Environmental policy in a nutshell

A recent Daily Cartoon at The New Yorker.

Reposted from 2017 to add this headline:

and this one:

This nail gun uses wooden nails

YouTube link.

More videos about the company's products.

Brahmin moth

Adult and caterpillar.  Photo credit to Igor Siwanowicz (gallery at the Telegraph).  Reposted from 2010.

Graduation mortarboard

Via.

More about the young woman's life here.

Expectation vs. reality: Dolly Parton tribute cake

I had to laugh at one comment: "Looks like Dolly Parton on meth." (The cake is probably an intentionally bad parody rather than a true "cake wreck").

Land use in the United States

This is a schematic diagram, not a "map" - obviously.  But it's also a visually dramatic presentation of some information that is not intuitive.

The actual mapping is available in the first image at the Bloomberg source, where there are other derived graphic images.  Very interesting, with much to ponder.

Median age in the United States, mapped by county

No surprises, really, and lots to think about in this map (click for bigger, but not interactive).

Via the DataIsBeautiful subreddit, where there is a discussion thread.

The world's largest cities in 2100

None of them in the Americas or Europe.  And note none in China.  The numbers are estimates and obviously based on lots of assumptions, but the trend in terms of localization is probably correct.

Details in this 2-minute video.

"Security theater" award winner

YouTube link.

No-touch pat-down done to perfection.  "Security theater" explained, for those unfamiliar with the TSA.  Video via BoingBoing.

Dating a coworker

Via

Big Fukang meteorite

Slab shown above (via).  The original weighed 1,000 kg.

The Fukang pallasite contains large, gem quality olivine, or peridot, in a nickel-iron matrix. The olivines vary in shape from rounded to angular, many are fractured and they range in size from less than five millimetres to several centimetres. The main mass contains several regions of massive olivine clusters up to eleven centimetres (4.3 inches) in diameter with thin metal veins.

Here's more (via):

Very impressive.  I didn't know they could be so beautiful - thought they were just stone or metal.  More on pallasites. You learn something every day.

"Nothing" was a Shakespearean euphemism for female genitalia

Explained at The Telegraph:

The familiarity of the phrase 'much ado about nothing’ belies its complexity. In Shakespeare’s day 'nothing’ was pronounced the same as 'noting’, and the play contains numerous punning references to 'noting’, both in the sense of observation and in the sense of 'notes’ or messages. A third meaning of 'noting’ – musical notation – is also played upon (eg in Balthazar’s speech 'Note this before my notes/There’s not a note of mine that’s worth the noting.’) However it is a fourth use of the homonym – this time as 'nothing’ – that is the most controversial element of the title. 'Nothing’ was Elizabethan slang for the vagina (a vacancy, 'no-thing’ or 'O thing’). Virginity – a state of potentiality rather than actuality – is also much discussed in the play, and it is these twin absences – the vagina and virginity – that lead, in plot terms, to the 'much ado’ of the title. 

This was not something that came up in my high school or college course discussions.  More info at the TodayILearned subreddit, where the example of an "innuendo-laden" dialogue between Hamlet and Ophelia is cited -

Hamlet: Lady, shall I lie in your lap?

Ophelia: No, my lord.

Hamlet: I mean, my head upon your lap?

Ophelia: Ay, my lord.

Hamlet: Do you think I meant country matters?

Ophelia: I think nothing, my lord.

Hamlet: That's a fair thought to lie between maids' legs.

Ophelia: What is, my lord?

Hamlet: Nothing.

- where the word "country" also offers a obvious salacious innuendo.

More discussion at the link, with other Shakespearean citations.  Perhaps I should rewrite the title of my 2010 post Proving that "pussy" jokes are nothing new.

Free sound effects

The BBC has made their 16,000 sound-effect archive available to the public for free for personal or educational purposes. 

A tip of the hat to the elves at No Such Thing As A Fish for the info.

Dirtball

YouTube link

Rear dashcam documents a driver intentionally swerving into puddles to splash pedestrians.

Via the Videos subreddit, where the discussion thread includes some readers' experiences.

Addendum:  A tip of the blogging cap to reader David Laidlaw, who found that the van driver was fired.

Selections from "Bad Newspaper"

Thousands more here.