Invincible Dinosaur

 In August 1969, Hurricane Camille devastated the Mississippi Gulf Coast.  The destruction was unbelievable.  In some cases, shrimp boats were found as far as half a mile inland.  Many homes and businesses were destroyed.  Less than 100 yards from the water, the popular miniature golf course, Magic Golf, received some damage, but the popular concrete T-Rex received almost no damage.  Following the story, engineering and architectural students from around the world visit Biloxi to discover why the statue stood firm and resolute amidst all the damage and destruction.  

Mississippi Mummy

In the 1920s, the Mississippi Department of Archives and History purchased an extensive collection of Native American artifacts from Colonel Brevoort Butler.

Included in these artifacts was one item that was clearly not of Native origin, an Egyptian mummy said to be a princess.

For decades the mummy was displayed in the Old State Capitol Building, becoming a much-loved attraction and source of local pride that Mississippi should have such an exotic item.

In 1969, Gentry Yeatman, a local medical student interested in archeology, asked the museum for the "human remains" to study for evidence of disease.

Permission was granted to remove the mummy and send it to the University of Mississippi Medical Center for an autopsy, where radiological examination showed quite a surprise!  

Inside the mummy were a few animal ribs and several square nails holding together a wooden frame. He discovered the "mummy" primarily consisted of paper-mâché, including German newsprint and pages from an 1898 issue of the Milwaukee Journal.  Our prized artifact was a forgery!

The fake mummy is 

The Mummy and the X-Ray

more famous now than ever and considered a prized possession as an artifact of Mississippi Folklore.  The Old Capitol Museum often displays the Dummy Mummy around Halloween.

Links:

The Case of the Dummy Mummy 

The Dummy Mummy

100 Years of Magic Drawings

Sometimes artists many years apart have similar ideas.

Below is J. Stuart Blackton's The Enchanted Drawing, produced in 1900



YouTube

Over one hundred years later, Dutch artist Evelien Lohbeck updates Blackton's idea to incorporate modern technology.


Noteboek from Evelien Lohbeck on Vimeo.

There's Something Strange in Loch Ness

Filmmakers for the History Channel's MonsterQuest recently discovered something totally unexpected in Scotland's famous Loch Ness.

Using remote operated vehicles to film underwater, Mike O’Brien of Louisiana-based SeaTrepid LLC was hoping to find evidence of the Loch Ness Monster when his cameras showed something else...

Golf balls, thousands and thousands of golf balls.

Besides mysterious lake monsters, Scotland is famous as the birth place of golf. Apparently locals and tourists have been using Loch Ness as a driving range for some time now and evidence of their activity is building up on the lake's bottom.

Although the monster can probably handle it, there is some concern for other life in the lake as golf balls can emit toxins as they deteriorate. Even though the ecology is somewhat fragile, there is no plan to retrieve the golf balls yet because they're in a part of the lake that's too deep to use regular scuba equipment.

What Do Drunk Gorillas Look Like?

Wildlife photographer Andy Rouse made a series of photographs showing Mountain Gorillas in Rwanda who had been eating the fermented sap from bamboo shoots.

"It was not exactly Gorillas In The Mist, more like gorillas who were pissed," said Rouse.

"Some were running round cackling to each other, others were going mad swinging through the trees, some were just lying on the ground in an inebriated state."

Gorillas eat bamboo all year and can tolerate a lot of it before getting intoxicated; usually they eat it with a handful of other greenery to water it down. Sometimes however they over-indulge, a habit they share with chimps and elephants.

"When I went back the next day," says Andy, "it was all very quiet, as if they were nursing gorilla-sized hangovers"



Link: Photo Set at Telegraph.co.uk

Barbie and the Death of Tattoos

Every style and trend has a life span, and for some time now, I've been wondering what would signal the end of the tattoo trend in western cultures. This might be it.

Barbie, still the best selling girl's toy (now that they've eliminated those pesky Bratz dolls with fancy legal footwork) turns 50 this year and to celebrate Mattel introduces the Totally Stylin' Tattoos Barbie, which features both tattoo stickers and washable ink tattoos girls can apply to their dolls.

Most fashion trends last about a generation, then they're verboten for a while before they have a brief revival as "retro". It's been about 20 years for tattoos so they're probably headed for the Elysian fields with poodle skirts and flat-top hair cuts.

Nothing kills an edgy fashion statement like seeing it show up on a barbie doll.

Video of Nadya Suleman, (Octomom) Giving Birth

Video of Nadya Suleman, (Octomom) Giving Birth




Link: You Tube

Amazing African Pole Dancers

In America, strippers dance on poles to show off their acrobatic skills and their tramp-tattoos. I've seen some girls do pretty amazing things on poles, but these guys in Africa make American pole dancers look like sorority girls trying to do the solja boy dance after nine beers. For one thing, their poles aren't attached to anything! They never had an act like this at Danny's.



link: You Tube

How to Smoke a Cat

For many years, scientists have argued whether or not marijuana smoking has any detrimental effects on the brain, particularly in the areas of logic and cognitive functions. Recently a story out of Nebraska provided evidence to support the argument that pot can really fuck up your mind.

Police sought Twenty-year-old Acea Schomaker of Lincoln Nebraska on marijuana charges. When they found him, he was smoking a home-made bong made of plexiglas and rubber tubing, with a six-month-old kitten duct-taped inside.

Schomaker said he put the kitten inside the bong because it was high-strung and needed the marijuana smoke to calm down. Police incarcerated Schomaker, seized the bong and took custody of the cat who was turned over to an animal shelter to be checked out by a vet to see if the experience damaged its health.

Schomaker said he had smoked the cat several times before. Police charged him with animal cruelty and possession of marijuana. So far, the kitten seems to be recovering.

Link: KETV Omaha Nebraska

Gay Spider Man and His Tiny Sidekick

I really have no adequate explanation for this.

It's a lap dancing spider man with red bikini bottoms entertaining office workers which is strange enough on its own, but when mini gay spider man joins in, who is either a child or a little person also in a spider man costume (without red bikini bottoms) the whole video becomes something one might expect if Salvador Dali's retarded little brother had a YouTube account.



Link: YouTube

World's Largest Snake

Scientists have uncovered the fossilized remains of the largest snake that ever lived.

In life Titanoboa cerrejonensis was some forty-three feet long and possibly weighed as much as 2,500 lbs. (that's a big snake)

It lived in South America some sixty million years ago and probably lived mostly in the water.

Artist's Conception of Titanoboa

Read more at Live Science and Popular Science

January's Most Read Posts:

Google provides webmasters with some really useful tools on how people use their website. Here's what it said about Boyd's Life for the month of January 2009

Most Popular In Order:

1. The Impotence of of Proofreading
2. Jackson's Horrible Movie
3. Is there a God Delusion
4. What do Teacher's Make?
5. Obama Chia Pet
6. Print is dead and I don't Feel So Good Myself
7. The Cruel God
8. Miss-Matched Presidential Hands
9. Oops CNN Does it Again
10. The Rational Flea

Unusual Search Engine Phrases that Found my Blog:
Search engines turn words into math to try and match up what someone is searching for with websites that might possibly be what they want. It's really fascinating to see the phrases people used that Google linked to my site. Sometimes it'll show some real lu-lu's that make me wonder what the searcher was really up to. For January 2009, the most unusual were:

• "articles that are considered strange for people suing companies for monies"
• "blue whale reincarnation"

Site traffic is not quite double what it was six months ago

Banned PETA Commercial

The great criticism of PETA has always been that it's just a money making machine that doesn't really accomplish much other than making nut-jobs feel better about themselves.

Here is a video of the commercial PETA wanted to place during the superbowl. I'm not going to embed it because it is in questionable taste and it was rejected for being too sexual.

The thing is, however much PETA spent making this ad, it was going to cost them three million bucks to place it. If PETA has that kind of money to throw away on that kind of ad, then I'm really wondering why they're not using it to actually do anybody some good, like feed the hungry or clothe the naked.

Keep this commercial in mind if you're ever tempted to give PETA a dime and give it a second thought. If that doesn't work, consider the video below from Pen & Teller's Bullshit:

If the crazy PETA protest lady sounds familiar, it's because she's Pamelyn Ferdin who did the voice for pretty much every animated little girl in the 1970's.

Barack Obama Chia Pet

When I first saw these I thought it was a joke, but this is real!

In what has to be the worst presidential novelty item ever, Joseph Enterprises, maker of the world famous Chia Pet, now offers this stately bust that (sort of) looks like the 44'th President Of the United States, Barack Obama.

Chia Pets were first introduced in the 1980's and feature a terracotta statue that you can slather with Chia seeds to grow into a green pelt on the sculpture. Historically, the most popular Chia Pet has always been the sheep, but I'm thinking the Obama Chia Pet is gonna' kick its ass.

Chia is a plant of the salvia family, related to mint. It's entirely edible, although I have no idea what it tastes like. What I do know is that the Obama Chia Pet is in such horrible taste that it's almost irresistible.

Not satisfied with offering just one version of the Barak Obama Chia Pet, Joseph enterprises offers two versions! The "Happy" Obama Chia Pet which is kinna goofy looking and the "Determined" Obama Chia Pet which is just kinna creepy. Both feature a commemorative box with an American Flag. YES WE CAN!

Available at Amazon.Com Buy it NOW before people start to think you have taste! Chia Obama Handmade Decorative Planter

Famous Artists Bar

This is just a weird bit of animation, but it's fun to try and name all the famous paintings it references.

Included are artists like Edvard Munch, Henri Matisse, Marc Chagall, Salvador Dali, Hieronymus Bosch, Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollock, and Leonardo Da Vinci.

Torturing Chocolate Bunnies

Lernert Engelberts en Sander Plug (yes, that's a real name) presents this artistic video essay on the many ways to melt a chocolate bunny. I'm particularly fascinated by his use of color and composition. Melting chocolate bunnies is pretty much funny no matter how you do it, but a little bit creepy too.

New Blog Just For Monsters

I've started a new blog. This one is dedicated to one of my favorite subjects, Monsters!

It features Movie Monsters, Cryptozoology, Mysteries, Models, and more madness. I've moved some of the older posts from my other two blogs to the new blog to get it started.

I had a heck of a time coming up with a name for the new project. Just about everything to do with the word "Monster" is already being used. Finally I started playing around with the sounds of the word and came up with The Constant Monster Blog!

Check it out! Let me know what you think.

Confessions of a Superhero

You see these guys on Jimmy Kimmel a lot, but it's fascinating to watch this behind-the-scenes documentary on the life of people who dress up like super heroes to sell photo opportunities to tourists on Hollywood Blvd.



Of particular interest is Christopher Lloyd Dennis who plays Superman getting ready for a day as the "man of steel"

Cool animated GIF

I hope everybody can see this in all the various formats they read the blog from

At first I thought maybe it was just an optical illusion, but it really is an animated gif. I love images with subtle movement.

The source is an article on the Popular Science website about a real-life cloaking device which sounds way cool but is still pretty limited in its capabilities.

Astronaut Punches Asshole

LaReeca Rucker's really cool article about UFO's in Mississippi, the recent death of Eric Beckjord, and former astronaut Edgar Mitchell's claims about UFO's, made me think about the whole genre of fringe science today and one of my favorite stories ever.

In 1969, Edwin Eugene (Buzz) Aldrin was the second human being to ever walk on the moon. His responsibility was to actually pilot the Eagle Lunar Module from lunar orbit to the surface of the moon. Buzz Aldrin is not only an American hero, but a world hero as well.

Ever since that day, fringe people have put forth the theory that the whole thing was a hoax. There's a million reasons why they're wrong that I don't have time to go into here. Suffice to say, we really did go to the moon no matter what people say.

The reason Bart Sibrel is an asshole instead of just being a guy who thinks we faked the moon landings, is that he has a habit of stalking ex-astronauts. Besides the yelling and screaming and accusations of lying, Sibrel is known to ask moon-walkers to to swear on the bible that they actually went to the moon, carrying his own bible to aid the task.

In 2002, Sibrel laid in wait to ambush Aldrin at a California hotel. When the astronaut showed, Sibrel accused him of being "a coward, a liar, and a thief" to which, the seventy-five year old Aldrin decked Sibrel in the teeth, nearly knocking him off his feet.

Sibrel made noises about charging Aldrin with assault, but the police and court would have nothing to do with it. Watch the punch on the video below.