Recent posts at Neatorama

I continue to be only minimally productive while wearing my other hat, but some of these are quite good and worth your visit...

Bibliophiles will enjoy discovering that lighthouse-keepers and their families used to be provided with "travelling libraries" - prepackaged crates that would be replaced on a recurring basis.  The link includes additional photos and a sample list of books.

"Oops" is a compilation of segments filmed by (very) amateur videographers who dropped their camera while recording.  This won the 2010 Vimeo award for “Best Experimental Film.”

A 300-year-old pocket watch was recovered from a shipwreck, totally encrusted and corroded.  But the innards were remarkably preserved and nicely shown by CT scan (video flythrough at the link).

If you have ever played/enjoyed Sim City, you should see the video of "Magnasanti" - the largest city ever created and apparently the largest that can be created.  If you have no interest in SimCity, just give this one a pass.

Champagne has been studied scientifically, and a paper has been written documenting how best to pour champagne in order to preserve the bubbles in the liquid to optimize the pleasure of drinking it.

A never-published manuscript by Dr. Seuss (“All Sorts of Sports") was recently discovered.  It was very sketchily written and crudely illustrated, and it sold at auction this past week for $40,000.

The three photos at the top are, as usual, unrelated to the posts.   At the top is a Dainty Sulphur, and below it is a Little Yellow, two members of the Sulphur family that migrate into Wisconsin in the summer season to enjoy our weather; these were photographed during a field trip with the Southern Wisconsin Butterfly Association at the Avoca Prairie and Savannah, one of the State Natural Areas protected by the Wisconsin DNR.  State Natural Areas are wonderful places to hike and photograph, but they are truly "natural" without trails and facilities, so it takes a little extra effort to reap the rewards.

The bottom photo is a Monarch that was rescued from the streets of I think it was Ontario by one of the readers of this blog; the young lady who forwarded the photo to me said that "Jerry" (I think) was aerodynamically impaired, so she had been feeding it for several weeks.  If anyone in Eastern Canada is preparing to drive down to the mountains of Mexico for the winter and would like to offer assisted migration to a Monarch, please leave a message below.