizarre question posed to a defense official in recent memory." [more inside]
posted by gemmy at 2:29 PM - 2 comments

or maybe "not a real dog, but more like a vessel for a traumatized Victorian child that now haunts our home", needed a very specific type of adopter. His desperate foster mother took to the internet with an adoption post that went viral on Twitter and, soon, everywhere. But could anyone provide a home for such a demonic creature? [more inside]
posted by Hypatia at 11:25 AM - 13 comments

Voices From The Dawn I was looking at places to visit this summer and came across this fantastic collection of Ireland's prehistoric monuments.
posted by twistedonion at 9:00 AM - 5 comments

A few short fantasy stories about serving other people during times of death and peril. A daycare worker at the end of the world, and a restaurant server at a different end. A mountain guide who always finds what is lost. And the funniest one: a necromancer who doesn't realize they're a necromancer, and thinks they're just a really good paramedic.
posted by brainwane at 7:46 AM - 14 comments

Diamond Geezer helpfully summarises the London Fire Brigade's animal rescues.
posted by Stark at 6:46 AM - 8 comments

Vladislav Ivanov, a 27-year-old man from Vladivostok, was working as a Russian translator for the Chinese reality/talent show Produce Camp, in which a cast of young contestants are selected to form a boy band, when the directors invited him to sign up. He regretted doing so pretty much immediately, and attempted to sabotage his chances at winning by performing half-heartedly and pleading with the audience to vote him out, but to no avail, as he became a firm fan favourite, his miserable demeanour appealing to a generation of young people sympathetic to the ironic, defeatist Sang culture. [more inside]
posted by acb at 5:01 AM - 37 comments

To understand how risky it may be to board a flight now, start with how air circulates in a plane...
posted by Toddles at 7:26 PM - 91 comments

“Once I was in quarantine, I was just stuck in my own head with my own thoughts and I had to face it.” [more inside]
posted by catcafe at 5:08 PM - 4 comments

Neil Cicierega - Shitty Shitty Bang Bang (SLYT) (the many, many previouslies)
posted by metabaroque at 4:27 PM - 15 comments

The flush toilet may be the world’s gold standard for sanitation, but the sewer infrastructure it demands is inefficient, costly and outdated. [more inside]
posted by aniola at 3:25 PM - 80 comments

“I felt hurt. And I felt alone – as a woman and as a European. Because it is not about seating arrangements or protocol,” Von der Leyen said. “This goes to the core of who we are. This is what our union stands for. And this shows how far we still have to go before women are treated as equals, always and everywhere.” ‘Sofagate’ snub would not have happened to a man [Grauniad] [more inside]
posted by chavenet at 3:09 PM - 27 comments

“I mean, I didn’t try to deceive anyone over Samantha the Teenage Witch. I swear.” Felony embezzlement charges for 20-year-old overdue VHS tape rental. And you thought libraries were harsh.
posted by JanetLand at 1:08 PM - 45 comments

Investigators, family, and friends are still trying to close the case of Paul Fugate, a naturalist at Arizona’s Chiricahua National Monument who vanished without a trace in 1980. In the garage sat a Ford pickup, the tires flat, which Dody and her husband, Paul, had driven home from the dealership in 1971. No pictures of Paul were anywhere that I could see, but his presence was all around. There was the old nameplate from his desk: “Paul B. Fugate, Park Ranger.” And pinned to the wall was a bumper sticker, white letters on a forest green background. “Where is Paul Fugate,” it read. The absence of a question mark suggested less an inquiry than a demand. [more inside]
posted by jquinby at 11:40 AM - 10 comments

Somewhere in Japan, in a dimly-lit, sparsely-furnished efficiency apartment, an egg lies sleeping under a slice of bacon. You watch through the eye of a camera wandering aimlessly around the room. It takes in in the old-fashioned portable TV, balanced atop a cardboard box, showing a popularity ranking show being watched by nobody. And the empty bed, empty kitchenette, and empty sofa. And the boombox on the floor playing a mixtape of the sort of 'luuded-out lofi being streamed by hundreds of channels on Youtube. This is the Gudetama LiveCam & Chill Out BGM Radio stream and Sanrio wants you to suggest (in Japanese) what to furnish the apartment with next. [more inside]
posted by ardgedee at 11:32 AM - 3 comments

Here is the gorgeous video to his song Again. After 89 song posts, longtime mefi music contributor Seth Thomas aka Corduroy has a legit record out, and posted to mefi projects this video, which is a collaboration with Jon David Russell featuring impeccably rendered puppets and miniatures. [more inside]
posted by umbú at 11:18 AM - 12 comments

Maslow borrowed and misrepresented Siksika (Blackfeet Nation) teachings without providing due credit for their influence on his developmental model.
posted by COD at 10:17 AM - 18 comments

Delightful vine robots are happy to explore tight, pointy, unstable, and otherwise challenging spaces, and you can build your own simple version! [more inside]
posted by cnidaria at 9:25 AM - 10 comments

It’s Spring 2021, and here’s another roundup of weird audio dramas! They may help you spend time while self-isolating, waiting for vaccination, or doing chores to take you away from the endless online meetings. Notably, we can all take a moment to admire the completion of The Magnus Archives, the 200-episode horror extravaganza. Or, if you prefer, Alasdair Beckett-King’s not entirely unfair take down of the genre. As usual, I am focusing on paranormal ongoing stories as opposed to Science Fiction or Fantasy dramas or series of short stories, with or without framing elements. [more inside]
posted by GenjiandProust at 8:25 AM - 10 comments

[Aesthetics Wiki] is a comprehensive encyclopedia of online and offline aesthetics! We are an online community dedicated to the identification, observation, and documentation of visual schema. … Enjoy your stay!
posted by zamboni at 7:48 AM - 18 comments

At the time, O’Neill writes, it was ‘impossible to imagine’ just how unrealisable the idea of a dissident, fan-owned club sounded. Brady, a bricklayer and editor of the socialist United fanzine A Fine Lung, had no illusions about the graft required, writing that ‘the work ahead was going to break up marriages… Form a football club? Form a fucking football club? How? By going to the magic wand shop and wishing one?’

Even if you can't stand Manchester United, you have to love FC United of Manchester, as Marcus Barnett explains for The Tribune.
posted by MartinWisse at 6:29 AM - 9 comments

How do you better communicate with your Yaya? It's easy - you build a Yayagram.
posted by secretdark at 12:43 AM - 18 comments

San Francisco journalist Paul W. Lovinger takes a hard look at the general failure of American presidents, since World War II, to get Congressional approval for military adventures including but not limited to Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Lebanon, Grenada, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Colombia, Haiti, Iraq, Somalia, Sudan and Syria. "While not king, [the President] has become a ruler with more war power than George III had." The power to declare war, Constitutionally vested solely in Congress, has effectively lost all meaning. "Do we elect a chief executive—or a chief executioner? No president is likely to maliciously shoot someone to death point-blank. That’s murder. But no president seems to mind ordering many people shot or bombed in a distant land. That’s war."
posted by beagle at 3:14 PM - 53 comments

New Aviation Spokesperson. LeVar Burton's new gig, almost. [YT 0:48] [more inside]
posted by Glinn at 3:07 PM - 13 comments

“Fending” is our household’s word for picking around the kitchen, seeing what’s there, and making a meal of it… I might have leftover chicken fried rice, some lox and cream cheese on Triscuits, and the end of a jar of pickles. He might use up the chicken salad, Tuesday’s chili, and the last of the roasted cauliflower, which, by the way, is still good.
Writing in The New Yorker, cartoonist Roz Chast describes how she asked around on Instagram about what other people call this practice and collected a moderately long list of vernacular.
Since people might not want to burn their clicks on this tiny li’l article, a list of many of the entries is inside. [more inside]
posted by Going To Maine at 2:31 PM - 124 comments

The Girl in the Kent State Photo — In 1970, an image of a dead protester immediately became iconic. But what happened to the 14-year-old kneeling next to him? (alternate links: 1, 2, 3) [more inside]
posted by tonycpsu at 10:11 AM - 33 comments

Duran Duran keyboardist Nick Rhodes and artist/singer/violinist Wendy Bevin are releasing their Lockdown Project across the next year. [Variety] Astronomia [YT overview video with artists, ~9m] is a 52-song, 4-volume project being released as 4 albums. Astronomia I: The Fall Of Saturn [YT audio playlist] came out on March 20, 2021. It can be heard (or purchased) on these online services. [more inside]
posted by hippybear at 5:47 AM - 11 comments

Meet Aerospace Engineer Judith Love Cohen | Judith was, at various times in her fascinating life, an engineer who worked on the Pioneer, Apollo, and Hubble missions, an author & publisher of books about women in STEM and environmentalism in the 90s, a ballet dancer with the New York Metropolitan Opera Ballet Company, an advocate for better treatment of women in the workplace, and actor Jack Black’s mother. [more inside]
posted by I_Love_Bananas at 4:42 AM - 15 comments

After being called out for having problematic names for many years, and a change.org petition, Gearslutz -- named "to poke fun at some people’s pro audio shopping habits" -- changed its name to Gearspace at the beginning of April. Followed 3 weeks later by modular synth forum Muffwiggler -- named by its late founder as a combination of the names of two Electro-Harmonix guitar pedals, the "Big Muff Pi" and "The Wiggler" -- changing its name to Modwiggler.
posted by Catblack at 10:27 PM - 42 comments

The meme appeared a year ago, when Josh sent a Facebook group message to Josh, Josh, Josh, Josh.... and a lot more Joshes. Josh provided coordinates and a date. The purpose? To combat to see who gets to be Josh, with all losers having to change their name. The coordinates? Some place in Nebraska. The date? April 24, 2021. And now, after a year of anticipation, it's finally happened: The Josh Fight. [more inside]
posted by meese at 4:35 PM - 109 comments

How to calculate fractions. Tanya Zakowich runs TikTok channel pinkpencilmath offering quick math tips!
posted by storybored at 4:32 PM - 35 comments

The gentlemen Foxe and Boxe welcome you to their new home. [more inside]
posted by blnkfrnk at 3:41 PM - 9 comments

Man drives to pick up food and eats it SLYT [more inside]
posted by mumimor at 1:39 PM - 29 comments

As work subsumes leisure time, worldwide anxieties mount, and a pandemic reshapes comfort and togetherness, meditation has been touted as a panacea. There has been little mention of potential negative side effects, but a report in Harpers investigates the possible psychological risks. [more inside]
posted by blue shadows at 1:17 PM - 50 comments

Billionaire Took Psychedelics, Got Bitcoin and Is Now Into SPACs [Bloomberg, archive version] [more inside]
posted by chavenet at 1:07 PM - 14 comments

Tomer Hanuka asked his 3rd year illustration students at the School Of Visual Arts to come up with a post-pandemic New Yorker magazine cover. Here is what they sent in [Twitter thread with images]
posted by bitteschoen at 12:36 PM - 31 comments

Rina Sawayama: Tiny Desk (Home) Concert
posted by ellieBOA at 11:50 AM - 6 comments

”When she premiered, the tradional bottle of champagne bounced right off the side instead of smashing. A bad omen, but... Nothing could go wrong on Friday the 13th of January 2012, on the 100th year anniversary of The Titanic, on a ship that is also only safety rated for two-compartment flooding. Especially when you have a five-star, max-level-rated captain like Francesco Schettino, a man who mysteriously rose from Head of Security to the position of Captain in just a couple of years... He knows exactly what to do in an emergency.”

The Cost of Concordia (SLYT)
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 11:27 AM - 10 comments

Jersey Girl Homemade Guitars have been making hand-crafted guitars for thirty years and are based in Hokkaido in Japan. A collaboration between the luthier Kaz Goto, his wife Eiko and Akiko Oda, each guitar is unique, with elaborate and beautiful wood inlays, and comes with a matching strap and (often) a matching pedal, each designed along with the guitar. Here is an interview with Kaz Goto. Here is a direct link to a gallery of JGHG's archive of guitars. [more inside]
posted by Grangousier at 9:03 AM - 7 comments

This listing has my emotions in a shamble. Long private drive leads to this unparalleled modern riverfront glass barn designed & engineered on skyscraper principles. Newly renovated top to bottom in 2018 with no detail overlooked
posted by bluesky43 at 8:54 AM - 82 comments

Sorting Hat Chats, a character taxonomy by writers Emily and Kat: podcast, blog, Tumblr, and the guided tour of the system via quiz.
Primary Houses are about moralities and motivations... it's important to understand all characters have the capacity to feel compelled by any and all of these motivations: their gut, logic, their community, the protection of their loved ones; the distinction rests on which of these sources of morality is prioritized.... Mal of Firefly is a Hufflepuff Primary, while Simon is a Slytherin Primary deeply (and, initially, solely) loyal to his baby sister, River. While the two men begin the show at odds, when Mal fully adopts River into his Hufflepuff loyalties and Simon becomes loyal to more members of Mal’s crew, he and Simon suddenly have very parallel priorities. [more inside]
posted by spamandkimchi at 8:37 AM - 10 comments

For the past 20 years, UK Post Office employees have been dealing with a software called Horizon, which had a fatal flaw: bugs that made it look like employees stole tens of thousands of British pounds. This led to some local postmasters being convicted of crimes, even being sent to prison, because the Post Office doggedly insisted the software could be trusted. After fighting for decades, 39 people are having their convictions overturned. More than 2,400 claims for damages have been filed so far. [more inside]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:34 AM - 29 comments

Apple’s Ransomware Mess Is the Future of Online Extortion — This week, hackers stole confidential schematics from a third-party supplier and demanded $50 million not to release them. WIRED, 4/23/2021 [alternate Ars Technica link]: After years of refining their mass data encryption techniques to lock victims out of their own systems, criminal gangs are increasingly focusing on data theft and extortion as the centerpiece of their attacks — and making eye-popping demands in the process. “Our team is negotiating the sale of large quantities of confidential drawings and gigabytes of personal data with several major brands,” REvil [WP] wrote in its post of the stolen data. “We recommend that Apple buy back the available data by May 1.” Related: DOJ Forms Ransomware Task Force as REvil Demands $50M, SDX Central, 4/22/2021.
posted by cenoxo at 8:33 AM - 14 comments

Short, optimistic scifi/fantasy fiction stories: "It’s not a bad boarding house, as these things go." "If your suit watch is correct, you should have ran out of air… three weeks ago?" "The first time the humans told us they sang their way through subspace, we thought it a translation error." "A human. On Captain Diii’s ship." "'May you have a life of safety and peace', said the witch, cursing the bloodthirsty warrior." "What is the harm in one more lie?" All self-published by the authors on Tumblr.
posted by brainwane at 8:17 AM - 15 comments

Back in 2017, Johnny Wallflower posted a story about the radioactive puppies of Chernobyl. Now, there's an update of sorts. "The descendants of pets abandoned by those fleeing the Chernobyl disaster are now striking up a curious relationship with humans charged with guarding the contaminated area." By Chris Baraniuk writing for BBC Future.
posted by bryon at 4:17 AM - 8 comments

Philip Roth and the sympathetic biographer: This is how misogyny gets cemented in our culture This is how a misogynistic culture is conceptualized, created, cultivated and codified. It doesn’t happen because one dude does a bad thing. It happens when like-minded dudes are allowed to be one another’s gatekeepers, and the gatekeepers of broader culture, when faults are allowed to go unexamined, and so they instead spread: Harvey Weinstein dictated the content of movie theaters for decades; it turns out he was abusing women all along. Roger Ailes, Charlie Rose and Matt Lauer shaped coverage and discussion of sexual misconduct scandals throughout the 1990s and 2000s; they were later accused of sexual misconduct themselves.
posted by Toddles at 8:22 PM - 58 comments

From the NYTimes: Scientists "say that excessive hygiene practices, inappropriate antibiotic use and lifestyle changes such as distancing may weaken those communities going forward in ways that promote sickness and imperil our immune systems. By sterilizing our bodies and spaces, they argue, we may be doing more harm than good."
posted by coffeecat at 1:52 PM - 96 comments

High-speed bike tour of the Paris catacombs, via a helmet-mounted go-pro. Featuring: a lot of graffiti. Not for the claustrophobic.
posted by FirstMateKate at 1:19 PM - 16 comments

Researchers at Purdue University have developed a new ultra-white paint that reflects 98.1 percent of sunlight and can keep surfaces up to 19 degrees Fahrenheit cooler than their ambient surroundings. This new paint, which may become available for purchase in the next year or two, could someday help combat global warming and reduce our reliance on air conditioners. [more inside]
posted by gusottertrout at 12:56 PM - 48 comments

The Truth about Lying. "Police thought that 17-year-old Marty Tankleff seemed too calm after finding his mother stabbed to death and his father mortally bludgeoned in the family’s sprawling Long Island home. Authorities didn’t believe his claims of innocence, and he spent 17 years in prison for the murders. Yet in another case, detectives thought that 16-year-old Jeffrey Deskovic seemed too distraught and too eager to help detectives after his high school classmate was found strangled. He, too, was judged to be lying and served nearly 16 years for the crime. One man was not upset enough. The other was too upset. How can such opposite feelings both be telltale clues of hidden guilt?" [more inside]
posted by storybored at 11:00 AM - 39 comments