*Quixotic Squirrel*

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I just filmed a video “Squirrel 1” @ Hovde Hall of Administration (HOVD) on #viddy

Filed under viddy

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archiemcphee:

“On April 1, 1957 the British news show Panorama broadcast a three-minute segment about a bumper spaghetti harvest in southern Switzerland. The success of the crop was attributed both to an unusually mild winter and to the “virtual disappearance of the spaghetti weevil.” The audience heard Richard Dimbleby, the show’s highly respected anchor, discussing the details of the spaghetti crop as they watched video footage of a Swiss family pulling pasta off spaghetti trees and placing it into baskets. The segment concluded with the assurance that, “For those who love this dish, there’s nothing like real, home-grown spaghetti.”

The Swiss Spaghetti Harvest hoax generated an enormous response. Hundreds of people phoned the BBC wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti tree. To this query the BBC diplomatically replied, “Place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best.” 

To this day the Panorama broadcast remains one of the most famous and popular April Fool’s Day hoaxes of all time. It is also believed to be the first time the medium of television was used to stage an April Fool’s Day hoax.”

Watch video of the original BBC broadcast here!

Read more about The Swiss Spaghetti Harvest over at The Museum of Hoaxes.

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criminalwisdom: BOOKS OF HUMAN FLESH: THE HISTORY BEHIND ANTHROPODERMIC BIBLIOPEGY Amongst a collection of medical oddities housed at the Surgeons’ Hall Museum in Edinburgh lies a tattered pocketbook [left], no longer than the length of a man’s hand. It is dark brown—nearly black—with a pebbled texture and gold lettering that has begun to fade with age. To the untrained eye, it is altogether unremarkable in its appearance. However, upon closer inspection, the words ‘EXECUTED 28 JAN 1829’ and ‘BURKE’S SKIN POCKET BOOK’ come into focus, revealing the item’s true origins. This is a book bound in the flesh of William Burke, the notorious murderer. Between 1827 and 1828, Burke and his accomplice, William Hare, drugged and killed 16 people for the sole purpose of selling their bodies to the anatomist, Dr Robert Knox. During their murder trial, Hare turned King’s Evidence in exchange for immunity. Burke was eventually found guilty of the murders and hanged before [ironically] being dissected in Edinburgh Medical College. Previously: William Burke’s Brain

criminalwisdom:

BOOKS OF HUMAN FLESH: THE HISTORY BEHIND ANTHROPODERMIC BIBLIOPEGY

Amongst a collection of medical oddities housed at the Surgeons’ Hall Museum in Edinburgh lies a tattered pocketbook [left], no longer than the length of a man’s hand. It is dark brown—nearly black—with a pebbled texture and gold lettering that has begun to fade with age. To the untrained eye, it is altogether unremarkable in its appearance. However, upon closer inspection, the words ‘EXECUTED 28 JAN 1829’ and ‘BURKE’S SKIN POCKET BOOK’ come into focus, revealing the item’s true origins.

This is a book bound in the flesh of William Burke, the notorious murderer. Between 1827 and 1828, Burke and his accomplice, William Hare, drugged and killed 16 people for the sole purpose of selling their bodies to the anatomist, Dr Robert Knox. During their murder trial, Hare turned King’s Evidence in exchange for immunity. Burke was eventually found guilty of the murders and hanged before [ironically] being dissected in Edinburgh Medical College.

Previously: William Burke’s Brain

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vicemag:

SOFEX WAS SO-SO -

EXPERIENCING THE MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX’S TRADE SHOW

By Shane Smith

“You know, it’s weird, man. It’s like everybody’s real cordial with each other. But, at the end of the day, we’re, like, buying weapons to destroy each other. I don’t want to, like, sound liberal or anything. But it’s really not glamorous. This shit fucking kills people.” Shockingly, the guy who said this wasn’t some antiwar hippie who had just dropped acid. He was a 6’4” Marine Corps Force Recon sergeant who had recently returned from two tours in Afghanistan. We were both attendees at the 2010 Special Operations Force Exhibition (SOFEX) in Jordan. His booming reaction was prompted by the trade-show floor—a sea of displays and kiosks from weapons companies hawking missiles, machine guns, tanks, and bombs like they were next year’s luxury sedans. Even more unsettling, the expo’s biggest sponsor was the USA.

On arriving at SOFEX, I was reminded of when I was a punk kid and it was fashionable to say things like, “The military-industrial complex is taking over the world.” At the time, I didn’t know what “military-industrial complex” meant, but the conference rapidly provided me with a very literal definition of the term.

Continue

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We Love You - Iran & Israel (by israelovesiran)

Why do we let so few speak for so many? Why do we let so few decide the fate of millions? Why do we let so few lead us into wars that the majority opposes? In America it is supposed to be “we the people.” Why can it not be so for all mankind?

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We know that you highly esteem the kind of learning taught in those Colleges, and that the Maintenance of our young Men, while with you, would be very expensive to you. We are convinc’d, therefore, that you mean to do us Good by your Proposal; and we thank you heartily. But you, who are wise, must know that different Nations have different Conceptions of Things; and you will therefore not take it amiss if our Ideas of this kind of Education happen not to be the same with yours. We have had some Experience of it: Several of our young People were formerly brought up at the Colleges of the Northern Provinces; they were instructed in all your Sciences; but when they came back to us, they were bad Runners, ignorant of every means of living in the Woods, unable to bear either Cold or Hunger, knew neither how to build a Cabin, take a Deer, or kill an Enemy, spoke our Language imperfectly, were therefore neither fit for Hunters, Warriors, or Counsellors; they were totally good for nothing. We are, however, not the less oblig’d by your kind Offer, tho’ we decline accepting it; and, to show our grateful Sense of it, if the Gentlemen of Virginia will send us a Dozen of their Sons, we will take great Care of their Education, instruct them in all we know, and make Men of them.
In June 1744, the College of William & Mary invited the Indians of the Six Nations to send 12 young men to be “properly” educated. This was the reply. (via historical-nonfiction)

(Source: futilitycloset.com, via historical-nonfiction)