This summer, folks on the East Coast of the US will see (and hear) an invasion of billions of cicadas in what is probably the most obvious part of the insects' 17-year life cycle. The cicadas will crawl out of the dirt, make a lot of noise, and seek out other cicadas in order to breed and create a new generation of larvae that will, 17 years from now, emerge to do the same thing all over again.
It's big news for those of us who think things like insects, evolution, and cyclical processes of nature are really, really cool.
This weekend's contest on the Vintage Ads LiveJournal is old underwear ads, and the group is filling up with some extraordinary pics. Here are some of my faves (click to go through to the original posts).
The FBI has indicted Adam Paul Savader for "sextortion," alleging that he hacked women's computers, plundered compromising photos of them, and then threatened them with public embarrassment unless they performed private sex shows for him over their webcams. Savader was Paul Ryan's sole campaign intern in the 2012 elections, and Gawker reports that he also served on the 2011 Gingrich campaign, dressing up as Ellis the Elephant, a mascot for the campaign.
Costume Craze's sold-out "Chewbacca Second Skin Star Wars Costume" is a great choice for cosplayers who don't like their wookiee suits too hairy. It's the sexy catsuit of the 21st century!
Logitech4873 spent 62 hours rendering an interlocking, Jenga-like stack of tumbling, penile, rubbery thinngums falling in slow motion: "The reason for the excessively long rendertime was the use of high quality indirect lighting, SSS materials (Sub-Surface Scattering) and the high quality of the motion blur."
This article by Monique Robinson is interesting — not because it tells you anything particularly useful about what you can do before conception to influence the sex of your child, but because it provides a rundown of the many random correlations studies have linked to fetal sex determination over the years. From eating cereal to being a billionaire's kid, it's an intriguing look at how easy it is to find patterns, even when those patterns may (or may not) be totally meaningless. — Maggie
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First: When shown images like the one above and asked to choose which men they found more attractive, women cared significantly more about body shape than penis size. (Also, it's worth noting that the image above is meant to show you an average, actual human guy in the middle and the extremes of body shape and penis size that were shown to the women on either side of him. In reality, the women were shown a full spectrum of images mixing different body types and penis sizes).
Second: The hypothesis (that human women sexually selected human males to have the larger-than-other-primates junk they are blessed with today) comes with some big questions, including the obvious — flaccid penis size does not correlate well to erect penis size.
Blush, a German lingerie company, created a campaign that either co-opts or honors (or both) Pussy Riot, sending a scantily clad lingerie model in a knit balaclava to walk through -15C weather in Moscow holding a FREE PUSSY RIOT sign in order to advertise their clothes and to advertise freepussyriot.org, which legitimately raises money for the defense of the Pussy Riot women who have been sentenced to labor camps for singing an anti-Putin, anti-corruption song in a church.
I've been linking Double X Science a lot lately. That's because they're great. It's rare to get such smart, fascinating, science-centered discussion about female anatomy and reproductive issues that goes beyond the surface dressing we all already kind of know. Case in point: This piece by Emily Willingham about the development of the human heart in utero. You've probably heard at one point or another that a fetus' heart starts beating around 6 weeks (an age which is, by the way, calculated from the date of the mother's last period, NOT from the date of actual conception; so the fetus itself is really only about 4 weeks old at this point, and its mother only missed her period two weeks ago). But what's the heart actually like at that point? Turns out, absolutely nothing like what you imagine. Very cool stuff. — Maggie
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A new piece from Ukrainian steampunk leather mask-maker Bob Basset. I like the angular forms here -- there's something a bit Roman in it, to my eye at least.
Mr Unpronounceable Adventures is a book of comics by AustralianNew Zealand surrealist artist Tim Molloy in a Lovecraftian vein. But that only scratches the surface here. Molloy is incredibly fucking weird, and not always in a funny-ha-ha way (though there's plenty of that). The story loops around and around, almost making sense, almost following a narrative, returning to themes, to iconic panels, full of menace and hectic hilarity. It's really good. It's really strange.
LELO, a Swedish sex-toy company, has produced an IKEA-style, assemble-it-yourself vibrator called GӒSM (what else?) that comes with its own Allen key.
GӒSM is the world’s first truly eco-friendly vibe, made with100% recycled materials and powered by a revolutionary new rotation charging method pioneered by LELO. Meanwhile, GӒSM arrives in an 8-piece set that you assemble yourself, allowing you to take pride in piecing together your pleasure, and the money saved on production costs goes directly to you!
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A new piece from Ukrainian steampunk leather mask-maker Bob Basset. I like the angular forms here -- there's something a bit Roman in it, to my eye at least.
