While we look forward to things calming down here on Earth, there's going to be plenty of activity in the heavens. Ars Technica put together an overview of plans that… Read the rest of the article: An insane amount of cool space things happening in 2021
There's something very appealing about human skulls carved out of crystal. We now associate them with an Indiana Jones movie and the inspiration for a celebrity vodka, but for more… Read the rest of the article: The man who faked the Aztec crystal skulls
If you want some advice on how to spend a long lonely winter inside, safe from viruses but at risk for boredom, maybe we can take some tips from the… Read the rest of the article: Lessons on enduring a lonely winter from Antarctic voyagers
Alasdair Beckett-King introduces us to "Nordic Noir," or Scandinavian crime dramas. I've never seen one of these shows, but still found it funny. Those who are familiar with the genre… Read the rest of the article: A parody of every single Scandinavian crime drama
The Incas ground peanuts into paste thousands of years ago, but who invented the modern incarnation of peanut butter? If you had to guess, you'd probably say George Washington Carver,… Read the rest of the article: A brief history of peanut butter
Who knew that a widow of a Civil War veteran was still around 155 years after the war ended? Helen Jackson never talked about her status, because of the enormous… Read the rest of the article: The last Civil War widow has died
Orchestra conductors all over the world present the music of Beethoven, but even when they are trying hard to reproduce his original work, they almost always slow down the tempo… Read the rest of the article: The mystery of Beethoven's metronome
Astronomers scanning the skies for signals at the Parkes telescope in Australia picked up an unusual radio beam last spring. They've been analyzing it since then, and have not yet… Read the rest of the article: Scientists investigate radio beam from the direction of a nearby star
If 2020 were a movie, the critics would have a field day with the plausibility factor. Screen Junkies takes movies we've seen and tells us everything that's wrong with them… Read the rest of the article: An Honest Trailer for 2020
Nick Drummond and Patrick Bakker bought an old house in the small town of Ames, New York, and set out to repair and renovate it. The house had once been… Read the rest of the article: Prohibition whisky found while renovating the "Bootlegger Bungalow"
In 1995, a group of four chess enthusiasts were devastated when their opponents took their queen in a very public New Year's Eve match at Madison Square Garden. Exactly 25… Read the rest of the article: Celebrate New Year's Eve with a friendly game of chess
Mileva Marić Einstein was a brilliant physicist who is barely remembered today, mainly because she was a woman born in 1875. The reason she is known at all is because… Read the rest of the article: The forgotten life of Einstein's first wife
It's time for Barry Petchesky's annual list of things people had to go to emergency rooms to have removed from various bodily orifices in the preceding year. That includes the… Read the rest of the article: What did we get stuck in our rectums in 2020?
Gouverneur Morris was given an awesome name at birth, and became a well-respected representative of what would become the state of Pennsylvania. He wrote the Preamble to the Constitution, and… Read the rest of the article: Founding Father Gouverneur Morris died from a self-inflicted penis injury
Science says that having an alter ego, a different persona than the one you inhabit every day, can boost confidence and reduce anxiety. I can attest to that, as I… Read the rest of the article: The 'Batman Effect': how having an alter ego empowers you
DJ Earworm put together instrumental snippets of 52 hit songs, one for each year from 1970 to 2020 (there's two for 1985). It's like a timeline of pop music, accurately… Read the rest of the article: A 50-year timeline of pop music by DJ Earworm
It's been more than four years since French filmmaker Fabrice Mathieu brought us the surreal short Darth by Darthwest, in which Cary Grant was chased down by a TIE fighter… Read the rest of the article: Cary Grant pilots the Millennium Falcon in Darth by Darthwest 2
John C. Worsley has a thing for Star Trek and Christmas. For years, he's been editing Star Trek clips to fashion 23rd-century versions of classic Christmas songs. Now he's taken… Read the rest of the article: Christmas lunacy from Jean-Luc Picard
"A planet near you" is relative, of course, as 300 million miles is still quite a journey. NASA's Perserverance rover launched in July, and is scheduled to land in the… Read the rest of the article: Perseverance: coming soon to a planet near you
You may have heard at one time or another that honeybees hibernate in the winter. Insects use many different methods to survive cold weather, but bees do not hibernate. The… Read the rest of the article: How bees stay warm in the winter
