Sliding in safe

Lucky motorcycler loses control on the freeway and somehow manages to slide under a moving tractor-trailer.


And this poor man's version of Evel Knievel miraculously walks away from an idiotic bit of daring stuntery.

I'm not gonna do the math of this stunt, WCGW? from r/Whatcouldgowrong

"You can never plan the future by the past." -- Edmund Burke

Track stars

Professional artists and kids drew the same still life scene while wearing eye tracking glasses, and there were some interesting differences.


And a series of found-object charts that you might find quirky and insightful.

A post shared by Michelle Rial (@realifecharts) on Jan 5, 2018 at 10:34am PST

A post shared by Michelle Rial (@realifecharts) on Dec 5, 2017 at 9:45am PST

"Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures." -- Henry Ward Beecher

Let it flow

A storm left over from former Cyclone Gita swept across New Zealand recently, damaging buildings, knocking out electricity, and causing flooding. It also triggered a bizarre natural phenomenon known as granular flow -- essentially a raging river of rocks.

(If you're interested, geologist Dave Petley explains this freaky and frightening phenomenon over at the Landslide Blog.)


And tougher to fathom in retrospect, who would have imagined this way back when?

No one could have imagined... from r/funny

"Land is the secure ground of home, the sea is like life, the outside, the unknown." -- Stephen Gardiner

Widdershins

Inner monologue plays out in "A Chair at the Beach", a subtly ridiculous two-minute short film. Four stars for quirkiness.


And are the dots in this make-you-dotty optical illusion going side to side, up and down, or 'round and 'round?

2 dots oscillating? Vertically or horizontally? Or 2 dots orbiting? Clockwise or widdershins? Or 2 diagonal pairs of blinking dots with no "motion" at all? Or something else!? from r/illusionporn

"The only thing that could spoil a day was people. People were always the limiters of happiness except for the very few that were as good as spring itself." -- Ernest Hemingway

A million in one

See if you can withstand the seizure-inducing breakneck experience of watching one million famous film frames flash forward in five minutes. Recognize any?


And thankfully, a still image, a cat playing behind the TV.

My wife just texted me this picture of our cat playing behind the TV from r/funny

"There's no thief like a bad movie." -- Sam Ewing

Feathered mysteries

Q: Why did the chicken cross the road?
A: Don't know, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't to play an operatic aria on a keyboard.
(Earned her a spot on "America's Got Talent", anyway, which I thought was for people.)


And a chattering of starlings go to bed in less than a minute.

How 40,000 starlings go to bed in less than a minute. from r/NatureIsFuckingLit

"A bird does not sing because it has an answer. It sings because it has a song." -- Chinese Proverb

Overextended

This guy must seriously regret his attempt to demonstrate this minivan's sliding door safety feature.

And watch this trucker nail an impossible right-hand turn while hauling a 200-foot turbine blade.

Finally, an interesting map visualization that shows the best car route from the center of the U.S. to every county in the nation.

"Choices are the hinges of destiny." -- Edwin Markham

Plot twist

A post shared by Five Points (@fivepointsshow) on Feb 8, 2018 at 12:30pm PST

What the heck just happened? Craziest convenience store CCTV footage you'll ever see.


And not at all surprising, parking in front of a liquor store.

Parking in front of a liquor store from r/pics

"The odds of going to the store for a loaf of bread and coming out with only a loaf of bread are three billion to one." -- Erma Bombeck

Dishing it out

Pizza tossing to the extreme from gifs

Pizza tossing to the extreme. And a couple of efficiently-poured beers to go with it. (Thanks Mr. G.)

German engineering at its finest....

"Show me a nation whose national beverage is beer, and I'll show you an advanced toilet technology." -- Mark Hawkins

Fight or flight

Slugfest to hugfest, it's tough to explain how or why this brawl on a Sydney train ends in sudden friendship.


And painfully obvious, taunting a bull with flaming horns... WCGW?

Taunting a bull, WCGW? from r/Whatcouldgowrong

"Because of a great love, one is courageous." -- Lao Tzu

Incompatible interface

Apple lovers -- would you use this 1980s PC version of Siri?


And some historical perspective that's not a parody... check out The Titanic compared to a modern cruise ship. (thanks mr. g)

The titanic compared to a modern cruise ship from r/Damnthatsinteresting

"Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory." -- Franklin Pierce Adams

Improv hour

Attempted break-in goes very off the rails very, very early.


And you'd probably be extra jittery if Christopher Walken opened a coffee shop.

"No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness." Sheik Abd-al-Kadir

Fire and ice

Guy worked for months gluing 42,000 matchsticks together and watches it all goes up in flames (on purpose).


Likewise satisfying, this kid jumping onto an ice-covered trampoline makes for a great video effect.

"It's a moment that I'm after, a fleeting moment, but not a frozen moment." -- Andrew Wyeth

Toys for bots

As if the world didn't have enough problems, now it has one more. Hacker-musician Sam Battle wired up 44 Furby toys, soldering and all, to create the first/last singing Furby keyboard.


And a surreal bit of colorful abstract animation that lets you "see" the sounds of rainforest birds, synesthesia style.

"Man is so made that when anything fires his soul, impossibilities vanish." -- Jean de La Fontaine

Flim-flammable

Deceptive leaking LPG tanker + car with hot exhaust = highway to hell. Some scary math.


And not nearly as bad, why menu translations go terribly wrong.

"A spark neglected makes a mighty fire." -- Robert Herrick

lookOut on life

Enjoy a dose of Alan Gogoll's "Stringscapes", a relaxing half hour of fingerstyle guitar with a beautiful sunset vista, filmed from inside the guitar.


And an impressive three-year timelapse of Seattle shot from uptop the Space Needle.

"The longer one is alone, the easier it is to hear the song of the earth." -- Robert Anton Wilson

Take the rap

Sick of his wife and friends making fun of him, this 44-year-old from Austin bet them that he could put out a legit hip-hop song and make at least ten bucks off it. So without further ado, here's "Spinach Dippa" rapping about who knows what.


And a Nest video caught a dog starting a house fire when he stole leftover pancakes off the stove, reports Bay News 9. No charges were filed.

"Be faithful to that which exists within yourself." -- Andre Gide

Diner's remorse

This mischievous Iowa cow ate a family's mail right out of the mailbox for no apparent reason.


And when the chips are down... the anchor on CBS Philly only had to eat one chip to complete the One Chip Challenge, but Paqui's Carolina Reaper Chip got the best of him. His co-host, though, is a chip-champ.

"The cow is nothing but a machine which makes grass fit for us people to eat." -- John McNulty

Make-shiv cutlery

Katsuobushi (aka bonito) is dried, fermented and smoked tuna, and it's not only tasty (?) but it's possible to make a knife out of it.


And this is not a giant pair of jeans; it's a sleeping bag for two.




Finally, James McNabb is a talented designer who carves detailed mini-cities out of scrap wood.

A post shared by James McNabb (@mcnabbstudio) on Oct 5, 2017 at 7:56am PDT

"I cry out for order and find it only in art." -- Helen Hayes

Nobody move

This videographer caught a helicopter with its rotors are in perfect sync with his camera, making for an unintentionally nifty effect.


And an artist who draws sad clown faces on discarded objects strewn about Los Angeles.

A post shared by Lonesome Town (@lonesometown9) on Jan 20, 2018 at 9:34am PST

"Simplicity is natures first step, and the last of art." -- Philip James Bailey

Circumspectrum

"Instravel - A Photogenic Mass Tourism Experience" entertainingly points out the cliched sameness in every tourist's Instagram travel photos.


And so-called latte art is generally a monochromatic palette of coffee and cream browns, except when art professor Kangbin Lee shows you how it's done.

A post shared by 이강빈 (@leekangbin91) on Nov 16, 2017 at 4:08am PST

"Most travel is best of all in the anticipation or the remembering; the reality has more to do with losing your luggage." -- Regina Nadelson

Accent marks

It's a Southern Thing created this funny video about a version of Alexa that understands how Southerners talk. "The future is here, y'all. And it's available in burlap and reclaimed barn wood."


And this guy had to write a letter to cancel his gym membership. It was something of a tough breakup.

Planet Fitness wouldn't let me cancel over the phone, and required a certified letter to cancel since I live in a different state now. I dropped this in the mail today. from r/funny

"What we really are matters more than what other people think of us." -- Jawaharlal Nehru

Free woolin' it

Drone footage captures the controlled chaotic-yet-synchronized fluidity of dogs herding sheep, which looks a lot like a giant flock of birds.


And weird colorful visual puns created by the creative Randy Lewis.

"The roots of all goodness lie in the soil of appreciation for goodness." -- Dalai Lama

Route of bounds

When your friend makes you use Apple Maps instead of Google... "You Are On The Fastest Available Route" is an effective dashcam horror short from Local58, a news affiliate that thankfully does not exist.


In other bad directions, this notice of a public hearing in Hempstead, New York, is impossible to read. Fine example of malicious compliance. If you want to actually read the sign, here is a stretched version.

"We must make the best of those ills which cannot be avoided." -- Clarence Day

Iron cross

Brave man/maniac crosses a cheeks-clenched-terrifying Siberian bridge in nothing but a Ford Bronco.


And also remote, the sky in Antarctica looks like something from the world of science fiction.

A post shared by Christopher Michel (@chris_michel) on Jan 23, 2018 at 6:07pm PST

"Neither blame or praise yourself." -- Plutarch