Fact checker

XKCD's recent comic "Frequency" is something of a dashboard for visualizing the relative frequency of events both momentous and trifling.


And the ampersand used to be listed as the 27th letter of the alphabet...? That and other such trivia abounds at Now I Know.

"Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated." - Confucius

Chopping blocks

Despite starring a bunch of talking blocks, The LEGO Movie has a blooper highlight reel that might well provide a couple minutes of amusement.

"'Tis not the meat, but 'tis the appetite Makes eating a delight." - John Suckling

FXtra special

Vintage 1970s "Doctor Who" features incredible special effects that look almost like child's play.

"Humanity is acquiring all the right technology for all the wrong reasons." - R. Buckminster Fuller

Apology accepted

I thought being a cat meant never having to say you're sorry...???

"One is never sure, watching two cats washing each other, whether it's affection, the taste, or a trial run for the jugular." - Helen Thomson

Numb and number

Insane lunatics like to surf the icy waters of Niagara's North Shore and the Great Lakes, maybe for the fashion statement of an icicle-covered beard.

And while probably not necessary to read for most of us, an illustrated guide how to survive falling through the ice.

"The cure for anything is salt water — sweat, tears, or the sea." - Isak Dinesen

Eat your heart out

Enjoy some creative pop-up book (old style) analog animation in Apocalypse, backed by a zombie-flavored love song.

"True friends stab you in the front." - Oscar Wilde

Aw, chute

Parachuteless statistician sucked out of an airplane in/from 43,000 Feet spends his last moments on Earth (so to speak) calculating the time he's got left.

"How long a minute is, depends on which side of the bathroom door you're on." - Zall's Second Law

Royal flush

Not sure whether this is real or a put-on, but the views clearly outnumber the flushes. Certainly a rare and distinctive hobby, if that's the case.

"Life doesn't imitate art, it imitates bad television." - Woody Allen

Twist of face

Welcome to the Thatcher Effect, a trick or illusion that will make your head spin just a little.

"Every science begins as philosophy and ends as art." - Will Durant, The Story of Philosophy, 1926

Under the influence

Moving commercial for Bell's Whisky packs a feature-length film into two heartfelt minutes of rather nice sentiment.

"A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read." - Mark Twain

Sotto voce

Strange effect created with these musicless music videos, though it would have to be better if you've seen them before.

"After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music." - Aldous Huxley

Google me this

Small issue with how Google Now deals with commas makes it "think" that the world has 189 quadrillion countries.

"Prejudice is a great time saver. You can form opinions without having to get the facts." - E. B. White

When pigs fly

In the visually-striking animated short, "Juste de l'eau", a lonely piglet pursues dreams of escaping the isolation of his island home, only to realize that no matter where you go, you cannot escape yourself. (At least that's an interpretation that seemed to make some sense.)

"Too often travel, instead of broadening the mind, merely lengthens the conversation." - Elizabeth Drew

Five-second rule

According to Smithsonian Magazine, it takes only a five-second test to see whether you're a good liar. Who knows whether they're telling the truth about the test...

"Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad." - Aldous Huxley

Postcards from hell

I'm not sure of the intent, but "Portrait" looks like scenes of tortured souls writhing in the invisible flames of hell.

"God has given you one face, and you make yourself another." - William Shakespeare

Broken legacy

Man cranked the dials on Madden NFL 25 until the the machine is bleeding to death and somehow foretold the outcome of the real thing with his Breaking Madden Super Bowl XLVIII. Minus the snow, of course. (Thanks Raygun)

"Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat." - F. Scott Fitzgerald

Wright on

The first in what might become a Golden Age of Insect Aviation mini series, "The Great Grasshoppers" is a fine way to spend ten seconds.

"When preparing to travel, lay out all your clothes and all your money. Then take half the clothes and twice the money." - Susan Heller

54 in 4

Hank Green, one of the VlogBrothers, notches some sort of personal best in speed-joke-telling, racking up 54 corny cracks in under four minutes.

And 100 years of rock in less than a minute, a musical timeline.

"My grandmother started walking five miles a day when she was sixty. She's ninety-seven now, and we don't know where the hell she is." - Ellen DeGeneres