Ghost writing for fun and profit. via I'm a hired gun, a doctor of everything, an academic mercenary. My customers are your students. I promise you that.

The Schola Armaturarum Juventus Pompeiani has collapsed. Reported to be not thought at risk of falling, it is being linked to a broader neglect of monuments across italy.

How cats drink. (includes mention of the Froude number).

Hgiyiyi.

Millimetres matter - 2007 ad for Samsung features various insects and bugs and arachnids getting pied. Recipes included. via

Holy Lit Up Toledo! Fifty photographers got together to take a night time shot of Toledo, with the dark areas of the city lit up using hand held flashes. via

There is an Uncanny Valley - and this virtual Japanese pop star lives there.

White hole model - now includes kitchen sink. (The actual model uses silicone oil and a steel plate. I think the photos are neat.)

High on a dam sat a lonely goat herder

Interview with the curator of the Vatican Meteorite Collection. The Pope has a meteorite collection. *blink*

I love this sort of thing - and I think I'm in the target demographic for that SEO optimising image.

Contrastive reduplication - Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.

Inside a research proposal review committee - yet more great reasons I left the university career *cough cough* ahem...track.

The post that catalysed it all has been deleted from its original home, but was captured from Google cache. But the result is worth a look - a wide ranging discussion on how it is possible to make 9 times the US median income, and not feel rich. more inside

The Atlantic is getting bigger - for hurricanes that is. And this is only the second recorded time (the other was in 1926, for 6 hours) that there are two simultaneous Category 4 storms.via

Now this is underhanded viral catnip IKEA releases 100 cats inside one of its UK stores.

Top New Zealand scientist quits - didn't actually know the "Cool Runnings" guys. Or was an ex-Marine, apparently. Also, China's top UN diplomat apparently got good and plastered recently and then admitted that he didn't like Americans. Or his boss. more inside

Beneath Gunung Mulu National Park.

Illuminated by galactic starlight

Coming into spring here so antihistamines on standby. A gallery of pollen images from here. (First link is to the Telegraph; URL exceeded 140 character limit)