Yes, this oversized popcorn popper with wheels actually walked on the Moon. It was launched in 1970 even though it looks like something from the 1950s. And it was created by the Soviets. Ah those Soviets, they know how to make something look so-cool-old-school-robot style.
Imagine you are an alien. You are approaching planet earth for the first time. You could totally end up approaching earth from any direction. What if you approached earth from what we call the bottom, and you see Antarctica first? You would think that our entire planet is based around this one continent! In fact, …
Yahoo was talking about How did the phrase “out of whack” come about? and they mentioned that the phrase “in fine whack” had previously been used to describe something fit and sturdy. As John Hale describes Abraham Lincoln in 1863: “The Tycoon is in fine whack. I have rarely seen him more serene and busy. …
The library seems even more quiet than my apartment by myself. Even though there’s more noise at the library–constant hum of the escalators, copy machine beeps, people walking. The fact that the people at the library do these activities quietly without saying a word to each other makes it seem all the more quiet.
Have you ever noticed how vector shapes in a pdf file tend to look bitmappy? This makes no sense, because vector shapes should be super smooth. Here we will get to the bottom of this problem. Here are the things we will compare: 1) Address info (text converted to outlines) 2) White header lines (vector …
How to fix bitmappy vector pdf previews in Acrobat Reader Read More »
In December I bought a used vertical file cabinet at a thrift store for ten dollars. What a find! It was literally an answer to a prayer (the filing cabinets we looked at other places were $75 and up). The bottom of the drawers were lined with Chicago Tribune newspapers from 1997 (rather fitting seeing …
mmmmhmmmm looks like a herd of animals, and one of them is sticking its head out to see what’s going on.
CNN reports that the new largest prime number was discovered on January 4, 2006. It is 9.1 million digits long. (thanks Tom for the link) If you were to print this number out on 8.5×11″ sheets of paper, one-sided with 0.5″ margins at 11-point Helvetica, it would take 1,556 sheets of paper. That’s just over …
World’s largest prime number on three reams of paper Read More »
There’s this clever “KERN” sweatshirt being sold on veer.com. You unzip the sweatshirt to demonstrate how kerning works. neat. I want to make a shirt that says “LEADING” and pants that also say “LEADING.” To demonstrate how leading works, you just drop your pants. (thanks to Tom for finding this link and posting it on …
McDonald’s current tray liner promotes their new Arch Card. It very cutely lists what all the things the Arch Card can be. Some are very nice like “grandpa’s morning coffee” or “my night away from the kitchen.” And then some are just weird, “i love you as a friend”? or how about “more fun than …
Metra conductors are on their feet all day long. Yet the majority of them are quite… thick. How is that? They walk and walk all day long. They should be in prime shape, right? It’s because they are doing the same routine over and over. Your body becomes accustomed to it. Plus, it’s just nice …
