The Rat
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
      ( 10:33 PM ) The Rat  
JUST IN TIME FOR REUNION SEASON...

# Posted by The Rat @ 10:33 PM


      ( 4:31 PM ) The Rat  
SHARKINI, THE SHARK ATTACK BATHING SUIT.

# Posted by The Rat @ 4:31 PM



Tuesday, July 23, 2013
      ( 6:17 PM ) The Rat  
"HE WASN'T AFRAID OF MUCH. I DON'T THINK I'VE EVER REALLY SEEN HIM AFRAID..." The Man Who Fell to Earth, a BBC radio documentary from last month. Beautifully done but very hard to listen to.

# Posted by The Rat @ 6:17 PM



Monday, July 22, 2013
      ( 2:52 PM ) The Rat  
ALAN TURING TO BE GIVEN POSTHUMOUS PARDON.

# Posted by The Rat @ 2:52 PM



Friday, July 19, 2013
      ( 8:06 PM ) The Rat  
NOT-THAT-IMPORTANT EMPLOYEE SNATCHES BEST DONUT IN BOX.

# Posted by The Rat @ 8:06 PM


      ( 9:15 AM ) The Rat  
CLICHES COME TO LIFE.

# Posted by The Rat @ 9:15 AM



Wednesday, July 17, 2013
      ( 9:11 AM ) The Rat  
THE PROMS began on the 12th, btw. WQXR is broadcasting full concerts this year.

# Posted by The Rat @ 9:11 AM


      ( 8:25 AM ) The Rat  
LONDON'S BEST ICE CREAM. Check out the rose-shaped ice cream from Amorino!

# Posted by The Rat @ 8:25 AM



Tuesday, July 16, 2013
      ( 5:26 PM ) The Rat  
VIVE LA DIFFÉRENCE! Made me laugh out loud. As did this.

# Posted by The Rat @ 5:26 PM



Monday, July 15, 2013
      ( 2:35 PM ) The Rat  
"IT ENABLES ME TO FEEL LIKE MY LIFE IS ROCKETING SKYWARD, EVEN IF IT'S GOING STRAIGHT TO HELL." The terrible and wonderful reasons why I run long distances, via The Oatmeal. If you're close to anyone who runs and are still trying to understand why they're like that, you should read this, especially Part 6.

# Posted by The Rat @ 2:35 PM


      ( 7:43 AM ) The Rat  
WESTERN LOWLAND GORILLA AND BABY, and other winners from this year's Windland Smith Rice International Awards, on view at the Smithsonian till early 2014.

# Posted by The Rat @ 7:43 AM



Sunday, July 14, 2013
      ( 5:30 PM ) The Rat  
CREATING A NEW KIND OF NIGHT LIGHT: GLOW-IN-THE-DARK TREES, via JM.

# Posted by The Rat @ 5:30 PM


      ( 12:21 AM ) The Rat  
"HIS CURIOSITY [WAS] PIQUED BY THE CRONUT'S EXPLOSIVE POPULARITY, A PROFESSIONAL DESIRE TO UNDERSTAND THE BAKING PROCESS BEHIND IT AND HIS WIFE'S HUNGER FOR ONE." Shades of the opening of "Rapunzel"? Mille-Feuille Owner Olivier Dessyn Takes a Bite of Cronutmania.

[Ansel] seems more charmed by the social dynamics of the early morning line outside his door—"The second day, we had 50 people waiting outside and sold out in 20 minutes," he said. "The third day I couldn't see the end of the line"—than to have any desire to capitalize on his cronut fame by licensing mugs, posters, perfume or men's wear, even though he has trademarked the name.

For example, there was the man who wanted to present his fiancée an engagement ring inside a cronut. Unfortunately, they'd sold out by the time he reached the front of the line. "He came back the next day," Mr. Ansel marveled. "He was first in line. He delayed his proposal because he wanted to get a cronut."

Then there was the 89-year-old man who celebrated his 60-year-old son's birthday with his son while waiting on line. "He said he didn't remember having such a good time with his son for the last 55 years of his life," Mr. Ansel reported. "He reconnected with him. They were much closer after the cronut"...

# Posted by The Rat @ 12:21 AM



Saturday, July 13, 2013
      ( 11:15 PM ) The Rat  
HOW TO WASH YOUR HAIR IN SPACE.

# Posted by The Rat @ 11:15 PM



Wednesday, July 10, 2013
      ( 1:32 AM ) The Rat  
THE DISPOSABLE MAN: A WESTERN HISTORY OF SHERPAS ON EVEREST.

Still, Western outfitters, guides, and their clients rarely witness the true fallout from a Sherpa death. In October 2010, when Chhewang Nima died, Melissa Arnot had to confront the realities firsthand. After searching for his body by air, Arnot and Nima Gyalzen helicoptered directly to Chhewang's village of Thamo, landing in a potato patch behind the Tashi Delek, a small teahouse and guest lodge Chhewang had built with his earnings. By then, news had already reached the family.

"From outside I could hear the wailing," recalls Arnot. "Like nothing I'd ever heard." She entered the teahouse and found Chhewang's widow, Lhamu Chhiki, and her boys, Ang Gyaltzen and Lhakpa Tenzing, then 14 and 12, in the kitchen. "I got on my knees in front of her and said I'm sorry. And a lama came and took me out of there and said, 'You can't be in here now, you have to go.'"

The scene Arnot was witnessing is one that has been repeated throughout the Himalayas since 1895, the year a British expedition first hired two locals to help them attempt Pakistan's 26,660-foot Nanga Parbat. Both died on the mountain. Twenty-seven years later, during George Mallory's 1922 assault on Everest, an avalanche tore through a rope team and killed seven Sherpas. In 1935, Everest pioneer Tenzing Norgay secured his first portering job in large part because six of the most experienced Sherpas had died the previous year on Nanga Parbat. In those early years of exploration, casualties were accepted as an unfortunate price of conquest. The question is whether, in 2013, the summit of Everest is still worth this kind of banal and predictable human sacrifice.

In the past decade, Everest has been transformed into a tourist attraction, the cornerstone of Nepal's $370-million-a-year adventure-travel industry. Thanks to explosive growth in commercial guiding, the more than 300 paid clients who arrive each spring to attempt the Southeast Ridge route can mitigate their own risk by having Sherpas do the most dangerous labor for them. But little has changed for the workforce. The families of the men killed on the Mallory expedition in 1922 were eventually given 250 rupees each, a payout that, adjusted for inflation, is in line with the standard $4,600 insurance claims Sherpas receive today...

# Posted by The Rat @ 1:32 AM


      ( 1:11 AM ) The Rat  
HALF SADDLE. That is all.

# Posted by The Rat @ 1:11 AM



Tuesday, July 09, 2013
      ( 6:31 PM ) The Rat  
"THAT WAS NEVER A COMEDY FOR ME." Dustin Hoffman on Tootsie, indirectly via MR.

When we got to that point, and looked at it onscreen—I was shocked that I wasn't more attractive. And I said, Now you have me looking like a woman—now make me a beautiful woman. Because I thought I should be beautiful—I—if I was going to be a woman... I would want to be as beautiful as possible. And they said to me, 'That's as—good as it gets. Uh... that's—as beautiful as we can get you, Charlie.' And it was at that moment that I had an epiphany. And i went home and started crying, talking to my wife, and I said, I have to make this picture, and she said, 'Why?' And I said, 'Because I think I'm an interesting woman, when I look at myself onscreen—and I know that if I met myself at a party, I would never talk to that character, because she doesn't fulfill, physically, the demands that we're brought up to think we have—that women have to have in order for us to ask them out'...


# Posted by The Rat @ 6:31 PM


      ( 10:10 AM ) The Rat  
CRUMPLER'S SOHO STORE is doing one of their Beer for Bags promotions for four days (July 18-21).

# Posted by The Rat @ 10:10 AM


      ( 10:06 AM ) The Rat  
"THE TEAM RECRUITED 117 STUDENTS AND DIVIDED THEM INTO TWO GROUPS: THE PAIN AND THE DEATH GROUP..." People Who Subconsciously Dwell on Death Write Funnier New Yorker Cartoon Captions.

# Posted by The Rat @ 10:06 AM


      ( 9:45 AM ) The Rat  
13 ADORABLE PHOTOS OF BABY ANIMALS, BUT WITH EACH CLICK, ANOTHER APPENDAGE WILL BE CUT OFF OUR FINANCE DIRECTOR'S BODY, via the Onion.

# Posted by The Rat @ 9:45 AM



Monday, July 08, 2013
      ( 7:50 AM ) The Rat  
What makes New York so dreadful, I believe, is mainly the fact that the vast majority of its people have been forced to rid themselves of one of the oldest and most powerful of human instincts—the instinct to make a permanent home.
—Mencken

# Posted by The Rat @ 7:50 AM



Sunday, July 07, 2013
      ( 4:36 PM ) The Rat  
WHY PIANO COMPETITIONS WILL NEVER YIELD A SUPERSTAR, via TT.

# Posted by The Rat @ 4:36 PM


      ( 4:31 PM ) The Rat  
"PEOPLE ARE THRILLED THAT YOU SHOWED UP, BUT NO ONE REALLY CARES THAT YOU'RE LEAVING." Heh!

# Posted by The Rat @ 4:31 PM




A page I'm starting to get the overlords at EveTushnet.com to stop $#@! bugging me


06/01/2002 - 07/01/2002
07/01/2002 - 08/01/2002
08/01/2002 - 09/01/2002
09/01/2002 - 10/01/2002
10/01/2002 - 11/01/2002
11/01/2002 - 12/01/2002
12/01/2002 - 01/01/2003
01/01/2003 - 02/01/2003
02/01/2003 - 03/01/2003
03/01/2003 - 04/01/2003
04/01/2003 - 05/01/2003
05/01/2003 - 06/01/2003
06/01/2003 - 07/01/2003
07/01/2003 - 08/01/2003
08/01/2003 - 09/01/2003
10/01/2003 - 11/01/2003
11/01/2003 - 12/01/2003
12/01/2003 - 01/01/2004
01/01/2004 - 02/01/2004
02/01/2004 - 03/01/2004
03/01/2004 - 04/01/2004
04/01/2004 - 05/01/2004
05/01/2004 - 06/01/2004
06/01/2004 - 07/01/2004
07/01/2004 - 08/01/2004
08/01/2004 - 09/01/2004
09/01/2004 - 10/01/2004
10/01/2004 - 11/01/2004
11/01/2004 - 12/01/2004
12/01/2004 - 01/01/2005
01/01/2005 - 02/01/2005
02/01/2005 - 03/01/2005
03/01/2005 - 04/01/2005
04/01/2005 - 05/01/2005
05/01/2005 - 06/01/2005
06/01/2005 - 07/01/2005
07/01/2005 - 08/01/2005
08/01/2005 - 09/01/2005
09/01/2005 - 10/01/2005
10/01/2005 - 11/01/2005
11/01/2005 - 12/01/2005
12/01/2005 - 01/01/2006
01/01/2006 - 02/01/2006
02/01/2006 - 03/01/2006
03/01/2006 - 04/01/2006
04/01/2006 - 05/01/2006
05/01/2006 - 06/01/2006
06/01/2006 - 07/01/2006
07/01/2006 - 08/01/2006
08/01/2006 - 09/01/2006
09/01/2006 - 10/01/2006
10/01/2006 - 11/01/2006
11/01/2006 - 12/01/2006
12/01/2006 - 01/01/2007
01/01/2007 - 02/01/2007
02/01/2007 - 03/01/2007
03/01/2007 - 04/01/2007
04/01/2007 - 05/01/2007
05/01/2007 - 06/01/2007
06/01/2007 - 07/01/2007
07/01/2007 - 08/01/2007
08/01/2007 - 09/01/2007
09/01/2007 - 10/01/2007
10/01/2007 - 11/01/2007
11/01/2007 - 12/01/2007
12/01/2007 - 01/01/2008
01/01/2008 - 02/01/2008
02/01/2008 - 03/01/2008
03/01/2008 - 04/01/2008
04/01/2008 - 05/01/2008
05/01/2008 - 06/01/2008
06/01/2008 - 07/01/2008
07/01/2008 - 08/01/2008
08/01/2008 - 09/01/2008
09/01/2008 - 10/01/2008
10/01/2008 - 11/01/2008
11/01/2008 - 12/01/2008
12/01/2008 - 01/01/2009
01/01/2009 - 02/01/2009
02/01/2009 - 03/01/2009
03/01/2009 - 04/01/2009
04/01/2009 - 05/01/2009
05/01/2009 - 06/01/2009
06/01/2009 - 07/01/2009
07/01/2009 - 08/01/2009
11/01/2009 - 12/01/2009
12/01/2009 - 01/01/2010
01/01/2010 - 02/01/2010
02/01/2010 - 03/01/2010
03/01/2010 - 04/01/2010
04/01/2010 - 05/01/2010
05/01/2010 - 06/01/2010
06/01/2010 - 07/01/2010
07/01/2010 - 08/01/2010
08/01/2010 - 09/01/2010
09/01/2010 - 10/01/2010
10/01/2010 - 11/01/2010
11/01/2010 - 12/01/2010
12/01/2010 - 01/01/2011
01/01/2011 - 02/01/2011
02/01/2011 - 03/01/2011
03/01/2011 - 04/01/2011
04/01/2011 - 05/01/2011
05/01/2011 - 06/01/2011
06/01/2011 - 07/01/2011
07/01/2011 - 08/01/2011
08/01/2011 - 09/01/2011
09/01/2011 - 10/01/2011
10/01/2011 - 11/01/2011
11/01/2011 - 12/01/2011
12/01/2011 - 01/01/2012
01/01/2012 - 02/01/2012
02/01/2012 - 03/01/2012
03/01/2012 - 04/01/2012
04/01/2012 - 05/01/2012
05/01/2012 - 06/01/2012
06/01/2012 - 07/01/2012
07/01/2012 - 08/01/2012
08/01/2012 - 09/01/2012
09/01/2012 - 10/01/2012
10/01/2012 - 11/01/2012
11/01/2012 - 12/01/2012
12/01/2012 - 01/01/2013
01/01/2013 - 02/01/2013
02/01/2013 - 03/01/2013
03/01/2013 - 04/01/2013
04/01/2013 - 05/01/2013
05/01/2013 - 06/01/2013
06/01/2013 - 07/01/2013
07/01/2013 - 08/01/2013
08/01/2013 - 09/01/2013
09/01/2013 - 10/01/2013
10/01/2013 - 11/01/2013
12/01/2013 - 01/01/2014
01/01/2014 - 02/01/2014
02/01/2014 - 03/01/2014
05/01/2014 - 06/01/2014

Bookfinder.com
Pandora.com
Encyclopedia of Life
Shakespeare Search Engine
World Time Clock
XE.com
ReliefWeb
Airport Mileage Calculator
Mileage Mall
ResponsibleTravel.com

60 Second Idea
SYSKPodcast on Twitter
Two Gomers
Runkeeper
Map My Run
PostSecret
1,000 Awesome Things
Cracked
Theodore Dalrymple
Met Live Stream
Londonist
London Panoramas
Why Travel to France
Manolo's Shoe Blog
Daily Puppy
Miss Manners
Jess+TheMess
Ramit
Sandwich Mondays
Consumerist
Cradle to Cradle
A Daily Dose of Architecture
Astronomy Picture of the Day
Strange Maps
About Last Night
Paula Poundstone
The Daily Mirror
Classic Bloom County
Better Book Titles
Piled Higher and Deeper
Nietzsche Family Circus

Mail




Powered by Blogger