Here's a film I'll be lining up to see.It's the story of U.S. Supreme Court Justice/hero/dissenter Ruth Bader Ginsburg and it will be told on the big screen in the upcoming documentary, RBG.

Working as a housekeeper at a hotel is a disgusting, thankless job. (more…)

Viola Desmond was the badass mother of the Canadian civil rights movement.Born in 1914 in Halifax, Nova Scotia, she grew up in the predominately pale-faced province avoiding notoriety until until she was old enough to leave home. In her home province, her skin color made it impossible for her to attend beauty school – local educators wouldn't have her. Determined to better herself, Desmond traveled to Montreal for her education as an aesthetician, before continuing on to Atlantic city and New York City to round out her skills. Returning to Nova Scotia, she opened her own beauty salon – the first by a black woman in the province. While chasing down her dream of being a business owner is impressive, it's not what brought her the most notoriety in our country.While attending a movie in the village of New Glasgow, Nova Scotia in 1946, she called bullshit on the theatre's bigoted ticketing rules. The owner of the theater demanded that whites and blacks sit in different parts of the building. Additionally, anyone with skin that wasn't as white as the driven snow was forced to pay an additional penny for the privilege of seeing a film. Desmond refused to pay more than the white moviegoers did, nor would she comply with the owner's order to leave the whites-only seating area. For her trouble, she was charged for a tax violation – it was the only way that the government of her day could punish her for daring to defy the horse shit of racial segregation. Her refusal to pay that extra penny made the news and, in time, a political movement for equality under the law.Desmond passed away in 1965 at the age of 50. In 2010, she was granted the first post-humorous pardon in Canadian history. Her refusal to pay that extra penny? Scrubbed from the books. Today, the Canadian Mint revealed the nation's new ten dollar bill. Soon, when Canadians pull a tenner out of their wallets to pay for a cup of coffee, it'll be her face smiling we see smiling back at us.Small gestures in the face of inequality can lead to great things. What we do, how we respond in the face of hate, every day, can change the world.Image by Unknown - Winnipeg Free Press, Public Domain, Link

South Korea's national security adviser today announced he told President Donald Trump that Kim Jong Un says he's committed to denuclearization, and that Trump agreed to make it happen by May, as North Korea has proposed.(more…)

When a beloved teacher at Palmerston North Boys' High School in New Zealand passed away in 2015, young men from the school -- both past and present -- performed a rousing haka in his honor. Powerful, literally gave me chills!A commenter explains:

Florida might become the third state – after Hawaii and Arizona – to be done with the hassle of changing their clocks twice a year. Yesterday the Senate overwhelmingly passed the Sunshine Protection Act in under one minute, with only two dissenters. The House had already passed it 103-11 last month. Now it has to be signed by Gov. Rick Scott.If Scott passes it, however, it still has to go through Congress before Florida has Daylight Savings Time all year long.What spurred the creation of this bill? Via Popular Mechanics:

The Oregon Trail adventure game, published in 1974, was a classroom favorite, teaching students about managing resources and making good decisions in order successfully cross 2000 miles of rugged terrain with your family in a covered wagon in 1848. You can play it at Archive.org with their online emulator.Basic Fun has just introduced a handheld version and it looks cool. If you want "The Oregon Trail Hand Held Portable Classic Computer Video Game" for $25 you have to go to a Target store. (Amazon has it but it's $44).Charlie Hall of Polygon got the portable version and was impressed:

https://youtu.be/Cp4LUMl2994Colorado has a booming economy and high employment, yet its schools and infrastructure are seriously underfunded. The reason, according to this Full Frontal segment, is that 25 years ago an amendment to the state constitution was added requiring any tax increase to be voted on by the people of Colorado. As you might guess, people hardly ever vote to raise their taxes. The segment focuses on the man who fought to get the amendment added to the constitution, Douglas Bruce. He's quite a character. He was imprisoned for tax evasion, once charged with assault, calls himself a freedom fighter ("Martin Luther King and I are both freedom fighters."), and thinks an invitation to hug is a "homosexual encounter."

Maybe you don't want to shell out a heap of cash for real bagpipes.Or maybe you just want to make a trash-bag instrument.Whatever the reason, I'm not here to judge you or what DIY projects you jury-rig in your spare time. Source your bag and recorder and head on over to this 2009 Instructables tutorial to learn how to make your own bagpipe-like device today. (Spoiler alert: It won't sound like a real set of bagpipes.)Thanks, Don!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vo8izCKHiF0Richard J. Ridel's all-wooden, mechanical Turing machine uses the smallest set of data elements capable of computing any calculation: 0, 1 and blank; it was inspired by Ridel's viewing of The Imitation Game. (more…)

On March 7, the Florida legislature passed a gun control bill in a bipartisan 67-50 vote, banning bump-stocks and imposing a 3-day waiting period on long-gun purchases and raising the minimum age for their purchase to 21; the legislation is a mixed bag as it also includes millions to arm and train school employees. (more…)

"Precision agriculture" is to farmers as Facebook is to publishers: farmers who want to compete can't afford to boycott the precision ag platforms fielded by the likes of John Deere, but once they're locked into the platforms' walled gardens, they are prisoners, and the platforms start to squeeze them for a bigger and bigger share of their profits. (more…)

A gruesome discovery on a frozen island in Siberia: 53 human hands in a bag, and another hand 18 miles away. The Siberian Times reports that it remains a “mystery over who the sinister hands belonged to, when they were chopped off – and why.” Photos here if you are curious and strong of stomach.Image: Shutterstock

The bootleg_daycare Instagram account is a fantastic stream of poor representations of famous cartoon characters emblazoned on the walls of dodgy daycare centers, ice cream trucks, and other locales. "Don't worry, your children are in good hands."bootleg_daycare (Thanks, Lux!)

What a difference 10 minutes a day makes. This man wanted to learn how to juggle, so he practiced for 10 minutes every day for 30 days. This comparison video shows us how far he progressed from Day 1 to Day 30.

Someone with mumps attended a national cheerleading competition last February, prompting Texas health officials to contact all the attendees and warn them to be on the lookout.Via Live Science:

Airbnb hosts are supposed to be smallholders: people who rent out a spare room or let out their homes while they're out of town -- but in New York (and other cities), the system is dominated by professional landlords who have illegally converted huge swathes of the city's available housing stock into unlicensed, highly profitable hotel rooms. (more…)

These animal heads are hyper-realistic, but no, they aren't taxidermy. Created by Japanese artist and modeler Kamonohashizokei, these heads of lions, cats, dogs, wolves and birds are made to be worn. But becoming an animal isn't cheap – Kamonohashizokei's wearable heads will set you back around $2,500, give or take a couple hundred bucks depending on which animal you choose. The artist also makes heads to be displayed on your wall, which cost even more. If interested, you can contact the artist at his online shop or on Instagram.

If you upload an image to this experimental Google website, it will return art with similar color combinations.

The fire in Grenfell Tower had many causes: Tory MPs protecting their rental incomes by voting down basic tenant safety; the Conservative Party's campaign against "safety culture"; but much of the blood is on the hands of Rydon, the contractor who sheathed the tower in the highly flammable cladding -- and came out on top, winning the contract to undo their work on other towers that had been similarly clad. (more…)

Watch as a gentleman hops up completely amazed to be alive! After losing control of his headshaking bike, this brave motorcyclist slid under a moving semi and shot out the other side!

Artists and scientists are less interested in socializing than other people are, according to Gregory Feist, who studies the psychology of creativity at California’s San Jose State University. In this BBC article, Feist offers two reasons why this is so:

Nick Cave is heading out on a short speaking tour titled "So What Do You Want to Know?" during which he will spend his stage time just answering questions from the audience. It reminds me of some of Hunter S. Thompson's later "lecture" gigs when the Doctor would just walk out, sit down, and say "Any questions?" Last week, Cave posted this:

In 2002, Eric D. Page was granted US patent #6681419B1 for a "Forehead support apparatus" enabling men to rest their head (the one atop the neck) while standing at a urinal. The device includes a "mounting member," which contrary to what you might think is actually a fitting for attaching it to the wall. It's also suitable for the shower. From the Abstract:

If you need a bed and you're in the Brooklyn area, I strongly suggest you buy this one. Why? Well, for one..."Ain't nothing bad ever happen on this bed." At least that's what its current owner, Brian David Gilbert, says.Two: No one, not even Gilbert's friend Laura, has smoked cigars on it.Three: Well, watch the video.photo via Craigslist ad(Likecool)

My favorite leather motorcycle jacket was starting to feel stiff and dried out. I decided to try Obenauf's Heavy Duty LP leather treatement.For years I've used Pecard motorcycle leather dressing on my favorite leather jacket. The jacket has only gotten more and more lovely. The longer I wear it the better and better the hide looks and feels. It gets a ton of compliments when I wear it, and so I maintain it. I also WEAR IT. There had been several thousand miles in summer sun since I'd last fed the leather more than sweat. The elbows were getting harder to bend. Leather gets stiff when dry. I had read a lot about Obenauf's Heavy Duty LP on INTERNET FORUMS so decided I ought to give it a try.I also had a pair of new motorcycle boots on hand. They came advertised as "greased leather" and while the finish felt fantastic, I could tell the leather needed a lot of softening. It was hard a rock and they hurt my feet. I decided I'd start with the boots and if I trusted Obenauf's THEN I'd move on the treasured motorcycle jacket. I opened the jar and was unsurprised to see it resemble the familiar Pecard. Both are beeswax based but the Obenauf's is slightly thinner and seems to have a lower melting point. Just the heat I freely generate seemed to melt the wax very easily, at room temperature. I put a little on a cloth and the brand new boots absorbed the treatment as quickly as it went on. As the boots were already 'black' they simply absorbed the colorless Obenauf's and acquired a bit more of that matte oiled look, but didn't appreciably darken. I was able to easily work out a few fresh scuffs out of the toecaps as well. They leather didn't soften up but its really going to take a lot more breaking in. This will help and should add some additional waterproofing. I decided it was safe to move on the the jacket.Compare the image above with this one from 2014 and see how the jacket has aged.Obenauf's goes on much more smoothly and easily than the Pecard at the same temp. The jacket was done in about half the time I'd usually spend. The leather instantly had almost exactly the same feel as it does about 48 hrs of having put the Pecard on. Obenauf's absorbs and dries far more quickly, and with no buffing. I'd say the jacket had absorbed and dried to wearable about 18 hours after the application. That is pretty amazing, with Pecard I tend to need to wait a week and buff the jacket some.Obenauf's also doesn't smell like a god damn tannery. The house didn't smell at all, let alone for 3-4 days.I am not sure how long it'll last. I ususally get 4-6 months out of an application of Pecard. Obenauf looks and feels every bit as nice. The leather has taken on a very satin-y sheen and looks super soft. A lot of texture and character that had faded while dry came back to life. I look forward to showing it off.We will see how long this application lasts. If it is several months, I think Obenauf is my go leather dressing.Obenauf's Leather Heavy Duty Preservative via Amazon

Six collisions involving self-driving cars have taken place in California this year. Two of those collisions were caused by humans attacking self-driving cars. This article in The Guardian also recounts a few other recent clashes between defenseless robots and robot-hating humans.

Ordinary scarecrows cower in fear at the Super Monster Wolf, an animatronic beast invented to protect rice and chestnut crops from wild boar. The Super Monster Wolf has proven its value during trails near Kisarazu City in Japan. When an animal approaches, sensors on the Monster Wolf trigger its creepy eyes and hellish howl. From BBC News:

Some poor hen in Australia squeezed out an egg-stremely large egg, one so egg-ceptional that it had another smaller egg inside of it!At Stockman's Eggs in Queensland, the farm's egg collector "Zippy" made the discovery Sunday during his normal rounds.The massive double-egg weighed in at 176 grams (6 oz.) which is roughly three times the size of a normal egg, according to ABC News.A 2015 article in Pampered Chicken Mama reports that the "fancy name" for this kind of abnormal egg is counter-peristalsis contraction:

When I was a little kid, really little, my mother used to take me to a luncheonette in Rego Park, Queens, where there was a model train running on a circular track around the counter. They would put your food on it in the kitchen and the train would chug along until it came to where you were sitting. I thought it was the coolest thing I’d ever seen next to Robot Commando. The joint was called The Hamburger Train and here's an article about it. (The photographs—yes, photographs actually exist—are courtesy of Mark Lewis, grandson of the original owner.)I am always amazed at how my distant memories can be found in some form or other on the internet. And that’s all it is: a memory. Restaurants today make more money when they can take a cut of the server’s tips. You don’t see any automats any more, either.In Japan, food delivered on conveyer belts is very common, particularly sushi. The system was invented in 1958 by Yoshiaki Shiraishi. Today there are countless pieces of sushi rolling forth on conveyer belts around the world, but The Hamburger Train beat the sushi by taking its first trip on the railroad tracks in 1954.Regardless, have you ever wondered what it’s like to be a little piece of raw fish watching the world go by? Now’s your chance.https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=420&v=8WbxbqwdWog

Isaac Bonsu, 30, faces charges of DWI and weed possession after "a police pursuit in which he ended up running over himself."

This machine solves Rubik's cube in no more than 0.38 seconds. This is much faster than the previous world record of 0.637 seconds and its creators, Ben Katz and Jared Di Carlo, think there's plenty of optimization space left.

Aviator Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly alone across the Atlantic Ocean, and almost made it around the world: her plane vanished over the Pacific Ocean in 1937. Many hypotheses cropped up over the years to explain her mysterious disappearance. Perhaps she simply ran out of fuel far from land. Perhaps she was forced down and captured by the Japanese military. Or, maybe, she was stranded on a desert island. The latter is probably the case, as a new study of bones uncovered on Nikumaroro Island in 1940 finds that they correspond to Earhart's physical dimensions and are likely her's.The study is based on the dimensions of the remains, not genetic evidence, and hinges on the fact that forensic specialists of the past were blinded to the physical reality of athletic women by the presumptions of the era. The bones were previously deemed too manly to be those of a high-society lady, and it was inconceivable to previous examiners that Earhart might be significantly more well-built than published posed photographs of the time suggest.

French designer FA makes models from scratch, like this cool imaginary skate park titled 1490 - sk8park #01. (more…)

Erika Rejka creates intertwined metal shapes into sculptures that can be manipulated by the viewer. (more…)

When Ron Risman posted a photo of the Whaleback Lighthouse in New Hampshire, a commenter accused him of ganking a photo just posted by Eric Gendron. When Risman saw Gendron's photo, he suspected he had ganked him: the two shots were seemingly identical. Close inspection of the waves and railings, however, show a slight deviation in perspective: the two men were barely yards apart when their shutters blinked in unison.I tried to make a pseudo-3D GIF (below) -- almost there! Perhaps it would work better with higher-resolution shots to align everything up more perfectly.https://www.facebook.com/ericgendronphotography/photos/a.271975762924269.59414.267395140048998/1438114989643668/?type=3&theater

Many movie stars who would never deign to lower themselves to making TV commercials in the United States have been cashing in by doing exactly that overseas for years, knowing full well that their images for their U.S. audiences won’t be sullied by their pimping for big bucks by selling everything from coffee to wieners to cars.The champion at luring American movie stars are the Japanese, who routinely pay obscene amounts of money to get a big “American” name and face in one of their companies’ commercials. Rarely do the stars attempt to speak in Japanese; mostly they speak one word in English, often loudly. What’s taking place around them is often bizarre, which could be because it’s Japan, or to draw attention away from the fact that the star’s face is usually only seen for a few seconds.I thought you’d like to see a few compilations of these I stumbled across on YouTube. There are lots more, but these should give you a few giggles to start.

Yuchen Pei is a Beijing-based toy designer, but he dabbles in other fun stuff too, like this whimsical balloonfish teapot. (more…)

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For a group gallery show titled, "The Kingdom of Specimens," longtime fave Hiné Mizushima created these delightful felt paramecia. (more…)

Surprise! The Root shares a well documented case of anti-abuse algorithms gone wrong, and then Twitter mercilessly stripping a user of their account. A decade of tweets gone without a chirp!Genie Lauren did nothing but poke back at a few well deserving Twitter trolls, and Twitter's automated systems victimized her in return. This entire story is well worth reading.

A war hero who saved American lives under fire deserves the best care our government can muster. It's the very least they deserve for bravely serving overseas. Unfortunately, not all soldiers returning from active duty have been paid this respect. Nor have the canine soldiers in their ranks.(more…)

In a country that has so much, it should be a crime to leave the less fortunate with so little. But it isn't, so here we are: As part of a United Nations study on poverty and human rights abuses in America, researchers have stated that rural Alabama is home to the worst poverty in the developed world.According to Advance Local, the U.N. Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Philip Alston, was shocked at the level of environmental "degradation," economic inequality and systematic racism in the state:

Michael Madigan has served as chairman of the Illinois Democratic Party for 20 years (prior to that, he was Speaker of the Illinois House for decades); if you donated to the party in Illinois, Mr Madigan used your money to fund mailers that smeared progressive Democratic hopefuls as being secret Tea Party members, Donald Trump supporters and opponents of universal health care. (more…)

Toronto is one of the many great world cities that has been rendered nearly unlivable by real-estate speculation, both from onshore investors and offshore ones. (more…)

'What's the right balance for a healthy mind?"(more…)

Golden West College professor and counselor Tarin Olson from Long Beach, CA was caught on video telling a couple to "go back to your home country." Not only is she a racist, but she's also ignorant, as the couple and their baby are American."I want you to tell everybody why you told us to go back to our country," Tony Kao tells Olson in the video that he posted on Facebook, which went viral with 538,000 views as of yesterday. "You need to go back to your home country," Olson replies."And what does that mean?" Tao asks."Have your wife turn your phone off and I'll talk to you," the racist college counselor says.According to Los Angeles Times:

Ajit Pai used his power as FCC Chairman to kill net neutrality.(more…)

Next Thursday (3/15) to Sunday (3/18) in San Francisco, the visionary dancers of ODC will culminate their 47th season with the premiere of Brenda Way's "News of the World" at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts! This new piece, with music by David Lang and mise-en-scène by painter Doug Argue and set designer Alexander V. Nichols, will be complemented by a reprise of "What we carry, What we keep," a real stunner that I had the chance to experience last year. (Behind-the-scenes video below.)Tickets available here for the performances. Also, Friday night (3/16) is the very special ODC Dance Around Town Gala Performance + After Party!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JzlQr_IZ90

Better than Jesus, this cute, solar-powered owl is twitching away on my dashboard.I've always wanted to have a bobblehead on my dash, and I still don't! This owl comes close tho! He twitches his center section about once every second, when in moderate to direct sunlight. As my '87 Vanagon shakes so much, and the suspension is rather whimsical, Twitchy doesn't need the sun to move around.The marketing says Twitchy is 'dancing' but he seems to just be really, really edgy.Solar Power Motion Toy - Owl, Dancing via AmazonImage via Amazon