Related browsing: TomLehrerSongs.com, a site that contains lyrics and sheet music free for download and use as if they “were in the public domain.” Permission appears to have been granted by Lehrer himself. But note: The site will disappear at the end of 2024. With that in mind…
You can claim to be interested in historical artifacts like pottery, suits of armor, and maybe even a mummy, but the most compelling reason to visit a museum, even as an adult, are the dinosaur fossils. If your hometown happens to be lacking in museums, however, Lego’s new Dinosaur Fossils set puts a small collection of thunder lizard skeletons on your desk, no admission required.
The 910-piece set, which is another Lego Ideas fan creation put into production, includes three 1:32-scale replicas of Triceratops, Pteranodon, and Tyrannosaurus rex, with T. Rex measuring in at 15.4 inches long. All three are fully posable and each includes a display stand with a tiny plaque for creating your own exhibit, but you can also make these dinos stomp around your desk should you find yourself trapped and bored during a long conference call.
If you’re having a hard time justifying the set’s $60 price tag because of other adult fiscal responsibilities, Lego is including a tiny paleontologist minifigure, as well as a Lego sapiens skeleton figure (which could help explain the mysterious disappearance of that paleontologist’s partner) so you can convince yourself you’re training for a career in paleontology while enjoying your favorite childhood toy. You can even tell yourself you’re buying it for your daughter, son, niece, nephew, or younger cousin to help foster an interest in science, and then conveniently forget to give it to them on their birthday. Whatever works.
This stop-motion animated film takes viewers on an exhilarating existential journey into the fully imagined, tactile world of Madame Tutli-Putli. As she travels alone on the night train, weighed down with her all her earthly possessions and the ghosts of her past, she faces both the kindness and menace of strangers. Finding herself caught up in a desperate metaphysical adventure, adrift between real and imagined worlds. she confronts her demons.
Directed by Chris Lavis & Maciek Szczerbowski - 2007
Just how effective is the Slap Chop? Can it be improved? Design and usability expert Dan Formosa takes a look at some common kitchen gadgets, rates them, and attempts to improve their designs.
I really enjoyed watching this with an eye to the accessibility of everyday products. Many of the "unitaskers" Alton Brown is against were designed to make specific tasks easier for disabled people. *TODO explain how oil test is similar to keyboard testing I do.*
The painting measures 132.7 × 214.4 centimetres (52.2 × 84.4 in). It shows a group of Roman diners at a banquet, being swamped by drifts of pink rose petals falling from a false ceiling above. The youthful Roman emperor Elagabalus, wearing a golden silk robe and tiara, watches the spectacle from a platform behind them,[1][2] with other garlanded guests. A woman plays the double pipes beside a marble pillar in the background, wearing the leopard skin of a maenad, with a bronze statue of Dionysus, based on the Ludovisi Dionysus, in front of a view of distant hills.
The painting depicts a (probably invented) episode in the life of the Roman emperor Elagabalus, also known as Heliogabalus (204–222), taken from the Augustan History. Although the Latin refers to "violets and other flowers", Alma-Tadema depicts Elagabalus smothering his unsuspecting guests with rose petals released from a false ceiling. The original reference is this:
Oppressit in tricliniis versatilibus parasitos suos violis et floribus, sic ut animam aliqui efflaverint, cum erepere ad summum non possent.[3] In a banqueting-room with a reversible ceiling he once buried his guests in violets and other flowers, so that some were actually smothered to death, being unable to crawl out to the top.[4]
In his notes to the Augustan History, Thayer notes that "Nero did this also (Suetonius, Nero, xxxi), and a similar ceiling in the house of Trimalchio is described in Petronius, Sat., lx." (Satyricon).[5]
The painting was commissioned by Sir John Aird, 1st Baronet for £4,000 in 1888. As roses were out of season in the United Kingdom, Alma-Tadema is reputed to have had rose petals sent from the south of France each week during the four months in which it was painted.[6]
The painting was exhibited at the Royal Academy summer exhibition in 1888. Aird died in 1911, and the painting was inherited by his son Sir John Richard Aird, 2nd Baronet. After Alma-Tadema died in 1912, the painting was exhibited at a memorial exhibition at the Royal Academy in 1913, the last time it was seen at a public exhibition in the UK until 2014.
Geographer turned Software Engineer, looking to shape the invisible systems that guide our world. Professionally interested in mapping, data visualization, values-based programming, and STEAM evangelism. Personally interested in crochet, knitting, textiles, and archery.