Disney princess movies are timeless, but perhaps they'd be dated if the characters dressed for the times. Beatrice Lorén drew 11 Disney princesses in the fashions popular when their movies were released, from 1937 to 2012. You can view them all at the link.

Pictured above are Ariel, Belle, Jasmine and Pocahontas.

Link -via The Mary Sue

British artists Heather Ackroyd and Dan Harvey grow grass -lots of it. They've covered everything from small furniture pieces to tower exteriors with living, growing grass, although these installations are temporary. Since 1990, their works have appeared in France, Switzerland, Latvia, Sweden, England, and elsewhere. See a selection of their works at Dark Roasted Blend, in a post which also features the vertical gardens of Patrick Blanc. Link

(Image credit: Heather Ackroyd and Dan Harvey)

This is so cute! Jeff Highsmith realized that with the vast increase in world population over the past few centuries, the Tooth Fairy must be increasingly pressed for time. So he built a pneumatic tube system that delivers his son's teeth from their home to the Tooth Fairy's house.

(Video Link)

Link -via Hack a Day

Sir Patrick Stewart posted this picture of a recent outing. Who is the most excited to meet the other(s)? Link -via Uproxx

Skull Phoney (sold individually)

Are you head over heals for Halloween. Show of your holiday spirit with the Skull Phoney from the NeatoShop. This devilishly fun cell phone accessory is shaped like a skull and fits into any standard 3.5 mm audio jack. It is a great way to dress up your trusted pocket companion.

Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more great Mobile Phone & Tablet Accessories. 

Link

(Video Link)

Chances are that you, nor anyone you know, will ever get a chance to hold Lil' Bub. But just in case you get such a glorious opportunity, here is a video showing how to do it right.

Via Cute Overload

Canadian artist Aaron Campbell recreated 12 classic Looney Tunes characters using just letters, numbers and punctuation. You can view them all at the link.

I wish that I could use Daffy Duck, the Egyptian god of frustration, as an emoticon.

Link -via Ian Brooks

Can't decide between dressing in your favorite superhero costume or like a knight? Then do both with this brilliant suit of armor by Etsy seller CreationsChristopher. Of course, you might need to be Bruce Wayne to actually afford this piece -the pricing starts at $9,500.

Link

Mr. Lovenstein explains why websites offer multiple translations in the same language.

I'd find it handy if websites came in Texan English in addition to, you know, foreign English. But that service is rarely available.

Link

(YouTube link)

This is Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement. It comes with a 25-hour fast, so here's a little levity to get you through, in the form of a Hunger Games mashup, from Jon Rudnitsky. -via Buzzfeed

A pride of lion. A school of fish. A flock of seagulls (wait - that's actually a band).

Why do groups of animals have specific names? You can blame 16th century English gentlemen who wanted to sound cooler by inventing terms of venery (hunting) that later developed into collective nouns we all learned in grade school and loved.

Supposedly, way back in 1486, St. Albans Press in England printed a popular book called "The Book of Hawking, Hunting, and Blasing of Arms" - later known simply as Book of Saint Albans - that became the "how-to guide" on various aspects of falconry (it has a chapter on what sorts of medicines you can give to your sick hawk, for example), hunting, fishing, and heraldry.

The Book of St. Albans also contained a list of collective nouns of animals - the ones we're familiar with today like "gaggle of geese" - as well as some humorous ones, including "a dilligence of messengers," "a melody of harpers," "a blast of hunters," "a subtlety of sergeants," and a "superfluity of nuns."

But enough history - let's get to the fun part. See if you know the oddest and most delightful collective nouns in the English language.

Click the name of the animals to reveal their collective nouns - see how many you know:

Ferrets A business of ferrets	Sharks A shiver of sharks	Cockroaches An intrusion of cockroaches
Cats A glaring of cats	Kittens An intrigue of kittens	Dogs A cowardice of dogs
Giraffes A tower of giraffes	Lemurs A conspiracy of lemurs	Monkeys A barrel of monkeys
Porcupines A prickle of porcupines	Rhinoceroses A crash of rhinoceroses	Buzzards A wake of buzzards
Owls A parliament of owls	Ravens An unkindness of ravens	Toads A knot of toads
Lobsters A risk of lobsters	Snails A hood of snails	Ants A bike of ants

So, how did you do?

You've made it almost through Friday the 13th with nothing out of the ordinary happening so far -at least we hope so. But there is another one coming in December. Why is Friday the 13th so unlucky? Or rather, who do some people think it's unlucky? There's no hard-and-fast answer, but instead, a lot of possibilities.

For whatever reason, among many cultures, the number twelve emerged throughout history as a "complete" number: There are twelve months in a year, twelve signs of the zodiac, twelve Gods of Olympus, twelve sons of Odin, twelve labors of Hercules, twelve Jyotirlingas or Hindu shrines where Shiva is worshipped, twelve successors of Muhammad in Shia Islam, and twelve tribes of Israel. In Christianity, Jesus was betrayed by one of his twelve Apostles—Judas—who was the thirteenth guest to arrive for the Last Supper. Surpassing the number twelve ostensibly unbalances the ideal nature of things; because it is seen as irregular and disrespectful of a sense of perfection, the number thirteen bears the stigma of misfortune and bad luck we know today.

But that doesn't tell us anything about Friday, or how the superstition came to be so widespread. Read more on those questions at mental_floss. Link

(Image credit: Flickr user Jim Rafferty)

These sinks by Meneghello Paolelli Associati are cute. Each one has the capacity of approximately one cup of coffee. Well, the ones in the bottom photo do.

Link | Designer's Website

Life can't be full of nonstop action -can it? Even Supermen has some down time, and that time is filled with mundane things like hanging out with superhero friends or getting this driver's license renewed. Artist William Wray depicts those moments that we rarely see in the comics. The painting shown here is called "Partners in Crime." See more at Unreality. Link | Artist's site

Our pal Tal Siach of Walyou and Visual.ly recently got married (Mazel tov, Tal!), and since he's big on infographics, it's only natural that he's got one made for his wedding:

A few weeks before my own wedding, I spoke with a good friend, Raj Kamal, who also happens to be one of the world’s best information designers. We discussed the upcoming wedding and I complained about how complex it is to plan such a big event (we had more than 300 guests!): from picking the right location and choosing the best food, flowers and DJ, to arranging the seating chart, and so on.

What did Raj say?

“You forgot the infographic!”

“What infographic?” I asked.

“Come on man,” Raj said. “You’re a founding member of Visually, and there is so much data related to you and your wife-to-be… are you not going to visualize it?”

And so he did:

The infographic tells the story of the bride and groom, their family trees, how they met and their first date and their life journey till the moment Tal proposed. The infographic is also packed with inside jokes and other things that close friends and families would appreciate. What a great idea for a wedding!

See, infographic can still be cool! Read more about it at Tal's blog post over at Visual.ly

Pretending to be Normal Compact Mirror

Being normal is over-rated. Embrace the insanity of your life with the Pretending to be Normal Compact Mirror from the NeatoShop. This humorous little mirror features a delightfully self-deprecating message. 

Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more great Personal Care items. 

Link

That's because it's not a leaf at all, but an incredible camouflage display by the moth Uropyia meticulodina. What's truly amazing about this moth is that its wings aren't just the same color and pattern as a dried leaf, but that they even are curled up like one.

Link Via io9

Bowtie Fighter by Daniel Sotomayor

Pew pew pew! Spaghetti Wars has gotten a lot deadlier for Ravioli Alliance since the Lord of the Ziti has got new a new fleet of intergalactic spaceship. Daniel Sotomayor doesn't have to tell us to "Use the Fork" to get this awesome Bowtie Fighter T-shirt.

Let us welcome Daniel Sotomayor AKA D4N13L to the NeatoShop! Visit his Facebook fan page, Tumblr and Twitter page, then head on over to his NeatoShop page for more neat tees.

Cloned to Kill	Mixed Up Superhero	Real Horror Show	Mashed Up Superhero

View more designs by Daniel Sotomayor | More Funny T-shirts | New T-Shirts

Are you a professional illustrator or T-shirt designer? Let's chat! Sell your designs on the NeatoShop, earn generous royalties, and get featured in front of tons of potential new fans on Neatorama!

(YouTube link)

This ad from Thailand is for a mobile phone company, but that really doesn't factor into the story at all. Bring a hankie. -via Daily Picks and Flicks

Artist Derek Yaniger created this adorable tiki-style illustration featuring Elvira hanging out in a graveyard full of zombies. He only made 80 of these great prints that are even autographed by Elvira herself. You can buy them directly through her website.

Link Via Laughing Squid

The common insect called the planthopper (Issus coeleoptratus) is a real-life steampunk bug. At the point where its back legs meet at the top, there are rows of small teeth that mesh together, ensuring that the legs move in sync.

Gears allow two machines to rotate together in opposite directions. That’s exactly what the planthopper’s trochanter bumps do. Sutton tested this by pulling on the tendons of its jumping muscles with some forceps (“It’s the Serious Edition of Operation”, he says.). Even if he only pulled one tendon, both legs would extend because the gears transmitted the motion of one trochanter into the other.

“Then, we got really lucky because we saw a few jumps where the gears wouldn’t engage perfectly,” says Sutton. When this happened, one leg was partially extended before the gears finally snagged and the planthopper’s nigh-perfect coordination was ruined.

Wait! It gets better. These gears are training wheels!

Training wheels, meaning that the gear teeth are not present in the final, molted, adult version of the bug. By then, the leg pivots are smooth, but they do move together, leading scientists to believe that the insect has its legs movements well-synched by that stage. See pictures of the gears at Not Exactly Rocket Science. Link

(Image Credit: Malcolm Burrows)

(Photo: Neoklis Martin)

Think of it as a metaphor for the hurdles that a committed couple must overcome. Or think of it as a chance to have fun. Either way, this is an original theme for a wedding. Angelina and Bobby created an obstacle course at their ceremony and invited guests to use it. You can see more photos of their wedding at the link.

Link

(YouTube link)

Simon's Cat discovers a mirror. He reacts a bit more emotionally than most real cats you've seen. It's a rather short, but satisfying, episode in our favorite cartoon cat's life. -via Tastefully Offensive 

This butter sculpture spotted at The Canadian National Exhibition is absolutely amazing. What's even more impressive though is that it made its way to the bloggosphere via Hugh Jackman's Instagram.

Link Via The Mary Sue

Finnish and Danish airline passengers aren't particularly superstitious, or this flight would be empty. On the contrary, Finnair flight AY666 bound for Helsinki (code HEL) is almost full.

"It has been quite a joke among the pilots," said veteran Finnair pilot Juha-Pekka Keidasto, who will fly the Airbus A320 from Copenhagen to Helsinki. "I'm not a superstitious man. It's only a coincidence for me."

The daily flight AY666 from Copenhagen to Helsinki falls on Friday the 13th twice in 2013. Friday the 13th is considered bad luck in many countries and the number 666 also has strong negative biblical associations.

The forecast for the flight is for calm skies over the Baltic. Link -via reddit

(Video Link)

Once upon a time, a monster kidnapped a little princess. All was lost until a brave knight stepped forward to rescue her.

In this short film, Mauricio Abril tells a tale as old as humanity itself. The gripping background music is "Knights of Cydonia" by Muse.

-via Nerd Approved

Keep Calm and Shop On Notepad

Are you at war with your to do list? Raise your morale and stay organized with the Keep Calm and Shop On Notepad from the NeatoShop. This great little pad includes 75 sheets for your list making and note writing pleasure. 

Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more great Stationery. 

Link

The Ig Nobel Prizes are awarded each year to real scientists for real research that makes you laugh and then makes you think. There are plenty of head scratching-research projects that won last night. The categories shift as necessary every year. For example, the Safety Engineering award does not appear every year, and the awards in Biology and Astronomy were combined because the winning project would have won both. You can watch the recorded ceremony, and you can read more about the winning research with the links below. In most cases, the first link is the more readable.

MEDICINE PRIZE
Masateru Uchiyama [JAPAN], Xiangyuan Jin [CHINA, JAPAN], Qi Zhang [JAPAN], Toshihito Hirai [JAPAN], Atsushi Amano [JAPAN], Hisashi Bashuda [JAPAN] and Masanori Niimi [JAPAN, UK], for assessing the effect of listening to opera, on heart transplant patients who are mice.

REFERENCE: "Auditory stimulation of opera music induced prolongation of murine cardiac allograft survival and maintained generation of regulatory CD4+CD25+ cells," Masateru Uchiyama, Xiangyuan Jin, Qi Zhang, Toshihito Hirai, Atsushi Amano, Hisashi Bashuda and Masanori Niimi, Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery, vol. 7, no. 26, epub. March 23, 2012. 

PSYCHOLOGY PRIZE
Laurent Bègue [FRANCE], Brad Bushman [USA, UK, the NETHERLANDS, POLAND], Oulmann Zerhouni [FRANCE], Baptiste Subra [FRANCE], and Medhi Ourabah [FRANCE], for confirming, by experiment, that people who think they are drunk also think they are attractive.

REFERENCE: "'Beauty Is in the Eye of the Beer Holder': People Who Think They Are Drunk Also Think They Are Attractive," Laurent Bègue, Brad J. Bushman, Oulmann Zerhouni, Baptiste Subra, Medhi Ourabah, British Journal of Psychology, epub May 15, 2012.  

JOINT PRIZE IN BIOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY
Marie Dacke [SWEDEN, AUSTRALIA], Emily Baird [SWEDEN, AUSTRALIA, GERMANY], Marcus Byrne [SOUTH AFRICA, UK], Clarke Scholtz [SOUTH AFRICA], and Eric Warrant [SWEDEN, AUSTRALIA, GERMANY], for discovering that when dung beetles get lost, they can navigate their way home by looking at the Milky Way.

REFERENCE:  "Dung Beetles Use the Milky Way for Orientation," Marie Dacke, Emily Baird, Marcus Byrne, Clarke H. Scholtz, Eric J. Warrant, Current Biology, epub January 24, 2013. The authors, at Lund University, Sweden, the University of Witwatersrand, South Africa, and the University of Pretoria

SAFETY ENGINEERING PRIZE
The late Gustano Pizzo [USA], for inventing an electro-mechanical system to trap airplane hijackers— the system drops a hijacker through trap doors, seals him into a package, then drops the encapsulated hijacker through the airplane's specially-installed bomb bay doors, whence he parachutes to earth, where police, having been alerted by radio, await his arrival.
US Patent #3811643, Gustano A. Pizzo, "anti hijacking system for aircraft", May 21, 1972.

PHYSICS PRIZE
Alberto Minetti [ITALY, UK, DENMARK, SWITZERLAND], Yuri Ivanenko [ITALY, RUSSIA, FRANCE], Germana Cappellini [ITALY], Nadia Dominici [ITALY, SWITZERLAND], and Francesco Lacquaniti [ITALY], for discovering that some people would be physically capable of running across the surface of a pond— if those people and that pond were on the moon.

REFERENCE: "Humans Running in Place on Water at Simulated Reduced Gravity," Alberto E. Minetti, Yuri P. Ivanenko, Germana Cappellini, Nadia Dominici, Francesco Lacquaniti, PLoS ONE, vol. 7, no. 7, 2012, e37300.  

CHEMISTRY PRIZE
Shinsuke Imai [JAPAN], Nobuaki Tsuge [JAPAN], Muneaki Tomotake [JAPAN], Yoshiaki Nagatome [JAPAN], Toshiyuki Nagata [JAPAN, GERMANY], and Hidehiko Kumgai [JAPAN], for discovering that the biochemical process by which onions make people cry is even more complicated than scientists previously realized.

REFERENCE: "Plant Biochemistry: An Onion Enzyme that Makes the Eyes Water," S. Imai, N. Tsuge, M. Tomotake, Y. Nagatome, H. Sawada, T. Nagata and H. Kumagai, Nature, vol. 419, no. 6908, October 2002, p. 685. 

ARCHAEOLOGY PRIZE
Brian Crandall [USA] and Peter Stahl [CANADA, USA], for parboiling a dead shrew, and then swallowing the shrew without chewing, and then carefully examining everything excreted during subsequent days — all so they could see which bones would dissolve inside the human digestive system, and which bones would not.

REFERENCE: "Human Digestive Effects on a Micromammalian Skeleton," Peter W. Stahl and Brian D. Crandall, Journal of Archaeological Science, vol. 22, November 1995, pp. 789–97.

PEACE PRIZE
Alexander Lukashenko, president of Belarus, for making it illegal to applaud in public, AND to the Belarus State Police, for arresting a one-armed man for applauding.

PROBABILITY PRIZE
Bert Tolkamp [UK, the NETHERLANDS], Marie Haskell [UK], Fritha Langford [UK, CANADA], David Roberts [UK], and Colin Morgan [UK], for making two related discoveries: First, that the longer a cow has been lying down, the more likely that cow will soon stand up; and Second, that once a cow stands up, you cannot easily predict how soon that cow will lie down again.

REFERENCE: "Are Cows More Likely to Lie Down the Longer They Stand?" Bert J. Tolkamp, Marie J. Haskell, Fritha M. Langford, David J. Roberts, Colin A. Morgan, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, vol. 124, nos. 1-2, 2010, pp. 1–10.

PUBLIC HEALTH PRIZE
Kasian Bhanganada, Tu Chayavatana, Chumporn Pongnumkul, Anunt Tonmukayakul, Piyasakol Sakolsatayadorn, Krit Komaratal, and Henry Wilde, for the medical techniques described in their report "Surgical Management of an Epidemic of Penile Amputations in Siam" — techniques which they recommend, except in cases where the amputated penis had been partially eaten by a duck. [THAILAND]

REFERENCE: "Surgical Management of an Epidemic of Penile Amputations in Siam," by Kasian Bhanganada, Tu Chayavatana, Chumporn Pongnumkul, Anunt Tonmukayakul, Piyasakol Sakolsatayadorn, Krit Komaratal, and Henry Wilde, American Journal of Surgery, 1983, no. 146, pp. 376-382.

You can find more at the Annals of Improbable Research. Link

Mad Men, Game of Thrones and Alien look so much more adorably zany in cartoon form. Thanks to illustrator Justin White, we know just how fun these shows and movies could be if they were only animated.

Link Via Design Taxi

When an Apple programmer’s project got canceled, he didn’t despair. He just kept sneaking into the office until the program was finished.

(Image credit: Joe Ravi)

Ron Avitzur knew his project was doomed. By the time his bosses cut the cord in August 1993, his team was actually relieved. The graphing calculator program they’d been working on for new mobile devices had finally been shelved, and they could all move on.

Most of his fellow programmers were reassigned to other projects within Apple. The company offered Avitzur a job, too, but it didn’t interest him. Avitzur, then 27, had been freelancing at tech companies since he was a student at Stanford—to him, the work wasn’t worth it if it wasn’t interesting. And what interested him was finishing the graphing calculator program that had just been canceled. But his ambitions were greater than that—Avitzur wanted to make the graphing calculator work on the new PowerPC computer that Apple planned to ship in early 1994.

The young programmer knew the project had merit. Everyone he mentioned it to exclaimed, “I wish I’d had that in school!” If he could just get the program preinstalled on the new computer, teachers across the country could use the tool as an animated blackboard, providing visuals for abstract concepts. The program could simultaneously showcase the speed of the new machine and revolutionize math class. All he needed was access to Apple’s machines and some time.

Apple Power PC G4. (Image credit: Clemens PFEIFFER)

In 1993, Avitzur had nothing but time. His girlfriend lived in another city, and he’d already spent the previous 18 months working late five or six days a week, sometimes until after midnight. His Apple gig had paid well, and Avitzur lived simply. He could work for almost a year without a paycheck. Plus, Apple had lots of extra offices and computers— who would it hurt if he just kept coming in? It would be the perfect crime.

On the last day of the canceled project, Avitzur’s manager called him into her office to say goodbye. He hadn’t completed the length of his contract, but the company would pay it in full anyway.

“Just submit your final invoice for what’s left,” she told him. That’s when it clicked: If Avitzur didn’t submit the invoice, his contract stayed in the system. And if his contract stayed in the system, his ID badge would keep getting him in the front door.

So Avitzur told his boss that he’d find someone to supervise him while he completed the program. Great, his manager said. Good luck. On the first day Avitzur came to work without a job, everything was pretty much the same. He drove his 1987 Toyota Corolla from the room he rented on the edge of a nature reserve in Palo Alto and parked in the lot outside Infinite Loop, Apple’s fancy new headquarters. He swiped in, went to his old office, and resumed working on the calculator.

Right away, Avitzur found help. His friend Greg Robbins also had an Apple contract that was almost up, so Robbins told his boss he’d start reporting to Avitzur. Robbins wasn’t getting paid either, but it didn’t matter. For the two buddies, it was about the work and the challenge. Plus, it was kind of a kick.

They worked in tandem for about a month. Robbins, the perfectionist, spent days tweaking the grayscale of a single pixel. Avitzur, the big picture guy, was more social. He chatted with fellow engineers, soliciting advice and mulling solutions. Avitzur’s and Robbins’s presence was an open secret; people admired their passion and believed in the project.

Then Avitzur got careless. He told the story to the wrong person—a manager who had come to tell him he needed to move offices.

“You’ll have to leave the building immediately,” said the woman. “I’ll have your badges canceled tomorrow.”

(Image credit: Andrew Hitchcock)

That’s when the real sneaking around began. For the next two months, Avitzur had to find new ways of getting into the building. He kept his canceled badge around his neck and timed his arrival for when he knew there’d be crowds coming through the front door.

“Morning!” he’d say to someone he knew, then he’d follow them past security. Avitzur was a familiar face and still wore his badge, so he looked legit. But he had to keep the badge away from sensors, which would sound alarms.

Avitzur also kept a list of phone numbers of friendly programmers in his pocket. If he couldn’t sneak in the front door, he’d call someone to let him in a side entrance. Inside, he and Robbins set up shop in a couple of empty offices. Though only a few dozen of the new computers were available for testing, friends ensured that Robbins and Avitzur had two of them. And people began pitching in—quality assurance specialists who’d gotten wind of the project would show up to test the software; a 3-D graphics expert devoted his free weekends to perfecting the program.

Still, the threat of being caught was real. Avitzur became adept at slipping into bathrooms and turning quickly down halls when he saw people from the facilities department or the woman who’d canceled his badge walking his way. Yet somehow the work got done.

Figure made with the Graphing Calculator. (Image credit: David R. Ingham)

By November, Avitzur and Robbins were ready to demonstrate the calculator. Engineers who had assisted the pair spread word of the project to their managers, who called Avitzur and Robbins in for a demo. Avitzur was prepared for the worst—ready to be dismissed as a loose cannon who had spent the last three months trespassing—but the demo went perfectly. When the computer came out the next year, Avitzur and Robbins’s graphing calculator program was on it. It has been loaded on more than 20 million machines in the decades since.

“It’s amazing we got away with it,” says Avitzur, who is still designing software, still living in the Bay Area, and still driving his 1987 Corolla. “Even more amazing that we ended up producing something of value.”

__________________________

The above article by Erik Sass is reprinted with permission from the July-August 2012 issue of mental_floss magazine.

Don't forget to feed your brain by subscribing to the magazine and visiting mental_floss' extremely entertaining website and blog today for more!