What happened to those 1,000 monkeys with 1,000 typewriters? Well, things have turned ugly. more inside

On writing well. At the beginning of his 1946 essay “Politics and the English Language,” George Orwell made clear that he thought the language had become disheveled and decadent. Intending shock, Orwell offered five examples of subliterate prose by known writers. But these selections don’t look as ghastly to us as they did to Orwell, because language is so much worse today.

"To the Person Sitting in Darkness" by Mark Twain. more inside

Don't you put it in your mouth

Photos from the air. Michael Collier takes pictures from his single engine plane. A slideshow from NPR.

The Unofficial Kids Incorporated Show Music/Video Page Warning: This may destroy you. more inside

Boy kills giant boar. [NewsFilter] I don't know what's more amazing: the way this eleven year old has been brought up with a killer's instinct to chase down this pig with a pistol and finish it off point blank, or the sheer size of the beast.

Thunderbird? An elaborate hoax, or a cryptozoologist's dream? Eiter way, the analysis is an interesting read, especially when Darwin is brought into it.

Leonard Cohen, happy at last? A nice little feature from Saturday's Globe. Features a small video of him at home in Montreal, discussing his art.

Sacha Feiner's Alien Costume
Reverse engineering at its most oddly obsessive. Great work here!

Bill Maher on the French. (Some NSFW-type language.)

"Eventually, the universe will appear static," said Krauss. "All evidence of modern cosmology will have disappeared." Physicists Lawrence Krauss from Case Western Reserve University and Robert J. Scherrer from Vanderbilt University predict that trillions of years into the future, the information that currently allows us to understand how the universe expands will have disappeared over the visible horizon. (via slashdot.org) more inside

The King of the Dutar. The Dutar is a two stringed lute found in Central Asia. Meet Abdurehim Heyit. Be sure to notice the track for downloading.

Brel's boat. On February 28th, 1974, Jacques Brel buys the yacht Askoy II, and in July, sails from Antwerp. After some detours, medical and otherwise, he reaches Hiva Oa in November, 1975. After some detours of her own, the Askoy II now rusts away on a New Zealand beach. more inside

Pistol Shrimp! A shrimp with the ability to stun prey via a super laser claw. Or something. (embedded YouTube video) via linkfilter

No more lab monkeys The U.S. National Institutes of Health, which supports a variety of biomedical studies using animals, will stop breeding government-owned chimpanzees for research - a step animal rights advocates lauded on Thursday

"Woman Goes Bananas After Pet Monkey Is Taken"

Shoes. Old shoes. Bespoke shoes. Shoes for cat lovers.

LOLPREZIDENTZ! more inside

SUV Sales are Up. The bigger the guzzler, the better the numbers. Sales of GMC's Yukon XL were up a whopping 72 percent last month, and the totals for its Chevrolet sister, the Suburban, rose 38 percent. Topping off the tank on either one can cost as much as $120. via SUVfilter