World’s Strangest

Image: Jan S. Krogh National borders are often a touchy subject involving a combustible mix of politics, patriotism and geography. Some borders are complex because of they’re based on natural rivers that change course [...]

You may hear jokes about “oceanfront property in Arizona,” but in the distant past, it really existed. In fact, 1.75 billion years ago, the area was undersea. However, there was a lot going on down there where tectonic plates were colliding. I don’t know if you can imagine an undersea caldera eruption. There’s the sea floor, [...]

There’s not much we can say with certainty as Thursday’s NBA draft approaches. Some team will get a terrific bargain in this draft. Some team will burn its pick on a colossal disappointment whose name will be whispered in the same breath those of uber-busts Darko Miličić and Marcus Fizer. NBA general managers should take [...]

Michael Powell and Juergen Horn are continuing their living experiment in moving to a new city every three months, and writing about them on their blog 91 Days. Currently in Savannah, Georgia, USA, they visited The Old School Diner and got a lesson in Southern hospitality. The evening really got going when Chef Jerome came out [...]

My mom just returned from a semester at sea (life-long-learner program). The other night she showed us her photos. Good stuff. The most interesting one to me was this Coca-Cola Crateman she spotted in Cape Town. It got me wondering about the artist. So I started researching. And while I didn’t find out who created [...]

When I read that a new spider species was named Heteropoda davidbowie in honor of David Bowie, it reminded me of several other celebrities whose names were enshrined in taxonomy because there are so many new spiders being discovered as distinct species. With a little digging, even more star spiders turned up! 1. David Bowie German arachnologist [...]