You could break your neck doing something like that!
Archive for August, 2011
August 30, 2011
Warning: Don’t Dive in Toilet
August 30, 2011
Grave Digger Fired For Dancing On Grave
A grave digger could face criminal charges after being fired when video surfaced that showed him dancing on a grave.
Christopher Redd was fired from his job as a grave digger in Mesa County after playing a shovel like a guitar while dancing on an empty burial vault.
What’s that? Oh, yes, there is video!
August 29, 2011
T-Shirt Contest Winners!
We’ve gone through all the entries from our New Word T-Shirt Contest – wherein you had to suggest new or newish words that should be added to the dictionary.
First, our three winners by random draw:
Candice: “fantabulous — adj., combination of “fantastic” and “fabulous”, used to express additional emphasis beyond each of the individual words. ” [BRI: nice]
Patrick: “spoot, whomp, and travashamockery” [BRI: "whomp" is already in the dictionary! we don't know what the other words are supposed to mean—but you won anyway!]
Angie: “We have a new word in our house: Filarious. Funny+Hilarious. When something strikes you as funny, but the more you think about it, it is actually REALLY funny! That was so FILARIOUS!!!!” [BRI: again - nice work!]
And now our two new-word-entry winners, as chosen by the crack staff at the BRI:
Ellen, for foshizzle, meaning “certainly.” We approve, Ellen – foshizzle!
Joi A. Cardinal, for adorkable, which she describes simply as “my husband.” Mrs. Uncle John would understand!
Congratulations winners. You’ve won a lovely UJBR T-Shirt, as pictured above. Enjoy!
Thanks for for playing, everyone else, and good luck next time!
(Winners will be notified!)
August 27, 2011
Irene and the New Moon [many updates]
5:32 EST: Irene has dropped in intensity but is still classified as Cat 1. As of now sustained winds are at 80 mph. Five deaths reported so far.
Update (more below): Live New York City “Hurricane Cam.”
Watch live streaming video from breakinglivenow at livestream.com
One worrying aspect of the storm is the storm surge, which seems to be lining up to come in at an already really high tide.
Here’s a report for Virginia, which should be starting to feel the storm now:
Although Irene was downgraded to a Category 1 hurricane, there’s another natural event that’s expected to exacerbate the potential for property damage and personal injury: the arrival of a new moon Sunday night.
During new and full moons, the gravitational pull between the earth and the moon intensifies, causing lower low tides and higher high tides. This can increase the power and level of storm surges flooding low-lying areas.
The storm surge from Hurricane Irene combined with the highest tides of the month could make Irene “the storm of a lifetime” for Tidewater Virginians, Gov. Bob McDonnell said Friday…
New Jersey faces a similar situation.
If you have pics, please share them on our FaceBook page!
More soon…
Updates:
• National Hurricane Center twitter feed.
• National Geographic has photos.
• Rosanne Cash takes a pic of 8th Avenue, “As empty as I’ve ever seen it.”
• Streaker ruins Weather Channel report. (Warning: Full frontal stupidity.)
August 26, 2011
Be Ready For Irene! [updates]
East coasters: Do you have your supplies yet? Don’t wait any longer. By all accounts this is a very real and very big storm. Here’s a really good pdf from the NHC about hurricane preparedness.
UJBR Tip: Fill up your bathtub with water! You may need it to flush your toilets!
• Irene is now a Category 2 storm, but seems to be teetering up near 3, and could strengthen after hitting the Carolinas and before heading toward the hugely populated areas up around New York.
We’ll be updating. Please let us know what you’re seeing and hearing in the comments.
Be safe!
*** Best real-time tracking map we’ve seen right here.
______
Updates:
• Weather Underground’s Irene page here.
3:52 PM PST, Friday: PC World has a list of best places to track Irene online.
4:19 PM: CNN has a storm blog up.
4:38 PM: Here’s a map of NYC’s evacuation zones. Zone A (the orangish one) is now a mandatory evacuation zone.
4:51 PM: The Huffington Post has a good thread going with lots of updates.
By 5 pm tomorrow, if everyone in the low-lying “Zone A” areas follows the mayor’s evacuation orders, Coney Island will be a ghost town.
5:13 PM: Oh very cool – Google has just released a storm tracking tool.
5:49 PM: Storm weakening, but still categorized as hurricane:
Satellite data and measurements from the Hurricane Hunters show that Irene continues to weaken. A 1:32 pm EDT center fix by an Air Force Reserve aircraft found that Irene’s eyewall is still gone, and the central pressure had risen to 951 mb from a low of 942 mb this morning. The winds measured in Irene near the surface support classifying it as a strong Category 1 hurricane or weak Category 2.
6:48 PM: The New York Times has dropped its paywall for the storm.
7:00 PM PST: The Gothamist, a NYC blog, might be a good place to check in.
Play Our “Hurricane Irene Bingo” This Weekend!
8:31 PM: As of 9 PM tonight PST Direct TV is dedicating channels 259, 325 and 349 – to storm coverage.
August 25, 2011
Contest! [winners announced]
Alright, folks, we’ve got a new contest to do, and this time we’re giving away our brand new Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader t-shirts – and they are very cool t-shirts, if we say so ourselves. And we do.
Check out this beauty. (That’s actually Matt Damon modeling the shirt for us, but he had a hangover and didn’t want us to show his face. Thanks all the same, Matt!):
See August 29 post for winners!
Pretty nice, huh? And a subtle extra:
Give us a word. Okay, we’re giving away FIVE UJBR t-shirts. All you have to do is go read about new words being added to dictionaries – such as “tweet” and “social media” – and give us your own idea for a word that should be added. *You MUST post on the blog. Entries on Facebook will NOT count. Blame Mark Zuckerberg for that. He changed the Facebook contest rules. Grrr.
Changed: Enter as many times as you like! We’ll pick three winners by random draw, and Uncle John and the BRI crack staff will pick two based on originality, cleverness, hilarity, guffaw-factor, sweetness – or a complete lack of any of those things.
Spread the word! And ready set go! Good luck!
P.S. You have until midnight Sunday, PST. Winners announced on Monday.
August 24, 2011
National Parks From Space
This is one of those things where you go, “Dang! Why didn’t I think of that? And why don’t I have a space ship?” It’s a collection of photos of American National Parks, as taken from satellites. It is a really stunning collection.
Just one example, via NASA, of Everglades National Park in Florida (click to enlarge):
Top that, Jackson Pollock! (I mean I know you’re dead and everything, but still, top that!)
There are many more over there. Way to go, Wired.
August 23, 2011
“I am in Gaddafi’s Bedroom”
“And I stole his hat.” Unbelievable!
Here’s the link to the YouTube page. Seems to be not working sometimes.
And a news story about it. And the Sky News report.
August 23, 2011
People Painting People Paintings
This is very cool. Check this out:
Nice painting, huh? Well, it is, but not in the way you think:
In essence, what Meade does is paint live models to make them look like paintings. Sound strange? Well, we guess it is, but we think you’ll agree, the finished product is darn realistic. She achieves this effect by applying acrylic paint to her subject and surroundings and then photographing everything.
“Meade” is American artist Alexa Meade. You can see much more of her work at her website.
* And thanks to Ol’ Jay for the tip.
August 22, 2011
Kate Winslet Saves Grandmother From Burning Home
No, it’s not from a film, it’s from last night. And the grandmother was Richard Branson’s grandmother:
Oscar-winning actress Kate Winslet and members of Richard Branson’s family escaped unharmed Monday when a lightning storm hit the Virgin tycoon’s Caribbean island home, which was destroyed in a blaze.
Winslet carried Branson’s 90-year-old mother Eve out of The Great House on Necker Island as the flames took hold in the early hours of the morning.
“She (Winslet) was staying there with her children and in fact it was she who carried my mother out of the house,” Branson told Britain’s ITV News.
“She swept her up into her arms and got them out of the house as fast as possible.”
*
Winslet said: “It’s like being in a film.” Well, she would know, I guess.
