Patrick Kennedy

A Pile of Rambunctious Puppies Play With Ice Cubes, Getting Ice Stuck in Their Fur and Falling Asleep on a Bed of Ice

The Spaceprob.es site tracks the active probes in operation in and around our solar system, from Voyager I (19.56 billion km from Earth) to the Artemis probes (358,000 km away). (via @BadAstronomer)

Tags: astronomy   science   space

A recent paper by three climate scientists concludes there's a high risk of an unprecedented drought in the Southwest and Midwest United States later this century, even if we manage to get our carbon emissions under control. The scientists say it'll be drier in the Western US than at any point in the past 1000 years.

In the Southwest and Central Plains of Western North America, climate change is expected to increase drought severity in the coming decades. These regions nevertheless experienced extended Medieval-era droughts that were more persistent than any historical event, providing crucial targets in the paleoclimate record for benchmarking the severity of future drought risks. We use an empirical drought reconstruction and three soil moisture metrics from 17 state-of-the-art general circulation models to show that these models project significantly drier conditions in the later half of the 21st century compared to the 20th century and earlier paleoclimatic intervals. This desiccation is consistent across most of the models and moisture balance variables, indicating a coherent and robust drying response to warming despite the diversity of models and metrics analyzed. Notably, future drought risk will likely exceed even the driest centuries of the Medieval Climate Anomaly (1100-1300 CE) in both moderate (RCP 4.5) and high (RCP 8.5) future emissions scenarios, leading to unprecedented drought conditions during the last millennium.

Eric Holthaus has the layperson's explanation of the study and its implications.

Smerdon's study is the first to examine the future risk of "megadrought" in the southwest and central United States in the context of historical episodes of drought in the same regions. Smerdon's study suggests that the coming years are likely to see droughts worse than the epic dry periods that are thought to have caused profound changes to human settlement in the region over the last millennium.

"They're 'mega' because they are droughts that lasted in these regions for multiple decades," said Smerdon in an interview with Slate. "We haven't seen anything like this since at least the 1400s." In comparison, the current California drought is four years old, though drought has been present in most of the last 15 years somewhere in the West.

Update: This NASA video provides a quick overview of this study and what it means for our climate.

Tags: Eric Holthaus   global warming   science   USA

The Front of a Jeep Creates an Accidental Freestanding Ice Sculpture in North Carolina

A Curious Crow Checks Out the Webcam at the New Levi’s Stadium, Home of the San Francisco 49ers

A Gorgeous Vintage 1956 Kitchen With Original GE Appliances That Has Gone Untouched for Half a Century

Facebook Legacy Contact, A Feature That Turns Over an Account to a Loved One When a User Has Passed

Riley Cooper, you might remember, did this . It was a whole big thing, and not even that long ago! Whatever company the Eagles contracted to make their official 2015 team calendar either didn't remember, or thought it was more prudent to try to get Cooper's appearance over with in the shortest month.

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A collection of weekly bus passes from Milwaukee, WI. Years covered are 1930-1979. Was there a new design every single week? (via @slowernet)

Tags: design

I'm so sick of Big Automotive hiding the truth  

Great idea, even better execution. David Lynch wishes he could make some shit like this.

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‘Descension’, A Mesmerizing Indoor Whirlpool Installation by Anish Kapoor

photo: Dave Chappelle @ Knit last month (by Ray Kump, via Knit Twitter)

Dave Chappelle will be playing five shows over four nights at Gramercy Theatre on February 12, 14, 15 and 16 (two shows on the 16th). Tickets go on sale at 5 PM today (2/10), and the schedule looks like this:

Show Date: Thursday, February 12th
Doors: 10:00 PM
Showtime: 11:00 PM

Show Date: Saturday, February 14th (late Friday / early Saturday)
Doors: 1:00 AM
Showtime: 1:30 AM

Show Date: Sunday, February 15th (late Saturday / early Sunday)
Doors: 12:00 AM
Showtime: 12:30 AM

Show Date: Monday, February 16th
Doors: 7:00 PM
Showtime: 8:00 PM

Show Date: Monday, February 16th
Doors: 10:00 PM
Showtime: 10:30 PM

These shows are significantly smaller than his last multi-night NYC run which was at Radio City, though they're not as small as the surprise show he did at Knitting Factory on January 18. That Knit show was during what up until recently was Hannibal Buress's weekly free show at the Brooklyn venue. But as the NY Times points out in a big article today, Hannibal has evolved "From Cult Star to Showman." He is busy playing headline shows at BAM, touring and being a cast member on Comedy Central's Broad City, and so Knitting Factory comedy shows go on without him.

New regulars Will Miles, Clark Jones and Kenny DeForest keep Comedy Night at The Knit alive every Sunday though. Maybe Hannibal will be a special guest at his own old show one of these days too. You never know when Chappelle might pop in again either.

Continue reading "Dave Chappelle announces five Gramercy Theatre shows; Comedy Night at The Knit continues without Hannibal Buress" at brooklynvegan

If you take the vocals from The Perfect Drug by Nine Inch Nails and match them to the beats from Taylor Swift's Shake It Off, you get this little bit of magic:

Update: I totally forgot I'd previously featured this awesomeness: NIN's Head Like a Hole vs. Carly Rae Jepsen's Call Me Maybe. Also of note: Mark Romanek directed the videos for Shake It Off and The Perfect Drug. (via ★interesting, @sarahmakespics, and mark)

Tags: music   Nine Inch Nails   remix   Taylor Swift   video

the To Kill A Mockingbird prequel is being released under very shady circumstances  

If you've ever noticed most ski trail maps look kinda the same, the reason is many of them have been painted by a single individual: James Niehues.

Each view is hand painted by brush and airbrush using opaque watercolor to capture the detail and variations of nature's beauty. In many instances, distortions are necessary to bring everything into a single view. The trick is to do this without the viewer realizing that anything has been altered from the actual perspective.

Here's a selection of his work:

Tags: art   design   James Niehues   skiing   sports

How to Build an Alarm Clock That Plays the Audio From the Beloved Comedy Film ‘Groundhog Day’

Fans and friends banded together in the past few weeks to raise money to care for Meier.

Legendary pizza delivery guy Bill Meier passed away this weekend. Meier, who was in his early 50's, was delivering pizzas for Williamsburg's Best Pizza on his bike regularly until he became sick and was hospitalized last month. Fans and friends, more than a 1000 of whom joined "Let's Help Bill Meier" on Facebook, hosted an auction and set up a donation page to help pay for his medical bills.

Meier shared some of his favorite delivery stories with Eater a couple years back. Check it out.

Conan had Rob Gronkowsi and Marshawn Lynch on his show to play the yet-to-be-released Mortal Kombat X, and there was really no way the premise couldn't deliver. Come for the discussion about Mario Kart characters, and stay for Marshawn Lynch teaching Conan how to properly taunt the opposition by grabbing your nuts. Also, the necrophilia jokes!

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Millions of Tiny Red Crabs Blanket the Ground as They Migrate En Masse on Christmas Island, Australia

Bioluminescent Plankton Illuminate the Waters Off Hong Kong

I’m really into this new art print by Pennsylvania artist Ryan Lynn. “The Best and Brightest” is a 12″ x 18″ screenprint, has an edition of 27, and costs $20. Visit RyanLynnDesign.com.

The post “The Best and Brightest” Art Print by Ryan Lynn appeared first on OMG Posters!.

The ‘Stock Photobomber’ Hilariously Inserts Himself Into Stock Photos