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GamesArchive for September, 2011
The Pearly White Baths of Pamukkale
by Amanda Arnold | September 14, 2011
No, this isn’t the Arctic; it’s Turkey. That white stuff isn’t ice; it’s limestone. Those waters aren’t cold; they’re scorching hot. I know — it’s confusing here at Pamukkale, or the Cotton Castle.
Here’s how things got all weird:
Living Underground: Abandoned Atlas Missile Silo
by Josh Clark | September 13, 2011
My bookmarks toolbar menu rules. Case in point: Quigley’s Cabinet. It’s a long-running blog by a lady who has multiple sclerosis and appears to live in Florida. She is into all thing morbid, but is decidedly less gothic than Morbid Anatomy, and Quigley also frequently posts links to articles that are fascinating not for any morbid nature, but because they simply are. Which is how a post on Subterra, a converted missile silo in Kansas, ended up on her site. And that is how I found it. And that’s the end to that lengthy intro.
Online retailer Amazon.com is in negotiations with publishers to create a digital library service for customers of its Amazon Prime service, according to Stu Woo and Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg of The Wall Street Journal. The authors compared the service to the movie-rental and video-streaming service Netflix, where people would be able to access electronic books as part of the $79-per-year service that includes unlimited two-day shipping and streaming video.
I referenced “shrimp on a treadmill” in a recent episode of Stuff to Blow Your Mind, so here’s a quick refresher on what I was talking about. As reported in this excellent NPR story, when politicians such as Oklahoma Republican Sen. Tom Coburn push to cut National Science Foundation funding, they love to point out the more preposterous-sounding details in the research. In the past this has included studies on the link between STDs and penis size (which didn’t actually use tax dollars), and “shrimp on a treadmill” is just the latest favorite among the anti-science funding crowd.
The Best Star-Gazing in the World
by Kathryn Whitbourne | September 9, 2011
If you’re into star-gazing, you can’t do better than Mauna Kea. The highest mountain in Hawaii boasts of pollution-free air, cloud-free skies and a very dry atmosphere which becomes important when measuring infrared radiation from heavenly bodies. Some 11 nations have telescopes there and the combined light-gathering power is 15 times more than that of [...]
Another Day, Another Sequel: “Beetlejuice 2″ To Hit Theaters
by Chanel Lee | September 9, 2011
As Charlie Jane Anders at io9.com said, “Beetlejuice” is “one of the world’s most perfect movies,” so why would such a perfect movie — with such a perfect ending — need a sequel more than 20 years after the fact?
Japan’s Concept of Moon Includes Extra Cheese
by Josh Clark | September 9, 2011
We like to give the moon a hard time here at Stuff You Should Know, but for the most part it’s all in good fun. In fact, I’m QAing an episode on the moon that comes out next week. I was a bit concerned that perhaps we were too harsh toward the moon in it, but it turned out we weren’t and the episode is even better than I thought. As with the Asteroid Mining ep, we made the very good point that the moon stands, currently unused, as a perfectly wonderful staging and launch site for deep space exploration.
It’s official — I survived attending both PAX and Dragon*Con. I didn’t throw my health and fitness plan out the window, and I didn’t become Patient Zero for some kind of crud carried from the former to the latter. I’m also safely out of the incubation window for rhinovirus, so if I get sick now, it’s either not a cold, or it’s a cold I didn’t pick up at either convention.
Stand in line at the local sandwich shop and you’ll endure a barrage of choices on what you want between the buns. Will that be whole wheat or white? Swiss or cheddar? Pickles? Tomatoes? Mayo? As insignificant as these choices are in the grand scheme of thing, are they decreasing your effectiveness at decision making later in the day?
Better Babies Contests: Eugenics Goes to the Fair
by Cristen Conger | September 8, 2011
In the 1920s baby parades evolved into Better Babies Contests, marketed as public health initiatives. At these contests, often held in rural fairgrounds, babies would be disrobed, measured, weighed and evaluated for temperament and intelligence. Winning babies might claim titles such as “Heaviest Boy Under 1 Year of Age.” If this sounds a lot like livestock competitions at homegrown fairs that’s because it was!
Recent Postings by Category
BrainStuff
- Thank You and Best Wishes to Marshall Brain
- Contest – Design a $300 house and win $25,000
- How the Philtrum works – the place under your nose where your face comes together
The Coolest Stuff on the Planet
- Have a Coke and a Smile
- The Latest in Frugal Lodging: Camping in Somebody Else’s Backyard
- The Painted Beauties of Bucovina
Keep Asking
- Why can a 5 foot 8 inch man dunk a basketball on a 10 foot rim while some people of taller stature can’t?
- What happens to our sun once it runs out of fuel?
- How do we know the age of the universe?
Stuff Mom Never Told You
- Who invented the Christmas card?
- How the Kinsey Report Fueled Whiskey Sales
- How to Get Your Wedding Announcement into The New York Times
Stuff to Blow Your Mind
- Space Music: DJ Food and ‘The Search Engine’
- Stuff to Blow Your Mind: Hug it Out
- Space Music: Jay-Z and Beyoncé to Film Music Video in Orbit
Stuff You Should Know
- The Southern Death Cult, the Maya and Georgia
- Deformed Baby Spider Brains
- Amazing Medical Conditions: Maple Syrup Urine Disorder
The Stuff of Genius
CarStuff
- Why is NASA studying car safety?
- Tips for in-car Navigation Systems
- Tips for Using Bluetooth in the Car
How-to Stuff
- How to Swim with Dolphins (When Deep Water Terrifies You)
- How to Cure a Homemade Cookie Craving Without Turning on the Oven
- How to Know When It’s Time for a New Pet
PopStuff
- PopStuff Show Notes: Episode 36: Now Available in 3-D
- PopStuff Show Notes: Episode 35: Let’s do brunch!
- PopStuff Show Notes: Episode 34: Play it again, Sam
Stuff They Don't Want You To Know
Stuff to Change the World
- Who will own the Arctic?
- Obesity: The New Global Crisis
- Bill Gates Makes For A Pretty Decent Cartoon
Stuff You Missed in History Class
- Butch Cassidy: Should we read between the lines?
- Are we rooting for D.B. Cooper?
- Party Time: A Look at Unconventional Politics
