Helicopter pilot Mike Schaeffer was wrapping up a tour when he spotted this incredible weather phenomenon along the coast of Panama City Beach, Fl. on Sunday. As soon as he landed, he alerted Panhandle Helicopter owner JR Hott of the “cloud form waves,” and together they went up for a better view. They moved quickly knowing that it is only in very specific weather conditions that this beautiful effect occurs.
Read and see more at MSNBC’s PhotoBlog.
JR Hott / Panhandle Helicopter
via Eric
And to depress and delight. Girls are Pretty is a writing Tumblr written by Bob Powers. Here’s Keep a Secret Day:
The man in the raincoat will be reading a message on his smart phone when he slips off of the subway platform and falls onto the tracks. Run to the edge and see him there, belly down, conscious but moving slowly. Look around but there’s no one else to help him. Peer into the tunnel. No train coming. There’s time.
Your hand extended: “Here.”
The man will roll over half-way to look up at you. He’ll look down the tracks, searching for anyone else who might be watching from the platform. Then he’ll look at the message on his cell phone once more.
“Can you keep a secret?” he’ll ask.
You can. You don’t say so, but he must be able to tell from your eyes, because the man nods, stuffs the cell phone back in his pants, then reaches out and grabs the third rail.
Tell the police you ran to the edge and saw his body shaking, already cooked.
His wife will track you down because she wants to meet the last person who saw him alive. Tell her you only caught a glimpse of him before he disappeared over the side, and the next time you saw him he was gone.
If it will help you keep the secret to know what was in the email he was reading just before he died, the email he was reading was an email from Netflix asking about the picture quality of Sons Of Anarchy Season 1. If he was getting service down there on the tracks he would have selected, “The quality was very good.”
Happy Keep A Secret Day!
via Eric
A for effort, T-Rex.
A selection below; see more of Hugh Murphy’s brilliant work at T-Rex Trying…
by Bill Watterson
Quoted in its entirety from the original article here.
On life’s constant little limitations
Calvin: You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocket ship underpants don’t help.
On expectations
Calvin: Everybody seeks happiness! Not me, though! That’s the difference between me and the rest of the world. Happiness isn’t good enough for me! I demand euphoria!
On why we are scared of the dark
Calvin: I think night time is dark so you can imagine your fears with less distraction.
On the unspoken truth behind the education system
Calvin: As you can see, I have memorized this utterly useless piece of information long enough to pass a test question. I now intend to forget it forever. You’ve taught me nothing except how to cynically manipulate the system. Congratulations.
On the cruel reality of commercial art
Hobbes: Van Gogh would’ve sold more than one painting if he’d put tigers in them.
On the tragedy of hipsters
Calvin: The world bores you when you’re cool.
On the tears of a clown
Calvin: Isn’t it strange that evolution would give us a sense of humour? When you think about it, it’s weird that we have a physiological response to absurdity. We laugh at nonsense. We like it. We think it’s funny. Don’t you think it’s odd that we appreciate absurdity? Why would we develop that way? How does it benefit us?
Hobbes: I suppose if we couldn’t laugh at things that don’t make sense, we couldn’t react to a lot of life.
Calvin: (after a long pause) I can’t tell if that’s funny or really scary.
On the falling of sparrows (or providence’s lack of timetable)
Calvin: Life is full of surprises, but never when you need one.
On why winter is the most frustrating season
Calvin: Getting an inch of snow is like winning 10 cents in the lottery.
On the gaping hole in contemporary art’s soul
Calvin: People always make the mistake of thinking art is created for them. But really, art is a private language for sophisticates to congratulate themselves on their superiority to the rest of the world. As my artist’s statement explains, my work is utterly incomprehensible and is therefore full of deep significance.
On the evils of mangling words
Calvin: Verbing weirds language.
On realising God is more Woody Allen than Michael Bay
Calvin: They say the world is a stage. But obviously the play is unrehearsed and everybody is ad-libbing his lines.
Hobbes: Maybe that’s why it’s hard to tell if we’re living in a tragedy or a farce.
Calvin: We need more special effects and dance numbers.
On why ET is real
Calvin: Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us.
On looking yourself in the mirror
Hobbes: So the secret to good self-esteem is to lower your expectations to the point where they’re already met?
On the future
Calvin: Trick or treat!
Adult: Where’s your costume? What are you supposed to be?
Calvin: I’m yet another resource-consuming kid in an overpopulated planet, raised to an alarming extent by Madison Avenue and Hollywood, poised with my cynical and alienated peers to take over the world when you’re old and weak. Am I scary, or what?
On the truth
Calvin: It’s a magical world, Hobbes, ol’ buddy…Let’s go exploring!
via Eric
Ryan Andrews wrote and illustrated this wonderful web comic about an older woman named Sarah, her husband, and the seed she gave birth to. Read ‘Sarah and the Seed’. His other comics are really great too!
Artist Lisa Nilsson makes gorgeous anatomical cross-sections…out of rolled strips of paper. The technique is called ‘quilling’ and is used with particularly striking effect in Lisa’s work. From her website:
These pieces are made of Japanese mulberry paper and the gilded edges of old books. They are constructed by a technique of rolling and shaping narrow strips of paper called quilling or paper filigree. Quilling was first practiced by Renaissance nuns and monks who made artistic use of the gilded edges of worn out bibles, and later by 18th century ladies who made artistic use of lots of free time. I find quilling exquisitely satisfying for rendering the densely squished and lovely internal landscape of the human body in cross section.
photography by John Polak
click to embiggen
Tsuneaki Hiramatsu has taken some beautiful time-lapse photographs of lightning bugs in the wild. Lots more in the previous links.
To preface:
In August of 1865, a Colonel P.H. Anderson of Big Spring, Tennessee, wrote to his former slave, Jourdan Anderson, and requested that he come back to work on his farm. Jourdan — who, since being emancipated, had moved to Ohio, found paid work, and was now supporting his family — responded spectacularly by way of the letter seen below (a letter which, according to newspapers at the time, he dictated).
by bbyrd
Aurora Borealis by Billy Idle