Odds + Ends

Pixar’s “Up” House Replica Draws Visitors to Utah

Up House © Cea. The city of Herriman, a suburban of Salt Lake City, has seen a surge in tourists since its replica of the house in the Pixar movie “Up” opened to the public. The multi-colored house is belongs to Beangerter Homes, and since it opened this summer, an estimated 27,000 visitors have come [...]

Locked in a Vegas Hotel Room with an Ultra-High Speed Video Camera

Videographer Tom Giulmette recently flew to Las Vegas to film a ping pong tournament, which requires a specialized camera to adequately capture the action. While trapped in his hotel room with nothing but a Phantom Flex ultra-high speed video camera (capable of recording at 2,564 frames per second!) and way too much time on his [...]

Clever, Lovely Typographic Maps

Axis Maps has release a new mapping/art project called Typographic Maps. Created as a labor of love, these unique maps accurately depict the streets and highways, parks, neighborhoods, coastlines, and physical features of the city using nothing but type. Only by manually weaving together thousands upon thousands of carefully placed words does the full picture [...]

Timelapse of December Blizzard [Video]

December 2010 Blizzard Timelapse on Vimeo on Vimeo

Google Maps Captures Plane in Flight Over Chicago

What happens when a plane flies through a Google Maps satellite photo? TheAtlantic.com has the answer: See for yourself. Geekosystem.com notes that “the rainbow effect could have been caused by a satellite imaging process that consisted of “several colored exposures [taken] over a few seconds and then combined”; failing that, unicorn magic.”

Show Your Teddy Bear a Good Time in Paris for Only $140

A Bear About Town © Lisa Omarali From the “Does this even require comment?” file, comes this interesting news story. A retired French man is offering to show your teddy bears and other stuffed loved ones a night on the town in Paris for the low, low price of just $140: Here’s how it works: [...]

Airtoons: Fun With Airline Safety Cards (and Other Silly Illustrations)

I think we can all agree that the illustrations on airline safety cards could benefit from a bit of sarcasm in the form of snarky one-liners (a la Mystery Science Theater 3000). Airtoons.com seeks to remedy that: Check out dozens more at Airtoons.com.

BAD POSTCARDS Catalogs the World’s Worst Postcards

Tumblr blog BAD POSTCARDS catalogs, you guessed it, some of the worst postcards ever created. There doesn’t seem to be any shortage of fantastically horrid examples. A few of my favorite gems: … and my personal favorite: Whoo-boy. Check out more fine examples at BAD POSTCARDS.

Introducing: World’s Most Socially Networked Tree … And It’s Please to Meet You

A 100-year old tree on the outskirts of Brussels is likely (could there be a contender?) the world’s most talkative, most socially networked tree. All thanks to EOS magazine, who decided to hook it up to: … a fine dust meter, ozone meter, light meter, weatherstation, webcam and microphone. This equipment constantly measures the tree’s [...]

Why It’s Easier to Stay Fat, Stupid and Untraveled

Turner Wright discusses why, with all our modern conveniences, merely living out our daily lives has become antithetical to the vagabond mindset.

Introducing: BackpackersGoneWild.com, The World’s First and Only Backpacker Porn Website

It’s been more than 18 months in the making. After thousands of man hours and nearly a quarter million dollars in venture capital, it’s finally here. Today, we’re announcing the launch of our boldest, most audacious venture to date. Introducing BackpackersGoneWild.com: the world first and only site dedicated exclusively to hot, sexy backpacker-only action. With [...]

Hilarious Take on Flying, Air Travel and Other Ridiculous Airline “Stuff” [Video]

This 8-minute clip from Brian Regan’s I Walked on the Moon is absolutely hilarious. You can check out the whole video at Brian’s store. Trust me, it’s worth every penny of the $15 price tag.

Introducing: The ‘Reswizzle My Travel Blog!’ Twitter Contest

We’ve launched our most ambitious Twitter giveaway ever. Introducing the Reswizzle My Travel Blog! contest. The contest is open now and crazy simple to enter: Follow @Vagabondish on Twitter Retweet: “Just entered to win an amazing redesign of my #travel blog! Follow @Vagabondish and RT to win http://bit.ly/reswizzle“ That’s it! If you’re tired of blog [...]

Brits Respond to Record Cold Snap With … Mass Infidelity?

© NASA/GSFC, MODIS Rapid Response via BBC As you may or may not have heard, the UK has reverted to the Ice Age. No kidding. Nature has gone so far as to re-evolve woolly mammoths and unleash them across London, just so something will wander around outdoors. That’s a fact. You can look it up. [...]

Yuppies Now Ruining Nature Too

© Scott Ableman / Flickr This post has been percolating for a while. But every time we started writing we got that numb feeling in our arms, the one that our therapist calls “Count To 10 Time.” Since it only takes 7 seconds for a double shot of vodka to hit the brain, by “10″ [...]

Vagabondish Citizen Of The Week, Post-Holiday New Year Edition

© Alan Pennington / Wiki Commons We’ve got a ton of stuff to clean out from the break – wait until you hear about the Chinese solution to stereotypical-but-not-really woman drivers – but in the meantime we’ve reached the end of another week. That means it’s time for your weekly injection of self-esteem, where the [...]

Augmented Reality Advertising Pretty Much Here To Stay

© Via Mashable We push Augmented Reality stories on you for the same reason we periodically post soccer stories. There are certain things that are so important – or will become so important – that it’s veritably our responsibility to keep you abreast on developments. When it comes to updates on The Beautiful Game, it’s [...]

Finally: British Scientists Create Hangover-Free Alcohol

© Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec Last time it was alcohol distilled into a pill. That was pretty neat – better than pretty neat, actually – but it still left the possibility of taking one or two or seven too many pills and waking up with a vicious hangover. Ostensibly the pill was supposed to help drinkers [...]

Vagabondish Citizen Of The Week, All Santa Edition

© Carpetblogger As we ease our way into the holiday season – after this post we won’t see each other again until 2010 – we thought it’d be appropriate to leave you with some cheery Christmas-related optimism. Unfortunately we read “stories” about “other people,” and so all we’ve got to offer is gnawing depression interrupted [...]

Confirmed: Kids Licking Frozen Flagpoles Is Still Pretty Funny

© NontrivialMatt / Flickr There are occasions when what’s called for is a careful explication of different argumentative angles, whether they be multiculturalism vs. individual values or public health vs. private rights or something similarly intractable. Those are in the context of controversies without easy solutions – the best we can hope for by the [...]

Vagabondish Citizen Of The Week, Ill-Advised Requests For Law Enforcement Edition

© Datrio It’s raining on both coasts and freezing everywhere else in the US, so naturally we’re all in search of a little pick-me-up. After reading the conclusions of our weekly contest you’ll be able to think to yourself “sure it’s so cold that I’ve been unable to have a complete thought in the last [...]

Not Smart: Humanity Now Creating Sword-Wielding Ninja Robots [Video]

© plasticpals1 We’re not sure that this is exactly the best way to assure the continued health and vitality of our species. There’s an argument to be made that we’ll need such Korean martial arts robots to protect us from the 500 lbs robots that Japanese scientists are creating – and we couldn’t make this [...]

Finally: Russian Scientists Create Vodka Pills

© RedAndr The reputation of Science has taken a few hits in recent months. Evolutionary biologists thought they had nailed down the missing link. “Not even close.” Three weeks ago climatologists were at the forefront of “settled science.” Now they’re embroiled in “the greatest scandal in modern science.” And things have gotten so bad in [...]

Detroit Woman Expresses Displeasure At Breakup Via Explosives, Aerosol Tear Gas

© Darwin Bell There was a Carrie Underwood special on FOX last night, which (a) preempted House, providing yet more evidence that civilization is over and (b) gives us a very weak peg for this story about the worst breakup ever. Or the best breakup ever, depending on where you fall on the “maybe next [...]

Vagabondish Citizen Of The Week, Bank Heist Supervillians Edition

© Jonathunder It’s that time of the week, when the line “eh – might as well start the weekend early” gives way to our vodka-assisted roundup of recent and particularly stupid fellow citizens. This week we’ve got a group of four entrepreneurs who tried to take shortcuts on their way to fame and fortune. In [...]

Fascinating Differences in International Cash Counting [Video]

© AMagill At least some of these demonstrations, especially the Asia-related ones, were confirmed by commenters on Boing Boing. We’ll also testify to having seen the Middle Eastern example once or twice. And the underlying message – that there are regional variations in how people handle paper money – is undeniably true and kind of [...]

76 Year Old Guy Scales Everest, Notes It Was Pretty Easy Actually

© r hyland Posted partly as inspiration – “see kids, you can accomplish anything if you put your mind to it” – but mostly as a reminder that we need to take a lot less pride in successfully acquiring Diet Coke every weekend. We feel a little bad for the 75 year old Japanese guy [...]

Greatest Rock Video of All Time Hits YouTube, Just in Time for Thanksgiving

A feel-good experience – destined to instantly go viral – to ease you into our impending, collective food coma. One-half rock ballad, one-half nostalgia brilliance, and 100% undiluted awesome, may we present the only cover of Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody ever to come close to the genius of the original. Begging the immediate and probably irresolvable [...]

Popular Hong Kong Theme Restaurant Lets You Lick Food Out of Toilets! Yum! [Video]

© Aliciay98 For reasons we’ll get into below, we’re kind of torn about this newest Hong Kong hipster sensation. Suffice to say that Japan’s status as “creator of the world’s weirdest stuff” is in jeopardy. How deep is it in jeopardy? Very: A restaurant chain where food is served up in mini toilets has proved [...]

War on Fun Goes Airborne With “No Drinking On Flights” Campaign

© Mr. Greenjeans Christopher Elliott, ombudsman for National Geographic Traveler magazine, is indignant. He knows someone who knows someone who was on a flight this one time and there were other people on the flight and those other people were having fun and – oh! – it was all so annoying. This anecdote proves to [...]

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